Dreaming in Technicolor by Laura Jensen Walker Read Free Book Online

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    Except, of course, she wasn’t old. And could never, ever be considered crotchety. And she had the delicious George Peppard living in the apartment upstairs.
    My kitten, Herman, purred and rubbed against my leg.
    â€œBad timing, boy.”
    Noticing a drop of milk on his whiskers, I suddenly remembered the ice cream in the freezer. I grabbed the Ben and Jerry’s chocolate-chip cookie dough and started singing the mournful refrain “All by Myself.”
    How very Bridget Jones of you. Can you say cliché? Snap out of it! I told myself in Cher’s no-nonsense Moonstruck voice. With a decisive snap, I replaced the lid of the ice cream carton and shoved it back into the recesses of the freezer.
    Then my mother’s recessive housecleaning genes kicked in, along with some “Man! I Feel Like a Woman” pride: I’m not some lonely, pathetic thirty-something single woman drowning her sorrows in ice cream. I’m a strong, intelligent woman with a cute apartment and plenty of friends, who doesn’t need a man to make her complete. And besides, I do have a man. A wonderful man. He’s just not here at the moment.
    Popping in a little Avril Lavigne, I turned on my vacuum and ushered in the New Year wondering why things had to be so complicated.
    My mom always cleaned to Barry Manilow or Elvis, but I preferred contemporary pop or some of my eighties favorites. A little “Uptown Girl” always got me in the mood. Then I’d segue into my Flashdance soundtrack and really go to town.
    So with Avril and the vacuuming finished, I did just that.
    Determined to start the new year right, I began cleaning my closet. First, I color coded all my shoes in the stackable shoe hive my brother, Jordy, had built for me. And for those that didn’t fit and had to remain in boxes, I took photos of each pair with my cell phone, then printed them out and taped a photo to the outside of each box, so I’d know at a glance what nestled inside.
    Next I tackled my underwear drawer. In basic training, we’d been taught to fold our panties into equal thirds, but over the years I’d gotten a little lax. After refolding them, I color coded them all too. Then I arranged my hanging clothes in an orderly fashion—beginning with blazers, working through blouses and dresses, and winding up with pants and jeans, all organized by color, hangers spaced two fingers apart (another basic training must-do). I surveyed my clothing rainbow with satisfaction.
    Maybe things weren’t so complicated after all. I could handle this little bend in the road with Alex. In fact, maybe this time apart was a good thing. Could give me time to work on myself a little, become a better person so I’d have more to bring to the relationship.
    I could finally start going to the gym in Lodi, for instance. I pictured myself meeting Alex at the airport, all sleek and firm.
    Get real, whispering-thighs woman .
    And I’d been doing better with my money—cutting way back on the plastic—but I could do better with that. I really didn’t need this much stuff.
    That’s better. Put that on the list. Resolved: I’m going to be even more careful with my money.
    And I’d been meaning to get serious about spending more time in God’s Word and having a quiet time every day. That was important. If I wanted our relationship to have a solid foundation, didn’t I need a solid foundation myself?
    The more I thought about it, the more I really liked the idea—a new devotional routine for the new year.
    Note to self: Set alarm for six o’clock tomorrow morning in order to devote at least one full hour to prayer and scriptural meditation before getting ready for work.
    But wait. It was already tomorrow, and I didn’t have to go back to work until Monday.
    Note to self: Make that Monday morning.
    Satisfied with my resolutions and my clean apartment and my new, positive attitude, I finally took the