One more day

It looks firm-ish that my dad will get home this afternoon.

So I'm cleaning the house up a little bit, doing tasks my mom didn't get to because she was over at the hospital. I admit I have mixed feelings about this.

On the one hand, I know it's the right thing to do and I *should* be doing it, and it gives me something TO do.  On the other hand I feel vaguely annoyed: there is literally nowhere I can go anymore and have people pay attention to me because everyone else is distracted by more important things (ergo: I am not important). And I'm again having the creeping realization that they way someone like me gets helped (with whatever thing, even down to getting leaves off the roof) it requires me to pay someone to do it. And that my role in life is always to be the one serving, the one cleaning up stuff, or typing up meeting minutes, or doing the jobs other people don't want to do...

Maybe in other times and other places there was more help forthcoming to people like me (without us having to call a "guy," and also without us having to call said "guy" multiple times to be sure he was coming out - frankly, the logistics of hiring someone, especially the "we'll be there between eight and five on Wednesday" and then they never show, is why I tend to do stuff myself that maybe I shouldn't do).

And part of this IS tied up with being the unmarried kid in the family: I do sometimes get leaned on for stuff my brother does not. I try not to be resentful about it. And I don't even know at this point what would make me happy. Having the car free to go do what I wanted? Being able to go shopping? I don't know.

(Well, I do: knowing for sure that a week from now I'd be getting on a train for my destination and being able to be on that train all the way to Mineola. But right now I strongly suspect I'm going to wind up on a bus, AT BEST, or stuck here longer and worrying about what to do about my mail-hold, at worst.)

There isn't even anywhere I can think of that would be all that wonderful to go. As I said, the big mall here is largely moribund (there was a letter-to-the-editor in the paper this morning floating the idea of turning the empty anchor stores into luxury condos, and I'll go that author one better: make them senior housing. Or low-income housing for families in need. And entice a grocery store to fill one of the empty spaces in the mall, so people without a car could maybe get groceries easily. Or, heck, if you have a concentration of people living in one place, easy to direct bus service there, so people could get out to work or groceries or doctors or whatever. But still. That doesn't help those of us who'd like to try clothes on BEFORE we have to pay for them...)

There is a small cheese factory that does tours and supposedly has a petting zoo, but I don't know. There's allegedly a yarn shop in the downtown of Bloomington, but I'm not sure how to get there and generally parking is a nightmare...

I'm sure part of this is the high humidity we've had, and the unrelenting overcast/rainy days.

Edited to add: well, I got the vacuuming/sweeping/putting stuff away done; I find that dusting doesn't need to be done as that seems to have been done recently: stuff isn't dusty.

I think I'm gonna go hunt in a box I noticed in the basement. Years and years ago I saw a photograph of my grandfather standing next to his plane (WWI vintage) in a box down there and have been trying to find it since to have a copy made for me. If I locate it, and if JMC is still in business, I could take it out there and get a copy made for me to put up on my wall at home...