not so lazy, a bit hazy

Being a tourist in my own town: Visiting
the orphan grizzlies on Grouse Mountain.

So where have I been? Or what have I been doing? Looking back through my calendar, I see that I've been busy with relationships. Friends, family, life sliding by.

Since the hockey riot, which was back in June, I've had an influx of visitors. It started with an old friend, here because her mother needed help. Her visit extended when her mother died, initiating a whole bunch of stuff that just has to be dealt with. My awareness of mortality looms every time someone's mother goes and dies. When my mother died, 23 years ago, it felt like the protective ceiling just disappeared. I'm not sure that's any different no matter what your age. (Forgive me for extrapolating a generality from my own experience. It occurs to me that some people heave a great sigh of relief when their mom checks out.)

I spent a week hanging out, and briefly housing, several of my American cousins, which caused a reunion of Canadian cousins too. During that week my firstborn rolled over to 31, which illustrates the passage of time better than perhaps anything, no matter how much my hair manages to resist grey.

Spent a week in a language class, trying to re-establish some of my brain's memory of the French it was supposed to have learned, almost half a century ago, yikes, time again. I had a great deal of fun, but was so overlapped with summertime visits that I couldn't give it the time it deserved. C'est la vie, mais c'etait amusement (and I intend to find time to continue).

Spent a weekend back-and-forthing to Saltspring Island, for a gathering of my bf's cousins, whose company I like. This is hardly work, but came at the beginning of my away daughter's visit, so I had to stomp out guilt. Leaving town when the away-child is in town! I've never done that before. To do something I might enjoy. Such selfishness. I had to flog myself into it.

I saw two plays at Bard on the Beach with my eldest, a pleasure we've shared since I first took her to see Midsummer Night's Dream when she was 11, an appropriately magical production, as I remember it.

I finally got some time with my visiting daughter, who was in town for a friend's wedding, and stretched out her visit so she could see all her Vancouver connections. She brought the news that I'm going to be a grandmother next year. Er, I mean, that she is going to be a mother. I remind myself, this is all about her. But people will congratulate me, though I've not done anything to make this happen.

There's lots of emotion in this kind of news, mixed in with that awareness of time passing, evidence that I'm well into the senior generation (I'm that ceiling!). I'm probably a bit jealous too; I did love having babies (excepting the pain part). So this is very exciting. A big change, don't I know it, and I feel this trepidation for her, until I knock myself on the head and remember how capable a person she is. And then I think how profoundly better my life is that I know these three children of mine, and I'm glad indeed for one of them to enter the club (not that it's a requirement.). It is something she's wanted for some time, so grand news. Grand.

Among the mundane things of the last weeks, a strata meeting at my complex, lots of little details. (I'm the President, so seem to be the recipient of a lot of emails.) Progress on some repairs, hurray.

Got vaccinated against shingles (at my own cost, saving the medical system potential future costs. Aren't I a good citizen?).

This takes me up to mid-July, when my bf's vacation began, and after a mad scramble to pack for some camping, and some cabining, and some posh housing, we were off to the ferry, again leaving while my daughter was in town, which took another effort of will, believe me. It's not that I see her much when she is here, as I'm not the only person wanting her time, but it's my inclination to be available. Ah well, sometimes schedules don't match. I console my (unreasonable) guilt with the thought that she/they hardly need a (s)mother hovering over them at this age, if she/they ever did.

(to be continued...)