THE SONG…

… that inspired this blog.

How’s Your Day?

So the phone rings earlier. The real phone. I cringe like I always do. But I answer it anyway.
A man named Danielle (I swear) says he’s with Window’s something or other. His English is so sketchy I can barely understand what he is saying.
“Do you have computah?”
And I think, I don’t have time for this nonsense so I say “I do not.”
Couple seconds of silence.
“Do you have laptop?” Sounded like he said “Le Pop” so I say “Pardon me?” and he repeats it. I say, “No, I don’t.”
So he says “What do you have?” I’m tempted to say “I have a vibrator” but I do not. I figure if I say I have a smartphone, I’ll be on the line longer, so I say, “I have a cellphone.”
Danielle (?) chuckles and says, “Oh my gootness!” and then there’s a couple seconds of silence, another chuckle and then a click.

Absence Makes Things Different

Was kind of surprised to log in here and a) see new comments and b) SEE ADS ON MY BLOG PAGE.  This is the kind of thing that sneaks up on you when you’re not paying attention.  Like old age and worn out underwear.

Anyway, it looks junky and I don’t like it but I’m not sure if I really care or not and I certainly don’t have the inclination right this minute to start clicking around to see if there is anything I can do about it.  I’m just coming down off a 48-hour work week that I’m not accustomed to working and my body and my brain are both screaming for a break.

You might be surprised that a mere 8 hours out of your week can feel like you lost a couple of days worth of time.  It’s gonna take me an entire weekend to get caught up with my neglected things.

Now that I think of it, that’s like losing an entire night’s sleep.  Or for me, two of ’em.  Bllerrrggghhh.

COUSIN

 My cousin died this morning.

 

  I’m having a really hard time processing this.

 

  My cousin has been struggling with a bi-polar disorder for most of her life. She’s been in and out of hospitals and much of her life has been a living hell. She’s struggled to keep a marriage together, managed to raise two amazing kids and has been a chain-smoker for as long as I can remember.  

  She and I shared a closeness despite the fact that we’ve only been together a few times in our lives, due to the fact that she’s always lived in a different state. We’d met when we were little wee and a handful of other times, mostly at family weddings or funerals.  The last time we were together was at a family reunion a ton of years ago. She and I took a long walk together and spoke of Life and Family and things of that nature. We were like-minded, kindred souls. We shared a birthday.

  And now, all I can think about is that, despite all her struggles, the pain that she lived with… how her family dealt with her dark times, the unexplained silences and frustrations of never being able to make her happy… now they are making funeral arrangements and saying goodbye.

  A month or so ago, her brother told me she had cancer. When I asked him how she was dealing with the news, he told me that she was so medicated that she probably wasn’t even truly aware of what was going on.  I decided that it was a blessing, of sorts.  And yet it all seemed so unfair to me.  As far as I knew, she and her husband had patched up some rough spots and relocated to another state, bought a house and were attempting to start a new life together in a new climate with new surroundings.

  But I hadn’t had the time to put together my thoughts and feelings enough to contact her and let her know I loved her and that I would be there for her.  I’d told her during our walk at that family reunion years ago that I said a prayer for her every day. She was genuinely touched by that sentiment and thanked me with all her heart. I’ve continued to do that all these years and I see now that all those prayers added up to precisely not much of anything at all.  

  I wonder if even for a split second, she thought of me before her last breath. If she could feel that I cared or that I’ll always keep her in my heart and that I cherish the memories of times we spent together. I should have told her.

  I should have made the time.

Home Saturday Night…

… listening to this

Home Saturday Night…

… listening to this

Gravity, Interrupted.

Prompted by an excellent piece by my good friend and author, Harry Ramble, I wish to share a short countenance that is stored in my memory as one of the first dates I had with PD.

PD’s father owned a camp a couple of hours from here.  It was in a beautiful and secluded wooded area and would make an excellent place to invite a beautiful woman for a nice weekend escape and PD, being no dummy, did that very thing.  And I accepted.

New to this whole “camp” scenario, I didn’t know that the propane tanks which enable cooking and heating inside the camp would be stored in a shed off to the edge of the property, probly about  twenty feet from the camp itself. C’mon. I was a city girl long before I became a country girl… At any rate, the shed had been built amid a blind of pine trees.  Very. Tall. Pine. Trees.  It was dark in the shed. I don’t remember if there was electricity in there, but I stood outside under the pines while PD unlocked the padlock on the door of the shed and stepped inside.  I was to find out later that the loud whooshing sound I heard was from the air escaping the tank when he opened the valve to turn on the propane.  It was quite startling since I did not expect the noise.  AND it was loud. Evidently the squirrel in the tree must have been at least as startled as I was because, mid-whoosh, he dove straight down out of the tree  like a furry gray torpedo  and landed  directly on my head for a second or two… his tiny paws scrambling around in my hair to get his footing long enough to dive yet again.  This time, to the ground and he shot off into the woods, most likely to a backwoods version of Urgi-Care to have a full cardio work-up to make sure he wasn’t having a heart attack. Me? I would never relax outside the confines of my own home, ever again.

Maybe a better title for this post may have been “Squirrel, Interrupted…”

Plead for Patience

I am embarrassed that I left you guys hanging here since my last posting.

Long story short, I got my passport.

Long story long, I’m getting to it. I promise. And I hope it will be soon. Life tends to get crazy sometimes over here.

Most Favoritest Televised Musical Performance Ever

Can’t Hardly Wait by mmr421

Catch Up

This is gonna be quick. If I don’t post right this minute, I don’t know when I’ll ever get the time so here goes.

This has been a wild and crazy summer so far. Back to back things going on and not a lot of time to breathe in between.  But here’s the best part. Forgive me if you already know all this because I’ve been shouting it from the rooftops posting bits and pieces of my good fortune all over the internet the past month or so.

At the end of the month I’m going to be able to cross three items off my Bucket List.  One item in particular was a complete and utter fantasy because I didn’t think it was possible, that being SEEING THE REPLACEMENTS.  Since they sort of split up (parted ways and have not performed together since) in 1991, fans of the band only dared to dream that they would ever reunite.  As fate would have it, they are doing the Riot Fest tour this summer in Denver, Chicago and Toronto.

Long story short (my bedtime, I HATE Sunday nights) I’m going on a road trip with my daughter to Toronto to see The Replacements perform ALIVE AND IN PERSON.  And those three things are all on my Bucket List.

Now, if my passport only arrives in time, I’ll be all set.  Another story for another time.