Well, I've been "shopping"... and finding alternative solutions to my space/storage/work area problems. That means I have to slow down and make decisions - LOL. Just when I thought I was going to be moving ahead. And we had a good snow... which is making me rethink my vehicle/equipment plan too. Found a really nice and right sized tractor... at a decent price... and while part of me thoroughly enjoys the idea of me on a tractor, customizing my landscape and making it "just so" - I really wouldn't use a tractor that much. Equipment that sits; is equipment that isn't ready to go when you are, so I passed on it.
Made serious inroads on the paper monster - a lot of files simply had to be thrown into boxes to get moved up here, and when I was in packing mode, there no time to shred. I've shredded 4-5 large green bags of paper this week or so. And used my old Bejewelled computer game as enticement to spend that much time doing a monotonous task that I don't enjoy at all.
I'm finding I'd much rather visit the stores and people right around here - than go over the mountain to the shopping mecca of a town I used to live in. There just isn't anything there for me (much) anymore. My tai chi teacher. There's less artifice or persona about people here; they are who they are and don't feel there's any need to pretend otherwise. They're warm and simply human and it's encouraging me to feel safe enough to just be me, too. Without worrying about being "liked" or "approved". That's different and takes a little getting used to.
And over the winter, all my discombobulation and fretting over decisions - is it the right thing, what are the follow-on impacts, what will people think... all that has settled & quieted & pretty much gone away. I'm having more fun days, these days, than I've had in a good long while. Even while I'm still dealing with business matters, taxes, cardboard boxes and "which box is THAT in?" stuff. The draconian slave-driver demanding that work must proceed at a break-neck pace until it's "done" has been fired. The ability to look at the "blank canvas" of the space around me - for hours and days and weeks - until I know just what needs to go where is back.
And there are surprises!! After the snow melted, I started seeing clumps of yellow blooms along the road and in the ditches - these aren't dandelions; it's the bloom of coltsfoot - a useful medicinal herb that grows wild. I've got a big patch of it on the backside of the pond dam. There's mullein, of course. I've heard that a couple owners ago, they kept goats here as well as chickens. I'm still debating the question of whether I want to be obligated to keeping animals - but my friend brought me a dozen of her fresh brown eggs and a person can almost taste the increase in protein in them.
Mio-mio is out of sorts; gave me fits yesterday. We're still trying to convince her it's OK to come out of her hidey hole way back in an awkward spot in my closet. I think it's my fault for thinking she might like different crunchies. I had a backup of her normal crunchies and moved food & water into the closet for the time being. LOL, I was disassembling the racks that hold the baskets in there at 7 am yesterday morning in a total panic to find out if she was OK. Maybe I do need a dog and a couple of inside/outside cats... LOL. There are lots of baby fish in the goldfish pond that made it through the winter even though the kids were afraid they'd all die. Now I have to buy fish food... LOL.
The warm is coming back; going to be in the 70s today. And I have SOOOO much outside work to get started on to get ready for some of the other stuff that's going to go on around here this summer.
