Looking Shellshocked

The last 14 days have been hectic. It started May 3rd. You see my devoted and demented husband decided we should divest ourselves of the detritus and debris of several decades. No we didn’t rent one of those trash bins that you chuck everything into and then it gets hauled away. No. We participated in the annual neighborhood garage sale. We also invited saintvi to add her stuff to our stuff because the more stuff you have the more people will buy. (I don’t understand it but it is how it works.) So Friday night found me organizing the garage and making a sign with general prices. I worked until the wee hours of the morning. We opened the garage for the early birds at 7:30 AM. Sparky manned the sale while I showered and dressed and waited for saintvi to arrive. My mother’s flight was scheduled to arrive at 1:19 PM and Sparky had to leave for work at 12:30 PM. (note that the individual who wanted to have the garage sale left half way through the day). I was able to leave the sale in Joyouswind and saintvi’s capable hands while I drove to the airport and collected my mother. The sale continued until about 4:30. We made some money (yay)! The thought was to have the sale continue a couple more days but Sparky was dead set against that. In the meantime my mother’s plan was for me to drive her to Muncie to connect with her peeps. If we left at 6:30 AM Sunday we could get to Muncie and to church by 10:30 service and she could really enjoy a “homecoming”.

We had lunch with several of her long time friends and then spend the night. Monday’s agenda was to visit her favorite second hand stores, lunch with friends, a visit to her 104 year old friend, dinner with more friends, and then the drive home. We were able to do it all and survive. We arrived home late Monday night. Tuesday was son#2’s college graduation.

(the graduate with his grandparents and then with his parents)
This was a big deal as he is the first of my sons to get that college degree.  We (his parents, brother, and grandparents on both sides) sat through a horrendously long ceremony. Everyone vowed that no matter who was graduating we would pay them not to walk! Since it was happening in the evening, a party was impossible. We had hoped for Friday but that didn’t happen due to schedules. Wednesday was shopping at the Goodwill stores in town and lunch with sons #1 and #2.  Thursday was a dinner at Sparky’s sister’s house because his sister from Montana was in town for 48 hours, there were 2 birthdays, and it was a kind of a Mother’s day celebration. I was supposed to make pies for the party and I did – but Sparky put them in my car instead of in his car and I rode with son#1 in his car since he didn’t know the way. Needless to say the pies were not in attendance!

(Sunny Apple made with Pink Lady and Jonagold apples and Spring Cherry made with tart and sweet cherries)
Of course it was also the last ceramics class which I had to miss. Friday found us saying many goodbyes since Saturday was putting my mother back on the plane to Philadelphia very early in the morning (up at 4 AM, at the airport by 5:15 AM, boarding by 6:00 AM and take off at 6:30 AM). Followed by a complete collapse for 1 hour. I took the car in for service (which ate 3 hours of my day). Sunday was Mother’s Day and we took Sparky’s parents out to lunch. Then it was back to the grind. I slaved all week at work trying to catch up on all the disasters that were just waiting for me. In my free moments at home I started on the vacation preparation. I started THE List. The list is the most important part. It details what needs to be done and when, what goes in the suitcases, and where we are traveling and what we are doing. Working off The list, I am still in the process of loading geocache coordinates into the GPS, packing the clothes and the check bag, and printing the agenda and maps. No matter how dazed you feel having read this to the end, I assure you it is only a ghostly version of how I feel… I really hope this is not how retirement feels! Vacation is looming and I have so much to do. On the bright side I am 6 weeks away from retirement!!

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