Tuesday, April 25, 2017

UGONANY #AtoZChallenge

Notes about this challenge:
The A to Z Challenge is to write to the letters of the alphabet in order, one a day each day in April, except on Sundays.
To find more A to Z Challenge blog posts, click on any A to Z Challenge link I've made in this post. Read through the comment links on that page and see what interests you.  Read.  Comment. Spread the love of our alphabet around!
If you are commenting here, please include your post's link so that I can return the visit easily.  I'd like to visit your site, if you don't mind!
If you want to see where I've visited, click on A to Z Challenge in the tab at the top and it will take you to a padlet of links.  If you want to see yours there, visit me.  If you are doing the A to Z Challenge, I'll visit you and link you. 
  PS:  If I don't get to your site today or this week, for a visit, my post today explains WHY!
It is also Tuesday's Slice of Life at Two Writing Teachers where there are more links to snippets of life from teachers.


You Go Nannie!

We are moving this week:
madly dusting,
quietly fussing,
silently cussing;
Decluttering
while recluttering,
sputtering
 muttering
puttering;
Wrapping up my life,
taking pieces of it and
giving it away
to other lives -
We don’t need mugs for
every day of the year;
We don’t need towels for
every possible extremity
or calamity,
We don’t need ten chairs
in our kitchen of two bodies.
We will bring
just what we need
and nothing more,
Except maybe my mandolin
that sits by the door
that I still can’t play.
But maybe
in this new place
its mellow tones will grace
that shore.

by Donna JT Smith

I had this plate, too.  It has the same message.










 

By Sunday night, we should be in Friendship.  We have spend the past 18 years in Georgetown.  When we first got here it was an adventure living out on an island just a few miles from the beach.  Every night coming home from school, I crossed over three bridges to get to our island home we had built.  I got to see what vacationers see when they come:  the beauty in the rock ledges, the tall white pines, the rivers, the sandy beaches.  I got to see what the vacationers don't see: the inside of the little school, the town transfer station, the wildness of the beach in winter, the grounded lobster boats wintering on shore, the lobstermen repairing traps and painting buoys, the April day of the osprey couple's return from Jamaica, the departure of the osprey in fall.
When we first moved here there was a family of moose we might encounter at night as they strolled along the edge of our dark (no streetlights) road, browsing on the young birch and other wonderful greens.  Sometimes one would look in our big picture window to see what we were doing.
There were terrible mosquitoes, wasps and ticks, too.  But over the years, all these creatures seem to have disappeared for the most part.  No more moose stroll through, and the biting insect population seems to have gone down.
We had no squirrels for many years, but for the past five years there have been a couple of gray squirrels, a couple of reds (one with a partial tail), and some ground squirrels that have all helped tear up the blue tarp that covered our old lawn tractor to use the lining for their nests.
The deer and turkeys are plentiful and entertain us as they pass through, finding things to eat.  It is a safe spot for them, and they don't mind too much the barking of the dog.  The owls that visit us sit still and watch our comings and goings.  Once when my grandchildren were here, a pair of them sat in a tree branch over our driveway.
We had a grouse who came to visit and stay for a season.  He'd appear each time we came out of the house to follow us around the yard, tug on our pant legs and chase the car down the driveway each time we left the house. 

We said good-bye to our church family on Sunday, though we will be there off and on for special days or when family visits there.  But the church is over two hours away from us now.  We began going when my father died and my mother had no way to get there.  We drove her every Sunday from 2001 to 2003.  And when she died, we kept on going - over an hour's drive each way every Sunday.

I will miss all of this.  I won't be sitting by the same window as I type my blog, create my poems, paint my world.  My drive will still have the ocean, but not the same look.  I'll still have a chair by a window, but there will be no deer, turkeys or owls.  Seagulls will replace the owls.  I don't know what new moments we will make in our new home, but I'm sure they will be ones we could never have dreamed of.  It will be good, too.  Just different.

We bought this new house five and a half years ago. We've been slowly having work done on this "House with the Wrinkled Wall".  It is almost finished becoming a house that can become our home.

Retirement.
It has fully set in.

U - Go - Nannie.
You go.

What will be next?


10 comments:

  1. I'm both happy for you, and hear the poignant goodbye too, Donna. It's hard to leave, yet that new place you've been sharing about seems quite wonderful, too. New memories to come!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I go from teary to excited (and excited to teary) very easily these past few days. I'm sure it will be a very good adventure in this chapter. You've been here through it all, too. Lots of changes for you, too. Good things will still keep coming!

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  2. Wow, big changes on the horizon. I can only imagine how emotional it is to make a transition like this. I just LOVED the poem. A few summers ago, I helped my mom clear out her independent living big apartment to go into an assisted living studio--no longer having the capacity to entertain was a big loss to her. She had to just walk away from cabinets full of kitchen equipment, since she now gets all her meals in a dining room. End of an era.
    Laurel's Leaves: U = Unexpected

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. New chapters are usually exciting, if not fun! We shall see!

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  3. I can't say I would miss having fewer mosquitoes, but fewer moose and other animals - those I would miss. You're doing well for moving during the middle of A-Z, excellent decluttering. We've been trying to minimize too. The island you lived on sounds romantic. Maui Jungalow

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's a pretty nice area - maybe even romantic! - where we are located, as will the next one be!

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  4. Hope you have a successful moving experience. Moving can be such a chore. It's something I haven't had to do for nearly 20 years now. If we do it again we will definitely need help as there is a lot that we couldn't move on our own. Sounds like you have had pretty decent prep time--but still...

    Arlee Bird
    Tossing It Out

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's a complex move, as we do a switch to a house that isn't completed. But we've never been ones to be scared off by a challenge. Our house today is in total chaos as we sort into piles. Goodwill, yard sale, children, trash, new house... where will each item go? Our new house is lots smaller, so most things won't be moving with us.

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  5. So you have made time to write as you are MOVING? Incredible! (And it makes me ashamed for my own lack of writing...)What a wonderful memorial to your old home and its beautiful surroundings. It is so hard to give up the things we love. However, new adventures, landscapes, and loves await you! So exciting. And you will "Go with God" to this new place, and that's the most thrilling part of all! Bon Voyage and Bonne Chance!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I am still writing. Each morning I start and see if I can finish. If I need to finish, I just write when I want a break from the chaos!
      It will be good, lots of changes come with this move. But we are ready to see what it brings.

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