(written on the 12th from notes taken previously)
Woke up late again this morning, did a few dailies, and got out of Rover to wish my sister a good day at work.
Having not yet been able to keep myself from being discouraged at my continual inability to get up on time and actually keep the schedule that I’ve prepared for myself, I’m letting go of that schedule… for now.
I hope soon to be able to follow the schedule again and to get to the point where I don’t have any emotional drag creep in from not having been as successful as I hope to be.
My most productive times of life are when I have been able to make and keep a schedule, and such has been the direction that I’ve gotten from God in the past, but clearly, I’m not quite there yet emotionally this time around?
I don’t notice anything significant, no strong emotional response to the daily failure to fully complete my “dailies” goals, but I do notice some minor negative feelings I think pretty much every day, if not every day at the end of the day. I wonder if maybe that’s one of the reasons I’ve been quicker to get down and discouraged lately. Too many expectations. Too much, too soon?
So I’m going to experiment. Lower the bar a little bit. (with the intent of raising it over time and seeing how it goes).
I did feel lighter today with many fewer requirements and less rigidity. 🙂
After doing some dailies, I worked for a little bit online, made myself an oversized bean smoothie, and got my garbage out to the garbage can.
Hans dropped off their Sam’s club card so I could grab them something from Sam’s club that they forgot to get when they were in Rapid last, and Hans kindly got on the phone and added international calling to my plan, so I can get in touch with New Zealand to work things out with the visa stuff.
On a different note, I’ve always hated sunscreen, because it’s so greasy, and because I just don’t like having weird chemicals on my body.
Funny the complete… hypocrisy isn’t the right word… Whatever the right word is when my principal doesn’t overlap into another area of my life. 😅
I spent years covered in automotive greases and fluids and oils and solvents and whatnot, and I thought about it. It was actually one of the motivators for quitting actually working on cars… But I refuse to wear sunscreen because of the concern of nasty chemicals?
Maybe incongruent is the right word.
Anyway, I decided to put sunscreen on today. I’ve been wearing long sleeve shirts and long pants and a massive sun hat ever since I came to South Dakota, but I’ve noticed that I think my face remains tanned, so I decided to look up how much radiation might be, if it even is, reflecting off of the ground back up into my face, and it was a pretty substantial amount, and if I’m spending hours and hours and hours outside every day… then… yeah.
Yes, I’m still struggling with the realities of what I’ve done to myself, and what that feels like it means for me on the superficial attractiveness side of things, and also what it might mean for me healthwise, as skin cancer definitely runs in our family.
And also what it might mean for me lifestyle wise… The outdoors are my Haven, my home, my happy place. But I’ve already had far more sun than most Americans get in a lifetime, and I’m still in my early 40s.
😅
Anyway, so I put on sunscreen today, despite my dislike of the greasy, and despite my concerns for chemicals.
🙃
When I was looking up sun damage stuff online, I saw this picture that I think maybe a 30-year-old woman had posted comparing herself to her twin sister, one having worn sunscreen her whole life, the other one not, and the differences were… striking.
Anyway, with sunscreen applied, I went out and spent a good little while trying to grade the mounded up dirt in the septic drain field area. I’d removed most of the dirt, but there was still plenty that needed to be raked down to try and make mostly level with the rest, so I spent a good little while doing that.
I also picked a fight with a bunch of cacti. From what I understand, if you just mow over them, the little bits of cactus that fly out different places will end up growing new plants, so you have to dig them up.
So I grabbed a shovel and went to a little cactus patch that I had mowed around the other day. My sister has marked them with little flags, so we know where they are, and I spent a good little while digging up each of the cactus plants, trying to get them all by The Roots.
I ended up dumping the water that was left over from the apple tree adventures, dragging the dump cart over, and filling the dump cart with the masses of cactus and cactus roots. I probably dug up dozens of different cactus plants in just two little areas northwest of the house.
I put all the little root balls, including the roots of the grass that was intertwined with the roots of the cactus in the dump cart, and then emptied the whole load into the nooks and crannies left over in the top of the garbage can.
Did some more grading, finished off my smoothie, let Zora out to use the bathroom, and then headed over to JHKP to mess around with the soaking pool, and to get soaked, before going to Casper for temple Tuesday.
I got there just at the wrong time for messing around with my little secret soaking pool, Kelly, one of the older gentlemen I’ve met there before, showed up on his Harley to take a soak, as well as did another older gentleman whom I met as he was just walking down to the Springs to take a soak.
Since I had just arrived, I didn’t want to not show up at the springs. 🙃
So I had it down and hung out with them for a little while, and then I went back to the van, grabbed my shovel and hammer, and made my way over to my little secret spot.
It’s not so secret, as I’m easily visible from the sidewalk above when I’m sitting in it, but it’s not so visible when no one is in it.
Multiple people have seen me in it and seen me working on it recently, so eventually, it won’t be very secret, but it may not be all that appealing, as it’s harder to access than the other two, by far.
Either way, it’s a fun little adventure building it.
I also realized I could hear the gurgling of the pipes all the way up at the parking lot. I’ve got the pipes partially blocked off, so they kind of sound like they’re gulping. 🙃
I need some big gulp gas station soda cups to block off fully dam up the water to increase the level inside the pool as well as to stop the sound.
Felt like I made some pretty significant progress again today on the little soaking pool, taking chunks of bedrock out at a time instead of fighting with the crazy-hard-packed, rocky, clay mixture that won’t take shovels, works only moderately well with a pickaxe, and though less effective than the pickaxe as well, the clot ended a hammer is much less tiring.
But every time you pull up any of that, you cloud the whole spring, which makes it impossible to see what you’re working on, so you have to wait for it to settle to see what you’re going to go after next if you want to be effective about it.
Anyway, maybe just a couple more days in the soaking pool adventure, and it will be relatively usable.
One of the guys at the main soaking pool said that it used to be about chest deep in there, and now it’s not even waste. He said people added Rock to the bottom and made it shallower.
Would be fun to get a water purity sample. For what’s bubbling directly out of the ground.
Spent a good chunk of the day listening to the scriptures. I found today that I was hungry for the scriptures themselves instead of listening to talks and speeches and whatnot.
Felt a little nudge to listen to Genesis, so I listened to it all the way through once, and then probably half of Exodus, and then listened to half of Genesis two more times after that. 🙃
One of the things that stuck out to me, that I’ve actually been thinking about lately… “It is not good for man to be alone.”
Boy do I have a testimony of that.
I’m lonely, and this particular time and circumstance of my life… it seems taylor made to share with a companion.
…conversations with the Big Guy.
Listened to Genesis while I was driving, then chatted with Cory for nearly 2 hours. Listened to more of Genesis, wrote my journal entry for yesterday, wrote an outline for today, and crashed for the night.
Gratitude:
- Grateful I didn’t get stabbed too many times by the cactus plants there were gazillions of them in one little section where I was mowing last time.
- Grateful I apparently didn’t run over and cactus plants while mowing, as I guess the pieces start new plants!
- Grateful it was garbage day today, and I was able to fit all the cactus plants, roots and all, in the garbage.
- Grateful for more significant progress on the soaking pool, large chunks coming out at once instead of the little bits of rock and mud and sand I’ve been fighting with for a while now.
- I’m grateful to have gotten cold enough being in the pool long enough that the drive to Casper in the mid 80s? actually felt good. 🙃
- Grateful for the chat with Cory tonight.
- Grateful to make it safely and uneventfully to my usual parking spot outside of Casper.
Success:
- I was more upbeat today. 🙂
- I’ve been doing better and better at being patient through the uncomfortable blessings. 🎉
Improvement:
- Be better at not letting my eyes and thoughts wander (lady with a bikini at the soaking pool). Titus 1:15.
Thought of the Day:
All people, especially the rising generation, need a vision of the richness of family life and its potential for developing the highest and best in each of us. In an age of increasing selfishness, we must highlight marriage’s capacity to lift men and women beyond their narrow self-interests to the joys that come from dedicating one’s life to a higher and holy purpose….
…the family is the ultimate mortal laboratory for the improving and perfecting of God’s children.
In marriage and family, we can experience profound loyalty, pure love, and consummate joy. We learn in a deeply personal way about God’s love for each of us.
To paraphrase what Jesus Christ taught, as we lose ourselves in service to spouse and family, we find our true selves. Every day, we become more of who He wants us to become. And that is the source of enduring joy and true self-fulfillment.
The family is the fundamental unit of society. We were not meant to be alone….
~ David A Bednar
Hand of God In My Life Today:
The nudge toward the scriptures today. Feeling hungry for the scriptures themselves.
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 