Bracing
Thursday morning I did the last of the gardening for the season--and by that I mean I took last-minute measures to spare a couple plants from the impending hard freeze. The geraniums came in and the perennial mums went in the soil, in the same spot where mums have died two previous years. (A gardener pal says those might not have been perennial but I'm not expecting these to live in any case.)
And the freeze did come, accompanied by some surprisingly rich and persistent lake-effect snow. I expected a dusting; I came home to an inch over most of the lawns. There were still patches in shady areas as I went into work today, despite the fact that it was above freezing much of the weekend and even rained overnight.
The reason I had the morning off on Thursday was that someone I know in the neighbourhood, ChiBareBear, was having a colonoscopy and needed someone to pick him up. I agreed before I realised it was at Weiss, the hospital I learned to hate over the past couple years. At the same time, I do miss some of the folks. I decided not to visit Millie at Radiology (partly because I was running late, partly because I couldn't bear it) but I ran into one of my favourite transporters in the hallway, who recognised me immediately even without my hair. "How's my friend?" he asked and when I told him, he said, "Come here, I'm going to give you a hug."
Getting into the elevator, I saw one of the nurses from the 8th floor who didn't recognise me. But I knew they'd all been told, so I could just exchange pleasantries with him. It was a different story with the attendant in the surgical waiting room, who was solicitous almost to a fault. Fortunately CBB was all ready to go, so I was able to get out of there with nothing worse than a brief flashback to that awful hour in the consultation room with Witch Hands. (As I was psyching myself up to come, I actually told myself, "At least Witch Hands won't be there.")
I'm not really sure why I agreed to pick him up, really, except that he asked. It was a general call and he didn't have to choose me. If he hadn't made an overture recently by inviting me to a get-together at his place the same weekend as HiBearNation I probably would have ignored it. But I keep thinking about all of us growing old alone in our individual apartments and think we have to do more to be there for each other.
And the freeze did come, accompanied by some surprisingly rich and persistent lake-effect snow. I expected a dusting; I came home to an inch over most of the lawns. There were still patches in shady areas as I went into work today, despite the fact that it was above freezing much of the weekend and even rained overnight.
The reason I had the morning off on Thursday was that someone I know in the neighbourhood, ChiBareBear, was having a colonoscopy and needed someone to pick him up. I agreed before I realised it was at Weiss, the hospital I learned to hate over the past couple years. At the same time, I do miss some of the folks. I decided not to visit Millie at Radiology (partly because I was running late, partly because I couldn't bear it) but I ran into one of my favourite transporters in the hallway, who recognised me immediately even without my hair. "How's my friend?" he asked and when I told him, he said, "Come here, I'm going to give you a hug."
Getting into the elevator, I saw one of the nurses from the 8th floor who didn't recognise me. But I knew they'd all been told, so I could just exchange pleasantries with him. It was a different story with the attendant in the surgical waiting room, who was solicitous almost to a fault. Fortunately CBB was all ready to go, so I was able to get out of there with nothing worse than a brief flashback to that awful hour in the consultation room with Witch Hands. (As I was psyching myself up to come, I actually told myself, "At least Witch Hands won't be there.")
I'm not really sure why I agreed to pick him up, really, except that he asked. It was a general call and he didn't have to choose me. If he hadn't made an overture recently by inviting me to a get-together at his place the same weekend as HiBearNation I probably would have ignored it. But I keep thinking about all of us growing old alone in our individual apartments and think we have to do more to be there for each other.