Homeless
(Written Saturday morning, July 15)
Today's the first day of our vacation, and the first day of our voluntary homelessness. (Well, actually, I'm still working, but I like my work, so it's not so bad.) We slept so well. When I got up I did some yoga stretches to ease the soreness from moving yesterday. Then I booted our iPod and dialed up Thomas Dolby's "I Live In A Suitcase" and it brought a tear to my eye, since it's so apt and a lovely song in its own right, but also no doubt from the freshly-released nasties in my bloodstream (yoga is like wringing the muscles out).
Yesterday was ... stressful. We clearly had too much on our agenda, and even with me taking a day off of work and Margo hiring people to move our few pieces of furniture and boxes, we still had enough boxing, moving, shipping, cleaning, and errand-running to keep us busy right up until early evening. And we'd both arisen by 5:30 - probably from anxiety - and worked pretty much nonstop.
So at the end of the day, after the last counter had been wiped, I took off my raggy jeans and ripped T-shirt and put them into the garbage bag, changed into a polo shirt and chinos, and joined Margo and Sarah for dinner at our favorite brewpub, Laurelwood. And after fish and chips (Margo reminded me I'd be getting plenty of that soon enough, but I still had a ken for it), a glass of a very tasty seasonal Belgian tripel, and a few bites of key lime pie, we got back into our rental car and headed out.
But where we usually turn, we didn't, and for me that was the start of our homelessness, literally the fork in the road where we don't go home but go somewhere else. In our case, it's the Georgian House bed and breakfast for a few nights. Which we are enjoying very much, by the way. It was great to check in to such a clean house. After spending a day dusting and mopping and wiping, I knew I'd be dreaming of cobwebs and dust, and it was great to not see any. But whatever I dreamed, it remains unknown to me as I slept better than I had all week.
I also got a bit weepy with appreciation and relief before breakfast, walking by the backyard garden, helping myself to some coffee, and reading the paper in the reading room. After a week surrounded by boxes and sleeping on the floor, it's so great to have everything taken care of. See that lawn? I don't have to mow it. That table? Someone else wiped it off. Someone else got today's newspaper and made the coffee. The weeds in the garden, waiting to push up and grow? The spiders in the garage, making webs? The slow leak forming in the bathroom plumbing (I'm making this up)? Not my problem. Entropy will go on and I'm okay with that.
Today's the first day of our vacation, and the first day of our voluntary homelessness. (Well, actually, I'm still working, but I like my work, so it's not so bad.) We slept so well. When I got up I did some yoga stretches to ease the soreness from moving yesterday. Then I booted our iPod and dialed up Thomas Dolby's "I Live In A Suitcase" and it brought a tear to my eye, since it's so apt and a lovely song in its own right, but also no doubt from the freshly-released nasties in my bloodstream (yoga is like wringing the muscles out).
Yesterday was ... stressful. We clearly had too much on our agenda, and even with me taking a day off of work and Margo hiring people to move our few pieces of furniture and boxes, we still had enough boxing, moving, shipping, cleaning, and errand-running to keep us busy right up until early evening. And we'd both arisen by 5:30 - probably from anxiety - and worked pretty much nonstop.
So at the end of the day, after the last counter had been wiped, I took off my raggy jeans and ripped T-shirt and put them into the garbage bag, changed into a polo shirt and chinos, and joined Margo and Sarah for dinner at our favorite brewpub, Laurelwood. And after fish and chips (Margo reminded me I'd be getting plenty of that soon enough, but I still had a ken for it), a glass of a very tasty seasonal Belgian tripel, and a few bites of key lime pie, we got back into our rental car and headed out.
But where we usually turn, we didn't, and for me that was the start of our homelessness, literally the fork in the road where we don't go home but go somewhere else. In our case, it's the Georgian House bed and breakfast for a few nights. Which we are enjoying very much, by the way. It was great to check in to such a clean house. After spending a day dusting and mopping and wiping, I knew I'd be dreaming of cobwebs and dust, and it was great to not see any. But whatever I dreamed, it remains unknown to me as I slept better than I had all week.
I also got a bit weepy with appreciation and relief before breakfast, walking by the backyard garden, helping myself to some coffee, and reading the paper in the reading room. After a week surrounded by boxes and sleeping on the floor, it's so great to have everything taken care of. See that lawn? I don't have to mow it. That table? Someone else wiped it off. Someone else got today's newspaper and made the coffee. The weeds in the garden, waiting to push up and grow? The spiders in the garage, making webs? The slow leak forming in the bathroom plumbing (I'm making this up)? Not my problem. Entropy will go on and I'm okay with that.
posted by Michael Nelson at 4:18 pm
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home