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.