While she sleeps

Is there anything wrong about eating potato chips, a fried egg, and plain rice for breakfast? Blame in on my flu, but in combination together, it just tasted wonderful. I was able to tolerate a cup of medium strength coffee (yesterday was weak, and may have accounted for my headache later), and feel much more optimistic about the state of my health now that I know I can go take a shower while Lina sleeps. It’s funny to me that essential things, things like showering, get pushed aside when one’s children are small. Or maybe I’ve just gotten lazy and used to it, but it is not uncommon for three days to pass before a blinking light goes off that I can’t remember my last shower. This is horrible, for more than one reason, but doesn’t seem to bother anyone in my family because I stopped pleading for shower breaks a few months ago and no one noticed.
Something else of consequence has happened in our household (blame it on the full moon a few nights ago) because of a certain argument about money, again. Growing up in my family, we didn’t really openly discuss money unless it was to sit down and make a list for a pro/con-type-decision-making situation. In my husband’s family, every other word out of their mouth has a dollar figure in it (or should I say lira?). If someone goes to the grocery store, they ask about how much the groceries were. They ask about credit card bills. They talk about bus money and minus accounts and mortgages and school bills and how much clothing costs and how expensive vegetables at the bazaar costs and how much of a rip-off restaurants are because they are too expensive. Everything is either too expensive or not discussed at all. Whenever I point out the value of something pricey (buying this home appliance/pair of shoes/suit IS expensive, but outweighs buying a cheaper one that will breakdown or fall apart), they just shake their heads with disapproval. This is not to say that I care too much about it at this point. I have been indoctrinated into the family enough to care less about what they say about my purchases. The point is that my husband’s way of talking about money (openly, freely, with love), is the opposite of mine (closed, panicky, defensively) and once in a while we have fun, drawn-out arguments that last days.
Case in point two nights ago. Which gave me a lot to think about because for the first time it got through to me that my strategy wasn’t working. Though I have not been asked, I am going to do something I think nearly impossible: give full disclosure about spending to my hubby through the form of a little notebook with figures in it. I have to do it my way, of course. Spreadsheets are SO not my thing. And this little notebook is a token of my love because I agree that I am nasty when talking about money. I retreat into my little hole and don’t come out until I think the coast is clear. I am the only one responsible for this, and I’ve used up my free tokens for the argument that “Americans just think differently about money!” because clearly, it is more important to me that all things regarding finance happen more smoothly in our household than they have been.
Thus, a cute little notebook that I spent $3.99 on from Cartolina Cards via GreetQ. My first entry in the notebook is $13.46 for an eReader download this morning, thinking I would take a chance on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo because it seems everyone in Europe has been wild about it. But first I have to finish my compulsive reading of Julie & Julia, with which I have fallen in love, despite my misgivings. I will say that I am glad that I didn’t read it when it first came out in 2005, even though I’ve had it on my to-read list for that long. Because I had just married, because I abhorred cooking my first year in Turkey, and because reading the first few pages about a woman in the subway who was destructively mad totally turned me off, I thought I’d save it for later. I’m glad I saved it for now even though everyone else is reading it and watching the movie. I’m not opposed to mainstream fixations. Lately, I am delighted by mine.
Hopefully this tangent won’t get in the way of me taking my shower, the very first thing I had on my mind once Lina fell asleep. My apologies for the extra-long posts these days. For some reason, taking six weeks off from blogging has made me come back enthralled.
Happy weekend, everyone.