Outburst

Inspirational song: Shout (Tears for Fears)

The stress of this moment gets to everyone sooner or later. It was my turn today. I was sore and tired and stressed and suddenly the whole world was too much for me. I don't want to get too deep into the details, because I'm still kinda tender about it, but basic executive functions freaked me out. I was angry and loud and deeply frustrated. I shouted enough to make myself physically sick. It's now bedtime, and I still have a sore throat, having felt all day like I had been violently choked from the yelling. My stomach turned, and I never ate an actual meal. I managed to snack on a little gouda cheese and pecan crackers, and that will have to do for the day. 

I thought I was surviving our communal stress pretty well up to this point. Many people close to me had had breaks in their cool around me, but the longer I went without one, the more cocky I got thinking I wouldn't do it. I try to be calm and understanding when others melt down during plague times. I hope I've earned the same consideration. 

This has been covered several times in this space, but it bears repeating. This is hard enough on all of us. Be gentle to yourselves, folks. We need each other's support, and we need to manage our own well-being too. I wish all of you peace and good health.

Choose

Inspirational song: Didn't Leave Nobody But the Baby (Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, and Gillian Welch)

At four o'clock this morning, I woke up for the third time. I picked up my phone, and opened Twitter. Why not? I reasoned. Going back to sleep was already going to be hard. I might as well get started on east coast news. I scrolled for a solid 45 minutes before I was ready to give up and sleep again.

A lot of my attempts to sleep go like this. I usually don't get out of bed to stay until closer to 8 most days, but I've generally stopped trying to sleep by 7:15 or so. It means I get groggy at various points during the day, usually needing a solid nap by 3 each afternoon. Yesterday was even worse. I fell asleep in a chair, after my second cup of coffee. I shouldn't have this much trouble getting decent sleep. And this doesn't touch on how much my spine and hips have been bugging me lately.

For months I've been saving up to buy a fancy Purple mattress. I had decided that their premier hybrid 3 was perfect for me, and I was trying to set aside enough to pay cash (no financing), for the mattress and an adjustable base. It was a ridiculous amount. Then I read reviews of their base, and the problems people had with the electronics failing. So then I thought maybe I could get a base at Costco, and the mattress locally, hoping that would mean someone would help haul off the old bed. It would mean a savings off the top of around $1800. Seemed like a plan.

Today I opened an email from Costco. They offered a split king made with "cooling gel" memory foam and an aerated latex pad, to achieve the same effect as the Purple, plus the base, for the low, low price of $1600 all in. That is a third of what I expected to pay when I got this idea months ago. Will this mattress be tolerable? Will I actually sleep through a night? Don't know. But tonight I made the leap, and ordered it. I have plans for how to handle it if it doesn't work for me. 

I got to hold my baby girl this evening. We had a late lunch together, and I was charmed by how well Dino can hold her head up now, and after holding her and patting her back long enough to elicit a large burp, I was rewarded with her looking right at me, recognizing me by my glasses, and smiling and cooing at me. These are the moments I live for.

Caprock

Inspirational song: Flatland Boogie (Charlie Robison)

Do other people collect rocks on all of their cross-country drives? Is it just us? We have been gathering watermelon-sized rocks everywhere we have gone for the last couple decades, and now that I have declared this The Forever House, they are being placed in the landscaping, where they were always intended to reside. Some rocks I can recognize in an instant, and remember where they were from and why they have moved with us for all these years. There are several surviving Lovelady rocks--rich, reddish-brown sedimentary beauties, covered in pale green lichens, selected from the hill where my family had a vacation cabin for a century (now sold). There are big, gray gneiss monsters and modest white quartz chunks from the mining claim where we have been building our own cabin near Central City. And this week, we were reintroduced to boxy hunks of the limestone Caprock in New Mexico, acquired somewhere in the lonely stretch between Tucumcari and Springer, and previously used to ring a doomed stand of aspens we tried to make survive in Clovis. The trees died the first year we left, as a monumental drought set in and our renters wouldn't throw expensive water at them. The rocks stayed in place for 8 more years, until this week, when they came back to stay with us. I missed them.

Since our daughter met her husband in New Mexico, and he is really into geology, we knew it would be nice to hand over a few of the Caprock rocks. They wanted some large rocks in their back yard, and at least one of the latest set fits that bill. We drove over this afternoon, intending to drop a trio off and get a baby cuddle before heading to the hardware store. We didn't communicate properly when we were due to arrive. We pulled up right as a big thunderstorm cell opened up, and went running into the house to find...no one home. Our daughter and the baby had gone for a walk, and were at that moment taking shelter from the storm at a ball park dugout. We used their gardening wagon to wheel the rocks up to the porch, and then set off (diaper bag in hand) to meet up at the park with the girls.

I ought to have taken pictures of how strong that baby neck is now. Dino is six weeks old today, and has discovered how awesome it is to sit up straight and look around (sort of--focusing is still a challenge). As usual, her grandpa and I battled a little over who got to hold her more (he usually wins, because she adores him). And after a brief visit, mother and daughter walked back home and we went on to the big box hardware store. The rest of the evening has been just peaceful and relaxing for me and all frustrating work on the garden irrigation system for the man. So, a typical summer night.

Day of Rest

Inspirational song: Peace Train (Cat Stevens)

Somebody is finally ready to behave like we aren’t teenagers anymore. What, did you think I meant me? Nah, I left that mindset years ago, when I learned that one wasn’t required to do cross country drives in one brutal long shot, and that stopping for hotels was a worthwhile expense. I mean the Mr is facing that reality, after much the same motivation. He completed a quick trip down to New Mexico last night, to rebuild the gate in the concrete block fence at the rental house. He left on Wednesday, worked Thursday and half of Friday, and drove home last night. When he arrived at 11:30, he slumped in the doorframe, and mumbled about how hard it was. I said yeah, because you aren’t a kid anymore! He pretended to deny it, but I know he is feeling it. It makes me hurt just to imagine doing all that in one week now.

I did quite enough deep cleaning and decided I needed a day off too. Most of one, anyway. I tried a little experiment with bleach gel and a stiff detail brush on the kitchen grout, and decided it wasn’t worth wrecking my hips and lungs by sitting on the tile floor sniffing bleach for hours. It got cleaner, but not enough to be worth the damage. I got through an area about 8 x 2 feet, and gave up. I rested after that.

We had a pair of visitors during the afternoon. Our daughter and granddaughter stopped in to look over some landscaping rocks that came home from the New Mexico house, to see which ones she wants. I got some quality baby snuggles, but she adamantly refused to give me a straight up smile. She was a little on the grumpy side for me, but of course she flirted like crazy with her grandpa. Once she went home and had a bath and fresh jammies, she was all smiles. I got to see them in pictures, not in person. My time will come.

Part Two

Inspirational song: Travelling By Steam (Fairport Convention)

What are the chances that the old crappy steam mop I bought a decade ago still exists in a box, somewhere in my garage? I've moved four times since then, so I believe it is possible. I really did myself a disservice getting that cheap, inefficient mop back then. It was hard to use, so I stopped trying fairly quickly, and never learned how nice steamed floors feel on bare feet. Wasted years.

I made myself wait to shower and dress until I had fully finished cleaning the bathroom to the point where I could use that steam mop. I forced myself to do all the higher level cleaning first, so that the floors were last. This translated to me working from about 10 this morning until 8 this evening, before I finally got to clean my own self. I took breaks from the bathroom to tackle a few other tasks, and to lie on the bed and swear foully aloud when my muscles screamed at me. I completed the whole room except the ceiling (I can't work over my head without passing out), and put up a new shower curtain and rug. It's amazing that one tiny room can take up so much time and energy.

I still haven't finished the bedroom. There are three horizontal surfaces that are still ridiculously cluttered. Sadly, the worst part of all three are the piles of medical bills. They are all paid, but I am afraid to throw the papers out. I can't just dump them in the recycle bin. They need to be shredded. But what if I need to refer to them? (I don't believe I ever really will, but it's still hard to let go.)

I will try to make a third stab at deep cleaning tomorrow. The first pass with the steam mop didn't make a dent on the stained grout in the kitchen today. I'm going to have to hit one of the hardware stores and get a case of grout pens. Tile covers more than two thirds of this storey of the house. I'm going to hate this part.

Part One

Inspirational song: Tits and Ass (A Chorus Line)

I checked in with the breast surgeon this afternoon. It had been suggested to me at my recent mammogram that she might be willing to remove the Biozorb marker, since I have continued to feel excessively tender in the area where the tumor was removed. The surgeon said that she has removed two of them, and neither really helped the patients. They also had troubles with chronic illness/chronic pain like I do, and it's more a problem with the surgical site, not necessarily the implant. We moved on to talking about the consultation I had with the plastic surgeon about reconstruction. She asked what he said he could do. I was very excited when I told her how wonderful he made it sound. I asked for her blessing for him to remove the lumpectomy cavity (I believe I am using her words correctly), and she was fine with it. When I left her office, I sat in my car and contacted the plastic surgeon's office to start the ball rolling to schedule it. I'm ready to pull the trigger.

I made a huge mistake this morning. While I waited for the time for my appointment to roll around, I started watching house cleaning videos on YouTube. Oh, man. I was too inspired. I did some preliminary work before I went to see the surgeon, and then went to Target to get some new stuff to keep cleaning with. I didn't find grout pens, which I really want to use in the kitchen, but I did end up buying a new steam mop. I had one about 12 years ago, and it was cheap and mostly useless. I used the fancier one on the wood floors in the bedroom, and I can feel the difference on my bare feet. I love it.

I must have done a combined five hours of cleaning today. I had to stop frequently to rest my sore muscles and to catch my breath. I cannot believe I still haven't finished the bedroom. I only did a few things in other rooms, and will do more tomorrow. Over the last four or five months, my bedroom hadn't gotten more than a cursory tidy and bedding change. For example, I had art supplies piled up under the tv for months, and the ironing board with mask-making stuff was under the window since April. I swept and dusted and steam mopped and carpet shampooed and everything else I could force my body to do before it all shut down and I went next door to play games. Tomorrow I will get up and do it all over again. At least next time there will be slightly less cat barf to clean up.

Life Is Like...

Inspirational song: The Real Me (The Who)

Up until this morning, I was absolutely certain that the ultrasound of my abdomen was going to be a waste of time. The last thing I said to Mr S-P before I walked out of the door at 7:30 was "20 bucks says the result will be 'it looks normal, you're fine.'" As always. Anything that bothers me for years and years always turns out to be something no common test will identify. (Although I concede, the paralyzed diaphragm Dx started with a chest x-ray. It just didn't stop there.) I held my conviction that nothing would turn up until I was on the table, and she kept pressing the transducer wand farther and farther down, even with or lower than my belly button. (It really hurt, but I didn’t make a sound.) She and I had a pleasant conversation as we lined things up, and I gave her an abridged version of what I have had going on, and what things could be in there. I made sure to include "or nothing at all," because that's what I assumed it would be.

As I was wiping the gel off my stomach, so I could straighten my shirt out, she casually asked when my cancer was diagnosed. I don't think I visibly flinched, but I did find it an odd question. It put a little crack in my shell of invincibility. Now I just wonder whether she was continuing to express empathy for what I told her I had been through, or do I need to reconsider my confidence? I'm trying to shake it off, but it still makes me feel a little weird. I probably will have forgotten about it in a day or two.

I'm on my own for a few days. The man had to go fix the fence on the house we still own in New Mexico. I have dreams of selling it and being out from under the stress of being absent landlords. Until then, we have to keep it fixed up, either by hiring locals or by him going down and doing work himself. It means things here will be quiet, and I have to remember to do the things he usually does, like water all the flowers and vegetables every single day. I've been told to be on bindweed duty as well, plus to go out and pick the ripe cherries off the north tree. I got a medium sized bowl picked while storm clouds cooled the yard, rain lightly sprinkled, and the wind kept yanking the branches from my hands. I need to do this during better weather, but what better weather is there than a thunderstorm?

The Deal

Inspirational song: Mama Said (The Shirelles)

Part of the problem with having a daily blog and multiple chronic illnesses is that some days are just flat out boring, by design, and there is nothing to write about. It's a thousand times worse during a pandemic. I assure you, I am fine. It was just the day I drew the short straw, and my muscles decided to lock up and be cranky, so I listened to them and took it easy. It is the bargain we strike, my body and I, that when warning signs go up, I agree to stop making things worse whenever it is possible. I had to dip into the pill reserves, the ones I only use for breakthrough pain, and it still took hours to soften me up. Hours and two sessions on the TENS and a long nap.

I want to come up with something interesting that has nothing to do with a daily diary entry, but I just can't. I have an ultrasound scheduled for early tomorrow (more imaging around the paralyzed diaphragm, to find out why the stuff under it hurts--I expect to be told they see nothing). I need to turn in. We stayed up watching Rocketman, and now I have no time for struggling to write profound musings. I'm about to set an alarm and let everything else go.

I don't even have time to take my own pictures for tonight. I'm stealing one from my daughter who sent me Dino pix when I asked how she was doing. My response to this one was yes, I can see that she is absolutely part of my family in that face. She is one of us.

Crash

Inspirational song: I Love the Sound of Breaking Glass (Nick Lowe) 

Early on in the lockdown, there were people trying to inject a little lighthearted spirit into their isolated neighborhoods by putting their Christmas lights back up. I'm not sure how widespread it actually was, but I recall two or three local news stories about it. 

We didn't ever restring them on the eaves, but I had a fun and simple way to join in. I had a glass block I got from one of the hardware stores several years back, that was hollow and had a hole with a rubber plug to make it easy to fill with festive decorations. I had a set of multicolored lights on a white cord that were the right length to fill the block just right. I hadn't set it out every year, because the lights were incandescent, not LED, and I felt bad about using that much electricity. 

This year I got over myself, and decided it would be perfect in my front window. And I was right. The colors were beautiful, and the glass block motif fit in exactly with my 1959 vintage ranch house, with glass block accents. 

Yesterday evening, I shooed Harvey away from the top of the block, as he was climbing over it to reach an open window. At one o'clock this morning, I startled awake to the sound of breaking glass. Harvey had gone back to that window, and threw the block onto the floor. I did the best I could to clean up the glass while I was mostly asleep. This morning I saw how poorly I did that, and cut my finger thoroughly on one of the big shards.

I can't decide whether to wait until Christmas decorations come out in the fall to find another one of these things, or to try to find a replacement on Amazon now. Patience is not my strong suit these days.

Best Day

Inspirational song: Veronica (Elvis Costello)

Simple days are often the best days. I have proof of that and the end of one of those days. When our daughter's birthday happened to fall on Father's Day, it was decided that the preferred way to celebrate both would be to hang out here all day.

I made brunch for everyone (including the best cassava flour crepes in the world), and we all just sat around, passing a sleeping baby between us, and enjoyed each other's company. We video chatted with my dad, watched some YouTube videos (feel free to check out Detail Geek like we did) and closed the evening by listening to the kids take turns reading chapters from a book that means a lot to them. This day could not have been more relaxing or soothing. All holidays should be this easy.

Side note on something I have been meaning to address: I have decided to stop using my grandbaby's given name in the blog. I don't use anyone's name other than my own, out of the habit I developed early on for the sake of privacy. Before she was born, from the first night I learned someone would be coming but wasn't going to know who until she actually arrived, I have been calling her by the same nickname--Dino. Pronounced like the pet dinosaur on the Flintstones, dee-no. I think from now on, I'll use that in this space. Even a little baby has the right to a little privacy.

 

Miles

Inspirational song: My Back Pages (Bob Dylan)

Way back, long ago, like two whole years (which counts as the Before Times), I had a foolish notion. I watched my daughter drive for Lyft part time, and I thought, hey, I could do that. I actually seriously considered doing it. Some desperate self-preserving impulse prevailed, and I never actually signed up to try. I'm so glad I didn't do it. It turns out that I would not have been able to do it, for multiple reasons. Among the strikes against me were that driving in Denver, especially on narrow, crowded streets, stresses me out. I get panicky when I'm on unfamiliar routes, if lanes suddenly disappear or exits are hard to access, or if parking is scarce. And, as it turns out, driving is actually exhausting.

My foster daughter has been gone for four weeks. Her real mom had a medical procedure done, and she needed someone to stay with her and help out. She came home this evening, and it was my turn to make the airport run to get her. The traffic wasn't bad, but it is a solid hour each way going the non-interstate route I chose. By the time I arrived at the kids' house to drop her off, my right ankle was so sore from being held in one position that I was afraid it wouldn't support me. I've spent the remaining time since coming home limping around like I'm old and broken, telling any cat within earshot how sore and tired I am. This brings into high-def clarity how glad I am I never tried to drive Lyft, even for a minute.

I didn't stay long at the kids' place. I got a few cuddles, a half a smile, and two extended sharts rumbling against my arm as I held the baby. I will get more time tomorrow when they come over for brunch. I did steal the photos my daughter took earlier today, of a very happy little girl. She posted them online already, but they were too good not to share a little more widely.

Smells

Inspirational song: Dead Skunk (Loudon Wainwright III)

First off, I must clarify. The above is the only song I know of off the top of my head that actually refers to skunks. The skunk in this story is not dead. Otherwise I wouldn't be writing about him/her.

Mr S-P did a Lowe's and salvage yard run today, preparing for a trip up to the cabin to restructure the Murray ramp he built just a few weeks ago. (Ramp is barely wider than Murray's wheelchair, so he is hesitant to use it.) Going one way or the other to the Boulder Resource store, he said some driver in front of him slammed on her brakes and swerved on the Diagonal near the reservoir. He nearly hit her, but didn't. The car behind him had to perform defensive maneuvers to avoid hitting him, and ended up off on the side, needing to be pushed out of the mud to be able to drive on. All of this because there was a little ball of muddy fluff on the side of the road.

He sent home a photo of legs and a bushy tail, and the rest of an animal buried under a towel. I asked, who is that and how badly injured are they? It was a muddy baby skunk, who seemed to be in shock for some reason, but otherwise uninjured. I never learned what the original trauma was, and I doubt he knew it either. He called the Greenwood wildlife rehab center, and they declined to accept. They said call animal control. Deciding that would probably mean automatic euthanization, he did not choose that option. So he brought the tiny creature home in a shoebox, vowing to release him after dark (since they are nocturnal animals). He got a tub of water and washed off the mud, gently and carefully. He tried to offer a little cat food and some blueberries. Skunk wanted neither.

Although it appeared that the little guy had sprayed himself empty before he was picked up, he still had a generous dose of natural perfume about him. My front porch smelled like that aisle in Walmart where they sell the jelly shoes. It has been almost four hours since Mr S-P took him back to the reservoir and released him far away from the road, but I can still faintly smell him like the inside of my nose is coated with skunk scent. He was a cute little thing, I could tell from my safe vantage point inside the living room. I don't want one as a pet or anything, but it was fun to see one up close.

Now, so that the first photo on the list is not of the baby skunk, which I don't want as the representative image on the Facebook link, I will harken to the Disney Bambi, and pair flowers with my skunk story. I noticed yesterday that the two sets of mini roses, which I received as gifts when I had my breast cancer surgery last year, are thriving in my old garden, where we planted them last summer. The big roses struggled, but these two little ones took off. It made me happy to see.

Impressionism

Inspirational song: Suite: Judy Blue Eyes (Crosby, Stills & Nash)

For the D&D campaign that Mr S-P wrote, he kept commissioning artwork from the girls to illustrate terrain and architectural features where we were playing, as well as to describe the creatures we encountered. A few months ago, I asked him whether I could try my hand at creating a location shot for him as well, although I wasn't well-versed in computer art programs like the kids use. I wanted to paint by hand, old-school. He agreed to let me paint a barren desert landscape, that stretched for many miles, with a faraway mountain range on one side, and a tightly contained thunderstorm in the center, in the distance.

I blocked out my colors months ago. It took multiple coats to get the sky roughly the right opacity, and I left it to dry for a while. Like for a month. Then I tried to add in a large thunderhead in the middle, but I made it several orders of magnitude larger than I intended. I set it aside, meaning to get back to it. I failed to return to it for another three to four weeks. Then last week, our party reached the point in the story when we were able to look in the distance from a tall tower, and see the storm. Oops. I wasn't ready with the painting. 

Today I sat down and finished it. I might have had a vague plan to make it realistic and detailed, but once I got going again, I started grooving on an impressionist vibe. I didn't have time to attempt hyper-realism, and I liked where it was going with just the mood over details anyway. I got to a point where my heart screamed STOP! And I did. 

When I tried taking pictures so that Mr S-P could share with the party members who are still playing remotely, I discovered it doesn't translate well to extremely clear photos, blown up large on my television. It made the impressionist aspects just seem hurried or sloppy. I like it much better in person than in the photo, but since I can't invite everyone over to see it, the photo will have to suffice. 

Also, baby pictures from the game. Enjoy.

Car Culture

Inspirational song: Roll Me Away (Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band)

Fifteen years ago, Mr S-P came home with a rumbly, smoky first generation Toyota 4Runner. He had bought it from some guy on base in North Dakota, fully aware that the engine was in sorry shape and the exterior was, well, let's use the word "rugged." Our oldest daughter was a teenager, but not yet old enough to get her driver's license at the time. Her father used some of the best dad wisdom I've seen. He told her that if she was going to drive on his auto insurance policy, she was going to tear apart and rebuild her own car, so she knew what to do with one when it inevitably broke down in the middle of nowhere. If only I had known then that that truck would be with us forever.

The truck has been rebuilt more than once. It has confounded the owners (and Mr S-P and our kid each consider it theirs), and it has frustrated auto shops. It has cost more money than a new car with a warranty ever would. Strangers come up and offer money for it all the freaking time. And it has even been stolen and recovered once. Our daughter said that she doesn't care about pretty much anything else of ours, but that truck is her inheritance. 

Stuff breaks on it regularly. The whole reason he went out and bought some guy's ratty farm truck early this year was the 4Runner needed significant attention, and he wanted to be able to tear it apart again yet still be able to get up to the cabin. 

Today we took the farm truck up to Fraser, the sister town to the ski community of Winter Park. There was a guy up there who had acquired a first gen 4Runner, and he was parting it out. We got a topper with a terrific welded cage of a roof rack. He also got the two front seats, and the seller threw in a replacement rear seat belt (the current one tightens down continuously and never releases, making riding in the back very uncomfortable.) Unfortunately, the seat belt didn't seem to make it in the truck. The topper almost didn't as well. It was a snug fit. The seller had to get his neighbors to come help load it.

We had intended on coming home through Rocky Mountain National Park, not realizing we had to have a reservation just to be admitted and allowed to drive through. We turned around at the Park entrance, drove back past lakes Grand and Granby, and came home roughly the same way we went to Fraser. It was a long, long day, but it sure was a nice drive in the mountains.

Photo Shoot

Inspirational song: Girls On Film (Duran Duran)

The idea was born a few days ago. My stepfather posted a picture on his timeline of the painting he created that hangs in my living room. (It's called The Encounter, and it's the vivid bit of loveliness that appears in the background of a lot of my indoor photos. It has the apples and butterflies against a bright blue sky.) Originally, I wanted to hold my granddaughter up in front of it, "holding" a card that wished him a happy birthday, and put a photo of this as a comment on the original post. 

The kids came over for lunch on Monday, but I didn't have the card made, and we were otherwise distracted. I asked them to come again today, so we could have a second chance at it. It almost didn't go off. Little Grumpus fussed and cried most of the time she was here, even when her grandpa walked her around the house, bouncing her. She acted like her tummy hurt, and the usual stand-bys just weren't relieving her discomfort. 

I gave up on the idea of holding her up by the painting. We pulled a small fleece blanket out of a drawer (I have been told she likes fleece), and swaddled her in it. It calmed her some. After a diaper change, she lay on that blanket on the floor, her mood temporarily mild. I set the birthday greeting card next to her, and took a handful of shots. Got a few cute ones, and I made the post. Whew.

The quiet period ended and she fussed again, loudly. It wasn't until then that I got my chance at her. I tucked her up on her knees against my shoulder, and patted her butt for about 20 minutes. She finally conked out, but any time I stopped patting, she woke back up. Girl knows what she wants, and apparently butt pats were it. Soon after, they put her in the car seat, ready to go home. You know that saying that newborn smiles are just gas? Yeah...yeah. Child was all smiles letting out whatever had ruined her day the hour before.