I am writing with my toes spread wide: I have just painted the nails electric blue. Why I have bothered to do this, when bar-toe season is over in Utah, I don't know. I have peeled off my tights as well, so my legs are chilly and feel exposed.
A front blew in overnight. Just yesterday Chuck was stuffing autumn leaves down my pants; but I woke to about 1/2 inchof snow on the ground. My morning walk to the mailbox soaked my hair and froze my breath. Chuck kindled a fire in the cook stove and made oatmeal for us both. After supper this evening, we took our wine glasses and strolled around the darkening neighborhood, switching our glasses from hand to hand when the stems made our fingers numb.
At the moment, I have a headache, and am drinking a big mug of tea, trying to convince my head that it is just due to dehydration. Well, and crying, because we watched The Descendants and I balled through large parts of it. Because of where I am in my life, it was odd to watch this husband making end-of-life choices on his wife's behalf. Simon and I were married for 19 years; so we talked about what we wanted if we became sick, we had lined up guardianship for the kids, all that stuff. Tonight, I looked over at Chuck while we were watching the movie and thought, "It's not going to be me and Simon at the end, after all: it's going to be.... me and Chuck." It was the first time I had looked to the future in that way.
I had a good day at work, although my schedule got a bit pinched in the afternoon. I was supposed to be at a meeting off-site at 3:00 PM; and I was just buttoning my coat when one of the childcare staff showed up at my office. She reminded me of a conversation we had had the day before? About the two TV / DVDs she was able to get donated to the school from a company that had phased them out? Yes, we had talked about it; and she had asked, could we have one over at the church building where we hold our Family Literacy classes, and another here at the school? She was thinking, "Show movies to the children." I look askance at that, but I thought they would come in handy for showing a DVD to a group of students. Faster than a laptop and speakers - just plop this little portable TV / DVD on the table and away you go!
Yesterday, she had outlined the shape and size with her hands, and I planned which of our cupboards we would keep in in. We have almost no storage at Guadalupe, so everything has to be considered, even when accepting a little portable TV.
Anyway, just before I headed out the door, she arrived and told me that the TVs were here! She had her mini-van; and her husband had his pickup truck. Huh. Quite a production for a couple of portable TVs, but OK. Here's the cupboard where we should put one of them; and the other can go in the cupboard over at the church. She smiled at the cupboard.
"It's not gonna fit."
"Oh. Well, I could make space on this slightly larger shelf..."
"Still not gonna fit".
"Maybe I had better look at these TVs."
Holy shit. They are huge. Behemoths. One has a cart that it is meant to roll on. They are too heavy to move without two people. I was totally at a loss. I asked them to take one TV and the cart over to the church, where we just might be able to push it into a corner and hope the priest doesn't notice and chew me out. The other one? No idea. We do have a storage garage.... I went to the business office to ask for the key.
"I just need a place where I can keep it until I can get a cart for it, and then we can roll it into the building when we want to..."
"No. You may not keep that giant TV. There is no spare room. It is big and old. It will sit in teh garage while you try to find a cart for it, and we will end up throwing it out the next time we clean the garage. You can show DVDs on a laptop. The answer is, 'No'."
"But Andrea is offering them to the school and I don't want to hurt her feelings..."
The answer was no.
Now, if I sound mad at the business office, I'm not. They are absolutely right. What I thought I was accepting was the size of a breadbox, not a VW Combi Van. It was a bit awkward to tell Andrea, though.
Needless to say, I was profoundly late for my meeting.
I am a bit stressed, thinking about the next few days. Tomorrow, there is a volunteer intensive training workshop. I have done this training many times, but we have made some changes to it. I know what the changes are, but I haven't actually written it, yet. Then, on Friday, I have to conduct another training, all day. Saturday there is a Halloween dance, and I do not have my costume ready. I want to be a cave girl. I am looking for chicken bones to put in my hair, and I have a press-on tattoo depicting a bison. And a spear. I need fur, though. I cannot believe that Chuck and I threw away a big, moth-eaten chunk of fur only a month or so ago. Bummer. Anybody out there got a random hunk of fur hanging around?
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