2024 Recap

 In a few more hours it will be 2025.  In three more months it will be 5 years since I lost Bob.  There's something significant in that.  I remember in April 2020, shortly after I came home, sitting outside, sobbing, wondering how long I could live here by myself, be able to take care of things.  It just seemed so overwhelming.  I figured maybe 5 years before I would have to give up and move into town.

5 years late.  Physically, I'm healthier and stronger than I was.  The land is as good as it ever was, the house is actually tidier.  A lot of stuff that accumulated over 30 years is gone.  Basically, until something goes badly wrong, I get to keep my home.

The best Christmas gift I could have given myself is my stream.  I love having it back, and I love feeling empowered - I didn't have to sit there being sorry that I couldn't see my stream again; I could do something about it.

Empowered is a good word.  I've felt it more this year.  I saw a tree that was going to be a problem, so I cut it down.  I replaced a faulty light switch.  I crawled under the car to remove the damaged skirting, and got everything zip-tied together enough to keep driving until I could get it fixed.  I cleared out the area out front that had gotten completely overgrown and made space for wildflowers.  I pulled down the rotting fencing out front, and rebuilt the swing.  I repaired the chicken coop,  the mailbox, and built and installed new ceiling panels. I did storm prep (for storms that thankfully missed us)  I've gotten a lot of the stream path cleared.  

I've pretty much stopped the whining of "this shouldn't be my job."  Because this is my home, and it *is* my job.

I've been a little slack in the making.  I knit a shawl, made the skeleton bird that perches on my shoulder and moves his head, sewed a  skirt (which I don't like and have to remake), made a new swing, and knit a pair of mitts.  I started another Mari Lwyd but didn't finish it yet.  I cleaned up the kalesa lamps but I haven't done anything with them yet.

I think the big thing for 2024 was to embrace my introversion.  After I lost Bob, I thought I would have to "replace" him with a bunch of new friends.  But I've never been particularly social, and trying to rebrand myself just didn't work.  I've stopped pushing myself - I'm fine being alone, and doing stuff by myself.  That's where my life is now - in the future, who knows?

Sum total of "doing things with other people" (in addition to my 8 days a month at the museum)

Jeff came into town 4 times (most recently with Rob)

I went to two events at the museum.

The FSU circus with museum friends (one of our volunteers was performing)

Lunch with Suzie and Ashlyn after working on chicken coop

Lunch with Judy when I went to get new chicks

A trip to a yarn store in Thomasville with Adrienne

Rob and Amanda came into town

One weaver's guild meeting

An SCA event

The trip with Michael

Thanksgiving with Rik and Christy

Dinner with Suzie, Shelby, Mike Jones, and a couple of other people

A book discussion at the library

So doing something with other people at least 1-2 times a month.  Plus my work at the museum 2 days a week, and I usually go see Gill after my monthly chiropractic appointment.

Honestly, not bad.  Throw in that my nephew Rob calls me every week or two, and I talk to Mike and Margo every couple of weeks.  So I haven't become a recluse or a hermit.

On my own, I went to the Highland Games, a theatre production, another circus, a Broadway songs presentation by school students, and the ComicCon at the library.

From time to time, I've started a blog post with an epigram or quote that I've seen somewhere.  The one that really gave me pause was:

"If you do not admit kindness from others, you cannot be too surprised when they fail to offer any."

 The hardest thing for me to do is to admit that I might need help.  But I'm learning to accept it.  When one of my outlets in the cottage stopped working, and putting in a new one didn't fix the problem, I was going to hire an electrician, but instead Rik and his friend Steve came over, checked out all the wiring, and decided that I just needed a new circuit breaker (which Rik picked up for me so I would have the right one).   After my chickens were killed by raccoons, and I thought I had rebuild the chicken coop sufficiently, Suzie offered to come over to check it out, and Ashlyn joined her.  Not only did they go over it, they fixed the problems that they found (and we all went out to lunch afterwards).  This last week, I needed some more chicken feed, which comes in 50 pound bags.  I usually take it home and then offload it into my feed buckets.  But my left arm is still healing, and I'm trying not to strain it.  I probably could have managed it, but instead I tossed a couple of feed buckets into the car and asked Rik and Christy to offload the feed into them for me.

There is another quote that I saw somewhere to the effect that it is a kindness to let someone help you.  I had to let that sink in - but it's true.  It feels good to help someone.  It's just easier to be the one doing the helping.  I have to realize that being helped isn't a sign of weakness.

So that about sums up 2024.  In the next couple of days I'll decide what my intentions (rather than resolutions) are for 2025.

For now - Happy New Year.

Penultimate 2024 Post

 Penultimate because I want to do a "Recap 2024" post this evening.

2024 in general went well  for me physically until mid-November.  Since then, I got Covid, found that I needed two root canals, and had a fall that messed up my left arm (actually my whole left side is none too happy with me).  And then Sunday . . . I was at work, in the kitchen.  We were all chatting before getting started on diets, and having some leftover Christmas snacks.  I was eating chocolate covered popcorn.  I felt an unpopped kernel, discretely spit it into my hand, and tossed it in the trash.

Except that a moment later I realized that it wasn't a popcorn kernel.  I had tossed a crown into the garbage.

This wasn't just a little waste basket.  This is the big, outdoor sized trash can that was 3/4 full of meat and vegetable scraps (maybe some fish bits too), just plain dirt and random leftover food from all the animals dishes, and a gazillion paper towel.  Yes, I searched.  I spent a solid half-hour or more going through all that fistful by fistful, shaking out the paper towels, sifting through whatever the hell it was in my hand (honestly, by the time I got to the bottom, I might not have been willing to put it back in my mouth anyway.)

No luck.  It's weird that while the gap in my mouth feels like I could park a truck in it, the crown itself is maybe 1/4" across.  Fortunately, it was my temporary one.  Unfortunately, my dentist's office is closed this week.

And ending the year (actually starting the new one) with sadness.  One of the deer at the museum, Bella, has to be put down.  Deer in the wild can live 10-12 years, up to 16 years in captivity.  Bella is 17 1/2.  And I know at one point I took a selfie with her but I can't find it - and I don't want to take a picture of her now because she's pretty rough.  But she's important to me.  Flash back to April 2020 (and beyond).  I had just lost Bob, and at the point of a person's life when she desperately needs to have a shoulder to try on, an arm around her, the aching physical need to be held, and to hug - well, it was early 2020, and it's hard to hug from 6 feet away.  Thank God for the cats - but they're small.  I could hug pillows (I still do) but they lack warmth, breathing, and heartbeat.  But there was Bella.  She's a sweet deer, and didn't mind being handled.  So if no one was around, I would slide my arms around her, lay my head against her side, and just lean into that warmth, breathing, and heartbeat I needed so much.  I've always been grateful to her for that.

Otherwise, it's all good.  After some more serious hacking down the the woods, I came to a pretty good stretch that didn't need much, so I'm about 700 feet in now.  I'm starting to think that I won't be able to do the whole loop, because the area behind the house is where the big trees came down - there are root balls higher than I am tall.  But I still have hopes of finding my lamppost (unless a tree fell on it).  Problem is - I'm not quite sure where it was, because all the landmarks have changed.

But I'm just so happy to be wandering around down there.  If I wasn't so used to things like flush toilets, I'd be tempted to build a tiny hut and move in.

Hmmm.  That makes me think of the word "bothy."  It's a Celtic word - the closest English comes is a hut or shed, but that lacks the feeling.  A bothy is a place to take shelter - small, but safe.

In the meanwhile, I can lean against a tree and eat an orange.

We got in a new king snake at the museum.  He is very beautiful, in a very subtle way.  Most people would say "brownish."  But I found myself reaching for my phone to take a picture - old habit.  I get the impression that most people see things in the whole - as "blobs."  Bob saw details - and I learned to see details (see my earlier post about the details of an owl's feather).  We would look at (and often take pictures for him to have a reference in his painting) of say, the shading on a crab's shell, or the pattern that rust made around a bolt on a dumpster.  Looking at this snake, he had very subtle diagonal bands of slightly different shades of brown.  What was really striking, though, was that each individual scale was shaded.

Old habits die hard.  I had to give in to the urge to take a picture, even with no one else to marvel at it.

And that about wraps up 2024.  Recap coming.  Then it will be 2025.

Winding Down the Year

 I've always thought of the week between Christmas and New Year's as the quiet week.  A time to contemplate the year past, and the year coming up.  Look at last year's intentions, and think about future ones.

In the last two days, I've made two batches of orange marmalade (I'm still eating my daily orange, but there are a lot on the tree).  

The clearing of the path around the stream continues (a bit slowed down because of my messed up arm).  This is really doing something to/for me.  I realized at one point that my face felt funny  -  I was smiling.  I've been having an odd feeling - it's that I'm happy, and it's a feeling I haven't had for years.  I found Squeaky Frog Pond (so named because of the little squeak the frog would give as they leapt into it. ) I laughed when I found a little rivulet where another pond drains into the stream.  When we used to go for a walk in the woods with the goats and sheep (which felt pretty magical on its own), Vincent - who was quite a large sheep - would balk when we got there, then finally bunch himself up to make a great leap over it.  The funny part was that the gap was maybe 8 inches across.

I've spent a lot of time just looking.  It's all so beautiful that I can't quite wrap my mind around the fact that this is mine; it belongs to me.  It is part of my home.  And it feels magical; I expect to see Baba Yaga's hut on chicken legs through the trees.

I'll probably spend the next few days going over this past year's blog to see what I can learn from it . I know that it's been a decent year, and that I'm a lot calmer, and my grief has moved from acute to chronic.  Partly that's just circumstance - knock wood, but in 2024 no friends, cats, or chickens died.  The roof didn't leak, the AC works, the porch didn't rot.  This might be a record year for me. (Of course, I got rear ended, and then later pulled the front bumper off the car - there has to be something)

My main intent for 2024 was to not push myself so much.  I really put myself out there in 2023 because I thought I should.  This year I just admitted that I'm basically an introvert.  I'm more self-reliant, mostly because I have to be, but I seem to have stopped feeling sorry for myself about it.  Like after my fall last week.  Yes - it would have been *really* nice for someone to run over, ask if I was OK, then help me inside to rest and recover while he took care of things.  But that's not my option at the moment.  I got up, got the chickens put away for the night, got the squirrel and the cats and myself fed, and then rested.  And drove myself to get X-rays the next day.  But that's simply how things go now.

I've read a lot - 49 books.  My big pleasure is when the weather is decent enough that I can sit outside to read - either on my back deck, my front swing, by the fire while burning yard waste, or - new delight - leaning against a tree down in the woods.  The reading is all over the place; I leaned heavily into fantasy, but also a lot of classics, and some non-fiction.

I'm still doing my walking challenges.  I did the 180 virtual walk of the Shire, and I've currently walked 663 miles around Iceland (164 miles to go)

Of course, the big thing I did this year was empty tonnage out of the barn.  Then things sort of stalled - nothing much has been particularly organized.  But I know what's there, and where it is.  This year's "winter project" is the stream path.  I confused Mike when I mentioned having a winter project - living in Boston, his idea of winter projects are indoor ones.  For a Floridian, it's the time of year you can work outside without heat exhaustion or getting chewed up by insects.

I'm re-reading my blog posts of this year.  The early ones show a lot of pain.  Going through the anniversaries of the time between when Bob when to Shands, and when I came home alone.  I wonder how that will be this year. (I note that I referred to this period as the "memory rodeo.")

More reviews to come in the next few days - I've just realized that I'm getting sleepy.  Rob and Jeff will be in town tomorrow (they went to Pensacola to visit Rob's family for Christmas) so I'll get to visit with them.

(Just noticed a theme that I need to visit. It's that I can go really well on the parts of a project that I can see what to do - like taking the 40 or so bags of stuff from Bob's room, or the Great Barn Clean Out.  But after that - with things looking half done, I just sort of stall out because the obvious stuff is done, and what do I do now?)

Christmas

 It's been a busy week.  I got my appointment with the endodontist, which was interesting because as well as X-rays I had a Cat scan done, so 3 D image.  Joy oh joy - I get to have *two* root canals (side by side).  The only silver lining in that cloud is that the endodontist is really really cute.

Bob and I used to celebrate our private Christmas on the 21st (before plunging into the loud chaos that was the family Christmas).  We would watch the Hogfather movie and eat meat pies and sherry (which was what the children left out for the Hogfather).  Like making fruitcakes, this was a tradition that I have had to tiptoe around.  I had to take my emotional pulse to see if it would hurt more to continue the tradition without Bob, or to skip it.  I've opted to continue.

I can't quite wrap my brain about this being the fifth Christmas without him.  It still feels like I lost him yesterday.  

Bob and Zeke, Christmas 2019

Otherwise, this Christmas has been rather low key.  I went to the museum this morning (like any other holiday, the animals still need care), had lunch, rested a bit, and then took a coffee and went to sit by the stream to finish reading A Christmas Carol (another annual tradition).  In a few minutes I'm going to make a red pepper and prosciutto fougasse (a stuffed bread) for dinner. 

I got about another 70 feet cleared on the stream path.  It just makes me so happy to be out in the woods again, and the memories are coming in.  One day we were down there, and suddenly, across the stream, a little pure white goat popped out from the woods, looked at us for a moment, then disappeared again.  We decided that we had seen the Questing Beast.

Alas, the stream project has been halted for a few days.  Saturday evening I was walking the path behind the chicken yard, heading over to put the chickens up for the night, as I have done every night for many many years.  I have walked that path thousands of times over the last 30 years.  But this time, I somehow caught my right food *under* a vine (or something).  If it had been a mere trip, I likely could have caught my balance, or at least had a somewhat more controlled fall.  But no - most of me was going forward except for the right foot - and I fell with my full weight on my left arm - and felt a sharp pain a few inches below my shoulder before the rest of me hit the ground.

I just rolled over onto my back and looked up at the trees for a few minutes, trying to do an inventory of any damage.  I was lucky - the only thinkg that really hurt was my arm (although my left hip isn't too happy with me).  I got up and was able to move it.  It wasn't bad enough to go spend the night in the emergency room (I've had enough experience with the ER and my mother to know that if you're not actively trying to die, you're going to be in the ER for 6-9 hours).  But the next day I did go get it checked out and X-rayed and nothing is broken (how the heck I didn't break my wrist I'll never know - but it's not even hurt).  Broken or not, it hurts like hell and I need to be easy with it for a bit (so I say, because I've worked two shifts at the museum since then, but light duty - no pushing of the heavy wheelbarrow).

Once again, though, I got lucky.  That could have been bad.

Dinner's ready - time to pour the wine.

Stream!

 Yesterday I continued cutting and hacking.  It's not like I'm trying to find the old path (although bits of it are there).  I clear a couple of feet, and then decide where to go from there.  Sometimes I can use my brush cutter, and a couple of times I needed the chainsaw, but 95% of this is being done with hand clippers and loppers because I don't use power tools if I can see clearly where I'm cutting.

The memories keep popping up.  I looked off to the side, and remembered the "Spud Bypass."  When Bob and I would head down to the picnic area, we'd follow the loop of the stream.  When Spud (one of the cats) would go with us, he'd just take a shortcut through the woods and meet us there.

Other memories are not so funny.  One time, when I was stressed out (I think it was when I was working on my Master's degree) I took a break to walk in the woods, and sat down by Squeaky Frog Pond.  As I relaxed, I just listened to the frogs, and admired the flashing red throat patches of the anoles showing off.  Eventually I lay back, hands behind my head, and looked at the trees overhead.  I glanced over to the side - and saw an equally relaxed water moccasin basking in the sun about 8 feet away from me.  I decided that study break was over and gently eased myself out of there.  (Now, years later and with a bit more snake knowledge, I wonder if it was a banded water snake.  I'll never know)

But as I was cutting away, I couldn't help but worry a little.  Was the stream still there?  Had it dried up, or been diverted, or would it be choked with trash and weeds?

But I finally found it.  It's still there, and it's still beautiful.

 I find it hard to describe my feelings.  It was like coming home after being gone for years.  It was like sitting with an old friend that I thought I would never see again.  Getting back something that I thought was lost  It was like getting a hug.

I felt happy.

That was about 6 hours of work to get there.  Even though it was spread over 3-4 days, I'm a little tired (I'm also working extra shifts at the museum) so I'm taking a couple of days off and then I'll tackle the next section.  The next goal is to make a path around to our old picnic area.  It's a lot further than I've been so far, so it might take, who knows?  10-20 hours?  It doesn't matter; I'll just work on it.

But I can also now take my book down to the stream, lean against a tree, and just enjoy being back.

Christmas Thoughts

 I got about another 30 feet of path cleared today.  So far I've mostly use clippers and loppers - things are getting dense enough now that I'll likely drag in my brush cutter.
I was very happy to find the little gargoyle that used to sit on the gatepost.  We had a gate between our pasture area and the path to the woods so that the goats wouldn't wander down there.  The gate used to be at the edge of the cleared area - now it's about 25 feet in but I found it.  I'll have to make another stand for this little guy.

I only cleared for about an hour today because my upper back was really starting to hurt.  Eventually it occurred to me that one of the chores I took care of today was emptying out the dozen buckets of water that I had on the front deck - flushing water in case of a sustained power outage if a hurricane hit.  But hurricane season is over (Hooray!).  I didn't think anything of it while I was doing it - grab a bucket, take it to the edge of the deck, and dump it.  But they held about 4 gallons each (so 32 pounds) and there was a dozen of them, so I lifted about 400 pounds doing that little chore.

But being back down in my woods again is making me happy.  Good memories.  Today I remembered our goose Godwin.  My parents had been visiting, and Mom came to tell me that a dog had run into the yard and our goose took off flying and disappeared.  We searched for her for several days - but how do you find a missing goose in a forest?  But one day we were out in the yard - and suddenly heard a familiar honking coming from the woods.  We made a mad dash down, just in time to see her happily bobbing down the stream, honking all the while.  In Bob's version of the story that he told people, I went diving in and swam out to rescue her.  The truth is that I slid down about 3 feet of bank and then waded in the calf-deep water to catch her as she swam by.  But you know the concept: never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

But this post is about Christmas.  I mentioned earlier that I just never got into Christmas.  It's not that I'm a Grinch or anti-Christmas; it's just not a favorite.  Halloween I love - it's about getting to play dress-up and eat candy (so what's not to like?)   Thanksgiving is about eating until you can't move, and hopefully expressing a little gratitude - that's OK too.  But Christmas?  It just seems stressful.

I realized that what bothers me about Christmas is the presents, and the focus being on that.  People going arse-deep in debt.  People feeling resentful because they spent too much time and money to get the Perfect Present for someone, only to get some small token gift in return.  What if someone you didn't expect to gives you a gift, and you didn't get anything for them?  The trying to decide what to get for someone.

That used to be a point of Christmas contention between Bob and I.  I would start fairly early in December with, for example, "what should we get your mother?" with the standard reply of "I have no idea."  This question would be repeated until about a week before Christmas, when I would start pushing, and often get "I can't think of anything - you take care of it" to which I would respond "She's *your* mother!"  

There are the common outs, which say "I had to get you a gift but couldn't think of anything" so you go generic:  a six pack of fancy beer, or fancy bath products, boxes of chocolates.  Or the really generic gift cards ("I couldn't be bothered to think of anything so go buy yourself something").  Gift cards + guilt ("Sorry that it's for Walmart, but I'm broke and that's the only place I have credit" - and yes that has happened to me.)  

And the great moment of opening gifts, when you try to plaster a big smile on your face to hide the thoughts of "what the hell am I supposed to do with this?"   And seeing that exact same look on someone's face when they open the present from you.  Of course, reactions weren't always hidden; Bob's family could be fairly outspoken, and sometimes a gift was received with a "what made you think I would want this?" and then things would get a little, uh, lively.  (One time at work a co-worker asked Bob what he was doing for Christmas, and his answer was "oh, the usual - go home and listen to my family argue.")

Poor Bob - every year he had to listen to the Flash Card story.  When I was in fourth grade, I wasn't doing very well in arithmetic.  Yeah for the Christmas break from school.  In those days, Mike and I would get to open one gift on Christmas eve, handed to us by one of our parents.  I opened mine - and it was a set of arithmetic flash cards.  Nothing like getting study cards for your worst subject for Christmas.  I was nine years old and not a good actor, so my disappointment was obvious.  Dad (I have to remember that he was a child of the depression) got angry, and said that if I didn't like my gift maybe I wouldn't get any others the next day.  Being a young wise ass, I probably responded that if they were like this one, I didn't want them anyway.  Things went downhill and I ended up crying myself to sleep.  And ever since then I always approached the Christmas gift opening with trepidation (and a smile firmly in place on my face).

There is much I like about Christmas.  The pagan concept of celebrating that the days which have been getting shorter for six months will start lengthening again.  I like a lot of the music (just not the pop stuff).  I like all the food, the fruitcakes and rum balls and shortbread and Christmas cakes.  I like the sound of bells.  I like people wishing each other well.  There's a lot to enjoy about this time of year.

Just not the damned presents.

December Ramblings

 Well, that two weeks sort of slipped by.  What's up?
Pretty much recovered from the Covid, except for the damned cough.  I've always done this - any time I get a cold, or the flu, or whatever, I cough for 4-6 weeks afterwards.  So annoying.

Having the usual post-adventure doldrums.  One gets excited preparing for the trip, takes the trip (which I still don't believe I climbed down into that silo), comes home - and that's about it.  Back to answering the question of "what did you do today" with "not much."

I had a birthday.  Didn't make a big deal out of it (I rarely do; after all, it's also the anniversary of my mother's passing, and I do miss her).  I roasted some vegetables and a Cornish game hen for dinner, because I like being barbaric and ripping apart that little carcass with my fingers.

And of course Christmas is coming up.  It's a holiday that we never really got into.  We gave up the idea of a tree after we started collecting cats.  And somehow we never saw the point in putting up decorations for a couple of weeks and then taking them back down again.  But to show willing, I did put bows on the gargoyles and dragon and stuck a Santa Claus hat on my wendigo helm.

For some reason Bob never wanted to let me put the bows on the gargoyles - but now I can.

I've started work on making a Welsh Christmas Horse - more on that later.  And I tackled a job that I've been putting off for a month (although part of that procrastination was taking the trip and being sick).  One set of light switches in the cottage died - made some crackling sound, the overhead light flickered, and that was that.  I hoped that it was only that the light switches needed replacing - and I bought some.  And there they sat for awhile, because I've never done anything like that, and electricity scares me (as it should).  But the instructions seemed fairly straightforward, so I turned off the power and unscrewed the switches.  And then was stumped for a moment because all the instructions were about which colored wire would attach to which colored screw - and I was looking at just black wires.  I decided that it was the relative position of the wires that was important, so I tagged them with masking tape, got the old switches off, the new ones wired it, and everything put back together.  Finally came the moment of truth - I flipped the power back on, and nothing exploded.  Then I cautiously flipped on the switch, using a wooden ruler - and lo! I had light!

Yes, of course, I could have just hired an electrician to come do it - but where's the sense of satisfaction in that?

I even socialized.  A couple of people from the museum were going to have dinner with the former head keeper and former vet, and invited me.  I almost dodged - mainly because I really hate driving at night.  But I have also realized that I can't complain about never getting invited to anything if I never accept invitations.  So I'll give it a 50/50 - it was a pleasant dinner, but it was still about a 45 minute drive in the dark each way.  But I did it!

The second social was much closer - I found out that there was going to be a book discussion at the library - bring a book and talk about it.  The library is only about 5 minutes away.  About a half-dozen people showed up, and we chatted for an hour.  It turns out that it's a regular book club that meets once a month, so I'll probably start going now.

I had two choices for today for going out - Adrianne's medieval group was having their Yule festival, and the museum was having its Farm Days, and I thought about taking my spinning wheel and demonstrating.  But I did neither - because of this damned cough.  I can suppress it for about an hour, but I have to be careful not to talk much (both at dinner and at the book club I could mostly listen).  But more than an hour - or talking - and the uncontrolled hacking starts.  And I'm a little self-conscious about coughing a lot in public (and it hurts after awhile).

Instead, I tackled this winter's Big Project:  I want to go down to the stream.  There's a stream that loops around the lower 5 acres of the property, and it's been 6 years since I've been down there.  Hurricane Michael trashed our yard, and also Lord only knows how many dozens of trees fell in the woods.  By the time we got the yard picked up, the weather had turned hot and Bob had gotten diagnosed and, well, I've been dealing with other stuff since then.

But I want to see if the stream is still there (I assume so) and if I can clear a path around the loop again.  We used to enjoy wandering down there.  When we first moved here, there was an ornate (but non-working) wrought iron lamp post lying behind the barn.  We carried down and erected it in the woods (a nod to Narnia).  We used to let the goats and sheep follow us down for walks.  It was pleasant to go lean against a tree and read, or sling a hammock and take a nap.  Often we would light a little fire and roast hot dogs.  Sometimes we would spread out a blanket and get frisky al fresco.   We even named some of the areas, like Squeaky Frog Pond, and a rather twisty area we called Shelob's Lair.  I just want to go there again.

It's going to be a helluva lot of work, and I very likely won't get all the way around this year.  But I should at least get down to the stream.  And the only way to do it is to start.  I headed out to where the path used to be.

After a couple of hours, I was about 40 feet in - rather impressed with myself!  And then, of course, I had to drag all the cuttings over to the burn pile.  This is going to take awhile.

So I've been a little busy (and will continue - I'm working extra shifts over the break, and at some point soon I'm going to have a root canal done - oh joy).  More to come.

Eating an Orange

 I ate an orange this afternoon.   That doesn't seem like big deal, but it was important for me.

I was able to go to work Wednesday and Thursday, and then to Thanksgiving dinner at Rik and Christy's.  But it sort of wore me out (still getting my stamina back from Covid).  It was near 80 for those two days; then we had a turn of weather and yesterday it didn't even make 50 and it was raining.  And I pretty much spent the entire day on the couch, reading ("Wicked" - don't bother) and napping.  Today it was still chilly, but bright and clear, and I at least got up to do things like vacuum and laundry.  This afternoon I thought I would attempt a brisk walk around the property.  As I rounded between the cottage and the barn, I had to stop at the orange tree that grows between the two.

It's sort of an embarrassment of riches sometimes - I have friends who live in small houses or apartments.  Me - all this land, and a cottage in addition to my house.  The cottage is on the far end of the property, on the other side of the barn.  And I haven't been down that far in three weeks (first I was gone on my trip, then while I was dealing with the Covid I would go as far as the barn to get the chicken food, but not past it as far as the cottage.)

Well, in those intervening three weeks, the oranges have started to ripen - and there's a shocking number of them.

It's hard to notice them while they're the same color of the leaves, so I didn't realize how many were there.

I can't remember how many years ago we planted that little tree.  It didn't bear for a couple of years, and then we would get a few oranges from it.  It was a sort of celebration when one would ripen.

And I remember it too well.  Bob and I usually took a few turns around the property after breakfast.   When we would round the corner to see the orange tree, and deem that The Moment Was Right, Bob would ceremoniously pick the fruit.  He would rub it, hold it up to admire it, cup it in his hands to inhale the fragrance.  It just made him so happy to pick an orange from his own tree.  Finally, we would resume our walk, with him peeling the orange and sharing segments with me.

He was like that in so many ways - taking vital pleasure in the small gifts of life.

The first year - 2020 - I tried.  I was taking my walk, I picked an orange, started to peel it, and then fell to my knees and sobbed.  I never ate any of them - I eventually picked the few that were there, and cut them up and cooked them down for marmalade.

The same thing happened in 2021 - they got picked and cooked.  In 2022 we had a hard freeze that ruined the crop and almost killed the tree.  It survived, but did not bear fruit in 2023.

Today, it was loaded, and they're coming ripe.  I looked through and found one that was ready.  I held it, and sniffed it, and finally peeled it and ate the sweet juicy fruit while I walked, spitting seeds.  And I'm going to do it again.  Some of them will become preserves (because I like using them in cooking), but I'm going to eat a sweet, freshly picked orange daily while they last.   And remember him.

Closing Thoughts

 Living underground was strange.  You don't realize how much you keep track of the time of day, or weather, when there is no window (I remember back in my early working days, where the "status offices" had windows and the rest of us had interior offices.)  And it didn't help that our bodies were on East coast time.

But there were things that we knew we wanted to see - like sunrises and sunsets.  I'm just not used to checking the time to see when it's happening.  But we did, and we'd pop upstairs (got a lot of exercise this trip) to watch it sink below the horizon, with the incredible colors in the clear desert air.   Same with the sunrise - fortunately, being on East coast time we woke up early enough on the second day.  Mike wondered when the sunrise would be - rather than looking out a non-existent window, I had to Google it - and the answer was "now!"  So the jacket got put on over the pajamas and another run up the stairs.  And, again, it was spectacular.

Less spectacular was the other thing that I had been looking forward to: the wonderful display of stars in the desert sky, far from any light pollution.  But I had not figured on there being not only a full moon, but a super moon. As Mike observed - you could practically read a book out there.  With that huge spotlight in the sky, no stars were visible.

Our other childhood memory was that of the desert dust.  Not sand, but dust.  We remembered the dust storms (sometimes school would even be canceled). The dust was as soft and fine as talcum powder.  When a storm was coming, we would take a dinner knife and paper towels to wedge into the crack of the door opening.  We both remembered the time that I accidentally left my bedroom window open about a quarter of an inch, and ended up with a sand dune in my bedroom, with poor little Squeaky having become a brown rat rather than a white one.

As we wandered around the compound, we did indeed find the windblown drifts of that talcum-fine dust.  Mike scooped up a baggie of it to take home (his plan is to find an hourglass to put it in - we'll see.

There's an impression, a feeling, that I've been trying to analyze, something odd about this trip (granted, the whole thing was a little strange).  It was odd, going back to someplace I used to live.  But more than that; it was remembering that somehow, once upon a time, I had a life without Bob.  We met shortly after I turned 19; he was part of me for my entire adult life. So in every adult memory that I have, he was there somewhere.  But there had been a time in my life without him; I had simply forgotten about it.  Very briefly, on this trip, I was for the first time in almost five years, simply Ann, not Ann-without-Bob.

Bob would have loved the bunker - he always wanted one.  When we would watch the TV shows about people living in weird places, the bunkers and converted silos were his favorites.  But I also have to admit that he would have had a problem with all those stairs.  He messed up his knee in high school, and damaged the same leg in an accident during military training.  He'd had a few surgeries for bone spurs.  Between his legs going out randomly on him, and his size, we just got used to doing automatic compensation; there were simply things we couldn't do.

When we were still newlyweds and went for his training in El Paso, we went to an event where different organizations had been set up.  We were talking with the hang-gliding group.  It really sounded like fun - but they didn't have a harness his size, and the glider was only rated for 200 pounds.  He never went zip-lining at the museum for the same reason - no harness would fit (I don't think he minded that much). Same with the tandem skydiving.   When we took our backcountry trip to Oaxaca, there were a couple of occasions where we would go exploring on our own when the rest of the group was being taken up paths too steep for him to manage.  When we went to Harry Potter World, he couldn't go on the ride at Hogwarts Castle (some of the newer rides had oversized seating, but not this one).

It was just a way of life.  And sure, I could have gone on the hikes or the ride, but the idea of the trips was for us to be together - I didn't want to run off and leave him behind because he couldn't make it.

Going down inside the abandoned silo was amazing and terrifying and surreal - one of the most fascinating things I have done in my life.  And it's oddly disquieting to think that if Bob had been there, I wouldn't have done it.  It would have been too dangerous for him to try, with  that tendency of his leg to give out.  I'm not certain he could have even fit on those narrow spiral steps.   He would have encouraged to to do it (like the skydiving) but it would have underscored that he couldn't - and I wouldn't have done that to him.

There is a scene in the Pied Piper where he is playing and all the children are dancing and following him and they finally all disappear into the big crack of the mountain which then closes, leaving behind only the little crippled boy who couldn't keep up.  I remember one time when a group of us were going down a sidewalk, laughing, talking, heading somewhere, and then his voice called out from behind us "Don't let the mountain close without me!"  We hadn't noticed that he couldn't keep up.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this.  It's just part of the realization that whatever I do from here on out, I don't have to think about how he'll fit in.  It's a lifetime of habit to break.  And I miss it.

Roswell, Day 4: Homecoming .

 Covid Report.  I'm annoyed.  I really wanted to go back to work tomorrow.  We're down one person anyway (Ben had surgery) and over Thanksgiving week a lot of the students are gone.  But I'm still a bit congested, and when I tested, I'm still positive.

I need to do the adult thing and stay home.  But I'm annoyed.

So our final day of this short trip came.  We had our breakfast, packed up, and gave one final farewell visit to the silo.  Gary wanted to drive us around what used to be Walker Base, so we dropped off the rental car and hopped into his.  It was fun.  When we cruised the old neighborhood I pointed out the house that I thought belonged to the "mean lady."  I remember walking around with my pet rat Squeaky on my shoulder and she said something about my nasty animal.  She had one of those miniature chihuahuas, and I pointed out that my rat was bigger (and nicer) than her dog.  Gary jumped on that  - he's still in correspondence with the people who lived there and is going to ask about the dog.

We drove to our old school, and the swimming pool (still there).  He took us to Dad's old office (when he wasn't at the silos).  It was old oddly nostalgic.

Finally it was time to hit the airport (tiny - only one gate).  A short hop to Dallas/Ft. Worth where I parted with Michael, a few hour wait, and finally the puddle jumper home, landing around 10:00 p.m.

I was expecting to deal with more emotions than I actually had.  I saw people hurrying towards the gate - with people waiting outside of it to greet them - to run, to hug, to ask how the trip was, to help carry luggage.  Once upon a time, that would have been me.  But that was once upon a time, and this is now, and somehow I was oddly more OK with it than I thought I would have been, walking out by myself and across the parking lot to the car.  The drive home was uneventful.  As Gill pointed out, by 10 p.m., people going out have already gone out, and people partying haven't headed back home yet. so there wasn't much traffic (I saw a lot of deer, but fortunately they didn't jump into the road.)

I do wish I had thought to ask Cam (my critter sitter) to have left the kitchen light on so that I didn't come home to a dark house (but there is a security light in the yard at least).  But the cats were happy to see me, and the chickens were fine, and it was good to be home again.

I planned to conclude with some final thoughts about sunrises, sunsets, stars, and dust - but I'm crashing and I think I'll head to bed.  Stupid Covid.

Roswell, Day 3: Carlsbad Caverns

 And Covid, Day 6.  Every day I feel a little bit better.  The problem is that it's a *little* bit.  I'm ready to be back to normal and hating the wait.  I did go into town to the grocery store today.  I was going to wait until Monday and go after work - but realized that by the time I finish my shift I will likely be really dragging and want to come home.  My problem was that before I went on the trip I ate down the fresh food in the fridge, and finished the milk, with the idea that I would go shopping within a day or two of coming home.  Today is Day 8.   I've got plenty of food in the pantry, and of course eggs, but I've been wanting milk and fresh stuff.

I found a cool video a guy made of our BnB, and especially of the old silo.  Still can't believe we did that. 

So - Carlsbad Caverns. As soon as we decided that we were making this trip, both of us wanted to go to Carlsbad.  For one - it's a gorgeous and impressive cavern, and I do love caverns.  But more importantly - it's nostalgic for both of us.  We came here a few times as kids.  And Bob and I came here some 50 years ago.  It's a couple of hours from Roswell, so we got up and headed out Thursday morning.

I can't believe that I was the Adult and the Voice of Reason this time.  Mike had read about a special tour - the King's Palace.  It's a limited tour, but there was a chance that we could have taken it.  I pointed out a couple of things - it didn't start until 2:30 in the afternoon, which would have had us getting back to Roswell after dark, and we really needed/wanted to spend more time talking to Gary (our real reason for going).  Also, we had done a lot of running up and down stairs in the bunker, and a lot more in our crazy exploration of the old silo, and our old bodies were feeling it.  The King's Palace is a bit more strenuous than than normal walk.

Still regret it a little.

Heading to the mouth seemed oddly familiar after all these years.  We were passed by a family with excited, somewhat noisy kids.  When the mother gave us an apologetic look, I laughed and said "I was that age my first time here."

I am lucky that Mike and I travel at the same speed - slow.  It's only about a mile walk down (it seems like a lot farther - it's a bit of a slope - 20 degree average but sometimes steeper) and  we got passed by a lot of people.  But our goal wasn't to get to the bottom - it was to walk the walk, and look at everything.

I was surprised at my reaction when we first started down- the acrophobia was triggered. 

You can see the handrails zig-zagging down - and I was feeling it.  Which was odd - but eventually I figured that I was still a little weirded out from out adventure in the silo.  There, if you fell - well, let's just say that would have been a bad thing.  So once again looking down into a pit sort of triggered me, even though this was on a path, and if you fell, well, you'd land on the ground at your feet.  I soon got over it.

I like the way they lit the caverns.  Instead of having general lighting, it was for the most part quite dark, with spotlights on the natural features.  (It reminded me a lot of how we used to light the sets when we did the Haunted Trail)

I didn't take too many pictures.  I don't like being one of those jerks who keep flashing the camera in dark areas.  My camera does have a nice "night shot" feature, but the pictures tend to come out looking like moonscapes.  So I mostly contented myself with just looking - I can find plenty of good pictures on the web.  But here's a shot of looking back and saying goodbye to the cavern opening.

A least one good set of stalagtites

And, as being that my "light airplane reading" was some Lovecraft, I definitely had to take a picture of the formation that I promptly decided was Cthulu.

We made it down to the bottom, and were quite disappointed that during the middle of a weekday in off season, there weren't enough tourists to merit having the underground snack bar open.  We had a quandary.  We still wanted to walk through what is called "The Big Room" (about another mile).  On the other - we were both a little tired from the previous day's adventure, and by our east coast internal time it was after 2 in the afternoon and we were hungry.  There is an elevator up to the surface - so we came up, had a sandwich, and headed back down.

Even slow strolling comes to an end, and we had the couple hour drive back to Roswell (alas, just missing the sunset, which happened behind us).  Back to another lively evening with beer, Raul's cooking, and Gary's talk.   Gary is partially disabled - we never got the full story, but there are back injuries and a hip replacement involved, and he walks with difficulty.  So, he engages his mind with research.  I loved his enthusiasm when he would talk about hours of research to find one small piece of a puzzle, when something would click into place and suddenly he would rub his hands in satisfaction and say "Ooooh, I got you now."

Eventually it was 11 o'clock New Mexico time - meaning 1 a.m. east coast time, and we gave up and crashed.

The next day would be homecoming.

Roswell, Day 2: Cheesiness

 And Covid, day 4: tedium.  At least the first couple of days I was sick enough that all I did was get up, feed the cats and chickens, and go back to bed.  Now I'm at the stage that I don't feel bad enough to just lie around, but don't feel good enough to get up and do anything.  I'm still being drippy and, despite slogging down quarts of water, dry mouthed.  I'm try to tell my immune system that it won and it can quit fighting now.  I've been living on tea and broth and I'm getting really hungry but don't feel like cooking anything.  I really want some milk and cookies.

I am fully aware that there are friends who would come running if I asked.  I would just be embarrassed to ask someone to drive 20-40 miles because I want a cookie.

Back to the trip.

I left off yesterday with being in the belly of the beast, imagining the explosion.  Although I don't usually think of myself as acrophobic/agoraphobic, I will openly admit to having some problems in there.  I could control my breathing by consciously taking slow deep breaths, but there was nothing I could do about the racing heartbeat.  Fortunately Raul was in no hurry.  He believes in experiencing a place, not just looking at it, and for awhile, weird as it felt, we just stood in there and talked about normal, everyday things (he has a wife and kids - that sort of thing) which did help ground me a bit.  But eventually it was time to leave - and I honestly wasn't certain if I could brave that narrow spiral set of stairs again.

But this isn't like a ride in Disney World where you can opt out.  It was either go back up those steps, or move in and get food lowered to me on a rope (I did consider that possibility).  I'm here, so obviously I was able to do it - but by not looking out, up, or (especially) down.  I just looked at the step  - put my foot on it - then looked at the next step.

Honestly, I felt like such a wuss.

After we finally emerged, Raul returned to work and Mike and I headed into town because face it - you can't go to Roswell without doing the tourist thing and going to the Alien Museum.  Roswell really milks the alien thing - even the lampposts in town have alien eyes on them.

They had alien autopsy scenes, and newspaper articles from people who had seen/been kidnapped by/been probed by aliens, and it was very much fun.

You do what you have to do to bring in the tourist dollars.  At least Roswell has aliens.  A town 100 miles away, Alamogordo, is known for having been the site of the first nuclear testing explosion - but the actual test site is only open two days a year.  The rest of the time they have to rely on their pistachio production - and Pistachio Land.

Alas, our time was limited so we did not drive the 100 miles to go see the big pistachio.

Nor did we do one thing that Mike had hoped for - wandering in the desert to hunt for Pecos Valley diamonds, an amber quartz crystal that we used to find in the area. It was either that, or go to Carlsbad Caverns - and we both wanted to go to the Caverns.  But he did spot a good rock shop.  Not only did he get a few crystals, but we had a lovely conversation with the owner.  I like talking to people who have a passion - even if it's for something that I might not be personally involved with.  I've had great conversations about birds, cheese, competitive rowing, or, in this case, rocks.  I love the way people open up and are so enthusiastic about sharing their passion if someone is willing to listen.  So we had a good rock talk - and Mike walked out with his crystals, a couple of small opals, and and interesting stone called an Apache tear, which looks black or dark gray until you shine a light though it and see that it's transparent. (He's such a pushover)

We found a good Mexicn (*not* Tex-mex) restaurant for lunch, then before heading back to the site we wanted to pick up something for breakfast.  Rather than hit a grocery store for something mundane like bagels, I did a search and found a promising little Mexican tienda (obviously geared towards the natives, not tourists).  They had a lovely array of traditional Mexican pastries.  Mike is used to fancy Boston bakers, where one muffin will be $3-4 dollars.  We bought enough for two breakfasts for under $6 (and they were delicious)

Then back to the site and another evening with Gary.  People who know me, know that I can talk.  A lot.  People who know Mike know that he can talk circles around me.  Gary?  We were eating his dust.  Remember what I said about passionate people?  His knowledge of this place, the history, and the people involved is phenomenal.  He wants to preserve the history of this era in time, the Cold War, now largely forgotten because, well, it was about The Big War that didn't happen because all the parties involved managed to frighten each other out of it.

Hanging out in the silos, I kept thinking of the old hippie saying of "suppose they gave a war and nobody came."  It actually happened.

We did have to pause and pop up outside to watch the sun set.  Living in Florida, and amongst trees, I'm not used to seeing the horizon.  Especially not on all sides, as far as the eye could see.  With the beautiful clear desert air.  So the sunset was gorgeous. (side note - perhaps "pop up" is not quite the right term.  Refer to Day 1 pictures of all the stairs involved to get in and out)

So we talked, and drank beer, and had a wonderful dinner (among his other talents, Raul loves cooking) [note to self - remember the appetizer of camerones aquachiles - a salad of cucumber, onions, cilantro, chili and shrimp] and finally crashed for the night.

To be continued with Day 3 - Carlsbad caverns.

Day 2: Terror

 I had plans for writing about this trip - I was going to write one post a day for the four day trip.  I wrote on on the 16th - and now it's the 19th?

Well, I thought I had brought home one souvenir from the trip: a pair of socks from the Alien Museum.

Actually, I brought home two souvenirs - socks and a case of Covid.  I had a couple of rough days, but the fever broke last night.  It is not a bad case (I did have a booster shot last month) so it mostly feels like a cold.  So much for being the last Covid virgin standing.

A couple more thoughts from Day 1 of the trip.  This was the first time I've ever flown at dawn, and boy - is that a beautiful time of the day to be taking off.

I've seen the evolution of in-flight entertainment.  When I was a kid, there would be an actual screen pulled down - you sort of had to peek over people's heads or between seats, and could rarely hear anything.

That progressed to either screens that you could pull up from the armrest, or screens that were on the back of the seats.  When I went to Boston a couple of years ago, I thought I was being fancy and brought a long my Bluetooth earplugs instead of the plug-in type - only to find that I needed to have the plug-in type.  I didn't bother to buy the airplane set - I could be content with my reading and knitting.

This time, I brought the plug-in set - only to discover that in-flight entertainment has evolved into "bring your own screen."  You can watch on your personal devices.  Because this was a short trip, I hadn't bothered to bring my tablet, which left my phone.  I thought I would at least listen to music  - and that's when I discovered that my phone does not have a jack for earplugs.   Back to the reading and knitting.  Someday I'll get it right.

Back to the first full day - which I'm realizing is going to take two posts because I'm starting to fade again (stupid Covid).  Wednesday morning - the most fascinating and terrifying day.

As well as the missile-site-turned-AirBnB that Gary owns, he also owns another site, still in original abandoned condition.  Raul took us out to see it.  The footprint of all the sites is identical, so we could find our way around, but it's amazing what Gary did with what he had to work with (he said he paid $50,000 for the site, and $400,000 to refurbish it).

Then we went into the silo.
Ahem.
"Our" silo in the AirBnB has a nice sturdy expanded metal floor with waist high railings, and a friendly alien to share a cup of tea.

a

Even at that, looking the 40 feet up and the 150 feet down make me feel a little queasy.

This silo?  A distinct lack of handrails and chunks of the floor.  And if we wanted to, we could climb down into the belly of the beast.  How often do you get a chance like that? (Answer - just once, if you make a misstep)

I have never thought of myself as being particularly acrophobic/agoraphobic, but I will admit that this place got to me.  In "our" silo, I didn't mind popping up and down the 30" wide steps, with that looooong drop off to the side.  Without the handrails - let's just say that I was suctioning myself to the wall.  We maneuvered our way along the catwalk and down a set of spiral stairs for a couple of levels.

 (Notice that there is no railing at the base of the steps.

This shot is taken from those steps - we went down to that second level.

These next two shots crack me up - Michael and I looking over the edge.  I am hiding behind an I beam, hanging on for dear life (I may have impressed my fingerprints into it).  Mike has his hands in his fricken' pockets, just casually leaning over the edge.  Sheesh.

Pictures just can't give an idea of the scale of the silo.  The missile elevator was mounted on springs (because you certainly don't want it to be jiggling) - this shot gives an idea of the size of them.

And always, in the back of our minds, was that our father was here, underground, when that 80 foot long, 130 ton missile, effing exploded.  Two of them, six weeks apart.  And by some miracle ("miracle" meaning that my father had safety drills on a very regular basis) everyone survived.  It's still a terrifying thought.

We were too young to think about it at the time.  It never occurred to us to even consider that he might not have survived.  And, in later years, he never talked about it, and we never asked, what that experience had been like.

The rest of the day was much less adrenaline provoking, but that will have to wait until tomorrow because I'm really crashing now.  Stupid Covid.

 

Roswell, Day 1

 Got home yesterday from the whirlwind trip.  'Twas amazing.

Getting to Roswell was blessedly uneventful, except for having to be at the airport by 5:30.  Ugh.  First stop was Dallas, with pretty good timing of Mike's flight from Boston landing about a half-hour after mine.

Then cue the talkfest, because that's what Mike and I do (I woke up this morning with a rough throat and a bit of a cough, and of course my first thought was that I caught something on the trip - but then realized that I talked more in four days than I do in an average month).

Quick background on the Roswell/alien thing.  The "Roswell Incident" happened in 1947 when "alien debris" was found - the government claimed it was a weather balloon, later released that it was a more sophisticated balloon designed to detect Soviet bomb tests.  Things went quiet for a couple of decades until the Atlas F missile program was ended and the military base at Roswell closed down in 1967.  Losing the base was a huge economic blow to the small town.  Somehow they came up with the idea of capitalizing on the alien theme, and the town now gets some 200,000 tourists a year, and there is a big annual alien festival.  We saw ads for a dentist ("get an out-of-this-world smile") and stores like the intergalactic vape shop.

So - we arrived at the Roswell airport.

Mike had been studying maps and directions, so we got our rental car and drove around to see our old stomping grounds.  It was strange, because other than visiting our first apartment here in Tallahassee, I've never gone back to anywhere that I've lived before.  Sad to say, after 60 years, the old neighborhood has gotten rather run down.  Then we headed out to the missile site.  20 miles away from Roswell, there is nothing to see from horizon to horizon of flat desert, with oil derricks pumping away (those things used to scare me when I was a kid).

We eventually spotted our Air BnB.

We were met by Raul, the owner's assistant (I have now realized that I did not get pictures of either Gary or Raul - my bad).  He showed us around the outside - there's a large cement pad over the missile silo, with the 150 ton blast doors - more on those later.  Finally we went in and down the first flight of stairs.  This shot is from the bottom of the stairs looking back up to the rather substantial door.

A couple more short flights of stairs took us to our apartment, which used to be the sleeping quarters for the missile crew.

The red thing above Mike's head is the escape hatch that leads up to the surface.  The big white structure in the middle is the support for the tonnage of dirt and cement over our heads.

We talked with Gary for a few hours (and Raul cooked a delicious dinner for us).  Gary is passionate and obsessed and has an encyclopedic knowledge of the cold war era missile programs and sites, and knows far more about Dad's career than we did.  Before we crashed for the night, we went into the missile silo itself.  When I first heard about Gary's AirBnB, I assumed that we would be in the apartment, and only allowed into the silo when escorted.  Not true.  Guests can go in there any time (musicians say that the acoustics are amazing)

We went out our apartment door, down a couple more flights of stairs, through a tunnel, and onto a landing about 40 feet underground.  The silo is mind-boggling: it's 75 feet across and almost 190 feet (some 14 stories) deep.  Although the landing has hand rails, I definitely felt some acrophobia.

Overhead were the 150 ton blast doors which would be opened for the missile to be brought up on an elevator before firing.  Due to a design flaw in the Atlas F missiles, on four occasions (three in Roswell, one in Oklahoma) the missiles would explode in the silo (fortunately without the nuclear warheads).  On at least one of these times, the 150 ton blast doors were blown completely off and thrown out into the desert.

This was enough for us for one day.  Time to crash.

Dithering

 I'm not responsible for this post.  I've been dithering, I had an extra glass of wine with a dinner that was too late, I'm getting up in a little over 5 hours, so I won't be proofreading this one.

So - the election happened.  I ain't happy.  But I'm steering clear of the doomsayers who are saying what might happen to this country.  I'll wait and see what actually happens.

Meanwhile - someone posted footage from a Ring camera on Halloween.  You know how some people - if they're not going to be home or don't want to pass out candy - just put out a bowl?  And, of course, the first few kids take it all?  So the camera shows these three little boys who run up to the house, see the empty candy bowl, confer for a moment, then they they all reached into their bags and put a handful of candy into the bowl before running off.

Things like that make me think that things are going to be all right.

Had an exciting moment a couple of days ago.  I was walking out in my yard, and almost stepped on this in my path.

I will confess to  a yelp and a quick step backward.  But then I looked - hard to see in this picture unless you zoom in close, but he had a distinctive striped chin.  Meaning that this is a banded watersnake (harmless) rather then a moccasin (not so harmless)

The main thing I'm dithering about is that my trip to Roswell starts tomorrow morning.  And like I have most of my adult life - I'm sort of hoping that something happens to stop it.  It's not that I don't like going places; it's that I  don't want to leave.  I found this quote from "The Last Unicorn"

    "I know how to live here.  I know how everything smells and tastes, and is.  What could I ever search for in the world except this again?"

And I'm sitting here in the couch, with RedBug asleep and purring beside me, and wondering how I can leave this, even for a few days.

But I do want to go.  I mean - stay in a missile silo?  Learn more about my father's career?  The big thing is again sharing with Mike.  I've gotten better at doing things alone, but sharing is so much fun.  And we have history in Roswell, even if we only lived there for a year.  He wants to hunt for Pecos Valley diamonds (a quartz crystal) because he remembers finding them when he was on boy scout camps.  We both want to see the amazing desert skies again.  We visited missile silos when we were kids and Dad was the commander.  We want to go to Carlsbad Caverns (I haven't been there in 50 years, and it's likely about that long for him).

So I really to want to make this trip.  It's just that I don't want to go, to leave my home, my cats, my chickens.  Everything I hold dear.

OK, really crashing now (not much sleep the past two nights because of panic attacks about the trip).  Alarm in 5 hours.  

I'll be home about this time, 4 days from now. I'll be happy that I went, and happier to be back.