TheBanyanTree: Putting Summer to Bed

[Margaret R. Kramer]

Rain, rain go away.  And it did!  Just for today.  Tomorrow it will be back.
We’re supposed to get snow on Monday.

This has been the coldest October on record.  This has been the snowiest
October on record.  This is the first October where we haven’t hit 70
degrees since 1981.  It’s a dismal October.  The colors are peaking fast and
because there is no sun, I am not inspired to take any photos.  

Again, this has been a week for job hustling.  Again, I’m getting hits, but
no bites.  I had a phone interview on Monday which didn’t go well.  They had
a contracting position in St Paul.  The job didn’t fit my qualifications,
but that didn’t matter.  I made a couple of mistakes.  I didn’t check out
the company and it showed.  The interviewer was older than I expected and
that threw me off.  She was belligerent and confrontational, accusing me of
not knowing about my job.

I have no idea why she called me, because my qualifications didn’t fit the
position, but whatever.  I used this as an interview to learn from.

I got a haircut on Tuesday.  I don’t want to look like a shaggy dog.

I had another phone interview with a HR person for a different job.  She
liked me, but the hiring manager didn’t, and therefore, I didn’t get the
face-to-face interview.

I had a great interview with a contract agency.  The recruiter gave me some
LinkedIn tidbits and also some information upcoming changes that all
companies in my area will need to deal with.  The work is out there, I just
have to get some.  She also told me that my unemployment plan might pay for
some classes.  I’ll check into that for sure. 

I heard from two of the consulting companies I interviewed with a couple of
weeks ago.  One had a job that didn’t fit me at all and the other had a
possible.  That one quick interview gave me a chance to update my resume,
which I had been meaning to do.  My new resume has been passed along to the
company and we’ll see.

I applied for a job on Wednesday and heard from the HR recruiter on
Thursday, but we haven’t linked up yet for a time to do a phone interview.

Meanwhile, I took a few webinars on social networking, Cloud computing,
interviewing 101, resumes, and use case development.

I worked out four days this week.  I’ve now officially added strength
training back into my workout routine.  I dropped it when I was working two
jobs, because I just didn’t have the time.  My muscles were sore last week,
but I feel better now this week.

And on top of all that, I worked 20 hours at my survey job in the evenings.

I have a meeting with an insurance agent next week to discuss life
insurance.  I lost my life insurance with my job, so if I died right now, I
couldn’t be buried.  My body would languish in a freezer forever, waiting
for cremation, waiting to be put into the ground with Ray.  So I need some
money to give Asher to bury me.

I also don’t have any health insurance.  So if I got sick right now, they’d
shove me into a corner and let me die.  No one wants to treat someone who
cannot pay, no matter what they say.  People without insurance get subpar
treatment, because the medical profession is not going to help someone who
is unable to put out any dollars.  Hopefully, I can get something cheap.

I’m glad I got my flu shot at the Fair this year.  Even the regular flu
vaccine is difficult to come by right now.

I don’t cry as much as I used to, but the loss of Ray is still there, still
so open.  That sting is gone, but I’ll never get used to him not walking by
my side.  I’ll always feel like half of a person.

I’m also getting used to being on my own.  I’m still freaked out about doing
so many things myself.  Ray always had my back.  We complemented each other
so well.  What I couldn’t do, he could, and what he couldn’t do, I could.  

I doubt I will ever find that type of compatibility again.  I just can’t
help but feel if we find a mate where the pegs fit into holes; it’s highly
unlikely, at least in this lifetime, that we get a second chance at that
same type of love.

I had my chance and I took it, and I’m feeling less desperate to have
someone else in my life.  Oh, I still have Joe, but I don’t really care if
he’s there or not most of the time.

Joe’s changing, too.  For over a year, he wasn’t able to sleep in his bed
unless I was with him.  That’s because that bed was his wife’s and where she
died.  He slept on the couch.  But he’s tall and in order to sleep on the
couch, he had to fold up like an accordion, and he began having hip
problems.

So he started sleeping in the bed and it didn’t take long for his body to
feel better, because he could now stretch out.  

The bed began losing special significance and became just a bed again.

He’s able to go through her things now without wanting to keep everything.

We just start realizing they’re not going to come back, so we don’t need to
keep stuff.  Of course, there are some things we’ll never give away, but
they are the things that are close to the heart.  The outer stuff, yes, we
can let it go.

Well, it’s the near the end of October and this is the time when I usually
put my yard to bed for the winter.  I dumped out the last of the flower
pots.  I swept out the garage.  Asher hung the bikes from hooks in the
garage’s ceiling.  I cleaned up the lawn furniture and the picnic table and
stowed them into the garage.  I hung out extra bird feeders.

In a way, I like doing this chore, because Ray is with me.  I always see him
in the garage, standing close by his work bench.  I see the projects he
started.  I see the little notes he wrote to himself.

It’s done now.  The spring and summer of 2009 are over.

And winter is coming.

Margaret R. Kramer
margaretkramer at comcast.net
margaret.kramer at polarispublications.com
www.polarispublications.com

October gave a party;
The leaves by hundreds came -
The Chestnuts, Oaks, and Maples,
And leaves of every name.
The Sunshine spread a carpet,
And everything was grand,
Miss Weather led the dancing,
Professor Wind the band. 
-George Cooper