C is for something or other

The six people who read this blog must be the nicest folks on earth.  Thank you for your kind words.  They meant a lot.  I'm feeling better.  I'm not really sick of my job so much as myself in my job?  Something like that.  But I felt a new surge of work-related energy this week.  I didn't get to take full advantage of it, because I had to stay home again with a sick Soren, but still.

That is the other side affect of all this terrible weather (aside from the mild but relentless depression, I mean)--constant sickness.  There has not been a moment for weeks (months?  I'm not sure) when at least two members of this family have not been oozing something disturbing from somewhere.  Soren's ailments have included a bacterial infection of the eyeballs (what?! ew.) and some sort of throat thing that was not herpes but was similar to herpes and again, ew.

However!  The sun is out today, and it is my day off.  I've spent almost all of it outside, which feels like an accomplishment even though nothing (aside from a little weeding) has actually been accomplished. It's amazing what a few short hours of daylight can do for a person. 

Soren and I took a walk early this morning, and then had a playdate with two moms and their sons who we met on the street in front of our house a couple of weeks ago.  It was really nice--they were very friendly, sweet kids, all that stuff.  This would have happened in our old neighborhood exactly NEVER.  As you may recall, the couple next door had a baby a few days after I had Soren, and they spent all their time just trying not to make eye contact with us.  The idea of a playdate did not come up.  And it wasn't just them; nobody on our block ever spoke.  This neighborhood doesn't even have sidewalks, but everyone's out and about as much as possible, chatting it up with everyone else.

There is a semi-housebound old woman next door who keeps making giant plates of delicious cookies for Soren.  The kindness of this, and the effort it must cost her, almost break my heart.  I don't really know how to sufficiently say thank you, so this afternoon after nap we'll go over there with a bag full of lettuce from our garden and a thank you note that Soren has scribbled on. Somehow this doesn't seem to cover it, but I'm not sure what would (that is within my limited abilities).  I'm open to ideas if you have any.

By the way, I was not wrong about getting fatter--I weigh four pounds more than I did just a few weeks ago.  I am going on a diet called the Stop Eating So Many Freaking Cookies Diet.  If it works, I'm going for a book deal.  Watch for my blog post tomorrow about all the cookies I'm not eating.