Until Later

It has been quite a week. Last weekend Harry, my 13 year old lab, started this choking, vomiting, coughing thing.  Sometimes it lasts for a few minutes, sometimes more then half an hour.  It looks like he is trying to pull his toe nails up through his digestive system and out his mouth.  It worries me, but it is also irritating trying to sleep at night and he is having his little spasm.  Then I feel so guilty that I am irritated, because of lack of sleep, but he is suffering.  So Tuesday I took him and Henry, who had the swollen back foot, along with Bob to the Vet.  The new vet is gorgeous.  I mean like as gorgeous as Dr. M.  They checked for heart worm with both dogs, and the tests came back negative, thank heaven.

Tuesday Richard and Colleen had to put Larry in a Hospice facility.  He was pretty much unresponsive.  I changed my schedule to head to Brooksville Wednesday after work.  I went directly to the facility.  Larry did respond for me.  He squeezed my hand, he ate ice cream, after I mushed it up the way he liked.  I stayed there until Saturday and then headed back home.  I am a wreck.  I am exhausted, stressed out as emotionally and physically as I think I have ever been.  I had to leave Larry there, obviously fading, but who knows how long he can hold on, he is a pretty determined man.

I got home yesterday and tried to take a nap.  No way.  I had to talk to Larry on the phone, and then got changed and went to the Opera House for Steele.  I didn't want to bring any one down, or distract from their work in the play, but these are my dearest friends here and I needed to be with them.  I needed not to stay at home alone crying.

Now I am going to head up to the Opera House to set tables and then pour mimosas for the lunch before our matinee show.  When I get home, I will come back here, and add in the information  I need to get off my heart.  To release some of this past week and let the words carry some of the pain away from me.  Just touching the keys just now has helped.  This 15 minutes of typing has already lightened my heart, now to the Opera House.  To work, to put my hands to tasks, to put my mind on the duties in front of me, and to move all the stress and concern and pain into the background for now.  Just being in that building, where Colin now lives in my mind and heart.  And to listen in my dark corner waiting for my cues to bring the lights up or down, to show the actors in their best light.  To run in between scenes to make sure they have what they need.  It is Sunday, it feels like spring, and my gardens, even unkempt and uncared for are pushing new green out of the soil, out of what appears to be dead limbs.  Put the top down, feel that warmth, and spend my day at the Opera House, and then back here to pour out the rest of the story.