Month: January 2022

Aging, Animals, anxiety, Creativity, Dogs, Emotions, family, Food, Learning, Life, Love, Medical, Motorcycles, Nature, Photography, retail, Riding, the World, Thinking, Travel, Writing

The Frozen Fly

1972italy

Last night at work was long. Tonight will be even longer I fear. We keep trying to tell the owner that we don’t need to stay open as late as we do. No one comes in so he is wasting money. But we shall see. He saw things first hand a few weeks ago. Hopefully he doesn’t forget.

Things have gotten dark here since Essie’s passing. That we are in the doldrums of winter here does not help. It’s not like we could take the motorcycles out for the afternoon and just ride. There is nothing to do. Being stuck in the house just brings things in to focus more as to what has been lost. Many of our old haunts in Traverse City are closing. Many places require you to dress now (good luck when tourist season gets here and everyone is in shorts) or are carry out only. Or just too many people.

Depression this time of year is a hard thing to deal with. I know sometimes for me it turns to anger. I can’t just call into work and say, “Hey! Got a case of the blues today so I won’t be in. Oh and I need to use a sick day.” With minimal staff and even more minimal managers it won’t be happening. And I don’t know what to do to help others in the same boat. Especially when I am going through similar experiences at the same time. I have no life preserver to throw because I am holding tight to it myself.

So here I sit putting words on the screen. I don’t know what else to do. Time is passing so quickly. (Even though I complain of work going slow.) It has already been a week since Essie has been gone. Even photography has its limits. It’s the same cold snow day after day. It hasn’t moved. It’s the same naked trees. There are only so many ways to capture the same thing. But I try to put a unique spin on it. Sometimes.

There is a dead fly that has been frozen to the screen. I feel a bit like that fly at the moment. I need to free myself so that I can take care of loved ones as well as work. I guess I should wrap this up and get it posted. Thanks for reading and stay safe.

Animals, anxiety, Creativity, Dogs, dreams, Emotions, family, Gardening, Learning, Life, Love, Nature, Photography, the World, Thinking, Writing

Pooh Sticks

1972italy

Little miss is tucked in a mound of blankets asleep. I feel as though I have gotten no sleep over the past few days. I woke up several times just soaked in sweat. Then there was the time around 3:20am I woke up and could not fall back asleep for atleast an hour (I quit looking at the clock not long after 4am rolled around). I did a lot of tossing and turning. I did random thinks to try to get my brain to fall back asleep and that made for interesting dreams. I was learning how to sketch in one.

When I finally haul myself out of bed it was snowing big fat flakes. Any animal (or human) tracks outside have been obliterated. It has been snowing ever since we got up. My phone has just notified me that the snow will start soon. 🙄 I may haul the camera out and take a few photos of the stuff piling up outside.

Laundry is going in the washer. It should be done soon. That will give everything time to dry before work. My mind is drifting all over the place. It’s rather like a game of Pooh sticks where you drop your stick on one side of the bridge (or in my case a thought) and see which comes out first on the other side. Or if it comes out. It could turn out to be Eeyore who has just fallen in and is swirling around on his back hoping someone will help him out.

I just want Spring to get here so we can start going outside again. Although Essie was always the one to go out with me to keep an eye on me. A lot of the time Stella would just stay in the house. I just want to be outside working in the gardens again.

It sounds as though the final spin on the washer has stopped so I had better wrap this up. Sorry for all the weird randomness. I hope you all have an amazing day! Thanks for reading and stay safe!

Aging, Animals, anxiety, Dogs, Emotions, family, Friends, Life, Love, Photography, retail, Thinking, Travel, Writing

Bringing Baby Girl Home

1972italy

Here I sit alone in my office. It is the end of an era. I have always had a dog that was mine or would hang with me when I am home. Essie was the last. Baby girl came home yesterday morning. I didn’t wait long after I posted this to call the vet. The cremation place said that she was on the way back to the vet’s office. They called back a few minutes late to say that she had arrived. So I put on Stella’s new coat (Essie’s yellow one that Mom made her) and Stella and I made the tearful drive to go get her sister. Stella was very disappointed when I did not come back to the car with her sister as she remembered her. But she understood. She laid in the front seat with her head draped over the center console the whole way home. I put Essie up with Dante’s ashes.

I wasn’t for … I should’ve called in to work yesterday. I’m not going to be much better today. The only difference is that I will be manager so I can hide in the office. I had to switch my schedule around for next week. He had me working 7 days straight. When I saw that I almost cried. I needed a day off sooner than that. So I looked at my schedule and asked a coworker to switch days with me. I will be working both jobs on Thursday but that is ok. My next day off is Tuesday now. Bringing Essie’s ashes home reopened the wounds that had started to scab over. Now they are bleeding freely again and my heart hurts. I just want to be alone and not deal with people. Atleast I get out at 2pm.

Stella was good and no accidents while we were gone. I was very proud of her. We’ll see how she does next week. Maybe having Essie’s ashes back has helped her. I had something weird happen the night before I brought them back though. What woke me up was someone trying to get into bed. I felt the mattress being pushed down. Like when Essie would need help getting back into bed at night. Stella was asleep on my pillow next to me so it wasn’t her.

I suppose I should wrap this up so I can try to get myself together for work. If I can clear enough space on my media I will go and add a photo of Essie’s beautiful rosewood box and her paw print (and here goes the water works…. damn it). I hope you all have an amazing day. Thanks for reading and stay safe.

Animals, anxiety, Automotive, Books, Creativity, Dogs, Emotions, family, Friends, Gardening, Learning, Life, Love, Nature, Photography, retail, Thinking, Travel, Writing

Waiting to Bring Her Home

1972italy

All I want today is to bring Essie home. It is a week as of today that we had to say goodbye. Normally it is a week to get the ashes back. Even work said that if they called and her ashes were ready I could go get them even if it was after my shift started. My anxiety has been keyed up the past few days. It will be a rough weekend if I don’t have her ashes back.

Stella is curled up in her usual ball behind me covered up. I notice that she doesn’t go very far when I let her out since Essie has been gone. I may go and shovel her a path and see if that makes a difference. She plowed her way along the fence and almost got stuck last night. I let her out so I could unload the groceries from the car. After I let her in I let her hop in the car and we drove into the garage. She was a bit underwhelmed as she thought it was going to be a real ride. She did pee on the floor again but the bulk of it was on one of the pads I had laid out. I guess I will just put more out before I leave for work today. I am working the gas and courtesy counter so I won’t be staying very late. The flip side is that I have to be back by 6:30am the next morning. So I need to be up at 5am.

The sun is out this morning but I find myself like Stella and just wanting to bury myself in blankets. I need to fill the bird feeder again. With the colder weather it has been busy at the feeder. I should be able to put two new suet blocks in as well. I did get my plants all watered yesterday. I also spent some time on my novel. A lot of what I am doing at this point is backstory. I’m not sure how much of all this will make it into the novel but I need this structure and history to make the story believable.

I keep staring at my phone as if I can will them to call and tell me I can come and get her ashes. I will wrap this up for now and see if I can find something to occupy my time besides staring at my phone. Thanks for reading and stay safe!

Animals, anxiety, Automotive, Creativity, Dogs, Emotions, family, Friends, Learning, Life, Love, Nature, Tattoos, Thinking, Travel, Writing

Coping

1972italy

The morning dawned with a yellow cast to it. What blue sky was visible was an iron blue, deep and hard. Now all has turned to a soft grey and snow is falling. Our neighbor was kind enough to plow yesterday while Stella (I almost wrote Essie) and I were out and about. Stella stayed in the backseat for most of the ride. She has never done this since Moose has been gone (they would push each other out of the front passenger seat). The only time she came into the front seat was when I stopped at work. All in all her ride was about an hour so atleast she got out of the house for a bit.

My tattoo is scheduled for February 17th at 11am. I figure if I am first in the door he will be fresh for the day. It will only be $150 for the piece. I expected atleast $200. So that was a nice surprise. I just need to find a small container to bring Essie’s ashes in once I get them. He won’t use much but atleast she will still be with me.

For as much room as Stella can take up right now she is in the tiny ball behind me. She’s not much bigger than a basketball. I covered her up but I guess not enough. She nibbled the blanket for a little bit then started to pull it over her head. Goof.

The skies are turning to a darker grey. The snow is light. I didn’t get much done yesterday around here. Dishes washed but they still need to be put away. Laundry washed but they still need to go into the dryer. I forgot to water my plants. I did talk to Dad for a little bit. Thankfully he kept falling asleep so I convinced him to hang up and go to bed. Stella cuddled the whole time I was talking to Dad. I threw the ball occasionally but she would always come back and get on the loveseat with me.

I should wrap this up and make an effort to do a few things around here while it is quiet. hope you all have an amazing day! Thanks for reading and stay safe!

These were supposed to go on yesterday’s post but didn’t???? So here they are. Stella has my photo buddy following me from place to place while I took pictures.
Life

A Little At A Time

1972italy

A late post. I tried to get up earlier since I had to write my article but nope. Even Stella stayed in bed longer than normal this morning. We got more snow over the course of the day and night. It wasn’t too bad to drive in but by the time I got home it had started snowing in earnest. So I was glad I wasn’t out in it.

Despite me letting her out before I left and telling her I was just going to cover a meeting I still came home to a pee spot on the rug. So it seems she is back to this again. I am going to take her with to go get my pricing for my memorial tattoo for Essie this morning. Then we will go for a little drive around. Maybe that will help. I know it is acting out because Essie is gone. I’m not angry angry with her. But I hope that it doesn’t go on for very long. But with mourning who can tell.

I have so many little things that need to get done around here. Do I do them? Do I work on my writing? I feel like a fraud sometimes because everyone is so impressed that I write every day. But it is usually just one thing that I work on (this). It’s not like I do a bunch of different things. I try to but it never seems to work out that way. I don’t know if I should try calling Dad or not. It has been several weeks since we talked. If he is doing the “woe is me” thing I might not be able to. I got my own “woe is me” going on here.

Stella is being overly busy. She just came in here to get a bunch of love. Now she is pacing the living room. And now back in here. I guess that means I need to wrap this up. By the time I get photos and that on here it should be about time to go. Thanks for reading and stay safe!

Life

Alone At Last!

1972italy

I am grateful that Chris plowed the drive Sunday. It is starting to pile up again but it is navigable where he plowed. I looked out the front door and the snow is almost to the top of the porch. I should probably check the bird feeder today as well.

I got home to pee on the carpet last night. That I was willing to forgive as it is the first time she has been by herself since Essie died. What I could NOT forgive was that she dug through Moose’s folded blanket to get to Essie’s frisbee and ate half of the frisbee. She got in a lot of trouble for that one.

I got in touch with my tattoo guy and I am going in tomorrow to talk to him about specifics with the tattoo. He is willing to put some of Essie’s ashes in the ink so I am very excited about the whole thing. I hope it won’t cost too much but we will see.

I had a coworker tell me that she had just been diagnosed with stage 3 sciroccos of the liver. She is scared to death. Then another coworker is trying to get her daughter to come up and stay for awhile for her own health. Her daughter got COVID and it has scarred her lungs badly. Her doctors want her to get out of the city for a bit so her lungs can heal otherwise the smog that will inevitably occur this Spring and Summer could kill her. But her daughter is being stubborn. So we were the closing crew last night and cried several times together. The coworker that was diagnosed with the liver issues wants to tell her family but doesn’t want them to worry. We told her to tell them some but not all of her diagnosis. If she wants to share more later she can. I told her she was going to come with me and get “less is more” tattooed on her arm so she would remember. We laughed. But she might do it. She talked about ways to embellish the wording. We’ll see.

So far the general consensus is that 2022 sucks. We aren’t even through the first month and we have lost loved ones, major health issues, accidents…. Yeah, no one is a fan. I am hoping that the body aches will go away as the day progresses. I don’t think my body realizes that I have the day off. Mostly. I just checked my phone to see if the meeting got cancelled. Still on. Depending on the weather I will leave about 35 minutes before the meeting. Maybe 40. I want to make sure that if their roads out that way are bad I have enough time to slow down.

I will wrap this up and get to…. whatever I’m going to get to. Maybe some work on my novel. There is a lot that I need to work on. I also need to check my seeds and see how they are doing. This also means I need to clean out the long window box so they have somewhere to grow bigger. I did clean up a few of my plants before work yesterday. Maybe I will keep going with the gardening theme. Anyways… thanks for reading and especially thank you to all of you that have reached out with your personal stories and love. I really appreciate it. Stay safe!

I miss my little girl
Animals, anxiety, Automotive, Creativity, Dogs, Emotions, family, Friends, Life, Love, Medical, Nature, Photography, retail, Thinking, Travel, Writing

Doing What I Do

1972italy

What I would not give for some alone time to process my grief! Instead I get to go to work and deal with people. I read the wrong schedule so it turns out that I am working tonight and even though I have tomorrow off I still need to drive to Elk Rapids to cover a meeting.

I actually got decent sleep last night since I didn’t get woken up every little while. Hopefully that will help at work. I will be well and truly exhausted by the time I get to bed tonight. Last night I just pretty much came home and went to bed. I read for a little bit but not very long.

Mother Nature is trying to make up for lost time apparently. Rumor has it that we could get up to another foot (30cm) of snow in the next few days. One of my coworkers spun her truck out on the way in yesterday. I guess she almost rolled it. But she is ok just shaken up. Her truck might be a different matter. They are still melting all the snow that got pushed up underneath. If there is an damage to the frame she will probably have to total it. The plow trucks have been out but it seems as though the roads get plowed down to ice. I would rather them leave some snow for traction. On ice all you do is slide. And if it is windy that day? Good luck!

I filled the bird feeder yesterday as it has been very busy since the snow hit. I counted no less than 10 different types of birds. They flew up out of reach into the trees while I filled things up then came back when I was done. I thought I would have to replace the suet but that was still mostly full.

I need to check to see if the plants need watering. It is very dry in here and some of them need to be watered several times a week because the dirt dries out. The lettuce seeds have already produced a shock of sprouts that have shot up in the small glass jar. That means that I need to clean out the long window box and get those in there. I thought they were supposed to take weeks to sprout. It has only been a few days.

I am going to wrap this up. If I am lucky I can get another hour or so of quiet before the house gets busy and I will need to get ready for work. Thank you again to everyone that has been reaching out over Essie’s death. I appreciate all the love and support. Thanks for reading and stay safe!

Aging, Animals, anxiety, Creativity, Dogs, dreams, Emotions, Exercise, family, Learning, Life, Love, Nature, Photography, Tattoos, Thinking, Travel, Writing

Through the Looking Glasses

1972italy

Well we now have around a foot (30cm) of snow. It came down hard over the course of yesterday. It lays in thick drifts all over, even in the trees. Stella looks so lonely when she goes out now. I wonder how Spring will be. I am thinking of getting her a harness and then she and I start going for walks at the local park. It will get both of us out. I mentioned it to Chris to see if he wants to go along.

Laundry is wreaking havoc in the utility room by the sounds of it. Things keep falling off the machine as it spins the clothes out. I have no idea why. It is not a different load than normal. Stella keeps getting spooked when something crashes to the floor. I think she is realizing that Essie isn’t coming home again. I am not sure how she is dealing with it. Over the past week or so they both got very jealous of each other. They could be close at times but I just don’t know. I also don’t know how she will react the next time she goes to the vet. Normally she likes to go because she is a very social girl but after this? I know that there was a big change in the dogs when I brought Minion’s body home. After that they didn’t want to go to the vet’s.

I just have to get through today and I have 2 days off. I am going to need my alone time to process everything. I am also going to design Essie’s memorial tattoo. It will be her paw in my hand (I have a photo) and I am getting under my left bicep so that when I put my arm down I she is next to my heart. I am also using some of her ashes in the ink. I want to come up with a tattoo that represents all of my fur babies over the years. I am thinking of maybe just a never-ending line of script of all their names. Just have it wrap around my body. I will also need to see how much this will cost. I have to make sure bills get paid.

The house is so quiet. Essie was such a big personality…. Stella is busy but it is a different energy than Essie. And the fact that we are all cooped up in the house doesn’t help. I wonder what Stella will do Wednesday when we are both gone to work. Tuesday night I have a meeting (please self don’t forget the meeting) so it will be a small taste for her on her own. I worry about her. I worry about all of us. Maybe I will take Stella for a ride tomorrow. Just a drive around then back home to get her out. I still have the blanket in the back seat from Essie (my seat covers are cold this time of year).

I think I will wrap this up and see if I can do some work on my novel. Thanks for reading and I really appreciate the outpouring of love. Much love back to you all! Stay safe.

Life

Heaven Has Another Angel

1972italy

Things are a mess here. Essie has left a big hole in our lives and it is hard to know what to do. Last night I kept seeing her out of the corner of my eye on the couch. Then I would look and there was no one.

I truly don’t know what to write this morning. My sense of time is off. I have no idea if I gave myself enough time to do this. Or maybe too much time. It takes less time to feed one dog.

Work will be interesting. Atleast I can hide in the office if I need to. One of the perks of being opening manager. And really that is all I want right now. To curl up in a ball until this is all over. But I have to put on the brave strong front and deal with people. I am grateful that Chris will have Stella with him today.

Looking at the clock I guess I could’ve tried to sleep longer. Such a big empty hole where Essie used to be…. I will stop here. Thanks for reading. Stay safe.