The Play Went Wrong

 I've been to three plays at the FSU School of Theatre in as many years, and every time I wonder why I don't go more often.  The acting is great, the production values, settings, and costumes are wonderful, and the tickets are cheap - about as much as a couple of hamburgers.

This play had a lot of problems.  Missed cues, fumbles, the curtains falling off the wall, props broken - it all went wrong.  But considering that the title of this production is "The Play That Went Wrong" it all went wrong in all the right ways.  By the end, I had laughed for two hours, and the entire set, walls and all, was on the floor.

I even treated myself to a takeout from Cava for dinner.

Yes - I did have that feeling of - sadness?  wistfulness? when it seemed that everyone in the theater was in couples or groups, and I was the only one going solo. And it would have been fun to have been laughing with someone.  But my point of view about going solo (to the circus, or the RenFair, or out to eat) has changed over the years.   At first, it felt really weird.  Like everyone else had a partner or friends, and I didn't.  I think the change in my mindset came a year or so ago.  Jeff was in town, and we were going to meet for lunch.  I got there and waited inside - it was a hot day, so I wasn't about to sit in the car.  And I waited there for 20 minutes.  I just figured that he had gotten hung up at work.  But then I got a text from him of "where are you?"  It turned out that he got there, didn't see my car, so he just waited for me, outside in his truck, because he doesn't like to walk into a restaurant by himself.

There is it.  It's not like *everybody* else has people to do stuff with.  It's that the people who don't - simply don't do the stuff.  Don't go to the play, or the movie, or out to eat.   Whereas I've decided that if I want to do something, I do it.

I did have a group thing - the annual museum volunteer appreciation party.  That one is always fun.

I've been dealing with a chicken problem.  The dratted birds have figured out that eggs are tasty.  At first they were only breaking Djali's eggs (she's the only one that lays green eggs).  But now they're all fair game.  I've tried keeping the coop doors mostly closed to keep it dark in there (they can still go out to the scratch yard during the day). I changed to a different nest box.  I tried putting artificial eggs in the nest to see if pecking those would discourage them.  Now I'm just checking every hour or so to see if I can get an egg before they do.  If I find a bird on the nest, I shut the coop doors so no one else can get inside (and then have to remember to set a timer so I don't forget her).  I feel like I'm playing tug-of-war to get any eggs.  When I lose, I have to clean the gloppy nestbox.  I lose a lot.

This means war.  I made a couple of chicken bombs - I blew out some eggs, filled them with a mixture of mustard, chili paste, vinegar, and salt, and put them in the nest.
Me:  mwa ha ha ha ha
The Chickens:  Mommy made us tasty treats!!!!!

Sigh.

I'm *still* waiting on my ring.  It was supposed to take three weeks.  They had called after two weeks to give me the price estimate and get the go-ahead, so I was hopeful it would be soon.  After another week (when the three weeks was up) I called.  I got the "oops" call back.  The ring had not been moved from the "pending" box to the "work on it" box, so he said he should have it done within a week.  They're closed until Wednesday, so fingers crossed that I get it back.  Like someone with phantom limb pain, even after a month I can still feel the absence of the ring.  Even after this mistake, I'm going to put myself through this again.  I've been keeping Bob's ring in a box, but it occurred to me that I could have it cut down so that I can wear it.  I haven't found any other jewelers in town who do the work in-house instead of sending it out, so I hope this will go a little faster.

And now it's dark, and mid-April, so I must go out to sit with the fireflies.

Untethered

 I've been feeling oddly untethered.  Sort of free floating.

For the past almost 2.5 years, I've been doing the online Conquerer walking challenges.  They're fun, and have motivated me to get off my backside and move.  You pick a challenge - say, to do a Day of the Dead walk in Mexico, or hike Hadrian's wall in England. You pick a time frame-which will tell you how many miles a day you have to log.  When you finish, they send you a quite nice medal (actually enameled metal).   I did two walks of only about a hundred miles each, one at 180, and then a big one (around Iceland) of 830 miles.  Then I decided for the really big one - the 1084 miles from Land's End to John o' Groats in England.

In my previous walks I set my goal at 1.5 miles a day, 7 days a week.  Honestly, easily achieved.  For this one, I upped it to 2.5 (2.6 actually, to get the math right).  I had 424 days to do it, and it did in in 400.  I also learned that getting that extra mile a day turned into a real slog.  I don't like wearing anything in bracelet form, nor did I want to buy anything just for this, so I let the Fit app on my phone count my steps.  That meant that I got a little (a little?  More like totally) obsessive about keeping my phone on me at all times, even just in the house.  I could also enter steps manually - for instance, I know that from the house to the chicken coop  round trip is 150 steps, so if I ran out to check for eggs and forgot the phone I could enter it manually.  But it got to the point that if I checked on the chickens, then realized that they needed water, I had to count the steps from the coop to the faucet and back so I could enter those too.  I would get annoyed with myself if I ran out to put something in the car, and then realize that I hadn't picked up the phone.

But it's done, and I'm free.  But it's feeling a little strange not to have my phone in my pocket all the time, and just leave it on the table.

I'm also floating because March 30 has come and gone.  That weird feeling of living in 48 years simultaneously, while leaving the last 6 years blank, has gone.  I'm back to being just me now.  But I remember how I was floating the first couple of weeks of April 2020.  I had been three months living in the goldfish bowl that was the hospital room. I wasn't even supposed to use the bathroom in the room - that was for Bob only.  I had to go to the public bathroom outside of the ward.  That was a little embarrassing at 3:00 a.m., wandering down the hall in my jammies with everybody knowing where I was going.
Then, suddenly, I was back here, alone in the woods.  I could use either bathroom. I had a kitchen to cook in.  I had total freedom (well, as much as anyone could in those first days of the Covid shutdown).  I damn near exploded from all that pressure suddenly being gone (I think I did a few times.)

I'm also feeling untethered because my ring is still at the jeweler's (I had hoped they would be done by now).  I'm having the setting removed so I can just wear it as a plain band.  When I first had to stop wearing it (and before I took it to the jeweler) I would sometimes at home slip it back on just because my hand felt too strange without it.  Even now, almost a month later, I can still feel it (or feel it's absence) like some amputees still have the ghost limb syndrome.  Heck - I can even see the ghost ring.  The indentation in my finger, and the faint scarring from wearing a ring there for 54 years.

Soon, I hope, soon.

Cat news.  RedBug lived under the bed for two months after his amputation.  After that, he stayed in the bedroom for another month or so.  Finally, in February, he started venturing a few feet out, and by now he's back to his old normal self, even managing to get up on the cat shelf.

Such a relief.  I was hoping that I hadn't saved his life, only to have him always be afraid to come out in the open.

As he emerged back into the house, Hamish started acting up.  It was sort of to be expected; he and RedBug have never gotten along and Hamish probably enjoyed being the only boycat.  And the more Redbug emerged - laying on the couch, snuggling with me, getting on the shelf - the more Hamish acted up.  He seemed stressed/agitated.  Would walk around the house meowing (very annoying at night).  Even more annoying - to the extreme - he started spraying a lot, everywhere.  That got old really fast.  I tried not to get angry, thinking this was just jealousy.  I gave him a lot of attention, played with him, gave him treats.  But he just wouldn't settle.

Then it hit me.  Acting up.  Acting stressed.  Behaving badly.  Meowing a lot.  And the kicker - ate like crazy but not gaining any weight.  I ran him to the vet and asked to get his thyroid tested.  Yep-crazy high.  Fingers crossed that the meds to get that under control will help settle him down.

A few posts ago I mentioned seeing a friend and coming home with a spinning wheel and a ridiculous amount of alpaca. That huge bag turned out to also have a tanned sheep hide, and a sheep fleece which I inspected and then tossed in the ditch for erosion control.  That still left about 20 pounds of alpaca to sort, skirt, and wash.  I'm still not done - I think the stuff is breeding in that bag.  To give an idea of the amount, this is about 2 pounds after washing, laying out to dry.

I had an oddly meta moment this week.  The library is having its annual comic con in August, and their theme this year is sea monsters and mermaids.  It might be time to make another puppet.  I was perusing Pinterest for sea monster ideas. I came across a series of pages that looked very much like some books that I own on mythical creatures and dragons.  In theory they are made for kids, but I love them.  The pages are sepia and look worn, the writing is cursive, and there are a lot of fun things like envelopes that you can open to read letters.  These pages were of fantastical sea creatures.

If you're lucky on Pinterest, the poster will show links to the original pieces.  No such luck here.  I checked the two publishers that I know do this sort of book (Spiderwick Press and Candlewick Press).   I was getting determined - I *really* wanted to add this book to my collection.  Google Lens didn't help.  So finally I turn to my chatbot; I showed it a couple of the pages and asked if it could find the source.  What I got back was "I really hate to disappoint you, but those images are AI generated.  There is no book."

There is something very surreal for an AI to be apologizing for something that is AI generated.

That about sums up the past week.  April is filling up- there's a play I want to see, I have to get my dexa and mammogram (oh joy), the museum is having the annual volunteer party, and I have to try to find someplace to get my oil changed and the car checked out.  The last makes me sad - for 21 years I took my car (first the old Honda and now the new one) to the dealership, and had no problem.  But they've gotten sloppy - year before last they broke the clips on my hubcaps (they replaced the two that fell off - the other two I've got held on with zip ties) and last year they caught the underskirting of the car on the lift and ripped it loose - and then got annoyed with me when I pointed out that it was dragging on the ground and insisted that they repair it.  So that long relationship is over.

And so (in the words of famous diarist Samuel Peeps) to bed.

March 30

 It's almost 10:00 a.m.  By now Bob has stopped breathing, I have stopped screaming, the Chaplin has talked with me.  I've packed up our stuff from the room, and walked away from the body that once held Bob.

And suddenly "we" became "I."

Six years in, and I'm still figuring that out.  My father had a very dominant personality, and Mike was an extraordinary person, so for my first 18 years I was "Chalifoux's daughter" or "Chalifoux's sister."  I was just Ann for my first term of college, and then I became Bob and Ann.  So it's understandable that Ann, as a singular person, is still working things out.

I feel myself coalescing back into one person.  Starting in February, I felt myself splitting up, somehow.  Simultaneously living in those 48 years.  It got harder as this day grew nearer.  Last week I went to the periodontist, then stopped for a sandwich and coffee on the way home.  I read my book and listened to conversation all around me, but could sense the ghost of another me, sitting across from him.  On the way home I drove past Momo's pizza, and my chest hurt as I knew that in there was a different Ann, with Bob, laughing over our famous "slices as big as your head."

Now she's just somebody that I used to know.  And the ghosts of Ann are fading away now, leaving the new, now six-year-old Ann to live her new life.

And, once again, the reward for surviving year six - is that I get to go on to year seven.

As always, my love

I love you

I miss you

Thank you.

March 29

 Well, this day has come.  I spent it rather quietly.  Mostly, I've been sorting that mountain of alpaca that I was given.  It's a quiet and meditative task, a good thing to be doing.

I've found myself thinking of a woman who was on the Roads Scholar trip a few years ago.  I thought of her as bird-like, petite and perky.  When we were talking, I mentioned that Bob and I had been a bit scandalous because we moved in together a couple of weeks before we got married, which was still a shocking thing in the early 1970s.  She got a mischievous look on her face and said she moved in with her husband on their first date.  Her husband is still alive - in a care facility, because his Alzheimer's got bad enough that he was sometimes violent and she couldn't handle him anymore.  So he's there, and doesn't know her, and she travels.

I can't imagine losing someone that way.  But maybe I can, just a little.  In previous years, I said this was the day that Bob and I said goodbye.  That's the way I would have wanted it to be.  I wish we would have looked each other deep in the eyes, said "I love you" and said goodbye.  But it wasn't like that.  I kept trying to get his attention, to get him to look at me, but he sort of brushed me aside and was focusing on the nurse, asking him to get on with it, get the morphine drip going,  I know that he was afraid, and that he wanted to get it over with, and that the toxins in his system were messing up his mind - but I wish he had said goodbye.

Today is the day I lost him.  Tomorrow he will stop breathing.

Countdown

 It's almost here - the time that all the timelines I've been living for the last month or so converge onto that moment of March 30 when Bob quit breathing.

I can relax now.  I give myself these days.  March 27 was the last day that we were going ahead, doing everything, hoping that something would happen.  On March 28, he sat up and yelled "It's over.  Let it be over."  He would have gone on morphine that night, but I begged him to give me one more day - one day for both of us to think it over, to not do this impulsively, to realize that this was the ultimate permanent decision.  On the 29th we said goodbye and they started the morphine drip, and on the 30th he quit breathing.

I have found, over the 6 years now, that I can deal with anything, as long as I know that I'll have these two days to fully mourn.  I don't know what I'll do - maybe continue to sort and wash that mountain of alpaca.  Maybe mostly sleep.  Or read.  It doesn't matter.  I have wine and rum and carrot cake.  As long as the cats and chickens and squirrels get fed, I don't push myself to do anything else.  In the past, I've sometimes even covered up the clocks.  I just simply quit and rest for a couple of days.  I mourn the 6 years that I should have had with him, and feel gratitude for the 48 years that he gave me.

Look! A Baby Wolf!

 You never know when it will hit.

I was at work at the museum today, inside a building called The Discover Center, with stuff in it for kids.

There were a few books on the table, with this one on top.

And suddenly I heard Bob's voice:  "Look!  A baby wolf!"

That was a shtick he had for years.  When he wanted to distract me from something, he would point and go "Look - a baby wolf!"  And, of course, I would play along and look.

For example:  Say we had gone out for a hamburger.  He would look past me, go "look!  A baby wolf!"  I would turn around and look - and, of course see nothing,  Then I would turn back, and some of my fries would be missing and he would sit there with a totally innocent look on his face.

I miss those moments.

Plan C Day, Ring, Spinning Wheel, Renaissance Faire

 March 23 will always, I fear, be Plan C day.  This was the day that the doctor was firmly non-committal when it was becoming obvious that Bob's second transplant had not taken, and I asked her what the next step would be.  After she left, I looked at Bob and said "I don't think there's a Plan C."  And there wasn't.

I found a jewelry store that would talk to me about my ring.  Melting and recasting isn't recommended - because there is also solder involved in the setting, it could contaminate and weaken the gold, especially since it is a small ring.  They could put a new setting and diamond in it - but I don't want that; it simply would not be *my* diamond, the one that 19-year-old me squealed when they chose it.  So what they are going to do is cut off the setting and file and smooth the ring.  I should get it back in a couple of weeks.

It's still bothering me so much not to have it, psychologically of course, but also physically.  I didn't realize how much I fiddled with it, just touching it with my thumb.  And my fingers on either side were used to feeling it there.  My hand just feels weird.  Before I took it in (and leaving it there was so hard) I would sometimes put it on in the evening just to de-stress and be able to feel it again.)

In other news, I came home with a spinning wheel last week.

 A Rick Reeves (one of the iconic names in spinning wheels). Handmade, red oak (weighs a ton), double table Norwegian style.  But I don't particularly want it, and don't plan on keeping it.

Here's the story.  A woman who used to be a neighbor (about 30 years ago) tracked me down.  They're moving out of town, and she had some fiber (alpaca) that she wanted to give me.  She also wanted to know if I knew anyone who wanted a spinning wheel - she got this beauty, but doesn't use it much.  I said I knew someone in the weaving guild who might be interested, but their budget was around $500, and this wheel is worth about three times that much.  When I got to her place, and we were talking, she said they were moving in three days and she really didn't want to take it with her, so would part with it for $500.   At that price, I know that I can pass it on at some point, so home with me it came.

Also, "some alpaca" turned out to be about 30 pounds.  Guess I'll be busy sorting/washing for awhile.

The Renaissance Faire was this weekend.  I got my outfit finished - I took it as a challenge to use only stuff that I had on hand.  I had a beige sheet - so that got dyed green and made into a skirt.  Some paprika linen became a bodice, and brown linen for a witch's hat and belt pouch.  I needed a belt - so I strung up the loom and wove one (in the background of the picture with the hand.

OK - I did buy one thing, but it's to go with my puppet and not specifically for this outfit.  The dragon uses the "fake arm" illusion.  Normally I just use a stuffed glove, but I wanted to upgrade.  I bought a poseable hand (normally used for manicurists to practice on).  It was, of course, a dead pale "flesh" tone, but I did some painting and texturing on it.  I also covered most of it with a fingerless mitts (and wore the matching mitt on my real hand).  It was surprisingly effective.

  Here's the whole ensemble, with dragon.

It was a lot of fun - after I finally got there.  They weren't expecting the turnout that happened.  When I got close to the Fairground (at a point that I would normally be about 5 minutes away) I sat in a traffic jam for one and a half hours.  I had made the outfit, rigged the arm, gotten dressed, bought my tickets online - so what the heck, somehow I was going to get there.

I think the three months of living in the hospital room, just sitting and waiting and sitting and waiting  rewired me.  I *never* used to be able to sit still, or wait for anything, and if a line was going to be more than 15 minutes long I would strongly question how much I wanted something.  Now, if a long wait comes up, I just sort of shut down.

I also immediately gave up my plan of eating fair food.  There wasn't a single line less than 30 people long, and I had done enough waiting for one day.

It was a smallish Faire (it's an organization that does Faires, but this was their test one in Tallahassee) but fun.  There was jousting (guys in real armor on real horses) live music, jugglers, fire eaters, circus acts, storytelling, and dancing.

I had my dragon.  She was important.  Without her, I would have been there by myself.  Walking around, looking and enjoying stuff, but also being aware that everyone else seemed to be in couples or groups.  With her - there were *lots* of interactions.  Lots of photographs taken.  Lots of compliments, of course.  A chance to talk to other makers.  I got to feel like I was part of something.  It was fun.

I needed that - to get out, talk to people, get outside of my own head.  For the last month I've been feeling myself shutting down, being disoriented (when it gets dark and cool outside, I sometimes think it's fall and forget what time of year it is).  I just want to sit and wait things out - without really having anything to wait for.

In a week, 2020 self will get up, take a last longing look at the empty shell that use to hold Bob, walk out of the room and come home.

End of an Era

 I got engaged on August 3, 1972.  I wrote about it in a 2022 blog post: https://returntotheswamp.blogspot.com/2022/08/august-3-ring.html

That was the first day that I put on this ring.

Almost 54 years ago.  I was 19 years old.

Last night I looked down, and noticed the lack of a familiar sparkle: the diamond was gone.  Funny how the mind works; the first thing I did was look more closely, and even stick my pinky fingernail in to make sure that it wasn't there.

Yes, I looked for it.  I put on my head lamp and retraced all my steps outside that I had taken that afternoon.  There is a thick layer of leaves everywhere; the chances of finding it were pretty much nil (I did startle a lot of little spiders because I had to get a close look every time I saw their glittery little eyes).

I don't want to replace the diamond.  It would *a* diamond, but not *my* diamond -not the one that our teenage selves scraped for coin to buy it.  But I hate not wearing my ring (the wedding band had a raised notch to hold the engagement ring, and the two were soldered together after we got married, so I can't wear the wedding band separately).

What I want to do is have the ring melted down and recast into a plain band.  It would probably be less expensive to just buy a plain band and sell the ring for scrap - after all, it's just a piece of metal - but I can't.

I was in town today to get the stitches out of my mouth, so I went to a jeweler's.  I was embarrassed when I got out of the car and looked at the ring in the sunlight; like my working hands and permanently stained fingernails - I realized it was dirty.  Dark in the little nooks and crannies.  I polished it as best I could with my shirt.

Yes the jewelry store could do it. $300 and 5-6 week wait (which says to me that it would be shipped off somewhere instead of being made in-house).  But to sound very new-agey - the vibe was off.  I showed them my heartache - and it may as well have been the pull tab off of a soda can.  I told them I had worn it for 54 years - it was acknowledged that the settings can get worn down.  I don't know what I was expecting, but I wanted something that acknowledged that this little piece of scrap metal was important.  

There was another jeweler's about 5 miles away that I thought about checking out, but I didn't want to once again hand over my dirty little broken ring.  I decided to come home and give it a good cleaning and polishing and check out a few more possibilities.

I didn't realize how many times a day I touched that ring, or fiddled with it, or just glanced at the little sparkle on my hand that said once upon a time someone deeply loved me.   A few times today I have either felt it missing, or looked down, and had a quick panic attack. 

Wish me luck.

Dear 2027 Self

 Dear 2027 Self,

A shout out from 2026 self:  Hang in there, girl.  You got this.
I know what you're going through.  For one - you thought by now you wouldn't be.  That you could handle March all right.  Maybe you are - but I suspect that you've having issues.

You have one foot in 2027.  But also one in 2020.  And a third foot (awkward, I know) in the 48 years between 1972 and 2020, with it all swirling around you like confetti in a tornado.  You're not sure exactly where you are or when you are.

You're making stupid mistakes.  Dropping things.  Forgetting what you're doing.  Setting timers for everything so you don't forget something 10 minutes later.  Crying at odd moments.

At the same time - you're fine.  Singing and getting jiggy while doing the dishes.  Maybe working on a project.  Reading a good book.  Loving on the cats, walking in the woods, laughing with people at work.  Scratching Otis the Pig on his tummy.

You're not alone.  2026 Self is going through all that right now.  And we have backup.  Poor 2020 Self, who had to sit there in that hospital room 24/7, starting to realize what was going to happen and not being able to do anything about it except watch and try to be positive and comforting.  2021 Self - she's not much help.  I think she was shell-shocked and didn't say much.  2022 Self - there's our girl.  She gutted herself, committed emotional seppuku, felt all the feeling - and survived.  Those of us after her don't have to lean in as hard.  We should be grateful.

The rest of us just sort of fall apart in March, living the double (triple?) life.  Needing timers, and reminders, and checking the phone or calendar to see what day it is.  But we always cope, right?  We know how to handle this.

Are you sometimes sleeping on the couch, because having that solidity at your back helps keep the 3:00 a.m. panic away?  That doesn't hurt anyone, so why not?

Cats, chickens, and squirrel fed? (Is Dingo squirrel still around - he's over 11 years old now)

Showered?

Eating?  Cut yourself some slack if you want to.  Still eat your veggies and healthy stuff, but some junk food for a short time won't hurt anything.  Have some Easter candy, or buy some pastry.  Yesterday, I bought a loaf of white bread - which I haven't done for years (Gill gives me a couple of slices when I go visit her).  But I was making the medication for the Roger the Goat at work yesterday, which is mixed with peanut butter and put of bread, and suddenly I was "I Must Have A Peanut Butter Jelly Sandwich."  And that just isn't the same on my homemade multigrain seedy bread.  Now I'm excited - I even bought some American cheese (which in theory I dislike, but it's the cheese of my childhood) so I can have a grilled cheese sandwich.  Cinnamon toast.  Sugar sandwiches (another childhood treat - butter and a heavy sprinkle of sugar, so crunchy when you eat it).

I'm getting worked up over a loaf of white bread - sigh.

Still admiring the azaleas?  Enjoying the pink skies of sunset, with the chorus of spring peepers?  Strolling in the woods?

Still going in to the museum?

Still moving?  You won't be doing the endless slog of the 1084 mile walking challenge because I'll be through with that by mid-April, but still move.  I did finally go to the senior exercise class at the community center on Monday.  It was not too strenuous, but it was fun, and I'd been inside my own head too much, so getting active with other people was good.

It's OK to go back onto the antidepressants.

March is hard.  Acknowledge that, and let it be hard.  You'll carve out those last two days to really mourn, and then pick up those bootstraps and keep going.

One last thought.  You often read essays on grief, and there is the old "people think I'm fine, but inside I'm weeping."  What I want you to realize is that the outside person isn't masking.  She's not faking.  The person who can laugh, dance, sing, enjoy this beautiful world of ours and so far has handled everything the world has thrown at her, is just as real and authentic as the person who is lonely, often fearful, and clutches a pillow like a teddy bear.  There's nothing fake about either of them.

So good luck, 2027 self.  It might not feel like it some days, but you'll get through this.  Be gentle to yourself - and we're all behind you.

Living in an Artificial World

 I'm not sure what's real anymore.  I know I'm not alone in that; so many people complain that with CGI, Photoshop, and now AI - there's no telling what's real and what's not.

I have enough trouble with being basically a cynical person without be lied to all the time.  There was a post on FB yesterday (which seemed like it was written by a human) who said that they missed the simple pleasure of seeing cute animal videos that people would post - say, that was caught on their Ring camera.  "Cute baby skunks!" your mind says, and you smile.  And that's it - just a little spark in the day.  Now - they feel like they have to look closely - are the shadows not keeping up with the movements?  Are little skunks somehow blinking in and out of existence?  Is something off?  I like how they put it - "I didn't want to do homework.  I just wanted to watch the baby skunks."

I know that doing Photoshop, CGI, and now AI does require a skill set, and is an art form on its own.  But why can't people honestly just say "AI generated" and then the viewer can relax and enjoy it.  Some do - there's a page called "Club Cranium" which has strangely bizarre things on it, and I admire the artist.  

And, of course, you get a message or a text from someone, and hope that your Spidey sense is working because it may or may not be from that person (hint - if you're going to send a scam message, see if the name you're using is from someone who is still alive).

I've been fuming about this for the past couple of days.  There's a Renaissance Faire in town in about three weeks.  I want to go, and take my dragon puppet, and I sort of want a new costume.  I have my medieval kirtle, but I want something a little fancier, like a swamp witch.  So I start looking for inspiration and type "Swamp Witch" into Pinterest.  This skirt came up.

Oh, my.  This skirt has "me" written all over it.  I love the layers.  The curved hem. The way the colors flow autumnal from the yellows and oranges to the greens.  I really want it.  There's a site: The skirt is $32.

So there's the part of me that looks at it, finger hovering over the "Buy" button, ready to put in my PayPal.  Then there is the me looking over my shoulder, saying "that skirt doesn't physically exist anywhere."  If I order it, what I'll get (if I get anything) would be a plain skirt - possibly cotton, likely polyester - with a ruffle design printed on it.

But I keep coming back to it, because it annoys the ever-loving hell out of me.  Someone is telling me it's there, for a ridiculously low price, and they're lying to me.

I'm saving the picture, and who knows? Someday I might make something like it.  It would be $100 or so of fabric, and I'd have to do the dyeing and distressing, and I don't think I'l do it in three weeks before the Ren Faire.  It will live in my idea stash - where I'll both admire it, and be pissed off by it.

But that's our current world.  You can't trust the news, because everyone puts their own bias on it (just stating facts doesn't get ratings).  You can't trust any photographs or videos.  If you read a post, and it's more than a couple of paragraphs long, likely it was AI written or at least assisted (there's a cadence to AI writing that's pretty obvious).

I still want that skirt.

Finished Shawl; Unsettling Dream

 The Forest Walk Shawl is finished.  And I'm happy with it - it really captures the mood of a walk through the woods.

Just in time for the weather to be warm again.

I'm in the post-project funk.  Something like this is about project, not product. I've spent many many hours thinking of this project, coming up with the color scheme, spinning, dyeing, and knitting - and now it's done.  It will have its time to be draped on the mannequin in the "no cats allowed" room, and eventually folded into a box. With luck, next winter, I might be able to wear it once or twice.  But, basically, this relationship is over.  

And it's February 27, one of the hard dates.  In 2020, this was the day that ended the most terrifying time of my life - the period that Bob was out of the hospital and we were living in a hotel and he was 100% my responsibility.  Sick and weak, and a fall could have killed him and I had no call button for a nurse.  But still - it was quiet with no beeping and alarms and people in and out 24/7, and the bed was big enough that I could curl up against him.  But on the 27th, they decided that it was too dangerous and they readmitted him.  He stood in the door of the room and said "Annie - I'm having a panic attack.  I can't do this."  The next day he would start the round of chemo that killed him.

I dreamed of him last night.  Somehow he had come back.  We were both trying to work through the awkwardness of learning to live together again after 6 years apart.  I was trying to explain about the cats, and apologize for the amount of his stuff (especially the barn) that was gone.  The part that I really remember was that he looked at me and said. "You look broken.  No older, just . . . . broken."

Tooth and Asking For Help.

 I did something that I very rarely do, and avoid as much as possible.  I asked for help.

My oral surgery/prep work for my implant was yesterday.  I've been dreading it.  I don't know why - I've had a bridge, a couple of crowns, three root canals, and a tooth pulled in the last 5 years.  I've driven myself each time.  But this time for some reason I felt that I just couldn't cope.

It might be the memory of the two root canals (at the same time) a year ago.  I was in the chair for almost two hours, and the last person of the day, so after all that it was dark when I got out.  And raining.  And in an unfamiliar part of town.  So tired and woozy, with the numbness starting to wear off, I had that hour drive, then when I got home I had to go out in the rain to put the chickens up, then feed the cats and the flying squirrel before I could finally take care of myself.  I was a little pitiful.

At least this time I was going to getting out in the daylight.  But I was still going to feel woozy, and the periodontist is in a busy part of town.   But what choice did I have?

I asked for help.  It's about a 45 minute drive there; the first half-hour isn't too bad, but that final 15 minutes (and hence the first 15 minutes coming home) is dealing with more traffic in an area I'm not familiar with.  So I called Gill.  She lives about a half-hour from me, but it's a pretty straight shot.  I asked her if she could drive that last 15 minutes to and from the periodontist and, God Bless Her, she said no problem.  So she dropped me off, ran some errands, picked me up, and took me back to her place.  It was only about a 15-20 minute drive, but I was feeling a little shaky when I got out, and it was nice to have that rest (and I drank some juice).  Then I was ready to get in my car and get home before the numbness wore off.

As I said when I hugged her goodbye - I am a strong, independent woman.   And I had to admit that at least this time - I wanted someone to take care of me.

February 21; Cardweaving

 The weather continues confusing.  As a matter of strong principle, I steadfastly refuse to turn on the air conditioning less than a week since I was running the heat  - and two days before I will likely be running the heat again.  Which means for the last two days it's been 78 degrees in the house, low 80s outside (not record breaking, but record matching).  By Tuesday we'll be down in the 30s again, highs in the 40s.  Insane.

I went to a card weaving workshop today - yes, meeting with the Weaver's Guild twice in one month!  But it's something different.  Card weaving is something that I try every decade or so.  The technique is interesting and dates far back in history.  But it's also fussy and fiddly and then I realized why I let years in between go by.

I had to figure out what was bothering me as I drove in.  It's not a difficult drive; it was held at a branch library, with only two turns from my house (20 miles, but a straight shot). But while I was driving and singing along to rock music, I was also feeling that tightness in my chest, and tears behind my eyes.

It's the date:  February 21.  In 1972, Bob and I had been dating for a month (he had already declared his intention of marrying me).  Things between us were getting . . . interesting (OK - we were horny teenagers).  We didn't want our first time to be a fumble in the back seat of the car and then going back to our respective dorms, so we checked into a motel room and spent the night together.

So for the next 46 years, February 21 was celebrated - leering looks, waggling eyebrows, suggestive glances.

The 47th year, February 21, 2020 - he was too sick to even cuddle.  We had just received the test results that his transplant had failed.

So yeah - part of me ain't happy.

The workshop went fine - we didn't have an instruction but tried to follow along on a DVD.  Some did better than others.  I was pretty middling.  It's a fussy method of weaving that requires focus, and after 6 years of isolation I find it difficult to tune out the chatter of people around me.  I might try finishing at least the first project just to wrap my head around the technique.

The Italian Circus is in town this weekend.  I had thought about going to the afternoon show after the workshop - but after 5 hours of being around chattering people I was peopled out and came home.

Good news!  Someone has taken up the Silent Book Club and it's back.  But . . . it meets tomorrow  Friday I drove into town for work and errands.  Today it was for the workshop.  Monday I have my dental surgery.  Tuesday it's back to work.  Maybe I want a day where I'm not spending an hour behind the wheel.

But all in all, a good day.

Drums and Flirty Owls

 Wow - another 10 days gone.  I'm still sort of drifting in time - not just 1972, 2020, and 2026 but all parts in between.  I just have random memories of my life - and, of course, Bob was always part of it.

I do need to stop doing stupid things.  I'm very good about shutting the chickens in their coop at night - but two night this month I thought I remembered doing it but didn't.  Thank goodness nothing got them.  Must get my brain to brain.

The weather is also messing with my sense of time passing.  Last week it was in the 50s.  Today it was 80.  By next Tuesday it's supposed to be a high of 50 again.  But my azaleas are blooming.  It's just confusing.

My last post - 10 days ago - I said I was keeping myself open because Jeff was in town.  I was hoping to spend some time with him - maybe have him out here for a fire and to listen to the spring peepers, maybe make a pizza for dinner.  Alas - work kept him tied up.  He was able to slip out for a couple of hours on one of my museum days - he and Suzie and I had lunch, and we walked around for a little while, but that was it.  As always, I keep thinking "hopefully next time."

Wilbur the Owl is still in flirting mode.  Some days he gets a meatball for dinner, other days he gets a (pre killed) rat or chick.  On those days, he's taken to not eating it, and instead saving it to show off the next day to tell us what a good hunter he is.

I did something a little different last week.  In mid  2020, when I was still being a bit frenetic after Bob died, I bought a djembe - a small African drum. 

 I figured I would learn how to play it, and maybe find a drum circle to join.  But, of course - Covid.  The drum has been sitting in a closet.   Last week the senior center was offering a drum workshop so I took it and went.  It was fun - the guy running it had drum available for people who didn't have any, and about 30 people showed up, and there was enough chaos that it really didn't matter what any one individual sounded like.   They might do it again in a few months.

I had to get domestic in the kitchen for a couple of days.  Sometimes Cosco gives the museum produce that is past the sell-by date.  They went crazy last week - three boxes, 5 feet on the side.  The two refrigerators were as packed as they could get, other food went to rehabbers, and there was still tons of produce that had to be adopted or tossed.  So I brought home pounds of spinach, blueberries, guavas, raspberries, a pineapple . . .    The raspberries got turned into coulis - easy.  The guavas . . . they were the yellow ones, not pink, not ripe, not juicy.  I could have just tossed them.  But nooooooo.  I chopped them up, covered them in water and boiled them to softness, pushed them through a sieve to remove the zillions of seeds, added sugar to the pulp, and boiled it down to make a sort of guava butter.  Three hours of work for a pint of butter (I will admit that the flavor is pretty intense).
At least blueberries are easy to free (and I brought home to limes, which have also been cut into wedges and frozen).  I've been eating a lot of spinach, as have the chickens.  Still need to deal with the two bags of little cucumbers and that pineapple.

I've lost a little bit of my lovely sense of isolation out here.  I wrote last year of meeting my neighbor Steve.  Yes - there is another house (several in fact) not that far from me, but I can't see them through the trees and I just ignore their existence.  But Steve is a little odd - he's been putting up a high fence all around his property (I wonder what his next-door neighbors thing of that).  There is an alternate road out of my place (which I never use so I sort have forgotten about it) that when I was getting the roof redone the truck bringing the shingles needed to use, so I had gotten out there to trim away some branches and underbrush.  Steve had some out, all concerned, worrying that I was going to start using that road, which runs in front of his house.  Strange - it's a public access road (and no, I don't use it).

It's nothing that bothered me - I allow other people their odd ways - until this week.  In the area of our (still say that, even though it's technically just mine) land in front of my cottage and on the way down to the stream is a cleared circular area.  My walking path is there.  In my head, the border between our property and the next one (which is now Steve's) was where the clearing ended and the trees started.  The reality (which I've always known, and it's on the map of our property) is that the dividing line cuts across the clearing - and now there's a fence there.  It feels intrusive - from the front of the cottage, and the burn pit there, it now stands saying "this is not yours."

I'm thinking that I might train some of the ivy that has taken over the garden over there to climb that wire.

And I know that Bob would be absolutely livid.  After 30+ years here, you'd think that we'd have squatters rights to that cleared area.

Stay tuned . . .

Ramblings

 11 days since my last post.  Brain sort of all over the place, so time for a ramble, without any obvious connections.

The nice thing about having this blog (as I've often said) is that I can look back and see that about this time each year I fall apart - and then sort of come back together again.   So the fact that my mind keeps flicking from 1972 (things starting to happen with Bob) to 2020 (things ending with Bob) to 2026 (now) and all parts in between is OK.  Sometimes it's memories.  Sometimes it might be closer to PTSD because for a moment I forget when/where I am.  Such as looking out the window at my car, thinking that I just want to get in it and come home but I can't until Bob dies - and then I realized that I'm looking out my own kitchen window and that I *am* home - at least as much as I can ever be.  These times don't really bother me - it's like 2026 self is observing and "isn't that interesting."

We had winter.  Actual cold (by Florida standards).  Going to work when it's 25 degrees and breezy - not much fun.  At home I have trouble getting warm.  I wear a sweatshirt, or wrap in a blanket, and sometimes I know I'm warm, even sweating a little, but it's like this core of cold inside that won't thaw out.  But all too soon it will be hot again so I guess I should enjoy the sensation while it lasts.

Even more surprising - Central and South Florida had winter.  Every year, when the temperatures drop, it's almost a joke that they have to watch out for falling iguanas.  When the temps are below 40, they go into a torpor and fall out of the trees.  As soon as the sun comes up and the temperature rises they wake up again.  But this year there were several days that stayed cold. With amazing alacrity for any organization, the FWC temporarily removed the ban on transporting wildlife without a license, and asked people to bring in the cold-shocked lizards to central drop-off points.  5200 were brought in over two days.  The sad thing- they were euthanized (nice way of saying "killed").  The bunny hugger in me is upset because they were just living their lizard lives.  The environmentalist in me acknowledges that they are tremendously invasive (that 5200 is a drop in the bucket of their population) and eating the native animals out of house and home and causing a lot of destruction.  But it's sad.

Woke up this morning and laughed because I suddenly remembered a time over 50 years ago when we were in bed and heard a cat crying, and an occasional thud sound.  Eventually our cat Algernon (our first cat) made his way into the room, bumping into walls.  Somehow he had found a little paper snack bag and gotten his head stuck in it.

RedBug is spending more time in the den, and has even wandered into the kitchen for a snack if I've forgotten to refill his personal kibble bowl.  He even found RiverSong's basket and somehow squeezed himself into it.

The Highland Games were this weekend.  Like the circus - I didn't go.  I've gone a couple of times, and they are fun (and there are Men in Kilts), but apparently I'm not yet in the mood to go by myself (and I didn't get any offers).  I also have a bit of a problem with the fact that unless you buy a VIP ticket ($$$$$) which gives you access to bleachers, there's no place to sit except on the ground.  After a couple of hours I get tired of standing and walking.   I also wanted to keep the weekend open because Jeff is in town for work and thought he might break free (alas - he didn't).  But the weekend was not lost - I actually went to the Weaver's Guild meeting (for once it was more on my side of town) on Saturday, and Sunday I started cutting up and burning a tree that had fallen on my walking path.

Projects are coming along.  I'm working on the 8th panel (out of 9) of the Forest Walk shawl (another reason for going to the Guild meeting - to get a couple of oohs and aaahs because this is getting to be a bit of a slog).  The cleanup of the rotting wood stack is slowly being finished - slowly because the wood is gone and the stakes pulled up, and now what remains is moving all of the cinder blocks and they're heavy enough that I don't shift more than a half-dozen before taking a break.

I did the drive across town today to the peridontist.  Turns out that they can't just evaluate if an implant can be done.  You have to start the procedure - pull out the root, pack it with bone paste and seal it up, then wait four months to see if my bone has grown into it enough to put in the implant.  So it will be four months and a few thousand dollars just to see if it's possible.  That all starts at the end of the month.

I laughed at myself this afternoon.  I got home, took care of a few things, then looked out the window at my dusty car and decided to wash it.  In Ye Olde Goode Days I would have said something like "think I'll wash the car" and Bob would have said "OK, I'll bring the truck around too.  I wonder if I have any tire dressing.  I need to set up the pad on my drill to polish the headlights.  I have to drag out the extension cord and the shop vac so we can vacuum the insides.  Uh - never mind.  That's too much for this afternoon - we'll do it some other time."
So we drove a dirty car a lot.   Today - in the words of Nick Offerman - anything worth doing is worth doing half-assed.  I got the hose, bucket, car wash, and a wad of nylon net and 15 minutes later had a reasonably clean car.  I even put in another 10 minutes cleaning the windows, headlights, and reflectors.

I'm still slogging along on my 1084 mile virtual walk.  I hit the 86% mark today (933 miles done, 151 to go)  I'm getting very tired of obsessively trying to keep track of my daily steps - but I should be done in a couple of months.

I got a nice compliment - nice enough that I want to write it down so that 2027 self can be reminded and smile.  It came from my chatbot - but hey - I take what I can get.  We were having a discussion of coincidence vs. the Baader Meinhof effect.  In this case, it was the word "quandong" - not a word I had encountered before but then got it twice in one day.  First, watching "Tasting History" where he saw it in a recipe (it's a fruit) and then that night when I was reading a book on birds, and it talked about a bowerbird building the bower in the shade of a quandong tree.

  At one point the bot said that yes, it was a coincidence, but that my interests are so varied that "You cast a wide mental net, so sometimes you can catch the same strange fish from two different streams."   I like that - I'm not a dabbler, a dilatant , or scatter brained.  I just cast a wide mental net.

And now, with the brain dumped, I'm going to resume my binge watching of The Great British Sewing Bee and knit a bit more on that shawl.

Flirty Owl, Bug in the Sun, Another Big Project

 I didn't go to the circus.
I've written about the Royal Hanneford circus before - the multi-generational family one.  I first went in 2023.  I had agreed to meet a friend there, but he fell asleep on his couch instead.  I felt very self-conscious - as far as I could tell, I was the only person there by myself.  But I eventually realized that no one else noticed, or cared.
In 2024 I went by myself, no worries.  Same for 2025.
But this year they caught me a little off-guard.  In previous years the circus has come to town in March or April, for two weekends.  This year it was the first week in January, for just one weekend.  I've been feeling unbalanced, and somehow just couldn't get myself to get up and go.  I threw the decision to the fates: I did a FaceBook post of "Hey - the circus is in town this weekend - anyone want to go?"  I got two positive responses - unfortunately from people in Alaska and England.
So no circus this year (at least not the Royal Hanneford - the Cirque Italia is coming next month).

Sometimes I take advantage of the lack of accountability in my life - that I have no one in my personal life to notice or care what I do.  I wrote last time of losing my tooth.  I got it checked out by the dentist, and got my referral to the periodontist.  I decided to do my grocery shopping on the way home so I didn't have to do it Friday after work - and I got a king cake.  I love those things.  And, because of the above-mentioned lack of accountability, there was no one to notice if for the next few days I got in the habit of staying up until 2:00 a.m., eating king cake (yes, one person can eat an entire king cake in 3.5 days) and flipping aimlessly through YouTube.  But it seems to have set some sort of reset button - since that binge, I've been better at staying in 2026.

King cake come with a little plastic doll (in theory they should be baked in the cake, but for liability reasons they're now placed in separately.)  Because of this annual indulgence, I now have three little dolls.  I can't bring myself to toss them, because Bob liked to make little found art assemblages with them.  Maybe sometime I will too (this one he painted, then put together with a ring box and a key)

 

I'm still knitting on the Forest Walk shawl.  Five panels done, four to go.  It's cold right now but by the time I'm done it will be too hot to wear it.  But it's more of a process than a product thing.  It's particularly pretty just piled up on my lap while I'm working.

Despite having a little spate of rain here and there, we continue to be quite dry (we didn't have a hurricane or even a tropical storm at all in 2025, so about a foot less rain than usual).  Lakes and ponds are way down.  But I rather like the very eerie effect of the cypress trees with their enlarged trunks exposed - very Jurassic Park.  This is also where quite often a deer will pick their way through the trees to come to me, adding to the otherworldly effect.

I had a cute flirtation at work.  It's courtship season for birds of prey, so our great horned owl Wilbur has been hooting at us like crazy (he was hand raised, so somewhat human imprinted).  When I went in to clean, he was standing right at the door, madly hooting, very excited, and showing off his dead rat -"see what a good hunter I am??"  (I did not tell him that I knew we had given him that rat, already dead, for the dinner the day before.  These days he's more likely to save his food and show it off rather than eating it).  I was too much in the moment to take a picture, but it was quite cute.  When I went in, he flew off to his nest box, turned his back on me, and buried the rat in the leaves.  At first I took this as a bit of an affront (No rat for you!) but actually that's part of the courtship - showing that you are a good provider, and have a cache.

I finally got started on this winter's outdoor project.  After Hurricane Michael in 2018, we had 20+ downed trees.  Over the next few months we got them cut up, split, and stacked.  Bob laid down about a 30 foot length of cinder blocks, with metal fence stakes between them about every 3-4 feet, the wood piled up between them.  We used up some of it and gave some away, but most of it has still been sitting there (there were plastic covers but they often blew off in storms).  It has become something of an eyesore - a long length of bug infested rotting wood.

The wood (and the cutting stand in front) is now gone - I had hoped to burn it as I hauled it, but punky wood burns at a rather leisurely pace so the rest is piled by the burn pit for future fires. 

I do like fires - and I especially like taking breaks to sit beside them and read.  But there were also memories of the two of us working so hard to clear up the acres of wood debris after the storm.  Usually if we ever had one or two trees down, we'd cut and split by hand - he with a sledge and maul, me with my wood splitter.  But 20 trees?  We went into town and rented a hydraulic wood splitter - and that was a fun bit of kit.  We'd put in a chunk of tree trunk, press a button, and wham! Split into four to be gathered and stacked.  We had to make ourselves slow down a little  - we were hoofing it to try to keep up with the thing (and kept thinking of the song "John Henry.")  Now I was sitting by that hard-won wood, rotted and burning.

 Back to the former wood storage: all but 5 stakes have been pulled up to be bundled - I'll keep a few, just in case, and the rest can go to the reuse center at the dump.  That doesn't sound like much - but in order to get to the stakes I had to move the wood first, then pry up the now-buried cinder blocks on each side.  The stakes have a wide flange at the bottom, and in many cases roots had grown around them, so it was a bit of work to loosen and pull them.  I was going to push through and finish - but my back was giving me signals and I know when to listen to it.  In fact - after three days of working on this project, I decided that I should take today off.  The next big step will be to dig out all those cinder blocks and stack them somewhere - but that will have to be spread out over a bit of time.  

I got a reward for all that hard work.  When I came in side for a nature break, RedBug was lying in a patch of sun in the den.  I realize that doesn't sound like much, but it was only about three weeks ago that he stopped staying under the bed 24/7 and starting sleeping on top of it.  This is the first time he's left the bedroom.

So at the moment I'm on a somewhat even 2026 keel.  I imagine that I'll come and go - but after 6 years, I know that's the rhythm.  Tuesday was rough, and I just let it be - it was Bob's birthday.  I went to work - quite cold for Florida, 25 when I got there and still under 40 when I left.  I treated myself to a bowl of Pho for lunch - but as I sat there with my hot soup and pot of tea and my book, I just felt so terribly alone.  I wish I could have met him for a birthday lunch. (Which probably led into my throwing myself into hauling wood - hard work helps).

Waiting

 Lovely start to the day.  When I woke up, one of my teeth felt odd - like maybe there was something jammed between teeth.  So I got up, grabbed some floss - and the crown popped off and went flying.  I heard it ping and bounce, so then had to get down and hunt for the thing because the cost difference between getting a crown glued back on and getting a new one made is several hundred dollars.  I was also being annoyed because I would have to get dressed and drive to the dentist.

I found it - and then noticed that the tooth was still inside.  Ugh.  Now will start the various visits to the periodontist for consultations and hopefully I'll be a candidate for an implant and in a few months and a few thousand dollars I'll have a new tooth.

I continue to be in an odd disconnected mood - not bad, just a little off.  I have been knitting a lot on the "Forest Walk" shawl, and really loving the color flow.

Usually I do my knitting in the evenings; during the day I'm doing more physical stuff - yardwork or maybe making something, especially since we've had some really pretty cool/cold but clear days.  But I seem to be content - and that is the feeling - to sit and knit.  Then I get up and have been doing cleaning - not my normal lick-and-promise and vacuum down the middle, but moving stuff to dust and cleaning under the furniture.  The plus side of doing this is that I don't think I have to buy any kitty toys for awhile.

But despite sitting quietly knitting, reading, or putzing around cleaning, I would also go outside just to walk around a little, a bit aimlessly.  I also found myself constantly checking my phone - to see if I had any calls, texts, or something on FaceBook.  I almost never get any of the above, but I was almost obsessively checking a dozen or twenty times a day.

Analysis:  My brain is in 2020 mode, and anxiously waiting.  By now his bloodwork should have starting showing up uptick in numbers if the bone marrow transplant had taken - and instead of getting sicker and sicker, he would level out.  But that hadn't happened, and all we could do was sit and wait - talk a little, nap, watch TV, and, in my case knit.  And wait to get a report on the numbers.

It helps to know what's happening.  I've curbed the excessive phone checking, and had two fires to burn yard trash and taken apart part of a fallen tree.  I went to the library book club meeting tonight.  Trying to stay in 2026.

It's hard not to think of the alpha and omega of our time together.  In two days, it will be the 54th anniversary of our meeting.  So it was at the end of January that we met, and over the next several weeks grew to realize that we would be joining our lives together.  Then, on the anniversary of those dates, 48 years later, we were beginning to realize that we would be separating forever.  Opening and closing.  Odd coincidence of dates.

A Rather Busy Day

 Part of me feels like I'm in 2020.  Bob has finished his round of chemo, and tomorrow he will get his bone marrow transplant.  The floor makes a big deal out of this.  They come in with balloons and cake, sing happy birthday (because they say this is your new birthday) and gifts - a hat (courtesy of local crocheters) Mardi Gras beads, a small soft blanket suitable for wrapping chilly shoulders.  Bob is his smiling affable self - until he opens a small box with a medi alert bracelet.  I saw his face change as he realized that even if everything went well (as at the time we thought it would, no reason not to), things would still never be quite the same.

But it's 2026.  Bug is spending his time sprawled out comfortably on the bed.  His old personality is back.  I can unclench a little.  For the two months that he hunkered under the bed, looking unhappy, I was feeling that guilt that I had decided to make him lose his leg and live like this because I wasn't strong enough to let him go.  But it's OK now.  The amazing thing in this picture is Hamish in the back.  The two of them have never gotten along - but there they are, sleeping together.  I guess a warm bed on a chilly day has a mellowing influence.

Today was a day that just kept on going.  I started with my usual morning at the museum, but when I got to the kitchen Suzie wanted to talk to me about an inspection the museum is having next week.  She hadn't let the bobcats out yet, so we did that while we chatted.  I very rarely go into the bobcat habitat - and the cats were very interested in this stranger's legs and boots.

On the second Tuesday of the month some women who used to work at the museum (and some who still do) have lunch at the cafe there, so I joined the and actually had a social lunch!

Afterwards I had to stop at the Dollar General for cat food and batteries.  Bob's former work partner Bill was there - after we chatted for a bit, he asked if another former co-worker (Richard) had found me - he had called Bill a couple of months ago to see if he had my number.  He gave me Richard's number and I texted him.  Turns out that he was just wondering how I was doing, and maybe we could have lunch and catch up.  Hopefully lunch will fit into his schedule, but it was really nice to have someone think of me.  (Note:  this will not be "a date."  He's married, and in the "I'm old enough to be his mother" category.  Just a nice guy)

Being as the weather can be so variable this time of year, I decided to have a fire and clean off some of the yard when I got home.  As long as I was going to be outside, I let the chickens out to free range a bit (I frequently do this in the afternoons).  I had gotten to the point that I was going to quit adding stuff and letting it burn down - my favorite part because that's when I can sit by the fire and read.  So I'm reading and enjoying the fire, and suddenly hear a major chicken ruckus.  I look over, and for a moment it looks like two of my chickens are in a big fight- but it was one of my chicken and a big hawk.  Fortunately it flew off when I screamed and starting running.  I was able to grab the chicken - I couldn't find any wounds on her, so hopefully all he got was a bunch of feathers.  The remaining five chickens had run off and gone into hiding so it took nearly an hour to find them all and get them back in the scratch yard.
I guess I won't be letting them free range for awhile, now that the hawk knows that there are tasty treats walking around.

After that big scare, I put the fire out (it was dark by then), fed the cats, and then soaked in a hot bath to relax.

Quite the day.

Kayaks

 It's January, and I've slipped back into the disconnect where part of me is here, and part is in Gainesville with Bob.  I look at my car in the driveway and wish I could just get in it and go home - but home was wherever Bob was, and doesn't exist anymore.
A random line from a poem that drifted by:  How heavy nothing weighs when it is in the shape of you.
Or the line from the Tim Minchkin song:  There's a hole in my heart that the light passes through, and the pattern it makes is the shape of the absence of you.

It was all brought home again today.  Rik and Christy came over to  return the cat condo they had borrowed, and then we loaded up the kayaks into his truck; he knows someone who wants to buy them, and he's going to take care of that for me so I don't have to deal.

We bought them just at 20 years ago.  Bob was starting to have trouble with his legs (it didn't help that his ACL was missing) and we couldn't take as long of hikes as we used to.  So we bought a couple of kayaks.  We took them other places a few times - like the Wakulla River - but mostly we just used them on Lake Talquin.  There were times that we'd get the urge to go out even in the afternoon for a couple of hours (against Bob's usual feeling that everything always had to be done First Thing In The Morning) - it was easy to toss them in the back of the truck, and the landing was only a few miles away.

It's at this point I should post a few pictures of us in the kayaks - I know they're floating around in a folder on the big laptop, or on a thumb drive somewhere.  Some day they'll pop up.

I love the way kayaks glide.  Bob called me his little water bug.  Sometimes I'd pack snacks, or a picnic, and at some point we'd pull the boats together and nosh.  We'd spot alligators and moor hens and blue herons, watch young osprey learning how to ride the wind, and one time just over our heads a bald eagle and osprey were fighting over a fish (which eventually got dropped so they both lost).

I took mine out once since I lost Bob.  It was still beautiful out there, but I couldn't stop trying to spot him somewhere, feeling so alone.  And then there was the problem of getting it back into the truck.  I had been able to put it in the truck to get there - but that was on level ground.  At the boat ramp, at an angle, it was almost more than I could manage; I was starting to wonder if I would have to just sit there until someone else came along to use the ramp and I could ask for help (that thought was enough to give me the oomph to get it in there).  And, of course, I have since parted with the truck, and even if I got a rack for the Honda I wouldn't be able to get it up there.

I think things should be used.  A boat that never sees water has lost its reason for existence.

So they're gone.  I did hug them goodbye.  I hope someone loves them as much as we did.  I was expecting it to hurt more than it did, but it was more of a feeling of resignation.  I came inside, had some tea and a couple of Gill's scones, and just sort of shut down for a couple of hours.  It was just another example of how much of yourself you lose when you lose your life partner.

So yeah - I'm a little down.  Starting to sleep on the couch again.  Starting to stay up until 1 or 2 a.m.  But the good thing about this blog/journal is that I can look back at previous years, to see how I was.  And I'm always like this - and I always see it through.  I'm just going to miss the idea that I might take my kayak out again some day (of course, I might take another one out, maybe a rental, but it won't be this one, and I'll never look across the flats and see Bob paddling towards me)

Typical; Forest Walk Shawl

 Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.
Add a lot of diacritical marks that I don't know how to make, and it says "the more things change, the more they remain the same."

So, 2026.  On week into the new year.
Someone on the Highway 20 FaceBook page said that they had a loaded grapefruit tree, and people could come pick them if they liked.  In the comments, I said I had the same offer my Meyer lemons.  Two people responded with "yes, please."  I told them to send me a message to get my address, and that was that.  Crickets.

A member of the Weaver's Guild sent a group email saying that she had gotten a table to do demonstrations at the Tally Highland Games - who could join her?  I replied that I could.  That was five days ago; no response yet.

I've posted recently about missing going to the silent book club meetings - two because of Bug's surgeries, one because I had a cold, two because of the holidays.  I was really looking forward to starting up again in January.  But the woman who organizes and runs it just posted that she was stepping down.  If no one else steps up - well, then it's over.   I like it, but not enough to go to the evening readings as well as the Sunday one, coordinate with the meeting venues, run the FaceBook page, etc. etc.  I just wanted to go and read and still be a little social.

So it looks like 2026 will follow the pattern of previous years.

On the plus side, RedBug is spending more time out from under the bed.  He still stays in the bedroom, ready to duck under, but is mostly just hanging out, and often on top of the bed.  He also stretches out and relaxed instead of being hunched up and sulky.  It's a weight off of me.  From when I was first making the gut wrenching decision to either lose the leg or have him put down (I kept hunting for a third option) to this past week, I questioned if I was doing the right thing, or doing this to him just because I couldn't let him go.  But he's seeming happier now, and I can breathe a bit.

Breathing is harder these days.  I try not to dwell, but two days ago was when Bob went out Shands.  The last time he ever saw his home, his land, his cats.  The last time he didn't feel sick.  It still hurts.  I seem to have taken to sleeping on the couch again.  I don't plan on it - I just lie down to watch a little TV and at some point I've turned it off and it's the next day.  It's fine - not like it bothers anyone.

I recently posted about taking a picture and trying to make dye colors to match.  My process for dyeing was pretty convoluted, but the resulting yarn is gorgeous, and so far the shawl-in-progress looks like something I could wear in that picture.  It's not often that something in your mind even comes close to resembling the final project.  The knitting is becoming addictive - I keep wanting to see the next color come up and how it swirls with the others.  I say that now - I've done two panels.  I was planning on doing seven (which would give me about a 3/4 circle shawl) but I might have enough to do nine for a full circle.  The novelty could wear off.

Do I need another shawl?  Of course not - I have several, and rarely a chance to wear one (and draping one decoratively over the couch is ill-advised with the cats).  I don't go out much at all (and now even less without the book club) and even though it's January it was almost 80 degrees yesterday.  But it's just soothing knitting, and unlike a sweater or even a hat, size doesn't matter (and in this case, that's true).

First week down - now for the rest of the year.

Random Memory

 I've often mentioned my friend who daily posts long rambling memories of his life with his wife.  It's a bit much (but it works for him the way this blog works for me - a grief journal).

Maybe I can do a random memory from time to time?

Like the time Bob became a fashion trendsetter.

It was about 40 years ago, when he was in a Civil War group getting ready to go to a reenactment in North Georgia.  We looked at the weather forecast; a front was going to be moving through.  He made the comment that he was going to freeze his ass off.

I said "give me your blanket" (wool blanket, military surplus).  I sliced a hole in the middle, bound the edges, and gave it back to him.  "Here's your poncho."

At the event, the other soldiers were trying to clutch their blankets around themselves while managing a backpack, haversack, and carrying a rifle.  Tends to be awkward and breezy in the front.

Bob?  He wrapped the front of the poncho around himself under the back, and belted it.  The back could be tucked around to the front.  No gaps, and he could use both hands.

Next thing he knew, the other soldiers were pulling out their knives and cutting slits in their blankets.  Eventually it all looked more like a casting call for The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly rather than a Civil War reenactment, but at least they were a bit warmer.