If only (getting those lyrics NAILED, guys. Poor Lochlan).

But you were history with the slamming of the door
And I made myself so strong again somehow
And I never wasted any of my time on you since then

I got the out from Christian this morning. Loch got up early and left to go hang out with August. Caleb was sent away by PJ early last evening and Ben just stared at me most of the rest of the night while Lochlan got much-needed sleep. 

Christian came over, sat on the edge of the bed, and told me they were hosting Thanksgiving today. That turkey and stuffing and gravy and mashed potatoes and maybe even a pumpkin pie or five will be at their house at four this afternoon and that if I would like to make an appearance there will be a chair with my name on it, and that if I'm not there by ten after, my chair will be removed and Schuyler will most likely eat everything. 

Or Ben. I laugh but it comes out weird. 

You gotta live, B. Don't let him continue to take this from you. 

I nod. It's a pointless conversation and I've had it a hundred thousand times. It doesn't matter. I don't know what's wrong with me but he said I was enough and then suddenly I wasn't. Suddenly I was so lacking that it was better to fly to Heaven then to struggle, like this. I forgave him. I understand and then when it's cold or I'm tired or I think too hard I don't understand at all. 

Christian leans down until he is holding me in his arms, head pressed against mine. But PUMPKIN PIE, he implores and I finally laugh for real, shaking both of us gently. He pulls back and smiles. 

Promise me you'll come. We're going to light the good candles and everything. Everyone's going to be there. Table is set for eighteen. 

Wow, that's a feat. 

You do it. 

I'm used to it. 

We'll get used to it. 

Actually?

Both tables. And the island. 

Okay, there's a use for open concept. 

Exactly. Let us treat you. Come and sit and mix your pills with alcohol. And eat something, for once. You're just bones. 

It's Halloween. Just trying to blend in.  

Stop trying, Bridget. It will never happen. Not with you. 

I know myself.

Okay, I can still play piano. I finally spoke this morning (not sure I did yesterday) and it's ratchety-whiskey and guttural so of course that means I can sing Total Eclipse of the Heart and I figured I would have forgotten all the notes but I did not. 

Not like I'm going to forget lyrics, though that song was followed by It's All Coming Back to me Now, a song that I don't know all but half the lyrics to, and I was fighting my way through that one, because Lochlan will listen to me sing the Bonnie Tyler songs now like he's in a trance and then if I start something really painful he'll stop me and I have no idea what the words are to half the Celine songs, her very light french accent messes up what little hearing I have. Besides. Have you seen the video? Between the ghosts and the ghosts due to motorcycles that one's off limits. All of her stuff is off limits. That's why I started it. 

Who wants to go to church when you can stay home and fight over an eighties Youtube ballad playlist instead?

Besides, the heat would need to be on in the church to go and sit for that long and I know for a fact it isn't and so I made my excuses last night. At this point Sam would excuse me for murder. Lochlan certainly won't and wants everything to be easy. 

Just like the Merovingian does. Same exact thing, Locket. 

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA oh, Jesus fuck this isn't funny but that's funny. 

During our rewatch of the Matrix several weeks ago we decided in secret that Caleb is the Merovingian. He's very smooth with a slight accent and tons of money and power for no reason and doesn't seem to have an actual purpose but here he is. 

Truth.

Who does that make you, then? Trinity?

Of course not. 

Niobe?

No, I wish. She kicked ass. I'm the ORACLE. 

Geez, I guess you are. 

Then can I keep playing please?

No. (The next song up was It Must have Been Love. Then She's like the Wind. Ouch. I hear dead people. But then REO SPEEDWAGON. Still alive, I think AND HE STILL SAID NO.)

And I can't fight this feeling anymore. I'm singing again.

Bridget, fuck off. 

Leave the room, Pyro.

Ah. There he is. Caleb's voice over my shoulder. He doesn't stand for that.Funny how verbal abuse ticks him off so bad but none of the other kinds do.

Through the gray.

I still fall for you like suns do for skies
Cerulean pouring in from your eyes
Just a hollow moon that you colourize
So powerful, I feel so small but so alive
Like watching the earth rise 

These drugs are so bad. I burst into tears listening to the new Starset song, when I ran out of red licorice, when I saw Christmas shit in the pile of flyers on the counter from the newspaper (WHY in 2021 are we still getting a newspaper, Cale?) and every time I come. 

Which, well, that part isn't bad and God do they ever love it. 

So I listened to Earthrise four thousand times, so loud my whole head still rings. They used the word Cerulean, a favourite. Dumb things that I appreciate since the world has been dulled to virtually everything else but I'm in that sweet spot right now between pills where it almost wears off and I have a half hour to organize everything and then I fall into the void again. I don't know if that's a complaint or a grateful turn, ask me in a month. 

Makes the coffee bitter but the love so much sweeter. I wonder when in my life my liver is going to call mutiny and take my kidneys with it. They can run away into the sunset and I will be left with no filter at all. I never had one on my mouth anyway and I told Lochlan yesterday that he gets off on disaster porn and he handed me off to Caleb and went for a long drive in the cold sun on New Jake's motorcycle and Ben went with him on PJ's and then I told Caleb he gets off on it too and he laughed and said of course. Otherwise no one would be here. 

Then I stood with my nose pressed to the upstairs staircase window until they came back and I finally could let out my breath. 

Did you capture the ghosts and take them so far away they won't be able to find their way back here?

Yeah, Lochlan shoots a look at Ben. Yeah, we did. Everything's fixed now, Peanut.

Good. I shove my headphones back up over my ears and go back to my favourite void. The musical one. Where I can listen to someone else's pain and I don't have to think about my own.

 I'm here. Don't worry.

And here I thought my hand was going to be the thorn in our sides this fall.

Bah, today is a massive setback 9for my surgery patient) but I think we can get back on track. I don't know how I went from all-capable to a little blubbering mess the minute things get scary but apparently it's PTSD. We'll just add it to the big list and maybe eventually someday I can take a big long breath without going right back to holding it forever. If you're a praying sort I could use a little for someone here but at the same time we have a houseful, no, a pointful going up. When it rains it pours, I guess.

See tree-pee. Oh. (LOLLLLL)

 Oh God. We've reached the t-shirt with flannel shirt or just a waffle knit shirt time of year for the boys, one of the upsides to fall, along with scented candles, long-burning fires and flavoured hot chocolate. Also I like sweaters and the leaves changing colour and the endless rain and cool stillness at last. The trucks are always clean thanks to the rain and the leaves have lit up the neighbourhood, a muted palette of rich warm tones that oddly make me feel like I'm getting somewhere. 

Also weirdly, people who were born and raised here seem to be allergic to rain and so I never see a soul who isn't part of the Collective. Gone are the days of heading down to the beach only to find boaters picnicking and using the driftwood house to change, or nodding to people as we go for slow strolls with the elderly dog up to the mailbox. Even our early grocery runs are deliciously absent other people, which is the whole point of going before sunrise. 

But the rain seems to magnify that. It's kind of weird. 

Also Schuyler in a pale-blue thermal long-sleeved t-shirt with a matching pale blue cotton mask is more than enough of a treat for the day. He was outside with the arborist who has come to see about a few of the trees in the orchard. Schuyler likes to learn this stuff so he went out there with Lochlan, and they both laughed out loud when I pointed out the trees were also changing colour..to black. 

They might be worse than dead. I have a feeling we're going to lose a bunch of trees out there but all good things come to an end, or so Dalton said as an idiom without thinking this morning and then I watched as he visibly cringed. 

No, they don't. I said softly. 

Bridge, I'm sorry-

It's fine. Please don't worry about watching your words. It's been too long. I try to remind them but they also cringe when I do it, as I repeatedly would tell them I was going out to deadhead flowers or kill some time. We're all stuck. It's like a group black hole sometimes. 

Dalton's babysitting this morning. At least while the trees are dealt with. I don't know if they're going to cut them down today but we'll know more shortly. I hate losing trees but I do like watching Schuyler. Hahahah. Which is funny because he absolutely PALES next to Lochlan, who is all smoldering-sunset-orange, freckles and pure fire this morning against a backdrop of red and gold. 

***

ALSO: I got a hydrojug! Not a sponsored post or anything. I saw one in the background on a tiktok of all things and the creator let me know what it was and I ordered a bunch for everyone here and wow. It's a water bottle that holds 73 ounces. It has a big handle. You can use it with a straw or not, and the top seals shut if you have to take it somewhere. You can also get sleeves for them that have crossbody straps and they come in a million colours and designs. I never ever drink enough water and this is the first day and I'm already a third of the way done and it's not lunchtime yet. Love this thing. 

The only downside is it does weigh five pounds when it's full so that's a lot but just think, you get to lift weights all day too. The website is Thehydrojug.com. I don't know if the ones on Amazon are legit but I ordered ours off the actual website. I didn't make it clickable because whenever I do that people accuse me of trying to farm out my blog for profit, something I've never ever done, not even once. Even when I was well and poor and people wanted me to post amazon wish lists or whatever. Just no. Don't even worry about that. But if I find something neat, I like to share it and then everyone can also tell me they already knew. So there's that. 

If you need me I'll be peeing.

I AM a requiem Pokemon.

 More surgery for the end of the month for my patient and then hopefully that's it. We're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel though, that will be for one tiny thing but otherwise the mend is on. I can play nursemaid to my heart's content, though I also bit off too much and had a micro-meltdown this morning, which Ben talked me out of and then we went grocery shopping, really fast so we could be home by eight. 

Right, eight this morning. We were there, waiting outside, before seven. 

There's no people this way. 

(Fun fact, there's also very little in the bakery section! This was why we don't go on Mondays.)

Ben carried everything from the truck to the kitchen in one go. 

He did not use the hand rails at all. Sometimes I wonder about this man, who trashed his body living a life of excess and then some who becomes a walking miracle a little over a year after having his brain injured beyond what they thought a man could endure and still come back from.

Also? I realized this morning that I hate mango. Absolutely hate it with a passion. 

In other news, the rain returns tomorrow, and along with it, the ghosts.

Jesus, childproofed.

It's Sunday, October 3 and the boys have turned on the electric fence, upgraded all the semi-awful lighting on the property to bright white LEDs so now when you drive down to the gate after dark it appears you are approaching a prison compound but when I complained about things such as ambience or aesthetic I was informed it was not up for discussion. 

So many bears, PJ barks. This is safer.

(But for over a decade it's been generally fine, though we did add a lot when we bought the point.)

Then I realized other things have happened as well. I suddenly don't know any of the exterior door codes. The knives are gone. My favourite sewing scissors are gone. They've added motion sensors in areas of the house that didn't have them before. 

Ah. I get it. It is a prison now. At least until closer to Christmas, right?

Also not up for discussion. 

Lochlan looks so grim. But he also looks mildly relieved that he's organized all of this up front instead of playing catch-up every year, and I'm suddenly happy for him if he feels a little bit of comfort from that thought. 

Did you move all of the meds? Also there are scissors in the bathrooms upstairs. 

Got them. 

Did you move the alcohol? 

No, PJ finished what there was. 

Oh. That explains his mood. 

He hates this time of year, Bridget. So do I. 

I bite my tongue not to say it and he watches me make it bleed.

Having trouble delegating (and also I can still juggle with my cast. Hurray!).

Autumn is a minefield and I keep stepping on them all, blowing myself to kingdom come and then when I hit the ground I yell I'm fine, barely getting the words out before I step on another one. 

Last night for the very first time in a long time Lochlan poured a drink for me and put it at my place at the table as I came in with take out. Don't worry, PJ drove/babysat. I feel like I am the bandage and if I don't hold everything together we're going to bleed out. At the same time people are tapping me on the shoulder going By the way, here's another challenge/difficulty/problem. Good luck and I have to juggle or I can't hold on to everything. 

Everyone always says Just drop it. We'll pick it up. Don't worry. Nothing's going to go wrong. Let someone else do it. But I always feel if I do that then everything ends or everyone will leave or if I don't have control over this one thing I won't have control over anything, you know? 

You need to talk to someone, Sam says. I can help but I'm too close. We're all too close. 

No strangers, I snap as I grab for a falling sweater. Someone left it on the porch so now I have to wash it. It might have been me. I don't remember, I'm too tired. I just need some rest.

How do you organize an outer space party? You planet.

This was a request in-house. I don't know why. 

My complaints, I present to you:

1. When a very-long dead person is wished a happy 459th birthday on social media. Firstly, they don't have social media so they'll never see it and also, they never would have made it to that number anyway so what is that even all about?

2. Artists talking about their upbringing/qualifications. It's always "Daddy encouraged me to paint in the gardens and then I spent my post secondary travelling around the world taking random art programs that no one can actually afford before he gave a large donation to the gallery that now bears my name where I freelance paint. Anyone can do it! Thanks Daddy." These revelations are almost always given in pleasant, quiet voices in a room that costs more than my life.

3. Makeup tutorials that have a catfish headline like I'll teach you how to apply a winged eyeliner that won't budge! and then the video is ninety minutes of spackling their face with eight different liquid skin uh thingies followed by at least forty-five minutes of painting in a wing in stages, with tape and baking (?) and primers and architects and mentors, with a steady hand and uncreased lids, followed by a smug It's easy! Like and subscribe! OH MY GOSH. I'm going to die without this skill. Apparently the mudding and taping is part of why it works so I guess I'll sit this life out. I really am a boy.  Though Ben can do eyeliner perfectly.

4. Packaging. My pocky sticks are in a box that's sealed in plastic and then inside the box every ten sticks are wrapped in yet another round of plastic packaging. I don't know what the answer is but I think it begins with a plan for feeding the pocky sticks individually through a big straw from the pocky factory straight into my face. For the environment.

5. The one tik-tok with the "husband hack" (BARF>) that shows a man drive up to Starbucks and hold his phone out where his wife? Presumably? on speakerphone yells "I want a *insert eighteen-step complicated not-a-coffee-anymore order* and then he smiles smugly at the camera. Okay. FIRST. If your coffee order is that complicated that your spouse can't remember it that's...food for thought. And B) If you start a request with "I want a-" like a toddler with no fucking manners and you don't say please, thank you or sorry (at the very least, for an order like that) then FUCK YOU and BE NICER to servers/baristas/everyone. DON'T BE SUCH A DICK. Arghhh. Pet peave. I never met so many rude people as I did at the coffee shop where I worked.

That's it. PJ wanted me to write a complaint thread. Here you go, buddy. He thought I would be mad about the bad joke theme-week he started but I love it. The title is my contribution, today.

*~*Bonus edit: Sam's joke: Atheism is a non-prophet organisation. He'll get a re-do since that's a pun and not a joke,e xactly.