Rain. And more rain. It looks like we’re going to get rain more days than not this week. The front lawn already needs to be mowed and, since it rained all night long, I doubt it will be dry enough today. And then it’s going to rain again tonight.
I also have to get going and plant my seeds. But Don has to replace the chicken wire (we’ve already taken down the old rusty chicken wire.) Maybe I can get him to put the new wire up today. We’ll see.
I am going through one of those mornings where I woke up in a dark mood. Edgy, negative, worrying about everything. I’m trying my best to pull out of it, but it’s a challenge. The best solution is to do, so I’ll go outside after this and tackle some chores.
Yesterday, we bought groceries, put gas in the car, went to the natural food store, stopped at our local hardware store, and went to the post office. I tell you, after over a year of doing relatively nothing, it was exhausting! We have to get back into errand-running shape. We are just not used to so much activity. We wore masks, of course. It’s not really physically exhausting as much as it’s mentally exhausting. I think we’re all still carrying around the fear of infection, of others, of public places, of those not wearing masks, etc. I imagine it will be with us for a long time to come.
That’s all for today. I need to get going and do something outside.
Stay safe.
Happy Tuesday.
Yes I understand the feeling of exhaustion errands can bring.
I read in The NY Times this am about the city wanting to open up more.
What do you think about that?
The tourists will arrive here soon and we dread it.
I think it’s time. The city needs tourism to survive and it’s been without that influx of money for well over a year. It’s also very hard to maintain any sort of lockdown in a city so densely packed as NYC. Most New Yorkers still wear masks and are cautious and I imagine that will continue. And even though we don’t like the thought of tourists and weekenders in this area (it’s very popular) it’s inevitable. Just take precautions, wear a mask, and if you’re uncomfortable, avoid crowds.
Stay safe, Linda.
Morning Claudia,
I know how you feel on some days. I am the same. I woke up today with a headache and that brings negative moods and worry. I am naturally a worrier and at times I have to give myself a real talking to to get out of it. Sometimes it will work and other times it does not. I tell myself it is okay and just do your best.
Marion
Shaw
Those are wise words, Marion. Thank you for sharing them with me. It’s okay and it will pass, right? (I am also a worrier, always have been.)
Stay safe!
Good Morning! Even though we are fully vaccinated, we still wear our masks when we leave the house and I don’t even feel like I want to stop wearing the masks. We might be wearing them for a long time. Maybe like the people do in Asia. They wear them all winter, at least, every year. I think it would help keep us from getting anything that is going around. I still have my hay fever, but I am trying to figure out if it is better this year. I think it might be. I have also started changing our pillowcases daily for the past year, and that might be helping too. I am not sure about that, but I do like to iron and so I have plenty of pillowcases to iron everyday. I have plenty of fabric around here, so I have started to make pillowcases for us, so I have plenty. (I already help to sew pillowcases for the children’s ward in the hospital near us, so I can sew them in my sleep, practically.) And I am slowly getting my fabric stash down to a manageable level. Some good from this terrible pandemic. You and Don have a good day!
We always wear masks when we’re out and about, Tana. We just feel better covering up.
Stay safe!
Hope your spirits lift as you get busy with your day. You and Don are lucky to have each other!
We are, indeed.
Thank you, Ellen.
Stay safe.
I hope a little sun finds its way into your day today.
I feel the same way about errands and anything that takes me out in public.
Our middle school granddaughter is in track and we went to her meet yesterday to see her run hurdles. It was strange to be sitting on bleachers again. We wore masks but quite a few weren’t. It wasn’t crowded so there was lots of social distancing but it was still stressful. I was always conscious of who was around me and how close they were. I think I’m going to be uncomfortable for awhile. It was fun to watch though and I intend to go to every meet I can.
Have a good day
It’s all a bit unnerving, Marilyn! But it’s great that you can see your granddaughter run track.
Stay safe.
Sounds like you are getting a lot of rain. We finally got between half of an inch and an inch. It was desperately needed…we were in a red flag situation for fire danger.
Running errands is exhausting. And face it, we are all not used to it. We’ve been cooped up, and ordering online. It is mentally and physically tiring. Guess we have to build up our tolerances again, if we want to return to what we used to refer to as normal.
Enjoy your outdoor work today. My friends and I are resuming our rotating monthly lunches today…we have all been fully vaccinated, finally! ;)
I have to build everything up again! My strength, my stamina, and my tolerance for being out there in the world.
Stay safe, Donna!
Woke up with same antsy feeling. It is dreary here. I am wondering if you ever bought packets of flower seeds and just scatter them around and had them come up? I don’t think I will ever start seedlings in the house again. Been there , done that. I was given box of seed packets and maybe will go out there and turn up some earth and see what happens. Probably a feast for the birds. Hope the sun shines for all of us today.
I don’t just scatter them, I dig little furrows and bury them under the dirt. I tried scattering wildflower seeds once and maybe one flower came up.
Stay safe, Maria!
I had to laugh when you described your errands and the feelings after — I had the same thought today after sitting in the blood lab, grocery shopping, getting pet food and going to the post office. Rick had his first business meeting outside the house today and when I stopped by on my way home and saw him dressed up in “grown up go to work” clothes, it startled me!
Gloomy here, too. One day, sunny…
Gloomy here, as well, Jeanie. And, I fear, gloomy for the next several days. Sigh.
Stay safe!
Southern Calif could sure use some of your rain. Sigh.
Claudia, what you said: ” I think we’re all still carrying around the fear of infection, of others, of public places, of those not wearing masks, etc. I imagine it will be with us for a long time to come.” I don’t look at it as fear; I look at it as appropriate/ongoing vigilance. Not the hyper vigilance before getting vaccinated; but it’s still vigilance.
I hear what you’re saying here; I hear it also from other people; and I hear it again and again. The ‘old days’ of browsing in a store (almost on auto pilot); just not having to think of anything else but the enjoyment or relaxation of the satisfying experience … it just isn’t there; not in these times; not yet. If a person stays informed, there is still doubt; ‘they’ don’t know what’s happening with these variants. While the experts are sort of ‘learning as they go’ with all-things-virus, we citizens should remain ‘aware’. (That’s my opinion anyway; not everybody holds the same opinion.) The balance; being reasonable about it but also being smart about it. Disappointing to hear some of those health experts now saying they doubt we’ll reach herd immunity, not for lack of vaccine but because of lack of compliance by people who won’t get the shot in the arm.
I also ‘get’ the edgy days, Claudia. I’m sorry you have to wake up to one like that. I dunno; life is just sometimes so … complicated. Or if it isn’t, it FEELS like it is. One example in my world: I’ve had this lingering refinance process on my home loan, going on forEVER (the loan companies are BUSY; lots of people buying houses [my cousin sold his vacation/second home {in a resort city; in another state, not Calif} in four days, 30-day escrow, multiple offers, got over his asking price; my neighbor a few doors down just sold a house for $10,000 over asking price and never even had a “For Sale” sign on the lawn; it’s crazy ‘real estate’ time out there; besides which, apparently a lot of people like my husband and me are refi-ing due to low interest rates]; the banks are humming; wait for your turn in line).
So, the notary came to the house yesterday; it’s not like we could go to the title company nearby and sign the final papers at a big ‘board room’ table (as we have before) in a spacious conference room, because the title company, this time for us, is in … Philadelphia! I was ramping up some anxiety about having this notary-person in my ‘germ-free’ home; my sanctuary. (When we had the appraiser come in a month ago, she kept moving around in the house, had on gloves, we all kept our distance; she never sat down, got in & got out.) We tried to position the dining room table near an open window; we opened up ALL the windows (it was still only in the mid-70s temps outside, thankfully). We put the xtra leaf in the table to extend it, putting me as far away as possible from this stranger. Nothing we did much mattered; he didn’t sit at the table, he stood over us, passing paper back and forth, and I was never more than three feet from his face, and he never stopped talking. What I didn’t like is that he seemed to only wear the ‘thin’ mask (he brought) reluctantly, kept fooling with it, saying how healthy he and his wife are, in their 40s, no underlying health issues, bragging that the two of them (was a notary ‘team’ of two) had done 3000 notarizations at people’s homes throughout the entire pandemic in 2020 and never got sick. He was just too casual (believe me, I was glad I had on one of my respirator/N95 masks which I only save for these types of occasions; I have them left over from our wildfires of three years ago); and, call me jaded, but when he answered our question if he’d been vaccinated, I just didn’t believe him. (He was nice; just not credible.)
Anyway, we got thru it; had to be done so we can get funded and done with this situation. But I was apprehensive beforehand and afterward. We disinfected (after handling a ream of paperwork although we had our own pens; had to do our thumbprints in an ink pad that many other people would have also used on this guy’s other appointments in the day [and I know, I know; the virus is respiratory, not so much the surfaces!]) but my husband also thinks he has a halo on his head now that HE is vaccinated and of course thinks I’m OTT with some of my cautions. I tried to calm myself down in the shower after this other dude left, but I didn’t like any of it! Okay, sure, I’m vaccinated. And maybe my chances for getting Covid-infected now are slim (slimmer). I am SO grateful for that protection. But whereas somebody else wouldn’t probably even be hospitalized in that scenario of getting infected after vaccination, with my seven underlying health issues, are you kidding me, I definitely WOULD end up in the hospital and I’d just rather not ‘go there’ and instead continue to be safe with myself although I realize I can’t impose all my worries on others around me who are wanting to put the virus behind them and feel ‘normal’ again.
We were at the beach a couple of days ago. We park right against the beach rocks. You can barely squeeze thru (and who would do that; there’s a walk-path/bike lane on the other side; PLENTY of room for both) between the passenger door of the small, compact car and these rocks that separate the road from the sand below. (We do this purposely. But most ‘walkers’ don’t walk right along the rocks anyway as it’s sometimes uneven ground. The waves wash over and erode the pavement, and it can be slippery with the sand residue. If it’s high tide, you can also get wet with wave-splash.) There are places we know to park where we don’t encounter ‘people’ a lot of the time (we like privacy; quiet!), so that’s where we were, nobody as far as we could see ahead of us or behind us (it’s a long view, flat road there); just a very-occasional bicyclist.
So, I’m relaxing without a mask on, the windows down, drinking in the sea air, feeling that glorious freedom … and this big, tall woman comes out of nowhere walking a big, tall dog. She seriously seemed to appear out of thin air; it was just weird. She must have walked up from the sand; clamored over the rocks to the road (not an easy feat for human OR dog). As she approached, I had a feeling about it, and I said to my husband, “She’s not going to walk at the rocks, is she? There’s really no room for her to walk on my side, the way we’re parked.” Sure enough, she squeezed so tightly between the rocks and my car door that if she’d had a button or zipper on her garment, she would have scratched the paint on our car. We don’t have electric windows on this older car of ours, and I couldn’t crank up my window fast enough, she turned and wasn’t but (what felt like) two feet from my face and she was maskless, too.
There was no reason for this kind of behavior from her. It made zero sense. There were no cars on the road at that moment, no bicyclists, no other people but us three. You could see the look on her face; she was defiant. WTF? For what reason? Had she seen my momentary-frantic ‘evasive action’ with trying to get the window closed in a hurry? Had she taken offense? (Our voices wouldn’t have been audible to her.) What is UP with some people out there in the world?!! Scary. Just look’in for a fight to let off steam or something? Boy howdy did I want to say something to her but I buttoned it up because you could just tell she was somebody not to mess with; just wasn’t worth it. Needless to say, it left me rattled and I let it shatter my winding-down time at the beach. We rescued it by just getting back on the coast road and driving north much further than we’d intended so that I could kinda replace the negative experience with a positive one (we succeeded). I’m not great at letting this sort of thing just roll off me whereas other people can just shrug their shoulders and say, “It’s her problem; not yours.”
But back to what you said today in your post about being in and of the world comfortably again, until the epidemiologists say we’re no longer in a pandemic, I will remain cautious. So, sue me. We all have to assess our own risk.
xo
I agree with you
When this pandemic is over,
We have repairs to make and we need another car to somehow magically appear and we have limited funds. And we’re not able to work. Still.
Thanks, Vicki.
Stay safe.
I do think I heard that Broadway is staying dark throughout the summer. I’m so sorry. I know that takes away the work because other theaters likely follow suit. I just heard they’re not resuming our county fair just because a lot of other ‘stuff’ is opening up like Disneyland here.
It seems like it’s going to take awhile to get enough episodes of new TV series’ in the can, since I guess production is only just resuming again in ‘Hollywood’; seems like a few movies might be getting made now; but, again, slow starts, and that would of course also mean fewer opportunities for Don, for now (for the time being).
But you’re ‘talking’ to somebody here (me) who well knows about no freelance (which we’d counted on for 2020 and then it didn’t happen) and bills to be paid; last week, the ‘roll-up’ (automatic) garage door fell and my husband had no choice but to go DIY, look at youtube videos on how to fix the ‘opener’ (electrical; I don’t know what) in the ceiling; where to buy a part; put it in backwards, had to start all over again, praying it would all work out and that the remotes would work; and, in the meantime, before he could do the work, he had to take everything out of the garage with his bad back (our garage is another ‘storage unit’ for us). I think it was Gilda Radner who said, “It’s always something.”
Anyway, Claudia, hang in there (somehow!). I think if you can just get rid of the rain and get back in the garden, it will ratchet down the edginess; the physical activity but also the creativity of your gardening can dispel negative energy (your yard is so healing for you; very therapeutic when you can enhance the beauty all around you at this time of year once the rain lets up and gives you another chance at it; you know, not everybody can garden like you do, they don’t have a green thumb, so it’s a talent of yours!). I have a friend who spends most of every Saturday and Sunday working in her yard, in her garden; it isn’t just a hobby; it satisfies a need in her to reconnect with something soulful.
I always remember in that movie with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan that was a takeoff on that movie, “The Little Shop Around The Corner” (I think so anyway) … what was it called, “You’ve Got Mail” … didn’t the character say something about daisies being friendly. I guess, for me, I just feel … hopeful … when I see the flowers beginning to bloom; like renewal. Something. Like a sunshine morning instead of gloom!
Thank you, Vicki!
xoxo
hej, vicki …
i agree with what you wrote … that it’s best to not impose feelings on other people … but that doesn’t just apply to you. it applies to the notary and the woman at the beach (and me and everyone else) and they should have been more respectful to you!
sorry you had those close encounters. hope you are feeling better now.
and best wishes on the home business stuff. i’ll be glad for you when it’s all done.
hope you do something enjoyable and stay safe (i know you’re working at it)!
kathy in iowa
…hi kathy, thanks for not criticizing me over my rant; but I think if we can all feel free here, thanks to Claudia, to sometimes ‘talk out’ our anxieties and get another reader’s (and Claudia’s) perspective, it sure does help; not everybody copes the same; and, yes, something I did today/Tues (enjoyable) was a rather unusual emailing back and forth with cousins in other states when we got to reminiscing about family stories, so it was quite heartwarming, a lot of sharing, and I just wish we all didn’t live so far away from one another…
…I hope when you read this that you’re doing well and having a good week, kathy!
I thought when my golden years came I would be able to take life without worry, boy was I wrong. We own an older home, always needs something. My son’s wife died recently at only 48 with 2 daughters, one 21, the other 15. My son said he needs me now more than ever and I try to be there as much as I can but it has added more stress in my life when the virus and all that is going on has added so much more. I know now what worry and stress is all about. I try to tell myself one day at a time and to trust my belief in God, some days that’s easier said than done but I try. I keep busy making masks, have made over 300 and stopped counting and never charged for postage or fabric, just a donation for me to continue making them. People have given me fabric, elastic. I also make crafts, I use to sell but with the way money is and all I have through the years I donate to the Salvation Army and nursing homes and to sick children. It helps me feel somewhat normal to do good. I never go any where without a mask and avoid crowds, I have to be here for my family now more than ever. God Bless all who are in the same way as you and I. Stay safe and I try always to be kind.
hej, barbara …
condolences to your son, grandchildren and you on the loss of your daughter-in-law. I will be praying for you all.
you wrote about yourself, “i try always to be kind”. i have no doubt that you are very kind. with all that mask-making, donating and helping your family, i hope you show kindness to yourself and do something fun or brings you peace and keep your faith in God every day.
sending a virtual hug, if you like.
take care and be safe!
kathy in iowa
Thank you for your kind words, doing good and being kind is the best medicine for us in this turned upside down world we are now in. Stay safe and God Bless you and yours
I echo everything kathy in iowa just said to you, Barbara. You sound like a very kind and good person, and I’m so sorry that life has been challenging of late for you.
We sure never know what’s around the corner, do we. My husband and I were just talking last week to a friend of his whose wife has MS. They nearly lost their home in the Calif wildfires about a year ago; my husband helped them evacuate (they had kitties to round up, the husband was at work, and the wife couldn’t do much with the animals as she has some limitations although she’s otherwise strong and tries to be productive). The latest thing for them, now in their 60s (he’s still working but his hours got cut back in 2020), is that they’re formally/legally adopting their 15-year-old grandson who has been shuffled around (the grandparents now trying to make up for having a deadbeat adult child who didn’t do a good job in parenting; it’s not this teen’s fault) and who is struggling with school (and just about everything else in his young life). The adoption process is almost complete. These awesome grandparents are trying to redirect this boy into solid academia and sports. It’s going well. He just needed a chance. He’s benefitting from a dedicated, daily routine and people committed to his welfare; he’d had no guidance. He needed somebody to believe in him. He needed to know somebody cared. It’s a lot to take on for these folks nearing retirement age; but, as in what you’re saying, about needing to be there for your family, it’s about love; support. And that’s a beautiful thing.
As a fellow reader here of Claudia’s blog, I’m really glad you commented so openly and honestly; from your heart. What you said just hit me in the gut the right way: “It helps me feel somewhat normal to do good.” I’m taking that with me today; thanks for saying it; you just helped me put some things in perspective, Barbara. Thank you. Take care.
I’m so sorry to hear that you lost your daughter-in-law, Barbara. Thank goodness you are able to be there for your son. I understand the stress, however. Bless you for all the good you bring to so many. You are a good person.
Stay safe.
I so look forward each day to your posts. You are like a longtime good friend to me. I enjoy each post and sometimes I read them several times a day just for the good feeling I get from them. I treasure the memories I have of my daughter in law, Heather, she was my best friend and would do anything for me. She was a girl scout leader, worked with the children at her daughters school and a then a van driver for the school. She and I did crafts together for our church bazaars and never had a disagreement in the 25 years I knew her. I think of her each and every day and the loss sometimes is almost unbearable but I know my son and granddaughters need me to be strong for them so I carry on. Please continue with you posts, they make my days better. Stay safe and strong and treasure you days with Don, I enjoy his songs.
I’m so sorry, Barbara. Heather sounds like a beautiful person. I know that her absence from your lives must be heartbreaking.
Much love to you.
xo
Thank you for your kind words. I know so many who struggle each day with illness either their own or a family member. When we each do a small part of helping each other it goes a long way to make someone’s life a little easier. I will be glad when mask wearing will be a thing of the past and we can once again see people smile. I miss smiles from strangers and people we know. God Bless you and yours.
what a crummy feeling at any time and especially to wake up that way. hope it went away quickly and you ended up having a productive and great day!
kathy in iowa
Thank you, Kathy!
Stay safe!