PRE TRAVEL

Travel requires planning. What to take. More importantly what not to take. I always forget something important but have too much that is unnecessary. Books. More books that I can possibly read. Not enough tops. Another time not enough bottoms. Always plenty of books, though.

Art supplies. Who knows what fancy may strike. Color pencils? Drawing pads? What size? How many? Always too many, but better more than less in this instance. I'd rather do without deodorant. Well, maybe not.

Spare glasses. Spiral "pages" notebook, pens, ink. Color Prayer Moleskine and color gel pens. Computer. Can't manage without the computer. And that means cords and cables and the mouse. Stuff.

And then there is Gabriel. Dog food, bowls, comb, brushes, scissors, cotton balls, and now eye drops. This little eight and a half pound Shih Tzu requires a bag of his own plus his crate. But, can't leave home without him. And this time am taking his rabies certificate and immunization record, just in case I have to board him for a day.

Upon the return home we just have to unpack all this stuff and disperse it back to where it all belongs. Sometimes wonder if it is really worth leaving home.

GABRIEL PROBLEMS

Upset in the family today. Gabriel is our six year old Shih Tzu. He is eight and a half pounds of love, spirit, and joy. I have noticed the past few days that his left eye was blood shot. This morning the light caught it just right and the cornea looked cloudy. Panic, of course.

This afternoon at the vet's he was checked for glaucoma, cornea checked for ulcer, and then sent home with eye drops for irritation. By the time I got in from work the redness had already started to clear.

This is my second Shih Tzu and he has captivated my heart the same as the first. He is small and soft and lovable. Gabriel does, however, have a few quirks. Like chewing on Bill's hearing aids when he finds them on the night stand. That's the worst -- but I can't really blame Gabriel. We have responsibilities too. The only toys that he plays with are small, stuffed squeaky creatures -- no balls or hard ropes or Frisbees. He loves red peppers, tomatoes, bananas, and peaches, which he gets with his kibble. No canned food, no table scraps.

We give our hearts so freely because they ask so little.

RELATIONSHIP

"There was a fine line between love and hate, you hear that cliche all the time. But no one told you that the moment you crossed it would be the one you least expected. You'd fall in love and crack open a secret door to let your soul mate in. You just never expected such closeness, one day, to feel like an intrusion." -- from Jodi Picoult's The Tenth Circle.

These words jumped right off the page and hit me between the eyes. Smack! I feel like that sometimes. Not often, but sometimes. Why is that? Because I let someone in, gave too much of myself away, allowed the crossover into intrusion? Scary. And even more frightening is the fact that the other person doesn't know. Doesn't understand the change in attitude. The backing off. The silences.

Yes, I feel the intrusion. Sometimes. Maybe he feels the same thing. Hmmm... I wonder how we correct this. Or if we even need to. Maybe couples need some space. Sometimes. Maybe we also need to take a look at what and who we are to one another. What we hope for ourselves. What we hope for the other. Do couples have these conversations?

We are going away for a few days. Away from the routine of every day. Maybe we will look at some of these questions. Maybe there won't be answers but we can acknowledge the questions.

WAKE UP CALL

Yesterday I left Bill at the eyeglasses counter at Costco and went off meandering on my own. I completed the circuit, saw what I wanted to see, and returned to the eyeglasses counter. Bill was not there.

Knowing that he was probably looking for me, I stationed myself in the center of two main intersecting aisles. This always works because I frequently meander off not paying attention to which way he has gone and I need to be "found." And he did find me.

"I thought I saw you before," he said to me, "but I was pretty sure you didn't have on a red top." And, of course, I didn't. Don't have but one red top -- rarely worn. Red is not my color.

"Look," he said, "there she is down there." And he pointed down the way to the woman wearing a red top. She was about ten inches shorter than me, she looked a lot thinner than me, and I am fairly thin right now. She had short hair like me. She had white hair like me. She was a little stoop shouldered, NOT like me. And she was old.

......like me?

I was stunned. Do I really look that old? Guess so. Don't like it very much, but there it is. Barbara is getting old. Getting? Hmmmm. Maybe is. I am sixty nine. I think of eighty as being old -- not sixty nine. My aunt Mary is ninety nine and that is old. Somehow I just don't think of myself as being old. And, guess what? I'm going to continue to not think of myself as being old.

A MIRACLE(?) HAPPENS

Late yesterday afternoon as Bill was about to get into the shower, he discovered that one of his hearing aids was missing. After his shower we drove over to the work site and looked. An impossible situation -- he had been mixing and pouring cement for fence posts so there was no clearly defined area in which to look. To say nothing of the poured and hardening cement and surrounding piles of dirt from the post holes. ARGHH! Hopeless.


He called this morning, about fifteen minutes after he left for the work site. "Guess who has two hearing aids?" he said. He went on to tell me that last night he "dreamed" where the lost hearing aid was, and when he got to the work site, he looked, and there it was. Then he said, "And I already said 'thank you.'"

Ask for what you want;

Believe it will be given;

Let the process happen;

Say 'thank you.'

SUNDAY'S GOSPEL -- August 12

Unless I am reading the lessons as part of the Sunday service, I do not read the lessons ahead, that way they are heard fresh with my current situation in life. Usually I am the acolyte that retrieves the Gospel Book from the Altar and carries it to the Baptismal font and holds it as the priest reads. Sunday it was Luke 12:32-40. The only thing I heard was "Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out..." I immediately thought COACH -- a Coach bag is forever, or so acquaintances tell me. Pick one you like, pay the exorbitant price and Coach will keep it going forever.


This is a sad commentary on what secular knowledge does to our thinking. I do NOT have a Coach bag. If I pay twenty dollars for a purse, it is a lot in my mind. I am frugal, frugal, frugal. In fact we went to Clinton Crossing on Saturday and, for the first time, I walked through the Coach outlet. I was appalled at the prices -- even in the outlet store. If it were "forever" there was nothing for which I would have paid such a price.


Obviously it was still with me on Sunday, these "Coach" prices and promises as I held the Gospel Book and heard the Word.

IMAGES OF BARBARA

We are still working on pictures. However, I do not take a very good picture. I close my eyes, I open my mouth, I look wide eyed and weird; my mouth is open in a gaping, gasping, guffaw; I am sallow and worn and hopeless; I am gesticulating and ranting and ugly. Nothing looks natural -- what is natural? I am a person of many moods, attitudes, and places of being.

I am thinking to take some pictures of my Shih Tzu, Gabriel, and use him as my "marker." He doesn't like to have his picture taken either, however, and photo shoots with him usually result in blurs, a bowed head, or even a back view. We will keep the cameras going and see what we can do. In the meantime we have this, and then there is the serious one that I chose -- mainly because of the color that matches the blog page. Somewhere down the road there will be a picture that seems like the real me. The real me? There are so many. Which one shall I choose? And who IS the real me?