I suppose in a way it's that this has been a week of losses - no one directly in my circle, but people on the edges of it. Mr. Flanagan's funeral, and also, how people were talking (on Thursday) about the sad irony that his funeral happened v. shortly after his death (I think it was five days - they just waited on a couple family members to get here) but there still was no set time for Margaret's memorial service.
Well, we have one now - it's in a couple weeks (and thank goodness, on a Saturday afternoon so not only can I go, I can work at the reception, which people at church are insisting upon as something she would have wanted, even though her one living relative - one that apparently wasn't that close to her - said he didn't want it). So at least we get closure, even though the people she was closest to at church (the secretary, for one) are having to do a lot about settling her estate that apparently is being left undone.
And I still feel sad about Brandon, my former student who was killed, and of course, every grief dredges up old ones, and I was thinking about the student who died last November again.
And thinking about all the people in South Texas. I know friends of friends who live there, and my former colleague's daughter and her family live there - I hope they evacuated. I found the news account of the "write your name and social security number on your arm in Sharpie" particularly chilling, but I guess that's SOP now in hurricane zones for people who don't evacuate. (You wouldn't need to suggest twice to me to evacuate - even if I'd worry about my piano in my absence and the possibility of looters, still, getting out with your life is more important than your stuff.)
Also, last night I had another melancholy dream. I think "having to set up the Christmas tree alone" has taken over for "cats I need to take care of but am not" as a metaphor for some need in my life that's going unmet. In this particular dream, I was up at my parents' house, and for some reason it fell totally to me to set up the Christmas tree. (Possibly memories of last Christmas, when my mother was injured and couldn't help, and I had to get a neighbor in just to lift the thing into place - my dad's knees and balance being far too bad for that kind of thing these days)
The tree was weird. It was more like those "Norfolk Island pines" (which are actually not pines at all, they are Auraucariaceae) with very long and floppy thin branches. And I got it up in the stand....and then discovered for some reason the stand I had been provided with was a very, very old-school shallow metal pan (like the one my dad inherited from his parents) instead of the nice deep "Swivel Straight" stand with a good well on it for holding water that we normally use. And it was up to me to retrieve the proper stand from the garage, but one of the cars was parked next to where it was and....I don't know. My dreams rarely make a lot of sense to me in a narrative way but I do sense overwhelming EMOTION from them, and that emotion here was a combination platter of frustration ("I can't make things work right" and also "Why am I having to do this alone") and sadness (probably related to my having to do it alone - as in, there was some reason why other family members were unable to help). And upon waking, it made me melancholy, because I got to thinking about how not-too-terribly-many years in the future, I will probably have to figure out how to "make Christmas" all alone, by myself, here. (Unless I make the even-longer trip to my brother and sister-in-law's, and either pay for a hotel room or sleep on the basement floor in their small house with several animals that I am allergic to in it (they recently got new cats to replace the old Maine Coon). And maybe other family members (her family which.....I don't totally always get along with) and it would be too strange and different and sad and I might actually be happier staying in my own house with my own little tree and doing Christmas at my local church....
But, I don't know. My mom comes from long-lived stock, and my dad, it's hard to know, because he's the first generation of non-smokers in recent memory (some earlier generations, if the genealogy is correct, had people in the 1800s making it into their 90s), and he's already outlived either of his parents, and right now, aside from the arthritis, his health is good.....so hopefully I have at least 10 more years of spending Christmas with them....
But yeah. I need to exorcise the mood of that dream.
I also had a minor challenge this morning: the blinds I use all the time (opening and closing) in the living room seem to wear out fairly fast - I've had to replace them every 2-3 years it seems. The little thin cords that join up all the slats fray and break and then the whole thing stops working....and that happened to the blinds on one of my front windows. It was a real fight to get it out of the brackets - I was afraid I was going to either break the window (if the screwdriver I was trying to use to push on the tab slipped) or hurt my hand (I did break two nails) or damage the brackets. I said a few not-very-nice words (especially for a Sunday morning) but finally got it out, got out to Lowe's. Their blind-cutters are off on Sunday (I should have known) but thank goodness, this one was a standard size and they had an exact replacement. Putting it back in was a good bit easier.
These are the cheapest grade Levolor blinds and I admit I wonder about replacing them with something nicer and, more importantly, more long-lived (I hate replacing things on a regular schedule; I would FAR rather pay more up front and not have to replace regularly). The only thing is - I suspect any better quality blind would have different types of brackets, and I remember how awful it was trying to put the current ones in. I don't know what the wood part of my window frames (original to the house - the windows have been replaced but the frames are still original) is, but man, it's super-hard. Oak, maybe? I don't know if they used oak for that. I thought the trim was maybe fir, but fir is a pretty soft wood....
Anyway. I don't love those early-morning repair trips but at least the blind is fixed.
So I'm trying to cheer myself back up. And I need to do more piano practice - messing with the blind ate up the before-church time I'd normally use for that.
I will say I am going to donate to the scholarship set up in Brandon's memory.
And also, one sort-of-good-news thing at church: apparently we were given a large (like, really large) donation, and the man who manages the money for the church is of the opinion that we should take part of it, and find a congregation of our denomination that was in the path of Harvey that now has great need (either serious building damage, or was already in an area that was already lower-SES) and give part of the donation to them to help them out. And that's good, and I like that idea. I like the idea of individual congregations partnering with others in need to help them keep going.
Also, the minister mentioned that our denomination's Week of Compassion (the office that mostly does disaster-relief) is accepting donations to help out, so that may be where I give some money.
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