Being busy is fine, but this is ridiculous!

November 7, 2024

Whewww. Taking care of my little homestead on my own is proving to be time consuming. I've been in autumn leaf hell for the past several weeks. It's me against them, and they are winning! If I didn't keep after the areas where there is grass, my entire place would be carpeted like the wooded areas. I won't mess with the wooded areas, though. The fallen leaves will feed the trees they came from, supplying nitrogen back to the soil. The leaves I chop up with mower do the same thing for the grass only faster for being cut up in smaller pieces. 

Yesterday, my cousin changed the oil in the John Deere 1023. Earlier in the week, we began to split firewood for 2025-26. That will be an ongoing project until what we have available to split is stacked. The chimney sweep has been here, and I've filled the firewood racks just inside the basement door. 

I think the fall chores are winding down. You'll note I've said nothing about getting any writing down. Heck, I haven't even had time and energy to blog and keep Between the Keys up-to-date.

And let's toss the fall time change in there. Yeah, that's fun. I'd much rather have the daylight in the afternoon. It's difficult to work in the dark. 

I tell myself I won't get any writing done if I don't sit at the computer and open the file. This is a true thing. If I'd open the file and leave it up, I'd be more likely to work on it throughout the day. Should I resolve to do better? Or should I acknowledge that Ron's death has affected me on such a deep level I have no enthusiasm for anything other than those things necessary to live through the coming winter? 

Medicating myself is not the answer. My mother suffers from Alzheimer's Disease. She is the only person I know of in our family to fall victim to this malady. How is this possible? I don't know. What I do know is she took anti-depressants for years. I will not. I will plow forward as best I can at this time in my life. 

I knew this first year would be a time of adjustment. I just didn't expect I would be so completely swamped by autumn leaves. 

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KC Kendricks
My home on the web- Between the Keys: 
http://kckendricks.blogspot.com
Visit my bookshelf at: 
https://kckendricks.blogspot.com/p/bookshelf.html

Social media links:

twitter.com/kckendricks

facebook.com/kckendricks

Snips and clips on my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@KCKendricks

Life through the eyes of my black Lab, Greenbrier Smokey Deuce: deucesday.blogspot.com

My country life at The Hideaway/Holly Tree Manor: hollytreemanor.blogspot.com

KC Kendricks, Between the Keys, autumn leaves, LGBT gay romance, widowhood, homestead, m/m romance, a writer's life, time management, rural living, country lifestyle

Do I feel the way I'm supposed to feel?

April 27, 2024

Some dates burn themselves onto our souls. For me, March 30, 2024, is one of them. That's the day Ron died. How was I supposed to feel at his passing? How am I supposed to feel today, almost a month later? 

The late Jim Morrison (of The Doors) penned some lyrics way back in 1967, or thereabout, that seem apropos to the way I feel today. I mentioned these words in a previous post, but I can't get them out of my head. 

Strange days have found us and through their strange hours
We linger alone, bodies confused, memories misused
As we run from the day to a strange night of stone

Back in January, I thought my strange days would pass, but instead, they got stranger. My indestructible Ron, who had triumphed over every adversity, passed away. A cancer we didn't know he had took him. How am I supposed to feel about that? 

Getting in touch with myself is on my mind. Who will I be now that Ron is gone? Being single is something I've done before. Being a "widow" is not. What's a widow supposed to do? WHO is a widow supposed to be? Who am I after thirty years of being Ron's queen? And he did treat me like a queen. He and I alone together were people no one else got to see and we liked it that way. I will never be that woman again. She is gone, already faded from memory.

My future is a blank canvas. I can paint it with all the colors of my choosing without heeding the suggestions of others. Who I will be is up to me. Society will view me as a widow, as partner-less, but that's not the full story. Ron will always be with me. His counsel was timeless, ageless, and I'm only physically alone. 

Should I sit home and mourn him? He constantly encouraged me to go with friends to those places his disability prevented him from accompanying me. He wanted me to experience life even when he could not. He was not a jealous man, but a generous one. 

I can't be the grieving widow who sits home alone. I may become one of those crazy widows with multiple pets, however. No, I will be home when I want to be home, and out in the world when I want to be out in the world. My vision of "widowhood" allows me to be who I want to be and do what I want to do. Those are the decisions I need to make, day-by-day, and they will be my own. 

Is that the way I'm supposed to feel? It's the way I DO feel.

    _*_*_*_*_*_*_

 KC Kendricks

My home on the web- Between the Keys: 

http://kckendricks.blogspot.com

Visit my bookshelf at: 

https://kckendricks.blogspot.com/p/bookshelf.html

Social media links:

Life through the eyes of my black Lab, Greenbrier Smokey Deuce: deucesday.blogspot.com

My country life at The Hideaway/Holly Tree Manor: hollytreemanor.blogspot.com

Snips and clips on my YouTube channel: KC Kendricks Between the Keys

twitter.com/kckendricks

facebook.com/kckendricks

KC Kendricks, Rayne Forrest, Between the Keys, widowhood, death of spouse, country lifestyle, rural living, grief, m/m romance, contemporary LGBT gay romance, romance fiction, Kindle romance