Greenstorm's Journal

Now that I'm home, and still on leave from work, I am finally able to sort some of the stuff out I'd intended to get to originally. My capacity is tiny, which is to say I have a couple to a few hours of movement/doing things if they're interspersed with resting per day, one phone call every second day or so whether it's practical/medical or for social, eating several times a day but minimal food-making, and that's mostly it?

So I managed to arrange for someone to pick up the pigs tomorrow, I'm keeping Baby and Hooligan back because they're old and friends. I unloaded the truck, which took 2 days and a furniture dolly (boxes of clay are roughly 40-50lbs and I just couldn't lift them the first couple days). I went in to my specialists appointment and they eventually gave me a bed to lie down on since I couldn't sit as long as I needed to without my head supported.

In February I'd ordered chicks with a friend and we got the reminder email last week, but I somehow thought they were coming next Sunday. Well, yesterday-Sunday she messaged me to ask where at the airport to pick them up. So yesterday I cleaned out the bottom chicken coop (6 wheelbarrows of light bedding) so I can move the silkies over into it so I can put the chicks to brood in the quail house. The quail house bedding is moister, so heavier, and I need to move everyone over at night when they're sleeping, so it'll be a couple days. Meanwhile the babies are brooding downstairs in a giant rubbermaid tub brooder on the sofa. Little Bear is interested but there's lots else going on.

When your memory sucks every day is a surprise.

I also had a talk with my supervisor, who-- you know, I think I need a lot more words to say "it's still bad and I don't get to see my doctor till after the leave is over because Healthcare so I can't really plan at this point"

A friend brought me by soup and bread. Another friend helped me out financially. I feel safe, and I feel like I shouldn't feel safe.

I haven't had capacity to do pottery yet. That's hard. Because I can do only one or two things a day I need to have food lined up and no animal/work/medical stuff, but because I can only do one or two things a day most days contain something I need to do, I can't get it all out of the way to clear my schedule.

My housesitter killed about half my tomato plants by number, and more than that by variety %. I still have maybe 16 flats of peppers and tomatoes, and I started a bunch of squash and leafy greens and re-started some of my precious northern cantaloupe seeds. I'm getting to the point where some of these I don't have backup seeds for, either because they're an F1 or a rare unobtainable variety or whatever. That isn't to say I can't get other seeds and start them next year - it's too late now to start more tomatoes or peppers -- but it's a loss. Turns out the plants started dying after a week and instead of messaging me to ask what to do the housesitter decided to wait till I came back to explain. Who knew what could have been saved in that time?

She also, like every human to enter my house without intimate knowledge and care for me, threw out the "rotten" tomatoes in a bowl on the counter -- my seed tomatoes that the parent plant is now dead, so that line's done -- and I'm pretty sure fed one of my prosciuttos ("moldy cheese") to the pigs to get them in the pen when they got out, and despite very very very careful instructions to take only the meat from the downstairs bedroom freezer (which had frozen and thawed) to lure the pigs in used the gorgeous salmon Josh brought me from the freezer in the carport instead.

A ton of things in my house are unique, irreplaceable, and don't make a lot of sense to people without exposure to the concepts behind them. When people visit and try to be well-meaning (and don't have unique homes of their own) generally irreplaceable or hundreds of dollars worth of stuff gets destroyed. Other people's houses are frequently inexplicable to me but I don't think I destroy stuff like that? I've finally got mom trained, pretty much, and Tucker and Josh understand. But it's frustrating and I think it's yet another reason I wish I had more space-- space to entertain separate from the living space which contains what I do with my time everyday.

Anyhow, that aside we've had good rain on and off, more than we've had in awhile. I'm hardening off my tomatoes. Something on my back deck eats lettuce but all the leafy greens other than lettuce I planted out there before I left are doing well. I have a silkie - looks like a giant white cottonball -- who can somehow hide effectively in an empty field. Little Bear had his first shots, is microchipped, and will shortly be fixed and I have a vet. Every time Little Bear goes to the vet they exclaim "he's such a delightful cat" so who knows what happens back there.

I need to get the wherewithal together to till my garden but we still have some lows in the forecast, even though the actual temps have been turning out very high. With the loss of so many tomatoes I started a sweet corn grex. My southmost garden is now fully planted, more or less, and waits only for a path and little greenhouse. It's woody perennials, needs underplanting with herbacious, but still. Has lots of haskap, hardy cherry, ribes, elderberry, etc and lots of blossoms this year.

Some apple seedlings from last year survived -- I knew my winter would kill some, since those seeds are from california -- and I'd like to catalogue them when I have wherewithal. I sorted through my seeds and put away anything I'm definitely not growing this year (missed the favas window, pulled out individual squash seeds, chose my corn path, put away the tomatoes and peppers, etc) so I only have a single dairy crate of seeds left out that I'll be putting in. The year is shaping up.

Every night Little Bear stalks me up to bed and settles in with me and Whiskey.

Solly has been sleeping in the muddy stream to keep cool, and here I thought she was just getting out.

The goose nests were eaten by the pigs when I was gone, but there might be a couple they missed.

The ambient temperature here varies between 10-27C indoors and 4-25Coutdoors (barring a little frost here and there) and is comfortable open window weather. Somehow n Vancouver a much smaller range was sticky and both too warm and too cold.

I'm not strong enough right now to unscrew the hard-water-encrusted thingers under the sink tap so I may need to hire the job out, annoying when I know exactly what I need to do but less annoying than not having running water in the bathroom sink.

I'm slowly sorting through "what if rest doesn't increase my capacity, it just maintains it, and I'm like this now". So: instead of telling a friend I can go for a walk with them, I would probably invite them over? So: I need to plan my systems much better and more efficiently. So: I need a cart so I'm not using the same wheelbarrow for chicken manure and bringing groceries in from the truck?

Threshold loves me. I love being here. All that, good and bad, and things are ok.

The psychologist I was referred to asked twice if I had things I enjoyed, hobbies, etc. Of course they want to steer me towards depression. The first time I just said yes. The second time I said "Yes, tons of stuff, the best is my tomato breeding program where I'm finally into the F2, so after 3 years of work I get to see the results finally, to see it opening out into a whole bunch of possibility-- and of course we're starting the little pottery studio in town, and there's a garden club" and I think he finally believed me. But it's hard for people to believe, I think.

If you're disabled you're supposed to be dissatisfied, unhappy. If you cure the unhappiness you're supposed to cure the disease, too, especially in "women". I have pain sometimes and a weird lack of function other times, enough that apparently I'm setting my jaw hard to get myself through things and have worn through the disc on both sides, which is what's causing the ear pain? But I'm happy. It's very possible to be in pain and also to be happy. And it's obviously possible to not do everything you want to do and still be happy, because in this near-infinite world how could anyone ever be happy otherwise?

Loving my life, and living in a life I love, has always been my most radical and least-understood act. Even when it's hard and it hurts and it's lonely. Even when it's not safe because of course it's never safe. Even when, even when.

I've been sitting up typing for 40 minutes now. The rain has restarted outside. I need to lie back down. Two cats are sleeping on the foot of the bed. Sometime later I'll go out and clear out another third of the bedding in the quail shed, or maybe do some pottery, or maybe do a run into town for more chick starter. I'll not chain multiple activities together, I'm learning that. And things will, for now, be ok.

So operation "can I do a vacation I like?" was successful. Turns out I can.

Operation "returning to my normal life" is a bit more tricky, even assuming I had a normal life to return to. This isn't the sort of "vacation drop" I hear from many people. My home is a theme park, perfect for me. Instead it's that I've come back inspired in several directions and I want to actually focus and get things done.

For example, there's a corner of the compound (the central courtyard space I'm working on slowly enclosing with a ring of buildings) that was thistles and young plum trees and haskaps. Mom flattened cardboard and mulched deeply with cardboard and aspen chips. I'd been thinking of putting the bed swing there, which is why I steered her in that direction, but now: I stopped at the dump and they had a big two-person jacuzzi tub which I snagged, and there's a perfect spot there if I build it out as a hot tub. There's also a perfect set of 4 aspens off the edge of that drop that I could set a platform between and I'd have a nice spot for the shower (it could just drain into the swale) and a net bed. Then there's another two trees perfect for a hammock right there. It's a central, secluded space with shade and drainage, so it makes sense as the hub of some outdoor living infrastructure. Looking into hot water on demand devices at the moment.

I had made noises about having pagany folks up this summer and didn't follow through for various reasons. I'm thinking very seriously about claiming Lughnasadh in 2024 and seeing if anyone actually will come up. It's a wildfire risk and there wouldn't be any way to do bonfires, we'd definitely be in burning bans. It would be warm enough, though. The alternative would be earlier. We could do fires, nights would be cool, and the garden would not yet be producing. I think eating from the garden is important? Solstice seems like the logical time to have a Thing up here in the long days and it might even be before fires if we're lucky, but it feels like it's too important for me to host?

I think Threshold would like solstice...

And then I have a bunch of clay inspiration, so I want to be spending my time doing that, and my garden is at one of the most interesting times right now with all the different tomatoes just on the cusp of ripening, and I still haven't got winter grains in, and something about sewing since I'm running out of comfy non-jean pants, and I have an idea for the pigs, and I need to decide on the other 13 orchard trees, and...

Anyhow.

Sherry kept pointing out that she was "retired" (into her second business, doing pottery, after a previous career) and I had both a dayjob and farm animals so it made sense that she had more time than I did to do fun ceramics things. I'm super envious right now. I want to make poetry bowls and mugs for the people I care about, build places that are fun, create homes, spend time with animals.

Oh well.

Most of a 5 gallon bucket of soap lard trimmings rendering in the oven, plus two crockpots' worth on the table. Instant pot full of dog scraps. Dehydrator on with bay leaves. Supergiant stock pot with bones on the stove overnight. Dishwasher on. Freezers all stuffed full, with more work to be done tomorrow.

Gonna be a big electricity bill for today, and small grocery bills for awhile.

Can one cook doughnuts in lard?

I'm incredibly tired, and I've been super sad and anxious all day except when I can get completely caught up in deboning a picnic shoulder or something. I don't want to be sad the whole time Josh is here. I want to be present and enjoy his company. He's a wonderful person to project with though.

There's not even any point in discussing my communications with Tucker right now. They go terribly, then really well for a bit, then terribly. Why am I doing them? What do I want to get out of them?

Lots of rain last night and today. Everything is muddy and chilly. Summer is over. Next dry day I'll take in grain and tomatoes I think. A dry day might be a bit if it stays this cool, since I don't think it'll dry quickly.

Demoncat hates the rearrangement of the kitchen for butchering and meowls piteously.

This is going to be my first full week's vacation where I don't have to manage a trip somewhere.

My mind doesn't exist. More tomorrow.

Getting away to the coast for a couple days. Definitely, every time I leave, I do several days' work in one day and then spend the first while super tired. Well, not every time, but often.

This time the first frost fell across my trip. I pulled in all the non-greenhouse tomatoes to ripen, and all the beans. Canned some tomatoes, pickled the beans. The cabbages and kale and grains will all be fine, and the greenhouse tomatoes should (?) be fine but also have a fine crop of slugs. I should run a duck through there, except, well, frost and I'm gone anyhow.

Anyhow, I was up with the canner until 1am, then up to do chores before my ride into town at 4am. Got into it with Tucker about living situation stuff - the discussion has been outstanding for awhile and there's just no good time - and that went somewhere between badly and better than one might expect for that time of night. He may not be able to stay in the relationship in the way I need. It was a hard night, though I'm super glad to have had the canning going. Sometimes I just need that feeling of accomplishing some concrete task.

We'll see what comes of everything. It would be just like my life to hand me a double breakup with my employment thing happening and I will certainly live through whatever happens, but I'd really rather not. I like my people quite a bit.

I can't wait to get home and snuggle Avallu and the piglets and I'm barely even at the airport. Hopefully the Mysteries have something to offer me this year (they tend to).

Things were going so well.

I went down to the coast for two weeks to visit people. I was curious about when I would start to get antsy, when I would start worrying about home, whether I'd give up and fly home at some point to make sure everything was ok. I made it a week and a half without thinking about it too much, then came back on schedule without feeling like the last few hours of the drive were a race to get home. The company was all lovely: groups of old friends visited at a wedding, and new friends met; more visits to folks and a property on the Island I haven't seen visited in years; and a bit of a ping-pong around some Vancouver people that felt like too many short visits but was still good for the soul. I got to see Josh and things feel ok there, which is a burden lifted that I hadn't wanted to carry. We're still doing a thing, though who knows what it will look like? I also got to see Angus, maybe in private for the first time since the breakup? That was also really lovely. The connections that survive significant relationship change between us are of such value to me; I change so much that it's impossible to trust anything will endure until it's been through a few changes.

I've now been on enough trips with Tucker that I can distinguish between two kinds of trip: one where we're staying together most nights but mostly busy doing other things with a couple date nights in there and the other where it's a vacation-together focused on each other. This was definitely the former except for the roadtrip parts. He's such a traveler; I've never traveled enough with anyone to begin to categorize like this before and it takes some sorting through on my end. I really appreciate the flexibility to explore both. More generally I really appreciate the flexibility of this relationship to balance space and support/intimacy; in fact, let's talk about that.

For the longest time I only understood good or proper relationship in terms of two modes: always-together and completely-apart. Even in poly I felt like I had to be 100% available to all partners at all times if they needed or even wanted me. I believed that my ability to be in relationship was innately flawed because I was poly, and so if multiple partners needed me at once I couldn't be there. I deserved anything less than a good relationship I received from my partners because I could not give good relationship in return.

You notice there's no room in there for being unavailable for my own personal reasons.

So eventually I started to make room for myself for my own reasons. First I did this through work or school: being busy enough that I felt justified (though still conflicted and bad) turning folks down. It wasn't conscious, of course. Then I went away for the summers, for school but also work, where no one could place physical demands on me. Then I moved up north and didn't engage with anyone up here. And... then Tucker moved up here too.

An ongoing thread in my relationship with both Josh and Tucker is taking space. Josh just... takes his, completely apologetically, without warning me first. It's getting me better at asking for what I want with regards to time, and also with my sorting out whether and how I think he's bad at relationship by how he goes about things. Tucker wants periods of space and closeness both; he models talking about what he needs in that regard and then making it happen. In response I've been learning to do the same.

Some things only release their grip on my mind through habit and practice. I'm beginning to make habit and practice around accepting other folks taking their space, and around just starting to ask for space when I need it. I often still feel like a whipped puppy when I schedule something without checking with a partner first in time they might be available, but I do it, and the feeling has diminished over time. It's starting to normalize that I have control, not only over who I fuck, but what I do all the time. It feels rather extraordinary. And I'm starting to believe, just around the very very edges in tiny glimmers, that I'm not innately unworthy through taking time apart from partners even when they want me to be there. I'm starting to believe that folks can show up for themselves even without me.

And that's amazing.

That's all a giant sidebar, I guess. I got home, there were 2 sets of piglets and a bunch of baby ducks, frost had killed my tomatoes, my plumbing exploded, and home felt really good. I was happy.

And now today all hell has broken loose at work. A colleague spent an awful lot of time on a department-wide conference call telling me what was and wasn't part of my job (spoiler: he was wrong both on what I was supposed to be doing and what I wasn't supposed to be doing), in order to meet deadlines I'm going to need to work a ridiculous number of hours which is less important than that I need to have everything run through folks who have signing authority and I do not want them to have to work long hours since they're helping me out; I am having to fight pretty hard to get support from my boss; and of course the lumber market is awful and so while everyone still has a job we're not as certain on that front as we'd like to be. And of course this is the day everyone has chosen to ask me for lots of little odds and ends which I would have had plenty of time to deal with last week or next week.

I feel scattered and overwhelmed. Hopefully this will pass.

Anyhow, there we are.