I have been trying to de-stress my life lately. Money probs, job probs, life in general probs...that can put a lot on a girl's shoulders! So, I am getting better at saying no, standing up for myself and making choices, while very adult and depressing, that will help me get what I want.
But sometimes none of that helps. I can get very overwhelmed, scatterbrained and emotionally drained. We work 4 jobs and never have enough money...who does right? We need to move closer to one of those jobs to save money, of course we need money to move...well, I guess it could be worse, right?
Which is my point today. Today I had a lovely moment of noticing the little things, my favorite!
I've never been terribly outdoorsy. I don't camp and I am not much of a beach person. What I am is a porch person. Porch/deck...whatever you wanna call it...something attached to my place of residence that I can sit out on and read, eat, drink, spy on my neighbors, etc. My husband is a porch person. My dog is a porch...well, dog. Thank goodness we have had really great porches in all of our apartments together. In fact, it is usually one of our deal breakers when looking for a place to live. We had a nice "back porch" at our Chicago apt. Right outside the kitchen door overlooking Grace Ave.
But here, in the glorious Epping Forest (yes, I live in a neighborhood that is referred to as a forest, I'll get back to that)we have what I can honestly say, with the exception of my parents deck, is the BEST porch...ever!
It runs the whole length of the apartment and there are two different ways to get to it...through one of two sliding glass doors in either the living room or the bedroom. It could probably easily hold 15 of our friends at once! I love it. We have a card table out there and my husband and I have been known to spend hours out there eating, reading, talking...AND sometimes the clubhouse in our neighborhood has parties and we can hear the music from our porch!
So, yes I live in a more "upscale" neighborhood in Annapolis. Now, WE are not so much upscale, I am sure we live in the ONLY apartment in the 'hood. The "Forest" has been around for about 30+ years and it is filled with the residents from the beginning of time (our landlords) and the Richie Richerton's that moved in and built up their multimillion dollar houses and blocked all the best views of the river (sometimes I have strong feelings). Along with the ginormous houses, these people also, obviously, have incredible porches. Multi-level, indoor, outdoor,indoor and outdoor, you name it! What's wrong with this? Nothing. Except that I never see anyone sitting on them.
Today on my walk I started thinking about that. Now I know these people work hard AND I KNOW some of them don't work at all. Why not sit out there? Is it cause they work too hard? They are on vacation too much? They don't appreciate the porches?
It got me thinking about all my stress surrounding my jobs, etc. I thought about how I never feel like I get to appreciate any of the money I make since I seem to be giving all of it to bills and such. Then I started thinking about that statement, something about "working hard enough to really have time to appreciate what you've got".
Well I work hard, I don't make a lot of money,I do have some extra time off these days (not that I really want it). I am not looking for pity or any sort of handout, honestly, I just started thinking about it.
I don't have enough money to sit back and really relax but I do have this porch that I really appreciate and just enough time to sit out there and read a book. And that made me smile today.