I’m out in the yard this morning, smoking a cigar and tossing “the toy” (a stick) for Cinder Dawg to fetch and monkey-talk with. I think she has separation anxiety or maybe she’s obsessive/possessive/depressive. She wants me to throw the stick but doesn’t like to let go of it when she brings it back to me. She wants me to chase and wrestle with her for it. I’ve done that a few times with her and know I shouldn’t have. Un-training is much more difficult than training, especially when it comes to self.
Watching the smoke drift over the yard fence to the east, I know there are several reasons I shouldn’t be smoking this cigar but I don’t want to let loose of it. Smoke tendrils drift on wafts of breeze too indistinct to be felt by my skin. How else would I know they were present and accounted for? It’s a matter of sensitivity, I guess.
I feel a cold coming on this morning; there’s a good reason to put down the cigar. Kathy, kind wife and partner that she is, noticed my cold-voice this morning. She said she’d do a bit of grocery shopping after work if I didn’t feel up to it today. I generally handle that task, an arrangement worked out in these first ten months of sharing life. We didn’t sit down and talk about it. It just worked out that way. I like that about her, about “US”. She set the stick down and I picked it up. I’ll e-mail her at work in a bit with the short list. It’s short because I’m heading out to drive to Colorado Thursday morning. She and Kelsey will take a flight out Friday afternoon. They’ll be there in just under three hours. The drive will take me two days. Kathy found one-way tickets for $79.40 each. Gas in Ol’ Blue will cost $400-$500.
One of the good things about driving is that I can bring Cinder Dawg and Rosie (Kathy’s 9-year-old Beagle) with me. Those two snaggly girls will keep me on my toes (Cinder and Rosie, not Kathy and Kelsey). I can also carry the ladies’ bags with me along with the Easter goodies Kathy picked up for the little ones. Having the camper there also gives Kathy and me a place to stay when we visit. My children have room and have offered to put us up but I kinda like being the redneck Daddy in the ol’ ’76 Mitchell camper parked in the driveway. Kathy’s okay with it since my kids all have nice bathrooms and showers for us to use. Kelsey doesn’t intend to stay with us in the camper. She’d rather hang out with her stepbrothers, stepsisters, and their families. Having raised three daughters, two sons, and two other lovely teenage girls, I have a bit of a clue as to what that’s all about.
Speaking of Kelsey, she’ll be 16-years-old March 31st. She and Kathy and I will go out to dinner that night, then mark her birthday with a celebration in Colorado with my young-uns. My cousin Sue and her husband Dick are going to treat us to home-cooked pork ribs and all the fixins while we’re in Colorado. That’s a real treat ‘cause they’re nice people and he’s a helluva good cook. Coloring Easter eggs, celebrating Sweet 16 birthdays, Easter egg hunts, breaking bread with Family Folk; what more could a person ask for?
It’s gonna be a good week. I can feel it in my bones. I got Cinder slobber on my hands and bark dust in my shoes. That gnarly dawg is using her stick and my foot for a pillow, napping while I write. The living of life is a fine drift, wisps of smoke in thin shafts of light between the upright fence slats of our days.
Smoke and sun
fire and wood
love in my heart
life is good
Watching the smoke drift over the yard fence to the east, I know there are several reasons I shouldn’t be smoking this cigar but I don’t want to let loose of it. Smoke tendrils drift on wafts of breeze too indistinct to be felt by my skin. How else would I know they were present and accounted for? It’s a matter of sensitivity, I guess.
I feel a cold coming on this morning; there’s a good reason to put down the cigar. Kathy, kind wife and partner that she is, noticed my cold-voice this morning. She said she’d do a bit of grocery shopping after work if I didn’t feel up to it today. I generally handle that task, an arrangement worked out in these first ten months of sharing life. We didn’t sit down and talk about it. It just worked out that way. I like that about her, about “US”. She set the stick down and I picked it up. I’ll e-mail her at work in a bit with the short list. It’s short because I’m heading out to drive to Colorado Thursday morning. She and Kelsey will take a flight out Friday afternoon. They’ll be there in just under three hours. The drive will take me two days. Kathy found one-way tickets for $79.40 each. Gas in Ol’ Blue will cost $400-$500.
One of the good things about driving is that I can bring Cinder Dawg and Rosie (Kathy’s 9-year-old Beagle) with me. Those two snaggly girls will keep me on my toes (Cinder and Rosie, not Kathy and Kelsey). I can also carry the ladies’ bags with me along with the Easter goodies Kathy picked up for the little ones. Having the camper there also gives Kathy and me a place to stay when we visit. My children have room and have offered to put us up but I kinda like being the redneck Daddy in the ol’ ’76 Mitchell camper parked in the driveway. Kathy’s okay with it since my kids all have nice bathrooms and showers for us to use. Kelsey doesn’t intend to stay with us in the camper. She’d rather hang out with her stepbrothers, stepsisters, and their families. Having raised three daughters, two sons, and two other lovely teenage girls, I have a bit of a clue as to what that’s all about.
Speaking of Kelsey, she’ll be 16-years-old March 31st. She and Kathy and I will go out to dinner that night, then mark her birthday with a celebration in Colorado with my young-uns. My cousin Sue and her husband Dick are going to treat us to home-cooked pork ribs and all the fixins while we’re in Colorado. That’s a real treat ‘cause they’re nice people and he’s a helluva good cook. Coloring Easter eggs, celebrating Sweet 16 birthdays, Easter egg hunts, breaking bread with Family Folk; what more could a person ask for?
It’s gonna be a good week. I can feel it in my bones. I got Cinder slobber on my hands and bark dust in my shoes. That gnarly dawg is using her stick and my foot for a pillow, napping while I write. The living of life is a fine drift, wisps of smoke in thin shafts of light between the upright fence slats of our days.
Smoke and sun
fire and wood
love in my heart
life is good
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