No More Darrell

The studio renovation is officially over. Darrell is done and gone. I’m completely on my own now. I laid the carpet (it’s soft natural Jute and I love it), lit the fire and listened to CBC One. (The photo above is what I see out my office side window.) Over the next few days I’ll be assembling — or trying to assemble — the furniture. I’m giddy.

And the sunroom is unofficially toast. Darrell said it would be expensive and I’ve been having second thoughts so the project will likely just fade away but might happen if I get rich from Defiant Dress royalties.

Above is the packaging from a TV stand going into my studio:

1.     Tall Styrofoam. There’s 4 large pieces.

2.     Is a compressed bag of plastic wrapping.

3.     Short Styrofoam; 17 pieces of it.

4.     The box, cut and bundled as is required by the curbside collectors. The stack, compressed, is 10.5 inches high.

5.     Hard cardboard. There’s 14 pieces of it.

The Styrofoam (and the insulation removed from the studio) has to go to the dump in Nanaimo and I have to pay as a non-resident. The plastic has to go to GIRO and the cardboard is curbside collected. I add the small Styrofoam and hard cardboard to my studio supply inventory.

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Quelle surprise étonnante! Wednesday was sunny – at least until the late afternoon. It was a relief to be able to tire Sheba with a walk. And yes, I wore sweat pants all day — a new pair. I’m a saggy panter.

I got some tennis balls and I tried more “training” with Sheba. She’s really getting good at fetch as long as I have treats in my pocket. If she comes back and leaves the ball behind part way and comes for treats, I say: “Where’s your ball?” And she runs back and gets it. I’m impressed.

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The Arts Council fellow (Mitch) has given me a massive amount of clerical work to do.

In the Spring the Arts Council hosts a workshop festival. It’s not curated; anyone can propose a workshop and offer it (but they may not necessarily get attendees). I have to edit all their submissions. I have to render all the workshop descriptions and bios into a standard length and format. It’s the kind of work that satisfies the OCD part of my brain so I’m keen to do it.

Mitch is the father of several kids, anArts Council employee and some kind of therapist with a private practice so he’s a busy guy and clearly appreciated being able to dump the grunt work on me. The deadline is one week from today.

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Now that Darrell is gone I’ll be leading a pretty solitary life.  I’ll speak to the clerks at the grocery store, of course, and I Skype with Dwight. But my only face-to-face will be with Dr. Shoja and even that ends at the end of March.

I’ll a bit anxious about being so solitary, but then I’m anxious about everything with C-PTSD. I think visiting Vancouver to see friends and welcoming friends here is going to be mighty important. There is so much to do here and there’s gardening coming so I don’t think being solitary will be a strain.

Will I be lonely? I’ll find out. Skype is the perfect antidote if I do.