Gratitude Journal #6

Apparently, you can train your brain to be happier by keeping a gratitude journal, so I am giving it a go. My goal is post about 100 things I am grateful for over the course of the year. (This should average out to just a little over 2/week.) However, I am going to try and stay away from the standard family/friends/pets. Please know I absolutely am grateful for my family, friends, and pets. I would not have made it through the past couple of year without each of them. But if I am trying to train myself to be happier, then I want to start recognizing the smaller things in life that I am grateful for.

I posted last week to get myself caught up from the two weeks before, but I did not then post last week’s gratitude journals, and here it is Thursday of this week, and nothing yet. So, once again, 4 items in a single entry, to get me actually caught up. I do apologize for no pictures this week, though.

Gratitude Entry #9 – Dual Monitors

At work, I have had dual monitors for more than 10 years. Because I do financial work, in multiple systems, where I often have to compare the systems, or enter information from one system into another, the dual screens are a life saver. It lets me have the information up to see while I am entering it, without me having to print off paper copies and then hang those up where I can easily see them (which is what I used to do).

I realized how much I depend on my dual monitors while I was working from home. My home office has a single monitor. I really could not do my job that way. I actually ended up bringing in my laptop and having it set up next to the desktop computer at home, so that I could have the information I needed up.

Ever since then, I have been coveting an actual second monitor, which would really mean buying C a pretty new monitor (and CostCo has a gorgeous one at an amazing price), and then me taking one of his old ones. We have not done that yet, but if it looks like working from home will be on the horizon again anytime soon, it will be.

Gratitude Entry #10 – Routine

I know that from where you are sitting, reading this blog, it does not look like I am fully back in the routine yet. (I am working on it.), routine is really important in my life. With advanced planning, like when going on vacation, I function alright not being in my routine, but when routine changes hit last minute, like they did with all of the snow days, it really throws me off. I really was not lying in the last post when I talked about my executive functioning being reduced due to the lack of routine. Seriously, I had difficulty getting myself to shower during the extended time at home.

So this week, the only week of the month (and not even the full week is in the month) where I work all five days, I am grateful for my routine.

Gratitude Entry #11 – Video Phone Calls

On some level, I feel like this entry should get it’s own post, but thinking that is part of what kept me behind. As I have mentioned before, Pop Tart no longer lives with us. In fact, she lives a few hours drive away, and I do not see her as often as I would like. (Which, honestly, as often as I would like would have her living at home again, and that is just not in the cards.) But, we see each other when it makes sense in the schedules, and we have regular video phone calls.

When I was a kid, video phone calls were in the realm of the Jetsons and science fiction. The fact that we all can easily do video phone calls from our phones, without any special software, or paying an arm and a leg, is just amazing to me. Plus, those calls let me see my kid, let her show me around her room, so that I can see new decorations, whatever new toy she bought for her Guinea pig, etc.

Video calls are the best thing ever on so many days.

Gratitude Entry #12 – Glasses Frames that do not go out of Style

Around midnight Sunday night, C woke me up to ask if I knew where the super glue was. His glasses frames had broken. He has not gotten new glasses for over 5 years, so it is not surprising they broke. But here is the issue, C is blind beyond 5” in front of his face without his glasses. I mean, he can see colors and general shapes, but he is not safe to drive, or even good at functioning outside of the house without his glasses.

And this means that any thing involved in getting him new glasses has to include me. I spent Monday calling around to find out if his glasses Rx was still even good (which it was, but only for a few more months), and trying to figure out the plan for the week if he could not get new glasses until this weekend.

I left work early and off we went to CostCo (because getting glasses at CostCo and paying for them ourselves is cheaper than using our insurance benefit, even though we have great insurance). While we were looking at frames, we realized they had his exact same pair – the pair he bought 5 years ago. So many things go in and out of style, that I really had not expected this, but there they were.

The CostCo optician was able to take the lenses from his current (broken) glasses frame and put them in the new frame, and bingo, he had glasses again less than 24 hours after breaking his frames.

He still probably needs to get new lenses (these are 5 years old), but now it can be done in his own time, without me having to take time off work to make it all happen.

So yeah, definitely grateful for those plain wire frames that do not go out of style.