Normally I'm pretty forgiving. I understand that housing construction is not typically undertaken by meticulous mathematicians and artists. But is it too much to ask that the subcontractors and laborers who do the actual work try not to do more damage to your property than the repairs they were hired to do? I tried so hard not to release my beserker self when they were jamming their ladder into my dormant hydrangeas, breaking all the stems and warping the way the root balls sit in the ground. I assumed that when I pointed out the nails that missed the mark directly over my front door and the man said he would fix them, he would do it. I wanted to believe them when they promised three times that someone with a trailer would come back and pick up the debris pile they left crowding my neighbor's mailbox, and I thought when they promised to caulk the gap in the gutters they re-installed badly, that action was imminent. I listened quietly when they talked about holes in the siding, as if they were pre-existing, not suspiciously shaped like the tops of ladders (as at least one appeared when I went around the house alone after my PT appointment). I don't expect perfection in much of my life, but I prefer things to be predominantly right. This was not the case this time.
I spent more time with my physical therapist this afternoon. We came to a better understanding after I explained that I view pain during exercise with a big dose of "shut up and keep going" attitude and he prefers more of an "if it hurts, stop doing it!" viewpoint. So when I told him how hard certain moves were to do, he said to modify and take breaks. I will alter my methods. Previously, this therapist impressed the hell out of me with his Bones-ian superbrain. Today, I actually noticed his Tolkien-esque elven perfection too. The dude works out. I was lying on a leg press machine that uses body weight on an adjustable incline. When my shin started to hurt unbearably, he grabbed the platform with me on it, and moved it down a rung without visible effort. This man knows his stuff and applies it in his real daily life. He has more credibility than a lot of doctors I have seen over the years. But I still left his clinic sore for hours. Can't have everything.
I proved my crazy cat lady bona fides today. I went to a friend's house for dinner, second time I'd ever been there (first time with just me), and all of her animals, even the skittish shy kitty, came out to cuddle with me. And I mean cuddle. Not just passing by just out of reach, as most animals do with strangers, but rolling around, begging for attention, right up next to me. The young pit bull, who was pretty energetic when I arrived, closed out the night curled up around me, sleeping hard on my lap. It was a perfect moment.
My mother had a lot of damage in the last ice storm to go through back home. My brother went out last weekend to haul off a lot of her downed limbs and to take down the remnants of the critically injured trees. She has transitioned from dealing with the loss of mature trees to thinking of the opportunities for new plantings. I may need to borrow some of her evolved coping skills when next I look at the broken central spire of the rhododendron I had been nursing back to health for two years. And I will really need to find inner peace in the next 48 hours, when the predicted winter storm Leon brings ice and snow to my Low Country sanctuary. I hope we come through it with only minor damage. But I know the condition my trees are in. It's going to be dangerous to be out in the park this week. Branches will be coming down.
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