Day 93

The Lonely Bench 
I saw this bench marooned in a flooded pond the other day.

The weather has been beautiful but there is still a flood-watch for people living next to rivers.

I woke up this morning and wanted to run, the vitamin C tablets that I took must have worked their wonders.  When Matthew was little he called them vitamin seeds.  I expect he imagined them growing whatever was needed to fight off the cold virus, like the avocado pip growing a whole little tree on our kitchen windowsill.

So I ran 1.43 miles (2.3km) today.  It was lovely running through the warm blue-skied meadow, then down the road through the cool forest, to greet the babbling brook, turn around and up the hill through the forest again, until I burst out into the green and yellow meadow, and .....repeat.  Afterwards I went to see my little opossum, and the sun was shining on the grey fur beautifully, but when I tried to turn on my camera it said, "Change the battery pack", which was very disappointing.  

We had a friend over today, a young man who is training to be a nurse. It is always such a pleasure to engage with him and we spent the entire day talking and walking and eating and laughing, and soaking up the sun at times.  He wants to eventually specialize in geriatric nursing, which is admirable.  I don't think I would like to work with very old people, especially when they are confused and don't know who they are, that is the saddest.  When your parents die it forces you to regard mortality, theirs and your own, face to face.  So that if I look forward to old age it is with trepidation for frailty and a firm hope that my body will not outlive my mind.

When it was clear that my dad was not going to live too much longer I took the long trip to visit him for a few days.  He was always happy to see us, his three children, and always recognised us, but then would drift away into strange stories which were half fiction, mixed with memories of his childhood and of the war years.  We were supposed to get him to walk with his walker, and this he gallantly struggled to do, because his heart was no longer the strong and constant crux of his large body.  We reached a little place with soft chairs and benches in the winter sun, and he sat down with heavy relief, holding fast to the chrome frame.  And suddenly my real dad was back, as he said, with the old twinkle in his eye, , "You know what I miss?   .....the throttle!"  My brother and I roared with laughter, at the last joke my father told us.

I have not had time to draw anything today, so here is a picture Tim took on the sunny beach, which was crowded with all the happy people and dogs who have been stuck indoors by snow and wind and rain for months.