Today is the first day....

Today is the first day of the rest of my life.  And so it begins.  The Mother's Day High Tea is over and the Yappy Dog Run passed my driveway as I left for church yesterday.  The cups are wrapped and stored in the basement of the church.  This morning I will wrap the tea pots and put them away.  It was a very successful event and I look forward to next year.  The tea is the one time of the year that I get to see a lot of my friends.  This year I had 2 daughters, 2 son-in-laws, 2 granddaughters, 3 great grand sons, my niece Lisa Shea Porter with her husband and daughter and a partridge in a Pear Tree.  The kids got acquainted and a good time was had by all.  But now it is Monday and life moves forward.

When I think about this being the first day of the rest of my life, it seems a  little daunting, but I am pretty sure I can handle it.  All I can say is I had a bumper sticker once that summed it all up for me. It said "If I had known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself."  When I was a teenager, I knew I would not live to see 30.  When 30 rolled around and I had 5 kids I was pretty sure 40 was my limit.  40 came and I fell in love and decided I would probably live forever.  Now that I am beginning to fossilize,  I am wondering if age is not just a number?  I have lost a lot of friends and most of my close family.  I am sure there are no uncles or aunts left out there.  The most I could hope for would be a cousin, but I am thinking that is a futile thought.  I have lived in Colorado over half of my life and lost touch of what ever family I had back there.  Do not think I am complaining, because I am not.  I never kept track of them, and by the same token, they never kept track of me.  So there you go!

Now, to the rest of my life.  Many of my friends want to know what I am going to do.  So, let me just weigh out my options.  My 2400 square foot house on one acre of land is pretty much free and clear.  If I sell it, I have to move.  Now where would I move, you ask.  Since I have spent over half my life in Pueblo, Colorado, leaving does not make much sense.  Living in this big house all alone does not make sense either.  I have a cat and 8 geese.  The geese have never lived any where except here, so if I sold the house, the geese would have to stay with the property.  Icarus could move with me, but she has never been a litter box user, preferring rather to use the doggie door and go outside. If I moved into town she would no doubt be ran over the first time the door was opened.

Or, I could get a room mate.  Now, I am sorry, but I can not think of a single soul in my repertoire of friends that I would want to live with and share space with.  I do not want to live with a female who would hog the bathroom and leave things laying here and there.  She would no doubt want to be friends and share secrets, but I am not a secret sharing person.  I thought about maybe a little gay guy, but what if he wanted to throw a party?  I do not want parties and loud music.  I think I am best if I just live alone.  My ideal scenario is just to wake up dead some morning, or better yet, doze off while Jeopardy! is on and just not wake up.  That way, the mortician could just pick me up, the auction house could just sell all my treasures and then...….who knows.

I do not look on death as a bad thing.  Number one, it is inevitable and we are all going to do it sooner or later.  So, rest assured that when that day comes there is going to be one happy woman here!  Before you get excited thinking maybe I have a premonition, think again.  No visions.  No premonitions.  Just the ramblings of an old woman who has been there, done that, and moved on.

Have a good day and remember,

You can not sprinkle showers of happiness on other people without getting a few drops on yourself! 

My bleeding heart.

There was one thing my mother always had growing in a shady part of her yard and that was a Bleeding Heart plant.  I never quite figured out how that worked, but I know I bought her several over the years.  Every time I wanted to get her something she expressed a desire for a Bleeding Heart.  The preschool at our church was having a plant sale a couple weeks back and I just could not resist.  One Bleeding Heart.  Right now it is residing in the refrigerator because it is not quite planting time.  Over  the years I have planted a couple in my yard, but they are no longer there whether it is because I neglected to water them or mowed them off or what, but I shall try again.  I seem to have the same luck as my mother on keeping things alive!

I do not know how many years my mother has been gone, but I never see a Bleeding Heart that I do not think of her.   I know my fascination with the plant is tied to her, but what was it that drew her to the plant?  I do not remember grandma having one in her yard.  She had Spearmint.  Lots of Spearmint.  I remember that because it was right under the window of the room where they slept and there were big spiders that lived in the Spearmint patch.  I used to live in fear of the spiders coming in, walking across the grandma's and coming into the room where I slept.

I had Catnip growing here over the septic tank.  That stuff really spreads.  I never really seen the cat in it, but some times Charmin or Boots would act very weird.  I planted Poppy's there once.  They were double and they were lavender.  Those were nice, but when they reseeded themselves they came back as single red Poppy's and then they died out.  Once when we were in Grand Junction Joe Fisher picked me a bread sack full of Apricots from a tree up on the BLM land.  I made jam out of them and threw the seeds out over the septic tank and they all came up next Spring.  I planted several in the yard and planted 12 over at Kenny's  mom's house.  Now 25 years later those are all died out except one behind my house.  It has bores and I have to trim it on the side closest to the house every summer so it does not rub the roof.  I am thinking at the rate I am trimming this side that soon it will be hanging over in the field next door and I will not have a tree anymore.  I am hoping I can get one more harvest so I can grow more trees and next time plant them away from the house.

Of course there was a time when I had 68 Hybrid Tea Roses growing in my yard.  The kids used to give me a bush every Mother's Day and when I had 10 kids total it did not take long to fill up the yard.  Course roses need fed every month and pruned every time they bloom and I am basically lazy, so here I now set with 5 that I do nothing with and they just refuse to die.  So I am going to plant a Bleeding Heart.  Not sure if I will do that before I go to Texas or wait.  I can hear the weather lady down on the television yapping about a coming snow storm.  I hate to pay $14.00 for something just to let it freeze.

Well, the sun is up now and it is time to get around and do something constructive.  Or not.