Wow. May already. Merry May, Happy Beltane, whatever floats your boat.
For someone who has decided to just be a quiet hermit, living in the woods with her books, spinning wheels, and cats, I've been out a lot and peopling a lot lately.
First, car adventures, which I didn't write about last post. It's because I'm sad; there has now been a breakup of a relationship which lasted over 20 years - between me and the Honda Dealership. They kept my (still missed) old Honda going for 21 years, and for the last 5 I've been taking the Fit in for it's annual checkup. No problems - until last year, when they didn't put the hubcaps back on properly. Two fell off and a third wasn't on correctly. They replaced the two after I showed them the incorrect one - but not that one, which had broken clips (I have since then rather elegantly held it on with zip ties.
Mistakes happen. But I had the routine maintenance done again this year. I was told that they couldn't rotate the tires due to the damaged hubcap (which they had damaged). Fine. They're in alignment and can go awhile without it until I take it elsewhere. But when I left to go visit Gill, I heard a scraping sound. I looked under the car - and the underskirting was loose, flopping around, and scraping the ground.
(Back story: Last August I had a freak accident with a curb (apparently went over it a little, and when I pulled out it yanked the front bumper loose and ripped the underskirting, which had to be replaced. I had it repaired at a body shop.)
So I go back to the dealership, point this out, and the shop manager shrugged and said "it happens." I strongly suggested that he fix it because I wasn't going to drive it like that. Which he did - sort of. It still didn't seem right, so a few days later I took it back to the body shop. They said it was pretty obvious that it was torn when it was driven onto the lift at the dealership - and no, it wasn't put back on properly. Nice people - $20 cash and a quick repair job to fasten it on correctly.
Sigh - 20+ year relationship, shot.
On to peopling. April 22 was the volunteer appreciation party. The 24th was the library book club meeting. The 27th was the Silent Book club - but afterwards I got into some good conversation with some other people for another hour. After that I wanted to go check out a "Half Halloween Oddities Market." That was . . . different. For starters - I get there, and it's an alternative dive bar. There were some . . . interesting . . . vendors. Actually I had a lovely chat with a . . person. Genetically male, but wearing a sweet sundress, elaborate makeup, and a headdress that looked like furry ears but was made of taxidermied squirrels. He told me about being an art instructor at FSU - and the difficulties of trying to teach sculpture remotely during the Covid lockdown.
Tuesday a couple of spinners that I met last month wanted to get together. And that was fun as well.
But the problem with peopling is that I get engaged, like a napping part of me wakes up. Then I come home to my usual hermitage and things just sort of echo for awhile while that part goes back to sleep and I get back to normal.
Maybe because of all this is why I had a dream of Bob. Just a short bit, silly - we were working on the Halloween trail and he was complaining of a raw spot on his foot where his shoe had rubbed. Ordinary. And I'd do anything to have real moments like that again with him. As usual after having any dream of him, I lie awake as long as possible, holding very still, trying to remember and hang onto every nuance of him.
That's people. Now possums. My museum boss, Suzie, did the most amazing thing. She was coming in to work, and as one often does in Florida, she saw a dead opossum in the road. But as no one ever does - she stopped, checked it, and four babies in the pouch were still alive.
They were trouble from the start. All she had in her van was a Publix shopping bag, so she put them in there, but one escaped and crawled under the dash. She checked all day, and finally found him around 10:00 that night.
Now I'm raising them. They'e still being fussy about eating so it's a little time consuming. And then this morning somehow three of them had escaped. The cage was still secured - no loose spots or gaps. I eventually found them. The guest bed is a trundle bed - and they were between the two beds. I was able to grab one, but the other two scrambled out of reach. I couldn't pull the lower bed out because the loom is in the way. So I had to move the loom as much as I could without having to shift other furniture around, and was able to pull out the lower bed enough to have about an 8" gap in between. They were in a back corner under the other bed. So I squeezed in the gap, crawled over and grabbed them, and then had to get back out while holding a squirming possum in each hand (I finally shoved them under my shirt)
I've got heavy books on top of the cage now. And it's time to go see if that worked.
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