Wednesday on Craig Drive

I am temporarily living in the house I came home to from college and Texas.  We'd just moved to Lawrenceville from Cochran the year before, and my 1966 high school graduation coincided with. moving in here.

At the time, soon-to-be-husband was completing his master's degree in Athens, and I moved there for the first half of my freshman year at the University of Georgia.  Then he moved to San Antonio to start his four years in the Air Force before getting drafted. 

On the night before my wedding the following summer, three of us (bride and bridesmaids) slept in my full-sized bed, two in Bob's bed. The next day, we drove our new Volkswagen to Texas, planning to move back to Georgia when he'd finished his Air Force stint. Obviously, we never moved back. 

So now with Bob, Jocelyn, and Carlene in Athens, I'm living in this house with a great big yard and a magnificent little dog who loves it rolling in the grass and listening to birds.

Luci has been scratching fiercely since we got here, so I took her to a nearby vet, a young woman named Rain.  She advised me to stop "open feeding" and to feed her only twice a day.  And to stop feeding her people food!  

To that her nurse said, "Miss Luci is about to have an existential crisis!"

A lot of things have happened in the lives of some of my friends and family and me, some tragic, some unsettling and scary.  I am both here and there, all the Theres where people are suffering.

I've made friends with a young woman in the neighborhood whose mother died a month ago and who likes to spend time with me because I remind her of her mother and have "such mama vibes." Today she texted me that she thinks her "mom sent me to her." 

My medicine for the hard things today was reading lots of doses of Anne Lamott.

The house was cleaned yesterday for the visit from Carlene and Jocelyn and Bob--who went to her appointment with the pace maker doctor.  He gave her a promise that her pacemaker would last for seven more years!  

After our visit, she was happy to go "home"--where she's made new friends among the staff and other residents and is kept busy every day with activities and meals she enjoys.  

"I've gained five pounds, though," she said.

Jocelyn said it's because she's getting three good meals a day, and we all agree she looks so relaxed and happy!