These day lilies just started opening. There would have been ten times more of them but the deer ate the buds before I could spray them. Still, I’m grateful that at least some of them survived.
After all the dire severe thunderstorm warnings and radar pictures that looked increasingly ominous throughout the day, we didn’t get a single drop of rain. And we really need some! This morning was foggy and beautiful and a bunny has been chomping on clover just outside the kitchen door.
The finished Alice’s Wonderland puzzle. I really loved this one. It was a little less complicated than normal because of the way it is designed. Everyone is there; the Queen of Hearts, the Cheshire Cat, Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, the March Hare, the Mad Hatter. It’s beautifully illustrated.
The puzzles I’ve been working on this year are published by Lawrence King. You can find them on Amazon by searching for his name. I’m a big fan.
Don and I have had several conversations lately about how exhausted we feel. He was speaking to some friends who also feel exhausted. Now, I have terrible allergies and that doesn’t help, but it’s more than that. We both nap in the afternoon lately – something I never did until now. And we’re not sick. We even did a self-test for Covid. Negative.
We think this has to do with everything we’ve been through, and are still going through, over the past 6 years. Trump, a pandemic, mass shootings, the assault on our democracy, a whole chunk of our population believing in conspiracy theories, the war in Ukraine, the loss of Roe v. Wade, a corrupt Supreme Court which has been bought and paid for – I could go on and on. Every day brings some new atrocity or assault. It’s never ending. More strains of Covid to worry about. Our lives have changed dramatically and we fight to keep some semblance of normalcy. But that requires – at least for us – deliberately shutting out the world. And we cannot do that all of the time. Nor should we.
I think we are suffering from a collective depression and exhaustion. I usually have a ‘can do’ kind of attitude, but some days it’s hard to summon up that energy.
There’s no answer but to do what we are already doing; find time to escape, meditate, spend time in the outdoors, work on things that bring us joy.
Just some thoughts this morning.
Stay safe.
Happy Wednesday.
I do identify with how you are feeling. I never used to be a napper. It just feels like there is a huge cloud overhead plus the deer ate my plants the day after I sprayed. I guess they were hungry. I should just try to put in more deer resistant plants. You would think I would learn.
Love you,
Eileen
Except I’ve been told that if deer are really hungry, it doesn’t matter whether the plant is deer resistant or not. They’ll eat it.
I’m sorry, Eileen! I’ve just been through it and lost a lot of my blooms-to-be.
Stay safe, cousin.
This is why I do not watch the news or any of the other horrible things
It affected my health in late 2016
I quit
Covid is ravaging my family at this time
We are waiting for shoe to drop
I do get anxious when this happens but…
Hope you get some rest
It might be good to drive to a lodge or resort and spend a couple of nights unplugged and enjoy each other
A mini vacation
Every
Penny spent on that comes back in health issues
Prayers sweet girl
Thanks Brenda but I’m not going to any lodge or result while Covid is raging.
We live in our own little resort.
Stay safe and prayers for your family.
After I wrote that I thought good grief
They live it here own resort alone lol
xoxo
In my case, I think my age is helping to bring me down also. I mean I do not mind my age but the process of aging is tiring! My body reacts differently and tires more easily or doesn’t bounce back as it used to… I have really noticed it now that I am over 70.
But I keep walking or exercising most days and I am more careful about what I eat so I am trying to stay as healthy as I can be. But yes, some days I am just tired of it all.
We will hang in there, Claudia, and just keep on keeping on as some song used to say! :)
Yes I’m sure age is a factor, too. Don is 71 and I’ll turn 70 in November.
Thanks Ellen.
Stay safe.
yay for at least some flowers! also deer spray. and living in such a setting that deer, bunnies and the hedgehog are around.
the puzzle looks great!
glad that both your covid tests came back negative. hope you feel better.
retirement has taken away from me a major stressor (tough-to-horrible job situation and being around so many people … especially those who couldn’t be bothered to wear a mask or maintain appropriate and safer social distancing) and given back to me about ten hours a day that i can spend with my family, putter, work on children’s books, take walks and naps and do other necessary things. i am very, very grateful for that. still, i also feel the exhaustion and depression you wrote about and on a near-daily basis have to keep renewing my efforts to focus on the wonderful things in this world. also talked with God and my doctor, spend more time with nature (outside and through books, images and online videos/nature shows) and setting goals while also honoring (recognizing and taking care of) how i feel and giving myself a break.
may you all have what you need and want, time to spend in ways that are helpful and enjoyable to you and be well and safe. xo
kathy
Thanks, Kathy.
Stay safe!
Agree with the mass stress and depression – BUT how much worse would it be to be a person who wasn’t bothered by all the terrible stuff over the last several years? And there are certainly such people.
Happy that your hydrangea recovered – they are great plants! We have a couple salvaged from a neighbor’s plan to eliminate a huge beautiful clump of the puffy blue ones – I didn’t think they would survive but now suddenly we have two tiny golf ball blooms, it gives me hope for next year!
ceci
Glad you got some blooms, Ceci! How wonderful!
Stay safe.
I love that red lily. Don’t know why, but I’ve never been a fan of red, so when I see a shade of red I do like, it’s really special. So much weighing on my mind right now I’m in danger of losing it. I’d love to be able to think rationally and write about it, but just can’t. Concentrating on holding it all together.
you can do it (get through it), shanna!
prayers continue for you and your husband. everyone else, too.
xo,
kathy
xo, kathy
You have too much to cope with right now, Shanna. Know that you and Fred are in my thoughts and prayers.
Sending you a big hug.
Stay safe.
xo, Claudia
My hubby and I feel the same. The heart and mind can only absorb so much distress and pain. I barely watch the news anymore….too often end up crying. My genealogy research has helped greatly……………and naps.
Naps are great, Lynn. Though I always feel out of it after I wake up.
Stay safe.
Don’t you think some of it has to do with retirement? Retirement should be more peaceful days, get to do whatever you want, etc. But it also means you have a lot more time on your hands to think. And you are a person that is interested and involved in the political world, which is depressing no matter who you are. Your guy wins, you are happy. Your guy loses, you are upset for 4 years. To me, it seems never ending. I tune out. And truthfully, I feel pretty happy. I don’t know….but I sure want you to be happy and content because you have ZERO control so, please don’t let it run your days.
LOVE your flowers.
But I’m not retired. Neither is Don. Because of the nature of our careers, we freelance. I worked for about 8 weeks last fall as lockdowns were ending. And I’ve got two projects coming up starting in August that I’m already prepping for now.
No, for me it isn’t that I have more time to think. I actually do a lot of gardening, and reading, and all sorts of projects.
It’s the world as it is now, and more specifically, our country.
It’s not in my nature to tune out. Nor in Don’s.
Stay safe, Darlene.
The world is a very scary place, I agree. I also think it’s important to know what’s going on around us, but I just wish happy for you. I don’t have the answers! lol
I find your life very interesting. I’m from Nebraska so I enjoy hearing and seeing about your life and your careers. Just keep going forward, I guess!
Thanks so much, Darlene!
xoxo
Well, definitely pause for thought. Our retirement (husband’s and mine) isn’t what I ever thought it would be (it’s not easy, money is a problem, we have health problems); over the years I believe my expectations for a carefree/problem-free (unrealistic!) retired life got overblown (and I have a really bad problem of comparing myself to others [and I just happen to have a good many well-off people in my life who just don’t feel the strains I do, because money eases any woes for them before the woes can even form, if that makes any sense!]). Let’s say that I certainly don’t have the life my parents had from age 55-onward; just a diff set of circumstances which left them in a well-funded retirement, a paid-up mortgage (although they weren’t immune from health problems either; but a certain amount of that is simply inevitable over time for a majority of aging folks). I do feel weary, a lot; some of it is health but it sure seems clear a lot of it is something else. I fear I can get caught up in the pity party; it’s not admirable.
But I get what you’re saying otherwise, Claudia; it’s more.
And I’ll reveal something in my anonymity here: My husband has been recently undergoing intensive testing for Alzheimer’s. Both of his parents died from complications of the disease; clinically diagnosed. His brother is starting to exhibit signs/symptoms (he’s 77). It’s come up before with my husband because he’s incredibly absentminded-forgetful; he almost burned our house down last November when he wasn’t paying attention to what ‘knob’ he was turning on the stovetop. He’s always been this way, but it’s getting worse with age. He doesn’t lock up the house; the cars; can’t find things; forgets appointments. Just before he retired from the more major part of his worklife; and, yes, he was really busy at the end; he lost his keys four times in four months. He was preoccupied with a lot of responsibilities at the time; but, c’mon. And that was just his house keys/car keys; it got so tiresome to keep changing the locks on the doors. But when it really came to a head was when he lost his WORK keys because they were keys to expensive equipment and so on & so on. He thought he’d get fired before he ever retired.
So, he’s been seeing a neurologist-neurosurgeon (brain scans and the like) and now a neuropsychiatrist, undergoing a barrage of testing both physical and mental, which includes oral and written tasks/problem-solving, repetition of numbers (all kinds of stuff like drawing/illustrations and I think word pictures); done over a period of about four hours on the mental-brain part with the neuropsychiatrist; just all sorts of brain exercises and challenges. The conclusion is that my husband isn’t anymore forgetful than any other man his age, which we find quite unbelievable … but we’ll go with the medical science and press on.
But what WAS indicated was indeed a low-lying depression and some anxiety. I attribute this to his chronic lack of sleep of 15 years. Which is caused primarily by a physical-medical group of problems as opposed to mental health. They asked him if HE felt he was sad, depressed, etc. He acknowledged that he was fatigued from the lack of sleep but also that, yes, goings-on in the world were draining. True, he’s a news junkie; not TV, but all the other sources, and constantly on his internet phone. He is a big reader of news. Anyway, it sure seems to overall be a mix of some ‘life’ negatives for as much as we got the positive on NOT Alzheimer’s. (My husband is age 70. He definitely does have worries about our finances, our house that needs a lot of work; and his health, as he’s likely facing some surgery soon which is definitely going to affect his life, probably permanently. Things like this grate on you of course.)
We’re still evaluating with the doctors and my husband is implementing some things to work through, if he can, any anxiety and depression in the absence of medication, which he may still do. He walked four miles this morning before 10am. Also trying to improve diet. I told him he needs to ditch his phone, but he’s not listening to me. When he was at work at his part-time job yesterday, he listened (earphones while he worked) to the whole four hours of the Jan 6 commission hearings when I felt he could record it on TV; watch later. Maybe instead listen to some enjoyable music in a diff setting outside of our home. But I think it’s also this dread to not miss anything; to stay on top of things; because things feel uncertain here in the U.S. It’s our lives; our freedom. We’re on alert. It’s stressful.
For me, I’ve turned off the ‘nightly news’ now for about six weeks, mostly only getting my info from the web and certain online newspapers, although I randomly watch one or two of the nighttime news-chat shows; stray bits, actually. For instance, lately, I’m trying to catch Rachel on Monday nights, and I love her, but she’s almost too much for me right now ; I like Anderson Cooper. Yet I’ve been resisting. But I started watching David Muir again, only just the past couple of nights, and I find myself with tears in my eyes as the news is ‘read aloud’ to me once again. This isn’t normal (the tears). It’s just that the news is so sad and disturbing all the time. There is SOMEthing continually on the national/global news to prompt me to cry. (A dent in ‘wellbeing’.) Do we just feel things more deeply as we age, when we’ve come to understand more clearly the certain consequences of things; of how FINITE our years are here; of what havoc death plays; a clearer understanding of loss based on greater life experiences than when we were younger adults and maybe didn’t yet have fully-formed brains to grasp that certain gravity to life?
It just seems that no matter which way we turn, if we go left or right, backward or forward, there’s a feeling that the world has never been in more turmoil in our lifetime than now, so of course attitude and mood is going to be affected as we struggle to have hope and subdue our fears. (I guess, anyway. I’m doing the armchair-‘psychology’; never the good way to be.) But it seems like, more and more, there’s less and less GOOD news on any one day. So of course it brings us down. Because, as you say, it’s been this way for too long, at least seven years in my calculation (in ‘my’ world at least; for instance, I can’t believe we’re back here again, with people I know who are talking a lot [and doing their research] about moving out of the country, just as they began to explore that same thought back in 2016; this is difficult stuff to have to think about when we’re all/a lot of us at the age where we’re just trying to simplify and get along in life without too many ripples).
Then I think to myself, “Well, how did adults survive ten years of The Great Depression of the 1930s?” (when there was no let-up with that whole awful time either…and then they didn’t get any real break, because they went right into world war…)
I don’t know the answers to my own questions. But my husband and I will find ourselves hashing out something we’ve become aware of in ‘the news’ and I’ll say too often, “I absolutely KNOW my parents never had to deal with this in THEIR generation.” So, what does that mean? Am I some kind of spoiled baby boomer who thought I’d be immune from difficulty in older age; that everything was going to be all-golden and ongoingly successful for our ‘privileged’ and special generation? Mass generalization, but are baby boomers too self-aware? Or does that whole thought process have nothing to do with anything. I dunno.
(Frankly, I sense I am in fact, making no sense. There’s no eloquence here. I can’t sleep either and my eyes are now burning a hole in my head; brain having trouble connecting the thoughts; I’ll be joining you and Don in a nap today.)
No, it’s our news outlets. They love the bad stuff. Trust me there are plenty of great things happening in this country, we just don’t hear about it.
We started watching the nightly news – first NBC, then ABC – but we stopped again. Too many commercials, too many stories repeated as breaking news that actually broke over the weekend and were reported on that same network. Don thinks the network news should be commercial free. It should not be a money making venture. But we know that will never happen.
I do think all the talk about ‘golden years’ didn’t help us. We expected to be free of work stresses and have enough money to do what we want. Don and I still have to take work when we can get it, and like you and your husband, still have money/budget stresses, especially now while we’re dealing with inflation.
Sigh. I don’t know the answer either.
Love Don’s thought that network news should be commercial free!!!
And cut the danged sensationalistic, breathless “reporting” by news readers.
There are so very few true broadcast journalists and reporters these days.
I miss David Brinkley, Chet Huntley, Walter Cronkite, Peter Jennings.
I miss all of those journalists. Also John Chancellor.
Stay safe, Amy.
Vicki I agree with you- at times Rachael is too much
I watch Anderson
I’m glad it’s not Alzheimers, Vicki. But the rest makes sense. Both Don and I forget things – it happens when we’re preoccupied with something else. I often forget names of movies or famous people. Then later, it comes to me. There’s too much in my head and these are extraordinary times. I know some people tune out (I can’t imagine doing that with something this important, the literal life or death of our democracy.) I am incapable of that. There has never been a more important time in our country since the Civil War. I do manage my time with the news. I’m not looking at it or listening to it all day long – far from it. Nevertheless, how can you tune out the video of the cops in Uvalde, using hand sanitizer and DOING NOTHING while children were being murdered? NO ONE should tune that out.
Anyway, I’m on a roll here. We’re older and we don’t have the same energy level that we used to. The world has gone to hell. We’re still dealing with a pandemic.
I guess your husband can’t change his nature – which is to be on top of things and listen to the news. To be aware. I understand.
This has surely been a stressful time for you and your dear husband, Vicki.
Stay safe.
Oh my gosh my heart was breaking for the parents of the Texas massacre.
Washing your hands- can’t they be prosecuted?
It is just too much
We pray for the parents. how will they ever heal.
I can’t imagine they ever will heal, Linda.
xo
Thank you for your responses, Claudia (and others). Gosh does it sometimes feel we’re all on a similar journey right now. Claudia, when you said, “I often forget names of movies or famous people. Then later, it comes to me. There’s too much in my head and these are extraordinary times.” With me, sometimes it takes a whole day and into the next day to remember what I was trying to remember, like indeed the name of that book or film star and then, bang, it’ll finally hit me. This is such a departure from a few years ago, so clearly it’s gotta do with age, too. And my sleep is poor; I don’t get replenished.
But I think there’s really something there, in the preoccupation. Can’t turn off the brain and indeed too much stuff swirling deep inside. Stuff that isn’t soul-nourishing or maybe even brain-protective.
And on top of everything else, we’ve got family members hitting us up for money again, when they know we don’t have it to lend or give, but it just causes us so much stress. It makes us restless. Which is why I think we spent nearly the ENTIRE day on Thursday at the beaches (the happy place). First south to Malibu/Pacific Palisades, then north to Santa Barbara (good thing gasoline dropped to $6/gallon for the first time in ‘forever’ here in Southern Calif), and we were only home briefly in between; just needed out of the house, almost like ‘flight’. Excuse was to see the bigger ocean waves which come with the super moon. But, for the first time in a long time, we sat there FOUR HOURS before and after sunset, phones off, when we couldn’t even see the waves anymore, not really wanting to leave (because ‘home’ is also ‘reality’ … although home we finally came).
xo
My husband and I are similar in age to you and Don and we are both retired in December 2019 with big travel plans for 2020…..we all know how that went. It is indeed depressing regarding all the issues you mentioned. I feel even more sad because we have four young grandchildren and I wonder what kind of country we are leaving them. What makes things even more frustrating for me is both my husband and I have siblings that believe the crap about voter fraud and vaccine untruths.
Oh, that must be so hard to deal with, Jen! I’m sorry to hear that. And yes, what kind of life will my nieces and nephews and their children have?
Stay safe.
I have such a lack of motivation. So strange for me. Dozens of projects that I want to do, gardens that have weeds as tall as me (5′) and stacks of work to be entered for invoices and bills to be paid and yet I am getting nothing done. I just want to read and hide in the book’s story.
I’m blaming it on these years of covid with no end in sight, grief over my parents and the awful goings on in the world. I haven’t watched TV in years and read the news because I found it easier to tolerate during the orange years. Still reading the news but it’s so upsetting and depressing. I don’t think that the letters I write or the donations I give will help.
I’ll be turning 65 soon. I try to focus on my wonderful family and the good in the world but I worry for my grands future.
Procrastination is my new skill and I don’t like it!
It’s a depressing time, Betsy. I understand.
Stay safe.
When I am depressed, I keep saying, I ‘m so tired, so tired. that is how I know it is depression. And who isn’t these days? Roe V Wade overturned, mass shootings every day, racist attacks every day, and news about how we almost had a coup d’etat in our country.
How could you not be depressed?
Thanks, Jan.
Stay safe.
First of all, I love that puzzle. I might have to cave and get that one!
Funny you mention that about the exhaustion. I’ve been going through the same thing for the past couple of months — well before I had MRSA or the concussion. I’ve done the blood work and all the things one does and it’s not every day — but it’s more days than it ever was before. I really am trying not to nap in the daytime and mess up evening sleep but find myself going to bed earlier or sleeping later or on occasion napping.
You may be right about our psyches absorbing all the pain and tension around us. It has been a long haul and more to come, I fear. One day at a time… be gentle with yourself and I’ll do my best to do the same!
We’re not meant to have to deal with all this trauma over an extended period of time.
Stay safe, Jeanie.
Your thoughts have brought tears to my eyes. I have not realized how much not only the pandemic but politics and violence has now become a daily struggle. It has taken so much out of me and as I age and have more physical challenges its all the more debilitating. I Thank God for my family and friends who I can share my struggles with.