Just discovered I’m a control freak – but a very quiet one (what kind of animal would that be?).

 

By quiet control freak, what I mean is I typically just handle details myself. I noticed this pattern  shoveling snow this morning. I noticed unplowed areas that would be treacherous underfoot as the snow melted and iced over – places we walked back and forth to the front door, between the wood pile and parked cars – ‘Ooh, scary!’ So I added that to the shoveling chores.

 

But my winter cold sapped my intent and sent me indoors, unfulfilled in my control-freakness – but aware for the first time how unreasonable I am by comparison to less controlling creatures.

 

I have neighbors who don’t deal with icy snow at all. They just walk through it year after year and put up with it. That always bothered me. A lot.

 

But the huge relief I felt leaving the icing snow in place and relaxing by the fire has just shown me how invested I was in a “snow” paradigm that has exact rules about snow and ice and winter in general – to be “safe”.

 

All I can say is wow.

 

I know now I got this virus being control-freak-personified when my husband’s family came for a ski week. Now seeing how quietly controlled I have been all my life, it’s a wonder I haven’t killed myself with my absolutes and have-tos relating to holidays and “family.”

 

I’m grateful to discover this, even so late in life. It will add immeasurably to the quality and maybe quantity of my life – and for sure add to the FUN!

 

Life really is a wonderful teacher, even if the student doesn’t know what’s going on.

 

Note: Jan. 29 – I couldn’t decide on a control-freak animal, so I finally opted for the result of the transformation: from being unconscious to conscious of the control-freaking tendencies, and the beauty of that new state of awareness. Thus, the larvae becomes the butterfly. It only took 22 days. Nice.