Wow. 2025 (or, as I think of it, Year 6) is halfway over.
So far, so good - although I have to admit that hitting year 5 did a number on me. This level of grief is a marathon, not a sprint, and I'm tired. But it's my life now.
I just read a book where one character entered the priesthood after his wife died. He's carved out a good life for himself, but he has a ritual every evening of pouring himself a drink, with the toast of "one day closer to you."
So how has this year been? The big thing that I accomplished was clearing my path to the stream. In the cooler months I practically lived down there. Not so much after the weather changed to hot, sticky, bug-ridden, and daily rain. Maybe I'll do a visit tomorrow. I cut down two dead trees, and cut up one that fell in the driveway. I've been to a play and the circus. I'm 353 miles into my virtual walk of the length of England (1084 miles). I've read 24 books and some short stories. I've raised three opossums. I've done a lot of yard work. I got a new roof put on the house. I power washed and stained the deck. Kept the roof swept off.
I lost Stumbles. It hurts. Between her personality - very friendly, wanting to get into the middle of everything - and her neurological condition, she was like having a happy little drunk around. She made me laugh - I so miss that. The other cats sleep on the bed from time to time (especially in the winter) but she always slept with me (I liked the company, even if she did often wake me up with her over-active dreams). The always-too-empty bed now feels even emptier. RedBug misses her too; he's been very clingy.
I've been thinking of an analogy of a comment my chiropractor made. When I first started going to him, he did the standard having me rate my pain on the scale of 1-10. I mentioned that chronically I'd put it at a 2 or three. He looked at my x-rays, checked out my wonky back, and said that I probably was just accepting a certain level of pain as being normal. What I rate as a 2 or 3, someone else might call a 5.
I think that's how it goes with being lonely. I don't really even think about it any more -being alone is just normal. Alone isn't the same as lonely - but maybe I'm both and just used to it. The truth is that I do have a social life. There's working at the museum two days a week. I see Gill once a month after my chiro appointment. I've been to a party at the museum, and a couple of lunches there. I've met with other spinners three times. I've been to four meetings of the silent book club, and three of the library book club. Jeff has been in town three times and visited.
But do the math. 32 hours a month at the museum. Maybe (if I go to both book club meetings) 3 hours of book club. My visits with Gill are about two hours. Random stuff (like meeting with other spinners and Jeff) average out to about three hours a month. So that's 40 hours a month of being around other people. An average month has 744 hours. Sigh. I think what I really miss is *doing* something with someone else, not just sitting and chatting, but no one else wants to go to the theatre or circus. And when I do something like show up for the forest cleanup - no one else does.
Eventually I'll work something out.
I didn't mean for this post to turn into a pity party. You'd think that after 5.5 years I would have worked things out, but I'm still feeling my way. With the house and the yard and the animals and my museum work, I'm keeping busy. But I miss someone to yell out the answers to Jeopardy. Asking if I want a cup of tea (someone making me a cup of tea). Making plans. Doing stuff. Saying "what do you fancy for dinner?" Having dinner with someone - or breakfast, or lunch (although lunch does happen once in awhile) But then the reality hits that I don't want just a generic "someone" (although, to be honest, it's not like there's a line of potential someones at my door). I want a specific someone, and that's not possible.
But I've kept busy, and keep moving forward, or at least in some direction. That's something.
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