Day 19

All is well with self-care and change.

But a very rough pain day. I will call my doctor tomorrow.

My neighbour next door gave me some strong pills and they did the trick but they are prescription.

I was defeated by the mathematics of a knitting pattern I was designing so left it to percolate on the graph paper.

I wrote a poem about old age.

My friend Lana called  me. She has dementia but she asked me to rescue some memories for her which I did. She marvels at my memory capacity. She asked me was her marriage happy and I told her the truth (it wasn't). I find it easier on her to tell her the truth as she can wax sentimental about fouled relationships. I was delighted she called as her memories of other friends, other places, are shattered.

Perspective.

I'm reading a very funny book called Slow Horses about the Secret Service in the UK. If you've ever worked in a grinding bureaucracy you will relate.

From the Archives - 2008 - Trinity Bay, NL. What an amazing place.

  

Day 9

So far so good.

I'm truly feeling it in my readings, BP and sugars super normal.

I was pondering today on groceries, how there seemed to be very little to actually "shop" for when I was growing up.

Below is an old photo of where the pub was at the end of the road I lived on. Around the corner to the left was the butcher shop, and across from it on the right was the local shop. 

 

It has changed greatly.

Everything was delivered.

Milk first thing in the morning.

Along with the newspaper

Bread some time in the afternoon. 

Mum usually walked down to the butchers (pushing a stroller) for the meat of the day which was always wrapped in newspaper and twine.

Dad grew a lot of our veggies but the small grocery store carried the basics of potatoes and onions.

Granny often brought in a "fowl" (turkey or chicken) and fresh eggs and "country butter" from her small holding. Carrying it on the bus where one of us children would meet her at the bus terminal.

All this information about meetings and Granny coming would be put on a plain postcard by Granny posted on the previous evening and arriving in our post the following morning. Two posts a day then. I wish we had saved all those postcards now, as Daughter is a postcardist. I was in my late teens before we got a phone.

There was none of this "stocking up". Our larder was  very slender. Mum baked a few times a week, Irish soda bread, the odd fancy pastry or cake (anyone remember the infamous "Victoria Sponge Cake"?)

If we were feeling particularly festive Mum would send one of us down to the grocery shop to pick up a shilling brick of ice cream along with the free wafers which would be carved up between all 8 of us.

We had two "accounts" in Cork City. One at Cash's for clothing where a discount was offered on all purchases "on account" and the bill was mailed to the house once a month. And the other at a place called Macroom Dairies where Christmas toys would be put away and paid for weekly. No interest ever charged in these two places.

What do you remember about your childhood shopping experiences, if any?

Day 8

All is kinda well.

Lots of snow overnight, I'm glad I cancelled my appointments. Snow never bothered me until I had that bad ice fall in 2015 and that changed everything. 

Here is a picture of the girls with the snow as a backdrop.

Slept a lot today but ate well and exercised nil. No energy.

Sometimes life is a bit of a trudge. But motto is "do the next right thing".  And that helped my day along.

A good book helps. John Boyne's latest.

And a riveting new documentary on the Night Stalker in LA.

Day 7

 A bit of a rough day today as a massive snowstorm is predicted for tomorrow and I had planned to grocery shop along with two medical appointments and library drop off and pick up after a day of rest.

I was reminded of Robbie Burns' famous poem: "The best laid plans of mice and men......."

So I staggered out to do the curbside pickup, really tired to begin with, thinking I didn't have that much but it turned out to be a lot when I added it all up as I include so much fruit and veggies in it now and they are awkward and well LARGE.

I called both clinics to say I wasn't risking my life on unpredictable roads and their snowplows so cancelled the tomorrow stuff. Another day.

Huge attack of the munchies as I drove home, realizing that I loved to stop at cafes and pick up a snack along with the Americano and just sit at a masked distance from others and well people watch. I knew it was a no-go as the flesh is almighty weak and I would fall on a pastry or scone. So I didn't. A masked wonder was right into my bread she saw poking out of my cart when I got to the entrance of my building. I was grouchy but my mask covered up my snarl. I may wear one both permanently. I would never invade another's groceries and comment, but that's me, pandemic or no pandemic. Boundaries all the way. Yeah, I get sprouted bread, and had to give her tips on how to separate the slices, exhausted as I was. Now she thinks we're bonded over bread. Shyte.

What a lovely surprise with the mail though. Plural. A gift of a book just published by a friend, I've already read two of the stories and they are brilliant. And another book by Irene Kelly about her life in one of those infamous Mother and Baby Homes that are all over the papers these days. And a gorgeous handmade postcard from Daughter who extolled on the back of it how we have nearly 54 years travelling together, across oceans and continents. Very moving.