Saying goodbye to Cindy

I trust everyone had a good and socially distanced holiday. We were with our daughter and her two sons. It was a quiet day filled with building with Legos, playing Monopoly Junior and watching Christmas movies.

For King and me it was a rather bittersweet day. On Christmas Eve we had our traveling companion

Cindy at a soccer game in Grand Haven, Mich.

Cindy Lou euthanized. The decision was heartbreaking and was not easy to make, but it was necessary. I’m not certain if people will understand that statement.

We adopted Cindy Lou in March of 2017 as a senior dog. At that point King and I (both retired) had been traveling during the winter in our travel trailer and spending our summers as caretakers on a hobby farm in South Haven. We had been without a dog for about two years. I had insisted that Sophie our

Cindy on adoption day.

Saint Bernard would be our last dog.  But I kept looking at available dogs on the Al-Van Humane Society’s website. I would send King links when I found dogs I liked.  It was really no big deal. I still send him links to property, treadle sewing machines, looms, fancy travel trailers… I have quite a list of things I send him. But one day after sending him several dog options, he said, “Call the humane society and see if that dog, Cindy, is available.”  King, by the way, is still under the impression one can simply go to the animal shelter, look at dogs, pick the one you want and go home. So rather than explain to him the necessary steps needed to adopt a dog, I simply started the application process for Cindy. We made an appointment to meet her (when she was surrendered to the shelter she had tested positive for heartworms so she was in foster care at the time) and went to meet her and see if we were compatible. I think the fact that we are retired and would be with the dog 24-7 helped our case. But the fact that Cindy immediately took to King was probably the clincher. There is a photo of us at the humane society with Cindy peeking out from between King’s legs. It was the first and only time she did it. But everyone was convinced Cindy had found her forever home.

And she had.

For the past three years, Cindy (who they estimated was about 13-years-old when we adopted her), was our constant companion. She went everywhere with us -- errands to the store, trips to the beach, hikes

Cindy at the Blair Valley
Campground in the 
Anza Borrego State Park, 
California.

with my sister, and, of course, traveling across country.  We had a seat cover in the backseat of the pickup and Cindy would scramble into the truck and stretch out in the backseat and sleep. Sometimes she’d look out the window and watch the scenery for a bit, but most of the time she was content to simply sleep in the backseat -- waking when pit stops were necessary, or complaining when it was time to eat.

Cindy was also witness to a lot of our bickering:

“I said left. That would be your other left.”

“Well, I didn’t hear you.”

“Because you have the radio turned up so loud.”

“Well speak up.”

Cindy would sigh and I swear she would roll her eyes.

We knew when we adopted a 13 year old dog, that her life expectancy would be shorter rather than had we adopted a younger dog. But so often older dogs get overlooked and it’s a shame. They have so much to offer.

 “Probably three years, maybe five,” I remember saying to someone.

The first summer we had her I would take her out into the woods behind the property where we were caretakers and let her run off-leash. And run she did. There was such joyful abandon as she raced through the woods, stopping occasionally to sniff an interesting tree or nose under some composted leaves. And there was the dancing game we played when it came time to catch her and bring her back to the house. She always came when she was called, but would stop just out of arms reach and run circles around us -- three circles, dancing around us and then sitting obediently at our feet, waiting patiently for us to snap the leash to her collar.

Cindy was sure
she saw a chicken in
the woodpile.

And the chickens … oh how she loved to chase loose chickens. She would watch for a hapless bird to fly over the fence and would then give chase. She was never fast enough to catch one, but the chase (for her) was divine. Not so much for the chickens. We named every hen in the flock Henny Penny. I would cheer for the hens, “Run Henny Penny!  Run!  Remember you can fly over the fence!”  The rooster and I had a hate/hate relationship and I secretly hoped one day he would be found outside the fence. But the jerk never strayed that far from his flock.

It didn’t take long to get to know Cindy’s quirks.  She hated Lake Michigan. Even on calm days. I think it was just too much water. She also didn’t like it when King would go out and weed whack. When he was in the yard working (or later when maintenance men at campgrounds were weed whacking) she would tell me just how annoying that weed whacker was. She was pretty vocal about it.

Cindy became a well-traveled dog. She hiked the mountains in the Cleveland National Forest, watched lizards skitter across the desert in Quartzsite, roamed the dry lakebed with us in the Anza Borrego desert, turned up her nose at the Salton Sea, stood with us as we marveled at rock formations in Utah and Joshua Tree National Park and probably smirked at me when I finally got

Cindy and King at Cibbits Flat campground
in the Cleveland National Forest.

the see the World’s Largest Ball of Twine in Cawker City, Kansas.  

After a while you forget that your companion is actually quite a bit older than you. And the signs of aging are there, but they come on so slowly you adapt and really don’t notice. This past summer I realized Cindy no longer scrambled into the truck. She would place her front feet on the running board and then pretend she was getting into the truck, but in reality she knew I would placed my arm between her hind legs and hoist her backend into the truck. She started sleeping more. When we went for walks she started slowing down (after leaving the farm, for safety reasons, I no longer allowed her to be off-leash). She still liked to trot ahead of me and stop and sniff whatever it is that dogs smell when roaming, but by the end of our walks, she would more than likely be walking at my side (like a well-trained dog is supposed to do, except I knew she was tired).

And then this fall she started having trouble getting in and out of the trailer. We had already built handicap steps for her, but she still moved the same way I did before I had knee replacement surgery. We also knew the jump down from the truck had to be bone-jarring, so we built her a ramp.

We arrived at our daughter’s home in Carlsbad, California in mid-November. Our daughter lives on the second floor of an apartment. Those first few weeks Cindy climbed those stairs like a trooper. But then that became a chore. So we took it slow and would encourage her as she made her way up and down. But Cindy was having other issues. Her hind legs would often give out and she would fall down. One evening as I was walking her before heading back to the campground she slid into a small ditch and refused to get up. King had to help me get her out.

“Maybe some leg braces would help,” King said one day. So I ordered some from Amazon.  By now we were having the “should we take her to the vet” conversations as well. 

There is something to be said for living in a rural area. In Michigan we have transported many pets (we always had large dogs) in the back of our pickup for that final veterinary visit. The doctor would climb into the bed of the truck with the dog and administer the “shot” and we would sit with our pets until there was no heartbeat, take them home and bury them.  Yes, tears were always shed.

It does not work that way in urban areas, and what we found was because of COVID many veterinarians would not allow people to be with their pet when the time came. Unacceptable.  I had many conversations with vets in Southern California. I was not overly impressed.

“My dog is having difficulty walking. Her breathing is labored. She falls down when relieving herself. She sits up during the night and it seems as though she’s trying to clear her lungs. No. I don’t want an examination. She is 16. She is suffering. I know what she needs.”

January 6 was the soonest I could get her in to see a vet who would allow us to be with her when she died. Three weeks away.

King and I loved on her as much as we could. Every chance we had. She was dying and we knew it. And we were helpless to figure out what to do.

On Christmas Eve day we realized she was too tired and too weak to make it to January 6^th.

“Both our dogs decided to get sick on weekends or holidays,” our daughter told us. “There is an emergency service here that can get her in.”

I didn’t even consult with King. I called them, gave them the information they needed, the three of us carried Cindy to our daughter’s SUV, wrapped her in a quilt and drove to the veterinarian’s office.

I can’t say enough good things about VCA California Veterinary Specialists (and I’m not one to ever endorse anything in my columns, but I will here today). King and I were escorted behind the building to a tent where we waited for them to bring Cindy. It was like a waiting room with chairs and a table. There may have even been flowers. I don’t remember. When they brought Cindy to us she was still wrapped in her blanket on the gurney and they transferred to the ground. I lay down next to her and told her how much I loved her. A little later the veterinarian came in. She told us her name. I don’t remember it. I told her I knew I hadn’t asked for an examination but I wondered if she had any idea what was wrong with Cindy besides old age. She said it appeared she may have had a tumor that may have ruptured. She was pretty sure Cindy was probably bleeding internally. And yes, she assured us, we were absolutely making the right decision.

It really doesn’t make it easier, but our youngest son, in trying to comfort me later that day reminded me, “At least it was while she was being loved and not alone somewhere.”

We won’t be able to bury Cindy.  We don’t have property any longer. But Cindy’s remains will be mixed with those of other dogs and spread off Point Loma into the Pacific Ocean.

Cindy hated water.

 

Some days the assholes win

 Happy Holidays!

I hope you are all well, safe, and content.

King and I spent last week helping our daughter with her sons as she shifted into high gear to get her real estate sales going. She has been in a holding pattern for several months waiting for some additional help. I’m happy to report she finished the year strong. Let us hope it will continue.

While we were there we enjoyed all the traditional preparations for the holiday – we baked cookies, made cookies for Santa, baked other holiday goodies and made secret packages for Christmas morning. The boys are not very good at keeping secrets, so our daughter already knows, but it was the thought that counts.

We also spent hours on their balcony looking for Hippogriffs. Hippogriffs, for the uninformed, are mythical creatures from the Harry Potter series. We have quite a list of rules and guidelines for searching for them.

This week the boys are with their father and King and I have retreated to our trailer. The campground is sparsely populated and those of us who are here have decorated our travel trailers with holiday cheer and hunkered down in our quiet solitude. No one interacts (pandemic guidelines) other than to wave hello when going for walks. It’s been years since King and I were social creatures so this is our normal.

At one time in our marriage we were quite social. Most of that ended with his tenure as a middle school principal in a small town in southwest Michigan. One can say small towns are friendly – but they are not – at least not to strangers who try to fit in. It took us less than a year to figure out we would never be accepted and the locals would never consider us one of “their own.” In fact, it was so bad, that when we moved to another community, part of King’s yearly job review included becoming active in the community. King said he would forgo any raises if it meant trying to fit in with people who would never accept outsiders.

For those of you who still live in small towns, I would suggest you greet the stranger in your church. I would suggest you invite your new neighbor over for coffee. I would recommend you do not exclude someone because you have decided they might feel uncomfortable with a group of people they do not know. Because guess what? They probably will never get to know others unless they are invited. Don’t just give lip service to acting kind. Be kind.

I started writing today with the intention of writing about Christmas traditions when I was a child. They are good memories. They were happy times. My parents moved to my hometown several years before I was born. I’m happy they were accepted into the community. Without that acceptance I have no doubt my childhood memories would be quite different. And therein lays the rub. I had eagerly anticipated moving to a small community again. I was bitterly disappointed.

Some days the assholes win … and they don’t even know it.

Cookie baking, school and sugar

 It’s Monday and another day of Zoom learning for the twins. I’m home alone with the boys as our daughter is working and King has decided to go to a friend’s home to work on a ramp for Cindy so she can get in and out of the truck.

Cindy is not doing well. Last night when it was time for us to head back to the campground I walked her one last time before loading her into the truck for the hour commute. (We now have to lift her 90 pound mass into the truck). She has always been one to spend a lot of time to look for the “perfect” spot to relieve herself, but last night she slid down a ditch and just lay there. There was no attempt to get up. King and I had to pull her up (he pushed, I pulled).  When one adopts a senior dog one knows ahead of time this day is coming sooner rather than later but it does not make it any easier. She has aging joints and I know from experience how hard it can be to move. We will work on finding her relief but we won’t go through any “heroic” efforts such as surgery. This is our choice and it is what we did for all our canine friends. This is a normal progression of aging.

But we are not ready to throw in the towel just yet. Hence, King is building the ramp. And yes, we have tried or will try all the recommended forms of relief.

In the meantime we are falling into a routine with schooling. There is a reason I never went into education (elementary, secondary or otherwise). I tend to want them to work as I would – get everything done and THEN take a break. Seven-year-olds have other ideas and I have decided perhaps their own pace is the way I should allow them to proceed. (Hmmm, ya think?) I can’t decide if I should intervene when they seem to have the same answers to reading questions (as in identical synopsis to stories they have read). The editor in me has a difficult time with plagiarism, the grandmother in me says, “Close enough,”  and the radical idea of “Grades don’t measure everything” that has been with me since high school, battles it all.

It would also seem these little boys have become eating machines. All day long I hear, “Grandma I’m hungry.” I believe the translation is “Grandma I want a delicious cookie that we baked yesterday

Frosting the cookies

because our mother won’t let us have sugar and you are a ‘marshmallow Mom’ when it comes to monitoring sugar.”

Actually it would be much easier to monitor their sugar intake if it were not for King. He is the original “junk food junkie.” When he goes grocery shopping with me (which since retirement is every time I go) the grocery cart is filled with Little Debbie cakes, chips, candy, Mountain Dew and sugar coated cereal. When we visit the grandchildren they can depend on Poppa to bring them junk to eat. I receive dirty looks from my daughter -- as if I have control over him. And I’m certain my daughters-in-law complain bitterly to our sons after we leave.

Last night, our daughter came home after a long day of showing houses, to find the boys were hyped-up on sugar. I’m pretty sure I heard King giggling maniacally as he headed down the stairs of her apartment and to the quiet of our trailer.

I have to wonder if part of King’s penchant for “forbidden” foods is because his mother had a propensity to hide them. She once told me (after hiding a batch of cookies my sister had given me) that often after the Christmas holiday season she had to throw cookies out because they had gone stale. “Did your mother have to do that?” My response was, “Not really, because after Christmas any leftovers were served to friends we had over after a day of sledding." “Oh,” she replied. “I always made fancy cookies.”  The passive/aggressive comment was not lost on me. 

Unfortunately there is darn little snow in southern California and even if there were, with the pandemic, I don’t think many friends would be coming over for hot chocolate and cookies, which is a good thing because there are four cookies left from the batch we made yesterday.

Realities of our lifestyle during the pandemic

It’s Sunday morning and we’ve been settled into our new campsite for a week.

Up until yesterday, the rhythm of this campground was much like the Kal Haven Outpost in South Haven where we spent our summer.  On Friday afternoon campers started coming in and setting up camp. A surreptitious walk with Cindy around the campground and I could see most of them (from the camping permits in the windows) will be leaving on Sunday or Monday.  The difference being Californians seem much more subdued than those from the Midwest. The campground is quite -- really, really quiet. If I had to hazard a guess I’m thinking in the Midwest one puts A LOT of living into weekends away because soon enough the snow will fly and people will be forced to retreat indoors. Or it could be because California is starting to implement a mandatory “Stay At Home Order.” My reasoning could be a lot of hooey too.

Portions of California are going into mandatory lockdown because of the pandemic. Those counties with available hospital beds below 15 percent are ordered to lockdown. San Diego is one of them. Lake Jennings, which is in San Diego County and is where we are staying, is no longer accepting reservations between now and January 15. Current reservations will be honored only if campers have a completely self-contained (toilet, sink, and shower) unit. No tents. The campground restrooms are closed. The playground is closed (it has been for quite some time).  We are allowed to stay through February as we have a reservation for a long-term stay. I should note the campground’s long-term stay limit is 90 days. After that, if COVID is not under control, I’m not quite certain what we will do.  We will cross that bridge when we come to it and perhaps, in the meantime, discuss alternative plans. Or, what is more likely, we will use the King method of coping – don’t think about it until it happens. I’m pretty sure the two of us have managed to stay together for 40-plus years because we choose to ignore one another’s quirks. We observe and complain,  but then let it go.

 For King and me the pandemic has not changed our lifestyle very much. We have not been social creatures since sometime in the 1980s. I think, other than weddings and funerals, the last time we were out with a group of people was when he was an assistant football coach at Coloma High School in 1989. I can’t remember the last time we ate in a restaurant. I think I’ve mentioned (complained actually) many times that special occasion dinners usually mean a visit to a fast food establishment.

We wear masks and continue with our normal self-imposed social distancing. We have a large supply of masks in the trailer. Some are homemade. Some are purchased.  When I’m bored I pull out the sewing machine and make more. We read a lot. King watches old TV westerns and sitcoms. Every-other week we help our daughter with her COVID-related homeschooling so she can work from home in relative peace.

I’m going to make what some might consider a political comment here. We don’t live in fear. We live our lives as though what we do matters to others. It’s called compassion, caring and taking responsibility. But please note: How people can make trying to do the right thing during a pandemic political is beyond me.

And life goes on.

Our new site is surrounded by trees and low bushes. Cindy has staked a claim under some of the bushes and spends most of her days sleeping in the shade. She has suddenly aged this trip and has trouble getting in and out of the trailer, despite the fact we built handicap steps for her. When we travel, she places her front feet on the step-rail of the truck and waits for us to hoist her back-end into the truck.

Cindy on adoption day

She sleeps in our bed at night and there are times when I reach over to make certain she is still breathing.  We adopted Cindy three years ago, knowing she was a senior dog. I am amazed at how quickly she adapted to life with us. But I often wonder if she misses her other people. We were told she was turned in to the shelter when her elderly previous owners could no longer care for her.  Since then she has wormed her way into our hearts and as much work as traveling with a canine companion is, I can’t imagine not having her with us. Puppies are cute, loveable and messy. Older dogs are grateful for love and friendship.

We have our doggie routine. King prefers to be left alone in the morning so he gets up and gets ready first. I have no idea what he does outside, but he goes out and putters around the campsite and then opens the door and jingles the leash at Cindy. She is more than happy to go for a walk with him. It’s my signal to get up, get ready, make the bed and start breakfast.  It’s also my chance to claim the TV remote and watch the news. In the evening, he takes her for one more walk before we retire.

We are all creatures of habit.

  

Moving day(s), traditions and tours

I trust everyone had a safe and socially distanced Thanksgiving. Ours was a very quiet and small affair.

It’s been a busy five days, starting on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.

The campground where we were staying, Sweetwater Summit County Park, had a 14 day limit. We had reached our 14 days and it was time to move on. Problem was, many, many, (many) people camp over the holiday weekends in California. It’s something one does not think about when coming from Michigan. Most people back home have winterized their RVs, tried their best to rodent-proof them, and tucked them away for the winter.  Not so much the case here. People like to spend the long holiday weekend camping. Finding a campground with openings in close proximity (and close is a relative term) to our daughter proved to be quite the task. We were also looking for a campground that would take us long-term. The age of our trailer has kept us out of many campgrounds. It’s something to consider when looking for an RV, but I like the price-tag and financing that came with ours (i.e., cash, no payments).

We eventually found a campground that 1) had a vacancy and, 2) did not seem concerned with the age of our trailer. It’s not that close to our daughter, but it’s doable. There was one hitch. A long-term opening was not available until Sunday and in order to camp for the four days prior to the site becoming available we had to move the trailer twice.

Lake Jennings

Lake Jennings

The new campground, Lake Jennings Campground, is part of the Helix Water District. The lake is a reservoir that was created in 1964 to provide water for the local residents of Lakeside. The campground has 97 sites (some of which are precariously perched on a bluff overlooking the lake – tent sites they say, but I’ve seen some intrepid RVers parked in them.  I swear they have to place them with a crane).  Anyway, King, who can be very gregarious and friendly when it suits him, talked the long-term campsite maven into getting us into two pull-though sites. The first site was more or less vertical. I could sit in my reading nook by bracing my feet against the wall. We had that site from Wednesday through Friday and parked the truck vertically behind the trailer – just in case. The second site was fairly normal (we stayed there Friday and Saturday), and our third and final site, (until the end of February) is just across the “street” from the second site. It’s fairly spacious and Cindy has some low bushes she likes to lie underneath and sleep. She is aging and tends to sleep – a lot.

We have stayed at Lake Jennings Campground a couple of times in previous years, never for a long-term stay though. This time around I will be following the example set by other campers and decorating the outside of the trailer for Christmas. I’ve never done that before. Inside I have two strings of garland, a few battery-operated poinsettia-shaped tea lights, a battery operated ceramic tree – and we will call it good. One obviously can over do decorating 184 square feet.

So it appears we are settling in. On Friday, following our first move, we enjoyed a family tradition of getting our daughter’s Christmas tree.  This is our third year of joining in on her tradition. The boys had seen some spray-painted trees from the road and although they did not seem too keen on getting one, they did want to check them out.  Grandma made the appropriate “ohhh” and “How pretty” noises. There also was a small petting zoo (farm animals) at the tree farm. We checked out the ducks, geese, pot bellied pigs, sheep, rabbits and chickens. I listened in as a mother explained to her toddler how eggs came from chickens. I also noted there were not that many hens in the flock but I kept that info to myself.

On Saturday we drove to San Diego and took a catamaran tour of the San Diego Bay. The boys have been asking to go whale watching. Our daughter figured if they could handle the bay tour they could probably handle the Whale Watching tour. Three years ago she and I took a whale watching tour late in the season. Although we never saw any whales (it was the first time all season the charter had not

San Diego skyline

spotted any whales) there were a lot of dolphins that followed the boat. We assume, on the off chance of the same thing happening again, the boys will be just as happy seeing the dolphins – so at some point this winter/spring we will do some whale watching.

Things are starting to fall into place and we are getting into a routine. We are slowly making repairs on the trailer brakes and working on figuring out what is going on with the truck. Lights are still blinking and bells are still ringing but we will get there. In the meantime I’ll turn down my hearing aids and look the other way.

This is the way we go to school

Since arriving in California we are learning, first-hand, the joys of homeschooling first graders.

Our daughter’s twin sons are in the first grade. They attend school online Monday through Wednesday and attend school in class (half-day) Thursday and Friday. The school district’s plan is to switch to five days a week, (half-day) in-class learning after Thanksgiving.  With the Coronavirus on the uptick I’m not certain if that will still happen.  

The country is waiting for someone to do something definitive rather than play golf and bitch about the election.

Yes. That is a political comment.

Regardless of what the district decides, we are here in California to help our daughter with daycare/homeschooling while she works. It’s tough trying to work from home with children in the house. Been there done that. It’s just plain scary when one works on commission.

On day one, what I discovered was keeping first graders engaged and on task (always hated those words when I heard educators use them) is akin to herding cats. “Sit up. Pick up your pencil. No you don’t have to sharpen that pencil again. Don’t hit your brother.  Get off the floor. Do you wiggle like that in school?”

 There was also some initial shyness when it came to reading in front of Grandma and Poppa, although at night they are always eager to take turns reading. I think when it comes to school it’s a little different.

The daily schedule is self-paced learning in the morning and zoom classroom in the afternoon. We finished early on Monday and spent some time in Grandma and Poppa’s truck pretending to catch bad guys or look for stray animals. Imaginations take us everywhere.  On Wednesday we took them to La Jolla to watch the sea lions and seals. It’s about 20 minutes from their apartment so we could finish with morning class, spend as much time as they wanted watching sea life and returned in time for speech class.

I asked the boys if their Mom or Dad helped them as much as I did with school. They said no.  It’s hard to know what is helping and what is interfering. The day after I questioned them about “help,” I stepped back a bit. King, the retired educator, didn’t agree with my tactic. I’m sure by spring we will have it figured out.

Back in Michigan one of our granddaughters in Grand Haven was exposed to COVID and was in quarantine. A few days later the entire Grand Haven school district gave up with in-class learning and school board decided to go back to virtual learning until December 9. In Paw Paw where the other grandkids go to school, the high school has closed for three weeks as mandated by the state, but the elementary remained open. Some things simply defy logic. Although I was informed it was so working parents who can’t find daycare can continue working, I personally believe if we don’t stop the spread, a mandatory stay-at-home order can’t be that far off.  It’s scary times for everyone. Please people. Wear your masks. It’s such a simple thing.  

Speaking of masks… Yesterday we took the boys to check out a campground closer to their home. We drove their mother’s car, since using her car with the car seats already installed is so much easier than moving them into the truck.  We forgot and left our own masks in the truck. King went into a gas station and had to use one of the kids’ masks … the one with dinosaurs on it. He looked really dashing. The boys were quick to point out that the mask had to be washed after Poppa used it. It’s rather sad that seven-year-olds are so wise in the ways of the spread of a virus.

After driving through the campground we took them to the local beach. I came home with bits of shell, lots of sand, and a few other "treasures" that I keep in my "treasure box" in the trailer.

Between trips to campgrounds, beaches and learning how to do virtual learning, it looks as though we are going to have a busy winter.

Report from the road

We meandered across the country and ended up in Quartzsite, Arizona on our sixth day on the road.  I have to admit, and this may offend some, Quartzsite is not my favorite place to stay. But it is free and that’s a big draw.  We have a reservation at a county park near our daughter on Wednesday and since we need some repairs, this is as good a place as any to stop.

I would say Quartzsite is a wild and beautiful country but it’s difficult to see with all the other RVers who are parked here calling this home. That sounds pretty negative, doesn’t it?

View from our backdoor.

Quartzsite is surrounded by Bureau of Land Management (the original BLM) land. So camping in some designated areas is free. These areas are known as short-term visitor dispersed spots, meaning you can stay 14 days for free and then have to move on. There is also an area referred to as a Long Term Visitor Area(LTVA) where campers can stay from September through April – for a $180 fee.  For that fee you get a pit toilet, a dance floor and RV dump station.  Quartzsite also has regular RV “resorts” with full hookups.

For a Michigan girl who loves green trees and grass, the Arizona desert is, umm dry. The landscape is flat, sparsely vegetated with creosote bushes and what they call trees (palo verde, ironwood, and mesquite) as well as cacti. But there is beauty everywhere if you look for it -- the mountains in the distance are purple against the sun and I can see awesome sunrises and sunsets through either window in the front of the trailer. Early this morning there was a coyote somewhere outside the trailer. I’ve often heard them in the distance – even at home – but never so close. This one was probably within a stones throw of the trailer. And I don’t throw very well these days. 

Yesterday and today are incredibly windy. King and I have retreated to our trailer. He is watching football and I’m keeping myself busy with writing and reading. I have some paranormal romance novels stored away on my Kindle.

We also have company.

We have a friend from South Haven who left on a nomad travel adventure about a month before we did. We keep in touch via text messages and discovered we would be in Quartzite at the same time so for the next few days we are socializing. I provide the coffee he provides the cookies.

Today King and I drove to town looking for cigars I saw a sign for the Hi Jolly Monument. We are staying at the Hi Jolly dispersed campsite, so I figured it might be worth checking in out.

Hi Jolly or Hadji Ali, was born in Syria as Philip Tedro. His father was Syrian who converted to Christianity and his mother was Greek. As a young adult Ali converted to Islam and after going to Mecca to perform the jajj (pilgrimage) he called himself Hadji Ali – Hi Jolly was no doubt an 
Americanized version of his name.  (For one brief moment the politically correct version of me was offended. But I have a very Dutch maiden name. Not only has the original spelling of my name been bastardized – my father changed it further after joining the Army in 1942. Some things simply are…).

Hi Jolly Monument

Hadji Ali worked as a camel breeder and trainer. He served with the French Army in Algiers before signing on as a camel driver for the US Army in 1856. He was one of several men hired by the US Army to introduce camels to the US to be used to transport cargo across the desert.  Ali was the lead camel driver during the US Army’s experiment with the US Camel Corps. Apparently the experiment was a failure as army mules, horses and burros were terrified of camels. The start of the Civil War led to congress not approving more funds for the Camel Corps.

Ali became a US citizen in 1890 and used his birth name of Philip Tedro. He married Gertrudis Serna in Tucson. They had two children.

Ali moved to Quartzsite, Arizona where he mined and occasionally scouted for the US Army. He died in 1902 and was buried in Quartzsite.

So now, for me, the mystery of the camel logos, streets named Camel, Pyramid or Oasis in Quartzsite has been answered.

New shoes and a few more new things...

For many, many years we dealt with what we called “McCrossin Luck.” It generally centered around our vehicles and involved breaking down -- often in inconvenient places with inconvenient passengers. 

There was one standout moment when we were moving from Paw Paw to Alma. It was the last load of the move. I was driving the car with our St. Bernard, Annie, and small mutt dog, Lucy. King was ahead of me in the truck. This move coincided with the time there was construction on the S Curve in Grand Rapids. Traffic was detoured to Wealthy Street and somehow detoured around the S curve and back to US 131. We were on the overpass on Wealthy when my car died. I managed to get to the side of the road. King came and got Annie and I snapped the only “leash” I had onto Lucy’s collar. It was a 15 foot longe-line for horses. No biggie. Now I should mention Lucy was probably a Coydog -- that is part coyote, part dog. Our daughter brought her home after passing a sign in front of a farmhouse advertising “free puppies.”  Lucy had several quirks that we learned to accept, one of them being she simply could not tolerate being on a leash, in fact, we could barely keep a collar on her. She was an extremely timid dog who was deeply attached to me. I managed to get her off the overpass by duck waddling backward, letting out the longe-line, calling her to me, having her leap into my arms, and repeat the process several times over. (The slightest tension on the longe-line and Lucy went into full panic mode, darting out into traffic while I reeled her back to the side of the road like a fish. And as much as she loved me, trying to pick her up and carry her was absolutely out of the question. She could not handle it). But we made it off the overpass and to the waiting truck -- driving the rest of the way to Alma with a St. Bernard, a scared to death coydog, King and I in the cab.

That was a typical day in the life of the McCrossins.

But that was also 20 years ago. Things seem to have changed and we have fewer and fewer mishaps. I suspect it is because I have taken over the maintenance on our vehicles (seeing that it is done, not doing it myself), but King would debate that fact.

So, when it came to our on-going battle over replacing the 17-year-old tires on our trailer, I worked to convince King it was absolutely necessary to have them replaced. Naturally he wouldn't take my word for it but by calling several mechanic friends and tire places the consensus was driving 2000 miles on 17-year-old tires was probably not a good idea. I also learned that not too many places want to replace trailer tires in the fall and I called at least five tire shops before I finally found one that was not only eager to help, but friendly as well.

So this past Tuesday found King and I packing our trailer, disconnecting everything and driving to Gobles to get new tires. We’ve been traveling with a trailer for about three years so we have a system. I back the truck to the hitch and decipher King’s windmill arm motions as to which way to turn and how close I am to the trailer hitch. It’s then our routine that I stow away everything on the inside and King takes care of the outside. New to us this summer is a Dish TV satellite system – receiver the inside, satellite dish on the outside.  You can probably see where this is going.

Even our kids warned us, “Don’t forget to take the dish down before you move the trailer.”

King said he thought about the dish several times while getting the trailer ready. But he never got to it. We debated quite a bit about my asking several times if he needed help since I got things stowed away inside in relatively short order. He was disinclined to accept my offer.

Before we left, I checked to make certain the electric and water were disconnected. We check the lights and turn signals together. That’s our normal routine. I forgot the satellite on the roof (not mounted, just resting comfortably) and evidently so did King.

It wasn’t until we reached the tire place in Gobles that he remembered at one point there had been a satellite dish on our roof. It wasn’t there any longer. All that was left of it was the coax cable running to an empty spot on the roof. No more CNN. No more Gunsmoke. Gone are the Wagon Train re-runs and the wisdom of Ben Cartwright.

Yes. We looked for it. It either broke into a million, trillion pieces, flew deep into the woods somewhere, or someone picked it up and now has a portable satellite dish.

The system had been a gift from a friend who moved out of the country. It hurts to have to buy a new satellite dish when we are so close to leaving and like to have a monetary cushion during our travels. But we decided to bite the bullet, reduce our cushion somewhat, and buy a new dish.

There are those who wrinkle their noses at the thought of television in a camper, but one must remember this is also our HOME. So today had me driving to Holland to buy a new satellite dish. As I write this it is sitting in the backseat of the truck awaiting installation.

King is content to watch Bewitched DVDs for the evening.

 

Down to the wire

 Surprisingly the RV potion of the campground was almost full this past weekend. There were even a few hearty souls who camped in tents. I am assuming the weatherman’s promise of sunny skies and warm weather combined with fall colors starting to peak here in southwest Michigan brought people out.

King and our sons played in their second to last golf scramble on Saturday -- The Turkey Open. Entrance fees were reduced rates plus a frozen turkey to be donated to a food bank. Judging from the food bank lines over the past six months at the Presbyterian Church in South Haven, I am guessing there will continue to be a huge need for assistance for the foreseeable future.  I’m going to make a political comment here: People in Washington – there are still many, many, many Americans who are hurting. Get off your backsides and DO SOMETHING. ANYTHING. Just stop arguing, finger pointing and blaming, ok? (I guess finger pointing and blaming are one in the same).

While King and our sons were golfing I drove to Grand Haven to watch our granddaughters play soccer. I have not been to a soccer game in a long, long time. It is fun to watch, especially the little, little ones who put their heart and soul into play and just a quickly disappear onto the playground when the game is over.

We have another granddaughter who plays on a traveling team. I’d love to watch her play but the league she is in limits attendance to two family members.  Maybe next year, “Lord willing and the creek don’t rise,” as a co-worker from the south was so fond of saying.

As I mentioned earlier, the campground was almost full this past weekend and now, for a Sunday afternoon, there are still a good number of people here in their trailers. This past week the road crew working on I-196 finished their project and pulled out with their trailers and fifth-wheels in tow. That left King and I and one other motor home in the campground until Friday night. Today a goodly number of people left at checkout time, but there are still a number of people camping, and a few more are still pulling in. I’m thinking those who are still here today with children are probably doing virtual learning for school so bugging out on a Sunday is not very necessary. In years past I may have talked to other campers to learn their stories, but most people (myself included) like to keep our distance.

And now for some really good news! We now have a definite date for leaving. I asked King the other day if he could give me one. He looked at me, blinked a few times and then, in his most sarcastic, condescending tone (and I’m perfect, remember), said, “We’ve always said we were leaving November 2.”

No King, we did not. You may have known the date for your last golf outing, but you did not share it with me. Sigh. After 44 years I should have known. But I’m still guessing our daughter’s-in-law are NOT going to be happy with the last golf outing of the year falling on Halloween, so if, indeed, the Halloween outing does happen, the day after the outing will be spent recuperating.

In the meantime I’m still working on getting car and truck tags (which I can do via a 24-7 Kiosk), trailer title transfer (which if I can’t get in early, I still have an appointment with the Secretary of State on November 2) and I’m still battling King about trailer tires. King says he will do whatever our mechanic recommends. I’m wondering if I can pay the mechanic off.

Little by little I’m making progress toward heading West. I do things King does not even realize. Yesterday I set a few extra radio stations on our Sirius Radio in the truck to news stations. It was done in anticipation of King announcing on election day, “Find out the election results.” Now, instead of going through a set-up procedure that requires a degree in Information Technology, I can smugly push a button and there it is.

And King thinks life just happens.

Last month in Michigan

I have a countdown app on my phone. It says it is 26 days until we leave and 28 days until the election. The election, probably, will go on as planned. Our departure is a moving target dependent on the last golf scramble for King and our sons.

Technically there is an outing on Halloween but my daughters-in-law are not too keen on husbands playing golf on Trick or Treat night (depending on social distancing norms – whatever they may be). I can’t say as I blame them. King does not get it. “They will be home before Trick or Treating starts,” he keeps saying. “It’s no big deal.” Well, it IS a big deal. Pulling into the driveway in just enough time to load kids into the car for Trick or Treating is not conducive to family harmony.

So… anyway, our departure date is still up in the air. We have an arrival deadline of November 13 --meaning as long as we leave shortly after the first of November we can take our time traveling out to Carlsbad, California, where our daughter now lives.

The campground is now basically empty. There are five trailers/motorhomes parked at sites. Three possibly four belong to the work crew for the I-196 highway repair. They work during the week and generally leave on Thursday night and return Monday night. So things are fairly quiet here. Target date for construction completion is mid-October and then it will more than likely be just King and I clicking our heels alone. I would think the owners of the campground are anxious to see the place empty so they can begin winterizing. Technically they close October 31^st but we can park without power for a day.

We’ve taken down our front planter and gave it to our son for the winter, removed the birdbath and will give it to our son in Paw Paw and take the little bunny statues (from Grandma McCrossin) and give them to our daughter for her balcony at her new apartment. One truck tune-up and a trip to the secretary of state for a trailer title and we are ready to go. I’m ready.

I will admit traveling amid COVID-19 is a little unsettling. Normally when we stop for gas and bathroom breaks we grab ready-made sandwiches at the gas station (no, they are NOT yummy, they are rather dry and gross even when there is not a pandemic). I will probably make sandwiches in the trailer and use our own facilities. It is always just a little disconcerting for Cindy the first few days of traveling west. When we leave the grassland of the Midwest behind she has a hard time finding just the right spot to relieve herself minus grass. She actually is a private dog. Tall grass is her comfort zone.

As things wind down for the season it’s a good time to reflect.

This summer has been an unusual one, hasn’t it. Everything has been politically charged – from wearing face masks, to tax returns, to conspiracy theories. I think we’ve all grown weary, crabby and mean. We can blame it on social distancing, we can blame the president, we can blame the governor. Fact of the matter is, we are responsible for ourselves. Point your finger at someone else and three more fingers are pointing back at you. That sentiment looks good in writing, but I tend to be pretty politically charged and what should be an easy concept to follow isn’t always so. I’m working on it.  In the meantime, I have un-followed, un-friend, or blocked a few people on social media. Not because their views differ from mine, but because they are mean or name calling.

There is enough icky in the world.

 

Rainy Days and Mondays

 Rain.

It’s Monday and it’s raining. The Carpenters had a song about that. Rainy days and Monday’s Always Get Me Down.

Except they don’t.

I like rain. I like the sound of rain on our metal roof. I’m not too keen on the rain seeping in the leak we can’t seem to pinpoint, but I still like the rain. As for Mondays – they don’t really bother me too much any longer. When I worked a regular office job (for that university that must not be named in the middle of the state) Mondays were kind of a downer. But when I worked for newspapers I worked nights, weekends and holidays so Mondays were just another day -- kind of like they are now, minus the work part. I guess that actually makes Mondays better any way you look at it.

The rain has chased us inside the trailer. King is watching “Gunsmoke” on satellite TV. Before that he watched “The Big Valley.” He has a penchant for TV westerns. I can take them or leave them. I have an annoying habit of watching the actors and their stunt doubles ride horses. I am a snob when it comes to riding ability. Michael Landon was a good rider as were John Wayne, Robert Fuller, John Smith and a few others. The rest? Not so much. I’ve also been known to scream at the TV, “lighten up on that poor horse’s mouth. That hurts!” And don’t get me going about the final scene of Hidalgo where the character Frank Hopkins (Viggo Mortensen) returns the horse to the wild – with its (the horse’s) shoes on. I saw the movie in the theater and yelled at the screen, “Are you kidding me?” John Wayne and Audry Murphy both rode the same horse. It’s a good thing they never did a movie together. Michael Landon’s famous paint horse was actually more than a dozen horses over the course of the TV series – sometimes two different horses were in the same episode (and yes, I can tell the difference). James Arnes (Matt Dillon, Gunsmoke) and Lorene Greene (Ben Cartwright, Bonanza) also rode the same buckskin horse – Buck. Stands to reason Ben Cartwright never visited Dodge City.

So, that’s my life on a rainy day -- thinking about TV westerns and the horses that made them.

Back in reality, we still don’t have a departure date – although we do have a “must be in California by date.” Our daughter has a work commitment in mid-November. We will be there by then to help with the grandsons. We are also running up against some new COVID-19 regulations that are complicating our stay. The San Diego County park system has some lovely parks for camping. Each one has a 14 day limit, but we could move from park to park and never really had a problem. This year they have a 60-day total time limit for all the parks combined. Although they say it is because of COVID, I am fairly certain it is because the huge homeless population often travels from park to park. Those of us here in the Midwest, where winters are not conducive to year-round homeless living, really can’t fathom how prevalent homelessness is. Trust me, it happens right here in South Haven, but one does not often see people living in makeshift shelters under viaducts, or alleyways next to generators.

The challenge for us will be finding an affordable place to stay near our daughter who now lives in Carlsbad, California. There is also the problem with the age of our travel trailer. Many private parks and RV Resorts have an age limit for their trailers (anywhere from 10 to 15 years). Our trailer falls into the “older than dirt” category. Having an age limit, and banning school bus conversions is a way to keep pleasing aesthetics in parks – but that’s another story.

  
In the end we will figure it all out. We fly by the seat of our pants but we always manage. It’s our way.

The time to leave is quickly approaching ... I think

It’s a beautiful fall day but I’ve been chased inside by the multitude of flies that seem to be so prevalent this season. I’ve become quite adept with the flyswatter. The hapless intruders don’t stand a chance.

From my vantage point by the kitchen table I can see the Kal Haven Trail. The trees along the trail are still green – until you look closely and you can see a slight yellow tinge to them. While driving to Glenn today to get our mail there was an occasional tree that simply could not hold out any longer and has already changed to a brilliant orange.

The RV section of the campground was near capacity this weekend. But that includes a handful of RVs that are housing a work crew for the I-196 highway project. They come in Sunday night or Monday morning, spend the week at the campground and leave Thursday night for their real homes. The empty RVs stay here. This weekend, in addition to those staying in their RVs,  there were few hardy tenters. I’m not certain how long they will continue to venture out. We had a frost Saturday morning so they must have been cold. Or not. We have not yet turned on our furnace. When I poke my head out from under the covers on frosty mornings, there is something to be said for being able to snuggle back under the comforter and know if it gets REALLY cold I can pull out a sleeping bag. One would think those who stay in a tent are of the same mind. Except, I also know I have a really nice furnace I can turn on when the chill becomes unbearable.

Things simply seem to be winding down. We are in the home stretch for getting ready to hit the road. I think I ask King almost daily when his last golf scramble is as our departure date depends on the last golf outing. I know he knows when it is. He won’t tell me until I quit asking. And I won’t quit asking so we are at an impasse.  This is one I cannot win, but I’m too stubborn to give in. He and our sons are playing in a scramble today so I’m hoping they will have a few more dates and I can ask one of the boys for an idea of how much longer. When sons get to a certain age they can’t say no to Mom. We’ve been married 44 years so I obviously have a few work-arounds.

I’ve already enlisted our sons to work on King for new tires. I’ve mentioned the need for tires in another blog. Yesterday a friend was visiting. We have a canopy outside the trailer where we sit when we “entertain.” The friend helped me find the manufacture date on the tires. They were made in 2003. King pretends he thinks it’s not a problem. Again, after 44 years I can tell when he is wavering.

I’ve also mapped out our route. For the past four years I have been saying I want to visit the World’s Largest Ball of Twine in Cawker City, Kansas. It has often been on our list of stops. For one reason or another (snowstorms, the need to be in California in three days, an ice storm, etc. etc. etc.) our route has always changed. Although Kansas is kind of considered the middle of the country, believe it or not it’s not exactly on the way to California. I’m hoping this year we can make it. I also want to see the World’s Largest Belt Buckle, the Kaskaskia Dragon, the Welcome Alien in Roswell, NM and a few other places many consider tourist traps. I’m a sucker for Americana and National Parks. The two can be compatible if you know how to do it right. Being a retired journalist I’d also love to go to the Ernie Pyle Museum in Dana, Indiana but I don’t think it will be open. Ernie Pyle was a World War II war correspondent. My favorite journalism professor used to read excerpts from his columns to our class.

I spent an afternoon mapping our route, knowing full well we won’t follow it.  In fact, we have yet to follow any route. I am not exaggerating when our say our trip always changes – most of the time before we reach Chicago.

 It’s just our fly-by-the-seat-of-our-pants way.

The foibles of technology.

I think it’s been a long summer for everyone. Not that King and I spend a lot of time socializing, but an entire summer of social distancing and finding things to fill our time meant we spent a lot of time on social media. Facebook is my social media site of choice and when I tallied my time spent on the site (they actually have a tool that tells you how much time you spend scrolling through junk) I decided it was time to disable the Facebook app on my phone. That way, I reasoned, I would have to consciously think about getting on Facebook. It would mean pulling my laptop out of the closet where it is kept, plugging in, booting up, wait for pages to load (it’s an old laptop) and – in short I’d have to REALY REALLY want to see what is happening in the Facebook world.

But getting Facebook off my phone was easier said than done. For me, the latest and greatest in cell phones is not a priority. My son was telling me he is coveting an android that comes with a $900 price tag. I’d rather have new tires on the trailer. My cheap, less than $150 phone came with Facebook pre-loaded so uninstalling the app was not an option. Turns out I had to disable it. When I clicked on the disable button I got a warning that disabling the app could cause other apps to “misbehave.” What does that even mean? In the end, I reasoned I had dealt with misbehaving children so how difficult could a misbehaving app be?  I bit the bullet and disabled the app. So far I’ve not seen a difference. No untoward behavior. Should bad behavior rear its ugly head, I’ll be stuck with a misbehaving phone.

Of course, I could have just stayed off Facebook but I have to be honest; I don’t have the willpower to just quit. The temptation was very, very strong. Sneaking one little glimpse into the Facebook world couldn’t possibly hurt, right? So I’d tell myself I would spend just a few minutes checking out my newsfeed. An hour later, with eyes blurring, I’d put my phone down.  It’s like eating just one potato chip.  It’s never going to happen. (I recall the time my sister-in-law told me about a new product she found in the dairy section of the grocery store. Philadelphia Cream Cheesecake bites. “They are so tasty,” she said. “One little square just hits the spot and takes the edge off hunger.” Really? One little 1 x 1 square satiates your need. Sure. I believe you).

But I digress.

 My son was telling me about a documentary he watched on Netflix about how much Facebook spies on us.  Then a few other people started talking about the same documentary, “Social Dilemma.” It would seem Big Brother (or a nefarious business) IS watching us. Now, I don’t have any deep dark secrets so no worries, right? I pretty much share everything on Facebook anyway, however, every time I drive past Walgreens I get a text message telling me what is on sale.  I know it’s not Facebook narcing on my location, but still. And I suppose it could be a coincidence, who knows?  Pretty sure it’s Google sharing my location.  But since Google Maps is such an integral part of our travels, Google has to stay.

King is cautious with sharing data but only if it is his idea. Most of the time he tends to think it is much ado about nothing. His attitude is so what? That is until the time our bank account was compromised and then he was concerned with “how did this happen?”  Telling him it could be any number of things did not help. Our next to non-existent online banking center help desk was actually a “no help desk.” We eventually gave up and switched banks.  It had taken me months to convince King direct deposit was the way to go. He REALLY wanted that paper check. When I pointed out to him it is rather hard to track us down while traveling he finally did acquiesce. Then the account was compromised, the bank shut it down and we were stuck with three direct deposits with no place to go. It literally took a call to our state representative (a former student) to get his pension check.

Technology is great when it works. When it doesn’t it is a nightmare. When they spy on us it is something else altogether.

 

Endings/beginnings

 The calendar says summer officially ends (this year) September 22,  and fall will continue  through December 21st. We all know that is not true. Summer ends the day everyone goes back to school. Winter begins with the first snowfall – unless it happens before Halloween, then it’s a fall snowstorm.

Or at least that is what it has been in the past. This year the recurring theme – rather than lamenting the end of summer -- is:  “What is going to happen when the kids go back to school?”

Tuesday, September 8, is the first day of school for our grandchildren in Grand Haven. The district had postponed an August start. The grandchildren in Paw Paw started August 31, and the grandchildren in California started (online) August 24. A niece who teaches in Spring Lake started a hybrid classroom August 26. Colleges are dealing with the spread of the COVID  virus among students and at my alma mater in mid-Michigan students are protesting face-to-face classes. It’s not your typical start to the school year.

I will confess both King (a retired school administrator) and I have a lot of reservations about the start of school. King is glad he does not have to deal with it on a professional level and we are both concerned for our children and grandchildren.

Meanwhile our life at the campground continues.  King and I are watching the weekend numbers slowly dwindle. I think the few trailers that are still here during the week are workers who travel the country to work when nuclear plants have their “outages” or maintenance on the facilities. Specialists come in to work the “outages” – traveling from nuclear plant to nuclear plant and living in the area for the month or two the plants are down/out/not powering or whatever you want to call it. The Palisades plant in South Haven is currently having an “outage.”  The plant is actually closing permanently at some point but that date appears to be a moving target. Since I no longer work in a newsroom I don’t pay much attention. Maybe that makes me uncaring? Or maybe I’m distracted by other things.

Ahh life goes on.

On a personal level, just as school resuming has caught us by surprise, so too has the reality that in two months King and I will be on the road again. We are waiting for the official date of the last golf scramble to determine our actual departure date. Retirement allows for that kind of flexibility.

But it is not as if our pending departure has taken us totally by surprise. There has been some planning, albeit it's been done in a haphazard sort of way. (My sister Donna, the perpetual planner, would be in full panic mode were she still with us).  In July I went online at the Secretary of State website to make an appointment for the trailer title transfer and discovered the earliest I could get in was November. That’s kind of not acceptable. I’ve been told I can call the day before I'd like to go in and try for a next day appointment. I keep putting it off a day of being on hold – I guess I’d better get to it.

The trailer also needs tires. King doesn’t think so. In the past I would just get up one day (preferable a golf day), hook up the trailer and have it done.  Unfortunately it’s no longer something I can just drive off and do. If we still had a backyard with a trailer in it, I might get away with it. As it is now he might notice the trailer missing or it moving down the road while he is sleeping in it. Small details, but I’ve always been able to figure a way around things or do what I want and listen to him complain about it in a off-handed way: “We could be going out to dinner tonight but you spent our money on new tires.” Those who know King see the humor in that statement. We never go out to dinner. My daughter has to tell him, “Take Mom out for dinner on Mother’s Day. Big Boy or McDonald’s does not count.”

And the truck … the “Check 4-wheel drive” light has been on since the fuel pump went out in Tulsa on our way home this spring. At the insistence of our son, and against the wishes of King, I took it in to have the differentials checked in June. The repair person said the differentials were fine and he was pretty sure the warning light was something that had been disconnected when they dropped the engine to replace the fuel pump. I’m guessing that light can’t be ignored much longer either. Points, plugs and warning lights are also on our “to do” list.

In the grand scheme of things these are small, petty annoyances. There are so many worse things going on right now. By the end of October they will be taken care of or we will have justified not doing them. It will all work out in the end.

In the meantime enjoy what is left of your summer, or fall, or whatever you wish to call it. And may all your annoyances be small ones.

 

 

 

 

But it's not enough for a garage sale

I am probably the Mrs. Kravitz (of the original Bewitched TV sitcom fame) of the Kal Haven Outpost campground.

Our home is parked next to the main entrance of the campground so I often sit in the “living room” and watch the comings and goings of fellow campers.

Last night a huge fifth-wheel trailer pulled in. I watched as first the truck appeared in my view and then the trailer, and the trailer and the trailer. Today, I can lean back and look out the window and watch as they continue to set up their camp.  The trailer was a “toy hauler” and this morning they backed a gator/golf cart thing out of the back end. The ramp then becomes a sort of outdoor seating area. They also set up a free-standing canopy. It’s a nice setup.

Before the pandemic shut things down last winter, King, our daughter and I took an afternoon and looked at new travel trailers. I have to confess we didn’t bother looking at the bigger models or the fifth wheels. It wasn’t so much the price tags as it was the length. Neither one of us has a desire to pull (and park) anything longer than 20 feet. That pretty much puts us in what manufacturers label as the “Weekender” category.  Evidently they don’t think one can live full-time in small spaces.  It takes some compromise,  but it is doable.

We are enjoying our life in our “weekender” and we continue to work to make our tiny house a home.

Last week King and I traveled to Grand Haven to help our son finish painting and putting up trim on his house. Well, King helped. I played with the grandkids. It gave us the opportunity to go through the nine remaining boxes of stuff we have stored in our son’s tool shed. I came home with a 1945 edition of the Joy of Cooking (which was a wedding gift to my mother), a few prints my mother had in her home, the Bible that was given to me when I joined Haven Reformed Church as a teen, and a couple of trivets.  

There are still a few boxes remaining that contain small appliances. They are doing little more than gathering dirt and mold. I thought I might save their content for the day we need to move into an apartment.  Now I am not so sure. I’m doing well with the set of cheap pots and pans, a single knife and plastic mixing bowls I use daily in the trailer.

So, I started eliminating even more “stuff” and gave a juicer and the picnic basked it had been stored in to our daughter-in-law.  I have a food dehydrator that I will give to the first daughter or daughter-in-law who says she wants it. I have bread pans and a few other things that can go to Goodwill.

Those treasures we decided to keep we brought home and spent a day or two looking for places to display them.  We live in 160 square feet. There is not a lot of wall space.

Our eclectic home has now become even more so. It’s become the Brady Bunch 1970s kitchen meets a 1980s rust and orange dining room meets my mother’s Early American décor.  The trailer now has a few sentimental things that will only mean something to me. The Early American prints were a gift from me to Mom when said she wanted something for above their bed.  There are two trivets in the kitchen. One was a gift to Mom when the church’s Women’s Guild group had a Secret Santa gift exchange in 1965. (There is a date and name on it). The other trivet I bought for her in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg, Russia) when I was an exchange student to Finland in 1973. There is also a glass vase my Finnish family gave my mother that same summer.  The cookbook is tucked away with a homemade Glenn United Methodist Church cookbook that has a few recipes from Mom in it.

Seven sentimental items and a sewing machine – that’s not so hard for kids to get rid of when King and I are gone, right?

Although it’s not much of a garage sale, is it.

We truly are worlds apart

It’s Sunday morning and the campground is a beehive of activity. People are sitting around their campfires for one last cup of coffee, joggers are getting one last run in before packing up and leaving and those wanting to get an early start are starting to unhook their trailers and RV’s or take down their tents.  By this afternoon there will be about eight of us left in the campground for the week. Summers are busy, but by the time we leave for the winter we will be the only trailer here.

I’ve been watching the young people across the drive from us. A group of eight friends (I assume they are friends) in their mid-to-late 20s spent the weekend camping. They have been a quiet group, spending most of the time sitting around the campfire, playing football and generally just chilling. There are two dogs with them – a golden retriever and a black lab. The lab must be older as he’s pretty sedate and goes with the flow. The Golden… is much younger and is quite insistent that everyone must love him for obvious reasons. They are well-behaved dogs. I got barked at when I came around the corner of our trailer with a huge hanging flower basket in my arms. It scared the poor lab to death to see a walking flower basket. He barked. Once.

Cindy could care less that there are other dogs around. She spends her days either sleeping in our bed or sleeping in the shade of the side of the trailer that faces the road. There is soft dirt there and she digs it up slightly for the coolness of the dirt under the surface.  I’m not certain she even notices the people across the drive, or if she can see that far. She definitely can’t hear them.  She is at the stage in her life where naps are frequent. She stretches out and almost immediately starts snoring.  Sometimes standing directly over her and calling her name is not enough to wake her and I have to physically touch her. I think it scares me as much as it does her.  Even my sweet Cindy could wake up snapping if startled. She never has… but the possibility is always there. I’m always cognoscente of that fact. I practice touch and jump back.

King and I normally park our home in more remote locations and often find our nearest neighbor to be a quarter-mile or further away.  This campground is very nice, clean and modern. But it reminds me of our early marriage years when we lived in married student housing. That’s ok. A bit of nostalgia is good for the soul. In our early days together I was the more gregarious one. I spent a lot of time outside with the other mothers watching our children and talking about classes. King only ventured out when there was a pickup basketball game.

I’m not so gregarious anymore. I prefer isolation. I could say it’s the pandemic, but I honestly think things would be the same with or without social distancing.  People wear me out.

Something happened this week that has me scratching my head and saying to myself, “Really, Phyllis?”

We got satellite TV.

For the first time in 43 years I can honestly say I am really excited about having almost unlimited TV channels. I think it is a further excuse to stay away from people.  A complete satellite system was among the things given to us by our friend two weeks ago.  It only took our son (a former cable installer) and 50 calls to the service to get it working. I guess I REALLY missed cable news shows. I didn’t realize it until I spent that first morning with satellite binge watching news shows. And yes… they are news SHOWS. Please people. Learn the difference between news reporting and opinion giving. That said, I do enjoy watching them.  Except for one news network, but since I neither endorse nor pan anything in my blog, that show shall remain nameless.

But I don’t watch news 24/7. And King likes his sitcom re-runs (before we got satellite I bought him the first five seasons of Andy Griffith on DVD and he now has the shows memorized). 

The other night, however, I fell asleep while reading and woke to King swearing at the TV. I listened for a while and realized he was swearing at a news show host.  “He’s just giving his opinion. He’s entitled,” I told him.

“Not when his opinion is wrong.”

“Ok then. I have a nice teen paranormal romance here. Why don’t you take a break and learn about werewolves and Dijons?”

We are worlds apart.

 

I get new marching orders

I arrived in Michigan from our winter in California with an ankle that sometimes ballooned to three times its normal size. Friends and family were convinced I was going to die. I was pretty sure whatever was wrong happened because I repeatedly whacked my foot on the side of our daughter’s bed while I was taking care of her after surgery. She often insisted, quite loudly, that I move a little faster while helping her in and out of bed.

After several ex-rays and doctor visits I finally relented and made an appointment with the orthopedic surgeon to see if he could figure out what was going on. Turns out I have an extra bone in my ankle (it’s congenital) that was, in fact, injured by whacking it repeatedly on the side of the bed. There is actually a name for the extra bone. It’s called os trigonum.

The surgeon suggested I start physical therapy. Three summers ago I went to physical therapy when I had knee replacement. So it’s not new to me. It’s cool. It gives me something to do.  And I’d like to be able to keep up with our 13-year-old dog, Cindy, when we go for walks.

I have the same therapist I had three years ago. My first day of therapy was his first day back to work since the COVID shutdown. I would like to say here, I wear a mask,   I work out on a bike for several minutes of “warm up” and I have yet to die from carbon monoxide poisoning.

Wrong again conspiracy theorists.  

So part of my therapy is to improve my balance while standing on one foot. I can’t do it and I’m pretty sure it’s not an injury thing. I simply don’t have any balance.  I used to. I could do that yoga pose thing where you put your left foot against your right knee and stand for hours.  Now I just tip over.  The therapist is always ready to grab me in case I don’t right myself in time.  I finally told him I would give him an A for effort but if I actually did tip over to just let me go. One person down is better than two.

Honestly, I used to be quite limber. I could do hand springs, cartwheels, forward and backward walk-overs and even a passable splits. It is quite surprising when you discover these feats are no longer possible.

Years ago, when the children were young, we were visiting my parents. The grass was soft and cushy and I decided to try a backward walk-over. I think I landed first on my neck and then on back with my feet stuck underneath me. And I could not move. I finally managed to roll across the driveway to a lawn chair and pull myself up. I walked into the house to find my father lying on the floor in fits of laughter.

He finally pulled himself together long enough to gasp out, “I was coming to help you but I couldn’t stop laughing.”

Anyway, that was the last time I tried anything acrobatic.

 

 

The give and take of marriage

It was a fairly quiet weekend for King and I. We helped our son paint his house Friday and babysat Friday night while he and his wife went out for dinner.

That left the rest of the weekend with little to do.

Saturday I attended a virtual wedding vow renewal for a friend I worked with years ago at Central Michigan University. Five months ago it was going to be an in-person vow renewal. Many things have changed since then. There is this thing called a pandemic. Maybe you’ve heard of it? It has forced a lot of people to make big changes in their lives. And because of those changes we are learning a lot about friends, family and acquaintances that may have been better left un-learned.

Anyway, Brian, (the former co-worker from CMU) was “the IT guy” for the department where I worked.  I can’t recall the number of times I would call him, “Brian I need a new keyboard.” Brian knew I spilled -- yet again -- another Diet Coke all over the keyboard. He never let on that he knew.  He would simply show up in my cubicle with a new keyboard and offer to plug it in for me.

There are some people (not many) I miss from that job. Brian is one of them. I’ve never met his wife Sara, but she and I chat frequently via Facebook. I wish them both all the best.

As for King and I…

Two weeks ago we drove to Chicago to get some RV equipment from a friend who is moving out of the country. The friend had just purchased a new high-tech motor home with all the bells and whistles. Since he is now moving and selling the motor home he gave us all the extra equipment he had purchased to go along with it.  It was a generous offer made because we had been good friends and loyal employees. After retirement King and I had worked as caretakers on his hobby farm in South Haven.  We were the last in a long line of people who came before us.  Taking care of his place was actually a pleasure and we stayed on there for seven years. Apparently it was somewhat of a record for most of the caretakers there.

We came back from our quick Chicago trip with two brand new deep cycle batteries, some type of holding tank pump, a made-for-RVs satellite dish and a few “other things.”

Among those “other things” was a foam mattress topper. I decided to cover it and use it as an extra cushion for the table-that-converts-to-a-bed in the trailer. I use the area as a reading nook – only setting the table up when I have a project that requires the use of my sewing machine.  I had ordered some material online and when it arrived I hauled the topper out onto the picnic table to attach the material to the topper – quilt style.

During the middle of the operation the wind picked up and the topper blew over onto itself. As I’m lying across the topper to keep it from blowing away I said to King, “I need a little help here.”  He promptly got up and went into the trailer.

Okay then. I’m resourceful. Guess I’ll do this one myself.  I pulled an ice chest over to the picnic table with my free foot and hauled it onto the end of the topper that was flying around. A second later King came out of the trailer and handed me my phone.

“What’s this for?”

“You said you needed a calculator.”

Marriage takes a lot of patience… and hearing aids.