After several days inside my brother’s house, I moved back out to the van last night. My cozy tiny house is feeling very tiny this morning. And it’s astonishing how quickly I started taking hot water for granted. I began to wash my cutting board this morning without thinking and then remembered, right, the water pump is not on, so no water. And I could turn the water pump on with the push of a button, but the water wouldn’t be hot, because I didn’t turn the water heater on. Ah, yes, life in a van.
But I’m happy to be back in my van, even if it is feeling more than cozy (read: cramped and inconvenient), because it is also feeling homey and peaceful.
I read some sad news on Facebook, that bastion of unwelcome tidings, a few days ago. Honestly, I’ve started to dread looking at FB — it feels like a magnet for misery, at least in my feed. My immediate response was to pick up my phone and make a call, but my secondary response has been to spend a lot of time browsing my own history. Photographs and journals and blog posts, some lovely reminders of times past.
Flowers in Arcata
It made me resolved to take more pictures of human beings, though. I have lots of sunrises, lots of flowers, lots of scenery, and lots and lots of dog pictures.
My dogs looking cute together.
But not very many people pictures.
I don’t think I need them, exactly — I have the memories and sometimes I have the stories. This one is one of my favorites, but I do wish I’d written out the “But you have to wear a mask” part, because the memory makes me smile, but the details are lost. That’s okay, though, I still have the smile.
I dreamed last week that Bartleby’s new owner needed to give B back to me, because his circumstances had changed and he couldn’t take care of B anymore. He passed him over to me and B was matted and skinny, really skinny, and I felt horrible because obviously somehow I’d given B to people who neglected him. But then I was so happy to have him back! He snuggled into my arms and I promised him an immediate bath with a long blow-dry afterwards (he loved the blow-dryer) and plenty of food.
Then I woke up.
In a way it was a great dream, but it ruined my day. I told Suzanne during our phone call that death felt like that to me, in general, like every day you have to keep waking up into a reality that’s just not the one you wanted to wake up in. And there’s no way to make the universe take you back to the reality you had yesterday.
But that’s the nature of time, anyway. One of the stories that I remembered this weekend — no record of it except my own memory — was when Suzanne and Greg and R and I went out to Chinese food in Oakland when R was about two, maybe three. Greg walked with R, pointing out various things in the windows, and… well, conversing with him. Lots of adults aren’t really capable of having conversations with a toddler. They talk at the toddler, but they’re not about the listening so much. Greg listened to R, answered his questions, had a real discussion with him, and then told me my kid was amazing. Toddler R was amazing, and even though I am lucky enough to have Adult R in my life, I do sometimes miss Toddler R. But Greg was amazing, too, and I’m going to miss him.
Goodbye, senormoment. I wish you’d had the time to organize those photos.
This is a sad entry … did you mean ‘seniormoment’ at the end? Your statement about taking more photos of people reminded me of the time we took a 6 week vacation and when I went to show my pictures to my father, his first comment was “where’s the people?” Interesting… It was only Robert and me so I only took photos of the area we were in. Probably should have got someone to take our picture but it never occurred to me. Love the picture of Zelda and Bartleby, though… can’t ever have too many photos of them.
Greg commented on my blog as “senormoment” — it was a joke on senior moment, because he’d spent a while living in Oaxaca and one of his passions was Mayan history. His last comment was on my Massachusetts post, about not having time to organize his photos. And I know just what you mean about not taking pictures of people — it never really occurs to me, until I’m looking through my photos. My ten days with Suzanne and Greg last fall is all dog photos and beach photos, tons of both, plus some food photos. Some good photos, but I can’t believe I didn’t take a single one of him sitting in his chair in the living room, because that is so much how I remember him. Lovely memories that make me smile!
So sorry for your loss. Seems inadequate to say that even though I say it with sincerity.
I am terrible at remembering to take any pics ever. I think it may stem from inwardly cringing at my own image in most pics I am included in. I have never been very photogenic.
I feel that way about myself, too. But it’s interesting to me as I get older, how often I can look back at a photo that made me cringe and think, hmm, I looked pretty good five years ago or ten years ago or whatever. And more importantly, of course, is the reminder of a time or place or situation or friendship. As for those words being inadequate, they aren’t. They’re exactly the right words! I think it’s always hard to know what to say when someone has died, but the simple acknowledgement works. In this case, I’m in the outer circle of loss, so I’m sad because someone I knew for decades is gone, but the true pain belongs to his family.
So sad to hear you’ve lost someone you cared about.
I love the flower picture. I’m always attracted to plants that grow up in weird places for some reason.
And I definitely relate that I often don’t like pictures of me, but when I look back at pictures of past me, I think I look much better.
Now is definitely the right time for pictures for you! There are some of me that I hated at the time, still hate — I had a horrible, horrible haircut when R was one, but the nostalgia value of them is enormous. Make sure to get some pictures of yourself with Toddler B, because you will appreciate them in the future. I should find the one I’m thinking of and post it, because it’s AWFUL, but it so makes me smile now. Toddler R was cute as anything, and I can see how much I love him in it, even though I look like crap.
B and I take selfies sometimes. I’m much more of a picture-taker than S is so there are more pictures of him and B. If one were to just go off of the pictures, they would get a very, very biased perspective about our family dynamics! So B and I do take the occasional selfie just so there will be at least a few pictures of us later.
In other news… B is officially Toddler B now after actually doing a little toddling. The other day I got the cutest picture of S and B out in the snow and it’s the first picture I have of B actually just standing there without holding on to anything. (I did in fact force the camera on S and make him take a couple of pictures of me and B in the snow, but I look like a whale in S’s puffy down jacket. Ugh.)