Leroy

Hello,

I was so sure Leroy would be better, but he won. He did not go anywhere all day. He thought he might work in the morning, but was too tired after breakfast. His long nap revived him, but he still was not able to go anywhere even though he did a number of small jobs around here.

I did not really go much either. I think I need a dog to remind me to go take a walk. A dog could be a personal trainer. They never seem to forget what the usual walk time is.

Leroy and I are getting together our financial information so we can speak with a more knowledgeable person than we are. I think the real deal is that neither Leroy nor I care so much about the financial world. We would just like to have things land in our laps in the proper way without effort on our part. Sounds like winning the lottery, doesn’t it? Since we do not play it would be a hard win.

We have eaten many of the greens in our freezer. There are two bags left and both are smaller. I now find that I have four bags of rhubarb in there. I made a crisp today with not enough sugar. We put molasses on it and liked it very well. Back in the old days we used to eat black strap molasses as our sweetener. Somehow I had gotten away from that habit. Reading the nutritional content on the bottle makes me realize that I should do that again. It has quite a lot of calcium and potassium in it.

I am hoping that Leroy will be well enough to go to church tomorrow. Our choir is singing at another church. We can walk there, but it is to be snowy and I am afraid of ice under the snow as it is raining now. But maybe the temps will stay high and I can walk with ease. I certainly do not want to fall especially if I am walking alone.

Paula

Home Again

Hello,

I arrived home this afternoon. Leroy was home to greet me because he is not feeling well. Apparently yesterday he felt worse, but he seems fairly good now, in spite of a bit of a stuffed head. I suspect tomorrow will almost be normal. I’m so glad as I am not good in the role of nurse.

He had kept the place quite neat as usual. I never worry about it when I am gone. He cooks, cleans, and watches my plants.

It would be so nice if I lived closer to all of my children then I could help more frequently and easily. But as people tell me this way I get to travel.

I will miss having younger people who seem to spark laughter with ease. I will have to work on just laughing more. It is so good for the sole. Their dog knew that I was leaving and I believe felt sad about it. Sophia confided that no one else walks her. Anyway the dog turned away from me as I was packing up.

Now that I am here I will have to start growing my chia pet. It should be interesting. I will also get more sprouts started. In the winter I keep alfalfa sprouts growing much of the time.

I call my grandchildren Henry and Henrietta. That saves me from calling someone by the wrong name. Logan has two Henrys in his pre-school class so I guess I have to come up with another name to tease him. I was quite surprised to hear about it. Name fashion changes.

Paula

Thinking of home

Hello,

Jen is home now. I could have headed for home, but wanted to be sure that she was here to take over before I left. Because of thinking she might not be here on time as one never knows with air travel, I did not tell the kids good-bye. I know they both said they wanted me to stay another day, they even talked of me coming to live with them. But I feel that when Mom is home I might fade into the background. All schedules were met this morning without a hitch. I did not tell so many stories in the car on the way to daycare because I thought the pavement might be a trace slippery so I kept more than half a mind on the road and traffic. Perhaps this evening I can tell a couple more stories. Sophia was pleased that I even told one story she had not heard before.

I have taken two walks today with a grateful heart that I did bring my down coat. During the first days it did not seem necessary. I did not put on my windbreaker pants, but wished that I had brought one wool sweater. I am not as warm as I like when sitting around. I suppose I could turn up the heat more, but hate to do that. It is nice when I am at home and I can make the adjustments to my coverings.

I looked for the white squirrel today, but did not see it. I only saw two gray squirrels when they ran across the snow. Yesterday I noticed that the white animal looked like a clump of snow.

I am proud of myself because I figured out how to eliminate the keyboard sounds on my new phone. I am not sure why anyone would want all that noise. It should have been easier to find the solution which was buried at least two layers deep.

Sophia used my phone to take several pictures. She declares my phone to be the best. Is that because she does not handle her parents’ phones very often and mine seemed so available or because she could move around so easily with mine. I learned without Sophia’s help how much it cost to send a picture to someone else and how much it costs to access the internet when one does not have a calling plan, but just a prepaid set up. I believe I could burn through a lot of minutes in a short time. Oh well, at home and away I will just use the tablet and Wi-Fi.

Tomorrow I will see Leroy again. That guy made granola while I was gone, I know because he called for the recipe. Nice he is so capable.

Paula

Live and Learn

Hello,

Well would you believe at the end of the day I was not outside waiting for the bus when I should have been.  Sophia did come to the door and knock and I thought I heard the bus at about the same time. I have excuses, whether they are good or not I cannot say. I had set the timer, but for some reason I was five minutes off on that. Guess I cannot add time. Then I was lost in a book and did not think about the time. I felt terrible, but glad that the bus driver allowed Sophia to come to door and knock. So it did not cause more distress.

When I told Leroy about it he said, “I bet you will be out there tomorrow.”

He knows. Brian left his watch with the alarm set, I set the alarm on my new phone, and I have once again set the timer. I made sure the timer will go off ahead of time. No serious book reading for this person today. In the morning I had both the watch and the phone alarm set. The phone rang first. So we were out there in plenty of time, but that was true yesterday in the morning, I just thought the bus had come early.

This morning I looked out in the backyard to see a beautifully white squirrel dashing around the trees and bushes. It was a great experience for the current visual and for the memories it brought forth of when we lived in St. Paul while Leroy was at seminary. There was a white squirrel in our yard there and I so enjoyed looking at it. That was a time of life filled with new experiences. Now I suppose I could say that my life is still filled with new experiences. At least it changes frequently.

How many alarms should I set tomorrow?

Paula

Exciting Morning

Hello,

Sophia and I delivered Logan to his pre-school. On that short trip I had to tell two stories. I am both pleased and pressured that all my grandchildren want to hear stories about my growing up or of their parents’ formative years. It is a challenge to come up with new stories so I do repeat, but have no compunction about telling them I have run out of new. From time to time I remember something, but that does not happen so often because I have told a lot of stories.

Once we were back home Sophia had a bit of time before the bus would come. I set the timer so we would not forget. Jen was home yesterday to be in charge of all this so I knew the routine.

I was not sure if the bus was to come at 8:10 or we should be out there at 8:10. I asked at 8:00 about that. Sophia said she should be out there. We were down in the mud room getting coats etc. on when I heard the sound of a motor belonging to something larger than a car. I glanced out the high window and noticed flashing lights. “The bus is here,” I stated with an edge of panic.

I popped into the garage, pressed the button for the door to go up, thinking that Jen had said the bus would not even stop if the student were not out, and wondered how the door could be so slow. Sophia hurriedly got her backpack on, carrying her gloves, and her coat flying open. As the door got high enough we both burst into laughter! It was the garbage truck and not the bus. I had a vision of Sophia being picked up and taken to school in a new fashion.

We were in plenty of time for Sophia to zip her coat and put her gloves in her bag. The bus came at the right time and Sophia climbed on the normal way.

I sighed with relief, came in, got out my devotions and settled into a more contemplative mode. After a bit I heard a bell ring downstairs. Brian had told me that the alarm was on in Logan’s room, but he said, “I will turn it off.” So I ignored it. In a bit I heard that bell once more. Later I was downstairs getting ready to run an errand for Brian when I heard it once more in Logan’s room. I could not see how the alarm was set on this clock, but pushed two buttons anyway thinking it could not hurt. Before I left the room I once again heard that bell and realized it was not coming from the clock, but from the bag holding my new phone. When I opened my flip phone I was pleased to see a welcome message. My phone now works. I had understood that I would have to turn it on myself, but it was on without my help. Who knew that could be done remotely?  I am pleased. The only problem is that I have to enter my contacts myself. I can put in Leroy and Brian and any other family members Brian has on his home phone. Life feels like it is stable once more. I wish I could transport Leroy’s phone to him through the air, but it will have to wait and go home with me on Thursday or Friday.

Paula

Losing my Phone

Hello,

My phone battery was getting very low so it seemed like a good idea to take the charger to work and charge it there. However at work I could not find my phone, only the charging cord. surely my phone would be at home. When i looked it was not in the usual spot. leroy said he too had noticed it was gone. I did some searching around the apartment and found it not. I tried calling it, but it immediately went to voice mail so for sure the battery was now dead. Leroy searched as well. He also found nothing. I was thinking about my trip to MN tomorrow and wanted to have a phone with me. Leroy and I looked in the car and in the garage before going back to Ely.  We took a flashlight and shined it where I had parked, where I walked and then searched inside the library. I had thought I might get a smart phone for my next purchase, but now I wanted a phone fast so I just got another cheap one that I will probably keep for years because it still works.

I am not sure what has happened with my phone records but they tell me that the name recorded for my mother’s maiden name is not the one I am telling them. Neither is my maiden name or Leroy’s mother’s. Beyond that I do not know what to say. I guess they believed me although it took a while to find an email that matched the records with my lost phone. I was able, after two attempts, to use the right zip code for it.  Because we have moved so much it is a hard task to guess which zip code they have. Several years ago we made a card in our address box that has former addresses and phone numbers on it. It is a very handy help.

My new phone still has not started to work so I will probably have to call them again. They did talk about it taking two business days so I will tackle this tomorrow. I have recorded when i have talked to someone as well as theaca name and the ticket number. It is stressful, but I keep telling myself that in terms of all of life it is a small thing.

In the meantime I have Leroy’s phone so he is without for the week. He told me that he would rather I have a phone while traveling. So far no one has tied to call him.  He did, however have something scheduled so it sang to me on the trip up. I can not focus on it while driving. I was able to stope it from singing, but it came back two more times before it was silenced.

Paula

Oh, That Leroy

Hello,

I wanted to tell a tale about Leroy. I asked him if I could write about it and he thinks it is too embarrassing. Personally I think it puts him squarely in the absentminded professor territory even though I have never heard of anyone do this particular thing. It also made me think about how I can start on a task, see something else that needs to be done, start on the new task, and several mini jobs later realize that I never finished the first thing. It seems to me that happens more frequently as I have grown wiser, not older, but wiser.

Surprise, surprise, I did find two birthday gifts for Leroy while I was shopping this morning. One was purchases at Goodwill, but it seems to be new. At least it was snuggled deeply in the original box. Two of the workers there commented that they would like to buy it for themselves, but they are not allowed to buy things from the store where they work.

The other I got in a regular store, but it was on sale about 50% off. Just the way I like it. Leroy did give me a suggestion for a gift for him. Unfortunately I did not write it down so I spent quite a lot of time wondering just what it was. Oh well another day. He also suggested that I get him some winter boots that might be on clearance at our favorite shoe store in St. Paul. I will be going to the Twin Cities on Sunday. The only problem is that Leroy’s feet are often not happy in a shoe even if it is the size he frequently wears. The boots like he likes are not very often in the stores. I believe that even men’s styles do change. Apparently the last time we were in that store he did see some that he wanted, but they were regular price and that was a bit more than he considered paying. So maybe I will find them. We can always send them back to the store if they do not fit. I have done that before.

Paula