avoiding misery lane

It's been a while. Things have changed.  The position that was wonderful ended, as I knew it would, but so far nothing has come after it.

Well, okay, not nothing.  I've done things.  I deep cleaned my bathroom, I went through all my jeans and got rid of half of them.  I have so many boxes of clothes to get rid of, and a porch I haven't yet cleaned.  I mowed and repaired a ton of stuff at my partner's house, and deep cleaned the hell out of it. I put a hand rail on the wall by myself.  I'm pretty proud.  It's about the most I've done in...well, it's been months now.

Nothing has materialized, outside of the dregs of employment.  Oh sure, I had an offer last week--from a sketchy place that was essentially a telemarketing firm that now operated through email a few blocks too far into the bad part of town.  I was sent there by an equally sketchy employment agency who unceremoniously told me, "Well if you don't take this job, I'd hate to see another two months go by and you still aren't working."

Ouch, lady.

What she failed to realize was that I haven't been working because I've been picky. I have to be. I'll be 36 next month and it weighs on me almost constantly.  I started doing mturk this week. Transcription and surveys, through Amazon.  I love typing, I love academia, and I love surveys.  My opinion is needed and willing to be compensated!  Every survey looks the same after a while, the same questions. My last year's salary?  Next to nothing; I was doing a term of service and okay with living in poverty.  

My age.  There's a seemingly infinite number of ways to sort ages demographically, and not all of them are pretty.  The nice ones lump 35 in with the mid 30s.  One I took the other day listed "35-44". Yikes.  Serious numbers, right there.  Heavy numbers.  Burdensome, almost.

So age weighs on me.  My lumbering, silent but lethal giant named "student loan debt" lurks in the background, breathing.  Heavily.  I was fortunate enough to earn an education award at the end of my term of service.  I don't remember exactly how much it is.  I haven't bothered to look because it would be like trying to fill a lake with a thimble.  It's a nice sentiment, but certainly not going to appease the sleeping beast--and why I've tried so hard to cling to staying in non-profit.  Six words are my hopeful savior:

The Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program.

The Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Program forgives the remaining balance on your Direct Loans after you have made 120 qualifying monthly payments under a qualifying repayment plan while working full-time for a qualifying employer. 

To sound, as the parlance of our times would say, like a basic white girl (what even IS that?): I CAN'T EVEN.

Qualifying employment for the PSLF Program is not about the specific job that you do for your employer. Rather, it is about who your employer is. Employment with the following types of organizations qualifies for PSLF:

• Government organizations at any level (federal, state, local, or tribal)
• Not-for-profit organizations that are tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code
• Other types of not-for-profit organizations that provide certain types of qualifying public services

Serving in a full-time AmeriCorps or Peace Corps position also counts as qualifying employment for the PSLF Program.

I mean honestly.  HONESTLY!!  The only thing that will slay that suffocating beast once and for all, since as I have often quipped to people, "I'll be dead twice over before I'd ever be able to pay it off myself."  (It's a lot.)

So no, surly woman from the sketchy temp agency, your idle threats are not enough to get me to cave and work for the pittance your client demands.  I love typing--but sure as hell not that much.Options get a bit limited at this point.  Okay, they are really limited and I am running out of time. I have fought and scratched and kicked and screamed like hell because I absolutely, positively, under no circumstances want to go back to retail.  At all.  Ever.  Period.  Unless I have to.This has brought forth varying well meaning but largely uninformed comments from people who (I know truly do) care about me--and I know they care because when I was in a serious funk the other night and poured it all out, they were there for me.  


Side note--I used to feel bad about talking about my emotions and struggles.  I used to think I should always try to be a model person so as not to make myself stand out from more "normal" people.  Even though I know this to be a foolish and false truth, the stigma is there.  I've taken some inspiration from Daniel P. Finney, who has been sharing his journey with weight loss and the mental health issues that surround it.  He will undoubtedly feel awkward if I tell him about this shout out, but I had to stop and say that if he can write about it for a newspaper with the circulation size of the The Des Moines Register, what's to say I can't get a little blue in a Facebook post?


Anyway, I'm stubbornly trying to stay out of retail for the following very valid reasons:

• I'm getting too old for this shit.  No, really.  Time is fleeting.  I don't just feel that when I fill out surveys.  I feel it in my body more these days, when I can't sit a certain way the same way I used to be able to.  My (amazing, destined for sainthood) partner of ten (up, down, backwards, sideways, crazy) years has frequently told me this.  He's older than me, he always has been, but I see both of us getting older now.  He kept telling me this would happen someday.  He was right. (he usually is)  Time is fleeting.  I'm getting too old for this shit, too old to work somewhere where I get nowhere.

• I got so incredibly far off track the last time I got into retail I'm not even remotely close to getting back to where I started.  I started at Starbucks what seems like an eternity ago, in 2010, after taking what I thought would be a temporary break from my master's work. (helpful note: try to take some time off between undergrad and grad school, lest you burn out at your own risk)  I had only planned on being there a short time; I was there a month shy of FOUR YEARS.  Four years where I got so completely behind and off track from my work that I don't even know if I'm anywhere near finishing my degree now at this point.  I took the job and I got sucked in, and it was okay, for a while.  Then things sort of went to pieces in our relationship, and I moved out of my partner's house. (Yes, we put a lot of work into things and managed to turn the ship around.  I know, we're amazing.)  It then became a way to survive, as I was the only one supporting me--finishing my degree wasn't even possible at that point.  It wasn't possibly logistically, financially, and one more point, probably most importantly...

• Retail made me a terrible person.  An awful, negative, spiteful, angry, vengeful person. I was a person that was Not Fun To Be Around.  I didn't like myself much, which sure didn't help.  It's funny, I ended up being probably the most positive and encouraging person in our Public Allies class because I completely LOVED NOT being that Horrible Person anymore.  That, and I was trying like hell to make sure people didn't make the mistakes I made.  Now that time and panic have set in, I see that person creeping back and that person is not who I want to be.  I was in such dire straits then.  Every minute I wasn't at work I dreaded going and every minute I was there I longed to be anywhere else.  The days I was home were never enough to try to rebuild myself enough to face another work day.  I attempted to cope in productive and non-productive ways and methods, not all of which were good or bad.  I hated life, I hated everything, I hated where my life was going, I hated how truly terrible of a situation I ended up finding myself in. 

My dear partner: "You liked working there!"  To some extent, yes, indeed I did. But ultimately not a large enough extent to make it remotely worth it.  I hesitate to think what might have happened to me had I not been "fortunate" enough to have a complete mental break down at work (oh, and nobody really cared much or showed any compassion to me about it, AND I got written up for it because someone essentially got his "feelings hurt". LOL, okay buddy, try being in my shoes?) and come home fed up enough to comb through Craigslist to find something, ANYTHING that wasn't this dark hole of an existence I was in.  It took six long, agonizing weeks of bothering the lovely person who ultimately became my program manager, but I finally found my ladder out.  Yes. Public service, here I come.

Of course my sadistic manager had not only driven me to the brink, but she had also driven away four other long term partners (what we were called there) away, people who had been there four, five, six, and seven years with the company.  She was silently expecting me to fill their shoes, instead I drop new availability on her--I'm going part-time!  Your punching bag will be here no more to deal with your incompetent BS anymore!

...of course she found a big enough loophole to "separate" me, and two months before most of my stock grants fully vested.  Now THAT, I still have reason to be bitter for...mostly because I'd fully intended to quit December 1st, after that happened.  But anyway.  I did fight it, just because it was BS and because I'd had such a long standing case open with Partner Resources anyway (going back into July, and I was separated on September 5th, one month short of my four year anniversary with the company) because the store was Just That Terrible.  Ultimately, my intended result didn't happen--she's still there, and another person has reached out to me to give me the unsurprising news that she is the new target of my old manager's scorn.  I gave them enough ammo, they should have had plenty to fire with.  I think there are reasons why it didn't happen, I'm uncomfortable with those reasons, but it is what it is.

...given all that, I don't think I can find it in myself to do anything like that again.  Not even so much because of the circumstances, though that was certainly out of the ordinary. No, it's because I know myself, and my predilections and my emotional capability, and because I promised myself if I ever got out of that situation alive, that I would never, ever, EVER let myself get into that situation again.  I don't break promises easily, not even to myself.

Again, my saintly partner (except I don't think he can get sainthood with his actual name, so that might not be an actual option): "I want you to be happy and hate it when you're not."  Which really brings up another point I guess I almost forgot to make.

• I have been an unequal partner in my relationship for most of it.  Yes, I realize relationships are not equal by their very nature.  I get that.  However, it's been pretty lop-sided for a pretty long time.  I want to balance things out.  Not even just in that relationship, but all of mine.  My parents, my brother and his kids, my partner's family...everyone I know!  I want to be doing much, much more than I am right now and that takes time and money, two of which there is very little of in retail.  For the record, there's no pressure from anyone but myself about this issue, just a bunch of old fashioned guilt and humbleness and gratitude and wanting to return the favor, you know?

Anyway...a lot of you wrote very nice things the other day which I haven't read just yet because I was pretty emotional when I posted and I'm not quite ready to read all of them right now.  Thank you for that, though--it means a lot.

I suppose I'm at a point where I have few other options left, but the TL;DR really is: I don't want to, and I have very valid reasons for not doing so, and if I do, it is because I have literally no other options left.  For now, the job search continues, and the HITs do on Mechanical Turk do as well.

a herd of turtles stampeding through peanut butter.

Things are slow for me right now.  As in s-l-o-w.  S.  L.  O.  W.

S.
L.
O.
W.

But I digress.

Truthfully, it isn't so much that things are slow as it is other people are slow...by my standards at least.  In all fairness, I've only got a couple of things on my plate, some of which are growing colder and congealing.  Meanwhile, the people I'm dealing with have seven course buffets to contend with. That's super.

I'm trying to stay busy, but at the same time, I'm super restless.  I really shouldn't complain, but I just want to be doing more than I am.  It will happen eventually...but now would be nice.

my modus operandi from here on out.

I have to get this off my chest.  This is long, but it would do you good to read it through to the end.

When I was at Public Allies training last week, one of the things we did was to create life maps to share our unique life experiences with the rest of the group, and talk about what our future goals and plans were.  It was very enlightening and powerful to hear others share their stories, good and bad, happy and sad.

In the last few days, it has given me much to think about and reflect on about the things I have said, and the choices I have previously made when it comes to relating and interacting and thinking about others.  It deepened and renewed my way of thinking and my commitment to what I am doing with Public Allies, the work that I am doing at Operation Threshold, and the work I hope to do after my placement.  Before I go much further on this path, I feel that I need to say this--and I only want to say this once, so let me be clear.

• I have many friends of both sexes and genders.  
• I have Asian, African-American, Hispanic, Indian friends.  
• I have friends who have been sexually assaulted.  
• I have lesbian, gay, transgender friends.  
• I have friends who are disabled, either physically or mentally, or both.  
• I have Christian, Muslim, Jewish, and atheist friends.  
• I have friends of many different cultures, ethnicities, and nationalities.  
• I have friends from many socioeconomic backgrounds.  

You get the idea.

Not only do I have friends like that...

• I also have co-workers who have some of those characteristics.  
• I work with teenagers who also have some of those characteristics.  
• Some of my fellow Allies also have those characteristics.  
• After my placement and term with Public Allies is over, I hope to keep working with many diverse people and populations who will have those characteristics as well.  

I have found tremendous satisfaction and a renewed sense of purpose in doing this kind of work.  I am a happier, more positive person.  My life has been infinitely changed for the better.

These people I have mentioned, and others like them, have all experienced harassment, prejudice, hatred, and discrimination because of those things that make them unique and make them special, valued people to myself and others.

And so, in that regard, I say this: from this point going forward, I will no longer tolerate nor participate in ANY form of hate speech, action, or thought that comes at their, or anyone else's expense.

It's not humorous, not a joke, not just kidding around.  It perpetuates the problem and ignores the solution.  It shows a lack of humanity and empathy.  It makes you look unintelligent.  It spreads hate and fear and ignorance.  It breaks our society, our community, our world apart when we should be coming together.  It reinforces negative stereotypes that for the most part, I have found simply aren't true. It is degrading, demeaning, dehumanizing, and WRONG.

If you don't understand this, or you don’t think it is a big deal, or don't see how those words and actions are part the problem and not the solution, or you want to give me any number of excuses, I will set you straight--if I didn't, I would be doing a serious disservice to the people I serve and care about. I'm sure the friends I've mentioned can help set you straight as well if need be.

I have largely already lived my life in this way, but there have previously been times where I was negatively influenced by others in this regard.  I now see the power of my words, thoughts, and actions.  I'm not going to dwell on it or live in the past, but I apologize to anyone I have wronged, and I will take it for the learning experience that it is.

Here is where I draw my line in the sand and say "no more".  I'm not going to put up with it--and neither should you.

It's 2015; this shouldn't even be an issue anymore--but it is.  The only way to stop it is to remember this:  We are all human.  We laugh, we cry, we think, we bleed, we feel, we love, we live.

We all are in this together.  Let's act like it, shall we?

out of my mind, back in ten minutes (I hope)

There's no point in being less than forthright and no shame in being honest: this has been a rough 2015 for me already.  Friends, to be real deal Holyfield, I'm having a bit of a mid-life crisis, first suspected and researched online, then discussed with and confirmed by my therapist.  I've become insanely, acutely aware of what I have, but mostly what I have not yet done with my life.  I second guess and doubt everything I am going to do or have thought of doing or need to do.  I'm having terrific anxiety about what I'm going to be doing after my placement, which gives me anxiety about what I am doing now, and then I worry about that.  I can't say there isn't any aspect of my life that I have not questioned or second guessed or fruitlessly thought about changing in some way or another.

Coupled with the traditional Iowa winter blues, and a nice healthy dose of "someone f*cked up my prescription renewal so I haven't had some of my medication for almost two weeks now" I am in a weird place.  I don't wish myself any harm or ill-will, but I am about ready to plan a "I've got my meds back and I'm feeling fan-freaking-tastic" party and I feel very much like I am not all there right now.

Food doesn't sound good.  This is not good.  I need to keep eating.  I have been pushing myself to eat for days now.  Hunger as a concept no longer exists.
I am almost constantly sleepy.  I think I could sleep for days.
I am also almost constantly jittery. So laying down to sleep...still not easy.
Yesterday I found myself laughing at something that wasn't even funny.  Literally not funny.  I just couldn't stop laughing at it.
I feel like I am in a constant fog.
If you ever saw the Futurama episode Time Keeps On Slipping, that's also going on.  I feel like I blink and suddenly 20 minutes or so is missing.
I keep getting off and on headaches.

All in all, this is not as a whole terrible.  But I can tell you...it's Not Very Good At All.  I just don't feel like I'm always in my body and that's a very discombobulating feeling.  And a very isolating, panic inducing feeling.  I feel Very Alone, but at the same time, since I do feel so out of it, I don't like to burden others with it.  So I am Very Alone, but for everyone's own good.

I was nice to myself today.  I was going to get up early (after being up far too late, sleep schedule is an issue right now too) and Get Things Done, but even with my most obnoxious captcha necessary to turn off alarm, that didn't happen, and I spent the day mostly in bed, just watching TV and the Internet and basically being a zombie...

No regrets.  Hopefully it makes tomorrow better.

Three meetings on Wednesday, then two days away at training.  Please hope for the best.  I could use it.

Sexism? In my office? In my Internet? It's more likely than you think.

Originally this blog post was going to be a little one dimensional, but I have an interesting new angle on it!  (I've been sitting on this for a while, just hadn't gotten around to writing it.)

I'm also going to throw a content warning here for language, but it's necessary in this case.
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Let's be honest, everyone--we all waste time at work online. (I am right now, writing this!) Sometimes you just need a break, you know?  Clear your head, learn about the world around you, goof off, whatever.  Internet in healthy doses=good.

I'm pretty careful and respectful of what I'm browsing at work.  I'm not really one to look at anything that would land me in any sort of trouble in OR outside of work...well, as far as I was aware of, that is.

A bit of backstory if you aren't aware: Gawker, Jezebel, Deadspin, Lifehacker, io9, and a whole bunch of other websites are all under the umbrella of the same company.  They all offer something vastly different that I find interesting:
Gawker has news (usually).
Jezebel has women's and feminist news.
Deadspin has sports, with a snarky twist.
Lifehacker has life tips. (duh)
io9 has interesting science-y stuff.

They all typically link to each other (and the other blogs I don't normally read) so usually I'll click on a link from Facebook for an article, but sometimes I will click on something from another site.

A while back, I saw an interesting looking article on Facebook from Jezebel, and I clicked on it. Immediately the page redirected to screen that said the article was blocked because of content.  Okay, I didn't think the article I clicked on was that provocative, but I closed the tab, made a mental note of it, and moved on.  Clicked on a link from Deadspin, and it opened just fine--despite part of the article title using the word "fuck".

Hmmmm.  O...k...interesting.  I read the article, saw a link somewhere in that article to a different link on Jezebel.  Click on that.  Nope, same page.  Now it's getting frustrating.  I open a new tab and try to go straight to Jezebel itself.  Nada.  Blocked.

I thought I'd try another site about women's interests and issues--Jane XO.  Nope.  Blocked too. I thought "okay, I'll just look at it on my phone", but forgot I'd connected IT to the internet, too.  No dice, blocked.

I didn't inquire into the matter further (I'm really not here to be surfing the web for long durations anyway), but REALLY??  Apparently it's perfectly FINE for me to look at a sports website that sprinkles the word "fuck" in its articles like you'd sprinkle pepper on a steak, but an article about relationships or sex or Hollywood, that's apparently NOT okay.  Near as I can tell, the entire website has been blocked just because of SOME of the content.

I'm not necessarily one of those women who is on a tirade or crusade for justice in equality (it's nice, but COME ON.  Really?  REALLY??  There's no good reason for that that I can see.

On the flip side, something that happened to me yesterday reaffirmed the concept of , as James Brown would put it, it's a man's man's man's world--and apparently, especially on the Internet.

Yesterday there was a fairly popular reddit post (by the way, I LOVE reddit) of some pictures taken in downtown Cedar Falls.  One of the people interacting with the original poster mentioned something about how he plows in Waterloo.  I made an off hand joke about "could you plow for a really really broke person?" and he responded and said yeah sure, as long as I talk about his business. Initially, I told him he really didn't need to, because I literally have no driveway, just a parking spot with about six feet between the spot and the street.  Once I remembered that I had almost gotten stuck yesterday morning, I changed my mind.

I gave him my address, and my work phone number (just in case!) and waited.  He called, I answered, and I could tell I COMPLETELY threw him off.  For one, the location of my parking spot in relation to my house is weird--I live on a corner, my address is one street, but I have to use the other street to turn into my spot--and THAT street is a one way street!  Anyway, I gave him enough of a description so he figured it out, but in regards to the phone call, as he was trying to make sense of the call, I said "reddit?" and he said YEAH! and that cleared things up.

BUT.

I got home, he did a great job, and said he plows near there and if it snows again he'll swing by and plow me again. (it really is the smallest plow job ever, but it sure saved me the trouble).  He also sent me this after I thanked him:

You're welcome random reddit lady who I assumed would be a dude because there aren't any girls on the internet.

Hmmmm.  Okay.  Obviously, I'm a girl (woman) on the Internet, but I am also somewhat socially awkward.  I wrote back and said:

Ha! That's comedy. No wonder you were so confused when I answered. We're just as socially awkward as guys!

To which I got back:

Haha yeah I was like um awesome some guy sent me to get robbed with a fake phone number lmao

Uhh...okay.  Interesting.

Now I'm not going to throw this guy under the bus at ALL.  He did a great job, and he TOTALLY didn't have to do that for me at ALL.  It's really nice to know that good people like that are still out there.  But I KNOW he's not the only one that has that mindset, that there aren't any "girls" on the internet.

I can't find demographic breakdowns for the site as a whole, but I know there's a fairly sizeable female population! Two subreddits that I subscribe to have over 250,000 subscribers--and they are makeup subreddits, so odds are pretty good that it's mostly women.

Granted, one of the top subreddits, funny, has over seven million subscribers, but either way...it's not a SMALL population out there.

Apparently James Brown was right...but I sure hope it's not that way forever.

Buckle up, baby! It's s-no-w picnic out there!

It snowed!  I don't mind snow too much, I suppose.  It's the cold that gets me.  Ugh.  I start having vivid daydreams of moving south for the forever when it gets bitterly cold...shudder

But anyway, snow.

I LOVE DRIVING IN SNOW!!

I am crazy, I know.  I am also a bit of a risk taker, it seems. (One of my fellow Allies asked me on the way back from training once--"Are you a thrill seeker?")  By all appearances, I guess I am!

It snowed a good four to six inches here yesterday into last night, and I had no problem driving in it. Well, I won't say "no problem"--obviously driving in snow is no piece of cake, especially when the roads aren't plowed or aren't well plowed.  BUT...unlike most of the other morons out there, I know how to drive in the snow.  I'm not full of myself, but I DID grow up on a farm, and driving in the country in winter is a whole different game than in town.  I also had two parents, and at least one grandparent who had a fairly lengthy commute to work (over a half hour, not quite an hour).  Driving is in my blood at this point.

Why do I like driving in winter?  It's a challenge!  It's kind of fun to drive in the snow because it's the adult version of winter fun.  It's a warmer, albeit more dangerous version of sledding, if you do it right or wrong.  And honestly, it makes me a better driver.  Normal driving conditions are so automatic (especially now that I drive an automatic) so it sharpens my normally dormant super driving skills.

Therein lies the problem with other drivers though...these are not normal driving conditions.  And much like severe weather watches and warnings (that is for a whole OTHER blog entry, I tell you), people don't take that seriously.  Driving is a privilege, not a right.  And I take that seriously.  I think that's another reason I like winter driving--I have earned the privilege to do so, and I'm not gonna screw that up.

For all that is good and holy in this vast world of ours, if you are reading this, I hope you know how to drive in the winter.  But if you don't (and that's okay!), here's some tips to keep in mind from someone who has had some kind of license to operate a motor vehicle FOR OVER TWENTY YEARS. (holy crap, I am old.)

Don't speed.
This SHOULD be a no-brainer, but you'd be surprised at how many people act like the road conditions are fine and pass me like I'm standing still.  I drive slow when it snows.  I like driving slow when it snows and knowing that I'm being safer than the morons.  I'm not an idiot. Sometimes I probably drive slower than might be necessary, but I have NEVER been in a snow accident (ice, but that's not snow) and going under the speed limit helps up those odds.  Again: duh.  This should be common sense.  But...

For the love of God, yield to the plows.
Again, this should be a no-brainer.  If you collide with a plow or cause an accident with a plow, guess who wins?  The plow.  They're a whole lot larger (again, duh) and you're going to come out on the losing end of that stick. (this is not to say that plow drivers are entirely faultless, but size wise, you won't win that fight.) To that end, here's some super helpful tips from the Iowa DOT about mindful winter driving with plows.

http://www.iowadot.gov/maintenance/images/snowplowlg.jpg
http://www.iowadot.gov/maintenance/SafeTravelAroundSnowplows.pdf

TL;DR: plow drivers have big blind spots, and their field of vision is much less than in a car.  They're also traveling at a fairly slow rate of speed compared to other drivers (WHO SHOULD BE GOING SLOWER AS WELL)

Plan ahead: Give yourself extra time.
Get up earlier, leave earlier, whatever--and even if you end up running behind, better to be a little behind than a little bit in the ditch or median.

Always be mindful of your surroundings and what is ahead.
I know, there's a lot to focus on.  But if you are so focused on the road ahead, and you ignore the person in your right lane until you merge right into them, you're gonna have a bad time.  Similarly, pay attention to what is in front of you.  Don't tailgate--and you should be going slowly enough anyway that you wouldn't BE tailgating.  Again, if you are going slow enough, you should be able to anticipate anything up ahead with enough time to do something about it.

Don't gun it.  Slow and steady wins the race.
Especially going up hills and inclines--tempting though it may be, don't accelerate too quickly, or you're just going to spin out.  Now granted--sometimes that's kind of fun if you know how to do it. Whee!  I wouldn't do it if I didn't have all my years of driving under my belt, though.

In the same vein: don't gun it if you DO get stuck.
That's just going to get you MORE stuck.  Even going from forward to reverse repeatedly doesn't always do the trick.  Just try not to get stuck in the first place, and if you do...get help, don't try to push the thing out by yourself.  It is futile to even try!

If you start getting stuck, start gently turning your steering wheel back and forth.
I've gotten up many a slippery slope that way.  Slowly, but I got up there.  It's the steering

The "easier said than done" tip: RELAX.  Don't drive scared.
This one isn't such a no-brainer, and to be honest, it does come with time and practice. (I've only been driving about oh, 20 years or so now?  HOLY COW, I AM OLD.)  But seriously--if you drive white knuckled on the wheel, leaning forward in the seat, looking too quickly around you...you're going to set yourself up for an accident.  Or at the very least, you're really setting yourself up for the potential of an accident.  Now I'm not saying relax to the point where you're careless.  But don't drive scared.  If you are scared, you are tense, and when you are tense, you don't always make good decisions.  Shoot, at this point, I'm so good with driving that I will turn up the radio (when it is safe to do so, obviously) and that, oddly enough, helps keep me focused and grounded. (It's the AD/HD, I'm sure.)

Hopefully this is all old news to you and you're just wondering why I wrote a blog about winter driving--but hey, you read it! :-)  And if it can help anyone, pass it along, why not?

Stay safe out there, people!