New Year's Eve

 Well, here it is.  Made it through another year.  My reward?  I get to try to make it through the next year.

That's a mindset that I need to work on, and I'll write about that next post.  That will be about where I'm going.  This one is for where I am.  Which I'm not sure.

I honestly don't remember 2021.  Maybe that's why I was compulsively writing in the blog this year (I did 13 posts in 2021 and 86 this year).  I wrote last January that I need to dump garbage out of my brain, and I think I've been doing that.

But where am I?  Calmer, for one.  Perhaps too calm.  Sometimes I miss my chaotic energy of 2020.  It's just as well that I was in isolation, so people didn't notice the crazy.  I think it was like taking the lid off a pressure cooker without hitting the release valve.  Three months of sitting in the goldfish bowl that was the hospital, seeing the worst happen to a man who didn't deserve it - and suddenly I was out in the open and alone and could do anything I wanted.  And everyone who has ever lived with anyone else knows that weird feeling of freedom when the other person goes away for a little while and you have the place to yourself and can do anything.  I was bouncing all over the place - I bought my little drum with the intention of maybe hitting some drum circles (Covid prevented that).  I put videos on TV and did zumba and belly dance and clogging.  I cleaned the house with a vengence and worked in the yard.  I think in the back of my mind was that Bob was going to be so proud of me - it was hard to accept that he was never coming back.  

I miss that energy.  I don't miss the screaming and the actual physical pain that went with it (broken heart syndrome is a real thing).  I miss feeling, having emotions.  I don't, much, anymore.

Back then, I'd check my phone a few dozen times a day, praying that someone would reach out to me, want to talk (and talk about something besides the damned Covid).  I was screamingly lonely (literally).  Now - it's nice (doesn't happen much except for my nephew and brother) but I'm OK with that blank screen.

I remember getting my first Covid shot - the light touch of someone actually physically touching me.  I had closed my eyes to savor it, being so desperate for any physical contact with another human.  Now - hugs can happen again and they're nice when they do, but there's no big deal about it.

I really got into cooking (and eating) after those three months of hospital cafeteria food (I still miss my Misfits).  Now, I still eat well (meaning home-cooked healthy meals) but seriously just rotate about three meals.  There are time that it's annoying to realize that I'm feeling hungry ("really?  C'mon, I ate 5-6 hours ago.  Why again?") 

Rob and Jeff visited last week!!  They were coming from Tennessee to Pensacola to see Rob's mother for Christmas and I got to go to lunch with them.

So good to see them - especially since Jeff had a quadruple bypass a couple of months ago.  We dawdled over lunch for a couple of hours and then they had to head out.  It was really nice to see them.

Nice.  Sort of a neutral word, isn't it.  I remember when they were going to move.  I never said it out loud to them, but in the privacy of my yard I would be on my knees on the ground begging "please don't leave me."  Losing them, losing the possibility of ever going to another gathering at their place, no hanging around in their living room and laughing with people, losing the safety net of someone I could call if I needed help - that really tore me up.

Now, I could smile and wave and watch them drive off with nary a pang.

I'm just kind of meh now.  But I still believe, at the core of me, that I'm not really a meh person.  I'm just long-term tired of hauling myself up by my own bootstraps - but I don't know how to take a break from that.

I've lost track of what I meant to write about when I started this post.  But maybe that sums up where I am right now - I've lost track.  I'm going through the motions, and dealing with stuff (and stuff happens - just in the last couple of months I had to have some AC ducts repaired and the roof repaired and just in time for Christmas my septic system backed up so every flush was done with a bucket in one hand, a plunger in the other, and cries of encouragement.  That got taken care of this week.

Tomorrow will be a day to think not so much of resolutions but maybe of intentions.  Life it too precious to be spending months on end twiddling my thumbs and just waiting for time to go by.

Meh.