Yesterday I was on a lawn tractor

That about sums it up. I decided the yard at Mother’s needed to be mowed. It was just too long to go into winter . . . just the tiniest bit too long, but no doubt about it, too long. So I spent a long time on the big mower with lots of horsepower and an accelerator. I almost bounced off a couple of times, but managed to both hold on and not get my head clipped off by low reaching limbs. And there was enough gas in the cans to keep the tank filled. I won’t say it’s the best job that has been done, but it was effective.

The sky was iron grey, but still the trees were stunningly beautiful. I chose not to take a picture, but keep the one in my head.

One week

It’s about eight now; well, a little after, and I’m sitting here in my flannel pajama pants and a blanket around my shoulders. And at noon we’ll be heading out to go to the cemetery for the 1 pm service. It won’t take long. Then it will have been one week almost to the hour since Mother died here at the Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse and when she was laid to rest beside her father in the old part of Oak Lawn in Sturgis, Michigan.

It will take some getting used to  this business of Mother having passed away. Yesterday, I found myself thinking I’d have to tell her about the surprise caller at the visitation . . . then I remembered.

Some pictures

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Mother and Der Bingle at Christmastime, probably 2000. Sydney is probably smelling “cat” on Mother.

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About three years ago – Mother’s holiday beer, Eliot Ness. Over the years, Der Bingle delighted in finding exotically named beers for her infrequent sips.

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Maybe five years ago: Apple Festival, sitting on the straw bales at the Settler’s Roost (Swine Barn) listening to the Well Spring Fiddlers. Summer and Alison. Nice hat.

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Apple Festival the year of the shattered ankle for Grandson Robert. Another cool hat.

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One of Mother’s pre-Christmas meals. No hat.

To all things there is a season

Mother passed away Saturday. Visitation is 2-4 and 6-8 Friday with private burial services on Saturday.

Today I went shopping for something nice to wear.

Tomorrow I will have my hair color perked up.

I may go home then to look for pictures of Mother at different points in her life. Maybe the one where she is about one and wearing a polka dot dress with polka dot bloomers. That would be this one:

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Banana Birthday Boy

I went looking for a picture of LZP – whose birthday is today – in his banana suit, but I couldn’t find it right off the bat in iphoto. I going to have to refer you to a previous post – THIS ONE – and before you click to view, remember he is a trained professional. Do not try this at home until you have completed the relevant classes from the LZP Correspondence School of  It’s So Crazy It Just Might Work.

Clearing throat sound . . .  One, Two, Three

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR BANANA HEAD. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU.

* I just remembered LZP was the one who sent us the Peeps CD and Summer loved it and played the chirping songs over and over and over again.  Suddenly, from out of the blue, I am thinking Banana Split. Or, we could put him in a plastic bag so he will be all brown and spotted and rotten by Halloween . . . with gnats hovering around him.

Long day

Ah, yesterday was a long day. I started this post at about 10 pm and I opened my computer to see it staring at me – just the title, nothing else. I don’t know what happened really between then and now, except that I obviously closed the lid. For my mother to worry about being sick, finally go to the doctor and come to think she was fixably ill and then, boom, to find out she has advanced pancreatic cancer is a terrible thing for her to have to face. To know you are alive and that soon you will not be so . . . beyond accepting. To go from promising to eat better and build up your strength on one day and choosing hospice on the next is . . .

And that is where we are at this time. We are at life’s grammatical three dots that say we are at a loss to truly describe what is coming in the next minutes.

Because we are fascinated

I got this email from LZP:

This is weird……..

BATHROOM PAINTED FLOOR !!!
*IMAGINE YOU ARE AT A PARTY ….

* Tenth floor of a hi-rise building….*

*AND THEN YOU HAVE TO VISIT THE BATHROOM…. *

*You open the door…. **
NOW, REMEMBER,*

*THE FLOOR IS JUST* A PAINTED FLOOR!**

KINDA TAKES YOUR BREATH AW AY…..* *DOESN’T IT?*

Scroll sloooooooowly…..

to this picture

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here.

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