Or don’t. I actually don’t like Halloween..or hardly any of the “holidays”
10-31-22
One thing I really love about Facebook right now is that everyday, almost, I have a “memory” regarding Mark. Its fun to swipe over or up or where ever… and see him smiling or jumping something or standing proudly next to one of his kids…or in a boomerang trying out his new kicks to wear to one of the kids Cross Country meets. What I don’t love about FB right now is politics… but I have weeded my feed out pretty well so its not bad. All you have to do it click on the 3 dots and choose “hide this from my feed” and you don’t even have to unfollow or unfriend people but it cleans up your feed. However, alot of people will complain but secretly love the drama and so they never change a thing.
Right now I still have low lights, no outdoor lights and I’m typing by computer and lamplight only. I just took Hatcher to his very first drivers training class. He has bugged me for like 2 years!! Before I could even sign him up, he was bugging me to sign him up, claiming he was already the best driver. Sometimes the youngest want to just stay the youngest. He wants to drive, convert a van to a camper car and drive the world. He has already had me on the phone with Matt Keller of Blue Ice Aviation to see if there is some sort of job opportunity in Alaska for him this summer! He wants to also make sure he can change a tire and do some other basic things to ensure he can help himself and others. Anyways….on the way to drivers training…I realized it was trick or treat night. I have never ever lived in an area where kids would even come knocking on my door but now I live in town and even though I’m up off the road and on the wrong side…I all of a sudden wondered if kids would walk to my front door. I told Hatcher I had to quickly get home and turn off ALL exterior lights and even the interior. I did NOT want someone walking up my drive. In fact, I wanted to be as stand-offish as possible. Hatcher basically called me a party pooper and prude but I had no candy and did not plan to participate. So I went to my basement and worked out my computer light and then jumped in the hot tub before sitting before my computer to write to you. So far so good. It’s pretty obvious now that this house does not get involved.
Poor Bucky is curled up next to me. I thought we were in the clear but I finally checked him after a few weeks and he DOES still have fleas. This is so defeating as I just started unbagging and heat treating the last of the things I threw in the garage. I spent my free day last week starting the whole spray and vacuum process over again but I just can’t do it. Its too much. I usually make him get down but here he is…It’s all fun and games til a flea jumps on me and bites me. I’m at my wits end. I did it all, sometimes twice and for 3-4 months. I might be time to light the match…or islandize the dog.
So in other news….Aly had a meet in GR at Riverside park and she had quite a turnout to watch her. Her own little fan club from Grandma Huismann down to chunky monkey Kiyah Mae. But for real…several of her high school friends came (who are in college) and current high school friends and even some of their parents along with us and her uncles. She ran 8th (almost tied for 7th) for her team (some of those injured seniors came back) and she ran her college PR so far. She really would like to not only go to Nationals in Tallahassee FL this month (November) but she would like to run with the team. I mean just going and being a part of it with all the perks and no sweat is fun in itself but she would like to run. She has one more meet in Toledo on Friday to work for that place. I know she can do it. I KNOW she can. She has run a faster time before and that would probably be all it takes. She CAN do this!
Lets see. Hatcher had his last meet. He ran in Regionals on Saturday in Allendale but had really gotten sick the week leading up to it. I could hear him cough below me in his room and it reverberated the house. A deep juicy chest cough. I did my best (but my brain is not 100%) to remedy it with thieves on his chest, in the difusser and in this cough drops and plenty of water but he ended up staying home Thursday. There just wasn’t enough time to get better before Saturday. It was a fast flat course but he just couldn’t give it his all…he was all gunked up. So he ran and finished and now he is done for the season. His cough is still there but more dry and hurty and he is still draining grossness from his nose. The girls made it to State again!! Their #1 runner, Lila Volkers (a freshman) finished first and broke the school record! I am going to be honest…I’m not sad to not be going to State Meet this year. I went 3 years in a row one was a covid year and so that was weird.
Instead…I will head to watch Cora run just outside of Chicago…and then celebrate her turning 20!! WHAT?! Weird. Friday I’ll head over to Toledo to watch Aly and then I’ll head home…I think. That’s the plan. Originally Aly’s meet was Saturday… and so it all got smooshed together and changed around. I hope it works out. Ya just never know.
So…I was going to blog Wednesday because it was my 21st anniversay. Can it still be your 21st if he is not here? In my heart, it still is. I was going to go up to Beaver Island Tuesday…hang out my myself on the lakeshore Wednesday and then return home Thursday but the weather was going to be very wet Tuesday and Wednesday so I decided to stay home…I have a kiddo here anyways and its easy to get inside your own head thinking you need alone time when you really do have someone else to care for that needs you…even though he might not admit. I spent Wednesday..well not as I planned. I started the day spraying..vacuuming and washing dog bedding and such. It made me about 2 hours later than I wanted to be in my day. I had no real agenda but I blocked the whole day off. I decided to go to places where I had real great memories with Mark. After dropping off Hatcher I took a different way home and went by our 19 Mile Kent City house. We prayed for that house and loved that house and never planned to move and even in talking to Hatcher yesterday…wish we never had. The whole idea behind it was that we had years of medical stuff ahead of us including 5 day a week dialysis…we needed to simplify. We didn’t know it would only be 9 months. I’m not going to start this regret path but trust that is was God’s plan and the right thing to do. I looked at the orchard and all the hustle of picking season. We loved this time of year and we spent many evenings walking the orchard paths. We sat out front on our andirondeck chairs like old people in their garages…talking..with no traffic passing by. It was lovely. We had many pool parties and evening swims, winter hot tub sessions and graduation parties. The memories go on and on. When I did finally get going I went to Montague/Whitehall. I didn’t go by the Olin Lakes house but it was our first and I remember feeling a sense of freedom as Mark started Linsley Aviation and had the freedom to come home for lunch and work his own hours. We didn’t make much but we were happy with what we were building. On our first night together married we stayed at the Weathervane Inn and we were too exhausted from wedding planning and getting married…we stayed another night! We would go back often to the Inn and the latter years we watched the Lewis House get remodeled and then one year we stayed there. We probably went back 7-10 of our anniversaries. One year we waited til February (Mark’s birthday) and it was crazy warm that year. I remember sitting outside in just a sweater with the sun on our faces and we coud NOT believe how warm it was. We shucked peanuts and drank some beer overlooking White Lake. He really liked to shuck peanuts. I went to a restuarant and sat and ate tacos and drank a local brew while writing in my journal and then communicating with some of my kids. I was talking to Abby…and then she volunteered to pick up Hatcher as I was running out of time and still wanted to go to the beach. First I stopped at the grocery store (the one we would go to to get snacks and such for inside TV picnics) and I helped a man in a wheelchair with is groceries. He asked why I was there (I can’t remember how we got to that) and I told him my husband and I often visited for our anniversary. He asked how many years. I told him 21 and he congratulated me. I didn’t tell him I was alone. I headed to the State Park by the campground at the channel and walked to the light house rock wall and watched some kite boarders. Crazy people, in my opinion. It was cold just standing there. I can’t imagine being IN the water. I saw the light break through the clouds…listened to the waves and thanked the Lord for the time I had with Mark. I know I said alot to Him…I don’t remember all of it. I was the crazy lady walking alone on the beach talking outloud. I was cold and I headed back to my car to get home. Home to the one place that really didn’t hold good memories of Mark…except….we bought this house 17 years ago when the market was not awesome. We really had no business buying another house. I had saved up child support money and we had saved some of our own and we figured it was an investment and it was okay. We never had to pay very much of the mortgage ever. We always had a renter (good or not) and so besides the down payment we never put much into it until we demolished alot it and rebuilt. We had a great year in 2020…coming up here and tearing it apart…and then framing out new windows and putting up some new walls. Tearing out basement floors and lifting the house. It was like we had all the time in the world. Mark put on the front deck and Hatcher helped him with the stairs. Mark put up all the OSB on the house was constantly making new spreadsheets to keep track of the expenditures. We did have some good times around this house but IN this house….living here has not been the best of my memories of Mark. I remember feeling rich and blessed when I would really think about the fact that we had two houses. So even though it feels crappy and lonely and maybe like it wasn’t the right choice at the time…I feel like we made good choices and that more will be reveiled to me later. I’m sure there is more to the puzzle then I currently understand.
I’m not lonely…but I’m lonely. I never wanted to do life alone. If I did, I would have never gotten married. I wanted to do life with Mark and it wasn’t enough time..for me. Call me selfish but I wanted more. I know my kids did too. I’m not sure how you are suppose to spend your anniversary when your spouse is gone but that’s how I spent mine.
That interview I did will release this week. Its an interview so the text is me talking..and you know how I talk….lots of dot dot dots…and pauses and mixed thoughts and so I feel like the interview is hard to follow (and they only posted part of it. It was long!) Thank goodness for the podcast and the youtube video. I think it will be easier to follow when you can hear it. I’ll post it when I have a link.
I made an effort to have dinner with my siblings…and even though it was my idea and I made the reservation..I was very late to the party. Life and cars and repairs sure do get in the way! We went to ther Forager in Howard City and if you’ve not tried it..you should. Expect to pay a bit more than your usual local cuisine (in Newaygo County) but its worth it. The atmosphere AND food are very good. It was good to sit and talk but we don’t do that often and there was alot to say…from everyone all at once.! Guess we need to do that more often. People…spend time with your people!
I feel like lately, its been really hard again to get in reading and working out and anything that I personally want to do. I know I struggle a little bit (or alot) with SAD but it seems to be coming early or I am just really bad with my time management (which isn’t untrue) or too much is going on. Also sleeping at night this last week has been weird. I was still sleeping with my window open and a window fan…I like it chilly at night but I wasn’t sleeping well and after I took it out I’m still not. I wake up all the time. I wasn’t doing that before. When this happens, I wake to the day tired and unrested and by 11am I am ready for a nap but the list of things to do is way too long to take a nap. I went back onto thyroid meds in August?? or July, I guess. After a retest, my thryroid number didn’t change so she upped the dose but I still feel pretty cruddy so I’m guessing the numbers won’t change. I only started to feel better when I was pre, during and post detox. Ya know what that means!! No sugar, no grains…no junk. No dairy, limited meat is the best way to go for me but I’ll wait til I do another blood test to know for sure. Aly had raised liver enzymes this summer and that was a little confusing and alarming but we waited to get retested and they really didn’t change much and also her ferratin is even lower! It’s a protein that stores iron. She will often get dizzy and light headed and even goofy (more than normal) and has to recover from that. It’s kind of scary. Cora has low ferratin too. What is going on!?
So I guess that is the update.
Nothing too exciting..I mean if I had written about any of those thigns in the moment, it would have included much more…I mean Wednesday was super emotional. Actually, all last week was.
If you follow my stories or the Jacknrubys Instagram account you will know that I am elbow deep trying to get this apartment done and I’m about to learn how to plumb because I need this done. But really, I should not plumb. However, I will hook up the stove vent/hood myself and install it. I have cut the butcherblock countertop myself (but I have to trim it) and I built a cabinet on my own. (lazy man’s woodworking on a budget as I used all scrap crap we had around and we had alot!) I will install the shower door, I’m not afraid, won’t be my first and I’ll either paint the floor or install the floor Karson took out of his house. I have to get this done!!!! So I can move on to doing nothing….or a whole new project. You never know. I think I’d like to just do my house (like maybe clean it) and get ready for Christmas. Which to me feels more important than it did in the past but also I know it will be sad…so not sure about it overall.
Comments 1
I donโt like politics either. Not many of my people post them, but now I know how to get them off. Thanks ๐
Keep posting Dusty. It keeps me praying. โค๏ธ๐๐ผ