One of the waterfalls we saw on our to Vancouver.  I do love waterfalls.  They're right up there with trees in my estimation.

Life continues on.  I'm doing a good job of not being impulsive and doing stupid things that I will regret in the future.  I'm starting to understand and believe that most things are outside of my control.  I started taking CBD oil at night a couple of days ago and I'm sleeping much better and my knee hurts less.

Fall is starting around here.  Already leaves are starting to change color.  The shadows are getting longer and the days are getting noticeable shorter.  My garden looks worse for the wear.  Flowers are making their last ditch effort to reproduce.  My tomatoes are looking scraggly and the bottom leaves are turning brown and curling up.  Slugs and scarlet lily beetles are taking their toll on some of my plants.  It will be time to put the whole thing to bed soon and let it rest for the winter.

We took our grandson down to Red Deer on Sunday to visit his great grandma.  She has dementia but she was so happy to see him.  She still lives in her own home, supported by her children.  She asked us the same questions again and again and we kindly answered them again and again.  She has always been kind to me even though I broke up with her son thirty-four years ago.

The little guy was not a happy camper on Sunday and on Monday a tooth finally busted through his gums so at least we know why he was so cranky.

Drama continues to swirl around him and so far he remains oblivious to it which I am thankful for.  I am even more thankful that I am stepping back from the drama and not letting it affect me so much.  

I have buns baking in the oven and I will take the dog for a nice long walk this morning before I pick up Miss Katie for her doctor appointment and maybe lunch.  Gracie and the little guy are coming over for supper.  And I'm learning.  Learning to wait.  Learning to listen.  Learning to stand back.

 
We're back home from Newfoundland.  I learned a few things while there.  Newfoundland truly is a rock, a really big rock.  There is rock everywhere with a little bit of soil covering the rock, or bog covering the rock;  a lot of bog which is not something you want to step onto, or rather sink into.  It rains a lot there and because it's a rock, there are lakes and rivers everywhere, catching the rain or sending it back to the sea.  Europeans started fishing the waters off the coast of Newfoundland five hundred years ago and fought wars over this Island.  Vikings used it as a temporary base for ten years for boat repairs and as a base for further exploration down into the Gulf of St. Lawrence a thousand years ago.  Who knew?

The scenery was beautiful and wild.  The people are lovely with a great sense of humor.  The villages are dying because of the collapse of the cod fishery in 1992;  there are empty and abandoned homes in small inlets up and down the coast.  Thousands of people left the island in search of work and many have never returned.  Thousands of those people now live in my own province, brought here because of the oil field work.

 Cape Spear, the most easterly point in Canada, enveloped in fog which later burned off and left us with a truly beautiful day.

And now it's back to reality.  There is laundry to do, animal hair to vacuum up and groceries to buy.  I have to deal with my son, again.

I saw my little grandson last night.  He's grown so much.  He's holding his head up so well, reaching for things, stuffing his hand in his mouth and talking.  Last night when I gave him kisses on his neck he was almost laughing.  He does my heart good.  Gracie and the little guy are coming over for lunch today so I get to seem him again today.  Sigh.  He's so damned sweet and easy going.  I have fallen in love with him.

Yesterday we had a birthday party for Miss Katie.  This photo pretty much sums up her day.  She had a wonderful time.  There were two babies, she held both, a dog, potato chips, old friends and a birthday cake.  As you can see by the look on her face, she loved it.  She actually vibrates when she's excited.  The dog was pretty excited too, hopeful that some cake might fall.

This was my view yesterday morning on my walk in the river valley before work.  This morning we couldn't even see the downtown skyline because of the smoke from the forest fires raging north of us.  High Level is almost 750 km north of us and the wind has driven the smoke south.  The sun is an eerie orange color and it smells like smoke.

The trees are all blooming which is lovely.

The poor cat hasn't figured out how to open the retractable screen door, yet.  I imagine she will.  The dog has it figured out.  She just runs at if head on and it snaps back.  We have a neighbor cat that spends a lot of time outdoors; it was a barn cat when it was born.  The little girl next door loves picking him up and throwing him outside.  I like seeing cats outside, despite the coyotes and cars but our cat takes a much dimmer view of having a strange cat in her yard, eating her catnip, laying on her deck.  Bagheera now spends countless hours staring out of the window, ever vigilant.

I'm feeling much better.  I stopped the pepcid and three days later the depression has lifted, no thoughts of death.  My doctor doesn't really believe me but this is the second time that this has happened on pepcid and it happens very quickly;  I go straight to feeling suicidal which is very scary.  I can take pepcid once in awhile but if I take it daily, it's bad.

I'm going to pick up my grandson soon and we're going to the nursery to buy more plants.  The big guy has built me another planter and he requested vegetables and herbs, so we're off.

When I Am Among The Trees

by Mary Oliver

When I among the trees,

especially the willows and the honey locust,

equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,

they give off such hints of gladness.

I would almost say that they save me, and daily,

I am so distant from the hope of myself,

in which I have goodness, and discernment,

and never hurry through the world

but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves

and call out,  "Stay awhile."

The light flows from their branches.

And they call again,  It's simple,"

they say,  "and you, too, have come

into the world to do this, to go easy,

to be filled with light, and to shine."

I'm a little weepy this morning, worried about a son who continues to crash against the world, unable to see a clear path ahead for himself, unable to there for his son, just as his own father was not there for him, history repeating itself.  It's early days I tell myself but still it breaks my heart again.

I was sick again this past week.  The last six weeks have conspired to make me feel like a very old woman, but I'm on the mend.  Yesterday at work a seventy-four year man assumed I was close to his age.  Ouch.  It's the almost white hair.  I hope.

My grandbaby hasn't made an appearance yet.  His mama has moved and is all settled in now and loves the house.  I took the dog for a walk last night and stopped by to visit her and see how she was doing.  She's good but big as a house poor thing.  Soon.

We had a code at work this week, a severe allergic reaction to the CT dye, something that happens but rarely are the reactions that bad.  The patient was fine in the end but scared the shit out of all of us.

One of the nurses I work with is a good friend of mine.  She has bipolar disorder and is sinking again.  She usually only last about six months at work and then ends up back in the hospital which always breaks my heart.  She's a smart, funny, kind woman who has a huge heart and right now I can see her fading.  She folds up and slowly backs away when she is suffering.  Her fur goes up and she gets prickly.  It's the disease but still I miss her when she's like this.

Same old same old.  Nothing much changes, while constantly changing.  The snow is receding in the back yard leaving behind snow mold and what appears to the stools of a hundred dogs.  I can't believe such a small dog can produce that much shit.  I suppose mine would look the same if it wasn't flushed down the toilet each day but rather spread on my lawn, waiting for spring.

My in-laws are coming for supper.  I won't hold my tongue today if my father-in-law starts talking about Muslims.  I'm done with letting him getting away with his racism because I try to respect my elders.  If he chooses to talk about racism I will respond.

Now it's time to clean.  There are muddy dog footprints on the floors which need cleaning up.  Supper to be made and a dessert.  I'll listen to the CBC while I putter around the house.  The big guy has gone into work for a few hours and I have the house to myself.

Miss Katie is doing well.  We took her out last Sunday and she wanted me to take this photo of her.  She's sees young women taking photos of themselves and each other all the time at the mall and she is a young woman, so she insisted I take a photo.  

The last year was rough on her.  Last April she had a few very bad meltdowns, one which including attacking me, another, attacking a caregiver.  I didn't know what to do so I took her to emergency.  There is not really any good psychiatric care for people with developmental disabilities.  After eight hours we finally met a wonderful psych resident who recommended valproic acid as a mood stabilizer and after eleven hours, we left emergency with a prescription for valproic acid.  

I can't say enough good things about the drug.  It has dramatically changed Katie's life.  She is no longer anxious, or rarely, and when she does become anxious, it is short lived.  Her attention span has increased greatly and she is trying to fingerspell people's names and tries numbers as well.  Because she's more relaxed and has quit attacking people, she only goes into her wheelchair when she's tired.  The cape is gone, except when she's on DATS, because of an incident that happened six years ago.  She attacked a bus driver, pulled their hair.  When we wander around the mall with her in wheelchair, legs crossed, she holds up her hand and wants to high five everyone.  She hugs freely as well.  A lot of people who work at that mall know her.

She's more like her old self again.  She's happy, smiling and enjoying life.  Her sense of humor has returned and she laughs often and hard.  She gets so excited at times that her body vibrates but she doesn't tip over into anxiety anymore, she's just excited and then it passes.  

We were at the mall on Sunday and there was an International Judo competition going on.  She's not a fan of conflict but when I explained that the contestants were "playing" she was okay with it.  She sat in her chair and watched, mezmerized.  She loves watching people.  When we had to continue on to meet the big guy for lunch, she asked if we could go back to watch the fighting.  I said later and she remembered that and held me to it.

During lunch the big guy asked if she wanted to go to the petting zoo and Miss Katie looks at me and signs fighting, later.  I started laughing because I had already forgotten about that promise but she didn't.  I kept my word and she made her choice, Judo over animals.  

On the way home in the car she asked me to ask her caregivers if she could go and watch the swimmers at the nearby pool, so I did.

She's learning and growing and it blows my mind that after years of regression that she is now blossoming.  I am thankful.