Recharge? in Everyday Ramblings

A Cosmo in the garden. Fully recovered from the deluge last Saturday. Big relief. The eggplant are growing, and I have these adorable tiny green bell peppers coming on. The garden, while small, is full of endless delight. We had more rain last night.

And rabbits. They so far aren’t disturbing anything in a dramatic way for me but those with leafy vegetables have all kinds of contraptions in place to deter them. I did scare up one the other morning in my neighbor’s neglected bed full of self-seeded yellow snap dragons. That little white tail bounded off in a flash.

We are having a four-hour board retreat tomorrow with a buffet lunch across town at a refurbished elementary school that is now a restaurant and unique hotel. With meeting rooms in some of the old classrooms. I went to this last year and can’t believe it has come around again so soon.

Last year I was an off-board officer as the Budget Chair. This year I am much more in the mix as the Treasurer. With a heck of a lot more responsibility. A bit too much responsibility it feels like right now.

The summer squash gratin I made last week for the potluck was a success. Yay. I have all the ingredients to make a chard version of the same dish. What I need to find around here somewhere is the energy to make it.

This is kind of like the revelation about how much the last dental surgery took out of me, the fact that meeting all these new people and learning tons of new things and having new responsibilities runs up against some heretofore unknown energy limitations. I am dragging my tail feathers.

It turns out my niece gets to stay in her place a bit longer than she thought so I am postponing the trip up to visit and help out with her move. She hasn’t heard yet on the subsidized apartment. Apparently, she is coming down here in a few weeks to hang with Kes and Most Honorable and go through some boxes of things she stored with them.

Everybody in my life is downsizing. A huge generational shift is going on out there.

I need to get on trend. It seems hard to initiate anything while in this learning curve as I take on these new tasks. Just keeping up with some modest strength training and thinking about organizing things here where I live has been daunting enough the last few weeks.

There is the week after next to look forward too. I have five whole days with nothing on my calendar. And just one League thing on that following weekend. I so need this unstructured time. I know it won’t be enough, but it will make a dent in the reservoir of tiredness that I have been hanging out in.

Some things do help. Naps, and reading. Just getting out of the house, yesterday I barely contributed at all to the discussion with the guys, but the conversation was interesting. It went from what are we doing when we are making art to the inevitable discussion about doing something that we were entreated to do during the Democratic Convention. That “something” I have covered.

I know that I want to go to the gym. And maybe to a movie, like in a theater. The library, maybe the art museum. Stuff I used to do when Mr. Finch was alive. I also want to focus on more on in depth yoga practices, which are different in many ways from what I share with my students. Much more time on the floor. Meditation, breath work.

And I would like to reestablish my fitness, diet and home environment goals.

But of course, I might end up spending the whole darn week sitting on the futon, staring at the songbirds at my feeder with Carlo on my lap.

That would be fine too. Come to think of it, that last bit I can get started on right now. Practice makes perfect.