Bumps in the road

I swear I never set out to make this my online catalog of complaints ... But. I do need to record that I'm sort of taking a nosedive right now. So much so that my therapist is insisting I get back on meds, at least for awhile. Which I am going to do starting this week.

Depression sucks. I still have such a hard time accepting it as an illness that is not my fault; symptoms like hopelessness, feelings of worthlessness and guilt, anxiety, complete and total physical and mental exhaustion all feel like things I should be able to "get over" with positive thinking, exercise and a healthy diet. The fact that I can't only makes me feel like more of a loser.

So I hope the medication helps.

Other than this one big black spot on my heart, things are going OK. The house and garden are looking good, the dogs are awesome, I'm exercising every day and getting out with friends and eating mostly pretty well. Bea went in for her spay surgery this morning, which I've been having very mixed feelings about. Not that I want her to have puppies, because I definitely don't. It's just that she's my little girl, and this is major surgery, and I've never had a girl dog before and I really hate the thought of anyone cutting into her poor sweet little puppy belly for any reason. I dropped her off this morning and cried all the way home.

I also stopped by my old house, which happens to be just across the street and down a bit from my vet's office. The property has been on the market for at least seven or eight years and it finally sold, so right now it's sitting empty and as luck would have it the doors were open so I let myself in and spent a half hour or so walking through and remembering how much I loved the place when I lived there. I was lonely there a lot of the time, but it was such a sweet little house, all French doors and windows and a little stone fireplace, with flowers and vines and roses everywhere and beautiful trees all around. It's been sadly neglected, and painted some pretty god-awful colors, but the plum tree I planted ten years ago is doing great and so is the lemon verbena, and the fencing I built when Tater was born is holding up well too. I don't know who bought it but I'm guessing the whole place will probably be bulldozed before too long, since nobody who could afford to buy it would ever consent to live in it, and it's too far gone now to offer as a rental. So that was kind of sad too, though I'm glad I got a chance to see it one last time, empty, instead of full of ugly crap "antiques" for sale like the last time I stopped by. It will always stay in my memory as one of my favorite houses I've ever had.

It feels weird to be here with just Tater and me. Bea is staying at the vet clinic overnight. It's a foggy, cold morning; the fog never did really burn off yesterday and maybe it won't today either. I really should get out and go for a long walk, try to metabolize some of these stress chemicals ... or maybe I'll just go back to bed for awhile and walk later.

Moss gardens, blue boots and other assorted miscellanea

I didn't take this picture myself and I don't know where it came from, but I had to post it because it so gorgeously illustrates my latest obsession – the moss garden. I've been collecting little pieces of moss everywhere and storing it in jars, making little tiny terrariums, tucking it in under the feet of house plants ... It's just the most beautiful color, and so fuzzy, and I love the different forms. Some look like tiny little ferns; others grow in clusters like stars, or miniature aloes or succulents. And for some reason in this driest of winters in as long as I can easily remember, it seems prudent to keep in my mind's eye the image of the lush, green, wet winters I hope will soon return .....

Here's a selection that Mr. A collected for me yesterday from the flower beds next to my office. Two different kinds, plus some oak leaves. The little one on the top right is one I got out of the creek bottom today – slipping on a rock, smashing my knee and destroying a new pair of tights while simultaneously landing with one hand right in the middle of a dried up blackberry bramble. Yowch. Totally worth it, though.

They're resting at the moment on my favorite blue and white plate, by the way – the only one of its kind, which I liberated from the Bauhaus when I moved out in 1986 and have carted around with me like a sacred relic ever since. I've eaten dinner on that plate almost every day for almost 25 years! Not tonight, though.

In other news, this afternoon I went to the plant nursery to see if they had any button ferns in two inch pots (they did not, but are going to get me some by next weekend) and on the way back I decided to finally stop and check out the shop that's now open in the little house I lived in for almost nine years, across the valley on the highway into town.

I almost never even go over to that part of the valley anymore and when I do I make a point of Not going past my old house. It's true it was shabby and ramshackle even before I moved in, and didn't improve much in terms of structure or stamina in the time I lived in it, but I loved that little house so much, and took such care to make it my own space – I knew every tree, every flowering vine and bulb, every bush in the hedge, and planted so much more while I was there, including perennials and herbs and several fruit trees that are now producing beautifully (according to my friend who still keeps a studio in the back of the lot) – it sort of broke my heart to leave it, even though it was what made sense to do at the time, and still does.

So for almost three years I've avoided even looking at the house, preferring to remember it as it was when I lived in it. I could see from the road that the subsequent tenants had ripped down all the jasmine and climbing roses from the front porch and roof, and even that was more than I wanted to know. I also heard from two different sources that my beloved ancient walnut tree had been cut down, and the back of the lot down by the creek was being used as a dumping ground.

Anyway – I guess enough time has finally passed to secure my memories against the threat being overshadowed by a new view of the place ... So I decided to stop. Since it's now a shop that nobody lives in, I was hoping I would be able to actually go into the house and snoop around, instead of having to guess what was happening to it based on what little you can see over the fence, from the road.

Maybe you're one of those romantic types who's expecting me to say that I was pleasantly surprised – charmed, even – by the changes the new tenant has made. Maybe you think I'm going to say that I made my peace with the place at last, and was finally able to release my jealousy and wish it happiness in its new life with its new people ....

I would've loved it if that had happened. I guess in a way I did make peace with it, but not in the way I expected to. First I will say that the stuff they're selling there is not so much in the line of "antiques" as it is more run-of-the-mill "dusty and chipped old junk that smells like mold." They've broken out part of the fence and opened up the French doors from the kitchen onto the patio, which is piled up on one end with soggy old couch cushions, mildewed books, broken lamps and other detritus. The entrance to the shop is through these doors, and from there through the kitchen, which is somehow much, much smaller than I remember, and which looks broken down and depressed now that it's no longer being cooked in by candle light and lovingly cleaned with my special homemade lemony cleansers and filled with climbing plants and flowers and beautiful one of a kind plates and cups and crystal – from there you go into the living room, which is also much smaller than I remember, and similarly depressing in its garbagey clutter, dust, and smell of neglect. The stone fireplace is covered with black smoke stains that they haven't even bothered to remove.

Looking out the French doors into the front yard all I could see was more broken, rain-ruined junk strewn and stacked around, and a 20-foot eucalyptus tree that has sprung up right next to one of my Santa Rosa plums, close enough to kill it if they don't take care, which it doesn't appear they intend to do.

They've nailed up a plywood door in the bedroom doorway, so I wasn't able to see in there.

I did notice that the walnut tree has NOT been cut down, which made me happy. And my favorite little flowering almond in the front yard has buds on it, so at least I know they haven't killed that one yet (though most of the other things I planted are no longer there).

The positive side of this little excursion is that I've finally freed myself from the image I had in my head of that house as being the perfect place for me, that I had to abandon for love. Which it was, at the time, and which I did – and which I'm still glad that I did. But now, when I look around the house I share with Mr. A – which in my mind has never really measured up to the cottage I loved so much – I'm seeing it more for what it is: a solid, well-built house that is slowly being transformed more and more into a place I'm coming to love just as much as I loved that cottage. It's true it isn't as charming as the old house, but it also isn't falling apart – it isn't on a noisy highway – the rooms are bigger, the doors actually close, the water pressure is good, it has amazing views in every direction, and I'm not living in it alone, waiting for a good man to arrive in my life. He did arrive, and here we are together.

I still love the years I spent living in that little house, though. What I remembered today is that I'm loving my time in this house, too. I think allowing myself to take a good look at how that house has moved from the past into the present has helped me see more clearly where I really am right now, myself. I can't wait for Mr. A to get home so I can tell him about it.

As for the blue boots – there are two other buildings on that property, and right now all three of them are occupied by vintage retail shops, one of which is a new place specializing in hip western stuff and amazing boots. The pair I almost got were an amazing turquoise leather with a tall shaft and a low heel, and so close to a workable fit – but in the end I reined myself in enough to admit they were really at least a size too big, and so long I would've been constantly tripping over them. I know this because more than once or twice already in my life I've fallen in love with boots that are too big for me, and every time, I've lived to regret it. Once I came close to losing a tooth when I tripped while my hands were full and landed face-first on the pavement. Those were the cherry suede shearling-lined Dansko boots that stained the cuffs of my jeans red ....

So – no blue boots for me today. Besides, boot season is almost over now. Soon it will be time to start scouting for clonky platform sandals again. Actually I guess that time is already here – so let the stalking begin!

P.S. He also had these, which were too small – unfortunately – or fortunately, depending on how much you would've loved/cringed at seeing me tear it up at the next farmer's market dance party in leopard fur platform shortie boots.

Sick-o-meter

You know those days when you think you might be about to come down with something, but you can't quite tell? You feel sort of tired, but maybe that was just because you stayed up too late the night before. Or maybe had a little too much cheese – that could be why your head feels a little stuffy. Should you stay home from work and try to nip it in the bud? Or is there really anything the matter at all?

If you're diabetic, there's an easy way to answer this question. Test. I've found that if I'm starting to get sick, my blood glucose first thing in the morning (FBG, or fasting blood glucose – typically the lowest number of the day for me) will be as much as 30 points higher than usual. That's how I knew on Monday that I really was starting a cold, and was able to call in sick with a clear conscience.

When I was growing up we did not stay home from school unless we were practically on death's door, and I've always retained the fear of being seen as a faker if I claim to be too sick to go to work. It's weirdly gratifying to be able to "prove" that I really am fighting an infection. And taking the day off to sleep and drink tea and sleep some more made all the difference. Yesterday and today I forced myself to stay in bed all morning as well, since I don't have to work until the afternoon, and that has helped a lot too. A cold of the type that usually takes about a week to work its way out of my system is already about finished, and today I feel well enough to ride my bike to work (the sun is out, it's only three miles, and I may call Mr. A for a ride home depending on how I feel by the end of the day).

In other news, we finally replaced the faulty big front burner on the stove, and I keep burning things on it. I had gotten used to the old one, which took forever to heat up and never really did get as hot as it was supposed to. Someday I would love to replace the whole stove with one that runs on propane – which is the next best thing to gas, if you live someplace where gas is not available, like we do. I hate, hate cooking on an electric stove. This one is not original to the house but it's from the same era, and the main thing I do like about it is its color – dark avocado green. I don't think they make them that color anymore, unfortunately.

The first house I lived in out here was way out in the mountains and it didn't have a furnace or gas lines – the heat was a big wood stove, and we cooked on propane. I loved it. This house does have baseboard heaters, which smell and are inefficient ... so I've been loving the wood stove we installed at the end of the summer. Chopping and hauling wood is not as romantic as some people might try to describe it, but it is kind of a satisfying routine and wood heat is just the best. I don't know why 70 degrees of electric heat should feel different from 70 degrees of wood heat, but it does – maybe it's the humidity? With wood, the heat seems to penetrate my body more. It radiates off everything – the fireplace bricks, the furniture, the walls, everything.

The one thing I had forgotten about is the dust. Heating solely with wood produces a lot of ash that invisibly filters into the air every time you open the stove. Dusting is one of my least favorite household chores, and I'm finding I have to do it a lot more often now than I did before – twice a day right around the stove, and at least once a day in the rest of the room. I'm wondering if there might be some kind of air filter that could help keep the air a little cleaner; must look into that.

Dancing the bobcat

I learned a new skill today that Mr. A informs me is known as "dancing the bobcat." Actually, even just driving the bobcat was new to me, as was using a gigantic auger to drill post holes into soil that is packed with head-sized stones the way a Snickers bar is packed with peanuts (only way less satisfying).

The stones are what led to the dancing. When the whole contraption was struggling and lifting itself up off the ground with the effort of coming up against them, I had the bright idea of steering the cat around slightly, hoping to slip the tip of the auger under the obstacle from the side and lift it up from underneath. This kind of maneuver causes the thing to jump and twist – not enough to actually turn itself over, of course – as if it were dancing. It was fun to practice, once I got over being afraid of killing someone. And several times, it actually worked.

Installing several hundred feet of fenceline will be our first sorta big step toward making some of the changes I've been itching to make around the property, and although there's still a lot more to do, we got a pretty solid start. I'm going to call it a good day.

P.S. That is not me in the picture, in case you were wondering.