It is insanely early and yet I’ve been awake and working for more than an hour. I’ve cleaned my email inbox down to 59 emails. That, in itself, is wonderful. I keep the email that I want to reply to in my inbox. I delete what I don’t want to hold on to and I file those that I want to save but do not need or want to take action on. But in the past 18 months I’ve let emails in the inbox build up. I sorted and cleaned once but still the number was way more than I could handle. I forgot about what I wanted to answer and I missed all sorts of little dates of interesting webinars and get-togethers. More important, I failed to write back and lost some touch with those I want to keep close. The number in the inbox grew to over 700 recently and it was time to cull, weed, edit, just get rid of a lot of email. I’ve been whittling the list down but could not get under 200. This morning, I made some new folders and wrote a lot of short emails. I am down to 69 which is much more manageable for me. At least for the moment, this hermit has emerged from her cave. Ummm, do I sound like a ground hog?
Ground hog’s day was David’s Nanna’s birthday -- Great Nana was what Cheshire called her. We always laughed about the day being her birthday and I don’t remember why.
It is the end of January, and I am beginning to feel the money crunch of the last few months beginning to lift. When I planned the renovation last year, actually the year before that when David was still alive, it was planned around the money that we would get from my mother’s estate. But the estate is still not finished. I scaled back the renovation until I could pay for it out of immediate savings, a small amount taken out of long term savings, and lots of scrimping since we came back from vacation. I’ve have no trouble making the bills, but it has caused me anxiety, and well, I’ve had general money anxiety since David died. Finally, I have two, maybe three more months of renovation bills and then it is all mine. I am very satisfied with the renovations and with the items that caused me to run over budget. I will be more than happy to get back to monthly bills that allow me to put a little bit into savings each month. And thank goodness that I did that before the renovation.
I’ve registered Julia for an after school Spanish class. I want us to go to Bolivia -- probably summer of 2013 -- and I want to see if she has any language ability. I’ve volunteered to go to the classes with her and also help with the program in general. Maybe I can pick up a bit of Spanish myself. I’m almost ready to sign her up for the spring term of riding classes. I do wish that they began a bit later than the end of February. It is still what I consider winter at the end of February in Wisconsin and I don’t fancy standing in the unheated riding ring, watching the class, but I do want her to continue riding and learning about horses.
I need community. I have close friends but I need a larger circle. I’ve always needed that and sometimes have gathered it around me, but when I didn’t have the community, I depended on our small family unit that was always enough. I don’t have the option now and I still need community. I need to do it myself for myself. And Julia, of course. She could really use a few siblings or cousins who see her all the time, who accept her for who she is and who play with her. Again, we don’t have that, but we could if I look for it and make the effort.
My emails tonight/ this morning were entitled “message from the hermit’s cave”. I do feel that way and I am not sure that I am ready yet to emerge from my self-imposed cloistered life, but for at least today, I long for the ability to chat and laugh and cook for those I love and eat the treats that someone has brought. I want this house to be filled with more than Julia’s therapists and us all the time. I love those therapists; they are wonderful but we could use friends and fellow journeyers.
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