Signs?

I walked out for my usual this morning - two laps around our circle road. I continue to miss The Senior Boy in a way that feels like my flesh is peeling away from my bones but he always said, "If you can do something about 'it' do it; if not, pray." I can't "do" anything about his absence and my prayers are - well - absent of words.

Lap one was slow and weepy, lap two: brisk and get-on-with-it underpinned with a sotto voce Alleluia chorus from Mozart's "Exsultate, Jubilate"(thanks to Ballet Kelowna's brilliant performance on Sunday). I was, by my rules, "finished" for today but my feet marched me right past the end of the driveway and onto lap three. Sunshine under the clouds floated the city in Tuscan light. I slowed to look and remember.


And there he was: the biggest 4-point buck I have ever seen. Ten metres into the neighbour's yard, head up and watching me. We stood for a long time, looking at one another. He outwaited me and I walked on up the hill.

Smiling in the rain.

Signs

Thank You

Happy Anniversary to Us

Anniversaries are funny events. My parents had 61 of them and all but 4 were spent a deux. Somehow, they had to share 25 and 50 and one that The Junior Boy got in on by accident of parental misreading of the calendar. Their 61st they shared with all the people who came to my mother's funeral to say good-bye to her and to show their love and support for my father and the rest of us blasted ones.

Yesterday was my/our anniversary. We weren't quite so adamant as The Oldies - we did spend most of them together although you, Constant Reader, will remember that last year I ws negotiating a new leather jacket in Firenze whilst Himself was motorcycling in Africa - inadvertent practising for the unpredicted change in status..... but we did have a few requirements: something decent to eat and decent to drink and usually something physical. (Get your minds out of the gutter!) Occasionally, presents. So yesterday I did that:

to eat: very good oatmeal muffins, some fine bunwiches, chocolate chip cookies (what else is there to say??) and some excellent (if I do say so myself) lasagne with (much-washed b/c one can't be too careful about those organics, don'tcha know) salad and brown buns.

to drink: several pots of coffee, various juice, water, some beer, and some wine (the March 2006 DIY from the basement has aged quite nicely)

for physical/presents: over 80 personhours of yardwork = 5 felled trees, 1 rented chipper (trying not to think of "Fargo"), 5 pick-up loads to the landfill (aka The Dump), and a severe reduction in the fire hazard around here not to mention immediate improvement in my mood and the appearance of the property.

We have THE BEST friends in the world!!!!! Next year, I will make sure the hot tub is running and the massage therapist is hired!

And the next best pressie??? They came back today and finished off the job: 4 more trips to the dump!

The Jr Boy and I can see the ground all the way around the house. We do not have piles of skivy lumber lying about waiting for black widow spiders to nest and the across the street neighbours will think they are in the wrong house when they come home and don't see all the creeping detritus they have had to look at for the past while.

The rain held off until the last of the locals waved good-bye and the imports and I listened to the water running down the newly cleaned eavestroughs and downspouts.

Truly: The Best Friends in The World!!!!!!!

Still breathing.....