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“A rainy day is like a lovely gift — you can sleep late and not feel guilty.”

October 14, 2017

It was a late night so it is a late morning, actually an early afternoon. I was still awake at four when Gracie finally settled, Maddie got comfortable on my sweatshirt, and I was snuggled under the afghan to stave off the chill.

This morning when I took Gracie out I was surprised to see everything was wet, and the air was a bit chilly from the dampness. I came back inside and put on my sweatshirt which Maddie had been kind enough to leave for me. It’s raining again. I opened the window behind me to hear the drops on the leaves in the side yard. It started as a gentle rain but is now heavier, a steady storm.

I have no lists today. I could do a couple of errands but I’ll wait until tomorrow. Today I have designated a do nothing day.

My friend Bill keeps track of the weather in Bolga where we lived. I checked today, and it is currently 94˚, a cool day. Tomorrow will be 99˚ and every day for the rest of the week will be over 100˚ but will drop to the low 70’s at night. I used a woven wool blanket this time of year as the 30˚ drop was chilling. It was an unexpected but wonderful feeling being cold. I still have that wool blanket.

My house is dark except for a lit nightlight and a small driftwood tree lit with white lights in the bathroom and a strand of scallop shells and a cluster of red peppers lit in the kitchen. They give the house a cozy feel.

I’m watching a really bad movie called Deep Space. You’re probably thinking of course you are. The creature sort of looks like giant bug with lots of legs and sharp teeth. I had to laugh when it traveled on a sidewalk as it looked like a wind-up. None of its legs moved. It attacks by jumping at the necks of its victims. A few babies just as lethal as their mama have been born. The death count of their victims is rising.

It feels strange to have a Saturday with no baseball.

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“Look after your laundry, and your soul will look after itself.”

September 11, 2017

I’m late this morning. I slept in and so did Gracie. She sleeps in her crate for most of the night then joins me on the couch at no particular time. Today it was close to 7:30. I helped her get on the couch then got comfy and went back to sleep. That has become our daily ritual.

Last night was an afghan night, and the chill is still in the air mostly in the back of my house, in the shade. I wear a sweatshirt now while I wait for Gracie to finish in the yard. While I was outside, I noticed the bird feeders were empty so I filled two with sunflower seeds and another with thistle. Immediately, chickadees went for the sunflower and gold finches for the thistle. They arrived so quickly I figured they were hanging around on branches waiting and hoping. I’m glad I didn’t disappoint.

My dance card is pretty empty. I do have two errands which I’ll finish this afternoon. My inside plants need watering so that’s on my other list. The dust in this room is almost bad enough to force me to clean it but not yet. Maybe in a few days. I espouse the maxim that dusting today still means dusting tomorrow. It is a never ending chore.

When I was a kid, my mother cleaned the house while I was in school. It was a miracle of sorts. I’d leave for school and when I got home, the house was clean, the dishes washed and the beds made. My mother was like the shoemaker’s elves. The only chores I ever saw her do were cooking dinner and doing dishes at night and taking clothes off the line in the backyard.

We lived in a duplex so we shared the backyard with our immediate neighbor. We each had our own clotheslines, either two or three apiece. I forget which. The end of the lines were attached to metal poles which were green but always seemed to need paint. I remember the silver-colored metal underneath the green. Below the lines was pitch or what we called hot top. It was square-shaped except for the small walkway leading to the back door. The rest of the yard was grass. My mother kept her clothespins in a bag which attached to the line and could be slid up and down so she had easy access to the clothespins.

My mother hung the laundry upside down. I never asked her why. I just figured that’s how laundry is hung. What I remember the most are the sheets doubled over the lines. In my mind’s eye, they are all white. I can still see them billowing and flapping, and I remember the sound of the sheets in wind. I also remember running between and under the sheets. My mother always yelled at us.

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“The best bridge between despair and hope is a good night’s sleep.”

February 18, 2017

My neighbors didn’t try to break-in with their mirrors to test my breathing. I don’t know why they didn’t check or at least call as my newspaper was sitting in the driveway until noon. Maybe there needs to be a stack of papers before the neighbors notice.

I slept so late to make up for the interrupted sleep on Thursday when Gracie was shaking enough to wake me up three or so times. I took her out each time then gave up the bed to sleep downstairs on the couch.

I think I’ve figured out the shaking. It has nothing to do with going out. When I turned the bedroom light on to get ready to go downstairs to take her out, Gracie was always by the edge of the bed looking nervously at the floor. I’m now thinking she might have fallen off the bed, but I can’t imagine when. She is always with me upstairs so maybe it was when I was gone; anyway, last night I decided to switch sides of the bed. It was easy, and it worked. Gracie and I both slept the whole night and the whole morning. We didn’t wake up until noon. She didn’t shake once all night. Solution found though the question still lingers.

Today is a beautiful, warm sunny day. There is a breeze and sometimes even a wind which makes the pine trees sway. The oaks still have brown leaves at the ends of branches. I know spring is coming, it always does, but I get impatient around this time of year. I figure winter has held sway for far too long. The snow last week was the final straw.

My front garden has green shoots. I think they’re daffodils. I also think they’re brave and I do hope they survive. February isn’t finished yet, and March can be snowy.

Baseball spring training is in full swing.

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“The only sure thing about luck is that it will change.”

April 14, 2016

Given the lateness of the hour, you’d think I dawdled the morning away. That is not even close to what happened. The last few days I have been in a funk, a malaise if you will, as my back has been especially bad, especially painful. Yesterday Gracie and I went to the dump. A couple of the bags were so heavy I had to drag them, but they had to go. They had developed dump smell. When I had finished tossing the bags into the big bins, I could barely get back to the car for the pain. I sat down for a while, patted Gracie and bemoaned my fate. After that we had two more errands. When I got home, my back was so bad I took up residence on the couch and stayed there all the rest of the day. I caught up with my DVR’d programs, read through the mountain of catalogues and took a nap. This morning I was so much better, and the best part is the grayness has gone.

I had that weird bout of energy I get, one of those walk around the house and dust with my sweatshirt mornings. I washed all the dog’s dishes and her placemat. I swept the kitchen floor and then changed all the newspapers at Fern’s alternative cat box by the front door. I even made my bed. I feel accomplished.

Today I have to go to the vet’s to pick up Fern and Maddie’s medicine. Maddie’s medicine is for thyroid and Fern’s medicine is for kidneys which, given her age, aren’t functioning as well as they should. The vet figures that’s why Fern has chosen not to use the litter boxes. Fern would have had to take a couple of pills a day. I would have needed to hire a crew to help. When I told the vet how feisty Fern is, she said I could get it in a rub but it was more money, as if I cared. The rub goes on her ear. That’s my only part. The rest is up to Fern.

Today is beautiful, a bit chillier than yesterday but all in all it’s a lovely day. With the change in seasons I have noticed an adjective change. In winter I would have said today is colder than yesterday. Now, in spring, it is chillier.

I guess all in all I’m feeling lucky. After everything it sounds strange I’m sure, but today my back doesn’t hurt for the first time in nearly a week. The Red Sox finally beat the Orioles. My house is clean enough for company should someone drop by to visit. The vet bill this month caused tremors, my hands shook signing my name, but we finally know what’s going on, and Fern will get better.

Things are looking up in my world.

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“The sun did not shine. It was too wet to play. So we sat in the house. All that cold, cold, wet day.”

October 11, 2014

It was a mirror under the nose morning as I slept until after ten. I always wonder if my neighbors will notice my paper still sits in the driveway so late and hope I’m okay or if they’ll just shake their heads and think that woman sleeps really late. I know they are up before seven every morning.

It’s raining. The house is dark, and I haven’t turned on any lights. The dog and cats are sleeping, the cats in here with me and the dog in her crate. She and I are going to the dump today because I figure the rain will keep people away, and tomorrow will be a madhouse as the dump is closed Mondays and Tuesdays.

Rainy Saturdays this time of year were the worst when I was a kid. It was too chilly to be outside playing in the rain, and there wasn’t a whole lot to do in the house. We could watch TV, play board games or read, and we’d try each until we were bored enough to move on to another. We often ended up fighting over the board game. It was always a he said-she said argument or accusations of cheating, and my mother would yell for us to put the game away. Most times I’d lie in bed and read. It was one of the few places where I could be by myself. I figure rainy Saturdays drove my mother crazy because she was stuck with the four of us, and we were stuck with each other. My father was usually off doing his Saturday stuff. When I think back, my mother was always around while my father worked until late every day and on Saturdays he was off doing his errands and then he’d worked outside in the yard. Sunday was the only day he was around the whole time except he went to an early mass where he was an usher. Once in a while we went with him, but it was really early.

My mother was the disciplinarian when my father wasn’t around. He was always the threat, “If you don’t stop what you’re doing, I’m telling your father.” That scared us. My mother was easy-going while my father wasn’t. We usually stopped. She never did tell.

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“Football combines two of the worst things in American life. It is violence punctuated by committee meetings.”

January 7, 2013

A good afternoon to you all! It seems I slept away the morning. Because the clock in my bedroom doesn’t work, I had no idea the time when I finally got out of bed. Fern and Gracie were with me, and they stretched and greeted me before we went downstairs. I got a shock when I saw it was after eleven. My neighbors must have been thinking about calling the rescue squad as my newspapers were still in the driveway. My morning ritual doesn’t change despite the hour so I took my time and read the papers with my coffee and did the crosswords puzzles and the cryptogram before I opened my computer. The sun which greeted me when I finally crawled out of bed is gone now. I guess I missed most of it. Now the sky is filled with clouds which have darkened the day. I have to go out and fill the feeders so I hope it doesn’t rain.

My dance card for the week has dinner with a friend, a doctor’s appointment and breakfast with friends on Friday. I can’t remember the last time it was so filled. One event a week has been the average. I don’t ever count Sunday breakfast as that is a ritual as is Sunday game night with my friends when we do appies and dessert with games in between, mostly Phase 10 and Sorry. Who’d ever think that a game like Sorry would be the source for such language, blue language which hangs in the air over our heads. Sunday is the one day I try never to book anything else. Next Sunday will still be game day, but not our game day. Next Sunday is football and the Patriots.

I always think of my Dad when the Pats are in play-off games. He was an ardent fan who would be thrilled at the success of the Pats. His first allegiance, when I was a kid, had been to the NY Giants but that was before the AFL and the Boston Patriots. He quickly became a Pats fan, but they were the lowly Pats who appeared only once in a championship where they were trounced. My father, though, never gave up. He watched every game from his spot on the couch. I really mean his spot as no one else ever sat there. It was his seat. My dad would jump up and yell and curse at the TV when the Pats fumbled or the other team scored. Most of the time my mother and I sat in the kitchen playing games. My mother never liked sports of any kind so I’d keep her company but I’d periodically check on the game.

If my parents were still with us, I’d go up to their house next Sunday, and we’d all watch the game together, even my mother. She, however, had no inkling as to how the game of football is played. A couple of times she rooted for the other team. We never said anything. She was just trying to be good fan.

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