I'd have a nervous breakdown if I could only find the time

{Keep reading--it gets way better after a few paragraphs of this garbage.}

As usual my desk is covered with papers that need to be dealt with. Either filed, trashed, calendared, or taken to the grocery store. There are about 15 cards that need personal handwritten notes, envelopes, addresses, and stamps. There are bills to pay, coupons to put somewhere, to do/go/get lists, and of course all my little scribblings. Scattered and piled on top of all this is work I need to be doing. Letters to write, letters to read, phone calls to return, phone calls to make, research done or to be done, and ideas for an out-of-control seminar presentation I should have finished day before yesterday. As soon as I get the desk organized, in the time it takes me to surf the Internet for a time-management wonder drug, it looks like a paper recycling dumpster has exploded. My desk is also currently sporting a burning candle. Dangerous, I know. But I'm living on the edge here. The edge of a nervous breakdown.

I don't know how to prioritize. I know that you eat the elephant one bite at a time; I just never know where to bite first. I've heard you should do the most important things first, but they are all important. I've heard that you should do the small things first, but then the big things seem even bigger. I've heard that you should do the big things first, but then the little ones will never get done. I've heard that you should do the things you dread most first, but I think I dread them all equally. So I get overwhelmed and freeze up. Then I spend an hour blogging.

All this to say, I am burning my candle at both ends, I have too much on my plate, and I'm in over my head. I have too many irons in the fire, and too many fires to put out. I have too many loose ends to tie, demands to deny, mistakes to justify, needs to satisfy, and tears to cry.

I had a whole Saturday today to try again to get on top of things, but all I managed to do was get my eyebrows waxed and spend too much money at the outlet mall. I knew I was wasting time. My nervous stomach and the still, small voice of reason could scarcely be heard over my determination to find my size in the racks and racks and shelves and shelves of low rise long and lean cut jeans at The Gap. I'm sorry, but they were on sale for $15. Sixty dollars worth of remorse later, I punished myself by steering clear of Pottery Barn and passing Starbucks by as if it were a foreign, inconsequential stranger.

So here I sit at 5:30 p.m. Too late to start over now. I would say I'd start over tomorrow, but tomorrow is already full. That pushes me to Monday. A whole new week to work on heading off my implosion.

Now, finally to the reason I sat down to write today. It is my father's birthday. He would be 66. Yesterday, I knew today would be the 29th, but when I saw the date in the bright, compassionless digital lights of my cell phone this morning, I had to cry. Two years ago on this day, my parents found out that my dad's melanoma had returned with a vengeance. We lost him just short of one month later. When he was first diagnosed, we knew we would be lucky to have him five more years. Turns out, we were blessed with those five years and enjoyed every one of them. He had tried to die on us several times before, so in a way, it came as no surprise that he finally went through with it.

Five days after his last birthday, I turned 40. I spent that day curled up next to him on the bed where my mother, sister, brother and I spent that precious month looking at pictures, remembering stories, laughing, and planning for the farewell. He wanted us to be sure to play some Kris Kristofferson and Willie Nelson. He wanted us to have Angelo's barbecue. He was grateful for his family and friends, and was pleasantly surprised that God gave him such a nice opportunity to say so. He was full of laughter. He was fearless. I miss him so much. When I turned 40 on that bed, I was painfully reminded that I was not a little girl anymore. No more safety net, no more of his strong hugs, no more anything like it was for my 40 years. Sometimes I still scream inside and shake my fist, but that's just part of the deal. If I hadn't loved him so much to begin with, I would never have been so sad. I don't think anyone would trade loving someone today to avoid any amount of pain they may endure to let them go tomorrow.

I'll have to post the eulogy I wrote. In my never so humble opinion, it was one of the best things I have ever written. I'm good at eulogies.