Hodge Podge

I have been busy for the past while, too busy to blog. Well ... not really too busy. More like too foggy to blog. Everything has seemed an effort. Maybe the weather? Maybe I am under it?

At any rate, today I am trying to get my life back on track, and that means blogging first thing.

Kenya continues to take her meds morning and night and is allowed out only under close supervision. That means more walks each day. Maybe that's why I am too tired to blog.

On Friday morning, I went to my second pottery class and loved it. After the first one where I produced several unrecognizable blobs I thought I might quit, but this one allowed me to forget everything and just let myself relax into the clay. I cleaned and burnished several of the blobs and began work on a coil dish. I doubt if these classes are to blame for my failure to blog.

It has been a more social week than usual, so perhaps that would account for my inertia. On Thursday Daughter #2 came for dinner with her new beau, and I invited friends on the lake who were moving the next day to join us.

Remi spent Friday with Kenya and me so that he wouldn't be underfoot during the move.

Saturday was the 40th anniversary reunion for Philemon Wright where I taught for 22 years.

On Sunday Pat and Mike came to do jobs around the house that would have been done incompetently or not at all. Now my towel holders in the bathroom work, I have wooden blinds installed in the den, and a shelf hangs securely in the front hall. When they come, they always bring skills, tools and irreverent laughter. Pat has been able to make me giggle since he was fifteen and in my grade ten English class.

Maybe I am simply exhausted because I am sleeping so little at night.

I spoke with a group of sixtyish teachers at the reunion. I mentioned not sleeping and they chorused. Oh, hell, who sleeps? If you put all the sleepless hours menopausal women spend tossing and turning to work on the economy and everything else, millions of women hours could be put to good use.

That reunion was an experience. One teacher greeted me with a question, "What books are you reading?" One of those questions you dread. Not it would have mattered what I answered because it was merely a springboard from which he could launch into a book review he'd prepared specially for this event. I expect he greeted all English teachers with this question. I escaped to the wine table.

An English teacher I knew well for most of my career greeted me with the news that she had just returned from a trip to Stratford. Only $650 and that included three plays, so really a deal. I found it hard to be enthusiastic, and mentioned that Stratford had lost a great deal of money this year, perhaps because $650 for three plays was likely beyond the reach of most people ... like me. She hurried away.

I met the first principal I worked with, now in his eighties. His memory was first rate; he gave me a large wet kiss in greeting, and told me he'd done me a favour once and had said he'd take a kiss for payment some time. Then he laughed and said it was a good thing he hadn't collected while we were working together.

Near him sat the school nurse who now uses a cane. She retired just a couple of year ago when the hip made it impossible to work. I think she is about the same age as the principal, and, like him, she still has all her wits about her.

One of the retired school librarians said he hadn't used his brain since he retired nearly fifteen years ago and is a much happier man as a result.

A very dear old friend, a phys ed teacher who has bone cancer and is in constant pain, said they'd discovered a lesion in the skull, and he likely would become even less articulate soon. I suggested that perhaps it would just make his conversations a little airier. I wonder if I would be able to joke if I were in his situation. Would I even bother to make the effort to come to something like this reunion?

This week I will be looking after a neighbour's cat and will have Tango, one of my favourite dogs, boarding for four or five days. I will attend another pottery class, and Marta and Henry may come for the weekend. It is shaping up to be a good week. And now I am off for the first of the day's dog walks.