I’m thinking of a woman I passed on my way into the grocery store with an aggressively bad side shave – I’ve seen the look before, it’s usually a kind of buzzed or shaved rectangle over one ear with the rest of the hair left long.
When you think about sorting your belongings before your death to ease the burden on those who come after you…
Does it make you feel uncomfortable? Or do you think, hmm, that’s a good idea? Or are you like those people who are finish Christmas shopping by November and you’re thinking, I’ve already done that?
I read The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning by Margareta Magnusson because I’m curious about the concept. I felt that having the death cleaning framework in my mind might inform the way I keep house right now.
A few years ago, I wrote a post about a high school classmate of mine and what our friendship had meant to me.
This fall, that classmate passed away.
He wasn’t the first of my graduating class to cross over, but he was the first that I knew well enough to feel the loss.
He had married outside of our friend circle and most of us didn’t hear about the ceremony that was held in his honor until after it had taken place. Grief circled around me with no place to land.
My habits are pretty deep trenches right now. I’m home almost all the time. I do the same thing every day, even when I don’t really want to. Changes to the routine are difficult to make, especially when I’m the only one who wants the change.
I have hope, because we made a positive change this year by adding Morning Announcements to the roster. Since this has become a part of our routine, I come downstairs, wait until there is a critical mass of awake kids in the room with me, and then we start.
Halloween has come and gone again, and as I woke up the next morning, I was again thinking, is this all there is? Is Halloween really the only local event where adults can shamelessly dress up and go out?
I’ve seen costumers around my area from time to time – a couple in 19th century garb swirling through city streets on Troy Night Out, a woman in an interesting cloak at the annual lantern parade at a local park, a few women at the Victorian Strolls in Saratoga and Troy. Reenactors at historic landmarks in the area.
I went to a local craft store the week before Halloween, only to find they were completely out of the supplies I needed because New York City’s comic con had just taken place. Is that the closest place to go if you like to dress up? How is that possible?
Yet every time I search for costuming events in my area, I come up empty. Albany Museum of Art and History is nearly the only hit (mainly for its collections). Depressingly, the only other link was what looks like a con in 1989. It was such an old reference I didn’t even click on the link.
