Tag: Writing

Posted in 2025, life, thoughts, Writing

A Shopping I Will Go!

Posted on by nancyb422

Where would you go on a shopping spree?

When I think of a “shopping spree”, my thoughts go immediately to all that I don’t need! I don’t need clothes because my size is difficult to shop for and I get discouraged. I don’t need electronic equipment because I have more than I need. My brain no longer works on a “want basis”.

Things for my home! That’s it! I would buy a nice coffee bar, the sectional sofa for the family room that my husband and I have discussed over and over again, and …… hmm, as I look around, I think it would be a quick shopping spree!

I feel content with what I have. I would prefer to take someone else on a shopping spree and let them buy what they want. It would make me happy to do that.

Posted in 2025, Goals, hobbies, Home, leisure time, life, thoughts, Writing

Social Media and Me

Posted on by nancyb422

Ugh. That is how I feel about this relationship.

I am curious which also translates to nosy. This is why once I start scrolling, I can’t stop. Facebook to Instagram to Threads. I hate Threads the most. It’s filled with complaining.

I deleted them all so many times off my devices during the election season. Then my fingers (and my brain) would itch to see what was going and I just had to reinstall them. And then delete them again.

They are unhealthy. But….

I have accounts for our business and I try to keep those full of content and comment on followers accounts.

I want positivity in my life. I don’t want negativity in my life.

One of my goals for 2025 was to “read less what other people and write more of what I want to say”.

Heading off to delete those apps off my IPad again….

I love this picture….
Posted in 2025, family, friends, hikes, hobbies, life, Memories, thoughts, Travel

Looking Back at 2024

Posted on by nancyb422
January 1, 2024

I can forget what I did the day before yesterday.

I really want to be mindful in 2025.

I took a look at my Day Planner for 2024 and my phone calendar and made a list in Notes of What Happened in 2024. I was surprised at all the events from the year. Sometimes in my mind I think “I never do anything!”, but this proved me wrong. There were lunches and dinners out with friends, two trips to New York other than our yearly Christmas shopping spree, and three week long vacations!

I’m looking forward to this new year of adventures!

Posted in 2024, Home, life, photography, Religion, thoughts, Writing

Starting The Day

Posted on by nancyb422

I don’t know about you, but my Sunday into Monday sleep can be a little rough.

Then after waking up, my mind is on every little thing I have to do from now until Christmas.

I drink my coffee and head out the door to workout and as I walk I say, Dear God, help me to slow down and appreciate the moments and I turned the corner and he says,

December 9, 2024

Be present.

Posted in 2024, family, Goals, life, thoughts

Big Business Decisions

Posted on by nancyb422

What positive events have taken place in your life over the past year?

In the past year, we’ve begun the process for our son to purchase our remodeling company. He’s been with us since 2012 and for the last 2 years, has worked in the office estimating and running projects. We’ll start the buyout as the calendar turns to January 2026.

My husband and I have owned the company since 1999. It’s been 25 years of hard work building it from the ground up starting out in our basement to now in an office with nine employees.

When you work for yourselves, you wonder as time passes, “will I be at work until the day I die?” Terrible thing to think of but, it’s your business, not some corporation that you hit retirement age and leave. What option is there other than to find a buyer or close the doors. My husband has retired from the office and I’m starting to work four days a week and come and go a little more freely because I know our son and our client manager have everything under control.

It’s a remarkable feeling to know that our son is incredibly capable of owning the business and he’s already running it. I picture my 3 year old with a plastic hammer in his hand pounding on a piece of sheetrock with dust on his nose and marvel at how accomplished he is today.

Posted in 2024, family, hikes, hobbies, Holidays, leisure time, life, photography, Travel

12/4/2024 Hump Day Photo

Posted on by nancyb422
Salmon River, Moodus, Connecticut

January 1, 2020 was brisk and bright when I set out for the guided first walk of the year with my sister and niece.

Machimoodus State Park was the location and it took us through the woods and towards a view of the Salmon River before it meets up with the Connecticut River in Haddam, Connecticut.

“Machimoodus” is an indigenous term for “place of bad noises” because of noisy rumblings and echos heard by the Pequot, Narragansett, and Mohegan tribes. The sounds were real and in 1981 geologists determined “micro earthquakes” were the cause amplified by a nearby cave!

We didn’t hear any rumblings, but we saw some beautiful scenery and had a brisk hike to start out the new year!

Posted in 2024, life, Memories, thoughts

The Music Of My Life

Posted on by nancyb422

Sitting at my desk, I’m listening to “The Bridge”, a station on Sirius XM. Jackson Browne singing “The Pretender” comes on and I’m immediately transported back to the fall/winter of my junior year of high school in 1976.

It was a very tumultuous time for me. I had a boyfriend through my sophomore year, but we broke up in the waning days of the school year. Aww, poor me! It would have ended here, and I might have gotten over him, but I couldn’t because we continued to see each other. During the day, I would go to his house to swim. His mother was home so it wasn’t anything sneaky. But I’ll bet his friends didn’t know about it!

Silly, naive me thought we had a chance to get back together! But, in public, he had moved on from me with his group of friends, painfully one of them, who it was rumored he liked, had just made the incoming cheerleading squad!

Back to Jackson Browne!

I had moved on by fall. Ha! You obviously don’t know me very well, do you! I hoped he would ask me to Junior Prom, but no luck. Was there a possibility? I’m sure he kept my hopes alive. He went as “a friend” with someone in his group. I lived in the periphery of that group and I went with a boy that someone in that group set me up with! It was complicated with that group. I was friends with almost everyone in it, but not really included.

By prom time, I was dating someone else, that fact is important only to this story.

Christmas came around, and I hinted at and received Jackson Browne’s The Pretender album from the new boyfriend for Christmas. I wanted the album because the song “Here Come Those Tears Again”, reminded me of my old boyfriend!

In hindsight, the relationship with the original sophomore boyfriend was a match made in Hell for so many reasons! Stay tuned….

Here come those tears again
Just when I was getting over you
Just when I was going to make it through
Another night without missing you
Thinking I might just be strong enough after all
When I hear your footsteps echoing in the hall

Baby here we stand again
Where we’ve been so many times before
Even though you looked so sure
As I was watching you walking out my door
But you always walk back in like you did today
Acting like you never even went away
Well I don’t know if I can
Open up and let you in baby
Here come those tears
Here come those tears again

I can hear you telling me
How you needed to be free
And you had some things to work out alone
Now you’re standing here telling me
How you have grown
Here come those tears again
Now you’ll tell me how to hold them in
Here come those tears
Here come those tears again

Some other time baby
When I’m strong and feeling fine maybe
When I can look at you without crying
You might look like a friend of mine
But I don’t know if I can
Open up enough to let you in
Here come those tears
Here come those tears again

Walk away
I’m going back inside and turning out those lights
And I’ll be in the dark but you’ll be out of sight

Posted in 2024, leisure time, life, relaxing, thoughts

Sleep Glorious Sleep

Posted on by nancyb422

Does your sleep pattern change often? Mine drives me crazy sometimes!

I know it’s the weekend because I will sleep through the night and wake up at 6am. But as soon as Sunday night rolls around I wake up at 1am, 3am, and 5am! My alarm goes off at 5:45 and I’m always tempted to get up when I wake up from a doze around 5:30. But I stick it out and wait for the alarm.

I try to figure out if it’s related to something I eat, or don’t eat, at dinner or afterwards. Is the room warm or cool? But there’s no clear answer.

I must get enough sleep because I’m not tired during the day or nodding off in front of the television!

Posted in 2024, family, Holidays, Home, life, thoughts, Writing

(Is it?) The Hap-hapiest Time of The Year

Posted on by nancyb422

The holidays stress me out.

I try to be chill but once we turn the corner from Thanksgiving, I feel like a train is rushing down the track. Am I on it? Or is it heading towards me? I haven’t quite decided.

I have hosted our family Christmas Party for 10 or 15 years always the second or third Saturday in December. Throw in a work party we host on the first Saturday and a trip to New York to shop in whatever week doesn’t contain a party at the end and there’s December, done and dusted.

Gift-giving has slowed down, which is a good thing. My husband and I shop for ourselves in New York, and our son and daughter-in-law usually receive something large during the year. Now it’s gifts for our great niece and nephew and something for the grab bag at the party.

This year’s election has f*cked it up a bit as some people don’t want to be around other people and it’s enough that I try to make everyone feel welcome regularly to now have to worry about who’s ignoring whom and what will they mutter under their breath.

I will be sure I do my daily meditation, get enough sleep and exercise, select my menu, and buy a big bottle of wine for myself and hide it away!

Posted in 2024, hobbies, leisure time, life, Writing

Scrolling, Scrolling, Scrolling….

Posted on by nancyb422

What technology would you be better off without, why?

I have a love/hate relationship with social media.

Social media refers to “the means of interactions among people in which they create, share, and/or exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks”. Maybe that’s what it was intended for, maybe some sites are still for that intended use, but for me, it’s an absolute time waster!

I’ve spent so much time doom scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. Will I miss something if I don’t swipe up one more time? I don’t know! Let’s find out!

On the flip side, I use it for our remodeling business by posting projects we’ve completed to entice people to call us! I try to post often enough so we show up in feeds and cross post on a variety of sites. I’m hoping people keep scrolling until they come across my posts.

I’ve deleted Facebook from my phone and IPad for the tenth time in a couple of months so if I want to check our business account, I access it from my computer and quickly switch accounts. I’m hanging on to Instagram because of family chat and if I have to set a timer I will!