Sunday Selections

 

This is a meme that Elephant's Child has been posting about, I think since I started following here many years ago. She is on #583. According to her, the purpose of the meme is to use up photo's that are languishing on your camera roll that would otherwise not have a home. Having ridden on seven different trains since Christmas, I have quite a lot of those who will thank Elephant's Child for the opportunity of liberation. So without further ado... 

I do not think that I used this picture on anything else. It is the ceiling of the King Street Station in Seattle. The buildings built for the railroads in the early 1900's were spectacular structures that obviously meant to impress passengers. Those that are built in the Amtrak period are much more humble. Some aren't really even stations, they just drop off or pick up in front of whatever building seems to be available on the track. Sometimes the building isn't much more than a bus shelter by the tracks. It kind of tells you the way the railroad has gone over the last century and a fifth. The issues that I am having with them right now is all about that loss of customer service and has nothing to do with the buildings. But the buildings do reflect the companies culture.

This was one of the first train trip pictures that I took. Considering that I was taking pictures from a fast moving train through a dirty window, you would expect a blurred picture that can't be made out. That isn't really the story with this one. What happened was that we were moving head on into a blizzard, and only a few days before Christmas, to boot. There is actually a river and some mountains that can't be made out in the distance. It was hard to see it in the snow and it didn't show up at all on the picture. The snow was blowing sideways. My compliments to the conductor for keeping the train on the tracks.

This winery is in eastern Washington state, near a town named Wenatchee. I hear that it is a tourist town and worth going to see. Instead of the grand tour of the country that I had hoped to enjoy on Amtrak this summer, I might just take the train there and enjoy a few days tasting wine instead. Or maybe Karen and Ken would like to go with me, and we could easily drive there in a few hours. We haven't been travelling much this year due to Cheese being so weak. We didn't want to have to ask someone else to care for him while he was down. Now that we only have healthy cats, we can have someone come by twice a day to feed them, and they will be fine. I think that I'd like to see the vines in their lush summer greens. 
 

Elephant's Child's selection this Sunday featured clouds, so I thought that this would be a good place to end my selections today. I hope I haven't bored you too much with my little slideshow of my travels. 

Have a wonderful week...

It's Five O'clock on a Saturday

 

I'd ask about the regular crowd, but it's 5:00 am, not pm and I do hope that you were all still deep in your dreams. I however, had woken up covered in sweat, ravenously hungry and wondering if I could make it the 20 feet to the bathroom before wetting myself. There was an anxious buzzing inside my head that was different than what I am used too. And my movements were slow and clumsy. It felt as if I was walking on shifting sand.

After relieving myself, eating a peanut butter and banana sandwich and changing my tee shirt I realized that all the things that had woken me from a dead sleep after 3 hours are the symptoms of a low blood sugar. I checked and even after having eaten I was only at 66. I waited another 15 minutes and checked again to find that I was at 61. Glucometers are not really known for their remarkable accuracy. It is hard to know if my blood sugar was actually falling or if the decline was just a quirk of the test strip. I ate a couple of sugar tabs and waited another 15 minutes to check again. That is how my morning has gone. After nearly 4 hours my blood sugar is finally in the acceptable range of 85. I am exhausted, but I rarely nap. once I wake up, I'm up. So, I'm thinking this rainy Saturday is a wash, and it has only just started. 

Summer Weather on it's Way

The weather today is absolutely gorgeous. It's warm and sunny with a gentle breeze. I opened both of the windows in my bedroom for the first time this year. And just about the time I was turning around to do something else, Max jumped in my window and dropped a small, dead mouse on my newly washed quilt. Really, it's the thought that counts...

I walked to the park and enjoyed the sunshine and fresh air. A lot of other people where there enjoying it too. It is good to see the children back. That is the "covid precaution" I really didn't understand. They closed all the parks and playgrounds. That never made sense to me. But I guess back then, we really didn't understand much about how it was spread. 

Something else I'm glad to see back is all the street markets and festivals. I do enjoy them and every town around here seems to have them every weekend in the summer and fall. Karen really doesn't like them, so I think that I will be out visiting them on my own this summer, just to really be able to enjoy a few of them fully. We will go to the Scottish Highland Festival together. But as always, we will most likely leave before doing anything more than walking through as fast as her legs can carry her and leaving without seeing much of anything. It's not a criticism, some people are just like that. It's the thought that counts.

 
 

Overheard

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I have been contemplating a conversation that I overheard a while ago. It was during the holidays and all the stores and restaurants were short staffed. To put this conversation in perspective, unemployment at the time was at an all time low in many places.

She said that people just didn't want to work anymore. If the homeless poor wanted jobs, there were plenty to be had. He said people are working, just not in jobs advertised on the establishment's front door. Those jobs don't pay enough to live on. You would have to work 3 jobs and still not have enough to house and feed yourself. If the business owners would pay enough, people would work there. She said those jobs AREN'T WORTH THAT MUCH MONEY. (Sorry for the shouting, but I wanted to emphasize that part.)  He asked if she would do those jobs knowing that at the end of the day the only home waiting was a park bench. She did not answer. But there it is. She left the foul unspoken part sitting out for all of us to see. She thinks that there is a whole class of people who don't deserve a basic quality of life; housing, food, clothing, healthcare. They should just be grateful  for the privilege of flipping her burger. 

There is a study that says to rent a basic apartment anywhere in the US, you need to make $24.50 an hour. 

And that is what it is like here in the United States.

Cheese's Last Day

Sir Cheddar Cheese Esq. 
~2003?-May 15, 2022

One of the first things I was told about Cheese was too not get too attached. He didn't have long for this world. That was nearly three years ago. And he was a decrepit old cuss when I met him. It was hard to get a picture of him doing anything but sleeping. If he wasn't begging treats in the kitchen, it was most likely what he was doing. 

He died by halves, especially this past year. At Christmas it was clear that it would be his last. He immediately pulled himself under the tree and stayed there until we took it away from him in March. The tree was long dead, but he seemed to enjoy it. 

He went down hill since we removed the tree. He finally became almost completely paralyzed. But surprisingly was still quite lively sometimes. This past week he seemed like he turned a corner. He quit eating and drinking. He began to cry sometimes when people would walk by, but would stop if we would hold him. Karen woke up in the very early morning thinking it was time for the lunar eclipse. She had the wrong day. She found Cheese crying and stayed holding him until he quietly slipped away. 

We buried him in the back yard. I will find something suitable to mark his grave with, but until then we plan to plant sunflowers above it for this summer. He loved a good shady flower. Soon he will have them again.

 

Required

 

So, this is what I have been working on. It isn't finished by far. But I can only visualize part of what I want to do with the rest of it. 

I went grocery shopping at Walmart after working on the painting. There was a time that I was stopping by one of their stores almost daily. Now, I can count on one hand how many times I've been in there this year. I consider that a good thing. Ken said that he'd like to have Swiss steak for dinner, and I had a few things I wanted to pick up there. The best thing I can say for the experience is that it was Tuesday afternoon. If it'd been the weekend, it would have been worse. 

After getting home and putting the groceries away, it was time to make dinner. I'm using that as an excuse for not getting a walk. The truth is that I picked around with a lot of different things that didn't accomplish much. But that's okay. My life isn't about quantity of accomplishments anymore. I have no use for a daily summary. Pay my bills, clean up after myself; that's all that is required. 

Another Day in the Park

 

I played with my paints this morning. The result, while looking like something a fourth grader might have produced, made me very happy. I think that I have accepted that I will never be mentioned among the greats, but just doing it is enough. I should have cleaned my room and washed my clothes, instead I did this.

And to cap my overarching lack of responsibility off, I decided that I would like another picnic and knit day in the park. The weather had other thoughts about that. I did walk to Zola's and pick up a sandwich and a bag of chips before heading to the park. My lunch was enjoyable. But just as I was finishing and beginning to knit a wind picked up and it began sprinkle. I quickly packed my things and started walking home. By the time I made it to F Street the sprinkle had picked up and was a decent shower. Still, it was a pleasant walk home. I was glad that I decided to wear my raincoat instead of just a sweater.

I got home to find a Mother's Day gift from Mollie that had arrived a day late. It is an electronic picture frame with web connectivity. Not only can I put all my travel pictures on it, Mollie can send me her wedding pictures and pictures of George too. I am going to have to study the manual to get it set up properly. 

Oh look! Now the sun is out again. I really want to go out and play today.

Mother's Day

 

It's Mother's Day. I really didn't know it until my brother wished me a happy one when I woke up this morning. We really aren't celebrating it here. None of our children are here and it's been decades since we had a mother to honor. Since it is a beautiful day, I decided that spending it in the park with a picnic lunch would be good. I packed a tuna sandwich, a banana, a couple of diet cokes and my knitting and walked over. I'm glad I did. It was a good plan. 

The added benefit was that there was nice natural light to see the stitches in the dark blue hat I have been trying to knit. I have taken it out several times because the stitch pattern gets off. And it does that because I can't see it well with house lighting.  I could remedy this if I would make myself develop consistent habits, like always putting my work down on a knit stitch. Or I could just knit with a brighter color yarn. The color of the yarn doesn't show up well in the picture. It is actually a dark royal navy color. 

The hat is for Jack's birthday. I would like to get it sent out tomorrow, but that isn't likely to happen. It takes 8 to 12 hours to knit a hat. This one is fairly simple, but I chose to do it in a dark color that I can't see very well. I chose the color because it's for Jack and I don't want him asking "Does Nana realize that I'm a guy, not a girl?" 

That and I think the other hat I made him might be taken for being too. And the rest of the gift is a guidebook for hunting Sasquatch and a horn cup. He might think I'm just off. He probably will, so I'm sure that making another hat will really make it better...yeah, I'm alone in my head that much. It would be easier to get a gift for a teenager that I actually have contact with. But I haven't been allowed to see or talk to him since I left Georgia nearly 3 years ago. He isn't allowed screen time, so no phone calls or FaceTimes. He isn't allowed to go to family events because he might have to miss a day of school. Sometimes my son will send a photo of him with a gift I have sent. That is as much as I ever get. I wrote letters to him for a while, but he never answered. I have to wonder if his mother withheld those too. Maybe I should include some stationary, a pen and some stamps too. But that almost puts a demand on a gift. Maybe I'll just send some with a letter at a different time. I think this will only get harder as time goes on. I'll probably just resort to sending gift cards at some point.

I think my knitting picnics in the park might become a pleasant day event. It was very enjoyable. While I was there, people's dogs kept walking up to me because they smelled the tuna. Then they would talk for a minute. It was just a nice afternoon. I think it will happen again

Early Morning Ramblings

 

I am so inconsistent about coming here it makes writing a new blog awkward. So much has happened. It is hard to speak of it. I watch the news in horror now. The world has always had evil, but it seems that it has taken completely over. Russia is ... there just are no words strong enough to cry out against evil! Then I have to realize that we have done the same, and in my lifetime. Just on the other side of the world and... and what? The truth is that I had no way to truly understand or empathize with the people who were being terrorized. And there is Afghanistan...I have to close it out because I have no way to apologize, or to make it better.  And I worry about WW3. This time we will not be spared. This time they don't have to cross oceans to get us. 

Now I hear that we are to be the next target of the republican war machine.  Welcome to Gilead...Roe v. Wade is gone. How could we not understand that it could be taken away. Or in the least, not understand that Roe was the ERA that we got. Why did we not insist that it be made constitutional law? Mostly I block it out. I sit in my room and knit or play games on my iPad. I watch Time Team on YouTube. 

We had a beautiful double rainbow the other day and I prayed it was a sign, but Cheese is still here. I don't go into the living room other than to walk through the front door. To sit in there is to watch him die. It's pretty awful. Karen sits with him and takes care of him. I know she wishes I would too, but this is not my choosing. I would handle this all very differently because I know that emotionally I can't handle it this way. He can't possibly hold on for much longer. I say that, but yet I said that last year this time. I pray God that he doesn't. 

On the lighter side, Mollie and Chris got married. The ceremony was beautiful, Mostly, everyone behaved. Mostly it was Chris's family. Matt and Jen had just started new jobs in Austin, so they weren't able to make it. Tim and Ex. were there. But Jenn forbade Tim from bringing Jack with him. She said that he couldn't come because he would have to miss school while traveling home on Monday. Frankly, I don't buy it. She was being the passive aggressive B she has always been to us. But we were spared having to deal with Ex's wife. There are mercies. 

I really like Chris's family. They are maybe the only extended family I know who don't show up for Thanksgiving dinner with drama and baggage. Everyone relaxes, drinks way too much, eats even more and then leaves happy they came. The wedding was the same. Everyone came, drank way too much, ate even more, then danced the night away, happy they had come. 

The visit with Ex was good, and weird and awkward. I am still processing what I feel about that. I didn't realize until the wedding that something in my mind equated the wedding with finally closing the door on my relationship to him. So now for me, it's over. He is another long-ago friend living in North Carolina. 

To be honest though; I barely recognized my old friend. Physically, he has changed a lot. When I married him, he was 6'2".  His nickname was Too Tall. Now he's barely taller than I am. Mollie was a little taller than him and she's only a little taller than me. And he is feeble. I don't know how it is that he is still working. 

I think it is better that it's over now. I'm not sad about it. It has just taken a lot of mental adjustment to come to the realization. Like I said, it was good and awkward.

The train trip was hard, and frustrating. It was beautiful, and there were definitely redeeming things about the trips. But I don't think I will be doing it again for a while. Amtrak has made it unsafe to travel in Coach. They have cancelled so many trains and routes on the west coast that all of  their trains are over-booked. That means that there is a 100% chance that every seat will be sold out for most of the trip. They don't require masks, and won't enforce not coming on the train if you are obviously sick. They could allow me to purchase both seats, so I would have a buffer and they wouldn't lose a fare, but they won't. If I purchase two tickets for myself or a ticket for a fictional passenger they will just cancel my trip. So I just don't feel safe riding with them for the time being. I would like to take a trip in the fall, but that is unlikely with the way things are now. For now, I. am stuck to where I can go on the Sounder.

I have a lot more to say.  I just need to work through it more. The wedding was a big transition for me that I hadn't expected. Hopefully I will find my way back here more.