Category: Life

I was thinking today about life. How each and every one of us has a very individual life, despite what we may share with family and friends.

I’ve had some moments, some times in my life, that I went through alone, with no one beside me. Be it a shopping trip, or a plane ride to see someone, or even going off to grocery shop, and stopping for a meal alone. Or even more challenging times.

The experiences are singular and we alone have the memories.

Some people might not like that idea. They’re very group-oriented. And yet, it is the sweetness of our individuality, that can actually enrich our relationships with other people.

I value my alone time. My quiet time. I like to read, or write, or maybe cook something wonderful. But it’s during this time that my soul’s internal batteries recharge.

I think I was 7 or 8 years old when I realized I really liked being off by myself. Back then it was perfectly fine for your kid to ride their bike all around town. And I did.

I rode to the local convenience store. Often getting bread, milk, and cigarettes for my mother. Then riding home. Sometimes I rode to the beach and sat on the jetties watching the ocean.

On some occasions I had company, but more often then not I was alone. And that was just fine.

Looking back I realize the importance of learning to be alone. I never realized it until I was well into my 50’s.

Love yourself. Be happy with yourself, and the world will be full of adventures. Alone or with those you love!

The TV was on and Jack sat down after dinner and suddenly the news was on. It was terrible, horrible news, and I found myself shaking. A man was being mugged and beaten in the street. It brought my own mugging, right back to my heart and soul.

So I sat down at my computer, put my headphones on, and turned on the music of my youth!

It is still too soon to go to bed, so writing this and listening to Freddie Mercury & Queen, or The Alan Parsons Project or Pilot, helped to calm me.

It’s funny really. When I was a teenager and life was complicated and I wanted to check out, I would go up to my room and do this. Only back then it was with my record player.

Ah yes. The healing powers of musical tunes. How lucky we are to have them to use to escape.

It was hot, humid, and hazy a large portion of the day. This caused me to spend a lot of time outside and in the water.

After being cooped up for so long, it felt good to feel the sun on my face and the wind on my back. Unfortunately, I forgot the golden rule. Sunscreen, sunscreen, sunscreen!

It’s my face and the tops of my shoulders. A bit sore and up close my repaired nose looks really funny!

As you can see, the stitched up part burnt in a strange fashion. I’m sure it will be toned down by tomorrow. After this, I will be sure to use sunscreen again, all the time!

I thought I would take the weekend off, so to speak. You know, kick back, not worry about the little things in life…

That was not the case. Saturday found me stripping the bed, and washing everything from mattress pad to comforter. Why? Well, little dackels that are low to the ground can become wet and muddy faster that you’d think. Such was the case on Friday night when storms went through here.

I also wanted to do a countertop wash and dusting. Not my favorite things to do, but quite necessary.

Saturday was so beautiful and since we have not installed the air conditioners for the summer, I took advantage of the fresh air and opened all my windows.

The real glory in that is when I turned off the TV and sat with the open windows, and I could hear the loons on the lake, and the birds in the yard as they tweeted. Perfect!

We had a new addition to our back yard, This very pretty Yellow-Rumped Warbler Female.

She is quite lovely and spent a lot of time here this weekend.

Anneliese has been very happy this weekend and she has spent a lot of time stretched out, on her back, smiling.

Happy Sunday!

All these self-isolation orders have caused several things to occur in my daily life. Here is a shortlist of just a few things that are big changes for me.

1. Arnie had oral surgery just before this all began. Afterward, he couldn’t eat anything hard, so I was using baby rice cereal mixed with warm water and a tin of his wet food to feed him. Yesterday, I ran out of the baby rice cereal. I thought I had some, but I did not. In my old life, I would have run out and gotten more at the local grocery store. But since we are not allowed to do this, I made due. I wet his crunchy food and mixed that with his wet food and he wolfed that down. Score!
2. Jack got a flat tire on the trailer for our tractor. He is doing work on our patio and needs to move heavy square cement blocks from down in our driveway to the back door of our house. I cannot help him here because those suckers are heavy. I did offer to order whatever he needs from Amazon. He could not commit. So we wait. In our previous life, he would have driven over to the tractor shop and had them fix this pronto.
3. Getting our mail. When we moved here in 1999, we took a Box at our local Post Office. Our driveway is 600 feet long and since we couldn’t see a rural delivery box from our house, we opted for a box at the local Post Office. Each day, Monday through Saturday, we’d toss the dogs in the car, and head to the Post Office to get the mail. Now, I can look online and see what is in our local mail that day, what packages, and then choose when I go to get the mail. No dogs, no Jack, just me in my hazmat suit.
4. Every Wednesday morning at 7:45 I would leave my house and head to Weirs Beach to go to my WW Class. I would weigh-in, and then as my friends arrived and also weighed in, we would sit and talk, and eat our breakfasts. Now, I attend class online, at different times, and I don’t “see” my friends. We text or talk, but it is not at all the same. I miss the camaraderie with these wonderful women and one brave man, who occasionally joins us.None of them have seen me since a very large portion of my weight loss has occurred.
5. Likewise, I miss going shopping after class. Usually, I would see my friends at a few local shops, as we simply enjoyed being out in the world. Living in a rural community means that you don’t have big shopping areas locally and have to make do with what is available.
6. Life right now is to go nowhere unless it is an emergency. One stays in and stays home until this blasted Virus is past us. It is what it is, but I look at how much everyone’s lives have changed. I only hope that it is over soon.

I decided to go out in my front yard with Lili and make a short video of the Lake. We are very close to Ice Out on our little piece of Heaven on Earth.

It was rather an unexciting day here. I think the one car you see in my video is the only one that went by all day!

I hope you all are well and healthy.

More craziness is entering our world. My little town of 5000+ now has 4 cases of Covid-19, also know as The Corona Virus. We’d managed to escape for a long time, but with cases all around us, we knew it was just a matter of time.

We also jumped State-wide to an overall number of cases at 621. The number of deaths attributed to COVID-19 is now set at 9.

My State is not a highly populated State and these numbers, which rise exponentially each day, scare us all.

I had a video call with Amanda and the kids yesterday and that was so nice! I miss them a great deal but realize that we all must make sacrifices to come out of this thing alive.

Yesterday I decided to watch some Amazon Prime TV. I watched a Biography of Singer/Actress/comedian, Rose Marie.

Most people will know her from “The Dick Van Dyke Show”. I had no idea that she actually started her career at the age of 4 in Vaudeville Show Theaters!

She was an amazing woman and met and fell in love with a soldier who played with big bands after his discharge from the military.

They had a great love that lasted until his death. She never remarried and at the age of 93 still mourned his passing. So many things I never knew about her. It really was a good biography.

Next, I watched a show about the United Airlines Plane accident. United Airlines Flight 811 was a regularly scheduled airline flight from Los Angeles to Sydney, with intermediate stops at Honolulu and Auckland. On February 24, 1989, the Boeing 747–122 serving the flight experienced a cargo door failure in flight shortly after leaving Honolulu. The resulting explosive decompression blew out several rows of seats, resulting in the deaths of nine passengers. The aircraft returned to Honolulu, where it landed safely.

The investigation was really going nowhere when the parents of one of the Victims, Kevin and Susan Campbell investigated the cause using documents obtained from the NTSB. Mr. Campbell is a mechanical engineer who explored the causes of the cargo door problem. The Campbells’ investigation led them to conclude that the cause of the accident was not human error but rather the combination of an electrical problem and an inadequate design of the aircraft’s cargo door latching mechanism. They later presented their theory to the safety board.

The Boeing 747 was designed with an outward-hinging door, unlike a plug door that opens inward and jams against its frame as the pressure drops outside, making it impossible to accidentally open at high altitude. The outward-swinging door increases the cargo capacity, but it requires a strong locking mechanism to keep it closed. Deficiencies in the design of wide-body aircraft cargo doors were known since the early 1970s from flaws in the DC-10 cargo door. These problems were not fully addressed by the aircraft industry or the NTSB, despite the warnings and deaths from the DC-10 accidents and attempts by Boeing to solve the problems in the 1970s.

So, that ate up an hour and really was fascinating. There are about 20 more episodes that I can watch.

So that was my Saturday and now I start on Sunday. Let’s see what mischief I can get into today. Probably not too much.