I took this yesterday on my way to the garden just after sunrise. I didn’t think there was enough light, I am thrilled that it came out so well. I have been putting up pictures of flowers on my Instagram page and cross posting them to Facebook. My stealth way of saying, hey, I am still alive and out here doing my thing. And I wish you were doing it with me but…
As you all know I have been taking pictures of flowers for the last 20 years but have only been posting them regularly on social media because, message in a bottle, hello I am still out here should you wish to get in touch.
One of the people that have been commenting on my pictures on Facebook is Mr. Pedantic. Remember him? The board member that was driving me nuts last year by mansplaining everything I said to the group? We came to an accommodation. He toned it down a bit and I stopped letting it bother me so much.
He has a partner that comes to the Dialogue Group sometimes. An independent dedicated outdoors woman who was telling us a poignant story a few weeks back about a friend of hers who is terminally ill. She is quite soft spoken, and I noticed after this particular heartfelt story he jumped into the conversation and explained it to us. I was impressed by her ability to put up with that.
He has been unusually friendly lately. Starting right about the time Mr. B. did some work on their yard. He texted me on my birthday a sweet message. WTF? He quit the board last year but still comes to Dialogue Group most weeks.
I am pretty sure I made the decision to resign from Walt’s board walking over the Hawthorne Bridge when I was so angry after the very bad Walt Whitman day. The idea birthed in anger felt so liberating.
But I didn’t have the courage of my conviction until this last Friday. You saw the correspondence between us. My exact words were, “I would appreciate it if we do not make a big deal out of me leaving. Please.”
So yesterday morning after an energetic stab at rearranging my living room to make it look less like a gardening refugee lived here, I get an email from Walt… “We want to get together with you and sing your praises! noko! We’d like to take you out to lunch or brunch! Where would you like to go? What’s a good day? peace & love from the Board”
It looks so cheerful and innocuous. My response? I started shaking.
I started shaking like a creature that has her nervous system wrecked and didn’t have any other response available.
What part of I would appreciate it if we do not make a big deal out of me leaving, please is not clear?
It is kind of like the current majority on the Supreme Court not “getting” the 14th amendment of the frickin’ Constitution.
What I wanted to do was ghost him. That is what I wanted to do. Later I arranged a Zoom call with my sister and asked her advice on how to or if to respond. We decided direct and unapologetic was the best approach. She was quite helpful as a sounding board and I am grateful.
Then Mr. Pedantic chimed in with an email saying even though he is no longer on the board he would like to participate in the brunch. No. No. No.
So, my response just to Walt. Thanks so much, Walt (and the board), but no. With my name. No with Love and Fellowship, no Peace, Love and Happiness… nada. Argh!
I signed up for a weekend poetry studio workshop with a well-known gifted teacher at the end of the summer. He has nothing to do with these people. I have taken classes from him before back in the Mr. Finch days. I will be reading at least two of the new poems at an Open Mic this next Sunday and I will practice reading them this week.
Mrs. Sherlock and I had a lovely walk and talk this last Sunday. She is a dear good friend, and I am also incredibly grateful to have her in my life even if it is on a more limited basis these days.
Another one of her friends, someone she has been helping lately with a neurological disorder, dropped dead on Friday morning. Mrs. Sherlock is her executor. So, she has plenty to do. Such a shock to have that caregiving end with such abruptness.
You just never know. Seize the day and all that. I just happen to be seizing my days back from the people I apparently lent them to without knowing I was doing it.
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