Didn’t have a new photo, so this is what you get!

And it sort of looks like this at the moment because I cleaned it up after working on Jessie.

Oh, wait a minute! I do have a new photo:

Jessie and Derek are walking Bertie.

As you can see, we still have some flowers on the porch. I have another week to enjoy them. The week after Thanksgiving will bring really cold temperatures and there will be no saving them then.

I had a lovely birthday. Very low key, just the way I like it. Much time was spent answering Happy Birthdays on the blog and Instagram and Facebook, all of which brought a smile to my face. I heard from childhood friends, high school and grad school friends, former students, family (Z sent me a happy birthday message on his very own phone,) neighbors and lots of theater colleagues. It brings an awareness of the crazy quilt of my life and how blessed I am.

Don made breakfast yesterday – french toast and scrambled eggs. And then he made a spectacular dinner. I requested crabbiless crab cakes (something we have only once a year, on my birthday.) Oh my heavens! DELICIOUS!

He spoiled me, as he always does. My only request was a new bottle of my favorite perfume (Amazing Grace by Philosophy) and he came through. It should last several years.

Oh, and I actually put on makeup.

Thank you for all your birthday messages and for all the kudos on the creation of Jessie. They mean so much to me!

Don whispered in my ear yesterday: “Don’t tell the others, but she’s my favorite.”

It rained all day long yesterday! And it’s raining today. In fact, just down the road, friends of ours got some snow! We didn’t. Go figure. There are lots of little microclimates around here. Anyway, we thrilled about the rain.

Stay safe.

Happy Friday.

It’s not enough that we have the fallout from the election and the very real fears that go along with it, but we’re also in a drought here. It’s estimated that normal rainfall level is down 10-12 inches. That is shocking. Yesterday, we stopped in at the library and then took the back roads home. This road runs along one of our rivers.

All of what you see here, except for the areas with trees, is normally covered with water. The small rocks are the river bed. The brown area in the center is always completely covered. Except for now.

Right by where we were standing. This brown vegetation has been exposed as have all the brown patches – normally covered with water.

The width of the river would normally be from the branch in the foreground to the edge of the trees in the upper part of the photo. We saw geese sitting in the water, but the water didn’t even cover their bottoms. It was as if they had deliberately perched on a rock, but they hadn’t. I wonder how the fish are doing.

We have two rivers right by our house and it gets even more shocking across the street from us. This is our 20th year here, and we have never seen it like this. We’re supposed to get rain on my birthday – which is Thursday. I will be grateful to see it, but it will be just a drop in the bucket. We need so much more.

We’re trying to stay positive, but let’s face it, it’s almost impossible to stay in that place longer than a moment or two. Yes, we express our gratitude – we’re both very big on saying what we’re grateful for out loud – but sometimes the stupidity of the vile sh*tshow going on right now is too much.

So we work at maintaining some sort of balance, trying to occupy ourselves with chores and creative pursuits.

I know all of us are attempting to maintain some balance. Let’s help each other as we move forward.

Stay safe.

Happy Monday.

From about a week ago. Look at that sweet face!

Well, my friends, yesterday was not pretty. I was short tempered, everything was making me angry, Don was making me angry, I felt my blood pressure going up. I finally realized that my tamped down anger and rage over the election results had finally emerged – full blown. It had taken me a while to realize that it wasn’t just ‘being in a bad mood.’ Far from it.

That rage took over the day and I couldn’t fight it off. I finally told Don what I thought was happening. I apologized for being tough on him. And I asked for help. Asking for help is not easy for a perfectionist like me. But I knew Don would understand and wouldn’t judge me. (Heavens, I’m lucky!) He talked me down a bit, and he also realized that I was most likely spending too much time scrolling through the news on Threads. He was right. I was enraged. I am  enraged. But I can’t stay in that place because it’s not healthy. I finally read a bit right before dinner. After dinner, as we settled down to watch an old movie, I ditched my chair and the heating pad and sat right next to Don. He put his arm around me and halfway through the movie, I fell asleep for a bit. I felt all of the turbulent emotions of the day leave. And I slept well last night.

Today, I’ll do my best to just be, here at home, with Don. In our safe space.

It’s perfectly fine to let those emotions out, even thought I was in an uncomfortable place all day long. In the end, I felt like I went through a purge, a cleansing, something that was necessary to move forward and resist in a healthy manner.

Advice of a sort: let yourself feel it all. Then you can let it go and be productive.

It’s a little less cold today and the skies are sunny. I might be able to remove the tarp that is currently sheltering my porch plants. I’m hoping for at least another week with them.

Stay safe.

Happy Saturday,