Signs we live in a house full of nerds

Just now, Gabe said: "our new dishwasher sounds like the Tardis." Not only did Paula (my 11 year-old) and I know what he meant, we emphatically agreed with him.

Summer 2003

It was the last days of July 2003. My 5 year-old daughter was spending the summer in Puerto Rico with her father. I was out with the old man on a Friday night, sitting at the bar at PF Chang's, having a drink as we waited for our table.

Out of the blue, the old man laughed and said to me "you are going to leave me in the dust." Those words, uttered seemingly in jest, have stayed with me years after we parted ways, the only salient memory of an otherwise ordinary evening. At the time I thought it was absurd. I wanted him so much I would walk through fire for him. Turns out he was right. He saw our relationship for exactly what it was, a May/December summer fling.

Average Day

It's Tuesday. I am working from home. Next week we will get market share results and it is my job to ensure everybody across my region will have access to the data they need. It sounds easier than it actually is in practice.

The house is still relatively clean, but already there's dust/hair clumps in corners. It's a good thing the cleaning lady is coming tomorrow.

I have not made up my mind yet about whether to keep my blog public or switch it to private.

I try not to comment here about my in-laws and their financial/health/life woes. There are plenty. Unfortunately, they seem to be magnets for chaos, tough breaks, bad decisions and drama. Events in their life are starting to threaten life as we know it and the stability of my household. They may lose their house. They want to know if we can "merge households." I cringe at the thought, honestly. I am stressing out.

Clean house

Hopefully, a year from now I will look upon this week as the time when I reclaimed my house from the mess.

Gabriel had been on my case for months (months!) to hire a maid, someone to come once a week and clean the house for us. I resisted. My house was so incredibly cluttered and messy, and we did not have the time or the energy to tackle the whole thing and getting it fixed without help. Everywhere I looked there was a mess, and I had just given up. I felt like a failure and was ashamed to bring anybody here, and felt I had to clean the house a little before hiring a maid. Gabe thought that was ridiculous, and could not understand my guilt and anxiety over the whole thing. Things were tense.

I finally broke down out of desperation and hired someone recommended by a friend. Now I can't imagine why I did not do it sooner. She worked hard for three days and deep cleaned the whole house. She helped me tame the mountain of laundry, load after load after load. It is not perfect, as there are many things left to do (too many toys and stuff I need to get rid of), but I now have a house that I am not ashamed to let other people enter.

I confess that I am a little cautious about claiming victory. I am careful not to be overjoyed, not to celebrate too much this development. What if it all goes wrong? What if six months from now we are back to where we were last week? To avoid that, we plan on hiring the cleaning lady to come once a week, for as long as we can afford it. For our happiness and well being, I hope it's a long time.

If a tree falls in a forest...

Increasingly I have started questioning the wisdom of keeping this as a public blog. There are certain disclosures that I am no longer feeling so comfortable about sharing openly. It has been quite a long time since I have participated in any writing prompts or memes that require me to share links. I don't feel there's much incentive to keep it public.

Lately, when I have felt the need to get something off my chest, I have hesitated before blogging. The feelings/thoughts I want to unload are of a sort that could get me in trouble at work or invite trolls to heap abuse. The truth is, I no longer see my blog as my safe, quasi-anonymous, below the radar space. I even worry about perverts grabbing family pictures for seedy purposes. Perhaps I am being neurotic now. Perhaps I was way overconfident in the past about the lack of buzz keeping me relatively safe.

Despite my recent neglect, I have a lot of affection for this blog and what it represents. And I would benefit from a place where I can go back to speaking my mind freely when I need it, without worrying about the consequences. Thus, I am seriously considering making my blog private/by invitation only in the future. If you are one of my online or offline friends and you want to keep on reading, please leave a comment or send me a message and I will grant you access when I make the blog private.