Word Play

This will be too long for a social media post, but it won’t be a book. Who has energy for a book? Part of the problem is nutrition. Healthy nutrition and pandemics, forest fires, and car accidents do not really go together–at least in our house. They probably should because people need energy for this stuff. But I don’t want to think about food–anymore than I want to think about the world right now. Heck, I can barely think about who has to sleep on the couch tonight or why the heck did we forget to buy garbage bags at the store yesterday–and shouldn’t the hotel provide them anyway? Oh, yeah. We’re on day 11 in a hotel–the third, and with some luck, last hotel we’ll be in before we get to go home. Home. It’s still standing. I have envisioned going home about 20 times a day for the past week–but I’ve also envisioned losing our home at least that many times. And it wasn’t just my house or my neighbors’, but it was also my parents home and my sister’s home; they also have been evacuated. My sister returned home last night, only to be startled back into evacuation status again this morning. Sometimes, when I’m worried about other people, my situation doesn’t seem so bad–do you find that happens to you? There are so many people who have it worse than we do–almost 800 homes lost near us. That is astounding. Heartbreaking. That we need to stay away from our place for a few days more–or a few weeks more seems trivial in comparison. People, though, are still so kind. Plenty of people checking up on us, offering housing, asking, “Is there anything you need?” Well, I’m not sure what it is we need, short of being able to go home. We need that. But is it insensitive to say that when surrounded by so much loss? Anyway, thinking too much about it makes my head hurt. Work helps as a distraction, but I’ve a case of fuzzy brain–I hope simply the result of the stress of pandemic concerns and wildfires (oh, and my daughter-in-law’s totaled car on Friday–thanks for that anonymous truck driver on Hwy 17), makes everything feel like it’s working in slow motion. I’m actually surprised that I’ve been able to write this down since every time I’ve looked at a screen in the past couple of days, it makes me nauseous. There definitely isn’t a poem in me at the moment. More like some Five Guys french fries and Dr. Pepper.

Sometimes, I have soda. It’s not the end of the world, but it definitely feels closer. Hope you’re safe and well.