I called him a piecemeal salty motherfucking timbit and he got mad. I mean, come on.

LOL 

Sorry, I went AWOL again. I still don't have access to anything other than this page, and I am not online much at all. The news sucks, the weather is hot one minute and cold the next and I do as much as I feel up to when it's cold. My allergies went crazy this week and so I got some allergy pills that I'm not allowed to take and cut them in half and took one a day, just to take the edge off the constantly runny nose and sneezing. My face is pink and raw around my nose from the constant wiping on tissues, hankerchieves and Ben's shirt sleeve, and Lochlan has a perpetual worried expression that doesn't leave his face when he sleeps even. 

I backslid a whole lot with the anxiety this week too. The sleep doesn't get better. The fear won't leave completely, just enough to function and I tried to throw myself into working away at the landscaping (we're changing some areas to make more room to grow food, of course. Full-on commune now, thank you very much) and it was hot and too difficult but I made enough headway to feel accomplished and then the mercury gave me the excuse of not finishing anyway, and PJ gave me a covid test just in case it wasn't allergies and my nose was so sore and it hurt so much that I snapped at him and then the look on his face made me cry. I know it's not his fault and he knows I didn't mean it but if I've going to break their hearts it shouldn't be over something this dumb. 

In any case, I am here and the allergies seem to have tapered off a little or maybe the pills last longer than I thought. I am sleepy and hungry and agitated and I wish it was fall but maybe not and this weekend is a long weekend for Canada Day but we're only going to finish some more landscaping and shop for Henry's upcoming twenty-first birthday. I can't even believe it. 

I also want to take PJ to the fancy gelato place in town for a special treat since he's God's gift to everyone but honestly if you shove a giant sharp q-tip up someone's nose you have to be prepared to be sworn at (exact words are in the title, I didn't choose them, they chose me). It's a given.

Melted lip gloss.

What are you thinking about, Peanut? 

We are at a lake I don't know the name of, pretending we are residents at the campground even though we've just walked up the road from the asphalt parking lot where the camper is parked with blocks against the tires for the next five days as we work a show four hours from home, but a lucrative show with last day bonuses, meant to keep everyone from bailing as we are paid each night at ten. We've heard rumours that the bonus might be a full days pay and that would be amazing, as the camper needs tires and Lochlan needs better food. I can live on sugar and fresh air but he works hard in the sun and needs the calories. Seventeen year old boys are walking appetites. I've never seen them eat so much as they do now. I wonder how much he will eat by the time he is twenty, though that's so far away from now.

I'm wondering why they call it a glove box. How that kind of label would persist when I've never seen a grownup reach over and tuck their gloves into a special locked case in the dashboard. Like, if you're wearing gloves then it's winter and you'll need to leave them on until the heater warms up the car. Unless that's why and once it's warm you put them in the box. Just because they might get lost otherwise?

His laugh rings out across the water. That is what you're thinking about? 

Well, what are you thinking about?

Where we should go next. Do you want to stay out?

Yes, at least until the beaches are empty at home. 

What if we went really far?

How far?

New York far. 

I don't know where that is. 

It's a few hours past Cape Cod. You just keep driving. 

Oh. That's REALLY far. We're going to drive? 

Maybe. 

If you don't need the glove box since it's summer can I use it for my lip gloss?

Sure.It will still melt in there though.

No. Hot.

Not going outside today. Even though the pool is set to a refreshingly cool temperature, the air conditioning in the house is too nice to leave. I am hot, though I did find bras yesterday. FIVE of them. All cotton, all comfortable and god it sucks to be a woman. I mean, I could just whip off my shirt and wander around but that's distracting. Hilariously I'm not wearing any of them, instead opting for a very spare, very revealing cotton sundress with ties that has a halter and an open back. Which means everyone touches my back and makes me shiver. 

Dinner will be ice cubes and lettuce leaves.

Well, shit.

I don't think I'm staying on the new-new meds. After three short days I'm waking up with a terrible headache that takes half the day to go away and it takes me all day just to wake up, and I'm on half a dose. The doctor told me dosages go up to 400mg. Hahahahahaha. I'd be in a coma on that prescription. My pills are 5 mg and I would sleep all day. I hit snooze four times before Lochlan got annoyed, mostly because my phone cord is threaded under his pillow so I can have my phone close since I wake up first. 

Or rather, I used to. I think those ones are not for me. The hypomania is exceedingly productive, the sleep isn't real if it's drugged but if I get super-worn down I can pop one at night, right? Which is what they told me not to do. Also holy shit they make my legs go like a marathon runner winning in their dreams. So no to that. The hangover and exhaustion and weird fog isn't going to fly for this poor sleeper. On to the next idea, which Lochlan says will be a good head start across the lawn and a line of boys with tranquilizer guns disguised as Nerf water guns. 

Cool. 

In other news I think I found a bra. Hahaha.

Top heavy.

Ben and I had a swim race today. The rule is three laps across the longest part of the pool and no touching the bottom during said laps. Winner gets to choose a sexual favour. The game is rigged and I cannot keep up with someone who is almost two feet taller than I am with arms the length of my legs. I also have a lot of strength but am a surprisingly weak swimmer and so guess what I get to do tonight?

Maybe get my revenge with teeth. Maybe no teeth. I haven't decided. 

I ran out today for a couple more errands, I almost need the reassurance that I can still drive and I can, I just concentrate a little more fiercely so that I don't zone out, and I keep the cold air on and the music off. Supposedly once I get used to this medication after a few weeks things will be easier on it. So far so good though. 

And I'm looking for summer bras today online. Which, well, always a treat since the sizing is so fucked up. I have my measurements and they aren't helping. Nothing is actually all cotton or all organic or bamboo and it's all synthetic or has uncomfortable looking straps or weird colours and I'm here refusing to give up. Caleb offered to send a shopper out. I told him I'm fine, it's buying a bra, it's easy and he just laughed because I can make anything difficult. I also reminded him that he does not need to provide for me and he said of course he does, and not to be ridiculous. 

That's my middle name. Ridiculous. But I am picky about clothing, especially uncomfortable clothing and now I'm wondering if I should take them up on the offers of surgery and have a reduction so that I can skip wearing bras forever. 

Except I won't and we both know it.

Also I heard the best description today of a book I was wanting to read, which I won't name here because I'm on the fence now, because the description called it struggle porn and I am still laughing.

I'll be over here online shopping if you need me.

Eighteen months.

A weird first day of summer, to be sure. 

Woke up very early but not early enough. I rushed to do my morning chores and then headed out for a long-overdue dental checkup and cleaning. Surprise. I have a huge cavity. Nice. Getting it fixed in a week. They did a gazillion xrays. I will glow in the dark tonight. I let my insurance pay for most of it and then I headed down the mall to the grocery store to stock up  on caffeine-free cans of pop and ice cream sandwiches (HA DID I MENTION THE CAVITY) for the BOYS for the summer weekend to come. 

When I left the grocery store and was loading my Jeep an older lady was staring at my tattoos which makes me somewhat irritable but whatever. She got into her car and backed out without looking, into a vehicle that was passing behind her. WOW. Huh. It's like karma or something. I manifested that moment. Or maybe I didn't but it teaches a valuable lesson about rudely gawking at people. 

Then I unpacked all the groceries, checked the garden and drove out to see Ruth. There was nowhere good to park and I finally shoehorned in a spot just off the main road and walked back to her little neighborhood. We hung out with her cat and watched the sun play off her numerous plants and then I decided to join rush hour traffic home. Hilarious. A long day, but very doable by my new completely legal drugs that finally work or something, cross your fingers. No mania but a lot of weird punctual-panic and eh, I'll get used to it eventually or it will go away. 

And now we're having dinner and then some ice cream sandwiches because yeah. First day of summer. Maybe a late-night swim in the pool. Maybe a backflip off the cliff. Maybe nothing. Maybe bed at eight. I don't know yet but I am tired.

Seroquel Tuesdays.

Okay, the title is catchy to my brain, and this is only one medication of many I am on. I have three doctors, four specialists on tap (globally) and a host of psychoanalysts, psychiatrists and well-meaning boys who are well-versed in all of this to look after me so please, no armchair comments since you don't know the full regimen. 

Or story frankly. But this one is the tranquilizer gun. This one is new because Bridget was out on the roof cleaning windows. Bridget was painting trim on a shed at eight at night. She organized the inside of every drawer and cabinet and closet and brushed and trimmed the dog and made dental appointments for everyone and hauled out fans and spring jackets and cleaned boots and sneakers and baked cookies and froze chopped green onions for the rest of the year and-

Right? I'm so manic it's wonderful. So productive. Fucking crazy. Hypo, unfortunately and I'm glad I got it all done and then I outed myself and now come more pills to stabilize everything in the in-between. We want a perfect blend of less anxiety and also less frenetic activity so I will keep you posted.

That or I'll be asleep facedown in the grass for the rest of the week in which case everyone has promised they will bring me inside or something. They'll probably use me for lawn dart or paintball practice first though. I would. 

(OMG, I'm KIDDING. Kind of. I'm very nervous to take this. Wish me luck. Also wish me sleep. There is never any sleep.)

My army, their world.

I just wanted to drop in and proclaim a Happy Father's Day to all of the honorary dads here on the point. 

To all of the hunkles who dropped potential one-night-stands, drunken ragers and epic seats at NHL games to come and play Speak and Spell with Ruth and Henry, to the men who had their hair, nails and makeup done, complete with photoshoots by Ruth and who tore up a large percentage of the backyard when requested to by Henry so that the Tonka Trucks could DO THEIR JOBS, who followed boyfriend new-drivers at a safe distance (only the first couple of times) and who have waited up with me when the kids went to parties. To these hunkles who insisted their brains and muscles actually came from the carrots, beets and green beans the kids didn't want to eat, but did and then spend thousands of miles and dollars over the years taking us out for ice cream since somebody ate all their beans and now gets a reward.

To the men who gave the kids' friends the third degree but played chaperone at pool parties and junior high dances and to my army who provided an easy, impenetrable wall of protection for me and my children when I (and they) needed it most and who still tell endless stories always with a good theme that teaches a specific lesson and to the ones who taught them Pythagorean therum when mom had given up in tears because 'they do it differently now', thank you. 

Happy Father's day. Thank you for loving the children as though they were your very own, for keeping them safe, for keeping them happy and entertained, and for teaching them how to be good people and for keeping to my rules, when I said one bowl of ice cream a day was enough, and you agreed even when you wanted another. Thank you will never be enough to repay you all for this twenty-plus year commitment to two kids who are literally the luckiest on earth to have you all. And their mom, who is the luckiest of all to have you, and know you have my back.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Take out kings.

A good Saturday is when you sleep in until nine (I only actually slept from five until nine), get up, have a hot shower, have McDonalds coffee for breakfast, buy a bunch of crystals, a new pair of Birkenstock Boston clogs (black leather, on sale since it's summer for $130) and then manage to mow a third of the backyard before they realized it was me, then they finished the mowing and we went to our favourite Indian restaurant for dinner, where the owner's son not only told us we deserve to be there but I ate my body weight in pakoras, keema naan and chickpeas and now I am in pain and really full and damn, what a good day.

On a bed of rosemary and lemon balm. Like a chicken breast. Just wrap me in foil and throw me on the grill.

I had a very bad dizzy spell at the grocery store this morning, between the muffins and the deli counter. I gripped the handle of the cart very hard and it passed as quickly as it came on. So I of course ignored it and then later I am standing at the top of the concrete steps, on the side that is open to the garden below and not on the railing side, and it happened again! This time I wavered mightily and managed to save myself from falling into my precious rosemary and oregano bushes but it was a close one and Lochlan watched it happen and I mentioned the earlier incident and now he won't let me do anything at all. 

He was already miffed at Caleb's hope that I might change my mind and extremely chuffed at my insistence that Lochlan and Bridget aren't a decision or an option, we're a brand. A lifestyle choice. Two kids running headlong into bad decisions and epic romance through so many decades now we are practically cojoined. 

I was hoping I'd have more than a few days of you to myself, though. He looks concerned. Me too. I've been fighting some awful side effects with so much success lately. This is not something I need. After a quick trip up to the house to check my blood pressure (129/91) he ordered me to do nothing so I called Daniel who brought his polishes over and now I have confetti glitter fingernails to go with my blue toes. 

I want to look good in death. 

Or something. 

Lochlan keeps finding ways to check on me and it's sweet. Ben is sleeping the rainy day away so he isn't good at keeping watch under those circumstances and I really just want to help make dinner and then go to sleep for a few hours. Maybe an Ambien but I probably won't be allowed to have one in case it simply hastens this slow death of mine. Maybe he will allow it so I get some sleep for once and live to see another day. Cast your vote and we shall see. 

Just kidding. You only get a vote if you live in my house.

Very important, useless conversations.

I have been back now for over twenty-four hours and I've caught up on laundry and boys and stories and even painted my toenails robin's-egg-blue and have all my plans ready to devote to a long weekend full of firing and glazing and firing and maybe some gardening, though I popped out today and planted more tomatoes, peas and sunflowers everywhere I could fit them in, so there isn't much left to do now but wait. 

The brief getaway was much needed and though it was short we accomplished so much. And no I wasn't drunk. Borjomi is just a brand of sparkling water and it's oddly addictive and I can't buy it here so I get it when I can. It's also a place, where the water comes from but I didn't have time to go there, sadly. 

I had a debriefing by Sam and then by August too, I ripped out all of my earrings (every last one) and I'm having my medications adjusted again. We are slow and steady, though I had two panic attacks this week and I couldn't get control of either so odds are more medication will be in my future. Chemical Bridget is a necessity, not a preference, trust me. Things were getting weird and I did this willingly. As long as I hear the right reasons I will agree with you. As long as it's for the right reasons I will agree to it. 

I still do not have my phone, I don't have email. I don't have television. I do have the ipod for music and I have my fifteen puzzle and my fidget ring (it's from myconquering and it's the best. I actually have five from here. Not an ad, just a rec) and I'm not for want of things to do, I'm just trying to take it easier than normal. Apparently I go way too hard. 

Ha. 

Me? 

Of course I do. That's how I roll. And if anything, I fight the lethargy and low-key motion sickness by going super hard and that's where I falter. It's just a bad idea. But not doing anything seems worse. 

I went for a walk with Caleb. Down to the sea where I couldn't hear him all that well but I tried. It was better as we walked back toward the stairs so that's when we had our brutally honest heart to heart and we're going to take it one day at a time and see how things go. 

For how long? 

I don't know. A few months, maybe a few years. 

Do you want me to leave?

Do you want to leave?

If you want me to I will. 

No, but I understand if there's nothing to stay for. 

My friends are here. You are still here. In whatever capacity, it's better than being away from you. 

This isn't a healthy response. 

You sound like you just left August's chair. 

I did, matter of fact but that's not the point. What we never go back to what we had? What if I simply move on?

Then I will wait for you until I die. And then beyond. 

Will you haunt me like your brother does? 

Yes. But probably more often. Would that be okay with you? 

Caleb-

Don't worry. I'm not the type, in case you're worried. 

I nod, suddenly unable to speak for the lump in my throat. 

You do care. 

Of course, I choke out.

Then I will stay here for the rest of my days. In case you change your mind.

Yeah, whatever. I ran.

 I'm so tired of hanging on
To everything I thought we had. I was so wrong
There's nothing left here to fight for, we've both been bled dry
Stop wasting time, yours and mine, cause God knows we tried

I don't wanna hold you back anymore, no
And you don't wanna live with the guilt of leaving me behind, oh
You know I'd be lying if I said that we were meant to be
So let's just move on and say goodbye to you and me

It was after I choked back a third glass of Borjomi that I looked at Caleb level, eye to eye and said I needed a break, that it started now. That he could fly home without us, that we were going for a few days in Montauk before returning to the West Coast, and that he didn't have to try hard anymore because there will be nothing to try for. And my heart was breaking the whole time because all I can picture is him falling backwards off a building in slow motion but that isn't a likely end to this love story and instead I know he will shore up his resources and begin a new campaign the moment I get home.

So here I am, home at last and I haven't seen him yet. Haven't seen him since Brighton Beach where I found the best way to spend all that money (on rent control of all things), that he could put something good out into the world and keep it that way and we would call it even. The most recent thing, that is. Not the whole of our history. That's a different weight all together and it's not going to be fixed by filling Bridget up on potatoes and sausages (oh my God SO GOOD AS ALWAYS) and I had a few furtive glances at Coney and an empty promise or two to come back in the fall and then the fairy tale slipped into the sea and real life returned. I did a favour for a friend, as it were, because I promised. 

I should have stayed away.

Harder than it seems.

My peonies started opening today and the poppies were gone in a flash. Too late, too wet for them but also they were too crowded and I had put a cage around the plant for the winter and then forgot to take it away when the growing began in earnest. It's fine. It was a small cheap plant that I was stubborn about and it's spectacular some years and ugly others. 

Like me. 

I have an enamel fifteen puzzle I can't solve. Ha. You'd think it would be easy. My fingers are down to the bone sliding tiles for hours and I can't do it. It's worth the twelve dollars and the boast that it's from the thirties. Pretty sure it will be ninety years before I can solve it, truth be told. I'll be like a hundred and forty something and blathering on about this little puzzle that fits in my dress pocket and is the stuff of kinder, gentler nightmares. 

Lochlan holds me while I sleep, which is the best way and so the nightmares have to go through him first, and so I know he is exhausted, catching some and setting them on fire before they can reach me, others he dilutes in seawater to make them less sharp, some he lets slip through his fingers gently into my brain and others he bricks into a room, covering the door and they'll never see the light of day again. He's always been so good at keeping the monsters away, there's only one he can't read, one he doesn't know what to do with. 

We're working on it though. 

I hold him while he sleeps, softening the alarm, anchoring him to me through the night so that he can find the light of day, keeping him focused and reassured that we're doing good. We're okay. We'll be fine and we'll be stronger afterward. It's been a multi-decade mantra and we are superhumans at this point but then why do I still feel like wet paper in a strong wind? 

What's written on you? 

My whole heart. 

It's such a long read. 

With no ending. 

It will be happy though. The fortune teller said so.

Twos.

Okay, phone is sorted (turned out to be a twenty-five year old extension cord that was the issue) and I spilled my coffee two days in a row, as it turns out. Actually we got take out coffee and I was distracted and brought it up to take a sip and the hole on the lid was turned around so I got no coffee in my mouth and instead it poured down my cheek, flowed across my shirt and puddled in my lap. Luckily, as always, it was already cold because as I've said before, I forget. 

I also forgot yesterday, as I was busy organizing, and I got a grocery list from Ruth and headed out this morning with Lochlan to get them all stocked up and now they have lots of groceries and are on the mend at last. Tired and easily worn out and easily discouraged but on the mend and it could have been worse. Thankfully it wasn't and so we move on to the next thing this week. 

For many reasons, the 9th through 16th is going to be a big of a challenge but we will figure it all out and technically it will be okay. I worry too much, as always. I'm kind of looking forward to it, but at the same time, a challenge, as I said. I will say more after the fact. 

Also I splurged today and bought a new dog leash. A pretty one.

Jesus, Apple.

My phone had a checkup and her battery was good (even at lowered health. I am what they call a power user) but something was wrong with my software because it would not charge past a certain low threshold. This is what I told them but they needed to prove it or something, so I was given some instructions on how to fix it and they offered to do it in store but I took my nudes and my secrets and brought everything home and did it all and guess what? We are back to one hundred percent charged. 

If only they could do the same with me. Actually, I know my hardware problems and I also know my software problems. The only thing is none of the fixes ever work. Too bad. At least my Bridget Care will never expire. 

Ben thinks it's hilarious. Especially the part where they told me if I wanted to restore from a backup that it would only take a few minutes. He understands. A restore takes a whole weekend for my phone due to the sheer expanse of music on it, and a restore for Bridget takes even longer still. 

He cupped his hands around my head this morning, pressing it against his chest (as one would when preparing to throw a football) and made a pretend twisting motion and I laughed so inappropriately Jesus (and Sam) rolled his eyes and gave up on the spot. Ben has picked me up by my head enough times to make everyone on the point cringe in fear but it's actually funny and feels kind of good. Besides, it's for a split second. Even my chiropractor didn't have an issue last time I went and had a good old crack session, which everyone swears will cure my headaches but after eleven million visits over the past twenty years, um, sorry but no. 

(The only thing that helps my headaches is mummy-sleep and Lochlan's lips pressed against my forehead for an eternity. Then I relax and breathe. It's a soothing trick he's been doing since I was eight years old and it still works. I didn't even have any really bad headaches until fourteen or sixteen or so. 

Mummy sleep is when you wrap up tightly in a sheet, arms in, swaddled, if you will and sleep hard, packed like a sardine. The temperature has to be perfect in the room, cold even, and there can be no light. It's probably like being dead except you can wake up later and go do things.) 

Ben has a third (fifth?) summer job helping some new bands dial in their sound, acting as an advocate between managers and record labels so the band doesn't get shafted, and being the tiebreaker on merch designs and single covers, something he lets us all vote on and we love every second of it. He's doing it for a percentage of a actual income, more as a favour to their fathers and to some of his friends in the business and so he is busy and in his element. With this and the eleven million other projects he is too busy to notice it takes him an extra minute or two to remember which drawer holds batteries and which holds ziploc bags and that's enough for me. He has a lot of support out there in the world and it makes me happy to see it continue even after he technically retired. Everyone needs an army. Mine is tight and local. His is scattered but more global. He would argue that we all know his army is my army too but it isn't the same.

So this morning we made an email to let the Collective vote on some items for accessories and designs  for picks and then we went for a long walk around the grounds to smell every lilac flower we could find before coming back and making camp coffee. Ben took his favourite chair and I took the hammock because nothing says good morning Sunday like feeling carsick and spilling my coffee within the first sip, right? 

I never learn.

(But you didn't want to.)

August is trading off Kelly Clarkson and Avril Lavigne playlists this morning when I come downstairs and I know damn well he has a little Christina Perri mixed in there. Just what we need, a slide back into the Jar of Hearts season that almost saw the implosion of this whole Collective. 

Avril is listenable and catchy and I think I know most of the words and I'm doing great today, thank you for asking. Sam poured us each an orange juice and we went for a walk to see the beginnings of the garden, see the beans popping up through the soil and the poppies almost opening already and the lilac scenting the whole point with their sweet smell of memories long past. Lilacs remind me of Ben though, and he is sitting in the shade on the patio with a coffee and Duncan and they are having a lovely talk. 

I handed Sam my glass and bent to weed some interlopers out of the burgeoning lavender plants and then he handed it back carefully and waited for my report. 

I am breathing again. A tenuous week, to be sure but we navigated it, no one fell overboard and kind, windy seas loom ahead. 

Ruth has covid. So does her husband. It's a good time to have it now that the wedding, honeymoon and everything else is behind them right now and they are doing okay. I was over this morning fully masked to drop off test boxes, croissants, and juice and a few bags of fruits and veggies and soups for them. 

(This is one of the reasons Caleb came back. The kids are on the other side of it though now and begin the long road of regaining their energies.)

My iPhone stopped charging again. When I wake up it's on sixty percent and after trying a week of different things she's getting a battery replacement today at Apple. I never know what to do. Should I delete the nudes first? Remove all of Ben's in progress songs? Delete all the secrets of everyone I know? Haha, of course not. By the time things get to me they aren't secrets as I am the last to overhear, as it were. 

Unfortunately. 

(Fun being deaf and all but I still adore the shit out of my phone and so I need it fixed. I have 276GB of music on it.)

I really just want to take the world, lick my finger and blur off the parts I have no interest in and sit and watch the radishes grow. Sam doesn't believe in escapism. I remind him the only one here who does is gone and he frowns. No one likes it when I talk about Jacob. They'd rather pretend he never existed which is escapism, IS IT NOT? 

Of course not, because it's majority rules and Bridget isn't a queen, just a princess. She gets no say. 

We survived and I didn't have an overwhelming amount of panic or fear, even with Caleb coming back. Even with Lochlan breathing on the top of my head perpetually. He is sleeping in, exhausted. I think he keeps watch all night so Sam has promised to be my forbidden sidekick today. Maybe he'll let me take some nudes for the Apple geniuses later. Maybe if I ask real nicely. 

But probably not, and that's how things are shaping up today.

I can hear August belting out Already Gone as we return to the patio. Ben is just listening. 

Should have put him to work. 

He's offered. I remind him. 

I want you to know that it doesn't matter-  

Wow. Those NOTES. I hate to interrupt but I want to put the glasses inside and get busy with my plans for the day, which don't include casual archaeology on my brain, uncovering years of regrets and misfiled memories. My thief is a dreamboat, not a crack administrator and so some things are inevitably going to be in the wrong spot. I need to make kiln cookies and test tiles for glaze so that I have a reference catalog. I need to beg for my email back, as I still don't have access. It's been six months. Do they care? No. Why would they care. It's just a 'blog'. It's just the record of my entire life as a mother and as a wife to four different men in the span of twenty years which sounds really fucking stupid. 

Those of us who read it and the one who wrote it, know differently. Don't we?

Ohhh noooo. Almost made it. Here's Jar of Hearts now.

Preservations.

What did you do with the money? Caleb is trying to make conversation as I empty the dishwashers. I don't really carry on discussions while doing it, it's loud and clanky and everyone ends up repeating themselves so I wait until I'm finished and by then he has decided that I am freezing him out, or angry at such a question or worse, simply ignoring him. 

Nothing. It's still wherever you put it. I didn't look. I'm guessing it's in the trust account he uses to send my money. Every time I get some I hope eventually it will add up and I will buy my dream house somewhere else. Today it's a cottage just on the other side of the little causeway between the lake and Queensland beach. It's perfect. It's a little weird and it comes fully furnished for just under half a million. 

Other days I want to take twenty million, fly to Europe, move into a moss-covered moldy castle and never be seen again. 

Some days I want to encase Lochlan in bronze or resin and preserve him forever but I think my brain already has done that for me on my behalf and so he is forever eighteen. Sixteen. Twenty-one. Doesn't matter, really. 

You should let us do these things. Caleb has been very all-in, very helpful since he's been home. On his best. No teeth. No fists. No fetishes, no frights. For now. I've been keeping my guard up though, otherwise he uses his charm as a vacuum to suck me right in.

I'm good. You have your list, I have mine. I smile but not with my eyes. And he doesn't push.

Dear.

Yesterday I was refreshing and repainting the mural on the side of the boathouse and so I spent all day on a ladder with two two-hour breaks and now this morning I am all but in traction, a twisted pretzel with aching limbs and core and a blistering headache to boot. I had my big floppy hat with the chin tie and I was in shade for most of it but that still doesn't change the sheer effort, especially since the previous day I cleaned up the entire perimeter of the stables, pulling out endless giant weeds and keeping a quick check somewhat regularly over my shoulder for the bears. I saw three deer up at the top of the glade nearer to the road and they took my breath away and then ran with it back up toward the mountains. I don't even want to think about where or how they cross the highway. I've seen the dead ones and it breaks my already broken heart but there isn't much I can do about it and also sometimes they jump into traffic out of the trees and it's just simply too late. 

I also, without any guilt whatsoever, ate PJ's croissant for breakfast this morning.