Time flies when you are retired

Just others, I haven't posted to this blog for many months.  Heard a rumor that you could lose the blog if you don't keep it updated, so thought something should get dropped in here, since there is a ton of history that I have nowhere else.  I was thinking about this the other day, that it might be nice to actually write something personal again.  Since I retired and moved to Rocky Point, I have spent a lot of time and energy keeping the MoHo Travels Blog up to date with all our current trips and travels, and now it even has home stories in there.

This blog is different.  It is 100 percent mine.  It isn't "out there" in the world and only a few folks even have a clue where it is.  My one lone follower, Mary Ann, knows all the inside stuff about me anyway, so I don't have to consider another person's views and feelings when writing here.  Funny how that makes a difference, but it does.  I tend to write a lot more personal stuff on my own blog, Mo tends to want to keep the travel blog "company friendly".  That 's probably a good thing, but still, I don't want to lose this blog as a place where I track my own personal feelings about life as it goes along.  So there you have it.

Maybe someday soon I'll have the time and the motivation to talk about something other than the daily stuff.  Do you suppose?

Friday night

Sitting in my office, working past closing time, printing maps, printing legends, putting finishing touches on all sorts of things. It is raining outside, and the entire day has felt cold and dreary. Not used to that much here in Sonora, it seems just a short time ago the sun was beating in these office windows with no relief.

I finished up the "exit/transition" meeting this week with Kit and Glenn and my crew. Working on the exit report, making sure that everyone knows where everything is and how to do everything. There may be some lag time between my leaving the the new project leader's entrance. It will be fine. The guys have learned a lot, will know what to do. Meghan will be OK with their help. I can pass the baby off without feeling too badly about abandoning it. Today finishing up the General Soils Map draft was rewarding. The survey may only be half done, but we still have 350,000 acres finished, and done well. Feels good.

I have just another week to work before going home for a week at Christmas, then another week after that. Three weeks and it will be done. My worries are getting redundant. Will I have enough money. How will my ego handle being nothing more than a retired old lady. No matter how much I think I have lots of interests and lots to do, I am recognizing that more than a little bit of me is wrapped up in this working identity. The soil scientist, the MLRA Project Leader, the one who always gets it done and done well. I keep thinking about this transition. I know I am ready, that I want to do it, and yet the thoughts keep surfacing. As usual, I often worry way too much beforehand and when the reality comes I am just fine. I imagine that will be the case this time as well.

I will be retired. "Retired". I will say that the same way I have heard others say that in the past. A statement that hints at long successful years doing something productive. A statement that says, I have earned this. Space, Time, Travel, Moments, Family, Gardens, Coffee mornings, Sunlight coming in a window that I don't have to leave. Only an occasional deadline, and usually self imposed. Writing, Knitting, Art, and more writing. I hope I live up to the call, live up to the dream of all that I think I can do when I don't have to keep going to work, hope I can fill the space that this work will leave when it is gone. I have never wondered or questioned this until now, just lately. Just a bit of wondering.

Home tonight to the empty house. It is REALLY empty, especially now in the winter, in the rain. One chair, Mo's rocker from Rocky Point, a few pictures, left overs to keep if from feeling empty. The TV. Everything else is already home in Rocky Point. Each day I move along, thinking about what is coming, working hard on what is finishing. Three weeks and counting.

Answering a friend's question "where were you when Kennedy was killed?"

In the fall of 1963 I was just newly 18, I wasn't old enough to vote in the previous Presidential election, but I romanticized Kennedy like many of us. My firstborn daughter was 10 months old, just starting to walk. I was 2 months pregnant with my second child. In the LA suburb of Arcadia, it was a bit murky, partially cloudy, nondescript afternoon. I had my baby girl on my hip, had just stepped out of the tiny duplex where I lived into the tiny front yard, surrounded by a low stone wall. Typical LA November afternoon, a bit smoggy, boring. My neighbor on the west side stepped out to me and called out, "Kennedy has been shot". I felt the world crash in, felt the world turn on its axis, felt the world change. It was completely unthinkable. The world to me then wasn't the way it is now, violence was rare and distant. Her words slammed into my heart, and I held my baby girl and cried. I don't remember a thing after that, I don't remember watching my black and white tv for news, don't remember much of the funeral. That moment is like crystal, shattering glass, clear, sharp and hard.

I don't remember MLK as clearly, but I was watching tv in another LA suburban town in 1968 when Bobby Kennedy was shot, saw it happen. Again, unthinkable, but less so. The world had already changed back in 1963, Watts had happened, people were protesting the war, violence wasn't something new. The world turned in November of 1963. At least it did for me.

Ten Weeks and counting

Mutual agreements. Compromise. Here's a funny one. I love color, harmonious colors in my home are really important to me. I'm not much of a blue person unless it sorta seafoamy. I really hate white walls. Mo insists on white walls. Has had them in her house since 2002. At first she said I could paint my bedroom whatever I wanted, but really wanted to keep the other walls white. A couple of months ago when I was there, we went to Home Depot and found colors we both like. We are painting the living room, kind of a soft rich honey gold that I really love, with some accents. My dining room furniture is now there, and last week we took up the sofas. My bedroom is still here, but will be going next weekend. I'll sleep on the extra bed here for the last 10 weeks.

Some strange memory just slid back into my mind about some song by someone many many years ago about "painting the living room". It was a good song , about life doing crap all around you, things are all a mess...and "why are we painting the living room?"

Compromise. It's funny how it works. letting go seems to give it space to happen.

10 weeks. My guys at work keep saying "slow down, quite worrying about it, we can handle it". You can see Chris on my facebook album. He helped me move furniture last weekend and is helping me load the bedroom furniture next weekend. Deborah is coming down from Portland to help unload, then we will do the small town Pacific Terrace magical neighborhood Halloween thing with Melody and the grandkids. Hope the weather holds.

I am at that point of holding breath...the last weeks before the huge life change, the shift. Dreams have slowed down, for a time they were momentous, reflecting the shift to come. The earth is fairly quiet, no big "things". No earthquakes, killer storms, hurricanes...just politics, health care. They are talking a 40 percent tax on my federal health benefits. sigh. I made a huge fruit salad tonight for myself, was really hungry for something juicy and sweet. yum. would have been good for me if I hadn't dressed it so lovingly with sour cream and mayo and a little pineapple juice. LOL

I would imagine that the gorgeous new moon I saw on my walk tonight around the mobile park is shining down on people I love all over this world. Same sky, same moon, same October evening. I looked at all the little old ladies alone in their living rooms, TV’s on, lace curtains, maybe a book as they sat in their chairs. It’s always been my fascination, the voyeur in me that loves the secret views into people’s living rooms in the twilight. I wonder how they live, what they think, alone in Mill Villa every evening with their TV’s. At the moment, I am one of them.

St Anthony

St Anthony, St Anthony, Please come down
Something's lost and can't be found

Something's lost and can't be found
St Anthony, St Anthony, please come around.

I am not Catholic. My grandmother (Oh Dahling, just a little more cream) was, but somehow she never managed to come up with the St Anthony prayer in our family history. Probably because she was raised Southern Baptist and found Catholicism late in life.

But Eva was. We were working in Spokane, she was my boss, and in the process of digging out at least half a dozen road cuts, I lost some very expensive bifocals. Back in the office she told me about St Anthony, the patron saint of lost things. We called on St Anthony, and next day went back to each pit, and found my glasses in the dirt at the bottom of one of them. Buried. Invisible. I became a believer.

That was back in 1998 or so, and I have used the St Anthony prayer several times. Most famous of those stories was in 2007 when he was instrumental in finding my cat lost in a Texas RV park. Recently the St Anthony prayer was invoked at a Home Depot in Klamath Falls, where Mo lost her wallet filled with military ID and lots of cash and credit cards. Within minutes of the prayer, as we stood around wondering what to do, two men drove up and asked what we were doing, and when we said looking for a lost wallet, they produced it. Twenty bucks is what I promised that time. I always promise, although a web site recently said you can't bargain with St Anthony, but you should at least show some kind of thanks.

Yosemite. I had a professional meeting there this week, with about 75 people from the Professional Soil Scientists Association of California. First day was great. A big tour bus, lots of really good discussions, capped by pizza and beer at the Curry Village where we were staying. Some of us in cabins, others like me in tent cabins, basically canvas walls with plywood floors. A bed, an old dresser, very close neighbors (several people kept awake by snoring), no bathroom. Where does St Anthony come in here?

I came home from beers, crawled into my bed and as is sometimes the case, took out my somewhat uncomfortable denture. A special pleasure of sleeping alone. I woke at 430, to pack and go to the showers, and could NOT find the denture. I spent two hours combing my tent cabin, the seams in the canvas, the bedding, the walls, my personal stuff, on and on. Finally at 630 I gave up. I loaded everything into my truck, and made some excuse about a broken denture to my boss and decided to go home. (broken was bad enough, but I couldn't bring myself to renege on the second day of the field trip due to a LOST denture???) Good god. I even took photos of every single corner in the cabin in frustration. I could not understand how a stupid denture could leave the cabin when I hadn't. I did the St Anthony prayer many times, but thought, well maybe this time it isn't going to work. I drove the 100 miles or so back to my home in Jamestown, went through all my stuff again, and finally called Camp Curry. Within minutes they called me back, some housekeeping person had found my denture. "Where??" "We don't really know, he doesn't speak english."

Needless to say, I drove the 100 miles each way back to Yosemite, wondering at the whole incredibly stupid thing, and thanking St Anthony. All sorts of symbolism came in, because throughout my life, loosing teeth has been a recurring dream, a fairly common one for humanity I hear. It's about change and fear of change and transitions and such. I had lost my teeth for real! In dreams it is a sickening feeling, as you realize your teeth are crumbling in your mouth. In real life, it was equally sickening. I actually thought a couple of times maybe I WAS dreaming, maybe I would wake up. I do love how real life symbolism can often mirror our unconscious thoughts and issues, and this was a big one. Change, Transition, Fear of Change Coming, Moving into another Stage of Life. ahh. magic. magic is everywhere. I keep forgetting that.

So I had promised 50 bucks. Same promise I made for the cat. The rule is, if at all possible, you should give anonymously, so there isn't any personal glory from the giving. I thought about giving it to a friend in need, but then realized that wasn't really the way to do it. Then Mo and I together thought about the homeless camp. So this morning I took three old vests, put 20 bucks in the pocket of each one, (an extra 10 bucks for extra thanks!) and walked up to the camp, just a few hundred yards across the highway from where I live. There are several tents there, and some people were sleeping. Finally I found a couple of women sitting and talking quietly in their tent and asked if they wanted the vests. I didn't want to hurt their pride entirely by just handing them money, but the pastel polyester vests were in the goodwill box for a reason. They were pretty weird. I said, "well, maybe you could find someone who might want them, and maybe check the pockets." I walked away out of sight before they had time to look in the pockets. It was almost as much fun as handing the young tattered father in a beat up car the 20 dollar bill I gave him for the last St Anthony find. Finding creative ways to pass out money directly is really kind of fun. Thank you, St Anthony.

Another birthday

Another birthday, another year. Yesterday while driving I had a magical mind full of thoughts to write, journaling about my life and my year past. Today, of course, when I actually have the ability to write, my thoughts are mundane and boring. I still don't want to miss it, though, this reminiscing and evaluating thing that I try to do every year. So be it.

This photo, just found recently, says more than I can express about the passing years. I was 36 here, mapping soils in the St Joe. Deanna found this photo among Lance's things and scanned it to email to me. The sweet young guys who work for me were delighted, laughing about 80's "big hair" and seeing me in a different light than the leader that I am now doing this work.

I guess the most recent life shift on my mind is Lance's death, less than a month ago. Somehow in the process of grieving, and being with my daughters who loved him, with his Mother, the exact age my own mother would have been, with his current wife and present family, somehow that whole process has given space for going back, for remembering, for again trying to sort out how life was then and how it is now.

The shift I made in those years was momentous. The shift I am making in the year to come is just as much so, although less dramatic perhaps, and yet it still feels huge to me, down inside myself. The shift I made then was all about beginnings and the future, the shift I am making now is about fruition, completion, even a bit of reward and some relaxation.

The year just past seems like a blur, and yet at the moment the only thing that really stands out about it is just how long it took to pass! This past summer seems to have passed very slowly as well, marked by travels and reviews, work and family, and of course, marked with a huge exclamation point by the travels to Spokane for Lance during that last week in August.

Hopefully as this day goes by, I'll think of something to write about this past year that will help put it all in perspective for me. For the time being, though, it seems that the year is marked by my posts on the MoHo travel tales. I work, then I go somewhere with Mo, then I work again. I can only remember how things have been by going back to that journal, and Mo and I laugh a lot about how we can only track our travels by reading our own blog. I gues that is the reason for this one as well, I know that I am trying to track my own travels, the inner ones, the life changing ones, even the boring ones. Still haven't really figured out the difference between the online journal and the paper ones except I don't have to rummage around in sheafs of paper and try to figure out where they all are anymore.

Strange world it is.

Umpqua Highway

Off to the Oregon coast

A quiet moment and a big sigh

I am sitting at my desk at work, listening to the hum of the air conditioner battling the 90 plus temperatures outside.  Summer is coming on in full force, and I am grateful for the amazing long lovely spring here in the MotherLode.  A gift. 

It is afternoon on a Friday.  My whole self, consciousness, my whole being has been focused on getting through the annual progress review.  Always challenging, always exhausting, and yet fulfilling as all my concepts are solidified, and I back up my models with data, maps, documentation.  It all works.  In spite of the weekends and long hours, in the end it is worth it because I can answer the questions.  I can go to whatever folder, paper or electronic, I can pull up the maps, and show exactly how this huge puzzle of a landscape works, how it is put together.  The best part of my job.  Juggling all those puzzle pieces into place. 

It's now over.  Whew.  and whew again.  I don't know why I get so wound up over it all.  Some sort of silly idea that everything will be perfect?  How dumb is that!  It's the natural world, for pete's sake, and I am trying to make some kind of sense and order out of it.  dumb. 

So now I will breathe, I will get over all the stupid stress that I lay on myself at these reviews, and I will especially savor the thought that it is my last one.  No more reviews.  Ever.  Maybe an exit review a couple of weeks before I retire, but that is a different thing entirely.  I do not have to do the stressful, brain busting, lay-it-all-on-the-table-and-justify-it kind of review ever again. 

weird thought.

This afternoon I will pack.  Tomorrow I will leave before dawn and drive 8 hours through the valley back home to the Oregon forests and beaches.  I will spend some days at the coast, feeling chilly, at the lake, in Klamath at the small town celebration of the 4th with my daughter.  A week away.  A week without worry about anything at all.

But right now, just for this moment, I am savoring the deep breath, the big sigh, quietly looking out the office window to the asphalt parking lot, watching the blue oaks laugh at the heat, watching the grass wither as I speak.  Just savoring.  I don't have to do one single blessed thing in this moment.

Friend thoughts

I have an online group of "friends", sometimes we write with a lot of energy, other times there isn't a post for weeks. One of those friends just posted that she finished her dissertation, and just received a contract for a book about friendships between women. Her discussion gave me the opportunity to put down in words what has been rolling around in my mind a lot lately.

My kids have become my best friends, even my son now in his 40's. I don't understand him much, he is a redneck boy from Missouri, but we talk on the phone at least every week and sometimes more. My daughters are the friends who don't leave. Maybe we get angry, or frustrated, or busy, but we don't leave. I find that now with them in their 40's my role as protector is lessened, but the role of listener never ceases.

In relationships, I have found "The One" several times. It seems there is definitely more than one "One" for some of us, depending on where we are in our life, our personal growth, our needs and desires at a particular stage of life. and the question, "are you settling?" most often seems to come from those who are really dissatisfied in their own lives and relationships, and yes, I too get frustrated at that question. I love "settling". I love the settled feeling that comes with friendship and companionship and love (small case). I love not having to fight or cry or fear or be depressed any more. Well, I get depressed with too much heat or too much darkness, but not with my everyday life. Depression to me is the key, if I am depressed then I know that I am either stuck, or angry, or am not listening to my inner self. I have been hugely depressed in my lifetime when I was with someone that I thought was "The One".

Friendships, I guess, must be like that. They flow through life like waves in the ocean, coming and going, and some, like those big solid heavy stones on the beach, just stay there no matter what. I can count them on my one hand. My grandmother used to say that, and I pooh poohed her, in my days of women's group, and online groups, and really close girlfriends. But with time and distance, those friends came and went for me as well.

A decade ago I had a completely different view of friendship. I had friends then I thought would be part of my life forever. One is dead, one is probably a bit crazier than really knew, but I still count her on that lifetime list, one and only one is still my lifetime friend, and another one refuses to remain my friend, even after many many promises of lifetime friendship. The women's group friends are all faded, due to distance and time, I guess, but I never thought that would happen. Online friends I have never met, another whole story, as close as the computer screen, and as ephemeral as electrons floating in the universe.

Funny this question should come to me right now because it has been something that I have been thinking on a lot lately. Especially as I pack and go through all my old stuff and photos, clearing, deciding what to keep, what to let go of. Parts of me are going in boxes, and parts of me are going to goodwill, and parts of me are going into the trash pile. It's a big sifting process that has to do where I am in my life right now.

I guess my thoughts and feelings about friendship are just one of the things I am sorting and sifting.