This year, so far, has had its moments. It's the kind of year in which your father dies AND you get married.
Today is proving to be no exception. It's only 10 in the morning. I saw my husband off to an all-day meeting, a process that required me to be awake several hours before I was ready. Then I settled in to spend some quality time in the house. I'm still recuperating from the trip, and what I need is some quiet time. Instead, what should I hear but a distinctive scrabbling noise.
This house is a nice house, a real live house--no cottage or "camp." It is, therefore, INSIDE. However, my office is in the walk-out basement. We have known, because we have seen, that rodentia of the squirrel and mouse variety can get in somehow, though we have thought we have plugged their ingress points. The weather is cooling off and now is the prime time for rodentia to come scouting for winter warmth. I could have done without company today, however.
As I mentioned, I'm still recuperating from the trip south--and east, but mostly south and mostly from the part of the trip that was due south. In other words, Washington DC was fun. They were having a solar home competition (see photo) on the Mall. The monuments were still there, as were the museums. I had a lot of fun with my friend in my favorite city.
Then came the Oklahoma part. Although I also saw a couple of friends during that long week (really 10 days by the time we got home), it was mostly work-work-work. And it involved dealing with family and memories.
Twenty-four boxes (and an envelope) containing my mother's papers made it to Austin, where the Mathematics Association of America archives are housed. Probably 50 (nobody counted!!) boxes of my father's Methodista made it to Oklahoma City University, where we hope they will be pored over by scholars interested in the esoterica of Methodist politics. And some 20 more boxes are ready for Oklahoma State to pick up in their second go-round of "all the rest of Daddy's papers."
Through it all, the five of us acquitted ourselves well. We got snappish at times but hey, we were tired. We all worked hard. We divided our parents' belongings in ways that made us happy. One recurring theme I heard was "I want someone to want that, so I'll take it if nobody wants it, but if someone wants it, please take it." I know that many objects that I associate with my parents are safe in the keeping of the family, and that's great.
What I didn't know (OK, I knew, but I didn't think it would affect ME) was how hard the work would be, physically and emotionally (another form of inside/outside). I've slept a lot since we got home late Tuesday. I was looking forward to a restful day today. But that scrabbling...
I have a "thing" about rodents. I can handle seeing bears on the porch more easily than I can contemplate sharing space with a squirrel or mouse. Therefore, I will spend the day, which happens to be my birthday, hanging out in town--either in my apartment or at a Starbucks. Or both. Someplace that's definitely inside, without rodents.
Because 2007 is continuing as it started...as a year in which your father dies AND you get married.
