Stuck on a cold hard rock

Life for me seems to consist of a series of delays. Clearly the Universe has its own timeline. After my cat died, I thought, okay, now I can move to a house share while I wait for my mother to die. Then Covid-19 came along, and I was like, no, probably not a good time to have a roommate. So I stayed in the Love Shack and began the process of downsizing—jettisoning books, scanning drawings, shredding journals, getting ready for the move I knew would be coming. Then my mother had to move from a nursing home to a foster care home. That was an ordeal for sure, but I learned moving during Covid can be done. Then three months later, Mom died, and I was like, okay, maybe now I can begin the final countdown toward a move to warmer climes. 

Then... winter. Just a little slice of the wintry mix, compared to some parts of the country. I feel stupid complaining, it's just a few inches of snow, followed by a bit of freezing rain. And a little more snow, and now another half-inch or so of freezing rain. It's a parfait of winter, a little something for everyone. The skiers, snowshoers, and sledders are happy, that's for sure. The snowboarders scud along the center of the street in their big black boots, heading for the park. The skiers and snowshoers maneuver along the sidewalk, balancing with their poles. 

Snow ploughs came through a few times, followed by gravel trucks. The main road is mostly clear. Drivers don't seem fazed as they merrily attempt to park on the piles of dirty snow on either side of the road.  However, the unthinkable happened on Friday: Bus service, MAX service, and streetcar service—in other words all public transit—was shut down across the entire Portland metro. Has that ever happened? Apparently not. This would not be a good time to be carless. 

Speaking of cars, I think I have one, somewhere. It's buried on a side street about two hundred yards away from home. I don't feel like risking my neck on treacherous pavement to go see if it has been shredded by a snow plough. 

Today I threw handfuls of birdseed out the front door and back door and watched as little birds came by for a snack. I love animals. I confess, I spend an inordinate amount of time watching videos of animals being rescued by kind humans (who always happen to have a video camera handy, for some suspicious reason). I despise the algorithms that know me so well, even if I click on nothing. The more videos I watch, the more appear in my feed. Curses! I've seen the deer swimming in circles with a paint can on its head. I've seen sea turtles, dolphins, and whales trapped in fishing nets. I've seen two fighting elk stuck in a wire fence. I've seen a sloth stuck on a cold, hard rock half-submerged in a river (a real nail-biter, that one). I've seen myriad dogs rescued from various terrible situations, rushing rivers, busy highways, you name it. I've seen a horse mired in a mud pit and a donkey running in frantic circles at the bottom of a cone-shaped well. What idiot community would build such a thing, impossible to climb out of, if not to trap animals? I despair. I'm trapped watching humans rescue desperate trapped animals. I'm trying to rescue myself by watching social media. You can imagine how well that is going.

I sit at my computer with my feet on my Tupperware bug-out bin. I nestle my feet next to three grubby microwaved socks filled with dry rice. I hardly move, except to reheat the socks in the microwave. There is no heat in the kitchen or bathroom. I spend as little time in these rooms as possible. Occasionally I spray a solution of water and bleach on the cracks in the ceiling and in the empty cupboards to keep the black mold at a tolerable level. Along the walls in each room, I have stacked the boxes I plan to take with me. I forget what is in them now. Maybe I will just leave them all behind. Pack a bug-out bag, dig my car out of the snow, and head south. 

Well, I can dream. Another delay is on the horizon. It seems I might be the person called upon to manage the closing of our mother's estate. Of course, I will accept. I love my family. I live to serve. However, this is not how I pictured freedom, interfacing with lawyers and filling out paperwork. Looks like freedom has been delayed a little longer. Oh well. It doesn't matter what happens to me now. I did my job, and I did the best job I could. Now she's gone. I surrender to the whims of the Universe.  

Waiting for the next episode

I miss her. I miss the routine, my sense of purpose, my north star. I knew this would happen, that I would be lost for a while. It’s different knowing something will happen and feeling it when it finally does. You can’t predict what it will feel like with certainty. You can say, I’ll feel sad, or I’ll feel scared, but until it happens, you don’t feel anything and when it happens, you are like, wow, this is different than what I imagined, this is murkier and ickier and I want to go back to where I was, imagining how the feelings would feel but not actually feeling them.

I've started packing stuff into boxes I've stored in a locked basement cupboard for seventeen years. No reason to keep them locked up. No reason to keep them at all, really. When I moved here to the Love Shack in 2003, moving on was my normal M.O. I don't remember now but I'm guessing I didn't expect to live here long. Then life ensued. I got a job, I got a cat, I went to graduate school, I got laid off and fell into self-employment. I peaked around 2013, I think. After that, my normal sense of confusion began to reassert itself. Regressing to the mean, as it were.

Until Mom got dementia. What a strange blessing. Once again my life had meaning and purpose. She needed me, I needed her. Of course, we knew that couldn't last forever. But it could have. I was prepared for her to live to one hundred. As it happened, I spent five wonderful but terrible years spinning in a tightening orbit around her. Then the cat died, then Covid, and you know the rest. Bam. Slow motion train wreck.

It's good I'm leaving this apartment. It's hard to stay warm in the winter. The heaters in the main room and kitchen have been nonfunctional for several years. The landlord attempted to replace the thermostat and almost set the place on fire. The wall around the thermostat is still singed black, a reminder that electricity can keep you warm or it can burn your house down. A small space heater works pretty well for maintaining a livable temperature around my work table. (The bedroom has heat, thank god, or I would have dragged up a long time ago.) The bathroom has never had heat, and in the winter, the room is both cold and damp. I've been doing laundry by hand at night and hanging the wet things to drip over the tub. The colder it gets outside, the longer the things take to dry. Last week I made the mistake of handwashing a small load of kitchen towels. Not a good idea. After five days of hanging on the shower rod, they are still damp, and judging by the smell, they are now starting to molder. No wonder my nose is trying to kill me.

Circumstances seem to be shoving me out the door. I'm going with the flow, hence, the packing. At some point, we will receive ashes and death certificates. All the tasks will be done. All the possessions will be distributed. All I need is a map and the open road. I'm ready to be reborn into some warmer, drier life, even if it means becoming temporarily homeless. I'm finding, though, that even though I'm happily letting go of furniture, the detritus of seventeen years is rapidly filling up all my boxes. Do I let more things go? Or do I get more boxes? The answer will depend on what kind of vehicle I find and how much it can carry. It's simple, really, just a matter of cubic feet.

Packing gives my hands something to do while my mind rummages around in a fog of shock and confusion. I have a plan, but it's in the ether. I haven't assimilated my new situation so I can't see a path clear to my next situation. I'm running on autopilot, just doing the next thing in front of me.

Last week I left four bags of her clothes at a thrift store. I donated her furniture to a second-hand shop. Today I tossed her upper denture in the trash, ew, I know. So weird. It all feels surreal. I still can't believe she's gone. Three weeks ago, in five minutes I would be bundling up to walk out to my car and drive over to the care home, wondering how much longer will this go on? I always knew this moment would come, but now that it is here, I feel no sense of peace. I have an intention, and I'm taking action, but it's like I'm a character in a movie. What will she do next? Is this a tragedy or a comedy? Or (most likely) is it the apocalyptic story of the end of the world? Stay tuned for the next episode.