Back at It

It’s a lot different trying to write at home after returning from vacation. 

The room that houses my desk also houses the “dog couch” and it smells like dog. More specifically, it smells like the little bastard, Enzo.  I clean the cover every weekend, and for reasons known to all, I was not able to do so this weekend because I was on a mini-vacation.

I put the dog couch in the same room as my desk so that Gracie can adore me while I balance my checking account or check my emails. Gracie is ten years old.  She smiles when I walk in the door, and her whole body wags with joy.  I am her girl.  While I mow, she follows me up one row, down the other, up another row, down the other until I point to the house and tell her to go.  She sits in the center of the lawn, and watches me.  If I stop mowing to pick up a branch or a ball in my way, she’s up and at my side.  To see a ten year old dog with a suspected torn ACL trotting to meet me, well, you can imagine how it makes me feel. . .  If you can’t, it’s a combination of heartbreaking and tender, guilty and proud.  I get tears in my eyes just thinking about it.  She's my girl.

Anyway, I am writing in a different space.  With the headphones on, it’s almost like I’m in the cabin on the mountaintop surrounded by nothing, and I feel like I had another day of vacation.  Today, rather than get up whenever, linger over coffee and conversation, stretch my arms to the bright sun and test my writing fingers: 

·         I went into work straight from the return trip, had a quick meeting, and then finished the vacation day.

·         I picked the kids up from their Dad's.

·         I returned license plates to the MVA because I received the third notice that if I didn’t return them, my license would be suspended.

·         The lawn looked like a field, and so had to be mowed.

·         The new pool filter came in (because the other one was shot), so that had to be assembled and hooked to the pool.

·         The mower ran out of gas a quarter of the way through the mow, and so Tony and I ran to the gas station to fill it.

·         My truck was empty too.

·         Gracie finally ate something.  She gets depressed and distressed when I’m gone, and opts not to eat but to howl the entire time.

·         Paige had me call her friend’s mom, to set up a play date.

·         I brought the garbage can up from the curb, and emptied the stuffed mailbox, sorting through the garbage I would keep and the garbage I would track.

·         Got chased out of the kitchen by Tony because I was singing a Taylor Swift song very loudly, and he’s not a fan.

·         Made dinner.

·         Ate dinner.

·         Answered a phone call, and laughed with a good friend.

And now, I sit writing at the kitchen table, overlooking Gracie and two kids who are already in their pajamas (the kids, not Gracie) and watching yet another episode of Malcolm in the Middle. 

As much as I enjoyed the trip, I look over the laptop screen and I see Tony on the sofa, concentrating hard on his game of MineCraft (soon to be disappointed when I take away the iPod to cuddle) and Paige curled up on the chair, snug in a blanket and holding her Eeyore, and Gracie in her chair, sleepy but attentive to every stroke I make on this keyboard (and I know the instant I close the top, she’ll be at my side).

Enzo is sitting in the other room, on the stinky couch, barking at squirrels.

So, I guess I’m writing to say that a cabin in the woods for two days without the noise of the daily intake and uptake is great and the view is fantastic.

And I think I am also writing to say that the daily intake and uptake is here and mine, and the view is fantastic.

It’s good to be home.