It's all I can think about now.

Got home tonight and feel like I'm walking around with no purpose except not sitting down for too long. Maybe it's better described as when you have 10x too much caffeine in your body and you sit down, stand up, walk around, and all you want to do are the things you can't sit still long enough to do. I just want to scream- DONT YOU KNOW WHATS COMING?!?!

How can you not acknowledge it every time you talk to me this month?

How can you not read my mind and know when things slow down thats where I end up. That day, over and over and over and over in my mind.

How can you try to plan things for that weekend? Like I can do things that weekend.

What am I supposed to do?! Just tell me what I'm supposed to do.

I just want to scream anything. and everything. and all the time. The screams are running through my blood, making me antsy and anxious. Making me think, and not think. Making me want to cry and not be able to cry. Making me mad. Just plain mad at anything that I can be mad at.

I do not want to do this week again. ever. and it keeps coming back.

Dinner- epic Fail.

I make dinner here. I like it. I haven't actually had to cook for more than just me very often so It's fun to be able to try new actual meals. Recently I've really been trying to incorporate more vegetables into what we're eating. I don't love vegetables, but aside from Asparagus, Nick would never eat a vegetable if he could get away with it. Last night I came home from class and asked if he had made any vegetables with the dinner in the crock pot. His response? I had some spinach dip. Um no dear, doesn't count.

Anyway, lets focus. I had a recipe for lemon pepper chicken in the crockpot. Crockpot meals for the day I have classes are fab because Nick can eat and I can eat later when I get home, or whatever. We're not stuck with both of us eating fast food at random times.  From my childhood I had a somewhat severe aversion to lemon flavored chicken. Once, mom made such a dish, and my ever-so-dramatic brother and I were pretty sure she tried to poison us. For months whenever she made chicken we were sure she was putting hidden drops of lemon on the chicken. I thought maybe I'd be a big girl and give it a whirl.

Doesn't it look delicious. Ya, well that picture is not what mine looked like, but that's fine. I'm not in the food biz, I'm just trying to make a yummy, (EASY), healthy dinner for us. 

Here's the recipe:

Lemon Garlic Chicken Crock Pot Recipe

Ingredients:
- 8 boneless skinless chicken breasts
- 10 garlic cloves, finely chopped or minced
- 2 yellow onions, chopped
- 2 cups fat free, low sodium chicken broth
- 1/4 cup lemon pepper seasoning
- 4 tbsp paprika
- 2 tbsp fresh parsley, finely chopped
- 1 tablespoon kosher salt
- 1 tsp lemon zest

Directions:
Rinse the chicken and pat dry. Mix together the lemon pepper seasoning, paprika and salt. Coat the chicken with the spice mixture. Place the coated chicken in the crock pot and cover with the fat free chicken broth, garlic cloves, parsley and onions and lemon zest. Cook on low heat for about 3-4 hours (or until done)

So easy, right? Here's what I did:

1. Plug in and turn on CrockPot

2. Add 8 boneless skinless chicken tenderloins

3. 10 seems like a lot of garlic cloves, so I'll only add 3 chopped.

4. I don't like onions. I'll only add one.

5. Add 2 cups of low sodium chicken broth

6. Shook in about 1/4 cup of lemon pepper seasoning. Seem's like a lot. hmm.

7. I don't have paprika

8. No fresh parsley, but I have some in my spice cabinet. I just sprinkle some in

9. No lemon zest-- substitute lemon juice? sure.

10. Leave for work. Return at 3 pm, stir. Turn to just warm as everything seems cooked.

11. We ate it when I got home at 7:30.

12. OH also, I added a can of whole white potatoes so we had some potatoey thing in the dish. 

Nick dished up our chicken and I nuked some green beans.

We dive in.

I cough. Hmmm I must have had a pepper on that bite!

Nick says he agrees, navigate around the pepper seasoning.

I try a bite of potato and have to find something other than my wine to quench my thirst.

One more bite- it can't be that bad.

I want to vomit.

Nick says, "Want to put in that frozen pizza?"

"ya... scrap this lemon pepper hell."

As I try to drink everything we have in the fridge, Nick makes the pizza.

Bummer. I know I took some liberties, but I usually do and things turn out ok at the very least. I haven't had an epic fail yet. Oh well- no lemon chicken in our future!

Army 10-miler 2010 vs 2011

Last year I set the goal to run the Army 10-Miler with Mike's sister, Amanda. She's had about 5 ACL surgeries and I've never run further than 200 meters so it was a lofty goal but in the spirit of doing things we've never done and honoring Mike's life in a way he would love, we saddled up. I took training seriously as 10 miles is a freaking lot. I started running 1-2 miles in April and it was so difficult for me, but once I got into it, I gradually increased to 4, 5 and even 8 miles before we actually did the race. The last 2 miles of the race were very difficult and all I kept thinking was "Just. Keep. Going." And we finished and I thought- never again will I do this. On the plane ride home I looked at Amanda and thought, ya we could do this again next year. And here we are.

Except this year is much different. I'm in NC but beside that I'm finding every excuse in the world not to run. I've been doing about 2/3 miles every couple days. I'm so worried the 10 miles will kick my butt so hard! The race is in October and tomorrow is the first day of September. Ummm train for a month?! Not exactly the plan. Nick's doing it this year with me, and a bunch of other friends are running. I need to get my butt in gear.

When you're not motivated to complete a goal that you've set, either physical or otherwise, how do you get yourself going?

(see how I'm blogging and NOT running...)

Ketchup

I have been missing and busy. As I'm catching up on blogs I am remembering how much I missed you all- missed my time to reconnect and be introspective. I need that.

As I said I've been busy. I know it's been a while but jump with me, if you will, to where I am now in this crazy life. I am engaged, getting married on New Year's Eve, in a new house, working about 30 hours a week and going to grad school. It all seems like a lot. The last few weeks I have not been myself. Not the "myself" I like, not comfortable in my shoes. With so much going on there is little time to be introspective- such a 180 degree turn from my previous few years of constant introspection and time spent running around inside my own head.

I told Nick the other day, "I'm not feeling happy. I know we have this new house and a fabulous wedding but I'm not feeling happy and I don't know why." I felt so guilty at the same time. I always feel as if I'm letting someone down. As we talked he pointed out that it may feel different to me because for so long I was independent of anyone else. I didn't let people in. I relied on myself and my dog, that was really it. Now that I'm out in the world, working and living and making friends in this new place, people are relying on me. It's quite a transition. He flat out told me, "I could not have this house without you. I need you to be where I am right now." That's scary, and good, and scary again. It's nice to be needed but hard to realize you're back out there, intermingling with the world, able to have an effect on people.

I think they call that "living."

Time, time, time

I apologize for not updating as often as I should. This blog is where I look forward to sharing some of the big things that happen in my life and lately I have been punking out of sharing due to work, and school and mostly more school. Summer I has come to and end and I finished with an A and a B and I am thrilled about that. Summer II is here and I am taking less so I should have little less on my plate.

Ok now the updates. Nick proposed May 28 and the last month has been amped up wedding talk. We chose New Year's Eve to get married, the day we met, and although it will be in chilly, snowy Ohio I look forward to getting married and celebrating the New Year with all of our friends and family!

Now I have a bunch of feeling related stuff that I wanted to share too, but we will save that for a later date.

The New Adventures of Lewis and Clark

Do you guys know Tori and Zac? Ok in case you don't, let's rewind. Zac is one of Mike's best friends from grade school and high school. They played football together- it's kind of a big deal! :) So after Mike was killed, Zac and Tori were amazing friends. They lived nice and close to me so Tori would pop over and get me out of the house, or at least chill with me. We worked out together and then we'd eat at Taco Bell, to balance things out! She and Zac watched Lily a few times for me while I had to go out of town for work. They are really great friends. Zac decided to join the army about a year ago and has finished all his early training and is now part of the 82nd Airborne here at Ft. Bragg. Needless to say Tori and I were ecstatic to realize we'd be in the same place after they were in GA for a year.

Zac and Tori began their move a couple weeks ago and unfortunately some plans they had to sign paperwork to rent a condo fell through. It was a stressful weekend for them because they drove a truck up with about half of their stuff so that they could begin moving stuff in. Since I work in our apartment community, when I talked to them I told them I could get them in a unit by Sunday with no problems. They tossed the idea around and ran the numbers and (YAY!) decided to go for it! So now not only are we in the same area, we are literally next door to each other! Nick and I couldn't be more excited that they are right here! Tori and I have many, MANY more fun adventures together now that we live the closest we've EVER lived to each other!

On a side note, when we all hang out I am so thankful and very retrospective that I've know these 2 amazing people through several stages of the last few years. I met them with Mike, and I remember him telling me all about them before we met. They were there when we found out. Zac helped me with all my finances when I needed him most and could have cared about money the least. Tori had so many late night convos with me about everything and her positive energy always made me feel a little more at peace with life. I just couldn't be happier now that they know and love Nick, are able to celebrate our engagement (yea, I'll update on that in a bit) with us. I just love them very, very much.

(oh, the title of the blog? Zac and Tori's last names- before they were married of course)

Knowing me, I thought about it too much.

"One of my great comforts since Liz's death had been talking about her- I was afraid that if her name went unmentioned or the stories went untold, our memories of her would forever disappear, and so would she." -Matthew Logelin, Two Kisses for Maddy

I somewhat freely talk about my relationship with Nick on here and I have a need today to explore some thoughts. I am about to finish Two Kisses for Maddy and there have been a couple spots where things have jumped out at me. Today it's the quote above, because of recent discussions Nick and I have had. After some poorly thought out statements and hurt feelings on both sides we sunk to the bottom of it all and uncovered the real issue were struggling with.

I talk about Mike often, and in a way, at inappropriate moments. It's not even always about Mike, but rather about making mention of losing my fiance' in Iraq in 2008.

I have grown accustomed to talking about his loss, as since day one I tried out new verbiage (ie: I am engaged but he was killed in Iraq; I was engaged but he lost his life in Iraq; No we weren't married; prefacing the story with a big long sigh and sad face; He passed; he's dead; he was killed; I'm a widow; I'm kind of a widow, etc.) often enough to know what type of reaction I would most likely receive. I do sometimes throw it out at inappropriate moments. Since the beginning my thought on this has been that yes, when I do this it may really impact that person and they may have a few awkward, rough, sad moments. I have had more than a few. In some way it is me shoving some of my pain in their direction. That's not the right thing to do. I also think it will make some people realize what they have, and frankly I'm ok with that. My other feeling is that I am damn proud of where I am right now. If you would have told me that I would be here in my life, having accomplished everything I have, having made several of the most amazing friends I could have, and knowing things that someone my age often does not yet know, I would have threw your words into the metaphysical trash can. So when people take a minute to get over the shock I smile at them, and I hope they realize that YES it was a traumatic event that I deal with every day, but I'm ok. And I'm proud of that.

Also, like the quote above, I have this responsibly to make sure no one ever forgets him and what he has done, even before he was killed. You can tell me it's not my responsibly but I won't believe you. So mentioning him, recounting stories, or the opportunity to bring up what I've been through assures in some small way that he's still a part of this world.

As I understand it, Nick's thoughts are different. He know's I will throw it out there are moments that people wouldn't expect that to be the case. He is prepared for it and has dealt with it on more than one occasion. As he was able to explain to me though, he feels like once I "drop the bomb" it's a conversation stopper. Not only does everyone feel awkward, but they will no longer inquire about me personally, or about us as a couple. He, in his most endearing way, told me that I am so much more than what has happened to me and he want's people to be able to see that. I've started my own business, I've gone back to grad school, I've made many new friends, I've become a runner and now am starting another very difficult workout, I've raised a pup from puphood to be a fully-adjusted functioning member of dog society (ok, I added that one.) But no one will get to know all those things about me, or be able to experience Nick and I as just Nick and I, a couple who met through some friends, when I explain part of our crazy story so early on.

I get what he's saying and I know his concerns are right on target but there are things about the way I handle the situation that he will never fully understand. I know it's different for me now because I am trying to make new friends in a new place and I haven't done that much outside the widowed world since losing Mike so sometimes I do talk about it when I should have waited. We've been able to discuss this continually and both adjust a little what we are thinking, as least enough to remember where the other person is coming from when it may happen. Luckily, we're both extremely aware of our craziness and are willing to adjust them for each other at times as necessary.