Sarah Wynde's Blog, page 43

Santee State Park, South Carolina

For some reason, my pictures of this state park are really not impressing me this morning. Generic green trees and a wood chip path; generic dock and gray sky reflected on water; generic blue sky with some kayaks in the background. I’ve seen them all before, only labeled with different locations: Pennsylvania, Maine, Florida. So have a Sarasota commencement sunset instead:

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Sunset at the New College commencement

My neighbor at this park just pulled a full size ladder out of a mysterious compartment on his trailer. He also has two kayaks stuck in the back of his truck. I’m not quite jealous — I would never want to pull a trailer and he’s using the ladder to clean off the roof of his slide-out so he can close it to pack up, which is not a chore I would want to add to my list. But last week, R and I finally figured out how to use my bike rack and the conclusion, after almost two years, is “ha-ha-ha, what a useless piece of equipment.” I mean I guess I thought that’s what the conclusion was already? I never believed I would be able to lift a bicycle high enough over my head to get it on the rack to begin with.

But it turns out that yes, I’m now strong enough to lift a bicycle onto the rack (whee) and it doesn’t matter because I’m not tall enough to lock it into place without somehow carrying a ladder around with me. I’m sure you’ll be unsurprised when I tell you that my van has no available room to carry around a ladder. And while two years ago I did optimistically think I could become strong enough to lift a bike over my head (I am! A light bike, anyway!), I don’t optimistically think I’m going to grow taller any time soon. Not to mention, even R had to bring out something to step on to finally get the lock on, so yeah. Bike rack, not much use. I’d rather have a kayak than a bike, anyway.

But back to the state park. It’s a nice enough place, which feels a lot like damning with faint praise, but I don’t intend it that way, not really. If I’d stayed here on my very first trip up to PA two years ago, I think I would remember it fondly. As it is, though, my view is of my neighbor’s trailer — admittedly, there’s a lovely lake behind the trailer, but I’ve stayed in so many places with really spectacular views by now that I’m jaded about having to look through people stuff to get to the nature stuff. Still, nice level sites, plenty of room between them, good walking, friendly people, lots of small dogs and children to admire, birds chirping… it’s a great place for a quick stop on my way to PA.

And not such a quick stop, really. I got here Tuesday around 4 and I’m not leaving until tomorrow (Friday) morning, so two full days here. My idea was that breaking up a long drive with a couple days of rest would give me time to do lots of writing. Eh. About 400 words yesterday was the best I could do. The fact is, long drives are tiring and the routines of moving are time-consuming. I spent more time yesterday searching for a place to stay Friday night, so I could avoid going through DC (at rush hour on Friday on a holiday weekend, aka nightmarish), than I did actually adding words to Grace.

Of course, that said, I should probably admit that I spent a lot more time playing with graphics and photographs than I did writing Grace, too. It’s not like I’m going to become a designer anytime soon but it’s fun to play sometimes. I designed a lovely post-apocalyptic horror thriller cover — well, not lovely, more grim and dark in an attractive sort of way. (Tagline: a post-apocalyptic thriller for the desperately bored.) I also turned a perfectly nice tree picture into a muddled mess of a graphic, having discovered a magnifying glass and a scatter tool.

But today’s another day, another chance to get some real words written, so I’m going to get back to it. I suspect part of my resistance is that I’m so close to the ending — I really could finish it with another 10K words, so within two weeks, quite easily. But that would mean I’d have to start letting other people read it and I’m not sure I want to. Wouldn’t that be ironic? Three plus years spent writing a book and at the end of the day, an unwillingness to let anyone else read it? But for my own sake, I need to finish it so I can move on, so back to it I go. Wish me luck!

Commencement and other things

This morning, I knelt on the floor at my dad’s house to rub noses with his dog, Gizmo. Gizmo is, I think, a mix of cocker spaniel and poodle — golden, soft, fluffy, with an extremely endearing underbite, and a passionate devotion to his person, my dad. With his person out of the room, he was willing to come be loved up by me and maybe even play a little.

When Zelda saw what we were doing, she decided to come play, too. Within minutes, she and Giz were both chasing after a squeaky skunk, racing down the hallway after it, shoving one another out of the way, even playing tug as they were bringing it back to me. Zelda was play bowing, batting at the toy with her paws, even mock growling, and Giz’s tail was wagging a hundred beats a minute.

If I’d had a tail, it would have been wagging even faster than Giz’s.

So Sunday before last, Z was sick and getting sicker. Not eating, hiding under the table, lethargic, no energy. Not even interested in going for walks. I’d been bracing myself for the worst and it felt like the worst was coming even faster than I could have imagined. Last Monday, I decided to stop the medication she was on. On Thursday, I got the news that she had no signs of a UTI and so I also stopped the antibiotic she was on. She started getting better immediately. Yesterday, at my dad’s suggestion, I took her to his vet. Instead of recommending an ultrasound and x-rays, which was where I was at with my vet, his vet put her on estrogen.

Wow. Just wow, wow, wow, wow.

The vet said it would take a couple weeks before we’d know whether it was going to help with the peeing problem, but watching her play with Gizmo; having her almost drag me out of the van to go for a walk in the rain; seeing her lick every last speck of food out of her dinner bowl, then nose me and look expectantly for more… I will buy stock in doggie diapers, I will plan on doing laundry as often as it takes, but oh, it’s so nice to have my energetic dog back!

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Zelda, attending R’s commencement ceremony. She listened about as well as some of the students around us did and was much less chatty. But it was a very festive atmosphere!

In other news, R’s graduation was lovely. New College students treat commencement as a combination costume party and picnic. It took place at sunset, by the water, and while there were appropriate speeches, suggestions to go out and change the world, and professors attired with dignity in their academic robes, the students were celebrating.

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New College commencement

R had been torn earlier in the day whether he was going costume-party or dignity, but he went with the costume and I got to watch — with immense pride — my six-foot four, bearded son accept his diploma while dressed as a lobster. I’d been thinking prior to the moment that despite the whistles and cheers and yelling of the audience, I’d probably only be able to bring myself to applaud until my hands hurt, but as it happened, I yelled and whooped for him with the best of them. I’d worried that I might cry, but I think it is actually impossible to cry when watching a lobster graduate. There was much beaming with pride, though. He told me later that his favorite part of the evening was all the parents of the kids he works with coming up to him and asking to take his picture to show their kids.

And then another nice thing happened this week: I was taking care of some basic business stuff, including checking to see whether the Italian translation was finally available, and I remembered that I’d scheduled free promotions for the other translations. Instead of going to Amazon and looking for the German translation, I used Google and it took to me Amazon-Germany, where I discovered…

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A German best given-away-er

I could have used Google translate to read the reviews, but I didn’t — I just enjoy knowing that they exist. And that for a brief moment in time, Ghosts — or rather, Die Gabe der Geister — was an international best-given-away-er.

Roses

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My dad gave me roses for Mother’s Day and I have been appreciating them all week. They’re perfect roses — they opened nicely, they look lovely, and they smell beautiful.

This morning I found a trail map of Oscar Scherer State Park — the place where I’m staying, and where I’ve stayed several times before — and I realized that there was a long trail that I’ve never been on. It leads to another lake, one that I’ve never seen. I’m leaving today, so I don’t have time to do it on this visit, but I mentally noted it for the next time we’re here.

And then I wondered whether Z would be with me the next time I’m here. She’s not doing great. She ate breakfast a couple of days ago, but now she’s pretty much turning up her nose at any food unless I hand-feed her, and even then, she eats a few bites and then turns her head away. The one exception was beef with sweet potatoes yesterday afternoon — she nosed out almost all the pieces of beef on her own, avoiding all the sweet potato, but at least she ate.

This morning, she was restless at 5AM, so I took her out, but she seemed confused: she just stood in the campsite and trembled, no peeing, no walking, no sniffing. I brought her back in again and put her up on the bed with me (she’s been sleeping on the floor, her choice) and by 7AM, she’d pretty much covered the sheets with pee. So today will be another laundry day, which is fine. But then instead of telling me at 6:30 that it was time to go out, she had to be persuaded to come for a walk. She did walk, eventually, with lots of very normal sniffing, but her walks are getting slower and shorter.

All of that added up to me being very sad when I thought about the trail that we’ve never seen and wondered whether I’d ever see it with her — and then I remembered: R is graduating tomorrow. My frequent visits to Oscar Scherer are coming to an end, because I’ll no longer have a reason to visit Sarasota. Maybe I’ll come back someday — it’s a great park and I love it here– but it’s not like I’m looking at a guaranteed return in three months or six months or even ever. So yeah, maybe I won’t have Z with me when I come back and maybe she’ll never see that trail, but life is change. Sometimes that means it hurts, but I wouldn’t want time to be frozen.

And meanwhile, we have today. It’s going to include — well, laundry, obviously. But also some good work on Grace, I hope; some texting with friends; some family time with my son and dad and stepmom; some delicious food, including a celebratory restaurant meal at a place where Z gets to come join us on the patio; and maybe even a movie.

Also, some appreciation of some lovely roses. They won’t last forever, because nothing does. But today they are beautiful and I am grateful to have them in my life.

Miscellany

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R told me a very funny story about love bugs yesterday (while we were having a nice Mother’s Day brunch) and it almost made me feel kindly toward them. For a minute or two. It didn’t last.

For those not from Florida, the bugs colloquially called “love bugs” — I have no idea what their real name is — have a brief mating season in spring and in fall. Every few years, their mating season is insanely crazy and there are bugs everywhere. You can’t go outside without breathing them in, because there are so many of them. They will crawl on you, they will get in your hair, they will fly in your face, and they will cover your vehicle. Yesterday, during my drive to Sarasota, I probably killed hundreds of them, maybe thousands. It does not make for a cheerful drive. So, so, so gross.

Fortunately (?), it’s also really rainy. Enough so that I checked the weather this morning with a wary eye. I’m not leaving Florida until R graduates from college and there’s no way I’m missing his graduation, but we actually might be looking at the first named storm of the 2018 hurricane season. About three weeks too early, but Al Gore warned us a long time ago about changing weather systems. It’s not a surprise. And it is handy for rinsing off dead love bugs.

I’m waiting on test results for Z, but she is unchanged. Yesterday afternoon, she peed on both beds, so I spent the afternoon and early evening doing laundry. The campground (Oscar Scherer Stat Park) has a nice washer and dryer, so I managed to get clean sheets on the beds, but it cost me $7 total. That’s going to be an expensive daily habit.

Meanwhile, she rejected fresh Atlantic salmon and rice for breakfast. I ate some and it was quite delicious. But she seemed hungry before I gave her the pills she’s supposed to take and it finally occurred to me to wonder whether the medication — which is not doing anything for the peeing problem — is making her nauseous. Turns out the side effects are restlessness, irritability and loss of appetite. I’m thinking we are going to stop those pills. I’ll continue with the antibiotics, at least until we get the test results. Eventually I will become nonchalant about the peeing, I suppose, if the other options are starving dog and/or dying dog. Peeing dog is fine in comparison.

I actually really wanted to make some cute flow chart graphics for this post. The first would ask, “Has Zelda peed inside?” and the answers would be, “No,” leading to “Of course not, what a bizarre idea, why would she do that?” and “Yes,” leading to “Seriously? WTF?”. The second chart would ask, “Has Zelda peed inside?” and the “Yes” response would lead to a bunch of variants, like “Did she pee on me?” and “Did it wake me up?” and “Did she pee on so many things that I must immediately do multiple loads of laundry?” and so on, with answers that would include “Great!” and “No problem,” for the lesser pee issues. Honestly, pee on the floor only bothers me now if I step in it.

However, creating a flow chart turned out to be a lot more work than one would expect. I wound up having lots of fun playing with book cover designs instead. I’m a long way away from needing any new book covers, but it was fun to try out some variations. (I was using free templates from Canva and my own photographs.)

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Of course, the book I’m really working on is Grace, so I should get back to it. No progress this weekend, unsurprisingly, and this week — given the graduation and the distractions inherent in being in the same town as R — is probably not going to be my most productive, but I’m really pretty close to finishing a draft for the first time ever. And I have no current impulse to start over from the beginning, which is a good sign.

I’ve got one other distraction happening this week, though, which is pretty fun. When I was walking Z this morning, I was wondering why it felt sort of like Christmas Eve. You know the feeling, that slightly magical sense of anticipation? And then I remembered that it’s because The Penderwicks at Last[image error] releases tomorrow. Yes, it feels like Christmas Eve because of a book. But I love the Penderwicks and I’m so looking forward to getting lost in their world again for a few hours.

First, though, some Grace!

Onward…

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The good news: I have written words on Grace. Progress! And after spending a couple of days mostly saying things like, “I hate this book, this book is so stupid, I hate this book,” last night I re-read some of the earlier chapters, trying to find a detail I needed, and it made me laugh. I actually made my friend L (whose driveway has been my home for the past couple of days) listen to me read bits aloud. She didn’t laugh, but that was okay, because I was mostly interrupting her in her own writing. And my own laughing is sufficient motivation to continue writing today. Someday I really am going to finish this book. I will probably hate it and think it’s stupid, but at least it has parts that are fun. That’s going to have to be good enough, I think.

The bad news: Z and I will be going back to the vet tomorrow afternoon. She’s now drinking lots of water while turning up her nose at most food, including plain chicken breast and ground beef with sweet potatoes, and she threw up her pills this morning, so… well, I guess the good news is that it looks less like dementia. And more like kidney failure, so it’s not exactly what you would call good news. I feel a little sorry for my vet, who spent hours valiantly trying to save B three months ago, including taking her turns holding an oxygen mask over his face while he snuggled in her lap. I know she doesn’t want to give me bad news anymore than I want to hear it. But we’re probably going to try some antibiotics, so maybe Z will be feeling much better soon. Fingers crossed, prayers said. And thank you for all the sympathy and good wishes — I so appreciate them.

Back to Grace. Not sure the LZSP strategy of trying to focus on work is really working out — I seem to spend a lot of time staring into space — but word-by-word, I will finish this book.

L.Z.S.P.

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On Thursday, I got nothing done. Zelda had a vet appointment at 4PM and I spent the day trying to drown my worry in puttering. Laundry, re-organzing cupboards, washing dishes, wiping down the floor, folding clothes in different ways… Eventually, we made it to the vet, who ruled out a urinary tract infection or kidney problems. That left, as I had suspected, hormone-related urinary incontinence.

Or dementia.

Don’t ever google canine dementia.

It’s not something you want to know anything about if you love a dog, not unless you’re forced to.

Zelda started the incontinence medication on Friday morning. It takes between 5-10 days to take effect, so the fact that she’s peed in the van multiple times since then does not mean that she’s got dementia, not yet. But the incontinence really is getting dramatically worse — she went from an unexpected accident inside in February to peeing on my bed on April 13th, to doing it again a week later, then three times within a week, then yesterday three times within the day.

I am… well, somewhat distraught, actually. It’s not just the peeing, although that’s obviously uncool. Yesterday she managed to pee on two fitted sheets, two pillowcases, and a top sheet! Plus the floor, plus a rug, or maybe two rugs. Fortunately, I’m parked in a friend’s driveway, so there was a washing machine nearby.

But she’s also not eating well, she’s doing weird things like burying bits of food around the van (so not okay), she’s sleeping on the floor instead of my bed, and, of course, every odd thing she does now looks like a symptom of dementia to me.

I don’t think I could possibly be living a worse lifestyle for a dog with dementia. And my vague thoughts of settling down by renting a room from someone are obviously impossible with an incontinent dog — I can’t imagine how stressed out I would be, if I was that tenant.

After I lost B, I realized I needed to develop a Zelda Loss Survival Plan. I can’t remember if I wrote about it, but I really did take it seriously. I knew that if losing B was bad, losing Z was going to be… well.

Anyway, I was walking her this morning and realized that the fundamental problem with my ZLSP is that it also needs to be a LZSP — a Losing Zelda Survival Plan. If her loss isn’t a lightning bolt, but a long, slow nightmare that includes the possibility of her no longer recognizing me, no longer knowing who I am, becoming aggressive… yeah, I need a different plan.

I have no idea what that plan looks like, but it probably starts with taking one minute at a time. And in this minute, it’s a lovely day in Florida. It’s probably going to get too hot, as always, but my window is open, I’m listening to clucking chickens from the neighbor’s house and chirping birds, and there’s a cool breeze.

I haven’t managed to get any writing done at all in the last week — haven’t even tried! — but I am working on a project that I should finish my part of today, and then I’ll try to get back to Grace. And the project that I’m working on — well, maybe I should save the details for another blog post. But for me it involves listening, not writing, so it’s a novel experience. WordPress just tried to change “novel” into “lovely” and I wouldn’t describe it that way — I actually find it sort of uncomfortable and torturous — but I think the end result is going to be excellent. And in the moment, it’s a really good distraction from worry. Perhaps my LZSP should include immense focus on work?

Best of April 2018

If the best day of every month is the last day of every month, does that mean that I’m really good at living in the moment I’m in or that my memory remembers things worse than they are? Or maybe that thinking about my best days reminds me to appreciate my days making them better than the days that I’m not thinking about? Maybe it’s just that I’ve randomly had a couple of really good campgrounds at the ends of recent months.

But April 29th, 2018 was the peak of a remarkably nice month. The month started in Arkansas, took a brief dip into Oklahoma, and ended in Georgia. With one parking lot, one random field, two national campgrounds, three state parks, and five Army Corps of Engineers campgrounds, it included the luxurious baths at Hot Springs, a sprinkling of snow in Dam Site Lake, a waterfall in Oklahoma, a very mellow and peaceful birthday that was highly sociable considering I spent the entire day alone in the van, and a lot of good writing.

But my favorite day was this Sunday.

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Cotton Hill Campground, Georgia

In part, it was because the campground was absolutely beautiful and at a beautiful time of year. I definitely regretted giving up my inflatable kayak, because it was a perfect campsite and perfect weather for kayaking. The day started cool, but warmed up to the mid-70s. I spent it… well, puttering around, really.

I’d finally found gluten-free oats at a grocery store in Alabama, so I baked granola in the morning and was very, very happy to be eating my own granola again. This version was heavy on the ginger and the pumpkin seeds.

I didn’t have a lot of food in the van, so wound up making a quinoa bowl with steak, avocado, cucumber, red onion, and a dressing of Greek yogurt, mint, lime juice and chili garlic sauce for lunch. It sounds wrong, I suppose, that not having much food led to such a tasty meal but I was out of salad greens and most of my usual vegetables, which is why I was relying on quinoa to fill me up. It did and it was delicious, too. And also just a really nice little cooking project of the “and what can I do with this?” ilk. I love that experience of feeling like there’s nothing to eat and then discovering that in fact I have everything I need to make something delicious. Maybe the only thing I ever really need is the imagination to put the pieces together?

I had a water hook-up and empty tanks, plus knew that I could dump the tanks the next day, so I was absolutely profligate with my water use, washing my dishes in hot water and rinsing them thoroughly, and then washing some dishes that I hadn’t used but that couldn’t hurt to be a bit cleaner. When I owned a dishwasher, I never knew how satisfying truly clean dishes could be.

I read books that I’d read before, I sat in my outside chair in the sun, I snuggled Zelda when she’d allow it, and I took a couple very mellow walks — more like saunters, really. I’m pretty sure I spent a couple of hours on a jigsaw puzzle; I’m quite sure that my writing was minimal, just journaling. I had a lovely conversation with R, in which he told me that we had to change our Mother’s Day plans, because he was not going to spoil my day with a movie that would make me unhappy for hours, ha. (We have a long-standing tradition of superhero movies on Mother’s Day. This year’s is maybe too grim for me, however.)

And I appreciated the air and the birdsong and the water view and my life. It’s so easy for the days to blend together — even when they’re good days, even when I like them. One good day follows the next and the highlight is a good meal that’s a lot like some other good meal from a week earlier, and I remember to be grateful but I don’t remember to savor the moment I’m in.

I forget to breathe and return to worry.

But after two long days of driving and with more driving ahead of me, a peaceful day in a beautiful place where my biggest ambition was to talk Zelda into eating some dog food was golden.

Journeying back to Florida

I spent last Thursday wavering with indecision. I’d intended to go to a meet-up of fellow Travato owners in Jasper and I’d been looking forward to it for months. It was, in fact, a big part of the reason I’d decided to spend my month in Arkansas, rather than North Carolina or Georgia. But I felt like crap. Not so debilitated that I wasn’t even leaving the van — Zelda was getting her walks again — but taking a shower still seemed like a monumental endeavor, possibly beyond my energy level entirely. Meeting people, going out to eat, listening to music, canoeing on the Buffalo river, sharing a potluck dinner, all sounded nice, but completely overwhelming. I was still in crawl-under-the-covers and stare-out-the-window mode. And I knew that the 16-hour drive to Florida wasn’t going to be a breeze.

Zelda made my decision for me on Friday morning. It was a chilly morning, so I was buried in my sheets, tucked up under my warmest blanket. She was snuggled into me so sweetly, curled up in the curve of my back. It was so cozy and nice. And then it was not cozy and not nice, because there was warm liquid on my back and my sheets and my blankets, rapidly turning cold in the chill of the van. She stood up and gave me a look of puzzled reproach, then moved over to other side of the bed and curled up and went back to sleep. I did not go back to sleep. Ugh. She honestly doesn’t seem to have any awareness that she’s peeing. She’s not showing signs of distress ahead of time, not telling me she needs to go out, not even squatting. She was lying down, and then she was lying down in a puddle of dog pee. And so was I. Ugh, double-ugh, triple-ugh.

Adding laundry and a need for clean sheets and a dog with incontinence issues to my trip dropped a heavy weight on the “go home now” side of the indecision teeter-totter. Instead of packing to head north, I called the vet and made an appointment for Z, posted my apologies to the Facebook group and started on the road east.

Here’s an interesting factoid: Arkansas is actually a lot closer to Colorado than it is to central Florida. If I’d been headed to Denver, it would have been a 12 hour drive. I don’t know why that’s surprising to me — obviously the western states touch the midwestern states — but I think of Arkansas as a southern state.

I didn’t leave too early and I didn’t push too hard on the drive. I took it reasonably easy, giving myself breaks when I got too tired and spending some time at rest stops and in grocery store parking lots. In the early evening and just across the border into Alabama, I found a water management area that offered dispersed camping. Perfect!

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Or not quite so perfect. When I got there, a sign said, “no camping.” Apparently they’d changed the rules. A nice woman warned me that the game warden would make me leave, plus give me a ticket. So I let Z out for a bit and ate my dinner while admiring the above sunset, then headed on. I wound up spending the night in a nearby Walmart parking lot. It was a typical parking lot experience, too noisy during the evening, creepily quiet in the early hours of the morning.

On Saturday, I decided I wasn’t going to push. When I look at a drive on Google maps and see that it’s 16 hours, I subconsciously believe that it’s going to take me 16 hours of driving time. My conscious mind knows much better. That 16 hours doesn’t include getting off the highway for gas, the extra driving time to find a place to stay, breaks at rest stops for meals and dog walks, traffic delays and getting trapped behind school buses. That 16 hours is the totally optimistic, ideal world, robot-chauffeur drive time. Reality is never so quick.

But leaving Arkansas early meant that I had plenty of time to get to Florida. Instead of driving all day and staying in another parking lot overnight, I decided I’d find a campground in the early afternoon and enjoy a peaceful night. I picked one not quite at random. I didn’t want to stay someplace that I’d already been (even though I’ve quite liked a lot of the places I’ve already been) which ruled out many of the places on my most direct path home. Also, I’ve been discovering that I really like the Army Corps of Engineers campgrounds. All other things being equal, I’m more interested in trying a new ACoE campground than any other option.

Slight digression:

National campgrounds, IME, are really crowded. They’re very nice, but they’re packed with people, and they’re busy, busy places. Not just people, but people on the move.

State campgrounds depend on the state. Some states have really nice systems: Florida is a total winner in terms of quality of the state parks for camping, but other states… well, it depends on the state. I was going to say “not all states are created equal,” but really, it’s, “not all states make the same choices.” That said, overall, state campgrounds are second on my list of campgrounds to try.

County campgrounds — completely erratic. You’ve got no idea what you’re getting when you try a county campground: it might be incredibly lovely or it might be a parking lot for transients.

Independent campgrounds, generally speaking, are for a different audience than me. Maybe they’re resorts, maybe they’re trailer parks, but they typically prioritize paved parking spots and amenities. Some of them are very nice, of course, but you also pay for what you get. The most expensive places I’ve stayed were independent campgrounds and while I can certainly think of a couple off the top of my head that were worth the money, I rarely try them these days. I only look at independent campgrounds if I’ve ruled out all my other options.

Which brings me back to Saturday and finding a place to stay. I spent a while at my morning rest stop browsing camping options reasonably near to my path, eventually picked Cotton Hill Campground, and headed that way. I got there around 2 and they only had a few spots left — and a two-night minimum stay! I didn’t even pause: I was already sick of driving and taking a day as a break sounded just fine to me.

More about Cotton Hill in my next post…

Aux Arc

I wonder how I’m going to remember places. And then I wonder whether it really matters. I’d like to live so mindfully that my present is always more of my focus than my past, that instead of trying to remember where I was at X date of years gone by, I’m always appreciating where I am.

That said, Aux Arc is the sound of trains rumbling by and Canadian geese murmuring.

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For some reason, when I arrived here last Friday, I paid for a full week’s stay. I didn’t know how I was going to feel about the campground, but I’d had a chance to drive through before picking a site, so I knew that at least I had a water view. And maybe I knew that I was getting sick. I definitely knew I was tired.

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As it turned out, my campsite was a peaceful place in which to be miserable. Not good for the writing, unfortunately. All my good intentions of progress on Grace turned into staring at the blank screen for a while and then going back to sleep. I wrote a few hundred words here and there, but mostly they went nowhere.

But I’d like to not remember this place as a place where I was miserable. It deserves better. It’s green and quiet and still and even though trains rumble by and barges drift down the river, I could easily imagine myself staying here happily for another week or even longer. It’s not wilderness, but it’s spacious nature. (Also a serious bargain — with an America the Beautiful pass, campsites are half price, so I’m paying $9/night for electricity, water, and a water view.)

But my time is up tomorrow, my tanks are full, my fridge is empty, and I have weekend plans. And then next week, it’s back to Florida. R texted me yesterday to let me know that he’d passed his thesis exam: it wasn’t a surprise, but I found myself unexpectedly teary with pride. I want to go back in time and tell the self that was agonizing over whether to try yet another new school to relax and just do it. And then in three weeks, I will get to watch him graduate from college: I suspect I should bring tissues.

Just a cold, really

On Saturday, I texted my friend L and said, “This illness has moved incredibly quickly from ‘maybe I’m sick,’ to ‘Death is inevitable and I can only hope it comes quickly.'”

Yesterday, R called. I said, “Hello,” and he said, “Oh, you don’t sound good.” I said, “Yeah, I thought about calling you earlier, but all I really have to say is ‘whine, whine, whine.’ And now I’m done. How are you?”

So yeah. Whine, whine, whine. Being sick in a van sucks and I would truly like… oh, a real bed, a hot bath, some good drugs — Dayquil would be nice — and another box or two of tissues. And some chicken soup. And Zelda would very much like someone to take her for a walk.

It is oddly peaceful, though. In a house, when I’m sick, I’m always in search of something to help me feel better. The hot bath or a more comfortable pillow, a distraction or a drink. I turn on the television, turn it off again. Pick up a book, put it down again. Walk to the kitchen, go back to the bedroom. Try out the couch for a while, then move to the recliner. It’s a fretful search for comfort. In the van, there’s nothing I can do, except stare out the window and wait to feel better.

So that’s what I’m doing. Waiting to feel better. Fingers crossed that it’s sooner rather than later.