Thursday, November 30, 2017

Cold Memories




Mamie and I went to town yesterday, which means we drove one mile to the little village center for a walk. I thought it would be a nice break for her from the Mobius strip of sidewalks in our condo complex.

           As usual, we parked in the small shopping area that’s made up of a bank, a pizza shop, an insurance guy, and a hairdresser, and then we walked from there to the library in back to drop off some books. She was thrilled to have new places to sniff and pee and trotted ahead of me, tail in the air.

          Through the park with the Civil War statue, past the village coffee shop, and we were on the grounds of the private academy. It was a beautiful sunny day and the students were out in force, passing us on the brick sidewalks. A group of three were paused in front of one of the dorms and they caught my attention because two of the three were wearing camel hair coats, something I don’t remember seeing in a while and particularly not on 16 year-olds. An ankle-length version passed me a few minutes later. All I can figure is this is one more fashion trend I’ve missed, although it could be limited to the stratospheric income range of these students’ families.

          These coats reminded me, though, of a conversation I had with my son-in-law over Thanksgiving. We both remember winter as a time when you just resigned yourself to being cold.

I have a good twenty years on him, but we both grew up in the pre-puffy coat, pre-Thinsulate eras. As a general rule, you only had one layer of wool and a shiny rayon lining between you and old man winter and you would just deal. That’s the way it was - of course you were cold; you were outside.

 Maybe being cold from November through March toughened us. What with the need to get through the cold from point A to point B as quickly as possible, we might have even been in better shape since everyone probably walked faster then, too.

Monday, November 27, 2017

Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Sunday, November 19, 2017

The Power of Words



Yesterday I dusted off my brain and went to an annual writers’ conference at Mt. Holyoke College.

Tuesday, November 14, 2017

A day of no events at all



To give you an idea of the madcap, carefree life of being retired, here’s my Tuesday. 

          Woke up, and realized with no surprise that my cold is still with me. I’m now at the coughing up a lung stage.
Shuffled around with a cup of tea, praised Mamie after she delivered a pee and then a poop on her pad in the bathroom. Yes, I’m insanely spoiled to have adopted a dog that came pad trained. It was 29 degrees out at 7:30 this morning.
          Made French toast, watched a little news – bad idea. The news, not the toast. 
          Took Mamie out for a big walk around the condo complex. Forgot to wear a hat – another bad idea. Will an ear infection be next?
          Went with My Guy over to the tile restorer company to arrange for the Pepto-Bismal tile in the upstairs bath at the still-unsold house to be transformed into a tasteful off-white. At ginormous expense, by the way.
          Went to the *@#! unsold house to put the second coat of blue on the other upstairs bath while My Guy put a last coat on a bedroom.
           Came home (sainted My Guy stayed and blew leaves for another hour) where I was greeted – as usual – by Mamie as though I’d been gone to the North Pole and back. One mad-dash lap around the back yard calmed her down a tiny bit.
          Went out again to buy curtains for the now-blue bathroom to hide the fact that we should have also painted the window. No luck. Tomorrow I’ll pick up some fabric and make them.
          Walked Mamie.
          Dinner.
          And here I am.
         

Friday, November 10, 2017

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Sneezles



Christopher Robin  

Had wheezles
And sneezles,
They bundled him
Into
His bed.
They gave him what goes
With a cold in the nose,
And some more for a cold
In the head.

Monday, November 6, 2017

Leafing Home



If two straight days of lying on my side painting baseboards, coupled with being scrunched on the stairs painting risers wasn’t enough, I did receive a reminder yesterday of why we need to sell our house – and soon.