Tag: 2023

Posted in 2023, life, Music, thoughts

A Sunday Rage

Posted on by nancyb422

Yesterday was a strange, strange day.

Was it because I was worried about my niece? Did the Barbie movie I went to on Saturday fire me up? Or, was it the movie bag of Ike & Mikes I ate while watching the movie?

Whatever the case, it was fortunate for us both that my husband went for a motorcycle ride because while I was home alone, I was just in such a mood. Little things set me off like, “I CAN’T BELIEVE HE THREW OUT THE WATER BOTTLE THAT GOES WITH THIS HIKING FANNY PACK THAT I HAVEN’T USED IN FIVE YEARS AND I HAVE A CAMEL BAK THAT HE BOUGHT ME ANYWAY” or “I CAN’T BELIEVE THERE IS NO GROCERY MONEY LEFT IN THE DRAWER WE KEEP THE EXTRA IN BECAUSE I HAVE TO BUY SOME THINGS HE WON’T GO TO WALMART FOR!”

It was insane. Our poor dog who was already roaming the house looking for my husband as he always does, was looking at me like I had lost my mind.

So I took myself out for a nice long walk. I set my Peloton app to record it, I found a Spotify walking playlist (remembering to download it first), put on my work out clothes and just walked for and our on a simple route around town. Boy, did that help!

It cleared my mind, and maybe it got the rest of that sugar from the Ike & Mike’s out of my body. Whatever the case, by the time he got home from his ride, I was feeling like my better self again.

Posted in 2023, family, Memories

Painful Memories

Posted on by nancyb422

Something that happened to my niece recently who lives two time zones away, brought up some emotions in me that have been long buried.

I moved from Connecticut to California in 1987 when I was 27 and five months after my mother died from brain cancer.

In November of 1989, on a Saturday afternoon, I had intense pain in my side and my husband rushed me to the local hospital. It was discovered I was pregnant but bleeding internally somewhere. After an inconclusive ultrasound, I had exploratory surgery and they found it was a ruptured cyst. They stopped the bleeding, said hello to my little fetus, and closed me back up.

All of this was long before the days of cell phones, zoom, FaceTime, social media. And three hours time difference from my family.

I remember my husband calling my father to tell him. I remember asking him to call my boss to tell her I wouldn’t be at work on Monday. I remember talking to my sisters from the hospital.

I don’t know if I wished for my mother at the time but resurrecting these memories, I wish I had her then, even from a distance like my niece has my sister now.

Posted in 2023, family, life, Writing

Family Folklore

Posted on by nancyb422

Where did your name come from?

I have a twin sister and our dad always joked that he wanted to name us Gretchen and Gwendolyn but our mother refused because they were the names of two dogs in the neighborhood!?! We would argue over who might have received which name. Since I’m older and Gretchen was always said first, i claimed that would have been mine. I’m hindsight, Gwendolyn could have been shortened to Gwen and “Gretch”=nope.

So we became Nancy (me) and Gail. It was 1960 and I think mine was a popular name because of Nancy Sinatra. I don’t know where Gail’s name was plucked from. My older sister is Janice. I don’t know where that came from either.

It’s funny because of all our generation of cousins, we are the only three who don’t have a “family name”. No Julia, Elizabeth, etc. and certainly no “catholic/saint names”!

Also, none of us were given middle names. One name was enough we were told. What the heck?

Nancy is ok but for some reason people call me Cathy by mistake. I tell them, “call me whatever you want, just don’t call me late for dinner”. Hahaha

Posted in 2023, life, Writing

It’s A Good Place To Live

Posted on by nancyb422

What do you love about where you live?

I live in a 40,000+ town in Connecticut that was incorporated in 1670. My family has lived here since the mid 1920s. It is very conveniently located between the two major highways running north and south in the state and close to two major cities.

It is a decent sized town (all 169 locations in Connecticut are called towns, and we have counties but we don’t use them like many other states do). Because it is so old (353 years old!), there were many farms that had animals, fruits, and vegetables growing in them and a few still remain.

Ok, I love my town because it is large enough to have box stores, but they don’t dominate the area. We have a great “center of town” with good restaurants, a classic town hall, and new coffee shops, a couple of spas, and a good selection of hair salons.

My town has many activities to gather people together. It has a great Farmers Market in the summer, a weekend festival in October to celebrate the town, and a holiday stroll in early December.

Our town is involved with preserving open space and we have trails for hiking, mountain biking, and fields for soccer, baseball, softball, and courts for tennis and pickleball.

Our public library is one of the best in the state! When I was young it was in a beautiful building built in the early 1900s. When they ran out of room, they built another one a short distance away. When they needed more room in recent years, they added on again! It’s a beautiful, welcoming place with wonderful programs.

The more I talk about my town, the more I realize how much I love it. I left in 1988 to live in California with my new husband. We moved back in 1995 to buy the house I grew up in, to be close to family, and to raise our son in a great environment. I’m so happy we came back!

Posted in 2023, life, Writing

I Am Content

Posted on by nancyb422

What positive emotion do you feel most often?

I had to think about what emotion I feel the most these days and it would have to be contentment. I usually relate everything to our business and my work there and this is no exception! For many years our remodeling business has been consuming because I oversee the operation of it. Clients, financials, and social media – three jobs that can be full time on their own.

Our office assistant of the last 1-1/2 years has taken over all of our customer service from the start of the project pricing phase, right on through to completion and that has given me the chance to BREATHE and really do what I want to do which is social media. Of course, I still have to do the financials and I can’t say I’m 100% gone from the customer aspect but 95% of it. I can now focus on setting up the path for success for our son as he takes over.

That has also given me the opportunity to leave the office before 5, go in after 8:30, take an afternoon off for some spa time and boy, when you can start thinking about yourself – what a world of difference it makes.

It feels good and I am content.

Posted in 2023, Goals, Music, Travel

Renewed Inspiration

Posted on by nancyb422

A conversation with a taxi driver in Lake George NY has prompted me to sit down at my piano and start playing again. Sounds strange right? Here’s how it happened….

We needed a ride from Bolton Landing back to our resort cabin on Friday after we dropped our truck and trailer at the marina. We would spend the day on the lake and then take the boat out of the water to head home on Saturday. We were going to wait for the trolley but given the “well, yeah the schedule says 9am, but you never know”, we got from the gatekeeper at the Sagamore Hotel, we decided to pay the $45 one way. Not the end of the world. It is about a 20 mile ride after all. Next time we’ll definitely find a place to stay that either has a launch or is very close to a marina!

So anyway, we got into the cab, me in the front because my husband wouldn’t be able to hear him anyway (left ear has less hearing than the right!). We started talking, “where you from, trolleys, subways, NYC, travel, California, East Bay and finally, Tower of Power! Evidently he lived in California and saw then in their heyday as did my husband.

We started talking music and instruments and he is a guitar player. He and his friend enjoy playing along to music and recording themselves. He asked if we played any instruments and I said I played the piano but after 5 years of lessons I stopped and I haven’t really found myself playing very much.

He talked about how much he enjoyed playing and how the time went by when he did and how relaxing it was. I realized he was absolutely right! When I sat at the piano, working out a song, or even a section, everything else fell away. I didn’t think of anything going on around me.

When we reached our resort, I thanked him for the conversation and told him he inspired me to start playing the piano again. When I took it up in 2017, it was never to become perfect at it, but to enjoy learning and hearing what I could accomplish. I needed to be reminded and I have a Lake George cab driver to thank for that.

Posted in 2023, life, Writing

Kindness Should Be a Daily Habit

Posted on by nancyb422

Write about a random act of kindness you’ve done for someone.

To me, kindness is something that I try to apply daily in all situations and with all people. The way I talk to people, the tone of my voice, and whether I’m paying attention or have my eyes on my computer monitor while they are talking. It’s like Mother’s Day or my wedding anniversary. I always told me son and husband, “I don’t need the fluff because you two treat me with love all year long”.

Even things like holding a door open for someone at the post office when I’m leaving is something I naturally do. If I see someone coming across the street to the post office with a large package I their arms, I’ll wait and hold the door. They appreciate it and it makes me happy to help.

A random act would be a spur of the moment decision to be kind and I’ve done those as well, but they’re more private to me.

Posted in 2023, family, Religion, Writing

Tradition Abandoned

Posted on by nancyb422

What traditions have you not kept that your parents had?

When I read this question, I knew exactly what my answer was. Perhaps it’s not a “tradition” such as holiday celebrations (still going on!), but something that was done and passed down from grandparents to parents….

Church. I don’t go to church.

I grew up in a strong Catholic family and went to a catholic school from first to eighth grade. We went to church every Sunday for 9:15 mass. Mom, Dad, my 2 sisters and me. It was never a consideration that my sisters or I would go to a catholic high school but I went to a catholic college for my 2 year degree. More so, because the campus in the countryside was so beautiful, not because of the religion!

This is not to say there is no God in my life. I just don’t need to look for him in church. That was a tradition or structure that was passed down from hundreds of years. But so much as changed.

My wise grandmother said something to my aunt back in the 1930s when my aunt a Polak (actually German) was going to marry an Italian. Someone questioned their different churches. My family went to a Polish Catholic Church and he went to a Roman Catholic Church. Gram shut that right down! She said, “that’s a lot of nonsense. God is in every church, not just in our church!”

I’d like to think she’d feel the same way about God being found all around us and not just found in a building. We can experience and talk to Him wherever we are.

Posted in 2023, life, Writing

A Day Like Any Other

Posted on by nancyb422

Was today typical?

Since today was a work day, overall, it was pretty typical!

First thing, I organized “my stuff” into categories – bills/receipts, pre-appointment, proposal done/needs input, signed job/needs input, permit to do/done but did I pay? – and managed to get through most of it.

My energy started to wane around 1:30 as usual but I tried to keep working. It was starts and stops and a fair amount of conversation between me and our office assistant. I usually shut my door so I won’t bother her because I’m usually the one starting a conversation!

Only difference to all my other days is I had to go on an appointment at 3 pm with my husband, the contractor. Which is ok, since I did spend 20 years doing that exact thing. I’ve been spoiled since our son started working in the office and they usually do the appointments together so Cody can do the estimating. But he was unavailable and alas, I was called to step in.

I still managed to leave the office at 4:15 and head home to my non-alcoholic Stella Artois beer and my book under the pergola.

Hubs made dinner which is totally typical!

All in all, a wonderfully typical day!