little pieces

When I was home a couple of weeks ago, my mom gave me a pair of earrings that belonged to my grandma.  After she passed away several years ago, we went through a lot of her jewelry and took the pieces we liked at my grandfather's behest.  But he kept some of her more favorite pieces behind, and I guess they recently re-surfaced.  He still has her fine jewelry at his house, hidden somewhere from what I hear, but this was a second wave, I guess.

The earrings are simple:  silver hoops.  In the first pass, I took several items, but most were not day to day wearable.  I have a bracelet that I wear on occasion, but the hook closure makes me nervous that I'll lose it, so I'm choosy about when to don it.  It always made me a little sad that I didn't have something that I could wear more often.  Luckily, these silver hoops fit that bill.  They are simple, classic and lovely.  Each time I wear them it's a happy reminder that at one time in her life my grandmother wore them, too.  :-)

My grandfather is doing OK.  I guess? I really don't know how to assess these things anymore.  I get daily updates from my mom, plus updates each time one of my brothers visits.  They are wildly varying.  Last week it seemed like he had a lot of "good" days.  He ate a little more, he was chatty, more alert.  My mom seemed to be harboring this secret hope that he was getting better.  However, he's been difficult the last couple of days.  Saturday she got there to find that he'd refused everything - a bath, getting dressed, his meds, food, etc.  During her visit, she managed to get him to do all of these things.  I guess he tolerated it OK and told her she was relentless.  Yesterday she went and he was sleepy and grumpy.  He told her no to everything, including food, and that he wasn't budging. My mom sounded pretty discouraged.  Add to this that on friday I basically got three different messages telling me he was not having a good day.  He was pretty out of it (before his daily meds, but could have been an Ativan hangover from the night previous) and kept telling my brother and the nurse to look behind doors where there were no doors.  Weird.  I know hallucinations are part of this process, but it's just so strange to hear these things knowing how clear headed he is most of the time.

My uncle and his wife are coming in this weekend from CA to visit.  I'm glad my uncle will get to see his dad again, as for a time there I was afraid he would miss it.  Right now I don't have a good sense as to how long my grandfather will be sticking around.  My answer in this moment is very different than what I thought while visiting, and could be very different by tomorrow.  None of us really know. Part of me wonders if my grandfather is sticking around to see his son one more time before he goes, but another part of me thinks maybe this is just another visit and that he could be around for our family reunion and LOTS of visits in mid-May.  I don't know if that's totally delusional, totally reasonable or somewhere in between.

And now for a totally illogical, tactless transition onto other subjects...

Weekend was pretty good.  Friday weather was gorgeous despite forecasts of storms.  It was 80 and beautiful.  We had dinner at a local spot and ate outside on the patio.  Then Saturday rolled around and the weather was gross.  It rained for most of the day and then got really windy that night.  I'm talking 60 mph gusts.  It was pretty scary to listen to!  Our power went out around 2 am and woke us up.  Unfortunately, a smoke alarm also decided it was low on battery, so BF had to replace the battery to stop the beeping.  Then, at 5:30 am the alarm went off even though it wasn't ON.  Thanks, battery backup!  BF couldn't get it turned off and went to remove the battery, but it was beneath a screw top panel, so he was down in the garage rummaging for a tiny screwdriver and muttering lots of curse words at the time.  It was a disastrous night of "sleep".  The morning was very chilly in the house, but luckily the power came back on about 9:30 or 10 am.

Reading and Writing:  Trying to do more of it.  As I mentioned before, I've had a very hard time finding a book to keep my interest lately.  I started a book called "The Elementals", which was originally published in maybe 1981, but re-released recently.  It's classified as a gothic horror novel. I'm very early into it, but enjoying it.  Writing:  I've got desire, but no motivation.  I carry around blank books/notebooks hoping inspiration strikes, but I'm not putting any real effort into it.  Must try to rectify that.

I'm definitely getting restless waiting on spring.  Today's weather is decent at the moment, but it's supposed to rain later.  The rest of the week is a crapfest temp wise and rain wise, and the weekend looks chilly AGAIN.  I'm so ready for real spring, though I am glad things are at least greening up outside.  I want to go to baseball games and on walks and eat meals outside and not worry about only doing these things every few days when it's nice for a day.  Hopefully it's not far off.

Ex-H has his wedding in less than two weeks in Mexico.  It's weird.  They already got legally married a couple of weeks ago at a courthouse.  I'm fuzzy on why, but that's the fact of the matter.  It's weird that he has a wife again.  It's even more weird that on April 16th he'll have another wedding, a nicer one than ours (we were broke babies when we got married!) and that all of his same family that saw us get married will be watching him get married to someone else.  I'm very happy for him, but it's also very surreal.  Secretly, or not so secretly, since I told him as much, I can't believe he's beating me to it!  I always figured it would be me first.  Life is weird!

I have my last session with a trainer tonight.  It's the replacement trainer (boo).  Nice kid, but he's like 12 and I don't mesh as well with his style.  I'm glad it's the last one, but I'm dreading it.  Last time I about died from the workout he put me through.  I cancelled last monday because it was such a crap day, but now I just want to get it over with.  :-/  I also hate telling people I won't be continuing with them because I don't want them to feel bad, but in the end I don't care and I won't be continuing LOL. I know enough to do this on my own, it's just a matter of finding the time and motivation.  If only those were easier to find!

I guess I've rambled on long enough today.  Silly Monday.  I need a nap!