Indiana countryside and Wal-Mart’s garden stuff.

Oh, what a great airplane for  little kids . . .

We got home about 6:30 this evening and then it took me another combined hour to transfer stuff from one car to another and drive to the Kendallville house. And, oh my gosh, we followed a car from Warsaw to Goshen that refused to go faster than 45 mph. Finally, partway through that town, the car turned off  . . . oh, but you haven’t heard the half of it. You see, this slow car apparently knew a shortcut and it met me at the north side of town and slipped in front of me again. ACK!! ACK!!! ACK!!!

Again, the 45 mph and then once again, it turned. I personally wanted to follow it and yell at the driver, but decided that would be over the top.

There has to be something not cool about being at a cemetery to leave flowers and then fantasizing about yanking someone out through their sunroof.

I won’t be here at the Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse tonight and tomorrow; I am going with my mother to Kingman Fraternal Cemetery to place flowers on my father’s grave. I am not even going to take my laptop and see if I wander into a Wi-Fi zone; I am not even going to take my laptop in order to do any writing.

That’s okay.

I mean that literally, the seeing myself differently title. What started out as something I pushed into the back of my mind and pretended was other than it was is now front and center – in my mind and in photos. I have been taking my own picture a lot, because when I started joking around with the bathroom mirror thing, it slowly dawned on me how I really looked. Close-set eyes. Big crooked mouth. Big crooked grin. And when I pull the towel off my head – little flat hair.

You see, I kind of had this picture of myself in my head from when I would glance in the mirror during summer session at IU when I worked at McNutt’s dining hall and checked numbers at breakfast. I was, oh, let’s say about 19 and all that close-set crookedness didn’t seem as noticeable. (Oddly enough, my soup can body accentuates it now.)

I just defined myself all those years as AmeliaJake – feisty, quirky, not very nice and always ready for a “What if I just pushed this button?” or “Well, we could fix that with duct tape” comment. AmeliaJake, who used to tear down the hill on her bike to get to Russian history class down by the old law quadrangle. I had the route down to a science. Of course to make it, I had to keep my little canary yellow uniform on – although I did take the checked apron off.

AmeliaJake, who gave Raggedy Ann’s and Andy’s unique personalities. AmeliaJake who used to do jumping jacks to burn of excess energy. AmeliaJake, who could throw a mean temper tantrum. I was never so dumb as to use the hold your breath ’til you pass out technique. That is so self-defeating; now the person who thought that up didn’t think it through.

Over the years, I started actively avoiding having my picture taken and when one showed up in a digital form, I would put the little mickey mouse gloved hand on it and drag it right over to the trash. A couple of times, in souvenir photos for instance, I would be stuck with my image and slide it in a drawer somewhere. I think mentally I just threw my hands up in front of my face and exclaimed, “Ack! Ack! Ack!

But once I did the bathroom experiment, I realized I was going to have to come to terms with this soup can AmeliaJake. I’m not saying I like it, but I don’t figure there is anyway around it. Rats, where is time travel when you need it?

I am starting to see myself in my mind’s eye as I really am and when I think about it, I feel like maybe I should slip into the shadows and turn away from people. But, most of the time, I forget and I am still . . . AmeliaJake.

Yes, this is the morning after the night I said I thought I might want to punch faces. I’m so glad I didn’t – I’m not in jail now – or out on bail being shunned by my family. But, then, I probably wouldn’t be here with them . . . and their punched faces. I would probably be at Mother’s and she doesn’t have Internet service because she lives OUT IN THE COUNTRY, dontcha know. She would be mad at me for winding up in jail. So, yes, I am really glad there was no face punching. I will hold this experience close to my heart as a lesson learned.

Will someone help me up? I fell on the floor laughing at that last little bit about close to my heart and learning. Believe me, that is not me.

I am in a bad mood and I am not apologizing for it. I told someone I felt like punching faces; I don’t believe that is accurate. I just want to have someone come in to pack up my things, put my mother into suspended animation so she will not worry about anything and then go off to a new life. If anyone were to miss me, let my memory be erased from their minds. Ah, it is coming back to me – this is my runaway mantra. Actually, I usually run away inside my head . . . to my quiet house, my quiet, quiet house. The one on the coast, with the big windows and the fireplace . . . and the cook and housekeeper . . . and the tons and tons of dollars in the double secret safe in the cellar.

Well, I didn’t know if it would rain or not rain today and so I put off fence painting and went over and cut Mrs. Feller’s rhubarb. We went into her kitchen and used her recipe and made lots of rhubarb sauce. Oh, gosh, it smelled so good cooking and tasted great when sampled.

Here’s Kathryn in our chopping frenzy.

The rhubarb starting to cook on Kathryn’s stove.

The rhubarb cooked down to sauce.

Today is a day for transcribing and I absolutely hate going through the stages of it. I think that has something to do with my lifelong erroneous idea that something started must be finished in one fell swoop. I have been trying to address this transcribing thing by actually trying to change my ways – to do a little at a time instead of going in for the marathon.

Today is not starting out too successfully. I feel the dread of making a document entitled “something notes” and then having to take the time to open one called “something article”. I dread this because that means I will have to actually start and it will be hanging over my head until it is done. Now, I know through recent experience that I can transcribe for 10 or 15 minutes at a time and get it done and think, “Wow, it just happened somehow.” And I will appreciate the importance of having heard the words once again and listening to them slowly enough to allow typing. It will help me in my end result.

As I type now, I am thinking I do not want to go trudging over with my fingers to the Word program and actually get this big old rock that I have to figuratively push up a hill positioned at the bottom of that hill. I think even though I do not actually bang my head against a wall, I bang parts of my mind against each other in frustration.

I am truly continuing on this theme because I just don’t want to start this transcribing chore. It does not necessarily make sense, oh, it is a feeling that is so real and yucky.

This morning I thought, “Oh, shoot, let’s get this lawn mowed and some branches towed out to the curb and some weeds pulled.” And, woo-hoo, I did it. Didn’t get around to raking or sweeping the driveway, but maybe I’ll hire a grandkid. When I got to the backyard part, I put white lathering cleansing cream on my face like I used to do when I would work up a sweat exercising. That stuff would get down in those pores and really do a great job.

Of course, it looks a little odd, and sometimes I forget and answer the door with it oozing around on my face.  Once someone asked if I were all right . . . took me a minute to figure out why. But, anyway, with the yard stuff sort of done, I went in and showered and shampooed and stretched out on the sitting room sofa (the chicken pox one) so my hair could dry hanging down and maybe encourage my roots to show a little oomph.

Then, then . . . I went for my daytime skin treatment and put on a little of this perfume I use that has the word elixir in the name. I don’t think I would have chosen that word, but whatever.

Now, in twenty minutes, the dastardly grandkids will be coming in  . . . for the entire weekend.  But right now, right this very minute, it is quiet and and pleasant and I am simply luxuriating in it.

Too early to tell, but I think the clock is against me. Last night I cleansed my face and put on Estee Lauder Night Repair, something I haven’t been buying but do have a stock of little sample bottles. Then, walking right off the edge of reason and into my favorite pitfall – is some is good, more is better, I put a lot of their firming moisturizer on my face. Some may have been good; more was definitely goo.

Then I lay there watching TV plucking random hairs off my lip and from my chin – a “feel for a wiry hair, blindly guide the tweezers” operation.

This morning my skin feels soft . .  . and a bit well-oiled. I will soon go remove the remains of the nighttime effort and move on to the chemicals of the day. AND I am resuming my facial exercises; I do them a lot – while sitting, while walking, while mowing, while working on the laptop. I also do them when driving, although people at stop lights in town and others passing by me on narrow rural roads often look disturbed.

I can live with that if slightly pursing my lips and reaching for my nose with them firms my jowl line.