Tag: haunted cello

Shall I tell you about my mammogram on Friday, which I followed by overeating—salmon wrap and fries–at Georgie’s and then going home and staining my upper deck till my back cried “uncle.” And then, despite the radio and the newspaper predicting sunshine, it rained and turned all the “Mountain Ash” stain to mud-colored soup?

Shall I tell you about the play I went to Friday night at the PAC, “Tiny Beautiful Things,” based on Cheryl Strayed’s book? So good. Four brilliant actors playing many parts. I’d recommend you go, but the show closed Sunday. Read the book; you’ll like it.

Shall I tell you how I only made it to Friday before I started eating the “thumbprint” cookies from Market of Choice that I had put in the freezer to save for an upcoming meeting? They just kept calling to me, like the haunted cello in the book I just finished reading—Everything You Are, by Kerry Anne King. Read that one, too.

Shall I tell you about how Saturday, after a little writer work, I went to the KYAQ Electric Blues Jam with my folk guitar, checked out the collection of mostly men playing electric guitars, each with their own amps, and decided I had better just listen while I ate pizza? Or how I watched the piano player, wishing I could play like that?

Shall I tell you about doing the music for yet another Saturday Mass at Sacred Heart all by myself—and fluffing some of the words and notes—because my choir was banished for holding hands during The Lord’s Prayer (the weekend after my father’s funeral) or how I have given notice because this priest who preaches forgiveness cannot seem to forgive them and let them sing?

Shall I tell you about how I cried during Mass on Sunday—where I had just two lovely singers left—because I don’t really want to leave, but I can’t stay either? Should I brag that I didn’t miss a note as I mopped at my tears?

Shall I tell you how my neighbor pressure-washed my house and deck for free so I could do the staining? In the process, a porch light, outdoor thermometer, and the covering on my back door, all old and weathered, fell apart, so I bought a new porch light which he installed yesterday, and a new indoor-outdoor thermometer, which works great. I’m still trying to figure out what to do about the door.

Shall I tell you I bought more stain yesterday so I could start over, and, after the neighbor finished with the porch light, I redid the whole thing, praying there was still enough daylight for it to dry when I finished at 5:30? There was not. Some of the stain was wet last night at bedtime, and all of it was iced over this morning. It looks like it might be all right, but next year, I’m starting early enough to find a pro to take care of the deck.

Shall I tell you about how the neighbor’s new motion-detector light (for bears and burglars) shines directly into my bedroom or how it was so cold in the house that neither Annie nor I could sleep? Should I tell you how after cleaning out a ton of burnt pellets that remind me of burnt popcorn and listening to the pellet stove wheeze like a dying human while offering no fire, I declared it dead (again) and dragged in the plug-in heater that makes it only slightly warmer while my new thermometer tells me it’s 37 degrees outside and 57 inside?

Shall I tell you that I’m seeing flashing lights that might be a migraine, or perhaps I’m going blind? But it’s Monday, the eye doctor is in Eugene, and I have to write anyway.  At least the sun is out, and Annie loves me. Dad is in heaven and not hurting anymore, and if my mammogram results are okay, I’m alive and healthy, so what am I whining about?

No? That’s what I thought.

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I’m planning to participate in NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month in November. That’s where crazy people try to write 50,000 words of a novel in 30 days, which comes out to about 1,600 words a day. I plan to take a vacation from the blog so I can focus on my NaNo book. After reading this, you might agree that I need a vacation.

Bundle up, and don’t forget to reset your clocks on Sunday or you’ll be an hour early to church.