Today is laundry day. I am trying to "knock out" as many loads of laundry as possible in one day. Uh oh...trouble just arrived. Jerry just walked in the door. He is returning from his favorite activity...flying.
In the midst of working on the laundry in San Diego, I have been negotiating the possible rental of 2500 square feet of our 7500 square foot warehouse in Mooresville, North Carolina with a man in New Jersey. Now isn't that a testimony to our 2009 lifestyle? I'm here...he's there...and the warehouse is somewhere else. I had hoped that Jarit would stay one more year in the warehouse, but he recently notified me that he will be leaving at the end of this month. Jerry and I are going to North Carolina next Friday (flying the red eye to Charlotte) for the purpose of officially taking possession of the warehouse. I know there is a roof leak, so I have to get a roofer lined up to take care of that. We are only going to be there for a week, so there is a lot to try and accomplish in a short period of time.
I'm doing laundry in San Diego. Who knows what my prospective tenant (Steve) is doing in New Jersey? Thanks to technology, we can both take care of business matters while meeting our daily reponsibilities. I do have an advantage. There is no way that New Jersey can offer him what living in Southern California is offering me today. The sun is massaging our English bulldogs as it casts a warm glow over the dark brown leather chairs in our family room.
A few years ago, my husband moved our laundry facilities onto a lower patio outside the 2nd master bedroom suite. He strung a clothesline between support beams, which means I can pull our clothes from the dryer and hang them on hangars in the fresh air while enjoying a view of the Pacific ocean and taking in the beauty of our exterior surroundings. Instead of dreading the chore of laundry, I look forward to it now. I enjoy the smell of the clothes after they have hung in the fresh air for a few hours before being brought inside the house. The hawks cry overhead as they search for heir next kill reminding me of my childhood when I could sometimes be found lying out in tall grass on a hot summer day watching birds of prey cruise around hunting and diving to catch their next meal. I was always torn between admiration for their speed and success versus the helplessness of the rabbit or field mouse who could be seen dangling in the air beneath them as they flew away. Must there always be a victim to another's success?
Living in a mountain community, I can often hear the voices of people talking on the other side of the hill mixed with the sounds of dogs barking and even an occasional crow of a rooster. I don't know how a rooster managed to find housing in our city, but I am glad he did. I usually hear him in the early morning, and I really have to wonder what he has to crow about these days. I guess a rooster isn't impacted by the stock market.
My daughter and son in law and their friend from North Carolina, along with my son, loaded up their respective motorhomes yesterday and headed for the sand dunes. I received a text from my daughter this morning that simply said "Everything is great." That means they arrived safely and are having a good time. It's only a couple of hours away from San Diego to Southern California's playground...the sand dunes and a little further down the road, the Colorado river north of Yuma. Even in a bad economy, families in San Diego try to hang on to their desert and river "toys." It's just a way of life to grow up riding quads and dune buggies over the dunes in the winter months and boating up and down the river in the summer time.
Jerry just went upstairs to take a nap. He spends a lot of time sleeping now, which I am told is common for Alzheimer's patients. He said he really enjoyed his time in the air today. He is a good pilot, but since the diagnosis of Alzheimer's we agreed that he will only go up in the plane with another pilot aboard. I believe flying has slowed the progression of the disease much like what happens with brain training programs. A deep sadness comes over me if I fully accept the reality of our future. I try very hard to just focus on today. Today is definitely tolerable and often quite enjoyable.
I hung some more family photos on the walls today. We had packed up a lot of items in 2007 in anticipation of selling our home for the purpose of downsizing. Once the economy took a huge dive, we pulled the house off the market and decided to wait it out before selling. About the same time, Jerry was diagnosed with early Alzheimer's and keeping the family home took on a new purpose. He was pleased when he saw that I was pulling framed photos out of storage this morning. In his words, "so you are in the process of making this a home again?" I feel the same way. There isn't any way that looking at the most expensive art work on our walls can compare to the feeling we get when looking at family photos holding loving memories of days past.
Just another peaceful day in Southern California.....
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