Nit-Picking :-)

Do you ever have one of those days when a whole lot of "little" things go wrong and they add up so you're thoroughly demoralized like I was earlier today :-) How do you get yourself back in a better frame of mind?

One of my courses I'm taking this summer is really horrible so far and so I told the instructors :-) but that hasn't really made me feel better, maybe even a little worse as they'll read it and respond and it's a bit embarrassing/personal, etc. and you know how you wonder if you said too much or were too direct, etc.? Like that. Then I got another e-mail from a volunteer coordinator telling me what a great job I was doing and how impressed she was, yada, yada but would I be so kind as to stop doing ________ as it might confuse people. But that embarrassed me as there are lots of volunteers and I'm thinking they'll "notice" and who knows who complained, etc. (probably other administrators taking part, I might have stepped on their toes :-) and then I got a third e-mail (see if I open my e-mail anymore!) about a panel I said I'd love to be on and they're going to call me next Wednesday on the phone and TALK to me before they pick the panelists they want and I suck on the phone so I'm already anxious about that.

Anyway, I tackled the course being crummy and wasn't getting any sympathy or understanding from my husband but there's a guy in the course with whom I was in another course a year or so ago and we enjoyed working together so I thought to e-mail him and ask how he was doing and finding the course and he replied with a nice e-mail confirming some of what I'd said and that made me feel better. But I had a nice surprise too, with the volunteer job (it's wholly online) I got an email from another volunteer who said she'd read my posts and my biography and we had a lot in common, etc., especially our interest in genealogy so we e-mailed back and forth a bit about that and then I went to look her up and her intro/biography and it turns out she's a graduate of the same program I'm taking! So, I asked her about the crummy course and she said it's really bad and she almost dropped out of the program because of it but that the other courses are better. Whew, I almost feel completely better.

Now, I have to figure out how to prepare for the phone call next Wednesday. I can't find my initial e-mail I sent so I have no clue what I said about myself/background!

Perna, i've always been so impressed with how caring and supportive you are......and your resilience is so great! you can do this......xoxoxo pat