Daily Notes- October 16th

Found on the Daily Walk yesterday.  We went a bit later than usual as G needed a nap.  So we waited for him.  Riley was patient and took advantage of me- taking him out to walk the yard.  I call it "checking the mailbox".

There is little to nothing in the mailbox - either here on the computer, the phone or the actual mailbox.  It happens every so often- no communication with other living beings.  I think then of even older people who, likewise, get no mail.  I now know why my father was glad to bring a few advertisement flyers into the house from the mailbox and spend time looking at them.  I mentioned that to my daughter and she began sending her grandfather a letter every week.  I know she did because, when emptying his house after his death, I found two cardboard boxes filled with her letters to him. I sent him old cookbooks I would find at book sales.  I found the cookbooks next to his chair, with post it notes stuck to the recipes he found interesting.  He never had the habit of book reading.

I think that is why I began the Daily Notes.  In case someone out there had no other way of getting a Daily Letter, even if it was just my Daily Letter.

I actually made myself a meal- a hot cooked meal- yesterday.  I make sure G has hot meals but I had been neglecting myself.  Eating a peanut butter sandwich, a banana or a yogurt.  Yesterday I used one of the packages of frozen roasted cherry tomatoes to make cherry tomato pasta.  I have enough for another two meals at least in the fridge.  G is finishing up his chicken soup.  The recipe makes 4 quarts.  I believe he has one quart left.  And then I will make his sausage ragu sauce and he'll eat that for a few days.  I haven't started having Cream of Wheat for breakfast yet.

I often wondered why old people had such a lack of appetite.  Now, I'm older and I understand.  It's the eating alone that gets to you.

Riley is having a hard morning.  Restless.  Probably in pain.  He's had all his pills.

I have procrastinated with the grapes and getting them into a pot to make juice.  So, I will hit publish and then start picking the grapes off the bunches.  Get moving.  Like they say- just make one step forward.  Then make another.  Don't think further ahead than that.  I wish someone had been there to say those words when I was deep into depression the last year of college.  I wish someone had noticed.