General Update February 28, 2018

Some day I will react even less to listening to mom, in person or via voice mail, telling me she can return to the Island ‘anytime now.’ Our phone number must have made it’s ever diminishing appearance for mom last night, as she left voicemail. She’s trying to sell me on Elvis, as she thinks taking him back to the country would be a disaster for him, and she would like me to meet him… To her credit, after saying that a friend of hers rescued the cat, she remembered that her granddaughter brought Elvis to her. The most important take-away from mom’s voicemail, is that it sounds like she and the cat have reached an accord. She trusts that he’s eating and drinking (word on the ward is that she’s emptying the poop container on the auto-cleaning cat box daily), and he’s warming up to her, sleeping with her even. Oommmmmm.

I’ve been corresponding off and on all day with a well driller on a nearby Island. While he isn’t willing to look at hooking up the well himself (and explained that there is a critical shortage of well drillers in the state due to regulatory constraints, making those who are licensed overwhelmingly busy), he did look at the bid I received, and save one item, the pump itself, thinks it looks very good. He uses a pump of equal quality that cost 30% less. So, I am feeling much more secure about spending goo-gobs of money hooking up the drilled well, and can talk to the contractor I am going to use about the pump pricing.

It’s a cold 40 degrees here, with winds gusting to 30+ MPH. The boughs of our big fir are waving to me from just outside the window, and 70 foot tall trees in the ravine are swaying through 25 degree arcs, sometimes more.  As twilight turns the ravine into a deep monochromatic poetry of swaying maple, fir and alder, including a flock of crows looking for their roosting place, I mourn, or maybe feel lose for what my mom isn’t missing. She is safe. She is safe. She is safe. And insulated from scenes like this one. There are good views from her community, and no, she wouldn’t remember what I am watching now the minute she took her eyes away from it, but that’s what I mourn on her behalf. And yeah, I mourn that she CAN keep her focus on her Island home, which she won’t return to. The loses she does and doesn’t know about are kinda profound. It’s only that she is safe in AL that I have the ‘luxury’ to dip into these feelings. Namaste.