Well, why not bring her a gift that you can send with the next letter you write?
I found myself greeting, and then, holding and briefly stroking Mr Monkey yesterday, and thinking of the pleasure Mother derived from holding and clutching him.
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Well, why not bring her a gift that you can send with the next letter you write?
I found myself greeting, and then, holding and briefly stroking Mr Monkey yesterday, and thinking of the pleasure Mother derived from holding and clutching him.
I don’t really want to deal with it if I’m honest. Easier to try and forget about domestic matters for now.
It is up to you, but buying a small gift for someone is always a generous gesture.
I'd settle for 23 on your side of the pond for sure!
But I'm over here at 22º Fahrenheit. The plow guy just left, having cleared away snow that piled up overnight before we arrive at those promised single digits later when that stuff would convert to assorted speed bumps good through April...
On old patterns and no need for their continuance: regardless if someone passes or is somehow otherwise subtracted from our lives, being memorious of shared times, places, habits can be so difficult -- and yet one wouldn't wish for ability to forget more easily. What would that say about what had gone before? Still it takes a long time or maybe forever for certain memories to quit tugging at the heart.
It took me the better part of five years to feel totally assured I would not lose my composure just pulling into the parking lot of a supermarket where my late bro and I used to shop together sometimes. It was simple companionship and the occasional funny experiences of shopping together but also separately, e.g., the accusatory joking about encountering each other back by the bakery sweets. I could never have those times back again and it would take so much time to accept that I'd have to settle for just the memories. I go there now but never without sighing as I take the key from the ignition of my car after parking.
Whether to put pictures of a shirt I sewed for a kitten (he nearly destroyed a medical cone) in Post Pictures of Your Pet or Post Something You Recently Made Yourself…
I deboned hams for 5 years. We received piece work for making high standard, which was easy. If I remember correctly, it was a 50 cent/hour increase.
Autumn slowed down so I’d get laid off and would bump someone and work the kill for a few weeks until recalled back in my regular (ham boning) department.
I can so identify with that, and might have had that quandary four decades ago if the internet had been around for consumer-grade users back then.
A nearly 20-lb young cat of mine once fell four flights from my apartment (after some idiot friend of a relative left the shutters open to the fire escape). The kitty survived somehow, apparently making a five point landing including on his chin, so lacerating his tongue. He was freaked out, but fortunate in not bolting out into the avenue. He turned and stumbled up the steps of the brownstone into the open lobby area where a neighbor of mine recognized the kitty and brought him upstairs.
Right so I stuffed the poor half-dazed thing into a cat carrier and cabbed over to the Animal Medical Center on East 62nd, where the triage staffer commented first and rather dubiously on "wow, what a big kitty he is"... and then summoned not one but two vet techs to have a look at him. By then he was apparently feeling a little bit snappier, let's say. He practically lunged out of the carrier into their arms.
Uh-oh, I thought. Yeah. He wanted to go home. But somehow those two techs wrestled him into an enclosure for some X-rays, administered a little "you're-sleepy-now-trust-me" and some local anesthesia and stitched up his tongue while they had him nailed down so to speak.
Then, both emerging with kitty in carrier and long rips and ragged flaps in their lab coats, one of them announced that the cat was "Ready to go... we stitched him up, he has no broken bones and if he had incurred any internal organ damage at all, it would have shown up while we were trying to peel him off each other and the supply cabinets just getting him ready for the X-rays."
I mean he had just about made grass skirts out of those lab coats the techs were wearing. I offered to pay extra to replace them, but they laughed and one of them said the price was probably in the bill and anyway they were going to hang onto them as souvenirs of a battle field experience. See today they'd probably have instagrammed themselves and that cat of mine all over the planet...
I can relate, too -- a few years ago, only a few months after the death of a dear friend I was on a short holiday trip with another friend, and we were casually browsing around the hotel's gift shop..... At some point I quietly burst into tears because I kept seeing so many things that my now-gone friend would have just loved.....reminders of her all seemed to be over the place! The pain of knowing she was no longer with us surged up all over again. I finally just said to the friend I was with (who knew her, but hadn't been close to the friend who had died), "just going to step out into the hall, find the Ladies' Room, but you keep on enjoying looking around in this lovely shop, see you in a bit!" Losing a beloved someone, regardless of in which way, just plain hurts.
It's indeed these sorts of sometimes totally unexpected situations that can be so painful, so raw, so intense..... The first year of grieving is the worst, with anniversary dates of significance popping up, holidays, whatever.... It DOES eventually get better but sad to say, at least in my own experience, it doesn't ever really go away. Both of my parents and my husband have been gone a long time but I stlll experience situations which catch me off-guard, where memories come unexpectedly surging to the surface, the pain of loss comes up and assaults me all over again, etc., etc. It's part of what we deal with as human beings who love and have loved others.......
@LizKat - I wrestled with sending a private or public reply. That was one of the nicest things ever said to me. Thank you. My mother was the best person I’ve ever known. I’m so lucky to have been her son and friend.
Well said and beautifully expressed.
I know the feeling; treasure the memories - and salute the fine person she so obviously was.
I find myself smiling, thinking of my mum; only this week, during a sunny spell of a few hours, I found myself laughing and saying to her that had she lasted until that very minute - she loved spring and summer and would never have passed away in summer - it would have been entirely possible that we would have been thinking (again) of a decline or dramatic deterioration sometime after Hallowe'en.
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Started to think about the future, about who I want to be...
Bad pain in my left arm while doing some cardio yesterday. Went to the doc today for some basic checks, will need to go to cardiologist. blah!
[doublepost=1551802603][/doublepost]
Question: what are you doing today to be 1% "better" (however you define it) than yesterday?
[doublepost=1551802603][/doublepost]
Question: what are you doing today to be 1% "better" (however you define it) than yesterday?
Oof, well good luck with your exam, hope it's nothing.
It's probably nothing, but since I had heart surgery at 17 I have to be extra careful at the various signs. Doc was very optimistic, but rightfully pointed out that with these things it's better to be careful to the point of obsession.
Yes, I could say the same thing about leaving plastic attached to my Apple ID but I rather think it's too late to divorce myself from their garden, and anyway I love at least the window shopping if not always the grocery budget adjustments I make after getting carried away in their refurb store.
Amazon Prime I think about ditching every time a box lands on my front lawn (summer) or front porch (winter) instead of the back deck per instructions left with both UPS and FedEx, but then that's really about the courier, so Amazon and I end up teetering on the brink of separation but still together yet again.
Bills, and paying them.
Relationships with loved ones - those that ended because they had to end, - death claiming someone cherished, and those that were ended, because they had to end, but death (unless we are speaking metaphorically) is not an issue.
And enduring relationships and friendships - the glorious splendour of those people who show up and stand shoulder to shoulder with you and bless you with small but treasured kindnesses which are balm to the soul and nectar to the spirit.
Relationships with loved ones - those that ended because they had to end, - death claiming someone cherished, and those that were ended, because they had to end, but death (unless we are speaking metaphorically) is not an issue.
And enduring relationships and friendships - the glorious splendour of those people who show up and stand shoulder to shoulder with you and bless you with small but treasured kindnesses which are balm to the soul and nectar to the spirit.
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Like my two friends I’m on holiday with. Been friends for nearly 30 years.
Been in touch through thick and thin.
Very much so. One of them lost his dad this year. The other his mother last year, so they are both enjoying getting away.
Yes, what can I say? - other than, I know the feeling, trust me.
Glad that they are enjoying themselves and that you are, too.
Last full day tomorrow. One friend is going early. The other at lunch. Then I’ll have the afternoon to do some (unhurried) Photography.
So, they are both heading off tomorrow?
Had you seen the football stadium yet, and been given the tour?
The cathedral is magnificent.
In the mood for chocolate chunk cookies. Just need to go out and buy the block of chocolate. Should do it before the rain comes in. Maybe I can order delivery. Spend an extra $3 and get it a few hours from now.
[doublepost=1551825900][/doublepost]Or we might have one at home already. I seem to remember buying several blocks of chocolate around Christmas time for melting down.
[doublepost=1551825900][/doublepost]Or we might have one at home already. I seem to remember buying several blocks of chocolate around Christmas time for melting down.