July 9

 Once again, it's July 9.  The pivotal day in our lives.  The day that Fiona died and Bob got his diagnosis.

I always associate it with this picture, taken 20 years before that pivotal day in 2019.  Bob and Fiona.  Now they're still together, and they've left me behind.

I usually give myself this day to mourn.  Sometimes I just go back to bed after taking care of everybody in the morning.  Sometimes I read, or just sit, or just be.  Take this day to stop living my double life, with an outside person bopping along, admiring little flowers, dancing to music, while there's a corner of me curled up and sobbing.

Unfortunately, I got text from my periodontist that I had to go pick up some medications in preparation for my surgery tomorrow.  At least while I was out I got myself some yogurt, cottage cheese, and ice cream for the next couple of days.

It's still just so frustrating.  I tried, I really did.  When you're young and in love, you don't think 30 or 40 years in the future.  But somewhere along the line, I realized that I came from a genetic line that had people lasting into their 90s, and Bob from a family that rarely made it to 80.

So.  I made sure that we ate well.  Good food, but healthy.  High on the good stuff, low on stuff like chips and soft drinks and desserts were for weekends.  We used to hike a lot - there are some nice trails just a few miles from the house.  When his knees started to give out (a problem with being larger than the average bear) I suggested that we get kayaks.  When he  discovered that the FSU intramural pool near the museum could be used by anyone, he suggested that on the days that I worked he could come by when I got off and we could go swimming for an hour.  Of course I said yes - but if I'm honest, after being on my feet working for four hours what I really wanted to do was eat something and collapse instead of swimming laps.  But swim we did.

He was one of the healthiest people to check into Shands hospital.  Weight reasonable (face it, he was big).  Lung capacity good.  Heart good.  Stamina good.  Blood pressure good.  Blood sugar good.  Whatever they could test, good.

Eat right.  Get proper sleep.  Exercise.

Die anyway.

Fuck July 9.

Six Month Summary

 Arrrrgh, another frustrating afternoon of technology.  I discovered that another victim of my switch to digital internet is that my wireless printer can't connect.  I don't print that often, so after a few hours of trying everything I just ordered a cable to connect it to my laptop.

Today I cleaned off my work table.  Rocky is officially finished.  I'll miss being that involved.  Hopefully I'll find another project.

Time for the 6 month 2026 summary, or What I Have Done So Far This Year.

My life sometimes feels like that as I walk along, the life behind me quietly crumbles away.  Sometimes I can't remember what I did this morning, much less in the last few months.  And if you were to ask me if I've done anything, I'd say "not much, really."  So it's good to look back and realize that I've done more than sit on the couch, scroll FaceBook, and wait until it's time to go to bed.

So I scanned my blogs so far this year, and there have been some things.  Starting with reading:  21 books so far, of wide ranging topics.

I've made some stuff:  A couple pairs of linen pants, the Forest Walk Shawl, a costume for the Ren Faire, and, of course, Rocky!  I was given a mountain (30+ pounds) of alpaca, which I washed, sorted, and mostly gave away.  I've spun some of it.

I started wearing Bob's ring, which still feels a little strange, like signifying that I'm now married to myself.  But it seems to have given me the strength to let go of things.  I finally did the paperwork for the jeep trailer to officially sell it to Rik (actually, I traded it for a sheep for the museum).  I had to gird my loins for that, because it was in his name, so I had to go down on the paperwork as "surviving spouse" and I hated that.

The kayaks are gone.  I had to admit that even my smaller one was too heavy for me to manage, and kayaking alone is, well, lonely.  Best that they go on to new lives.

The biggest heartache was giving up the jeep.  It will be cared for properly now, but that empty barn still twists me up inside.  With it went Bob's collection of GI water cans, and gas cans.   As long as things were going away, Rik came and got some of Bob's ammunition (enough to supply WWIII and the zombie apocalypse). The room is a bit emptier without those ammo cans.

I went to two plays:  The Play Goes Wrong, and The Midsummer Night's Dream.  I went to a card weaving class, and a drumming class.   I went to the Ren Faire.  I also gave  talk on wool to the Weaver's guild.

A couple out-of-the-ordinary things, like driving a couple of hundred miles to bring a young owl to museum, or helping to dig out a wolf's den.

I had the oral surgery to start my implant (with the next one being in a couple of days).  I also had the Reclast infusion for osteoporosis, which knocked me on my butt for a couple of days.

I finished the 1084 virtual walk of the length of England, and quit doing the walking challenges.  I did a total of five of them in a row, ranging from 100 miles to over 1000.  But it got to be a bit of a slog.  More than that - I kept track of my steps on my phone, and I was starting to feel like I was glued to it.  It's liberating to go check on the chickens, or get my mail, without remembering to grab my phone.

I did some upgrades.  I got a small TV for the cottage so that I could watch how-to videos (or, while working on Rocky, listen to interviews and behind-the-scenes).  I got a new CD player because my vintage one was having problems.  My TV in the house started getting vertical lines down the screen so I replaced it.  And I switched from cable to digital internet (not any better, but less than half the cost).  I got a new Alexa dot (because my old smart speaker couldn't talk to the digital internet)

I learned how to put hubcaps on a car.  I learned (well, the basics) how to use an airbrush.

There were a couple of social outings with the family, the really fun one being when Zeke was coming to Tallahassee for swim camp, and staying in the dorm where Bob and I used to live, and where we got engaged.

There's the Cliff notes for 2026 so far.  Apparently I'm not just sitting at home, waiting for the days to go by.  Not bad.

I Am Roooooocky!

 Well, the Rocky puppet is about finished ("about" because I'll probably keep tweaking him).
I can't remember when I started making him - somewhere around the end of May.  Life kept happening and I'd *think* about working on him, but not much actually got done.  But eventually the momentum picked up.

I've loved working on him.  I did a deep dive into the movie - I'd listen to interviews and behind-the-scenes while I worked.  Rob had printed me a miniature Rocky that I used for a guide.  Could I really make something out of Amazon boxes that didn't look like it was, well, made out of Amazon boxes?  Something that looked like this bizarre alien? Can I learn to use (and clean) an airbrush?

It did get frustrating near the end when I was stringing him up. Marionettes are a pain.  You think you have it balanced, and then you tweak something and it throws everything else out of whack.  It's awkward trying to hold something up, and work on it.  My back staged a protest and I had to walk away.  The next morning I thought to put a couple of sawhorses on my workbench with a pole between them, and the controller bungeed to, so he could dangle at eye level while I worked.

I took him to Gill's yesterday so she could take some videos, and I have to admit - I pretty much nailed it.  I saw where tweaks had to happen (I removed the lower part of his front two legs and rehung them).  But we had a lot of fun.

Rocky knows that humans get excited over football.

And he observed how dogs behave.

The Infinity Con is this weekend, and Mike predicts that I will be mobbed.

And then it's over.  I'll hang him up somewhere.  

The distraction has been good for me.  I've been having fun, giving in to obsession.  But also still feeling that familiar tightness in the chest, that feeling of frustrated helplessness.  The end of June was when Bob got the tests that eventually let to his diagnosis.  Best to stay busy.

There's a blog that I follow (The Gusset) that I have for years, but there was a two-year hiatus after her husband was diagnosed with cancer.  Then she came back.  It's an artsy little blog, talking about tapestry and baskets, and gathering wild materials for projects.  She illustrates it with fun watercolors of her and her dog.  But this one stopped me in my tracks for a moment.  She was talking about the pleasure of eating asparagus on toast while standing at the counter, reading a book.

"I love living alone."  I even commented on that, and we had a short exchange.  As my comment read -how many widows would say that.  Of course, she would want her husband back, as I want Bob.  But that's not an option.  And one option - the one she is exploring, as am I - is to realize that you can enjoy living alone.  Living life on your own terms, learning who you are, without those daily little adjustments that come with another person under the roof.

It can be lonely sometimes, of course.  But if I'm honest - if I can't have Bob, I'd rather be alone with my cats and my chickens and my woods.  I don't want the distraction of another person hanging around.   But we both came to the conclusion that yes - weird as it is to admit it - we enjoy living alone.

I still wish I had the other option.

Falling Carrots, Swim Meet, and Other Ramblings

 I saw a carrot fall from the sky and land a few feet away from me.  That's not a common occurrence, so I enjoyed the Kafkaesque moment before I observed that an enterprising squirrel had stolen a carrot stick from the beaver's habitat, only to drop it when he ran up a tree.

I earned my Good Aunt points last Saturday.  The kids were in town for Zeke's qualifying swim meet and I went to watch for a little while.  Apparently the way qualifying meets work is that you're there for three hours in the morning, of which your own kid will at four various times do his laps, for a total of about two minutes of swimming.  This is repeated in the afternoon, and then again the next day.  The rest of the time the parents sit in chairs and do whatever.  Heat index was 104.  I earned my minimum Good Aunts points by going for the morning three hours, and then treating them all to lunch afterwards.  (BTW, Zeke qualified for his areas, so the kids get to repeat this is other cities, lucky them)

My new airbrush came in, so I went through the learning curve on it.  It's not quite the same as opening a can of spray paint and, well, painting.  You have to thin the paint (and learn how to make the thinning solution).  You have to figure out how much to thin the paint (exactly how thick is milk?).  You have to figure out how to clean the airbrush, and how to make the cleaning solution.  And figure out how to use it.  But it was fun, and the Rocky puppet is now painted and put together, and hopefully tomorrow I'll string him up and figure out how to make him move.

Small sigh.  I keep reading that it's important to have a social life, and to make new friends.  It seems that for me the best way to make a new friend is to go to the cottage and build one.  I had a moment this week -someone posted on the local Maker Space page a question of "Does Anyone Here Make Puppets?"   Bingo!  I immediately posted back that yes, sometimes I make puppets.  And what type was she interested in?   I was set - maybe we could exchange messages.  Maybe get together to talk about puppets and puppet ideas.  Heck - maybe build together.

Or perhaps my comment would be met with the sound of crickets.   At least I tried.

I had another one of the "who the hell am I" moments.  When I realize that I'm not the same Ann as when I was Bob-and-Ann.  I've often talked about rarely having drive myself - I sat and knit, or chatted, and somehow we got where we needed to go.  When I started driving myself, it was strange to try to figure out how to get around in a city that I've lived in for 45 years (granted that it's constantly changing).  But after that morning swim meet,  I followed the kids to their Air BnB so Zeke could change, and we went to lunch together.  Then we went back, and I headed home.  On the way to the BnB, I had noticed a street name, and through "cool - that street will take me to Capital Circle, and then it's a straight shot home."  I used Google maps anyway, and it gave me a slightly different route - and when I saw that street name, my thought was "there's a Wawa gas station on the corner, and I can treat myself to an iced coffee."

Since when do I carry maps in my head?  Who is this person?

Fortunately we don't seem to be getting hit with the massive heat wave that's covering a lot of the country.  We're just having normal heat - which is about the same that everyone else is getting.  I had an interesting thought about it on Tuesday, the day the heat index hit 111.   I had been reading an article about how astronauts have to become re-acclimated when they come to back to Earth.  Not just the physical rehabilitation, but the psychological - too many people, too much stimulus, too much just everything after being in a confined area for months.  The line that got me was "gravity seems like a theatrical performance."

That's how I feel about the high heat - it doesn't seem quite real.  It is, in fact, surreal.  You step outside, and you look around for a fire, or a grill, or *something* to try to see where it's coming from.  Heat like this doesn't just happen, does it?  It feels artificial.  A performance is the perfect way of putting it.

And we're just in what's called the Florida pre-heating stage, so I guess I'd better settle down for a long run.

Air Brush Frustrations

 Today was frustrating.
My plan was to start painting the Rocky puppet.  Specifically - use an airbrush.  I've only used one a couple of times, the last being about 8 years ago.

In theory, it's a simple tool.  In practice, I'm overly intimidated by them.  I think it's because Bob was highly skilled.  He owned several (of which I gave a few away, mostly basic, and a high-end one to my brother).  I kept a basic Badger, and the high-end Iwata.  He used for different types of painting (broad shading, fine lines).  I remember him messing around with needles and various parts and it just seemed over my head.   A few times I asked him to teach me, but the problem is that when you're really expert at something it's hard to teach a beginner (imagine trying to tell someone how to breathe, and they're asking you what do you mean by lower my diaphragm and expand my rib cage?  How do you do that?)

Today was going to be The Day.  I grab the Badger and the air compressor.  Step 1: Connect one end of the air hose to the compressor, and the other to the airbrush.  That's where I stalled out - for hours.  There were several air hoses there, and various adapters, but there were none that could connect to both the airbrush and the compressor (I tried every possible configuration, even cutting some fittings off to see if I could put others on - but the hoses were all of different sizes.)

I had a flashback to that time I used it.  I had borrowed the compressor and Badger (which is actually mine; it used to be my father's) and headed to the cottage. Then I came back up with "How the heck do you hook these together?"  He looked at it, said "oh - give me a minute," turned to a parts drawer, did some incantations, and handed it back to me, ready to go.  I asked him to show me what and how he had done it, but he was busy and he said it was OK now.  I remember saying "but what if you're not home sometime, and I want to use this?"

Well, he's not home, and I want to use it, and I can't find a damn thing in that parts drawer to make it work.

So there's that day down the drain.  And I really wanted to learn how to use an airbrush.  I considered the high end (expensive) Iwata.  I'm pretty sure I don't want to have my learning curve on that.  On the practical side, it's designed for finer work,with a small needle.  I'm going to using craft paint, not specialty airbrush paint, and it's recommended using a larger needle.

Like giving up and spending $30 on an Alexa dot after spending too many hours trying to get my old Google smart speaker to work, I admitted that Dad's Badger is probably 35-40 years.  A new basic airbrush, with the hose and all the accouterments, is $30.  It should be here soon, maybe tomorrow.

And, of course, all this fussing was done in Bob's room, with the emotional load there.  It's been particularly rough this week.  I realize that I didn't write about Tuesday afternoon, when Rik came over to drag out a few hundred pounds of ammunition (have I mentioned that Bob liked having a stash?)  He was also looking at other stuff (at one point pulling a knife off of a shelf, where it was tucked in with a vintage steam engine and a tile with an imprint of a grizzly bear foot).  He studied it for a moment, and said "Miss Ann, that's a Randall made knife."  A skinning knife, looks like it was never used (and Bob didn't hunt).  I have no idea where he got it.  When I asked what a Randall made knife was, the short answer was "worth about $600. "  Just sitting there.

Just poking through Bob's stuff (and especially having someone else poke through it) makes me incredibly twitchy.  Bob and I were (I still am) pretty territorial, and we always respected each other's stuff and territory.  Even in our first tiny apartment, where we ate off of the coffee table so we could have the dining table for our hobbies, he had his side and I had mine.  He never would have dreamed of looking in my purse.  I knocked before going into his room (the door was always closed to keep the cats out).  He knocked before coming into the cottage.   I remember seeing Bob tighten up when his parents visited and his father would go in his room and (without asking) just pick stuff up to look at it.  

Going in there, digging through his stuff, just poking through it out of curiosity, seems terribly invasive and disrespectful.  But ammunition deteriorates, as do the guns.  A lot of that stuff is collector's items.  And it needs to be sorted out, and, well, go to collectors.  Rik has the connections, and he's a dealer.  I know it needs to be done, but it still bugs the heck out of me.

So maybe the new airbrush is a good idea.  It will have all the bits and pieces, and instructions, and I won't be digging around trying to figure out what I need, and if it's there.  I won't be using my father's airbrush, or Bob's.  Just mine, no strings attached.

Three Cool Animal Observations

 Nothing earth shaking here, just three things that I saw and want to remember, so that next year when 2027 self looks back, she'll thing "Cool!"

This was all at the museum.  The first thing was when I cleaned and refilled a snake's water dish.  Apparently he appreciated it, because he crawled in for a nice soak.  I have often seen snakes coiled up in a water dish, but never watched one get it.
It was oddly meditative to watch, because it was like tracing a labyrinth.  He first went around the outside edge, and spiraled inward.  When he got to the center, he reversed, and making a second layer of himself, spiraled outward until all of him was coiled up in the water.  A very calming thing to watch (if you're not the type to get freaked out by snakes)

The second was when I was cleaning the habitat for the great horned owl.  It's common to find a feather or two, but yesterday he had dropped one of his leading wing feathers.  The engineering on those is fascinating, and explains the silent flight of owls.  The leading edge has a tiny comb-like structure that breaks up the air.  The feather on the trailing edge are soft and wispy.   I didn't get a picture yesterday, but here's one I took of a barred owl feather a few years ago.

 

I've seen pictures in books, of course (which is how I knew what to look for) but it's not the same as holding it in your hand.

The third shows the human urge to share something that you think is really cool, but something that most people would go "yuck" and back away.  Theo (who works at the cafe) found a huntsman spider whose egg sac was hatching.  She really wanted to share her excitement, so she put in in a plastic container and brought it to the animal kitchen.  I didn't know that huntsman spiders carry their egg sacs.  But there she was, with a tiny hole in it, and dozens of near invisible spiders coming out.

I didn't take a picture, but here's one of spider with egg sac from the web (how appropriate.)

So the spider and the babies were duly admired, and then safely released.

That's it.  Just three moments that made me pause, go "Oh, wow" and feel a sense of wonder.

Rocky!

 I've noticed a odd thing.
I am a maker.  Which means I make stuff.  I always have been; there's usually an ongoing project or two, sometimes being set aside and being revived later.

The odd thing is that, important as it is to me, it seems to be the one thing I rarely write about.  Sometimes I post a finished item, but that's about it.  Of course, in theory one should keep notes, or journal, or somehow document a project.  I've tried - I've got a few handwritten journals started, and abandoned.  I tried writing a separate project blog -haven't posted there in almost a year.  I tried an app called Milanote, which is pretty cool because you can import pictures and color pallets and make notes.  I haven't touched that either.

I was pondering about that, and I realize that I write *a lot* - this blog, my scribbled legal pads with Wordle games, random thoughts, to-do lists.  But when I'm making something - head working with hands, thinking, testing - that's when I go non-verbal. It's a different part of my brain.  And one that doesn't want to be corralled into words.

So just a few words about the latest puppet.  Like a few hundred thousand other people, I've fallen in love with Rocky, the alien from Project Hail Mary.  Which happens to be a puppet.  So I'm making a puppet of a puppet.  My challenge - I'm doing it out of Amazon boxes and packing paper.

It's been different from my other puppets.  Usually they just come out of my imagination.  They come to life and develop a personality about the time you put in the eyes.  But in this case I'm making a known character, already with a personality, who doesn't have eyes or even a face.

Step one:  Basic structure of cardboard, with some pool noodle details -body and one arm pictured here.

Step two:  cover with packing paper, which helps a lot.

All five arms are made, and he's been put together.  Next step: painting.  Then string him up.  But it's slow going.  I don't work on it at all on my museum days.  In theory, I get home by 1:00 or 2:00, which should give me the afternoon free.  In practice - after being on my feet 4-5 hours, most of which is outside (heat index 100), I'm knackered.  I come home, shower, eat, and crash.

Side note - I have developed a bit of an obsession with James Ortiz, the head puppeteer and Rocky's voice.  To be more specific, I have a bit of an obsession with his hair.

Random other stuff.  The new little owlet is settling in.  I love that he still has his fuzzy baby feathers on his head - so I got him to look down a little for a good picture.

I've been feeling oddly OK for June.  I'm waiting for the familiar sense of despair that I get every year to set in.  I think of June as being the last Innocent Month.  The last month that we didn't know anything was wrong.  My only June 2019 blog post was me holding a fuzzy baby vulture, with no idea of what was shortly to come.  It was in June that Bob went in for his ordinary annual exam, and things were anything but ordinary.

So I tend to stress out in June (last year I had to go on the antidepressants, but I had also lost Stumbles).  My usual coping mechanism is to get outside - but June is when the heat first hits, and I feel trapped.   I'm waiting for that now-familiar wave of feeling helpless in the face of what is coming -but it hasn't happened.  The early summer heat is here (temps in the 90s, heat indices 100+) and I'm tolerating it oddly well.  The other day I was on the way to the cottage to work on the puppet, but I looked over and realized that I couldn't see my lemon tree.  It was surrounded by the feral bamboo, and covered in the equally ambitious Virginia creeper.   So instead of the puppet I ended up grabbing various clippers and an hour later my tree was free.  I was a sweaty mess, of course, but I felt fine.  

Which, in June, is a bit weird.