Yesterday morning I awoke, determined to put my shirt on with the front side facing forward, unlike yesterday when the shirt I wore backwards indicated the nature of my day. I gave a determined look at my cedar chest, and decided I was going to jump in with both feet.

My grandmother gave me the cedar chest when I graduated from high school. She and I walked from her apartment above the bakery about a half a block to Brenner’s Furniture Store. There, we looked at their selection of cedar chests.

I believe cedar chests have gone the way of the raptor dinosaurs. In fact, I don’t ever hear anyone talk about preparing their daughters’ hope chests. For that’s what it was. It was designed to be filled with mementoes of my life, and things to bring into my marriage. Maybe it was a midwestern thing.

To be perfectly frank, I never really liked my cedar chest. Fifty years ago, when I picked out my chest that would hold all of my treasures, dark wood and leather were all the rage. The chest indicates the dictates of the time. Somewhere along the line, the leather top was damaged. As I recall, I set a hot iron on it. Not good. The dark wood is a magnet for dust.

Anyway, true to its purpose, it holds 50 years of precious memories. Included with the chest, my grandmother gave me a couple of sets of pillow cases onto which she had crocheted beautiful lace. She also gave me several pairs of booties and a couple of baby sweaters in neutral colors of green and yellow that she knitted. My son never wore a single one of the sweaters because the sweater arms were disturbingly long and the booties would have fit a 5-year-old. Plus, in 1980, when Court was born, babies weren’t really wearing booties. They were wearing Baby Jordans.

But I was determined yesterday to open up the treasure chest and rid it of some of its contents.

The smell of cedar hit my nose immediately. The chest was filled to the brim with memories. I was determined to be brutal. But as I perused its contents, I was surprised at the number of tears I shed. I had forgotten everything that I had put in there over the years. Stupid things. For example, I saved every one of Court’s report cards from elementary school. (Hmm, I don’t remember him having those not-so-good grades in conduct.) I also saved every class photo from the same years. I have his high school diploma, along with his graduation cap. Oh, and his cub scout uniform, still stiff as ever.

I’m hoping he doesn’t read the post today, because I plan on bringing all of those things over to his house sometime in the next few days. He may toss everything, and I wouldn’t blame him. However, I don’t want to make that decision.

I did decide to toss the yellowed newspaper clipping and faded banner from my days as the Sweetheart Queen of my high school. I threw away graduation announcements from my nieces and nephews. I glanced at and then discarded cards from Bill’s and my wedding.

Buried deep in the bottom of the chest was a sad-looking silver cup with Court’s date of birth engraved on it, its uselessness apparent because it was smashed flat as a pancake. It took me a minute, but then I remembered it came from his great grandmother on his father’s side, a person he never met. In fact, I never met her myself. I hope I remembered to send a thank you note.

I worked for several hours, and then grew too weary to continue. Memories can make you tired. I will continue tomorrow.

Yesterday was a crazy day. To illustrate just how crazy our day was, I will admit that for half of the day I had my shirt on backwards. Wait, that only shows how crazy I am. To be fair to myself, there is no label or any identifying features that indicate front from back. Oh, except for the fact that the back is higher than the front. You would have thought that the fact that I kept tugging on the top of the shirt, pulling it away from my neck because it felt like I was being choked, would have given me an indication of a problem. It did, but not until half the day was half over.

We were at our new apartment by 9 a.m., where we were measuring walls and counters, and taking pictures. Our custom design person was very nice. Except that she didn’t point out that my shirt was on backwards.

In the middle of our crazy day, we made another stop at Apple Store. We are becoming such familiar figures at the Apple Store that I’m pretty sure we have our own coffee mugs back in the employee lounge. You might recall that Bill and I worked together and managed to get first his Apple watch locked and then his iPhone locked. We were able to unlock the watch, but the iPhone was seriously LOCKED. Like, if-you-try-that-same-password-one-more-time-you-idiot,-the-iPhone-will-explode-and-kill-you-and-anyone-in-the-same-room-with-you LOCKED.

Of course, in order to get it unlocked, you have to prove you are the actual owner of the phone. The four or five different Apple support people with whom we dealt over the past week kept promising us that they believed us, but we had to prove it to people more important than them. And less human. We could have had Pope Francis vouching for us and it wouldn’t have mattered. We must resemble Bonnie and Clyde. (I wonder if Pope Francis forgets his password. Maybe he uses the same password for everything: ihatemypointyhat.)

I will tell you that the Apple support people couldn’t have been nicer. Including the one woman who I spoke to on the telephone. She was sure she had it figured out, and when it didn’t work, she nearly cried for me. I think she might have resigned from Apple minutes later.

The good news is that they were finally able to get his iPhone unlocked and now both his phone and his watch are up and running. Anyone who has tried and failed to get ahold of him in the last week can try once again.

We ended our day at the audiologist, where Bill once again didn’t disappoint. When his audiologist asked him why he was there, Bill, with a straight face, answered, “What?” He has given that same answer to every doctor who has ever given him a hearing test. He thinks he’s hilarious. He’s not only Clyde, but also Jerry Seinfeld. The result? Next time you see him, he will be wearing hearing aids. And still thinking he’s Jerry Seinfeld.

The rest of our week is similar to yesterday. But at least Bill will be able to tell time.

Fishy
Yesterday Kaiya, Mylee, and Cole went to the movies. We started our afternoon my favorite way: eating sushi. Despite the hit my billfold takes, there is nothing I enjoy more than eating sushi with those three. We always go to the same place, and the proprietor knows us by now. He should know our order by heart, except that Kaiya changes it up once in a while. Yesterday she surprised me by ordering something called masago in addition to her regular veggie rolls (no asparagus). I had never heard of it. Masago is sushi made from the roe of the capelin fish, which is apparently a cold-water ocean fish. I tried a bite of the roe, and was unimpressed. Cole, however, ate much of one of them (she ordered two). As long as Mylee has plenty of green mussels, she is a happy camper. I eat my yellowtail hand roll and sit back and watch the food disappear.

Gru
Following sushi, we went to see the movie The Rise of Gru. I am embarrassed to tell you that I had never seen a minion movie, not even Despicable Me. I knew what a minion was because I don’t live in a cave. I had received two reviews of the movie — one person loved it and one person hated it. I fall in the middle. I love Steve Carrel and Alan Arkin, so I loved hearing their voices. The minions got on my nerves just a bit. Still, I admit that I laughed out loud in a number of places, and Cole thought it was very funny. A wobbly thumbs up from this reviewer.

Tech Troubles
At this point in time, neither Bill’s iPhone or Apple Watch are working. We have an appointment this afternoon with Apple to try and get the problem resolved. I have been to the Apple Store twice and on the phone once in an effort to get him back up and running. I hope this appointment today solves the problem. In the meantime, if it takes the 30 days they are threatening it might take, I will be buying Bill a burner phone, just like the drug dealers and the murderers.

For Sale
There are so many things that we won’t be able to take with us when we move, and some make me sadder than others. I haven’t played my piano for years, and yet it makes me sad to have to give it up. It seems, by the way, that no one wants a piano these day. If anyone has tips, it would come free as long as someone would haul it away. Oh, and definitely have it tuned.

Ciao.

A little over thirty years ago, Bill and I moved into our new home. It had taken a bit of time to find just the right kind of home that would meet both of our needs. I wanted a big kitchen where I could prepare and serve wonderful meals to our family. He wanted a two-car garage (three-car garages were nearly unheard of for middle-class Americans in those days). I wanted a lot of light coming through big windows. He wanted what he called something special. “I don’t know what that is,” he would say, “but I’ll know it when I see it.

He was right. He recognized immediately that our big back yard was special. I envisioned our kids — and then our grandkids — playing in that yard. Maybe throwing the football. Maybe hitting soft balls, barely missing those big windows.

We bought our house, and then when it came time to move, I left town. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t run away. I had a work commitment out of town. It didn’t matter because Bill and his kids moved us into our house while I was gone. When I got back to Denver, it was to our new house. They had put everything together except my kitchen. I will tell you that they did a surprisingly good job. In fact, I don’t think I changed very many things over our 30 years in the house.

Day before yesterday, Bill and I signed a commitment to buy into the Wind Crest community. After looking at a number of different apartments, we finally landed on the one that felt like it was meant to be our home…..

That’s not our furniture, of course. The apartment is staged to give potential residents an idea of how the apartment looks when it’s furnished. As you can see, it has the big windows that provide am abundance of light, something that is very important to me. I was very busy looking around and didn’t take many photos. My bad. But we are invited to return at any time to take measurements and get ideas on how we want the place to reflect Bill and Kris.

It’s got two bedrooms and two bathrooms. There is quite a bit of closet space, and room to build more shelves. The apartment is 1,200 square feet, about the size of our AZ home, including the area in which Jen lives. As such, we are certain the the smaller size will not only be fine, but even welcome. When Bill asks me if I know where he left his phone, I don’t have to send him up a flight of stairs to look in our bedroom. Instead, he can take 20 steps or so to look for his phone.

It will take approximately 60 days to close the deal, so we’re on the clock. I’m very thankful that Wind Crest provides people to help us downsize and move.

And speaking of gratitude, I so happy that both Bec and Jen were with us when we looked at the apartments and made the decision. Their advice and suggestions were very helpful.

We have some big changes ahead. But change is good. Isn’t it?

Bill and I made our decision to sell the house and move into a progressive senior complex quite suddenly. Something transpired that made it perfectly clear that it was time to sell this house that we love so much and move to someplace where there is no maintenance, lots of support, potential for a ton of friends, and a smaller abode with no stairs.

Because of the quick decision, I had very little time to anticipate what it was going to be like to clean out 30 years worth of life. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that there would be a lot of things that needed to be given to Goodwill. I was well aware that we had collected too much stuff over the years and that there would be a lot to pack up.

What I didn’t anticipate — and would have had I had more time to mentally prepare — was how painful it would be to get rid of certain things that in my heart of hearts I know shouldn’t make the cut. I’m not talking about the items about which I’ve been moaning for years that no one will want — my china, my furniture, my glassware, etc. I’m talking about little things that I have collected over my 30 years of marriage. Hell, over my 68 years of life. The little knick knacks I have purchased during my travels. The Christmas ornaments that Court made out of cotton balls and pipe cleaners when he was a kid. My wedding dress. How in the world does someone give up their wedding dress? The photo albums. Oh Lord, the photo albums.

I have argued in the past that while keeping digital photos takes up less room, they’re just as difficult to sort through unless you have a better photo management system than do I. But yesterday, as I made my way, piece by piece, through some of the stuff in our basement, I came across four or five photo albums. One of them held mostly photos of my early college years. I would label them in the back except that I mostly don’t remember the names of the girls with whom I shared a dorm floor. I could probably bear putting that album in the trash. It even has those little triangle-shaped picture holders that have glue on the back. However, one held some photos of my sibs and me as children. It also held photos of Court as a child. Another held photos of this house when we first moved in. There was a tree in the front yard that I barely remember. There were juniper bushes that Bill trimmed for twenty-some years before we realized juniper bushes SCREAMED 1972. Those I can’t give up. But where will they go?

Maybe tomorrow I’ll tackle my cedar chest. I know there are things in there that can go away. I could fill up the spaces with photo albums and my wedding dress. Then I just have to figure out how I fit a circa-1972 cedar chest into our 1200 square foot apartment.

This seems to be more difficult than I thought. At least I am more emotional than I thought.

When we sat down for Mass yesterday, Bill picked up the missal to familiarize himself with the readings. He leaned over and whispered to me, “Today’s gospel is one of your favorites.” I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or serious.

Really, he was being both. It is one of my favorites, but also one that makes me squirm. It was St. Luke’s version of the story of Martha and Mary. Jesus says we’re all supposed to be Marys, but every time I hear the gospel, I know in my heart of hearts that I am very often more like Martha.

“Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving?” Martha asks Jesus. Apparently not, because he tells her Mary’s made the better decision to sit around and listen. That’s when I always want Martha to say, “Perhaps, but just who’s supposed to make the hummus, hmmm? And I suppose you think the wine will pour itself.”

The Old Testament reading and the Gospel were both about hospitality. In the first reading from the Book of Genesis, we are told that three men appeared to Abraham one hot day. Abraham runs up to the three strangers and insists that they stay for dinner. He then runs into the kitchen and tells his wife Sarah to bake some rolls and make it snappy. The Bible leaves specifics out of most stories, but I am nearly certain that Sarah was thinking, “I HATE when Abe invites people to dinner without checking with me. I was just about to finish that article in the Mesopotamia Gazette and it’s the hottest day of the year. I don’t feel like baking.” The passage goes on to say that the men told Abraham that when they come back next year, Sarah will be pregnant. If she overheard, she might have thought, “Not if he keeps inviting unexpected guests that require me to bake.”

The readings made me recall two things about my grandmother. She and Gramps immigrated from Switzerland so English wasn’t their first language. She spoke really good English. However, occasionally, something would come off just a bit off. Like the time she invited her visitor into her home, and told them, “Make yourself homely.”

My second thought about Grammie was that whenever we were stressed or grieved or anxious, she would say, “You need to eat a little something.” It was her answer to difficult times. She grew up learning that hospitality was the name of the game, no matter the circumstances.

There was a time when cooking big meals for my family was a joy. I still like to cook, but I have learned that as we age, things just get a bit more difficult. I don’t know if the Bible ever tells us the ages of Martha and Mary, but maybe Mary was tired of cooking, and wanted nothing more than to listen to Jesus and hear the sound of dishes being washed in the background by her younger sister.

It’s a possibility, isn’t it?