Author Topic: Farm Doin's - 2020  (Read 50130 times)

lighter

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #75 on: March 11, 2020, 03:06:31 PM »
Is it the crazy ex wife?


Hopalong

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #76 on: March 11, 2020, 04:19:51 PM »
I'm really sorry, (((((Amber))))).

I hope you'll keep posting as you process this.

Big big hugs
Hops
"That'll do, pig, that'll do."

lighter

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #77 on: March 11, 2020, 04:32:25 PM »
Who can expect B to be up to a physical challenge when the VA hamstringed him through subpar/incompetent/non-existent care for very serious infections AND pain AND the stress that drives his BP up to unhealthy levels.... while they continue leaving him in pain and creating stress FOR HIM?

I can't imagine B would be ready for duty.... ANY duty..... he can't even have a week's visit with his SO.


OK... THIS is what's bugging me.

The VA is treating him like they're waiting for him to go ahead and die. 
NOT like they're trying to get him up and running for duty as a highly sought after asset in the field.

((Amber))  I'm sorry this is so dissapointing.  I'm dissapointed for you too.

Lighter 


sKePTiKal

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #78 on: March 12, 2020, 09:03:02 AM »
That's exactly how they're treating him Lighter. My head's exploded so many times from frustation at the sheer willful stupidity of it all... that I'm kinda numb.

Only thing I can think to suggest is for his commander to put pressure on these depts. Usually when the military officers "request"... people hop to.

And the other thing that's crossed my mind (god forgive me) is that I still don't know the whole story.
----------------------

It appears from announcements last night that the virus is picking up speed and getting the usual "lets throw money at it" solution from FedGov. I hope the virus is bribe-able. /sarc

Just to muddy the waters a little more, on what know/don't know about this virus...

one of the girls B took prom shopping a couple weekends ago - is now down with the virus, in hospital, with ARDS. She is 18. That contradicts all the official messages about younger people and mild cases, since she was a healthy girl. In another week, he and his D, will have finished up the 14 day (minimum) waiting period for incubation.

I have to go over the mtn today for banking. It'll be the last time I'll do so for a month. Everyone is adjusting their understanding of "basic expectations of normal life" around here - including the kids. Usually Steve works large events - concerts, conventions, etc. Those have been cancelled for the most part. She has other friends in the cities that will be magnets for community spread. So far, she's limiting travel - but not completely. She can't; she has classes to take (state mandated as part of her sentence) over the mtn.

I am not adjusting much to my routines - and will continue going out - but am very carefully watching what's going on and paying attention. With an eye toward being able to hibernate, at the drop of a hat.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

sKePTiKal

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #79 on: March 14, 2020, 03:59:29 PM »
Tell ya what - work seems to keep me away from seeing the 100th iteration of the same information online - and letting it get under my skin.

Painting and staining wood in bathroom, so that they can come in, Monday and finish up by the end of next week (Thursday for them). So far the contractors haven't stopped working 'coz of CV19. So far no (reported) cases in my state - I think we're the last of the 50. No idea how long that'll last. Our K-12 schools are closed as a precaution, but otherwise life is normal around here. Maybe fewer tourists - who usually start making expeditions this time of year.

This is about my "normal" for the start of spring/end of winter... so, nothing is all that different for me.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

lighter

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #80 on: March 14, 2020, 04:09:41 PM »
Amber:

Two questions:

1.  What color are you staining wood in the bathroom and...

2.  If you don't know B's entire truth, what is your intuition telling you that truth might be?  This is a rhetorical question, of course. 

Lighter

Hopalong

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #81 on: March 14, 2020, 09:37:11 PM »
Quote
the other thing that's crossed my mind (god forgive me) is that I still don't know the whole story

Forgive yourself, please, Amber. Given all the drama, darkness and heroic obstacles laced through B's exotic backstory, it would be irrational not to have any thread of doubt. Romance is what it is. And rationality is too. Don't feel guilty for having questions and needing evidence or looking before leaping too far. And for perhaps not entirely upending your life before you do feel that full confidence.

Love is the best. It's a healing purpose and a savior and sometimes a magician (or a trickster) and none of us manage it perfectly. But if love is also honest, true and transparent, it will not become enmeshment or obsession, and it will still be there after the examining and testing of passion is done. When love is mature, it winds up wise. And if it can't mature, but stays adolescent (we all start there...that's what lust and loneliness are about!), then WE get to wind up wise anyway.

(You can tell I never learned anything the easy way....)

I so hope it works out for you and B, but if it doesn't or can't, I know you'll be all right. Bloody but unbowed.

Hugs
Hops
« Last Edit: March 14, 2020, 09:38:53 PM by Hopalong »
"That'll do, pig, that'll do."

sKePTiKal

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #82 on: March 15, 2020, 09:13:02 AM »
'morning...

Lighter, the pine is going to get a stain of red oak on top of it; that will darken it a notch and cut the yellow a little; but I've upgraded the lighting in there and the floor and shower are now lighter (haha) - as well we dropped the ceiling to the bottom of the exposed beams in the area over the shower and opposite on the vanity side. Those are already primed with Killz as is the drywall behind the where the vanity goes. Paint color is "Bit o' sugar" - a shade of white, that has the palest pinkish; warmish tones I could find in the swatches. This picks up some of the tones in the stone tile in the shower.

I'll figure out a way to get pics to y'all. Everything will make more sense if you can SEE it.

Hops, my dear, thank you.

I think what my worries all boil down to, is that once again - my belief & faith in how institutions work has been shattered again. This time it's healthcare and the military/gov at a deeper level, than I already knew it was messed up. Along with: there are likely perfectly legitimate reasons why he isn't going to share every blessed detail with me about himself.

Those would be intensely personal and emotional. Just like I have things that even NOW after all these years - are hard for me to say and talk about. And the fact is - knowing such things isn't required for me to trust him; I don't have any "right" either, to know those things -- unless they're offered. Anymore than Holly has any right to pry into my deeper feelings about anything I don't offer to talk about.

In fact, as I sit here writing this - it occurs to me that this "modern" "virtue" of oversharing everything contributes to all kinds of dysfunctional interpersonal expectations and interactions. The problem I see with this - is that emotions & feelings are constantly in flux - changing - so a truth told to one, on a Tuesday can absolutely be false by Saturday. EEEEEEK.... there would be no constants, no continuity, no predictability in relationships if people actually did practice that (or could with any duration). It would be like not having ANY higher brain function or control over behavior EVER - and IIRC - that's a serious PD.

Enmeshment, codependence, abuse... are all nurtured in that kind of environment. Thanks, but no thanks. I'll just stay out here on my mountain and be an anachronism and dinosaur.

My doubts about B showed up when I was physically, mentally and emotionally exhausted. And concerned about things I was seeing about this virus situation. Oddly, Hol's concern too was even more upsetting than reassuring - as in, if she's noticing/worrying about it too... maybe I should be more scared & careful. I was just that tired.

One of the things I love about Buck, is that I can ask him a direct question and get a direct answer. No evasiveness; no judgement; no power-struggle game playing - not even making fun of me. His arrows strike true. So I asked him, if he wasn't talking to me - 'coz he was busy & more quiet that day than usual. I mentioned I felt that I just wasn't thinking "right"... and he told me that I should never think he wouldn't talk to me... and that I should try to sleep; he'd stand watch for me. (So, telling me to put away my hypervigilance and stand down and rest.) It worked; I dropped right off to sleep and slept 10 hours. I needed that protection to stop myself/my brain, and just rest...

He knows I don't need him, to do what I do and have done. He's told me he knows I am strong and believes in my abilities. He knows even strong women need a strong man to lean on and rely on in those times they just need to take care of themselves -- but aren't seeing it themselves coz they're too damn tired... he's needed me the same way, more than once and it doesn't diminish either one of us to admit that and to take care of each other, as needed. The rest of the time we're partners or playmates - like some self-perpetuating fun & creativity chemical reaction; and there is a great deal of intimacy in that.

I don't need to DO much FOR Buck. To take care of him. The man is self-sufficient, skilled, and highly intelligent. And way more civilized & nurturing than the stereotype of a grizzled,scarred old vet would lead one to believe. That's WAAAYYYYY out of my previous experience of men, in general. And go figure - he puts as much into "working on the relationship" as I do, too.

It just all seems way too good to be true. I'm not doing the starry-eyed, nothing can be difficult about this falling head over heels and not being practical thing. But it DOES come up periodically - and when it does - I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop instead of simply enjoying the feeling. Told him last night he makes me smile ear to ear - just coz of how happy he looked in a picture he sent me. He told me that brings him joy.

It doesn't get more direct than that and I'm SOOOOOO not used to this.

There is one youtube tarot reader I really like; she does "intuitive readings" - going deeper below the surface - and she does longer readings, even when they're just general - for one sun sign. This last one, the very last card was Blessings - count your blessings - gratitude. Maybe that will calm my nervousness and worry about how I can know if all this is really really really true, cross your heart & hope to die true. And whether this is what I really really feel for him, too - not just being lonely & needy.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

Twoapenny

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #83 on: March 15, 2020, 09:38:37 AM »
Skep, I think Buck sounds like an absolute diamond.  Yes, I agree with the not 'oversharing' thing.  From what you've written on here, Buck seems to me to be a decent enough man that he would tell you anything he felt you needed to know.  He just comes across as that sort of person - that he'd tell you if it might affect you.  But other than that - I know I've got stuff from years ago that I wouldn't bring up with a prospective partner now.  We all do things at times in our lives to survive - experiences we go through make us react in certain ways, and there are ways I coped when I was younger that I wouldn't use to cope now.  People change, as you say, sometimes even in the space of a few days.

I can also only say that after fifteen years of dealing with the public sector here on behalf of my son I honestly feel that it's the most corrupt and malefic institution going.  And it's very destabilising when you discover that systems you believe are in place for our benefit might not be.  So I can understand very well how you must both be feeling with all this endless faffing about over his health.  Terrible situation.  I am keeping all things crossed for the two of you to spend time together eventually and just have a nice time, being together and enjoying each other. xx

lighter

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #84 on: March 27, 2020, 01:06:42 AM »
How are you doing, Amber?

Is your bathroom moving along?

Lighter

Hopalong

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #85 on: March 27, 2020, 08:23:10 AM »
Well I'll defend lonely and needy any day of the week, honestly. I gave a lay sermon once called "Only the Lonely" about "needy" being a modern epithet. We DO need each other; we're supposed to. Lonely and needy are not shameful, they're human feelings in many human realities, and if you feel either from time to time that's just part of you being you. If those feelings got so huge they broke relationships, disabled you from functioning or meant you were no longer responsible, they'd be pathological. Sure doesn't sound like Amber to me.

Hell, you've been a recent widow on a mountain with a troubled, demanding adult child and her retinue and your only present friend was a married handyperson who's now a wounded logger. What would most humans feel in that situation? You deserve to feel whatever you feel and meet your natural need to be loved and cared for in whatever ways feel healthy and right to you. Ninety percent right.

It's the reciprocity that makes it beautiful. That you can express need or loneliness to him, and vice versa. Our culture sneers at vulnerability, which is the one thing that if shared two ways, forges something strong.

It's possible to heroize and romanticize someone from a distance. It's also possible to reach a near-breaking point about not having real time together to test and build on what is there. And exhausting.

In addition to everything else you have on your enormous plate on the mountain, you have a space beside you that you yearn to have filled. And you deserve companionship and love in the real. You also are stronger than you know and you can make decisions as you need to, about time tolerance, distance or any other part of it.

I'm so rooting for you. And B. In any combination that is healing and happy for you.

hugs
Hops
"That'll do, pig, that'll do."

sKePTiKal

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #86 on: March 27, 2020, 01:33:17 PM »
Having a pretty hard week, actually. The bathroom is almost done; it's functional at the moment but I still have painting to do. One wall is very dark (it's the exterior log wall; had water stains... so the dark camoflauged them really well. Opposite was all new pine siding, so I bought that tone down into a warm, oak. Floor tile is a warm gray; long plank-style which goes very well with the natural limestone in the shower.

I'm really going to need more storage in there and organization, but that'll come. I just haven't had a moment to think about it. For the time being, all I'm getting done doing is simply calming everyone down and trying to find ways to keep them occupied. We don't really feel all cooped up together here - not with several buildings to be doing things in - so not everyone is in one place together all the time.

Lots of good talks; supporting each other... some tensions and upsets, but that's to be expected. Sickness - of some sort (no one knows since people can't get tests) starting to hit people we're actually acquainted with or friends. Buck's oldest D in London has tested positive and she's hospitalized due having lupus. He is beside himself with worry; getting awake at 3 am to try to get her on the phone. My oldest, Amy, is sick - but can't get a test anywhere, despite being EMS for medical transport. Most of her patients are elderly/infirm so she was torn between going to work to get them to medical care... or staying home, taking care of herself and not infecting anyone with what she has. Mike's D Autumn, works ICU, ER & trauma... but has two school age kids at home. I need to check in with her and see how they're doing in all this.

People I haven't spoken with in years are popping up to chat, make jokes, and just generally commisserate over what we're all doing - and worrying about comes after this. My shop is still open; and we've had to print letters of "passage" for all the employees stating we're a critical infrastructure manufacturer. Without us working, repairs or expansions couldn't be made to energy companies that are keeping the lights & heat & tv/internet on for everyone.

So, lots of trying to support people having their reactions/emotions about this situation. Soon there will be plenty of work to do for everyone as we get into spring.

Today, I'm not going to do anything except try another variation on my ham/bean soup. Hol just got back from the store for some extras we've gone through. I see Steve found another dozen goose eggs - they're so big that's like having 2 dozen around. Then, I'm going into my sanctuary and hiding out till I doze off. Shouldn't have stayed up so late by myself... it's too easy to fall back into the grieving state right now.

There is a strong possibility that from henceforth, everything is going to change in this country and probably most places around the world too. The US simply can't afford to print that much money; it will devalue the currency to the point that a loaf of bread or can of soup will cost $10. After making myself face the real possibility that the shop (my source of income) would be shut down - and that the requirements of the shutdown would force employees to move on to other jobs... and put us out of business... (as other places shutdown that impacts our sales)...

I'm pulling out all my great depression knowledge that I gained from grandma and my step-dad... putting it to use, and teaching Hol.

Buck is doing what he can for me, from his distance - his infection isn't being treated at all, under the circumstances and that hospital has basically told him to go away. He has gotten his BP down - all by mind over matter and exercise - and right now, even with the lack of sleep - he looks good. Better probably than I do. LOL. But I know this is temporary and it's OK for me to have a day off... and just take care of me.

TOO many things I am not able to do anything about and I have to just let that go and do what I can do.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

Twoapenny

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #87 on: March 27, 2020, 02:04:16 PM »
I'm sorry, Skep, it's really hard not knowing what's coming - it feels like you either have to do nothing to prepare or try to prepare for all eventualities.  Neither one is a good option, and I'm sorry you've got people you know coming down with symptoms.  You are right about having to let go of what you can't control but it's difficult to do.  I feel that we've done as much as we can (myself and son) and now we're just hunkering down waiting for it all to be over.  Which I hope will be sooner than later.  I hope you get a chance to rest and nap a bit and I'm glad Buck's looking good :) xx

Hopalong

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #88 on: March 27, 2020, 05:20:40 PM »
((((Amber)))))

I hope you'll pause to consider whether you really ARE or HAVE TO be the engine that drives everyone else's survival. You don't. You're just one engine. A mighty one but not the only one. Everyone has an opportunity to step up now, in their different ways.

I am so sorry to hear that your company may be under serious pressure. That's talking load on shoulders huge worry, I'm sure. I don't grasp the details but know you don't take it lightly. I hope there's a solution that keeps it open, even if limping along, in a way that saves jobs if that's possible. What a heavy heavy responsibility.

Given that, I hope you won't feel you're suddenly teaching everyone, personally responsible for passing along Depression-era wisdom anyone who wants to learn can find on the Internet, etc.

You are NOT alone and must take care of yourself.

I'm so sorry about B's daughter's risk, and your own D's risk, and more. Please keep us in the loop. It's all unfathomable, until it's not.

Huge hugs,
Hops
"That'll do, pig, that'll do."

sKePTiKal

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Re: Farm Doin's - 2020
« Reply #89 on: March 27, 2020, 06:37:55 PM »
Two days after I talked with her, my D is feeling better. Probably going back to work next week.

Still no word from Buck's D - he just called a little bit ago. It doesn't matter we only talk about normal married people stuff - what he's been doing today, what I'm making for dinner - it just helps to hear his voice. I did think to ask him about the Navy today. Turns out he's "qualified" for the training - so now it's only a matter of assembling the students (assuming they aren't sick) and getting it all scheduled.

This was a really good day for his BP. Staying way down in his normal range.

Buck's OTHER D, has a prom buddy (which is still postponed) that has recovered from Covid. She's still in isolation though; most of her symptoms have cleared. And she has her cellphone back now... LOL. Makes it easier for her to stay in contact with her all-important-at that age friends.

Hol's friend who thought she was ill, is now convinced it is her annual allergies making her miserable. I know I'm suffering through that with trees starting to bud out. An ER doc on another forum, says about 83% of the patients he sees with Covid symptoms are mild and they recover within a week, two weeks at the most. They aren't even testing people unless they meet 4 out of 5 criteria. Obviously, the numbers were seeing updated daily are only based on tests, so the virus is pretty widespread. A couple days ago, there were only 39 cases in my state; now there are 76.

We are limiting our exposure and staying at home as much as we can - but we DO still go out & about some. Week 2 so far.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.