A Chance Encounter and Car Wash Cards

Decked out in a fancy-ish sundress with heels heading to a 50th birthday party, I had about 10 minutes while the department store wrapped her present to find an awesome card for a stunning and special friend.

I LOVE card shopping and truly enjoy finding the perfect one. It’s almost like an art…being a clever and thoughtful card giver. Almost like being an outstanding present giver, which I like to think I am as well doing much better at giving than receiving.

Ten minutes in a card store + ME = Not long enough!

I was lured into my favorite card store, Papyrus, by a large sign in the window.

“Buy Three, Fourth Free!”

Who am I kidding? It didn’t matter if the cards were on sale or ten dollars each. I needed one in the next few minutes.

And yet… I wasn’t the only one operating on the “Let’s see how close we can cut it” schedule, for an important event, shopping at the very last minute on Sunday of Labor Day weekend. On the same quick pace as me was a smartly dressed guy. 

Seeing him first in the Neiman Marcus ladies department (obviously shopping for a wife or lady-friend), browsing the home gifts area and then, again, behind me at gift-wrap. And guess who showed up next door at the card store all in a hurry?

When the door jingled signaling the arrival of a new customer, I heard a deep voice say “Hello”, in greeting to the store clerk. 

Then, “You’re in the same boat as me.” said the same voice while looking over my shoulder.

“Looks like it.” I replied glancing up but also thinking, “Let’s respect personal space, Pal!”

I was a little nervous because I’d be spending the next ten or so minutes standing close to this stranger. Why? I like to card shop alone. I often burst out laughing, definitely giggle, at the raunchiest ones or even slightly inappropriate where my eyes generally gravitate. They tear up (okay, tears do stream) more than occasionally at the sentimental and thoughtful cards. It’s what I adore about card shopping; the emotions, thinking of a person, the PRIVACY!

Apparently, this dude wasn’t going anywhere and was in it for the long haul or in both our cases about 15 minutes until our presents were wrapped. We remained relatively quiet for the first few.

He laughed first. Loudly. And I immediately thought, “We’re going to be okay here together.”

Then I giggled and he asked, “Which one's so funny?”

So I handed it to him and he laughed louder than me. Recognizing a kindred spirit with the same stupid sense of humor is always a relief. We looked directly at each other for the first time and smiled.

Reaching around and across each other, being just a little bit in each other’s way, he suggested as he knelt down, “I’ll take the bottom half and you look at the top. Then we’ll switch.”

“Huh?” was all I could think but said, “Sounds like an idea.”

We had a good partnership going on here. Finishing with success, I approved his selection for his friend and he, mine.

I grabbed a few extra because it was 3 for 4 after all! Besides, my friends know they get their birthday cards from me whenever I find the “right” one without regard to the actual date of their birth.

Reaching the door first, I held it open for him to pass. He thanked me graciously and returned the favor at the next one as we headed into Neiman’s to collect our gifts.

I never caught his name even though we’d spent virtually the last hour together.

As we rode the escalator up from gift-wrap stacked with our packages, I said, “You should try the car wash in Hinsdale sometime. They have the very best cards around.”

“Sounds like an idea.” He said with a smirk.

It’s always very interesting to me reflecting on the people who randomly cross our paths. You wonder if they ever will...cross again.

Do you really expect or want them to and what does it mean if they do?

Trifecta: Absence

Sometimes the absence of conversation is what you need. What you want.

“We” needed to be together and we had the time.

True. I was avoiding work, other things, but really, it was about "our" sweet friend needing us.

A State Of Mind, While You See A Chance, Paint It Black, Sweet City Woman, The Heart of the Matter!

So as I’ve mentioned a few times this weekend, I’ve puttered and meandered and flittered around not accomplishing one darn thing. What I did do a whole lot of was listen to music.

I listened while working out at “The Stairs” this morning, with ear buds in while driving (is that illegal?) and turned up in the house to keep me company while everyone was away doing their own thing…. and I was doing mine.

I’ve never participated in Monday’s Music Moves Me but because music does just that to me, moves me in more ways than one, I decided to participate on this holiday Monday (before anyone arrives home!). I found this through Stacy Uncorked and her cool friends.

My iPod was shuffling through one of my more interesting and favorite playlist. And these songs happen to come up right in a row. Each has special meaning to me, takes me back to very specific times, places, and people. 

Gina…Go be a productive member of society now and accomplish something other than YouTube surfing. And don’t get on Stumble Upon or any other such site. K?

Lose Your Dreams And You Will Lose Your Mind: SOCS

As I say every Sunday, and I’m in love with Sundays by the way, I enjoy feeling free to write for five minutes and have somewhere to put it like Jana’s Thinking Place. Where stream of conscious writing is standard Sunday fare.

Write for five minutes, don’t edit, then stop which is hard for me!

This week’s (optional) prompt: Wouldn’t it be awesome if… ?

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Wouldn’t it be awesome if I learned to manage my time better? I’ve had the entire weekend to my self. Yeaaaa meeee! But I don’t have much to show for except a list of movies I’ve watched On Demand and a couple hundred pages read in my book.

What I do when I have too much time on my hands is flitter away an entire day. Flittering never bores me. But then I must bust my tail the next day to pack in all the stuff I said I’d do or committed to do. That’s the place I’m in right now on Sunday morning at 11:33a.m.

Thank goodness for Saturday Mass!

I did accomplish the Swallow Cliff Stairs today and I’ve worked back up to my usual 16 sets I was doing pre-injury. Good thing because in 20 days I will have to do 3X that.

But that’s the only thing I’ve done.

Wouldn’t it be awesome if I could continue wasting time on YouTube and iTunes? And someone would shower for me, do my hair and makeup. Then hit the mall for my mom’s birthday present, remembering a card and paper too, wrap it all and drive me to her house 25 minutes away, all within the next 2 hours. 

Man…..I’m really feeling lazy.

Wouldn’t it be awesome to just lie on the couch, watch more movies and read a few hundred more pages? But then I'd disappoint my mom and I don't want that!

Times up. Gotta go do all the stuff I haven't done...

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There's no time to lose, I heard her say


Catch your dreams before they slip away


Dying all the time


Lose your dreams


And you will lose your mind.


Ain’t life unkind?

Ruby Tuesday, The Rolling Stones

Blue Moon Beauty

This is the last “Blue” moon until July 2015. 

Make a wish!

From 2012 Healing The Planet’s Facebook Page

I’m totally in love with this picture!

Me And "The Donald"

This was written for Write On Edge using the prompt:

For this week, write about a face to face meeting which, for better or for worse, doesn’t go as planned. Fiction or memoir, 450 words.

I’m choosing to do a memoir and if you are at all squeamish about medical looking stuff, blow past the picture because, unfortunately, it’s real.

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I was pissy. Who am I kidding? I was much more than that at 9:00 a.m. when my assigned, “a-hole” of a neurosurgeon walked into the Intensive Care Unit of a rural-ish Indiana hospital.

A lot had happened to me in the 48 hours leading up to that Friday morning in late June.

I had an accident. A pretty big one.

I was extremely mad at myself for being so stupid and at what my foreseeable future likely held.

I was transported to “erehwon” (remember that store...Nowhere spelled backwards?) by a brand new high school diploma holding, 18 year old, whose father coincidentally owned the ambulance company. All I could think was, “Why the hell wasn’t I transported to Chicago?” A rhetorical question but my mind wasn’t operating on full cylinders.

I wasn’t allowed ANY food or beverage including ice chips (remember 48 hours!!!) because I likely had another surgery in my near future. So what if I vomit? (I actually did later missing the barf bowl and projectiling chunks of curdled chocolate malt across the room hitting a wall 10 feet away. Impressive!)

Seventeen hours earlier, Dr. A-hole shaved a quarter of my hair off, drilled four holes into my skull to affix four pins in order to stabilize my neck with a contraption called a “Halo”. It was to buy him time so he could figure out what to do with me. The halo would stay on for 12 weeks he informed me.

(Me, post first surgery after the Halo was "installed")

I had a shitty night nurse who left the door open on my automatic pain medicine machine. So no matter how many times I pushed the little button on which I had a death grip and was supposed to dispensed narcotics every 8 minutes, nothing happened. I pushed it every 2 minutes hoping for a miracle knowing I only got a bump when it beeped. Sigh……And when the day nurse discovered “Mindy’s” mistake at shift change, all she said was “Oops!”

Granted, this doctor walked into a whole world of trouble but his attitude sucked and everyone in the room agreed (including the nurse). No questions were tolerated as he announced his vacation time through Monday. His partners would look in on me over the weekend and they'd determine my status on Monday.

I asked, temples throbbing with pain, “Is it going to hurt this much for the next 12 weeks?”

“Yes.”

“Are you planning for pain management ‘cause it really hurts?”

“I don’t think that should be your worry right now!”

“So basically, you’re telling me to just suck it up?”

“Yes. That's right.”

I looked right at him without blinking and simply said, “You’re fired. Scott hire Dr. McGee.”

He turned on his heels and walked out of my room never to be seen again.

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Blogger’s Note: My new surgeon operated within 24 hours and on a Saturday assuring me my neck would be like new.

Trifecta: The A-B-C's of You

Robert Frost once said, "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on."  We want you to do the same.  Sum up anything you want, but do it in three words.  Your response should mirror Frost's quote by beginning, "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about--."  And the last four words are yours to choose.

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In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about YOU: Amusing. Bewitching. Confounding.