Last night the kids wanted to watch Night at the Museum…again [we already watched during Friday Family Movie Night]. Lee and I had no desire to watch it…again. We were settling down to watch Deja Vu. So Lee put Night at the Museum on upstairs in the family room and we watched our movie downstairs in the family room.

After a while Caleb came down to tell me Night at the Museum is kind of scary. I said, “We saw it in the theater and we watched it last night. This is the first time you’ve told me it’s scary.” He said, “The part where the caveman turns in to dust [there I just ruined the whole story for you with that tidbit ] is scary.”

I told him that part was over so he could go ahead and go back upstairs to watch the rest. And I thought he did just that.

It wasn’t until our movie was over and we were heading up to bed that I discovered he never made it back upstairs. As I turned the corner to go up the stairs this is what I saw:

Oh to be young again and be able to sleep wherever without waking up with a sore back and stiff neck.

*Please try to avert your eyes from the ugly maroon carpet. It wasn’t our choice. It came with the house.

Caleb’s birthday is in two weeks. I’m trying to be a little more proactive with his birthday than I was with Justis’ so I’m brainstorming invitation ideas. I decided to get a few photos of Caleb for the invite so I dragged him out in to the backyard to get some shots.*

Look at me preparing two weeks in advance. You know you’re impressed.

Preschool has asked for a baby picture of Caleb. I’m guessing it has something to do with Mother’s Day since they have a Mother’s Day program in two weeks. I haven’t decided which picture I’m going to send with him yet, but I’m having fun looking through old albums.

He’s come a long way in five years. My baby’s all grown up.

*It wasn’t until I pulled the pictures off the camera and on to my computer that I discovered I got a shot of myself in the process. You can clearly see my green shirt in Caleb’s eyes.

Over at Mother Talk they’ve declared today Fearless Friday in honor of Arianna Huffington’s new book On Becoming Fearless: …in Love, Work, and Life. The ladies are all talking about fearless moments in their life and it’s inspired me to talk about my fearless moment.

It’s actually quite timely that they would be having a Fearless Friday because on my way home from school on Wednesday I was thinking about how I didn’t used to be such a scaredy cat. When I was 18 I went off to college all by myself. Ok, so it’s not like I went far away. It was only 45 minutes from home, but I lived in the dorms with two other girls I had never met before.

When I was in high school I made plans to either live with Necole or Rachel. But by the time September rolled around neither Necole or Rachel were attending the same university so I had to go on my own.

Now I wasn’t at school very long. Only three weeks actually. But I didn’t drop out because I was scared. [There were other reasons I won't go in to now.] But in those three weeks I was on my own and making new friends. This was quite an accomplishment for me since I had spent most of my life as such a shy child. Finally, I was fearless.

But then as the years went on my anxieties increased. Now I don’t like to go to places I don’t know well. I obsess about all the things that can happen. When the parkade where I park at school is full, I have a mini anxiety attack because, oh my gosh, how will I ever find another place to park? And, as you know, I’m terrified to speak in front of groups.

Most people don’t fully understand my fear of public speaking [or parking or going to places unknown or having my channel on an odd number or....well you get the point]. My mom always tells me, “Everybody gets nervous. Just practice more. The more you practice the easier it gets.” No. No it doesn’t. In fact sometimes it’s worse. It just really depends on the day for me.

So Wednesday night I had a presentation at school. I joke about it, but it really is terrifying for me. I hardly slept the night before. I could feel the anxiety building all day long. It was raining that day so all the way to school I was thinking, “maybe one these cars on the interstate will spin out of control and hit me. Surely being in a car accident is a good excuse for missing the presentation.”

Once I got to school and got with my team I felt a little better. I have a great team this semester. The best team I’ve had in any of my classes since I’ve been back to school [this time]. But it still wasn’t enough to completely calm my nerves.

As I sat and waited for our first two team members to finish their part I eyeballed the door trying to determine how long it would take me to run to it and escape. Unfortunately I was on the complete opposite side of the room and I would have to hurdle over tables, peoples and possibly the podium to get to it. Surely somebody would tackle me and force me to present my part before I made it to the door.

Then I thought about the walk to the podium. Some genius decided to put the chairs on the other side of the room from the podium. This meant we had to walk the width of the room, directly in front of the projection screen to get to the podium. I had on heels. I hardly ever wear heels so it’s always hit and miss whether or not I’ll make it the whole day still standing or if I’ll end up flat on my butt. I was praying that I wouldn’t fall right in front of the class and the “experts” in the panel. I tried to come up with a snappy comeback in case I did fall. I decided to go with “this is why we aren’t worried that public transportation or walking will be much of a competitor to the Chevy Volt.”

Then it was my turn. I was so panic-stricken I could barely pull myself up out of the chair. But I took a deep breath, stood up and walked all the way over to the podium without falling. I stood at the podium and went through my slides. I had my speech memorized, but with my nerves I stumbled over my words a little. But I survived. I got the whole speech out and I even made eye contact with the crowd.

And then I was done. I walked back over to my chair without tripping over myself and sat down. My teammates whispered, “you did great” because like I told you this is the best group of kids I’ve ever worked with at the university. And like I said in my last post, I think our team was the best team [and I'm not just saying that because I'm part of the team].

As I drove home, I looked over at the dorm where I used to live…for three weeks…more than fifteen years ago, I thought about how fearless I used to be. And I thought “what if I had stayed in school? Would I not be the big pussy I am now?” Who knows? What I do know is I really, really, really did not want to give that speech, but I did it. I looked my fear in the eye and said “screw you.” Ok, maybe I wasn’t quite so aggressive with my fear. But I did it.

Baby steps, people. I’m getting there. Maybe by the time I’m 75 I’ll be able to give a speech without looking for the nearest exit. Of course by then there’d be no way I’d ever be able to hurdle tables and run for the door. Unless I get a rocket powered walker.

So where the heck have I been? Giving myself an ulcer. Yes, I had yet another speech tonight. Enough with the speeches people.

Let’s recap today.

This morning I went on a field trip with Spencer. THE field trip where the teachers decided to send Spencer’s class on one day and Skyler’s class on a different day.

I don’t think Spencer’s teacher likes me. How do I know? Because she always pairs me with the annoying kids. I got out of bed before 8am [that's twice in one week...I must really love Spencer ]. I didn’t sleep that well last night probably because I was having mini strokes over this stupid speech. So I was cranky. And I was in charge of Spencer and this other little boy who has WAY to much energy. He kept running all over the science station and yelling. I was so wishing for a shot of vodka.

Then we watched a movie about the deep sea at the IMAX. I am not a huge fan of the IMAX theater. The IMAX in the Museum of Natural History in NYC is just a very large screen, which isn’t too bad. Our IMAX theater is a huge doom with the screen all around you. And with a movie about the deep sea I was getting a little sea sick. At least Johnny Depp was narrating so I just closed my eyes and pretending like he was personally chatting with me. Of course, the fact that he was talking about predators in the sea was a little odd in my fantasy, but I’ll take what I can get.

Shortly before the movie ended Lee called me. My phone was on vibrate so it didn’t interrupt the movie or anything, but I was thinking Dude, why are you calling me when you know I’m at a movie? After I got in my car to head home I gave him a call. Apparently he was at Menards and had lost Caleb. By the time I called he had found him again, but it was scary there for a while. Lee said he was on the verge of tears and he never cries unless it’s a really sappy movie or our wedding.

And then I ended the day with my speech. I was really on edge all day because that’s how I am when I’m only hours from possibly humiliating myself in front of hundreds forty to fifty people. But by the time I got to school I was actually fairly relaxed. The team I have for this class is awesome. They really are a great bunch of young adults. I might be a little biased, but I think we had the best presentation out of the four groups who went tonight. We were presenting our marketing strategy for the Chevy Volt, which is an electric concept car Chevrolet is working on. We presented, not only to our class of forty students and our teacher, but also to a panel of eight marketing “experts.” The “experts” asked each team a bunch of questions following the presentations and they were pretty easy on us, even complimenting our ad copy and presentation style. So I feel good about it.

On my way home I almost stopped at Dairy Queen for some comfort food. But instead I decided to just get home to watch my Tivoed American Idol and Lost. [Because I am so not participating in that whole "no TV for the week" campaign. You all are crazy. We're getting to the end of the season. You're missing some of the best episodes of Lost, Grey's Anatomy and Brothers and Sisters. Ya'll are crazy. I say that in the most loving way. ] So anyway, back to Diary Queen. I didn’t stop, but when I got home I discovered that Lee had gone to Dairy Queen and got me a Blizzard because he figured I’d want some comfort food. That’s why I love this man so.

Somebody else I love is Mrs. Flinger. Leslie is so good to me. She nominated my little blog for a Bloggers Choice Award. I’m so honored. This must be how the celebrities feel on the day they find out they’ve been nominated for an Academy Award. Or maybe not.

I don’t want to pressure you, but if you are so inclined feel free to vote for me.

Well it’s been great catching up, but I have some TV to watch and some ice cream to eat so we’ll talk more later.