Sto Lat!

Happy 26th Birthday to my dear older sis, Dolly! I can hardly believe that we are getting to be in our mid-twenties. It feels like only just yesterday that you were chasing me around the backyard with worm guts smeared on your hands chanting, "Smell 'em!" All this of course coming from the same girl who all the way up through high school would steal my clean underwear out of the laundry, put them on her head, and take off running around the front yard for all of County Line Road to see my unmentionables! I would not be the least bit surprised if you were to come home and do it all over again because that's just who you are.

Oh how you tortured me as a young child. Like the time I decided to take a Sabbath afternoon nap, and just as I fell asleep you filled my Care Bear sleeping bag with spaghetti noodles, knowing full well how terrified I was of worms (gee I wonder where that fear came from?!). Or the multiple times you sat on top of me letting the saliva hang down from your mouth, slerping it up just before it dripped onto my face! Fond memories sis. . . .

I hope that Poland finds you happy and well. I pray that you are blessed with all your heart's desires and that this next year of life is brimming over with all the joys you could ever imagine. I love you very much!

XOXOXOXO

Where Have All My Readers Gone?

When people ask me, "What's a blog?" I kindly inform them that it's like an online journal. So I suppose it seems completely insane to ask why there seems to be no one reading my journal of all things, but come on folks!

Here is your chance to get inside the mind of a young woman and explore the world from my point of view. Did I happen to mention ladies and gentlemen that this is your chance to get inside the mind of a young woman? Of course you read at your own risk, but really who could pass up such an opportunity?

So what I want to know is, where have all my readers gone?

MICU Here I Come!

I hate change. It's just that simple. I'm not sure if it's the unsurity of it all, or the irregularity of getting off track from my usual routine that scares me. And it's not that I'm against any and all change. I'm not one of those people who can never rearrange the furniture or do something different with my hair. In fact, I more than enjoy those types of change. For quite awhile I'd become notorious for going to see Elizabeth, my stylist, and coming home having had all my hair chopped off. Yet this change, I'm sure, is well overdue.

A few days ago I sat down in front of my laptop and nervously filled out an online application to transfer upstairs to the Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU). Of course after clicking the send button I burst into tears and paced the floor, cursing my own name, wondering what I had done to myself. These feelings continue to come in waves. Currently there's nothing more I can do from my end of the application process. Now I have to wait to hear from the director of the ICU's. So I suppose I really shouldn't entitle this blog "MICU Here I Come!" but more "MICU?"

Quote Of The Day

Again, I found this one on the pull-off calendar up at the nurse's station at work, and I thought it was really fitting, especially considering how I've been feeling about God lately:

I am prepared to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is

prapared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.

Sir Winston Churchill

I wouldn't necessarily say that I am ready to meet my Maker. I'd like to meet Him. There are quite a few matters I'd like to address with Him. I'm sure though there are times when He sees me coming and sighs heavily to Himself.

Lucky Lotto 6

Here lately I feel as if religion, God, the whole nine yards, is nothing more than a gamble. You bring your requests and troubles before the Big Man seeking some sort of response, when really the numbers are not in your favor. There are far too many people on this Earth for you to expect to receive answers, unless of course, you get lucky.

I know it sounds as if I'm saying God doesn't exist, and I don't mean to come across as some sort of heathen. I'm just trying to understand how things get accomplished on the other end of things. Why is it that some people nearly kill themselves, and live a life of deprivation, all in the name of religion or God, with nothing to show for it all? While on the flip side of things there are people who will not hesistate to steal, murder, lie, and cheat their way through this life, and they have not a care in the world, and they want for nothing. Where is the fairness in that?! Of course here is where I cue the voice of my mother who gently reminds me that nobody said life would be fair and then proceeds to inquire, "Was life fair to Jesus?"

I guess lately I just feel like every aspect of my life is being pummeled by temptations that could easily become a long list of bad habits. Yet as downtrodden as I feel, there is something that continues to hold me back. Call it conscience, call it cowardice, call it whatever you like. My point is that I know far too many people who are just coasting along, doing whatever they please, and life is a cake walk for them. Then here I am, fighting tooth and nail to remain true to what I believe, and for what? What am I doing this for? Where is it getting me? Where's the benefit in this? Where's my lucky break?

Are You There God? It's Me, Patti. . . .

Oh how I wish that this was all just some silly book and not real life. And believe me when I say, I don't need to be slapped to realize that this is my reality. No wake-up calls necessary! I'm fully awake, unfortunately.

Honestly, it's the pain that keeps me awake. The only sleep I've gotten over the last three days was forcefully induced after laying around for hours, bawling my eyes out, till I could barely breathe. Strange as it sounds though, that is the best sleep I ever seem to get anymore these days.

I often joke about men being cursed with selective hearing. It seems they only hear those things that are most pleasing to them, and that require as little effort on their part as possible. Here most recently I've even had the audacity to accuse God of using such an auditory filter. I feel as though I could cry all night to the point of exhaustion, and yet my cries fall on deaf ears.

To make matters worse, when He does speak to me, all I hear is "No." I can never hear God whenever He has anything else to say except "No." And it's not that I haven't tried either. I often pray to be able to hear Him, clearly. But it never fails that the "No's" come ringing in loud and clear. Perhaps I'm the one with the filter.

Don't You have anything else to say to me besides "No"?