As Ernie and I were sitting there in the hospital lobby the other day, I said something to him–I don’t recall what, and he paused, looked at me, and said, “Do you think I’m going to listen to a dancing bear? As semi-miserable as I was feeling, I laughed and laughed. Later, in the post-op, he made me do a twirl, just to prove I’m Dancing Bear. I complied, but noted, as I always do, that it’s hard to twirl in Birkenstocks.
My brain has been overtaken, with two different songs, occasionally merging into a third.
Kurt Vile sometimes segues into Question Mark & the Mysterians.
And then this pops in periodically. I went on a kick of watching old music performances on the Fridays show back in 1980-82 and hadn’t heard this in a long time.
So if you happen to imagine me (for some unknown reason) wandering around Carle Hospital or my ramshackle house, just imagine this music behind me. Try it.
The cats seemed quite pleased to have their hero back with them.
Here is Bob, staring at his beloved while I try to get his attention. Behind him sits a shelf full of books on 19th c glass. Oh, and clothes and pillows. Remember when I got obsessed with pillows? Well, I still am but I now seem to have extras. And yet I still search for the perfect pillow.
Yesterday we went to Prairie Gardens to buy lights for the fence (I’m SO excited). We went in and quickly found what we needed (I like the brown corded lights on the fence) and then immediately left. I’m up for Christmas movies but I can’t do loud-people-Christmas-retail yet. We sped off with our lights and Ernie bought me a drink at Huber’s. I ate a little popcorn, sipped some wine and we rambled away to each other (what ARE we going to get Leo for Christmas?). Then we headed on home and curled up with a bad Christmas movie (I thought it was a Hallmark but it was some kind of knockoff). Sometimes we have to start several to find one we can watch. Generally speaking, we don’t do any that have time travel, magic or fake royalty.
Ernie was exhausted so he dozed off. Later he kept saying he missed the ending and didn’t know what happened. Heh. We watched a couple of other things, snuggled with our ancient cats and ate frozen pizza for dinner instead of the kale and rice thing I’d been thinking of. It was delicious. 500 degrees makes a big difference.
I must say I worry about my little Hattie girl. She snuggles up with me and buries her head so this is what I mostly see of her (above). We thought we had her back on track with eating….having given up on cat food and buying her straight canned tuna or salmon. She (and Bob, of course) loved it. Yet again I think we’ve got a system. Appetite stimulant at night, food and Miralax in the morning. Today? She wasn’t interested in the tuna and wouldn’t eat….and just one or two days of that and we’re back in the same sorry cycle. I just don’t know.
I was in this waiting room for quite some time before I noticed those green leaves. It made me feel a little bad. I bet there were lots of meetings about those green leaves as folks wondered how to screen off the heating or cooling stuff or whatever is behind them. Anyway, nice leaves, Carle. I liked them. Isn’t it funny? I just found those big green leaves kind of touching.
And this, my last picture is a stupidly bad fuzzy picture of the shadow of a little old banister back chair in our bedroom. It’s only at certain times this shows up from the light of the window across the room. I hardly ever look at that little chair. I’ve always loved banister back chairs. We saw this one at the Hinsdale Antique Show years and years ago. It’s a real vernacular little guy, probably late 18th century, simple saddleback, beat-up rush seat, old black paint. My Dad went back and got it the following day. I think it was a Christmas present that year. I just love the little guy. He sits in our bedroom and holds either a stack of books or a stack of clothes or a complicated combination of both. Last night it just seemed as though he’d come over to the other side of the room to say hello.
Hey, chair. Hey, little guy.
Onward.