Tuesday, October 23, 2012

A Crisis a Day

Can't I get a break?  This morning, just before dawn, a tree fell and took out two other trees in our front yard.  The trees out here are tall.  These were cedar, maple, and alder.  The good news is that nothing else was smashed except that the strain relief broke on the power line and the cable and phone lines are now lying limp across the garage roof.  All afternoon, we cut and stacked wood and piled up the brush. 

I'd really like time to process one thing before the next crazy thing happens, but life doesn't hand it out that way, does it? 

I can't keep up.  I'm still dreaming of intestines spilling out all over into my hands when I close my eyes to try to fall asleep. 

There are things that just aren't normal to say.

"I had intestines on my shoes."

or

"His intestines got tangled up with the seat belt." 

At least I spoke to my friend Tracy this morning.  Remember the vet who is also a very good friend?  She's amazing.  She told me that whatever I did wouldn't have made a difference for poor Ruger.  She told me that intestines are hard to handle and not to worry that I was bumbling, that I was trying to help him. I keep thinking about this poor cat who was still alive during all of this.  Oh that poor sweet cat needed help that I was inadequate to give.

I generally feel inadequate.  I knew I couldn't clear the driveway by myself today either. I spent all day working with the power and phone people to get the lines fixed.  Tomorrow, I need to call the cable people.  I hope this guy doesn't want to talk. 

This morning, when my car was blocked in by the fallen trees, I had to drive the kids to school in our old truck.  When I got to the market afterward - I needed milk - my truck had a strong smell of fresh gasoline.  Oh right.  When I got home, the smell was still hanging about.  It's an old truck, sure, but I'm not certain I want to be driving around in a bomb, at least not that kind of a bomb.  One thing at a time would be nice.  Not an option, is it?

The hardest thing about handling extraordinary things is when I'm still expected to attend to ordinary things.   Meetings, groceries, dishes.  My friend was worried about one of the boys getting his feelings hurt and sent me more than fourteen long text messages about it.  I kept trying to tell her that we'd work it out, but we need to wait for the other mom to get back to us.  The funny thing is that I think the boys should be setting all this stuff up.  I know that they're not quite used to it yet, but they need to start.  And isn't there a point when you just get on the phone and talk about it?  Texting has its limits, especially when I was in a meeting tonight and the texts kept piling up because I was trying to be polite and pay attention. 

One thing at a time would be nice, really nice.

Tomorrow night, the notary is coming so we can refinance our house properly.  I just my name is right on the paperwork.

You could say that I'm getting about one thing a day to deal with, one thing I need to manage, then I get to stop with yesterday's thing and start working on today's thing.  I just hope I'm not too surprised by tomorrow's thing.

Thank you for listening, jules

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