What to say

My life is consumed by potty-training. This does not make for good blogging. I don't want to go into details (my poor family has been getting very detailed emails about everything). I don't have much else to say! I am reminded of how I felt when Rachel and Owen were tiny. I never left the house during the day unless I absolutely had to because it either messed up feeding times or naptime and it just wasn't worth the hassle. Once again, I'm home and we're not even going outside to play because they'd have to put on pants. I think it's getting to me though. I need to get out more - either outside during the day or at night for a little bit.

So, what else is there to say? I did read two really good books a couple weeks ago. One was The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and the other was Look Me In the Eye by John Robinson. The first was our book club selection for this month and the second was on my shelf at home and looked interesting. It was kind of funny how they were both memoirs and both so different and yet similar in some ways.

Randy Pausch found out he was dying from cancer and wanted to give one last lecture. He decided to also make it for his kids, who were fairly young, so they would have something to remember him by when they were older and would know what he thought was important. He had a very upbeat, positive attitude and worked hard to fulfill many of his dreams. He talked about how great his parents were and how much of an impact that had on his life. He encouraged others to develop good people skills and learn to work in group settings to be successful. He also emphasized caring for others and not things.

John Robinson had just about the opposite childhood. His father was an alcoholic who abused him. His mom had mental problems and would see things that weren't there. He was on his own a lot and learned to take care of himself at a very young age. He wasn't socially accepted and never knew what to do or say in social situations. The one thing he had going for him was that he was incredibly smart and taught himself about electronics and amplifiers. At one point he was creating special effects for guitars for KISS. After a series of others jobs, he started his own business repairing certain cars. It was at this point that he discovered he had Asperger's, a type of autism. He finally knew why he had trouble with social conversations and had to work so hard to respond acceptably to others. The interesting thing is that he stayed away from group situations and had horrible people skills but still was successful in life. He had dozens of excuses to not succeed but he didn't let any of those stop him.

Both of those books made me think about what my dreams and goals were and what excuses I am using to keep those from fulfilling them. So often, the only one standing in the way of what we want is ourselves. And maybe I won't be able to fulfill all of them but I don't want to say it's because I didn't try or gave up.