The Rest of the Birthday Vacation

Thursday, February 26, 2015
 I tried to get in touch with my voice coach today, but her phone appears to be having a problem.
I did get to go out and share some of the joy that I have been given.
I've taken one walk, and am about to take another.
Goofing off when you're on vacation is mandatory.

Having a husband who loves to cook is such a nice thing when you'd really like to put your feet up before dinner.  When he cleans up his own dishes, it's a marriage made in Heaven!!

A nice glass of Merlot from Canadian River Vineyards and Winery is a very good thing at the end of a busy day.

Doing things to make other people smile is the MOST fun there is!
I had such a good day yesterday, I was out spreading the joy today, and I think I succeeded...

And my darling husband made such wonderful spaghetti sauce that I ate more than I should have and feel rather like a beach ball at the moment.  It was SO good!

It's supposed to snow starting tomorrow and lasting all weekend.  Goody.  We're usually done with this crap by now...
Not supposed to be more than an inch or so total snow tomorrow, though.

Friday, February 27, 2015

Got up at 7:18 today.  Still haven't gotten much done.  Did try the recipe I was toying with for the sesame sticks.  Made those chocolate haystack cookies, but with sesame sticks.  Probably more calories, but a bit more nutrition and fiber, too.

Did some light cleaning, just finished 90 minutes on the elliptical, and am still trying to digest the news that Leonard Nimoy has passed on.  He will be missed.  Mr. Shatner, Mr. Takei, Mr. Koenig and Ms. Nichols are the only original cast left.  I'm guessing Mr. Nimoy, Mr. Kelley, Mrs. Roddenberry,  and Mr. Doohan are having one heck of a fun reunion party about now.  For fans, these actors, and the characters they helped create, are dear friends, family even.  We care about them, and we miss them when they pass on to whatever is next.  (I tend to believe in Heaven, and if my friends and my pets aren't there, then it isn't Heaven.  The God I love wouldn't do that to me.  They're HIS friends and pets, too.)

As I gaze out my office window, I see that there is a very light, dry snow falling.  Doesn't appear to be sticking to anything yet.
Time to go get cleaned up and see what other kind of trouble I can get into on my last official day of vacation.

On this day when we have lost Leonard Nimoy, and we remember that Jimmy Doohan and DeForrest Kelley are also gone, it makes me really conscious of the passing of time.  I just had a birthday.  That means I and all my siblings are older.  That much closer to the end.  I don't want to lose any of them.  Worst, suckiest thing about being the baby is that everybody else is older and liable to leave you behind in one way or another.  I don't want them to go.  I have friends my own age, and friends who are older.  I have younger ones, too.  No guarantees about who goes first, but damn, I don't want to live without any of my friends, or my loved ones.  Photos someone shared on Facebook brought it all home.  I don't wanna be the one at the empty table.

This was shared on Facebook by Chris Cracknell.  Very moving.

 

 

 

 

So please, friends, take good care of yourselves.  I know my siblings will try to take care of themselves.  Thoughts and prayers are with those left behind today.  Remember that love never dies, and those we love live on even though we don't find them in this world anymore.  Still, it's hard to get used to the change, isn't it?

What Scares Us

Many things are common fears among humans.  The dark, being alone, spiders, heights, enclosed places, all these are pretty common phobias.  We are also afraid of dying.  We don't think about it much, at least not usually when we are younger, but we don't really like the idea.  When we are young, it is inconceivable that anything could cause our existence to cease. We are vibrant, full of life, invincible.  Or so we believe.  The older we get, the more experiences we have of loss, or our own illness or injury, and Death becomes more real.  When we lose a loved one or even an acquaintance near our own age, no matter how old we are, Death becomes more real.

Death was a very real presence to all ages of people in the past.  Medicine was not so advanced, people were not so well-nourished, life was in general more dangerous, and more people died at younger ages.  Even in my generation, Death was a real presence during my late childhood and early adolescence.  There was a war going on in Viet Nam, and it consumed the lives of many men and some women the same age as my siblings.  Both my brothers had friends go off to serve.  Both knew some who did not come home.  They were both in engineering programs at UCLA, and because their grades were good enough, they had deferments.  (They were both also nearly blind without their glasses, as am I.  Only my sister has good distance vision.)  Every night on the news, we heard counts of wounded, dead, and missing.  Every night.  They don't do that with the wars today, but even though we have lost far too many, and had too many injured, the sheer number of injured and dead over the course of Viet Nam is staggering.  It still seems shocking to me that I thought of those counts as a normal part of a newscast when I was growing up.

There are a few things I fear.  I don't really fear confined spaces (like elevators), but I am very uncomfortable in them.  I have a lot of respect for fire, but I don't really fear it.  I have learned not to fear the dark, (unless I am alone on an unfamiliar street, or in a place like my old neighborhood in California.)  I dislike climbing on ladders because my uncle and my Pop both died after falling off ladders.   Right this minute, I am afraid to try to lie down and go to sleep.  I woke up choking last night, and for a few seconds, until I got whatever had gone the wrong way cleared, I was afraid I was going to die.  I could not get enough air in.  I am afraid it will happen again, and this time I won't be able to get the gunk out of my throat.  This has never happened before.

All day this has been perking along in the back of my mind.  I have distracted myself most of the day with things that needed doing and with reading and fooling around on the Internet, and haven't let it come to the forefront of my thoughts.  But now, bedtime looms, and I need my sleep because I have to work all day tomorrow.

My faith tells me I don't have to fear what will happen to me when I die, but I still don't want to go yet.  I have too many things undone.  There are too many messes in this house that I don't want other people to have to try and sort out.  Especially my husband.  I don't want to leave him. I really don't want to leave him all these things that need to be sorted and dealt with.  I told him we had better go together, because I don't want to go alone, or go on alone without him.  He just says we have to do what we have to do, and it isn't our decision anyway.  He's right.  (He's usually right, but don't tell him I said that. )
There are things I have not done, places I want to go that I have not gone, people I care about that I don't want to leave behind because they just might need me.  There are SO many more songs to sing, and poems to write, and books to read.  There are movies I want to see that are not out yet!  I want to see the rest of They Live Among Us!  But mostly, there are people I care for who may not know it, and I have to do a better job of letting them know.  Not telling them.  Showing them.  It isn't easy.  Actions speak louder than words because words of support are easy to offer.  Acts of support and concern are harder to accomplish.

I may have been flippant and frivolous today online, but it was only to cover the darker things clamoring around in my subconscious.  Thoughts of how much time I have wasted, how many I have hurt, those are the things that have truly been on my mind today.  Yet I still spent most of the day in avoidance behavior.  Of course, I had to wait on the plumber, and wait for him to finish his work before my time was really my own today.  Then, there was the generally run down feeling (now getting even worse) because I could not sleep for more than about an hour and a half last night.

Well, I can't avoid this particular fear much longer.  I shall set up the coffee pot so I can take a thermal carafe of good coffee to work tomorrow.  (I share, of course.)  I'll take the guaifenesin and the antihistamine and anti inflammatory,  brush my teeth, wash my face, etc.  Then I'll try to go to sleep.  Wish me luck.

Here is a picture of the new kitchen sink that I was waiting on the plumber to install, by the way.