Just a bunch of ramblings here. Isn't it funny how the body, mind, and spirit are all linked together? Throw one out of kilter, and everything else just goes to pot.
Mom is staying with me right now after some pretty big surgery a few weeks ago. She is looking at a senior apartment, but I'm not convinced that she can really handle independent living. Mobility issues are prime here, and her tendency to allow things to overwhelm her to the point of near paralysis. Worse yet, she is despondent this morning, and I have spent breakfast listening to all of the reasons she thinks she should just curl up and die. Calm logic didn't work here, either, and just listening to the venting sapped my energy as well, energy that I was hoping to restore with a sausage and egg sandwich and a glass of orange juice. Her immobility, and immobilization, won out. Hence her current residence with me, the nurse/pack mule/physical therapy aide/housekeeper. And hence my backache.
It doesn't matter that I know actual body mechanics, and how to move without getting hurt. I didn't force myself to step back and be objective this morning, and while I was watching her struggles to get up, offered to help her out. That involved physically lifting her out of the chair and onto her feet. And now my lumbosacral spine is whining in protest.
You'd think after forty years of helping sick people out I'd be able to do this objectively and compassionately but not sucked into the drama, and without getting hurt myself. Usually, I can. Today, not so much. Worse yet, I signed up to work overtime tonight, my hair color needs a retouch, and I bought a shrub last weekend that still needs to be planted. The back garden is an abomination of weeds, and needs chemical warfare.
And my lumbosacral spine is swearing at me with the neurologic equivalent of some ancient and dishonorable mariner's salty language.
The weeds, the shrub, the grey hair, and the overtime shift are all having an argument in my brain about which one takes priority. And the beagle is outside the door, voicing his protest at standing in the early morning gloom.
You can't argue with a beagle. Anyone who has tried to impose their will on one of these usually delightful little creatures knows exactly what I'm talking about. You will be treated to their full hunting bay cacophony. In the interests of not "disturbing the peace," I let him in and scratched his belly. Beagle was happy.
The backache takes next priority. I'll do the overtime shift this evening, as I can really use the money. Two can't live as cheaply as one, especially when one is running innumerable errands for the other one and gas is $3.89 a gallon.
Some Roundup will take care of the weeds, and when I get up from my cat nap I will spray it on them, weather permitting. It does look as if it is going to rain.
The rain will soften the baked clay so that I can dig a suitable hole for the shrub. And the grey hair can be dispatched later today.
Later. After the backache is gone, and after I get more sleep.
