Windy Night and H in Days of My Destiny

It was SO windy here last night. Fiercely windy. To the point where I was laying in bed, wondering how much more wind it would take to lift the house up out of the ground....... the trees were just going crazy, and I was trying to stay calm and not worry about it and just go to sleep already. I couldn't help it, though. Even L was struggling to go to sleep. I kept lifting my head up off my pillow to look outside and keep an eye on those trees. Would a branch fall off and be blown against the side of the house? Through the window? Would a window smash in from the wind alone? Even if this didn't happen, would the win get so strong that it would wake the girls? Cos if it did, they'd be scared. Should I go and lay in their beds beside them? I kept thinking, "Fear not, for I am with you." But it wasn't much consolation. As I began to fall asleep, I had an image of my youngest daughter flying up into the air as the roof of the house lifted off. It was horrible. I had another image where I was holding her so tight in my arms, as both of us were flung into the air into nowhere, to be carried away with the strong gusts. I wondered how long it would be before I couldn't hold onto her anymore. What would happen if I hit a tree? The grip of my arms would surely NATURALLY loosen. I knew it was a stupid, senseless train of thought but in that half-asleep state, I couldn't really help myself. At one point, I heard the wind get much much louder, and I jolted my head off my pillow to see what the trees were doing. I realised that they weren't any worse than before, and the reason why everything sounded so much worse was because it had started to rain. Suddenly I heard a loud THUD and it brought me back to back to an awakened state and shook away the terrible visions I had been having. In the end, I don't know if it was exhaustion or true calming that lulled me to sleep, but either way, I slept well after that. The wind continues today, but nowhere near as bad as it was last night.

I have been spring cleaning since Saturday. I've vacuumed the whole house (this house is huge) and mopped all the enclosed verandahs. I've changed the girls' toy room to a second guest room to accommodate the visitors arriving tomorrow. The toys are now back in their original spot, in one of the enclosed verandahs. When we first moved to this house, the girls' toys took up that WHOLE verandah. I've done a few throw-outs in the year and a bit we've been here, and now I'm pleased to see that their toys take up about a quarter - if that - of that space. FINALLY.

So my visitors. It's Jaz. I lived with Jaz overseas exactly ten years ago when she had her first baby and could not get maternity leave where she was working. She paid for my trip to that country and paid me as her nanny. I cleaned her house and looked after her baby from when he was 3 days old. It was a wonderful time in my life and although I rarely think about that time in my life anymore, I have a lot of awesome memories saved somewhere inside. So anyway, Jaz moved back home years ago now and turns out she lives about 5 hours away. The friendship has taken a few turns but we are still in touch in a roundabout way. I'm the one that mostly keeps in touch, calling every five months or so. She called me once, which surprised me tremendously, and it was after she'd missed a thousand of my calls! Anyway about two weeks ago I got a text from her, asking if she could come and visit. Of course my reply was, OF COURSE! Turns out, she has two aunties visiting from overseas and they are going to check out the sights in Sydney, and will stay with me for one night on their way back to Jaz's place. So that's pretty cool. She's coming with her youngest child, her two aunties and her mum. So that was an incentive to do a bit more cleaning than the usual and it's all just turned into a big spring clean! I have about 6 or 7 things left to tick off my list and then I'll be DONE.

H came over yesterday. I enjoy her company but she can get a bit much sometimes. I swear she crushes on L. She always finds an excuse to talk about him. It kind of annoys me, but she's respectful enough when he's around, and well she's a single mum, so really, she can crush on whoever she wants. Besides, at least she's crushing on someone who deserves to be crushed on - A GOOD MAN! Lol. Just don't even think about flirting with him!!!! So anyway yesterday she was telling me a bit more about her life and how she'd only been married to her ex for a few months when they were faced with some scary situations that he literally ran away from, leaving her to deal with them on her own, which made her go, "................oh. I married THAT?" I love that she is so strong and she's moved on from it all. She can look back and still get frustrated about everything, but it doesn't rule her life anymore the way it did when I first met her. (She found out he was having an affair with someone twice her age when she was expecting their second child. Way to get burnt.) I would've had all my jobs done yesterday if she didn't come over, but it's not the end of the world. In fact I'm glad she did, I was feeling somewhat..... down and out, and a cup of tea and silliness and laughs with a friend was just what I needed. H is good for that. She knows how to be silly and laughs a lot. At one point she helped her son go to the toilet and while she did that, I quickly went into my room and made my bed (I was in the middle of doing that when she arrived). While I was in my room, I heard her talking away and then she cracked up laughing. When I went back I asked what had happened and she said she walked back into the room where we'd been sitting, talking to me the whole time while she walked towards the room, and then realised I wasn't there. That's what had made her crack up laughing, lol. I love that she does that.

I had a bit of an annoying time with her recently. See, I'm always offering to babysit her kids so she can go to an event or something that might be on in the town. She almost always declines. Actually the only time she accepted was earlier this year when I told her about a speed dating night in the next town, and I fully talked her into it and made her excited about it. I did her hair for her and we hung about my place having some drinks while I did her hair and so on. It was all very girly and lots of fun. Other than that, she has asked me to babysit her son twice so she could go and give blood. She also texted me a few weeks ago, asking me to go and help her move some (heavy and awkward) furniture out of her house because she was finally getting new furniture. That time, I was slightly annoyed that she asked me. She said it was because I'm always offering her help. Well no, I'm always offering to babysit, but whatever, I'll help you with your furniture. Anyway, ONE TIME, a few months ago, there was a Girls' Night In event here in this small town, and it was basically a movie night at the school hall. There was finger food and wine too. I really wanted to go, and then, about 45 minutes before I was due to leave, it occurred to me that instead of going, maybe I could go to H's to babysit her kids so that SHE could go. It was down the road from where she lives. She declined. She said she didn't really feel like watching the movie they were going to be playing. I thought it was a slightly lame excuse but oh well, I went along and had fun anyway.

THEN, the day before the Pink Stilettos night (which I'm yet to write about - I think), I wrote on our private Backyard Fitness fb page saying how excited I was for it and who else is excited??!?!?! And she commented on it saying, "You're cutting it short now haha. Nah it's all good," or something like that. That just pissed me off.

1 - it's not my fault you're a single mum

2 - I have offered PLENTY of times for you to go to events and you don't go to them, so don't sit there and whinge to me now

3 - contrary to what your beliefs may be, it's actually not that easy for me to get out either, and even if it is, I don't abuse it thank you very much.

I felt like I should be apologising for my life, you know?!?!?!

So I wrote back on there and this is basically what followed:

Me: Sorry, H. How about you take me up on my babysitting offer next time, then it can be your turn to head out and let your hair down. Not that I offered this time but you know what I mean.

H: Yeah thanks heaps. But I kind of need a loooooootttt longer than half an hour to get ready. Lol.

[I hate that fucking LOL. I hate how it's used to supposedly diffuse shit sentences. It just makes the sentence passive-aggressive.]

Me: At least I thought of it, even if it was last minute, maybe you should've said that on the phone. Next time there's something on that you want to go to, MAKE SURE you let me know, you know I'm more than happy to babysit. And not just for blood giving purposes, you crazy woman!

Me: Also, I would've offered sooner if I had thought of it sooner.

H: He he I know.

And that was basically it. Somebody else then said something like, yeah I can babysit too, and then she replied something like, yeah thanks I do appreciate all offers.

I was so angry that she declined my babysitting offer that time because she didn't have enough time to get ready! Like are you serious? You live two minutes down the fucking road! It's a small town, you DON'T NEED a lot of time to get ready! You don't need to doll right up or try to look like the fucking queen!!!!!

So yeah, I eventually got over that. At the end of the day, I'm not her, and I don't know what it's like to be in her situation. All I know is that I'm just not going to offer to babysit anymore. Like I said, she has to MAKE SURE she can get to the events she's interested in. Not just sit back and whinge. I was also annoyed because it's not like we didn't know about this event for six months in advance! That's not even an exaggeration! She had PLENTY of time to organize babysitting elsewhere if she really wanted to go. But oh well, whatever. I was also annoyed at her for about a week after that because she seems to be one of these people who likes to whinge about her situation but doesn't actually DO ANYTHING about it. For example she's overweight and whinges all the time about it, but look at all the crap she eats! She said to me one time, "Everybody always says that to lose weight, the most important thing is to watch what you eat, but honestly I tried that and didn't lose any weight at all!" It's like, well did you try it for long enough? Seriously how can YOU be the exception to the rule/formula? So when the Pink Stilettos thing happened, I realised it was my turn to just give up. To stop looking out for her in that sense. Obviously she never asked me to look out for her anyway, but that's just what I do as a friend. It's how I show I care. She has admitted to me before though that her love language is Gifts and that she loves it when people give her gifts and they really mean a lot to her. So maybe she didn't quite appreciate what I was doing cos it's not her way of seeing that I care. Oh well.