Kablam!

Be careful what you ask for, right?  

Well, I wanted time off work to spend with spaceman... wrote about that in the morning, and then an hour or two after lunch I became nauseatingly ill.  After using the restroom to no relief, I sat back down at my desk with my head in my hands, rubbing my face and forehead.  After resting that way a while longer, I looked back at my computer to continue investigating some code versioning differences.  But I could not think straight.  My gut was sending my mind and emotions in loops.  Green, I walked in my bosses office, told him I was going to be sick and asked if I could go home.  He said yes, and home through the not-yet-rush hour traffic, thirty minutes north.  Driving the highway while nauseous is not recommended, but I managed to make it home without pulling over.

I wanted to be home spending time with spaceman, but yeah, not quite in this way!

I pulled around the corner to my street and could see him running the weed-whacker around the driveway.  Bump-bump, bump-bump the tires hit the curb as I pulled in and shut the car off.  Laden with my laptop backpack, purse and keys, I turned to him and said "I'm not feeling well."  And as if he might not have heard me, "I'm sick".  Continuing on into the house, I pulled off my work clothes, threw on a big shirt and climbed into bed. 

With a pillow over my eyes partially blocking my view, I saw him walk into the room and stand beside my bed to better greet me.  I don't think he heard what I had said out front and came in to inquire.

After asking me what he could do (there really was nothing), he crawled in bed with me and reached for my hand and held it for a while.  I rested as best I could.  And he fell asleep.  (of course lol)  I would find out later that he had a massive headache about the time I had driven up.  Our individual well-beings seem to be synced somehow.

It's been noticed by both of us at one time or another.  Either he or I will be telling the other how we've been feeling and the one listening will feel as if the one talking could be describing one's own feelings.  Still, we could never just reach out and take the other's hand when we lived 3 states away.  Conversations through technology just cannot take the place of good old-fashioned touch.  But now... we are four days into the beginning of our new life living together.

After some rest my nausea finally dissipated, the gastrointestinal stress finally moved into the less bothersome intestines.  We laid there as he told me some of the things he had done in the yard since I left for work this morning.  Not only did he mow, he trimmed the yard, pulled weeds, picked up and swept the deck, and that doesn't even count what he did to the front yard where I had found him edging the driveway.  I had tunnel vision when I was heading into the house, and I haven't yet been out there to look.  The landscaping has been a mess and I suspect he made a dent in that as well.

Now, when I tell people he's been spending all his time taking care of his aging parents, this is the sort of thing he's been doing, and way more.

And yesterday when I came home from work, dinner was done, table set.  Everything was something I can eat, with regard to my grain intolerances.

[pause, bedroom door is opening...]

And that was just him.  He had been off to the store and back for an ingredient and was "piddling around the house" as he called it.  He cracked open our bedroom door to see if I was awake... and what wafts in???  Garlic spaghetti aromas... mmmm.  And mine will be made with spaghetti squash since I can't eat pasta (gluten-free or not).

I swear!  If this is a dream please DO NOT wake me!  I have never been this spoiled and I just want to enjoy this for a while. :) :) :)

Which brings me back to what prompted me to open the laptop and write... enjoyment....  I was laying here in bed, having drifted to near sleep with a book partially open in my hand.  The windows are wide open and the birds are chirping too numerous to count.  Off in the distance the consistent muffled roar of the highway is only heard if I remember to listen for it.  But what woke me was the gentlest breeze, one that would gracefully billow the sheer curtains, if I had them.  It rushed past my face and sent me reminiscing about days like this.  You know, the ones that never seem to come often enough, so rare, that it takes the next one happening before the last one comes to mind again.  It's been 18 years, my previous somewhat comparable moment.  But nothing is quite like this one, and I cannot imagine a better one, sick or not sick.

Accolades

Ever just CANNOT concentrate?  for weeks, maybe months???

That's me lately.. and it's baaaad.

I now have a very attentive man at home who is crazy in love with me and I'm STUCK HERE AT WORK.  *cries*

This is yet another one of those times when I really wish I had more than a measly 2 weeks of vacation time from work each year.  Every time I ache for some additional downtime from work, I get angrier at society.  I know I have a choice in how I react, but after 18 years in my career field THAT SUCKS.  I think I have 2.5 days left for this year, and I'm always "saving it for a rainy day" in case I need to take time off, that is difficult to "make up" by week's end.  BUT... at least I have that flexibility, to shift my schedule around somewhat.  I do have privileges that others would completely appreciate.  I should STFU, eh?  It's not all bad.  But seriously... 

     SPACEMAN IS HERE!!!!

He arrived with all his stuff on Saturday afternoon, just as planned.  Last February we decided to move in together and this weekend it happened!  We planned appox. 6 mos for this transition and it took slightly more, but couldn't have been better planned and executed.  The kids (20 & 17) are beyond accepting... one might even say helpful and encouraging.  Certainly two young adults/teens could be quite the obstacle if they had chosen to be, but they aren't.  They see how happy he makes their momma and truly do want me to be happy.  They are both cooperative, communicative and welcoming (each to their own degree lol).  And so far, the picky girl child has eaten what he has been cooking (phew!).  And let me tell you... While I have microwaved and sometimes attempted recipes, this man can cook!  From SCRATCH! But I knew that already. ;)

Most of all, we went to bed early-for-us last night.  It was SWEET! lol  For a year I have been up until midnight or 1 am talking on the phone or messaging with him and yesterday I came home from work, dinner was on the table, THE TABLE WAS SET (such simple things amaze me lol), and the food was more than one dish.  After that we piddled, went to the grocery to cover the next few days, then came home and piddled some more before turning in... get this... EARLY.  We're like an old married couple now lol.  It was great!  So normal and that is incredible by my standards.  I've never been able to experience that before.  I'm 42 and have been a single (aka: struggling) mom for nearly half my life, 17 years anyway.

And while these (not so) little things are dearly cherished, I get the whole package with spaceman... hit the mega millions lottery, if I may use that comparison.  I feel rich.  I feel incredibly blessed.  I know just how lucky I am to be in love with someone who is so openly in love with me as well.  I don't know how life orchestrated all this, but we both have the feeling it's been lifetimes upon lifetimes in the making.  This is our awards ceremony.

It's just the beginning.  We have so many things we want to do together, complete with lists we've started lol.  I don't want to miss out on anything.  Dark sky park?  Why yes!  A countryside train trip... a beach walk at night with the ocean AND stars pulling simultaneously... maybe even a trip to Tibet and India. <3  But first... first we just merge our lives, day by day, find our groove.  And I couldn't be happier than that!

Batch Cooking for the Week Ahead

After some post alarm clock grumblings this morning, I am kind of thankful for a day of sitting in front my computer simply working.  ...or writing.  Yes, it's lunchtime, so I'm writing.

Lunch is sauteed cabbage and red peppers with kielbasa.  I've made this three and four times since spaceman was out here in mid August.  I cannot get enough sauteed cabbage!  For some reason, it REALLY does my body good (not like milk).

This past weekend, though it was slated to be "finish purging the bedroom and bathroom" weekend, actually ended up being mostly a "batch cooking" weekend.

My daughter, a senior in high school, is in the obese category and we are trying, repeatedly, to learn more interesting cook-from-scratch and batch-cooking recipes.  She's picky, very picky.  That meal pictured above.... she WON'T even taste it... because it has red peppers in it.  Sweet, delicious, YUMMY red peppers!!!  *smh*  Someday perhaps she will... (I hope).

Anyway, just to give you an idea of how involved this whole batch cooking is...

We bought a paleo book and companion cookbook.  We each spent time going through the recipes, putting stickies on pages of recipes we want to eventually try.  This was a month or two ago. haha  This past week, I told her, pick out a couple meal recipes and a dessert, make an ingredient list, and I'll go shopping after work Friday to pick it all up.  Then Saturday, we'll cook after her soccer game.  Sunday I planned to work on purging my room.

Did you know Whole Foods is a MAD HOUSE on Friday evenings???  Yes.  I think there were, not one, but TWO wine tasting stations in the store as I walked the aisles not knowing where these obscure ingredients would be.  Having resisted standing in line for wine, I checked out at $122.  I suppose that's not too bad considering it IS Whole Paycheck (as a friend of mine, Tidbitz, likes to call it).  Still, I didn't find a couple of items that I was sure I would also not find at my local grocery (Whole Foods is near work, not home).  So I scampered off to Health Foods Unlimited to see if I could find those, and I did.  

The goal had been to get all the grocery shopping done Friday night.  It didn't happen.  By the time I arrived home with the "expensive groceries" after my long commute, it was 8:30 PM and I was NOT unloading, putting away, and heading off to the local grocery for rest of our list (cheaper there).  

Saturday morning came peacefully though, and I made some scrambled eggs with tomatoes from the CSA (community-supported agriculture co-op).  After a quick shower and throwing on some comfy clothes, I was off to meet the girl child (who had left earlier) at the soccer field to watch her game and, inadvertently, met her boyfriend's father for the first time when I "happened" to sit next to him on the sideline.  

After the game she and I planned to split up.  She would tackle washing the dishes that had piled up since the dishwasher quit actually cleaning dishes, and I would tackle that last grocery trip.  After spending too much time and an ungodly amount of $ at Meijer, we were already running short on time to do "all day cooking".  So... we pushed it back to Sunday, my cleaning day.  *sigh*

Fortunately my older sister, who has a huge case of what she calls "basement-itis" showed up to both go through my garage sale boxes of books for titles she may want to take and to help me with my bedroom.  She's a Type A Goddess, I tell ya!  We made major progress, and I feel my room is now "reasonably" ready for spaceman's arrival (THIS) Saturday.  Except, the house still needs cleaned...

So Sunday, FINALLY, cooking day arrives!

And here's where the story gets visual... photos!

Even though rain threatened in the distance, we decided we didn't have enough time to bake EVERY recipe in the oven back-to-back.  So, we put two out on the fire, well... on some charcoal in the fire pit.

The man child dusted off his scouting skills and built, tended and determined when those dishes were finally done.

Yes, we have a pallet mostly burned.  I'm still working on that. ;)  Rest assured, we don't cook over burning chemical-laden pallets.

I lost track of time, so I really can't even tell you how long the pot roast was in the dutch oven over the coals.

The second recipe to be slow cooked over coals was sweet potato wedges, which we foil packed.

Mmhmm, pot roast.  This dish was INCREDIBLY delicious, although, I'm not a fan of beef.

This was some kind of flat bread made out of, I think, tapioca starch.  The girl child was in charge of all the recipes, and that included telling me what she needed me to do next.  I may have read a part of one of the 5-6 recipes we made yesterday, but that was it.  She was the chief cook.  This one... she wasn't impressed by.  I, on the other hand, cannot eat grains, so I kinda liked it.  I'm slightly deprived.

This one was basically pork chops and apples, but with some fennel, too.  

There was another recipe of chicken thighs with a hand-mixed spice rub.  THAT WAS REALLY GOOD, but I have no photo. :(

And last but not least, for our immediate consumption, some soaked & grilled, CSA-grown corn on the cob.

And that, my friends, was enough to wear me out!

Tuesday Blatherings

Spaceman reads my blog posts.  I keep telling him he can comment, but like most, he simply lurks. It's all cool; he "comments" to me over the phone or in chat (FB Messenger).  We will spend hours meandering across untold related and not-so-related subjects.  It's fascinating all these conversations we continue to have day in and day out.

I jested about the possibility, after full disclosure happens, of one day getting my hands on all our NSA-recorded phone conversations, so I can transcribe some.  There could very well be a book in there somewhere. lol

But... well, I'm pretty sure we will always be deep into something or another and therefore no need to pine for any one particular outcome of our time together (such as becoming an author).  We could get into many things!  One thing we have majorly in common is gardening... simple but not so simple gardening.  I'm more the simple type.  He's... well he's more the prepper type!  When he moves here, he's bringing some of his "stores" of canned food.  By that I mean stuff he grew organically and canned himself.  

My suburban back yard is not exactly up to the task of continually supplying that amount of produce to can and rotate into our diet.  Perhaps then, the CSA will remain in our lives.  That's another thing we haven't discussed yet.  Will we supplement with the CSA produce still?  I do want to make some improvements to the gardening situation here...

Sometimes I dream of having a little local CSA-like produce venture with him.  I'm not sure yet, though, how "into it" I really am.  I mean, ideally, I know I am 100% on board with grow-our-own-food efforts, but I don't know... well a lot of things... A) I want to get totally debt free  B) I want to live on farmable land!  C) we don't know what direction or form our joined aspirations will take.  But we feel a little farming, or big gardening, is definitely in the works.  A big operation has too many questions associated with it just yet, so we will only bite off what we can chew for now.  Our focus will be elsewhere at first.

The first few years will be us tidying up things here... getting my kids into full-blown adulthood and on their own and generally doing whatever is needed to be ready to step into our next phase of life together... doing the things we want to do with our lives, whatever that may end up being.  Then we will move and go full blown into that.  

It's exciting to have a partner with common aspirations.  We will make a good team together.  I'm a team player, he's someone I can put my good faith and trust in.  His ideas are good ones, ones I can get behind.  I don't need to lead, and after being a single mom for 17 years... I'm kinda ready to join forces, accept help, be open to a supportive relationship with someone else, to being a co-creator rather than the sole decision-maker of my family.  I can do this with him (which is hard for this independent, strong-minded girl) because I have the utmost respect for his ideas, methods, ethics, tactics, and wisdom (just a few items from his long list of admirable traits).

I am seriously the luckiest girl on this planet, maybe beyond.  I don't cite, word-for-word some of the truly humbling and wonderful words he says to me, because, for one, it's mostly verbal these days instead of written (which is why I want the NSA recordings! lol) and I'm not very good at word-for-word recall.  Instead, all you get is all my gushing, and not much of his perspective or input in this.

In a way, it doesn't matter because it's an impossible task... to relay the depth, the intricacies of our complimentariness.  New word.  ;)  I do wish, however, that everyone could experience this at some point in their lives.  And therefore, there *is* this desire to attempt to explain from time to time.  It always falls short.  *shrugs*

Enough blabbering, back to work for me!

The Undertow

We're down to four weeks out..

In 4 weeks we will wake up as life companions.

There's something huge and pulling about that... pulling, like the sea waves returning in the void, back towards the sea, the next wave forming.  

It's like the calm of the hurricane eye or the bow drawing back just before being launched.  It's a gentle tug calling you back, causing pause to look around, consider what's come before... before what comes, appears.  Stopping to look around, taking in the scenery, understanding the depth, significance and potential.  

And feeling the presence of the unknown becoming more dominant, allowing that sense of walking on floating ice and reaching for thoughts that soothe the mind into adjusting to the new norm.  The body will feel all that soon enough.  After that, you're back into the storm, riding that wave to wherever it rolls up onto the land... into the earth, onto stabilizing ground.

Something about this big event is scary to me.  It's certainly far beyond any relationship commitment I've given, at least not since my divorce 16 years ago. And it doesn't matter that divorce has become commonplace; its effects still leave scars in the hopeful hearts of the young and idealistic.  When the very definition of commitment somehow is wrenched apart from the experience of marriage...  well, it's quite like Humpty-Dumpty and cannot be put back together again... at least not in the same innocent way as before.

And I know that this is not marriage that I'm stepping into, but it's certainly everything that comes along with it, minus that legal declaration.  We are joining lives together with the full intention of living out the rest of our days together.  There will be no celebration, like occurs with a marriage. In that sense, the world will not recognize our union in every way.  But sheesh... have you really seen the world lately???  I mean there are "truths" within truths, falsities within shielded realities, and he and I live within knowledge we must pretend doesn't exist.  But within our connection is a bond greater than any society could recognize and declare.  So to me, this is when we join together as one.  This is when we exercise daily, having one another's backs.  This is when our hearts mend in a way that is both unintended and natural in result, because we were both happy enough on our own.  But together... together we realize a magnetism that puts the other first and thus unintentionally and naturally heals rifts and scales ridges that our first marriages never could have.

And so the water races backwards, the bow pulls taught, the wave fluxes opposite, and we are setting up to go where we haven't yet been before.  

And I'm looking for the examples, the role models, the guideposts.  Because, I don't intend to mess this up.  I feel there is a serious change forthcoming, a basic mode of operation, for me.  Watching him navigate through his world is an inspiration to me.  He is the most compassionate, insightful, driven, loving, service-to-others man I have ever known.  And the fact that he is so all-encompassing in that AND he's truly happy while going about it all... well, he's definitely an every day yogi to me.  And I aspire to more of that.  I aspire to do what's needed with such little resistance, with joy in my heart.  Being the passionate, self-indulgent type, I envy his selflessness.  And I see that in his perspective, he's being selfish in that doing all those things makes him feel good.

And that's just one way in which I admire this man.  He calls himself a country hillbilly, and that he is.  He grew up playing all day on the wooded mountain where his family home sits, built into the side.  A stream flows straight downhill just feet from the house.  Looking out from standing on the front porch, the neighbor's two-story house across the street is all below the elevation of the porch.  Sitting out back on that porch, the mountain looms steeply above any view of the sky.  It's a canopy of nature.  This past week he was sitting out back shooting off a 20 gauge or some such gun to scare the crows away from the corn in his garden.  Granted, that's not an everyday occurrence.  But if somebody shot off any kind of gun in my neighborhood there would likely not only soon be police, but charges filed.  And to him, I am a city girl.  Only, I "have country in my heart" and he's lived in bigger cities than I ever have.  We're flexible.  Most of all, we're compatible.

And he loves me for who I am, not despite it.  

That was my number one condition for future relationships, something I decided with the utmost conviction after my separation and divorce so long ago.  It's also why I broke up with R when that was hot and heavy.  He hid his born-again christian life and beliefs from me and it ripped my heart out when I realized how sincerely he had been trying not to judge me, because... ultimately, he saw me as a fascinating soul who was testing his faith.  As soon as I found out, I reluctantly broke things off with him and that meant my own heart was broken as well.  I needed to be loved for who I am, not despite it.

And then there was Jeff.  He wanted me to "always stay just the way you are".  My heart sank at that comment, offered so sweetly, so sincerely, and yet... so soul-crushingly.  "Just the way I am" is something he could not conceive.  And yet I loved him already by then, too.  When little things to me became big things for him, I knew it was time to cut our ties.  Doing such a thing is not easy.  It may be the "right action" but it hurts to break bonds like that, even if I am the one to initiate it.  But time has also proven it out.  Although he was a super insightful, powerfully positive influence in the lives of those he loved, he was not the one for me either.  In the end, I screamed into pillows and bled until it slowly stopped hurting again.

There were others.  They didn't last as long or burn as bright, though I loved them in the flavor of each of them.  And that's just it.  I always loved them to their level of loving me, but I never got to love them to my own, as purely myself.  Hell, my Self was still trying to pop fully through!

And that's why back then, between R and Jeff, when I met spaceman, not only was *I* not ready enough back then for what we had in store with each other... neither was he.  We look back on it now and see all the trip wires laying about and laugh at our former selves for all the shit we psychologically rained upon ourselves through guilt or rougher personality traits we would have had no real chance of reigning in even if someone had spelled it out for us back then.  And the thing is, neither of us ever blamed the other for our undoing.  We each walked away with the utmost admiration for the other, not to mention a few traits and qualities to work upon, each on our own.

Yes, there was a quiet period, a period of radio silence, if I may use that analogy.  There were also other relationships we each happened upon and jumped into.  For him, it was a love grand enough to jump into, in a way we had once envisioned for ourselves.  For me, it was far less successful, and yet, love Jeff, I did.  In time though, one of us (spaceman or I) reached out to the other and our letters simply did not stop.  There were lullls through the years, but there was so much cherishing of one another's friendship in those letters.  Lifetimes could have gone by and we would still have picked up just where we had left off.  

There is a grand sense that Spaceman has always been with me since the time we met.  And soon we will be together-together, instead of together-apart.  This long-distance thing moves, after 11+ years, into the realm of every day, day-t-to-day, hour-to-hour existence.  And I can't wait.  In some ways, this eye of the storm, this bow pulling back, this particle riding a wave, is slowing time annoyingly.  But at the same time, I'm using the pause for framing.  This pause is not in effort to check to see if I need to run (I don't, wouldn't, perhaps couldn't), it's to look around and appreciate.  It's also to recognize there will always be uncertainty in the face of the unknown, especially if we focus just on the unknown.  But by looking at the known, too, I know, for instance, that spaceman loves me like like no other, and he has proven it consistently over and over and over through all these long years.  My fairy tale is coming true.  And I cannot even begin to express to you how truly amazing that feels.

Transmution of Air to Fire

I feel like, somehow, fire came into my life. 

This post was brought on by Sadhguru's message about the element of Air in Vayu – The Element of Air:

"The idea of taking charge of the element of air is to bring about health and an instant sense of wellbeing. If you activate vayu and it reaches a certain peak, naturally agni or the fire element will follow to some extent – maybe to twenty-five to thirty percent. If you have mastery over the element of air, the element of fire will partially come along with it. A lot of people lack fire, which is a big problem in life. They may do things, but nothing will come out of it. Once the fire is on, you are much better than the way you were. Though fire only makes up a small percentage of the human system, in many ways, it is everything. It also gets you closer to the subtle element of ether."

There was a stripping down of how I experience myself over the past 6 years or so... I cannot believe it has been 6 years since I was laid off!  Certainly there was a deeply rough patch in there, and somehow it stripped me through dealing with so much SHIT that wore me down ("if it's not one thing it's another") and caused serious depression and anger for a long period of time.  I'm through all that now.  But because of it, and without my personally intending for it to do so, this period in my life shed parts of my persona that I wasn't looking to release.  And in the empty space bubbled up a drastically more authentic expression of my core being.  The effects started showing before I realized what was going on.  It was only through hind-sight that the new pattern became apparent.  I am more firey, and frankly, I love it.

The crazy part is, looking back over the entirety of my life, I see that "fire" somehow has been expressed in one form or another throughout.  When I was a child it made me stubborn to my preferences.  As a young adult, it made me argumentative to the n-th degree.  That, I own as part of my first marriage's demise.  In time, I whittled away at not only biting my tongue but, in time, simply not feeling my buttons pushed so easily by others - because I "chose" to react more wisely.  But even this "intended" self improvement was not enough to bring about the effects that the crumbling of my life invoked.  That was something much bigger than I could or would have chosen for myself.

But it happened anyway, and ironically (or not so ironically if you, like me, do not believe in coincidences), who I experience myself to be CHANGED.  

I laugh more readily.  I see the irony in things, even inappropriately so at times.  I am far less likely to participate in "shoulds" and I enjoy my life far more.  I seem to be instantaneously more "myself" than ever before.  It even surprises me when stuff comes flying out of my mouth before I "think before I speak".  But fortunately, I can usually trust what comes out, which is definitely far different from the me I used to be.  I was so unintentionally saddled by my inhibitions.  Inhibitions be damned now!  And I love it. :)

^from a Google search

Most people say this is just part and parcel to growing older and, hopefully, wiser.  I know this to be be something far deeper than just that, though it's that, too.  Although I am 90% air (astrologically speaking), there is more fire these days, and it's expressing spontaneously... burning with much less smoke, much less destruction.  I am thankful for this. And I cannot be merely thankful for the result without also being thankful for the causes.  Although, I really don't want to rehash all the pain and misery that rippled changes throughout my and my kids' lives for the period of time.  Please just know that it was INTENSE and unrelenting for a period of time.  I'm so glad it's over, and yet I'm so glad it happened. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy but then again I might consider wishing it on the world if the world could come out as shiny as I feel.  Sometimes I feel like the world needs such a cleansing.  BUT, I don't assume others actually need such drastic measures to come to similar or better results.  What worked for me, does not necessarily need happen for others.  I do wish the world, everyone in it, could find themselves a little more at ease within themselves.  (Actually, I'm sure there are a great deal of us who ARE experiencing this.)

Purging

I'm bummed.  

It's been so long since I've written in a particular Word document file, which I was using as a journal for several years, that I forgot the password I had changed it to use a couple months back.  I can't get into my own file. :(

Mondays.  They're all the same.  I'll try again on any other day of the week, preferably NOT in the AM... and maybe... just maybe the password will come back to me.  *crosses fingers*

~~~~~

I'm not really sure what's primarly on my mind this morning.  Mostly that because it's more a jumbled set of feelings, none of which are establishing as dominant.  For this too, I blame Monday mornings.  What I do know, is, I miss writing.  I've been way too busy with work lately to pause and purge.  And when I do get some free time, I've been doing more mind-numbing activities like sleeping or gaming.  Sleeping is better than gaming, no doubt.  But Skyrim is kind of fun.  My 19 year old and I are playing, not together, but alternating turns.  He of course, is way ahead of me.  And honestly, I have no real desire to catch up.  Mostly, I look forward to spending my time in other ways... like more time with spaceman.  

We have about two months left before we are what I term as "together-together" (you know, rather than "together-apart").  I am slowly purging my house, getting rid of 17 years of accummulated stuff.  "Stuff" was cluttering things.  I want spaceman to show up here with his U-Haul of his own things and walk around and find plenty of clear spaces to ingetrate his own things... things like paintings, books, crystals, closet space, anything... everything that needs a new space to be.  

The garage was in the WORST shape, so in order to bite off more than I could chew in any one day, I started there.  A glutton for punishment, I am.  It took me about 3 full days of work, over a month or so, to get the job "done".  Done is relative, because there is still a tall stack of empty boxes my mom wants and can't take just yet, along with another huge area full of stuff she insists on selling in a garage sale.  I told her if she does the garage sale, she can have the money from it.  I don't do garage sales.  I think spaceman does... which I now know, but I had already told her that before I knew.  So... anyway... those two piles will sit there, probably until sometime this winter or next spring (bleh).  My parents currently have not only my displaced brother (he moved out a month or so ago) and my older sister, her hubby and their two cats all living with them.  My sister is having a house built (near me) and it probably won't be ready for another three months.  So, the garage over there is stacked full to the ceiling, quite literally.  Hence, the back up in my own garage.  But, at least it's sorted.  The only other "area" of stuff that's not in a permanent place on a shelf yet is my 19 year old's stuff he is accummulating to move out one day.  I can't get to the space where it will go until the stack of boxes and garage sale stuff is gone.  *sigh*  So, I call the garage "done"... for now.  It looks amazing otherwise, relatively speaking.  And as overwhelming as it felt to commence that project, it feels soooooo much better in there now, and I kinda miss hanging out in the garage, "working" there.  Spaceman and I may turn it into a a creative space where we can paint and he can work on furniture projects or whatever else.

There was a lot of boxes of books, CDs, DVDs, knicknacks, etc in the garage that belong in the house.  So those got carried in and plopped down in the room they belong, where some still sit - awaiting my attention.

Yesterday I tackled the living room... the books, CDs, & DVDs.  We no longer have a TV in the wall unit of shelves and glass showcases.  I put a huge aloe plant in a ceramic pot in the open space where a TV goes.  I went through movies and music, tossing some into the garage sale boxes.  But mostly I purged my book collection.  I just kept the books that had the most impact on me through the years.  The rest will be A) picked over by my older sister, B) sold in the garage sale, or C) donated.  I had several boxes of books; now I can fit what I kept into one box.  But, they'll go on a shelf somewhere.  Spaceman has a bunch of books, too.  I wanted room for his.

I didn't get to the point of putting the books I kept ON the shelves. Mostly they are sitting on the coffee table. I ran out of time.  I had a dinner invite over at a friend's house, so the boy child and I ran off before I finished.  There is another healthy stack of books on a dresser in my room that I also want to purge and relocate to the living room.  That will be next.  Oh yeah, I also purged the hall closet and moved boxes and other memborabillia out of my bedroom closet and into the hall closet.  Eventually I will make another pass at purging my clothes so that I can turn over half my closet to him.  That's going to be tough lol.  I've been single and spread out in my dressers and closets for 17 years.  It feels good to purge, even if it's a lot of work.  I think my bedroom is going to be the last area I purge.  

After finishing the books, I'll do the family room. That should be easy.  All that's in there is a TV on a small TV stand, a shelf that needs to just go bye-bye altogether, and some boxes full of decorating knick-nacks.  Some of those items are cool things I forgot I had.  I will encorporated some of my favorites, but the others will land in the garage sale pile, I'm sure.  Spaceman has some furniture I'm kind of hoping he will bring, eventually.  We don't have furniture for that room.  It echos with my brother moved out.  Or, we can paint in there.  I'm open to whatever other ideas he has.

The kitchen, actually, that was the first place I started purging.  I had forgotten that my older sister came over and helped me do that so many months ago.  So that's checked off the list.  That leaves the bedrooms and bathrooms.  I need to start applying more pressure to the kids to purge their dressers and closets.  The hallway hamper constantly overflows and no one can EVER find any socks.  grrr  Both the bathrooms need some handyman work.  One project, replacing the bathroom surround (and repairing any plumbing issues), is beyond my skillset.  The other bathroom needs a hole in the wall from an outside faucet repair job.  I repaired such a hole once from the front yard faucet repair years ago.  But I have yet to tackle this one... it's not a priority at the moment.

We also already switched over to using non-chemical, organic wool dryer balls.  Spaceman is allergic to the chemicals in fabric softener.  So I ordered and tried out dryer balls and O.M.G. they WORK, and well!  The clothes are soft when they come out.  The only drawback is you might need to not dry things as long, since they dry stuff faster, and when overdried, can produce static.  Not really a drawback at all really.  It was like hitting the Staples "easy button".  Simple. Effective. Cheaper.  I highly recommend dryer balls.  They just stay in there with every load, no need to replace them, like ever, they say.  

It's pretty exciting to be receiving spaceman into our home, at least for me anyway. :)  The kids know it's coming, and I should probably sit down with each of them and get a better feel for their feelings on things.  But, I don't sense there are any major issues.  They have dealt with their dad having new women in his life a couple of times, so I think they have some idea of what that process is like - getting used to another person.  It's a huge plus that they seem genuinely accepting of spaceman in my life, and soon, in our lives.  I'm not saying I expect it will be a smooth ride, but... we will take it one day at a time.

So it's been really good to have 7 months of time between decision to live together and actual carrying out of that decision.  Yeah, it's been frustrating to continue in the long-distance relationship even longer.  But, I like the pace.  I have never been very successful at relationships before, so for the mere sake of "being sure" that's also a benefit of being patient.  I'm so sure about spaceman and I.  It's incredibly different this time, in really amazing ways.  He jokes around with me in a half-serious way about how it will be like after the U-Haul is unloaded, returned and we are left to face one another in a way that we've never done before... the inital awkwardness, the joy too, the not knowing where to put stuff lol.  But... at least with my efforts to clear out the place, prepare it for our life together, he will find enough "options" to not just stick things here and there because it's the "only" place it will fit, but because it feels good and right to place it there.  I will rearrange to make any of it happen.  I'll do round 15 of purging, if necessary.  It's incredibly important to me that the house feels like his home, too.  

We are already discussing plans for expanding and improving gardening on the property.  He has ideas formulating and said he will sketch up a rough draft of plans to discuss.  I'm stoked!  I cannot wait to be doing projects with him like that.  That's "play" to me.  It's work, no doubt, but it's something we both want to make CENTRAL in our lives, this gardening, canning, food-self sufficiency stuff - as much as we can integrate, bit by bit, anyway.  While we plan to make our gardens here as great as we can, we are also further defining, imagining, and dreaming up what we want with our next residence.  Pretty cool stuff, to dream and create, together-together.

work and kids

Oh thank god I am free

Free of all those windows I had open for work

Shut those things down, yes

Dinner is also done, served, and everyone doing their own relaxing

So nice


I left work today, early, just to set back up at home and be on call.  So I had some extra time to cook dinner for my kids. Nothing too special... crappy hamburger helper lasagna with organic green beans seasoned with beef bullion, mixed variety small potatoes in organic butter, garlic and onion powder, and fresh parsley from the garden out back.  My 19 yo young man said, "Mom?"  ...*makes the italian kisses-hand face*... "your potatoes" *makes kissy face again*

    The dish I enjoyed making the most, was the one he and I both liked best.  The girl child and her boyfriend did not say crap (other than load up with hungry eyes), they are in their own little world.  I don't need them to say anything.  It was crap for main dish, bleh.  The rest of the ingredients were more natural. ...but still basic.  I'm not a sensation in the kitchen haha.  Being an Aquarius-galore, cooking was, um, an interruption.  But as a single parent, a necessity, a routine. 

Me and routines... 
                   *shakes head*


Routines sometimes grate me crazy after some time, even the most well-intention-ed ones.  Maybe not that bad......

Anyway, free time this evening!

I decided not to go to the Up to Us caravan stop in Columbus tonight.  I had felt it fair I take an on-call night when the two top off-hours support folks both were unable, plus... it was kinda my job, as backup. You know, there's that.  So.... I left work a little early so I could "babysit support" from the comfort of my own home.  Working from home is a HUGE perk of being in the software developer world.  I worked from home for 5 years when the kids were little.  It afforded me more time to keep up on things around the house.  Ready for a walk? (We walk for 15 minutes afternoons at work even now) When I was working from home, instead of taking that walk, I got up and folded laundry or started dinner or ran out to pick my kids up from school because there are no buses.  Working from home was just what I needed during an important time while my kids were younger.  I don't prefer it these days.  At home I want to play, and at work I am better at not instead playing.  Simple.  Home just feels like relaxation to me and that's how I like it to be.  

When I get home I cannot wait to change my clothes!  I want my comfy clothes!  I want to throw off all those too detailed clothes and put on something made of old cotton.  
    THEN I can go about whatever it is needs doing when the kids-filled evening is calling my attention.  That's usually NOT been dinner lately, since it is MY belief that the 16 and 19 year olds are QUITE capable of making a dinner for the two of them.  I cannot eat most everything they can and am tired of cooking meals others like that I cannot eat.  Plus, I'm busy, or tired.  That must sound like a mean mom, but sheesh.  I taught the oldest to make his own bowl of cereal and to go watch tv until mom woke up... as soon as I could.  This is just me, thinking kids can do for themselves.  My niece made pancakes the other day by herself.  She asked a few questions but generally made all her own decisions and did it herself.  Later on, she and her brother asked me to supervise them using a wood-burning writing utensil on some scrap wood out front (this was at the farm).  They each made an attempt to make a sign for their new business "chicken run".  Kids are smart cookies.  I believe in treating them as if they are and developing their noodles.  Some parents parent by dictatorship.  That's not me.  I always try to explain my reasons to them when I tell them why I decide what I decide.  I will explain the dynamics of situations, for as long as they are willing to oblige me (they don't always), and we will discuss it when one of them feels differently.  Sometimes this has been quite heated!  But as I have grown while growing them, I hope that they internalize growth-seeking foundations as well.

     ....and the boy child has come into my room to bother me (his words not mine), time for laughs

That's not a ad in my blog post.  It's my googling what the 19 year old is telling me about, having sworn there was cosmic beer in that nebula.  hahaha  He says he would LOVE to drink some 10 thousand year old cosmic beer!  What a dork. lol

...and he's still imagining what it would be like, probably a little dirty (LMAO). 

I'm outta here, kids galore...

The mania in my head

It's raining, and that means I'm indoors tonight.  I've broken down and watched Cosmic Disclosure without spaceman, and he's not online yet.  And so I realized that for the first time in seriously too long, I have alone time.

*warning, a kid hovers close to my bedroom door.  beware of teenagers who, for some reason, really like annoying their mom.*

Disclaimers aside, it's nice to have the culmination of all things needed to write.  I REALLY miss it.  Work has been KILLER lately, and work is sometimes when I sneak 20 minutes of splurge writing, even if it never lands here.  There's been none of that lately.  I've also found myself in this mode... this mode where if I miss even an hour of sleep at night, I don't have the reserves to absorb it.  That is ENTIRELY my own doing.  I cannot pull myself away from spaceman hahaha.  We talk on the phone until 12:30-1 am every night, EVERY night.  It's NEVER boring, by FAR.

Okay, enough with the caps... (but seriously, mmhmm <3)

I'm in full prep mode, can't you tell?  I'm relaxing and writing. haha  But seriously, I should be doing some laundry so I can pack tomorrow night after work, because Friday after work, I'm hitting the road to Virginia again, to see him, again.  :)

*kid alert!!!*

19-yo kid alert: "Mom, I put your laundry in the drier.  I might be going to bed soon."

me: "Okay, thanks.  You go sooner, I'll go later. Gnight!"

and he's gone! (whew)

Have to try to avoid the conversations that usually follow!  Why you ask? BECAUSE THEY NEVER LEAVE ME ALONE lol  I laugh, and I joke, but it's kinda true.  If you're a parent, you probably get it, intimately.

Why?  Because it's writing time!!

Friday, yes... Friday I'm hitting the road and driving 6 hours to Virginia to spend his birthday weekend with him.  Psst, don't tell him... I don't have a gift.  I've been too back-to-back busy to contemplate this all important gift thing.  Maybe the trip will count, I thought???  And then he told me he's paying for my trip, for me not to worry.  mmm hmm, now what?

I'll think of something (or not :( )

aaaaaannnnnd my time has come to a close.  spaceman is online. :D

The Red-Blinking "Plane"

Most evenings after sunset you can find me out back on the deck in a chaise lounge chair sitting facing the back of my one story house.  From here I can see the southern sky.  

At one point I thought I could tell when it was midnight by the position of Mars over my house.  Mars glows slightly reddish and it easily the brightest star I can see.  But I soon found out,  Mars progresses clockwise across the southern sky.  By last night midnight was far closer to where 2pm is on a clock, maybe later, I'm not sure.  I just know it had surprised me when I got back from 4 nights away from my deck perspective.  I wish I would have paid more attention.  Either way, I couldn't even tell you how many hours passed 1, 2 or 3 after I had notice Mars in the sky.  

What I can tell you is this... like every night for months, I'm hanging out with spaceman, last night it was, like usual, a little messaging through FB and soon a phone call that always lasts until an early hour.

I could tell you other things we talked about last night, but I won't.  The point is, we were talking about some subject at length, I had finished saying my thoughts on the matter and spaceman was responding and elaborating.  I was listening and at the same time my eyes were perusing the sky, aimlessly.  

There's always more than one, usually multiples of planes at various distances in my sky, all around.  I live between the Dayton International Airport and Wright Patterson Air Force Base.  There are always planes from one or both airports in my view.

Along with the starry sky, I'm also noticing flight patterns.  As I'm writing this, a big gray military plane, just flew nearby.  They circle and land, do touch downs, to build up flight hours.  Flight hours are important.  The more you fly the better you are.  By the time I finished composing and editing that sentence, a commercial flight just flew a now familiar path south to north, east of my house.  I bet there's more there than I can see, since it's not dark yet.  

Well, last night I was listening intently to spaceman and noticing a plane flying in the far distance, blinking across the sky west to east.  I also happened to notice another red/white blinking plane moving from generally the bottom center of my sky over my house, up slightly back-slash-ish, but more straight up and down than that.  I'm sorry, I don't do angles very well.  Less than 45°, bottom center up to the left, the east.  Now that I think about it, I'm not quite sure it was coming from south so much as coming from down to up or some slant of that.  At the time I was glancing from one plane flashing to the other, imaging their intersection.  At that point, my thoughts turned to imagining them intersecting.  Dismissing them actually being in any intersection path, I giggled at my worry.  But at that point I was less listening to spaceman and more drawn in to paying attention to these two seemingly about to intersect planes.  They seemed to be travelling toward intersecting, but air traffic controllers would NEVER let that happen.  I know, planes must be one mile vertically from one another when crossing nearby.  At least, that's what I think I recall from a Sinclair Community College "field trip" to tour the air traffic control towers.  So, my logical mind was dismissing any danger and my imagination was fascinated and just HAD to stare intently until they passed one another.  

And then it happened.  When the lower red blinking plane got close to intersecting with the horizontal travelling plane, the red blinking plane zipped off at a greater than 90 degree angle to the east (to be level horizontally), then once out beyond where the plane would soon be, it zipped up at 90 degrees to fly past out front of the horizontally travelling plane and and then once out front and above that plane, it turned yet again and headed off in seemingly the same trajectory as it was using on their approach, up to the left some.

Now tell me, what "plane" makes those maneuvers?  None that I've ever seen in my life having grown up near an air force base.  It's not just any air force base, it's home of project blue book, the "cover-up investigation" into the UFO phenomenon.  There are legends of under ground tunnel systems, and one of the dead aliens from the famous Rosewell crash was supposedly autopsied there.  There is video leaked, thought it is crappy video, as usual.  So frustrating, but it was in the 1940s, I believe.

Anyway, that was my first "ufo" encounter.  I've been waiting MY WHOLE LIFE to finally see a ufo.  It was shocking and I exclaimed it to spaceman immediately as it happened.  Wow!  So ordinary sounding and yet, real!  Tell me, how does the starry night sky compare to mind-numbing TV?  The sky is amazing!

Soon

These are the last days while he's not here yet.  Today I'm working on round 2 of cleaning out the garage.  17 years of crap reside in here.  Yes, I'm sitting in the garage with my laptop, typing away.  When the urge hits, it hits, and I don't want to be in the air conditioned, incubator of a house.  I like the outdoors.  There's a big fan blowing, and that's enough.

Big piles in categories of tools, paint, car stuff, donations, trash, camping gear, my 19 year old's stuff (he will get a whole shelf for himself - his room is really small).  The garage has old kitchen cabinets as a work bench and storage.  I've emptied the shelves of old cans of paint and dated electronics.  There are still so many shelves along the walls yet to go through.  It won't all be finished again today.  I hate doing chores like this by myself.  I know if he were here, he would not let me struggle with it alone.  I miss him incredibly.  

And yet I find some comfort knowing this is the last summer I'll be alone, that is, until the inevitable takes one of us.  We are committed, marriage or not (and that remains to be seen someday), we are each done looking elsewhere.  He's amazing.  Every day he tells me what I mean to him... and it melts me.  I seriously crave his touch, and I'll have it soon.  

In a week and a half I'm headed back to Virginia to see him again.  I've seen him all of a measly four times over 11+ years.  April 2005, May 2005, February 2016, May 2016 and soon July 2016.  Every single visit has been electric... every conversation engaging and new in-between those visits.  I can close my eyes and describe what I see, get lost in an inner world, together with him.  Soon our worlds will integrate physically on a daily basis.  He's coming to live with us in September.  Hence, I'm decluttering the house, starting with the garage... because it needed it the most.  We'll make better use of it, however we decide to do so, once it's purged and organized.  

He paints, draws, plays the keyboard, guitar, and me.... in the most delightful, distracting ways.  We are magic together.  We're magic apart, too, but together... omg. divine bliss.  Sitting and longing for him, such sweet agony not having him.  Soon...

Back to work for me...

The Lake

Ah-mazing, I have at least a few minutes of “alone time” to record some thoughts during my lunch hour.  Everyone left me alone here. :)

Today I’m vacation planning… the family vacation kind.  This involves coordinating schedules, boat towing vehicles, and beds in campers with extended family who is also going to the same vacation spot during overlapping times.   The overlap is good.  You need two knowledgeable adults in each boat, and…. There’s only one of me.   Unfortunately spaceman cannot attend.  And my daughter… she’s expressing concern as the last time we were down there, we barely escaped a sinking boat.  Yeah, joy.  Wish us luck that we have no repeats of that fiasco, EVER. lol  (But, Oh the memories! lol)

In all probable reality, this could be our very last trip vacation at Lake Cumberland, boating, swimming, skiing, etc.  My father, who is 77 and has Parkinson’s Disease, is just not able to maintain the equipment and no one is stepping up to take it on for the longer haul.  It looks like my oldest sister’s grandchildren will be the last generation (of 5) in our family to experience the fun and craziness of “family vacations at the lake”.  It’s okay.  Other sides of the extended family (my aunt, cousins) pulled out long ago.  I do wish spaceman could experience this with us, at least once, though.  So, if we can, we will try to do an extended weekend trip later this summer… just not looking good, schedule-wise. :(  It’s kind of like me going down to Virginia to experience his home and filling in all those imagined stories with the REAL place, with REAL memories.  Lake Cumberland is a place I grew up.  Every summer (except one!), we were there having fun boating with extended family.

When I was an infant, all the way through early teenage years, we stayed at my Nana’s trailer.  She had a lot along the river with direct access, down a super steep hill that we had to hold on to a dry-rotted, splintering ski rope to descend/climb.  Back then there was no such thing as tubes.  We had an old semi-truck inner tube we tied a ski rope through the center for “tubing”.  There was no tube “bra”, and careful of that valve stem!  I learned to ski on two skis at 6 years old.  Papaw used to let my younger sister and I sit on the bow of the boat, feet dangling overboard, holding fast to the railing while we bounced over waves at full speed.  That’s completely illegal these days.  There simply wasn’t enough room in the boat except to send a couple people up front like that.  In fact, half the family was invariably left to play off the dock until we’d swing back by and swap out people.  Baths were always taken in the lake at the end of the boating day with floating Ivory brand soap and some shampoo, before ascending the hillside for supper.  I can only recall using the actual bathtub ONCE, and that was after one of our famous 2-mile walks (AKA: “get rid of the kids for a while”) when we brought back freshly picked road-side wild flowers and were eaten up by chiggers by the time we got back.  Such was life!

Back up at the trailer, we played a LOT of card games.  The adults played penny poker or Rook.  The kids played Rook or Uno… or WAR with a deck or two of cards.  There was a mini-pool table in the patio-like add-on section of the trailer, but we rarely played it.  Instead, we chased lizards around the propane tank out back or set off growing “snake fireworks” that left a permanent black mark on the concrete surrounding Pawpaw’s underground cistern.  I can remember one year we went home to Ohio and stopped by the emergency room because ALL four of us kids had inhaled poison ivy smoke from the fire where we burned all our trash. 

Nana always had friends and relatives that would visit while we were on vacation.  They would sit and play poker or team up and string ungodly amounts of green beans and can them.  I can still remember the old fridge that sat out front on the patio, curved corners and a lever that needed pulled upwards to unlatch and open for a cold can of Coke.

Nana sold her trailer, lots, and gave my parents the boat when Pawpaw got too bad with his Alzheimer’s disease.  Funny we are in the same sort of situation now with my dad and his Parkinson’s.  I miss that place.  Once a year, we usually boat up the Cumberland River just to drive by the old dock, point to it and tell our kids a few stories from days long ago.  I can remember one day I decided I could swim across the river to the other bank all by myself.  It’s a long swim for a child, and boats speed through that river not expecting to find a lone swimmer suddenly in their path.  I got a good yelling at for that one after having to turn back half-way there.  But, I’ve always been the one who is “most likely to get lost” in any crowd. lol  I get ideas that pop in my head and BAM! I’m gone.  It happened at King’s Island once, a popular amusement park in Cincinnati. *sigh*  As an adult, my “wandering” requires more planning. ;)

After Nana sold the property at the lake, we took to camping in our travel trailer at a nearby state park for a few years.  We even tent camped one trip (never to be repeated lol).  In time, we found a “new home” at a private camp ground where my parents have 2 trailers (one travel trailer, one fifth-wheel camper), both with a permanent deck or patio and facing one another.  That’s the only spot my kids have ever known at the lake… and that’s what we are considering giving up after this season.  It’s a big deal.  Part of me knows it’s time to move on, that change can never be stopped, and all life occurs in cycles.  But part of me hates the idea of not having that place anymore.  I’m 42. I’ve been vacationing at the lake for 42 years.  It’s safe to say  I’m going to miss it and that I would really like spaceman to know it, experience it, at least once.  It’s just not necessarily in the cards. :(

Transparency

There's a distinct difference between this relationship and all that have come before it.  It's transparency.

Everything I express is welcome food for his ears.  All matter of whimsical, mundane, and concern is fuel for his understanding of how to love me more fully.  The amount of care and tenderness, all the ways he goes out of his way to tell me whatever has been running through his heart and mind... it all comes out with an intuitively considered timing and approach.  

He asks me probing questions about our future.  The questions leave little to the imagination at his intentions, but seeks for me to describe our possible futures.  We are creating our future, we are co-creating our lives together.  

And when he isn't asking, he's full of wisdom and insight, or he's listening to my constant inner chatter, spewing aloud nonsensical play-by-play thoughts.  He listens to me parent. He listens to me read what I write about him.  He listens to anything and everything... 

This man responds to my every move and admission.  

I decided long, LONG ago two things:

1) I won't settle for being loved despite who I am, but instead because of who I am, and 

2) I aim to be as authentically myself in order to attract the right person into my life.  

Both of those things have been in effect since after my divorce in 2000.  It's been a loooong time coming.  And both of these are in play with us.  The one (1) is not possible without the other (2).

Transparency is key.  When I am myself with people, anyone in my life, then that relationship has the right building blocks to form authentic bonds.  Through the authenticity of one or both persons, the relationship builds authentic roots as well. That's how spaceman and I are.  We also happen to be romantically connected as well, and let me tell you this is divine, complete with ravishings.  But it's not his touch that I love most about him (although omg I am stunned lucky with this guy!)...  No. That's greater than great, but what I am humbled by most from him is this WIDE OPEN SPACE he provides for me to be 100% myself.  This is a sincere space... not space as in "I'll leave you be tonight so you can [whatever]" (though that sometimes happens as well)... this is a deliberately loose space where I can exist just how I am and just however I might become.  It's a space where WE can be ourselves, discover our inside jokes, contemplate the universe, discuss anything under the sun and within our consciousnesses.  As individuals and as a couple we are each free to be ourselves.  I don't want someone who is compromising on what shouldn't be compromised.  And if he changes his mind, it's because he's revisited the subject and thoughtfully come to another perspective.  Each pass through stance-making can come after loads of new insights.  

It's truly wonderful to bond ever stronger with this man.  He wants to know every faucet and curve of my mind, body and heart.  He's become everything to me.  The sun, the moon, the stars, planets and empty space between.  He's with me in the energy that mingles between us.  I can trust him to be there when I need him most, and I have to tell you that's one hell of an incredible feeling.  There's nothing I wouldn't trust this man with, except coding hahaha.  But I'm sure he would't trust me to do the plumbing either. ;)  Joking aside, it's our transparency with one another that breeds fertile ground, grows bonds, increases trust, encourages intimacy on an ongoing basis.  

I seriously could not be happier... except... if he were here right now.   

The trip to Virginia

Quite a trip indeed!  It seems odd to be attempting to write about it nearly a full week later.  In all actuality, I wrote about it before I even left. 

It turned out a bit too sultry for a public audience. 

Think Love in Eat, Pray, Love.  Think a little Pray and Eat as well.  But first, let’s talk about the area…

I knew he lived in the Appalachians, but somehow I had it in my brain that he lived on the edge of the mountains.  What I discovered was that I drove right smack into the middle of them, then turned south for a long while, driving over elevated highways that wove through valleys.  There were sky-scrapers poking up from the valleys below!  But, those weren’t near where he lives.  He lives further south, where not a single big town was nearby.  The smaller divided-highway routes around my area were his area’s largest type highways.  And then, there were miles and miles of curvy, hilly no-line roads to traverse… some snaking back and forth along the side of mountains, only to scale them and snake back down the other side.  These are treacherous in snow and ice.  He says traveling them in the winter is akin to a constant “controlled wreck”.  I could only imagine.  The only consolation is that the trees are so thick that if you veered over a guardrail (assuming there was one), you could get lucky and quite literally hung up in a tree.  But who knows…

The house where he grew up and currently lives is literally on the side of a mountain.  I forgot to ask him the name of that particular mountain.  Do they all have names?  There’s so many.  But imagine this… it’s a two story home with a walkout basement, in the front.  Yet a full wide set of steps ascend up to the center of the “first floor” covered porch with two wooden rocking chairs on each side.  I can’t believe I did not take a picture of this, so you’ll have to bear with me as I attempt to describe it.  To the left of the stairs is a shed-like door to enter the basement.  There are more steps that lead down from the front steps towards where the cars are parked in a 3 car-wide gravel driveway.  Standing down there with the cars and looking up at the towering house, the basement begins well above my own height. 

Inside the front door the house is open with a family room to the right, dining room straight back, bedrooms and staircase to the left.  The kitchen is off the dining room and leads out back to another covered porch with more rocking chairs.  Just outside that back door there is a flat-ish area with a patio table… but this seems terraced off because immediately behind that the yard is a steep climb.  Two sheds/storage buildings are built into the hill, one higher up than the other.  This about where you’ll find two large gardens, dwarfing my own.  He has 3 rows of peas (beans?) already growing, each row progressively bigger than the next with empty rows ready to sow all in due time.  The larger plants were already hanging from strings draped parallel with the rows.  The mountain itself climbed further than I could see from standing there, completely wild.  A few weeks back their security cam caught a black bear peering into a rear house window near the dog’s bowl of food.  Along one side of the property, running straight down the mountain was a fresh gurgling stream.  That stream was so relaxing, a constant reminder of the beauty of the place. 

My favorite “room” of the house was, oddly, the upstairs bathroom.  It was on the side of the house with the stream and the window was propped open with a fan that I never used.  Instead, it let the gurgling stream water sounds waft in like sweet-feeling white noise.  Unless it was nighttime, a light wasn’t needed.  The window provided more than enough light.  It had white paneling half way up the walls and a big bathtub with no shower walls or curtains.  What a delightful place to take a hot steamy bath on a cool night.  As enticing as that was, I wasn’t about to spend any amount of my precious short stay getting “me time” in a bath.  I was there to be with spaceman.

And that’s what we did.  We were side-by-side practically the whole time, except when he slept longer than I did, and I spent that time downstairs talking with his parents.

This may sound cliché, but his parents were two of the nicest people I have ever met.  Every time we left to go exploring the area, they both got up from their recliners to give us each a hug good-bye.  Every evening before we headed upstairs for the evening, there were more hugs!  Seriously, these people are sincerely awesome.  They truly did make me feel at home there.  I really miss that place, already.

The things we did…. OH the things we did!  We spent less than $10 (other than my gas to travel back and forth), but we were all over that place, exploring the landscape by car.  He also took me the sportsman’s club – a lake with a small campground, gun and archery ranges, stream and woods.  It was there that we sat suspended on a two-foot wide bridge above the stream and meditated together.  The next morning we went back and tried our lot at fishing, a fail despite umpteen jumping fish!  It just means we will go again someday.  I truly love fishing and never got enough of it when I was little.

How’s that for a rated G story?  Our time together… only our 4th time visiting one another in 11 years (can you believe that!?!)… was anything but rated G.

Do you know how they portray romantic movie love scenes… the sultry steamy lovemaking, the intensity, the hours of ecstacy… a lights on kind of erotic bath… yeah, it was like that.  And I miss him incredibly. 

I don’t know how we can have so many connections with one another like we do.  I’m not quite sure how it’s possible that we relate so well together, on so many fronts, with so much depth.  I’m so in love with this man, and he recounts his love for me, to me personally, every single day. 

I can’t concentrate.  I feel like I’m going to get in trouble for this, eventually.  lol  I feel like I’m often quite useless at work, you know?  I’m off in la la land, reminiscing or dreaming.  I want him here and now.  Communication through messaging is killer now.  It just isn’t enough.  It feels constraining.  Hearing his voice is soothing.  Spending hours on the phone laughing and joking and being serious, planning our future, pondering our present, re-viewing the past… subjects can be anything, anything at all.  I’m not beyond certain temptations to reel him in closer.  He’s dreamier than life, and I laugh so much with him.

We talk about how we are both “done”.  We know we have found the one person we each were born to be with.  The mundane comfort level is growing, and the intimacy is off the charts, delicious!  I’m not sure how it could get any better than this, but not yet cohabitating… I know there’s so much more to come.

You should hear the sweet, sweet sentiments he tells me each day.  No one has ever been as devoted as he is to me.  There’s a certain kind of satiation that has occurred within me.  He meets all my needs AND desires.  Who has been this lucky before???  I haven’t met them anyway, not that I know of.  I’m cherished, and loved in every conceivable way by him.  It’s not a completion so much as an exaltation.  Our relationship embodies an elevated state that tows the line, however curvy.  I’m in.  I’m totally in for the long haul.  I love this man with all my heart and soul and I can only pray he feels it as omni-presently as I feel it from him.