Do you ever grow tired of the mundane, sometimes monotonous, day-to-day life of routine? Who doesn’t?
I leave my bed each morning, always about 7 a.m., and go straight to the bathroom, then to my kitchen, turn on my oven, make the coffee, all in that order, and then sit down with my husband and have breakfast, usually the same food, and then continue to carry on my repetitive, echoing routine of the day.
There is rarely any departure from the day-to-day chores that I repeat on any given day. But then, when an anomaly happens, I am totally thrown out of whack for the remainder of the day. I truly love being a creature of habit.
If we have a doctor’s appointment, I always want to cancel. Salon appointment, cancel. Grocery store trip. We have enough food to last a few more days. I was reading a comic strip the other day and it showed an old lady saying, “I’m always excited about going out to a social until I realize I have to get dressed.”
I can easily remember if I was asked to go out to lunch, I could hardly wait for the appointed time to arrive. My husband would ask me to ride with him to one of the stores and I was in the vehicle before he opened the door. I have always loved to work in my flower beds, but now I hardly see the weeds. Just give me a good book, a cup of coffee, maybe a blanket and my rocker and I am so contented.
Why am I this way? I am lazy! I cannot attribute this feeling to age because if it’s something I really want to do or somewhere I really want to go, I am off “to the races.” I just need some motivation.
On the days our little Emmie Jo, 3 years old, comes to visit, I love to play outside, and she helps me pull weeds. I love pulling up the wild onions and weeds with her. If my husband suggests going out to supper, yeah, I’m ready. No cooking tonight. Or if my daughter wants to go shopping, I can get dressed rather quickly. I have my motivation.
Pondering these things, I realize that we all become so set in our ways. We love the mundane, the routine of every day, and the humdrum of our ordered lives. I don’t know if I have stepped on a toe of any of you, but for myself I am going to try to find something that motivates, energizes and even provokes my life into more wonders, that takes me by surprise or staggers me into the extraordinary. I don’t want to miss one minute of my stretch of time.
I needed a quick dessert the other night and decided to do some “throwing together” and the following is what I came up with.
Apple Cake
One box of spice cake mix
1 package of vanilla instant pudding mix
4 eggs
1 cup of milk
1 stick of butter
Bake for 55 minutes in a tube pan. I divide mine into two loaf pans as we never eat the entire big cake. I freeze one for another time.
Icing: 2 cups of powdered sugar, 3-4 tablespoons of melted butter, 2 teaspoons cinnamon. Half this icing recipe for the two loaf cakes.
