Home again, home again, jiggety jig

 Finally.  It was a long six weeks, but I'm home.

Lisa continues to do well.  Her new kidney is working like a champ.  No sign of hepatitis C, happily.  All the things they test for are within normal range.  And, for the first time in decades, she is no longer anemic!  Bonus!  She's still got a lot of follow up.  It is beginning to taper off, though.  She has reached the point where she only has to go in once every two weeks, so that's a huge improvement.  Everything is pointing in the right direction.

Back here in Portland, autumn is in full swing.  Leaves changing color and piling up, temperatures dropping, days very much shorter.  I have loads of stuff to catch up on.  But, it's all the normal stuff and it feels good to be futzing around at home.

My next goal is to get my dad a booster shot, and one for my brother and me.  Dad had Pfizer, I think, so that won't be difficult.  Brother and I had J&J, so we're in a holding pattern.  But, we'll get it done.  I do feel bad about getting a booster when so much of the world hasn't gotten even one shot yet, but I don't want to jeopardize my dad's continued survival. 

What else is going on?  Nothing.  Ahhhhhh......  

Back and Resting

 Well, I'm back.  

So nice to be home!  So nice to be somewhere green!  So nice to need a hoodie!  I've missed the PNW.

Lisa is now well on the way to reasonably good health.  She is driving herself to and from dialysis and even going to the grocery store.  She is being very careful about masking and distancing, but enjoys getting out of the house (don't we all).  I knew she was ready for me to go when she started getting snippy with me.  Lol.  It's a sign of health!  I say that with great affection.  She is hugely, profoundly grateful for the care that I and KA gave her as she recovered from this medical nightmare.  

On my way home, I spent a long weekend at the ranch.  Ouch.  After a fairly sedentary stretch of time with Lisa, the long days of physical work on the ranch were a shock to the system!  I came home with bruises and exhaustion, and a cooler full of lamb.  Still, there is something very satisfying about working outside in the relatively fresh air.  

And now I'm home.  I have dozens of delayed chores and tasks to get done before it's all rain, all the time.  I'm just in time for leaf raking, the trees are beginning to turn.  My negligible garden needs to be put to bed (all those volunteer tomatoes!).  There are still huckleberries to pick, and lots of jam to be made.  The jam can wait for inclement weather but I'd rather prune and rake and dig in the fleeting sunshine.

My big kitty was happy to see me but not overly effusive until last night when he relented and chose to sleep on the bed.  He doesn't hold a grudge long, ordinarily, but this last trip was trying his patience.  He had to put up with Sara for a week, then Zoe, who brought her big male cat, for two weeks, and then good neighbor Donna for a day and a half.  It's too much, I tell you!  I need to stay home for a long stretch.

So, I'm here and I'm chilly.  I left the summerlands in the south where the temperatures were in the 80's and 90's.  Arrived home to temps in the low 60's.  I'll adjust, of course, but it sure feels chilly right now!  

I'd best finish this post and get to work.  I've got a long list!

Cheers!

Update from PDX

What do I have to say that is of interest?  Little, as usual.  But, a survey of events since last I posted reveals that I am overdue on communication.

So, how was the trip to Cali?  Good.

Lisa, my bestie from the first day of high school, the one who needs a kidney, the one we went to celebrate the birthdays with in April, is doing much, much better.  I was so relieved when I saw her!  She didn’t have her old energy – but, who among us does?  But, she was so much healthier than when we last saw her… quite the relief!  The dialysis is definitely working!

She still teaches at the really rough high school, and it is just so draining.  I worry about her all the time.   The kids are so bad.  The administration is so bad (but maybe a tiny bit better than last year).  Hell, southern California is bad.  It’s unhealthy, I believe.  It’s so dirty.  And so crowded.  So hot.  And so stressful. But, maybe that’s just me.  Anyway, I wish Lisa didn’t have to keep exhausting herself on a daily basis.

But, that’s my worry.  Let’s move on to other things.

This coming weekend I will be assisting in a Women’s Self Defense class at my martial art school.  A little background:  Besides being a black belt, I completed the training to instruct women’s and children’s self defense classes.  I worked at that in my limited spare time for a while.  But, then my mom got sick, and then she transitioned to another plane, and my energetic focus has been directed elsewhere since then.  One of my teammates is taking over the self defense program and asked me if I was interested in assisting once a month or so.  I pondered this a fair bit.  And, I decided that, yes, I was interested in going back to teach self defense.  The time is right…  sadly, the time is always right for teaching self defense.

Did I tell you about my niece moving to Portland?  Well, she did, and she is absolutely delightful.  She is smart, funny, quirky, studious, sweet, sincere.  She is a great kid!  She’s living at my dad’s house, which is great for both of them.  They are keeping an eye on each other.  Lol.  I’m trying to find the balance between helping out when and where I am needed and not interfering!  Hahahahhaha….  Actually, I’ve been pretty good at not overwhelming her.  Which makes me wonder if I should be in touch more…

One of the cats needed a trip to the vet and a ridiculous vet bill. Of course, it was the best kitty.  Couldn’t be the jerk who pees in the house, no, it had to be the most loving and affectionate of the cats.  The one for whom we are willing to spend beyond our budget.  Sigh.

We had a massive storm last weekend, but it wasn’t nearly as traumatic as the prognosticators thought it would be.  Glad of that!  Still, I did have water in my basement and there are branches down everywhere.  If it’s headed your way, it’s a wet one.

Well, I guess that’s all for now.  I hope things are humming along on a good track for the rest of you!

The new arrangement

So, how’s the new arrangement going, you ask?  Overall, pretty well.  T is settling in at her new place, although she has loads of stuff here at my house.  I don’t really care about that – at least not right now.  Her condo has tons of storage (rare, I know!) so she will be finding spots for most things as we go along.

Most of the time, I think she likes being back in Vancouver.  Her family are all there, and she is just minutes away from them all.  Sometimes that’s a good thing and sometimes it’s an annoyance, but overall it’s good.  They love having her back!  Also, her new job is just minutes from her home and she loves that.  She goes home for lunch and walks the dog, so that’s a very good thing.

Round here, things are beginning to settle down.  We’ve had a very busy August, what with T moving and then a family wedding and all sorts of other busy-ness going on.  I’m looking forward to things settling down and cooling down as we move closer to fall.  I need to get into a new routine and get the feel of it.  Right now I feel pulled in too many directions.

But, when I’m at home, alone, my contentment is up and my anxiety is down.  You know, as long as I had plenty of reading material, I could easily be a hermit.  I have very little need for socializing, and usually find myself to be the best company.  I don’t mean that in a ‘I hate people’ kind of way, just that it is so restful and calm, so restorative and serene, when I am by myself.

One thing that has surprised me is that I really miss the little dog!  T took the grouchiest of the cats and the dog with her to her new place.  I wanted her to take another cat, but she can only have two pets.  I don’t miss the cat much at all, but the dog… yes.  I haven’t been without a dog for many years.  It feels decidedly odd.  Plus, last month when she was staying with her sister during the week, I was in the habit of taking him for a brisk 20 minute walk every morning, and a more leisurely one in the afternoons.  It was good for both of us.  Now, T has to take him out every time he needs to pee, but I don’t think she is walking him for exercise.  Oh well.  He is happier with her, no matter what.  He misses being here, though!  Of course, she brings him over whenever she comes, but it’s not the same for him.  He has no dog door or his own backyard…  I’ll have to think about getting a dog of my own, but I’m in no hurry just yet.

We’ve had conversations with friends about our living separately but still being together.  Some people get it, others don’t.  One of her friends is sure that this is just step one to a break up.  Another friend is quite jealous of the arrangement, but her partner said ‘don’t even think about it!’  That made me laugh! It is a little out of the ordinary, but it works better for both of us right now.

So, really, there’s not a lot to report.  Everything is settling down and we are looking to establish our new normal.  How are things going in your world?

Sunday morning musing

Good morning!

I dropped T off at the airport at 8:20 this morning.  She is on her trip to Hawaii with her sister.  They will be gone for a week.  I really hope that she can spend the time resting and restoring her physical and mental self.  She is tired.  This will do her good.

So, that means that I have my house to myself for a week!  Yay!  Time for quiet and reflection, or projects that are on my list.  My time is my own.  I'm tempted to take the week off work but I'm saving my PTO for something else.  Well, I might take one day off...  plus, Monday is President's Day and I have that day off.  So, yes, some quality time home alone.

Listen, you NorthEasters, NorthCentralers, GreatLakers, GreatPlainsers (you know who you are), Spring is coming.  I know it may not seem like it right now, but it's on its way.  I promise.  We are being battered with rain but the bulb flowers are pushing through the soil and will be blooming any day now.  So, hold on.  Have hot chocolate.  Or a hot toddy.  Look out at the snow and plunging thermometer and say, 'Spring is coming.'

I'm off to go do something.  Not sure what just yet.  Might just walk around the house a bit and see what bubbles up to the top. Cheers!

Monday on Tuesday

The first Monday of my new schedule was yesterday.  Hooray!  Hooray for .8 fte! The corresponding decrease in income may not elicit such a glad and gleeful response, but we'll wait and see.

So, what did I do with my glorious first Monday?  First, and this is important, I got up early and escorted my partner to her new job.  Her new job with BENEFITS!  What a relief!  I have been providing the benefits for years and since I am going to part time they will cost a lot more for dependents.  So, she needed to get a job with her own benefits and she did.  Whew!

But, you may be wondering, why did I escort her to her new job?  She's a big girl, not a child going to kindergarten.  The thing of it is, now she has to take public transportation.  She has only taken the bus or light rail when I insisted that we use it to go downtown during a heavily attended event.  She has a small town girl's fear of many 'big city' things.  I know, I know, Portland is hardly a big city!  But, she is from a distant, rural suburb (or even exurb) and has simply had no experience.  Plus, her family!  Good god, what a bunch of yokels!  When she was explaining that she would be taking the train in to work, they all suggested that she get a new can of mace or pepper spray.  I laughed out loud at them.  On purpose.  I reminded them that I had been taking the bus and train from my neighborhood for over 20 years and had never had an 'incident'.  Is there crime in Portland?  Of course.  Of course there is, but we hardly qualify as a crime hotspot.  Can crime happen anywhere?  Of course it can, but statistically speaking, it's pretty safe here.  So, she made it work and she made it home from work.  Good.  That's one hurdle down.

The rest of the day went like this:
1. Read some blogs.
2. Look at FB.
3. Have lunch.
4. Actually do stuff!

I wanted to rearrange my sewing room.  It's actually my project room, but since I have the sewing table out, that's what I am calling it.  I needed to move a double bed mattress and box spring out of that room and into the box room.  That meant that I first needed to rearrange the box room so that there was space to store the bed.  It was a bit of a jigsaw puzzle getting things to fit, but I managed it.  I really need to pull everything out of the box room, sort it all, and create some sensible storage solutions.  But, not this week.

I got that done, and then found the perfect fabric to make a tablet cover for T's new toy.    It turned out so well!  I'm pleased with it.  All I need now is a velcro fastener and it's done.  Let me see if I can post a picture.

It is lined with a piece of sham-wow... some kind of cleaning cloth.  It's fairly padded and it cleans the glass while in the bag!  I like it!


Today, though, is Tuesday.  I'm still at home.  Not because I'm having fun doing stuff but because I'm sick.  Dammit!  I've had a run of sinus trouble, due to the wildly shifting barometric pressures I'm sure.  Now it's gone into my chest and I have a deep, phlegmy cough.  And still the sinus junk. Gross.  I woke up with a pounding headache and a racking cough and thought that I would not subject my coworkers to that.  So here's me today:

Yikes!  Why am I showing you this?!?!?  Actually, it doesn't show the mountain of used tissue, the cup of hot water with lemon and honey, or the blanket pulled up high.

Oh, hey!  I got new glasses!

Ok, I'd better stop.  I'm obviously just blathering on at this point...
Cheers!

Update from the Rose City!

Wow!  What a crazy couple of weeks it has been! 

When last I wrote to you all, we had just returned from the Twilight pilgrimage where a good time was had by our quirky, blended family.  We had barely gotten the sand shaken out of our shoes and shorts when something so amazing and wonderful happened that I am still stunned. 

My daughter called two or three days after she got back to Iowa.  She said that she realized how much she missed living in Portland.  She missed her family and friends, she missed mountains and forests and the ocean, she missed the funky vibe of the city.  She asked if she could come back and stay for a month or so.

Yes, that’s right.  She wants to come back!  She asked me if she could stay with us for a month or two.  Ha!  I told her that she never has to ask, this is her home and she is welcome in it whenever she chooses to stay.  She insisted that I ask T if it was alright, which I did, and of course it was.

So, at first she was going to come back in a couple of weeks.  Then it was right after the boyfriend’s birthday.  Then it was the following weekend.  In the end, she left within a week of calling me.  She decided to drive out.  I offered to fly out and drive with her, but she wanted to do it on her own.  Well, I understand that.  A long solo car trip is a rite of passage, especially out here in the wide open west.  She wanted to have her car here when she arrived, and wanted to bring some of her things that would cost too much to ship.  She brought both her lap top and desk top computers.  And, more than that, she brought her cat.  Yes, let that sink in for a moment ~ she brought her cat.

Now, she has assured me that she and the boyfriend are not breaking up or separating.  Pity.  But, she has definitely matured in their relationship and is no longer doing everything his way.  We have had some long (and short) chats about that.  She told him that she is moving back to Portland with or without him and he needs to get on board.  I am so relieved to see her regain her sense of self and her stubbornness and her will.  She’s got all that, and it’s time to let it shine.

So, the last couple of weeks I’ve had my kid back.  Heaven!  This also means that we have a full house and lots going on.  It wasn’t too long ago that I was living alone in relative silence.  Sometimes, it’s true, I miss that quiet bookish existence, but mostly I am pretty darned happy.

Right now, the boyfriend is visiting.  It was Zoe’s birthday on Tuesday (27!) and he came out for a few days.  They are staying at a hotel.  Zoe told him that he needed to leave by Saturday since my birthday is Sunday (52!).  All in all, this spring is shaping up to be a pretty happy one.

I’ve got lots more to tell you, but so little time to write it down.  I’ll keep at it though, because I know that you all are on Pins And Needles waiting to hear how this saga plays out!  :-)

What's new?

What’s new with me, you ask? Well, pull up a chair!

My mom is having a skin cancer removed today. I’m waiting anxiously to hear how it goes. Of course, the lab work won’t be done for several days and as we all know, the waiting is the hardest part. I’m actually nervous as hell, because she survived breast cancer a dozen years ago but still smokes. Stubborn old thing. I’m holding the good thought.

Last weekend I completed my apprenticeship as a self defense instructor. Yay! Whew! I am so glad that is done! It’s been a long two years, but I finished. So, what happens now? I continue teaching self defense, but now I get paid for it. There isn’t enough work for me to quit my day job, but my long term plan is to reduce my job to part time and teach self defense on the other days. We’ll see how that will play out.

My partner’s niece is moving in with us next week. I am deeply ambivalent about this, but on balance I know it’s the right thing to do. Still, what middle aged, retired-from-parenting, hard working, busy, menopausal woman would be jumping for joy over this? The girl has been living with her grandmother (T’s mom) for over ten years and while she was young it was an acceptable arrangement. Now that she is an adolescent, however, it’s not working. Grandma is tired and cranky. She is also nearly completely deaf. Oh my god, the shouting at their house! I can’t stand it. They are all loud talkers anyway, but now that their mom’s hearing has gone, it is just too damned loud.

Angela is fifteen and starting as a freshman this year. She is one year behind her peers chronologically, but many years behind academically. She definitely has a learning disability and has been in special ed for the last few years, but I have to disagree with the diagnosis on her IEP. They have labeled her as mentally retarded, but I think she needs to be retested. We have an appointment next week with the school counselor and will be able to ask all the questions then. She is currently reading the fourth Twilight book, so she isn’t “typically” mentally retarded.

It’s been a fair amount of work getting ready for her to move in. I’m giving up my sewing room/guest room. I took a week off work to clear it out and sort through stuff and I need another week to deal with it all. I didn’t realize we had so many blankets and pillows! The homeless shelters will be getting extra bedding from us. All of the other stuff is going to charity. Some things went to the basement to spend the next four years.

It’s just a lot of change. We’ll manage, of course, but the selfish part of me wants to say NO. I’m overriding that part and doing the right thing, but I’m still ambivalent about it.

Money vs House vs Happiness

The love of money may be a root of evil, but lack of money causes problems too.

T lost her construction job last summer ~ along with hundreds of thousands of other people in the building trades. She has had a couple of crappy maintenance jobs since then that pay, on average, a bit less than half of what she used to make. She has been picking up side work when she can to keep some money coming in but it isn’t steady enough to count on.

This has two primary effects and many secondary effects. First, of course, is paying the bills. I can carry all the bills for the household and make my house payment. She has rented her house but the rent is not equal to the mortgage and she needs about $500 a month to make up the difference. This means that neither of us is saving any money which, at our age, is problematical.

The second primary effect is on T’s state of mind. Not contributing to the household, not having money in her wallet, not “taking care” of me; these things weigh heavy on her. In all of her previous relationships, she was the primary earner, the one with the house, the one who paid for things, the daddy. She was also, maybe not coincidentally, always older than her partners – at least by a few years.

Now, everything is upside down. We are the same age – in fact, I am a few months older. We made roughly the same amount of money before she lost her job and split the bills equally. We used to trade off paying when we went out to eat. The first time I paid the bill she was a little shocked – she’d never been with someone who simply assumed that it was fair to share in the cost. But, that was before she was laid off. Now I pay almost all of the time. And, it kills her. I can see a little part of her self-image erode every time. I feel bad about that, but not bad enough to give up eating out occasionally.

And the household expenses – she can’t pay every other month like she used to. So, instead, she has embarked on some fabulous home repair projects. My house is old and has suffered through some decades of neglect. The house and the yard, for that matter. When she moved in the yard looked more like a jungle than a small city lot. She has completely transformed the yard and together we built a wonderful deck. She has replaced light fixtures, patched drywall, tiled a vanity, painted, powerwashed, installed a gas fireplace, replaced faucets, rehung doors, and on and on… All of which is wonderful, and believe me I am grateful, there’s just one catch. A lot of those things take money. Which puts us right back to square one.

I generally keep a household maintenance and improvement fund. I put my tax return money in there and contribute a little extra to it when I can. It had grown to a couple thousand when T moved in (since I hadn’t done anything to maintain the house). We have used it up on worthwhile projects like the deck. And all those other things. I don’t regret that one bit because the house is in better shape and we are reaping the benefit by living there. And, T feels good about contributing, which makes her a little bit happier.

The issue at hand, though, is the latest project. A sunroom. With a hot tub. Oh, yes, that will be wonderful, and we will get lots of use out of it, and it will increase the value of the house and, and, and… But, it’s not free to build a sunroom. I had some of the windows from a different project, and we bought the doors at the local low cost, recycled building materials place so we didn’t pay tons of money for them. But there is lumber, tile, electrical, roofing, plumbing, etc, to pay for and we have gone through all of the building fund. She is waiting for some money back from her federal taxes, but mine is spent. I paid for half of the hot tub out of my checking account and I am looking towards Friday anxiously.

I don’t like worrying about money. And, I don’t like my partner to feel unhappy over money. But, she is happiest when she is building or repairing something and feeling like she is contributing. I’m not sure how we’ll continue paying for everything we need to complete this project, probably end up putting some of it on credit cards. Sigh.

I know the economy will turn around one of these days. I know that T will get a good, well-paid job again. I’m holding the good thought about all of that. It’s just getting through this rough patch that is so difficult right now. Difficult and expensive. I may end up broke, but the house will be in great shape!