Wednesday, July 19

[gottawonder]

Today I am grateful for:

Decent day. A bit muggy, but sunny, and everything is green after all the rain.

A short talk with Trainwreck. She tells me that Sister N's partner fell, and is now willing to wear one of those bracelets that will alert the ambulance if you don't get up. Sister N is not capable of helping her partner up any more, and vice versa.

This is not surprising, the man in question is over 80 now, and quite frail. It sounds like at least people are starting to see that he needs more help, so if Sister N has to be away now, they are getting his daughter to stay there with him.

A lot of my family is now getting to this point in life, and it's very sad. It's not "tragic" or unexpected, but still very sad.

I went to the barn, and River and I had a lesson.

We are STILL going through a lot of the same things, and it feels more like a demo because R just goes "good job", but where is the next step?

We were given one new thing to work on, which is good. We are now going to work on doing a canter in our Liberty circles.

R spent a lot of time talking about how she and another client want to bring in a fairly well-known Liberty trainer from the States to do a clinic, but she thinks there are too many complications with him coming from the U.S.

I was like, I don't know, I'm sure there is a process, it's been done before.

I had to drag her back to my lesson, because my lesson is not where you mull over how you're going to bring in a clinician.

Then we worked on trying to get that lead again, and I think I do see the problem. I am supposed to bring back my outside leg for the canter cue, but I am twisting my body too much, and likely blocking him with the inside leg. I will work on this.

River did good today, in terms of effort. It was hot and muggy, but he tried for me. Good boy.

I came home and let everyone out for a while.

I talked with my Sweetie who joined the local bike club for a ride just in town; their very nice bike park is not accessible right now as the fires left standing dead trees. Until they are cleared, it is too dangerous to use the park.

I picked quite a few raspberries in a hurry as the days are noticeably shorter now.

I learned that alcohol withdrawal can cause vivid dreaming. Heavy alcohol use reduces the amount of REM sleep we experience each night, but that when we quit alcohol, REM sleep rebounds.

https://www.home-detox.co.uk/vivid-dreams-a-sign-of-alcohol-withdrawal/

Comments

[ratunderpaper]

The passage of time brings unwelcome surprises, preparations for illnesses and illnesses. None of it is jolly.

I'm going to Alice's visitation tonight. She led a rich and full life, but I am sorry it came to a rather sudden end - or maybe an end at all.

https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/name/rev-d-canon-dr-mary-alice-medcof-obituary?id=52467776

She also invented the "stubby" - but it's not mentioned here.

[cf2princessawnw]

It's so good that you have River, and it's great that you're both making progress together despite R. You should feel very good about yourself for being able to still find a way to use her help as you need.

In a different way, I've been feeling the passing of generations and changing of everything around me. I just found out that the church I grew up in which was at least a few hundred people, Now has maybe only 20 people in a Sunday morning, and Wednesday night prayer meeting is canceled because only 2 to 3 people show up. Everyone who was larger than life has now aged or passed on.

I read something profound on Twitter today by a Hospital chaplain, and one of the regrets people often had the most was why did they live their life in fear or for so many other people that weren't even alive anymore at that point, why didn't they live as freely as they deep down had wanted but instead felt they needed to hide in some way.

I wish I had some positive or encouraging words on this, but at this point I'm grappling in my own way of trying to understand the aging process from where I find myself perceiving it in life at this point. Sending a hug.

[gottawonder]

I do feel that overall, R has been very good for both River and I. I certainly have very few complaints, if any, over how he is treated there, and how gentle our riding lessons are.

I have had lessons at a barn where I was put on a lame horse and never made any progress at all (several years ago now, and it was awful how, in retrospect, they just took our money).

The second barn did help in many ways, but the lessons were often harsh and also led to a complete stagnation after a while, and the care of the horses there was terrible.

This thing of hitting points of stagnation isn't entirely R's fault. Sometimes you just hit a wall where you aren't making improvements in spite of working your ass off, and it isn't always easy to get over those hurdles because there is something inherently wrong in your approach, or even in how your body works.

I do feel that maybe R sometimes goes into "Oh good, an easy lesson" mode sometimes, because River and I are not demanding in our needs compared to some of her students. It's easy to think that if we don't make some kind of forward motion this week, there's always next week.

Also, I have noticed that R likes to train us according to whatever show or class is coming up, and that makes her job easier. As in, the International Liberty Association has frequent shows where I can video my performance for a class and submit that, and as we progress gradually, the class brings a new challenge that R helps us with.

I don't mind using those shows as ways to set goals, but R has gotten to where if we don't have a show coming up, she seems to forget to set one for us anyhow.

It's not like we haven't improved at all in the last few months, but it seems S L O W at times.

As to things moving on without you, or getting older, and so on, I think we all feel that.

When I go home to visit family (which is once a year now, since it is such an ordeal), the changes can shock me.

Literally the trees on the family farm grow enough that the yard and landscape look different to me, and other trees fall down.

When you only see a place one day every year, it seems dramatic.

It's the same with my family members. One of my sisters especially looked like she's aged ten years instead of one since the last time I saw her. Sister S had surgery to remove a kidney (cancer), and it seems like that was very hard on her. She's always had a stooped shoulders, and it seems like just this year it turned into one of those permanent hunches. It was very hard to see so much change at once.

I'm not sure there really is anything very encouraging about aging, and I don't know that anyone handles it gracefully. I find myself struggling with what is going on with my older sisters (these ones are much older than I am, 15 to 20 years older, and they haven't taken particularly good care of themselves).

Yet I do see how aging can be very different for people if they stay active and care for themselves. There was a woman today that runs a U-pick berry farm and greenhouse herself, who must be well over 60, who is healthy and vigorous with a big smile on her face. She laughed beautifully.

I can't help but see the contrast to my Trainwreck sister who ruined her health with drinking and smoking and pain pills who can't breathe anymore, and is mired in her own mental illness and seems to only notice pain and suffering. She rarely mentions anything positive, and never talks about the future except to think there is nothing left but more pain and suffering.

We all get older, but we don't all have to get old the same way.

[gottawonder]

In observing the many different paths my family members have taken, I've learned a lot about how important planning can be. To move when it's needed before things go to ruin, to take care of your health, to stay somewhat updated with technology and culture, to keep as active as you can be, to have your plans made and paperwork in order.

I know it sounds kind of boring, yet being engaged with your life makes all the difference.

Trainwreck avoids as much responsibility and awareness as possible, and now she is looking at spending another winter in that trailer with no running water and full of filth, instead of moving on with her life.

While we will all face death as we know it, not all of us actually face life. How we choose to engage with our life, even as it changes, makes all the difference.

Alice sounds like she lived a very full and passionate life.

[ratunderpaper]

The other awful truth is that very few die "just like that", with the proverbial martini in one hand and chocolate in the other, after a life lived fully and well. Those who don't take care of their health will live their final years painfully and in attenuated suffering, afflicted by different (and often preventable) diseases.

Until the last couple of months, Alice lived life to the fullest. She and her husband were the "originals" on our historic little street. When they are gone, it will be up to me to carry on the history. I'm not sure anyone else is interested in preserving community heritage except in an architectural sense.

[gottawonder]

I agree with you that many people who drink a lot and smoke and so on, are either in denial, or they DO think that "at least it'll be quick".

Nope.

It's oxygen tanks at 60.

My husband has an Aunt who isn't much older than we are, who is morbidly obese and had to have heart surgery already in her 50's, and she and her also obese husband are literally expecting not to live for ten more years and treat it like there's nothing they can do.

I knew a guy in his 60's who went on an 8 week hiking trip alone in Alaska.

This is the thing, we're all going to die, and granted, living well doesn't always spare you from disease or disaster, but you have a much greater chance of still being able to do things that are life-affirming for much, much longer.

Since I drastically changed my diet (almost no sugar and few carbs), I have almost no blood sugar lows anymore. They used to be awful, you'd feel like you were going to pass out, sweaty, shaking, no energy. It used to make it really hard to enjoy hiking and so on.

Today I took the kayak out and paddled for about two hours straight. I was tired, but my blood sugar did not collapse.

It actually makes it easier to BE fit, because I can do physical exercise more intensely without crashing now.

[cf2princessawnw]

💖