My Vacuous Life

Wednesday:

Wednesday was dreamy good. It was cloudy and uninspiring, and I was so cool, I decided to light a fire. I’m glad I did. I let it burn out and when it was burned out, the sun was starting to come through the clouds.

I’m not engaging the gardener to whom I wrote. I am an experienced employer. By the time I was 25, I had a staff of 30, many of whom were older than me. As an employer, I had to do a lot of hiring, and the gardener behaved in a way that makes alarm bells go off. I sense profound unreliability. Pete and I will move the big things, and I’m going to get serious about the small things today. 

Sosa was over today. He lives next door, and we leave the friendship gate open. He and Sheba played together for hours today and so from 5:00 onwards, she was dead to the world on our bed. He is an adorable dog. He’s a Doodle, like Sheba. He’s smart and less than half Sheba’s size. They loved each other the instant they met. I have seen Sheba do this once before. She was smitten with Minjou at puppy classes.

Last night, for the first time in 2 months, I tried doing my monologue and it went okay as far as I went. I didn’t do much, but I was surprised by how well I did. I have to get serious about renewing my mastery of it because September is going to be here soon.

I’m feeling that the sciatica is over. All that’s left is tingling in my leg when I rise after sitting. Slowly, I have almost fully recovered, so when I return to Cory, it will be for guidelines for living with a vulnerable back. I feel, however, like someone might who just had a malignancy removed. It’s great news, but now you wait to see if there was any metastasis. Over the past three months, I had two attacks between a few weeks of relief. I will need a good chunk of time to go by without any sciatic pain to feel confident again. But I will live by Cory’s rules.

Steve arrives in just under two weeks. It’s going to be intense having him here for five days, and then going to Victoria with him for one night. We were partners for 14 years, from 1980 to 1994. Next year, it will be 29 years since we broke up, but we remain very close. We talk, at least once a week, and he visits every Summer. I can hardly wait until he retires and can come for an extended stay. We are family to each other.

Thursday:

The day began with a thorough dousing of the gardens, and then, at 10:30, I hosted an online meeting of adults new to stuttering. Tracey, our regular leader and a speech language therapist, was busy assisting her daughter who’d been emergency admitted to hospital. It was a great session. I think I am a reasonable session leader.

And then it was time for lunch, then some sun time with my book, and then Ron arrived to walk Sheba. She was already pretty beat from playing all morning with Sosa, but the walk helped ensure that we’d both get an awesome night’s sleep. Then, when she was back, we went shopping in the village. I got supplies with which to try a new salad: Mediterranean Chick Pea Salad. Yum!

I changed my mind and accepted a consultation with the gardener. She’s coming on Tuesday and will provide me with a detailed written series of recommendations for the garden that she can do, or I can do with Pete. I think it’s worthwhile because she sounds knowledgeable and I am keen to have help.

Today will be like every other day of the past several weeks—minus the pain. But this morning began with worry: My right hip is hurting. Because I’ve just been through Hell with my right hip, this is troubling. I’m just praying it passes quickly and that it’s nothing. I’ll water today, like every day, and putter.

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I lead the most vacuous life. How did this happen? I blame FND. I was a person who slept only 4 hours a night and my long, long days were full of projects and activities. And now? Well, I do virtually nothing except water my gardens and read. At least I’ve started walking Sheba again. It’s good to be out and about in nature.

I think that today, I may get a slow easy start on my studio. I want to deconstruct my dresses and start using the studio to store my outdoor furniture through the Winter. I’m never going to use the studio, I’m sad to say.