Once is Enough

I love this quote by Mae West: “You only live once. But if you do it right, once is enough.”

I feel I’m doing it right, but I’ve nothing to tell you about yesterday. I got up, I did things, I went to bed and now it’s Friday morning and the same thing is going to happen today: Nothing. Nothing happens day after day here now and I couldn’t be happier.

Life at Pinecone Park has become routine and that’s a good thing — in fact, it’s wonderful! I feel adapted to this semi off-grid, animal-filled lifestyle.

I went to the hardware store yesterday. (I love hardware stores!) I got bellows for the fire and a purpose built wood carrier. Both are very welcome additions to the household. I also got a timer. It turns on the lights on the outside of my shed when it gets dark making it very easy to get wood at night. And it turns them off at ten pm.

The doing of all these little things, as is said, make a house a home. And it’s the capacity to be kept busy doing these kinds of things that brought me here — of course I can hardly wait to be doing them from 4:00 am to 10:00 pm in warm summer daylight.

I cannot believe, for example, the amount of arboreal detritus in the backyard again. I had things pretty tidy before the recent storms and now there are enough branches and pinecones out there to finish the fence. I’m having second thoughts about having eradicated the fire pit.

When I was checking out at the hardware store, the clerk asked me, “How’d it go with your generator during the blackout?” I explained that I’d not used it and why but I was chuffed by her remembering my purchase back in October. She made me feel part of the community here — and in a comfortable way. My condition prevents me from going to community gatherings so I appreciated her question very much.

Sadly, urine is still part of my routine; an “accident” this morning ruined a several-day-long stretch of no indoor accidents at all. This morning while Ethel and I were sitting on the chaise, she came into the living room and peed on the rug. The rug is doomed. It’s lovely but cheap. Both urine and cleaning fluid cause the colours to run.

It seems like she gets that she shouldn’t poop in the house, but she seems to think peeing is okay.

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Mertz Manor (and the dingle balls inside it) are a monster hit! The Manor is a primary resource now for Fred and Ethel. It’s pretty much constantly in use and I’m really stoked about its success. It’s a place, like under the bed and the bookcase, where the cats can get away from Sheba.

I’ve lots more decorating to do and I may do some today. But the weekend is predicted to be sunny so I will do yard work and I may work on the fence.

I remember hating almost all my creative work during my adolescence and throughout early adulthood. I’d work all day on something, go to bed, get up and hate it the next morning. Happily for me, when the snow melted, I liked what I saw of my fence work.