Sorry I missed last week’s blog. Had a busy weekend getting caught up on all the chores that piled up while we were sick. As we were still in recovery mode, there wasn’t any energy left for much of anything else.
Here’s a bit of what I’ve been doing and thinking about lately.
Community
In my SLC Book Club, only my co-leader (also my friend) and I showed up. I know my friends all have lives, but I really hoped this would be a way for us to stay connected. Not that I would object to talking with her one-on-one every month about books, but I hope this was just an anomaly.
I knew moving would take me away from the family/community I had created but I was feeling the loss last week. I think it’s part of what was making me so crabby despite finally feeling better physically. Then I read “How We Show Up” (see below) and I really started to miss the community I had built.
This same friend said she hasn’t felt truly welcomed at Trivia since I left. Tennessee says that my group of friends fell apart with me gone because I was the center of it. At first, I was like that can’t be right because believing that makes me feel like I was being narcissistic.
But I guess it is mostly true when I let myself think about it. That particular grouping of people happened because I cultivated it, not in a self-centered way but by being friends with each of them and all of us finding ways to be together.
The people who were friends with each other before meeting me are still mostly friends, but the full circle fell apart. It makes me sad. I miss them all so much. Some of them I still talk to via Zoom or old-school phone calls, with others it’s the occasional chat or text, but they’ve moved on just like I have.
Don’t get me wrong I love my new life. I am so happy and I’m finally feeling settled now that the move is official, and the wedding is behind us. It’s part of why I’m missing community now that the dust is finally settling.
I am making some headway on building a new community. My local book club had its second meeting last week and it was a small group but we had a lively discussion about the book and learned more things about each other.
It felt good to be there and I hope they continue to come. I would like to find other ways to integrate but for now, it’s a good start.
New Bucket List
My old bucket list was full of exotic places to visit. After reading “The Bucket List” (see below) I thought a lot about my list. So much of it was there because I have had itchy feet for as long as I can remember–always wanting to go to places I’ve never been. I was searching for something, for somewhere to belong.
I no longer feel that way. I’ve found my home, here with Tennessee.
The itchy feet are gone. Now they only itch from bug bites (tip: buy stock in Benadryl). I’m no longer searching, and it feels great.
However, now I need a new bucket list. I still want to do some traveling but it’s about road trips with my wife, not far off places where everything is so different and where I’m pretending to be something I’m not to see if I will fit.
I like who I am now, and I love my life. Finding new things to put on the bucket list has proved difficult and I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not. I’m content with my life as it is so I don’t have many big things I want to accomplish. Everything I think of is more like a to-do list for perfecting the life I’m already living.
For instance, I’ve never been an active participant in growing a garden, but I’ve always wanted to be the kind of person who loves growing things. I could have written ‘start a garden’ but we did that yesterday. Granted, knowing myself as I do, I probably should write ‘harvest from a garden I’ve tended’ since I’m good at starting projects but not so great on the follow-through.
Or I could have written ‘sit and watch fireflies’ but I got to do that yesterday too. I felt like a little kid, giddy with delight as I watched them come out as the sun was getting ready to set. Tennessee takes them for granted because she got to grow up catching them and putting them in jars…a rite of passage I didn’t get to experience.
I do still have a few travel-related experiences on the list: book a sleeper car on a train, stay on a houseboat, go to a jazz club and eat beignets in New Orleans, see a show on Broadway in NYC, experience Fall in New England. Easy to come up with these though the motivation behind doing them is different now.
Also on the list: publish my book, fulfill someone’s wish, and learn to drive a riding lawnmower. It feels like there should be more, but it too is a good start.
Books
Book 38
“Thistlefoot” by Genna Rose Nethercott
A modern retelling of the Baba Yaga myth. Highly recommend!
Book 40
“How We Show Up” by Mia Birdsong
A non-fiction book I listened to for one of my book clubs that I ended up buying a paperback version of so that I could reread and process many of the passages that I read. It was triggering and thought-provoking and I have more work to do.
Books 41-43
“Whispers at Dusk” and “Secrets in the Dark” and “Cursed at Dawn” by Heather Graham
A trilogy kickstart to the international arm of the Krewe of Hunters series. Romance novels with a twist—the main characters are all able to talk to ghosts and this aids these FBI agents, and now their European counterparts, to take down terrorists and serial killers.
Book 44
“The Bucket List” by Rachel Hanna
A lovely straight romance where the protagonist must complete the bucket list of her dead best friend by that friend’s 50th birthday in order to inherit a beach house and a small fortune. This is the June read for my local book club. It’s a bit of fluff but fun and kind of a needed break after the darker books we recently read.
Books 39 and 45
“Mrs. Pollifax Pursued” and “Mrs. Pollifax, Innocent Tourist”
The last two books in the series by Dorothy Gilman and narrated by Barbara Rosenblat. I really enjoyed this series and I’m sad there won’t be any more.
I’m ahead of schedule on the 100 book goal, not by much, but it will allow for some leeway to tackle some to-do list items around the house.
Take care of yourselves and have a great week!
Baby Gay When You're Fat and Gray - All Grown Up 