And yet another dozen days go by with no urge to write. 2025 self is going to be annoyed if I keep this up.
Hit with another unexpected trigger. I got an email from Honda about my Fit. It read, in part "Five years ago you brought home your Fit and opened the door to adventures around every bend." To which I yelled, "Well, SCREW YOU!!"
Buying that car was an attempt to grasp at a little bit of control after the world got jerked out from under us. Five years ago was when we started making numerous trips back and forth to Gainesville. And, if things had gone according to plan, while he was in recovery I would have been makes numerous trips back and forth by myself. Although we both loved our 20-year-old Honda, and it was still running fine, we thought that maybe we should get something a little newer and safer, so we traded in Dad's Infinity and got the Fit.
The "adventures" were not what I had in mind. In fact, after I came home I went back to driving the old Honda and merely glared at the new one for six months.
The other hit was FaceBook memories - this one from 6 years ago, where I talked about how Bob and I went to a tiny local theater to watch MST3K and eat huge buckets of popcorn. Now it seems so innocent. We had no idea that a year after that we'd be driving back and forth to Gainesville instead.
Last post I mentioned that I had a medieval event (SCA - Society for Creative Anachronism) to go to. I had the date off by a week - so that gave me time to finish the costume. The event wasn't quite what I expected; I knew there would be some sword fighting, but I also thought there would be other stuff - like singing, or dancing, or carousing at the feast table. But it was held in a gym on the basketball court - sort of lacking in ambience. And no singing, dancing, or feasting. I did have someone show me how to make a Roman style safety pin.
(and no,no pictures of me in my new costume. Somehow the basketball court wasn't inspiring)
I've found myself thinking about spaces - or gaps. Empty areas. There is often the human need to fill a space (the old "nature abhors a vacuum") but I have been exploring - or at least thinking about - empty spaces. Of course, there is that large emptiness that used to be filled by Bob - there are still times that I sleep on the couch because I can't handling the yawning chasm of his side of the bed. There are spaces that demand to be filled - like the rather small but really annoying one in my mouth. I had been having a lot of problems with one of my molars for years (OK, a decade or two). It was getting to the point that it really couldn't be recrowned - and the old crown would come off periodically. Then came the point when we were getting ready to go stay in Gainesville for Bob's treatment, and it came off again, and I went to my dentist and said "I can't be having with this - pull the damned thing." He didn't want to - he tried to tell me if the crown came off in Gainesville I could find a dentist to put it back on. Nope - I wanted to focus on Bob, so the tooth went. My plan was to get the bridge in before we left but the timing wasn't right - and when I came back it was Covid time so no having someone hanging around in my mouth. I know many people who have lost a tooth and the gap doesn't bother them; my dentist told me there was no danger to having a hole that far back. But I hated that damned gap and *finally* got my bridge in a year later.
How's that for meandering? I wrote awhile back about giving away a loom that was in the cottage.
My plan was to move an empty bookshelf (used to hold Bob's hundreds of T-shirts in milk crates) from the bedroom to that spot. But even though the loom wasn't that big (30" x 30", 55" tall) the room seems somehow so much more open having that bit of unfilled space (I did put my bench there)
I don't really need more storage (but if I put shelves there, they would certainly fill up) so I'll just leave it as is.
The other gap is where the missile picture was (the one I sent to the missile guy). Rather than having pictures on the wall, Bob had built me a couple of picture rails where I can just put up (and overlap, and rearrange) pictures at will. We did that 7 or 8 years ago, so the picture has been there since then. Now there's a gap.
I have other pieces hanging out in a closet, and something will go there. But that picture had been in the family for 60 years, and I didn't want to fill up its space too quickly and thoughtlessly.
Time for a few less philosophical thoughts. One was the celebration - one of my new chicks laid her first egg!
I've had chickens for over 30 years, yet "first egg" is still a thrill.
The other was just an opportunity to look closely at something. I've written before about how most people just glance at life and move on, rather than stopping and really looking. When I read a book about owls earlier this year, it mentioned how their feather structure allows for silent flight: the front edge of the feather has a very fine, stiff, comb-like structure that breaks up the air, while the back side is soft and wispy to prevent any air vortices. Well, the museum's barred owl, Mabel, dropped a wing feather, so I was able to study it. Amazing.
Whew! That was a ramble. And I feel like I've missed stuff. Must stop going two weeks between posts.
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