Past Due

I am past due on the usually weekly blog here on Sidetracked. I am behind on a lot of things. I spent the fall working for others to get their houses and property up to snuff. Helped my budget but got me way behind on everything at my house.

The polar event that plunged my area down to 7 degrees at least a month early work me up. I quickly rounded up straw and covered my beloved hollyhocks of this summer. And got the supplies to "winterize" the apartment. Did the actual draining of water lines a day after the first bone chilling temps saying thank you's about escaping any frozen pipes. Scheduled in the oil change for the truck though because everyone else was doing the same thing, it does not get done until next week.

I sill have a long list of stuff I need to do, inside and out, but the weather was horrid and so I did the inside things first. Number one has been setting up my photography site at Fine Arts America. Been meaning to do that for several months. No sales yet but they can do prints of all sorts cheaper than I can. Better for my fans.

And there have been a whole host of things which came up to occupy my time. None of which had been on my original lists. And new items for the lists. All of which boils down to still being behind. My father always said to be worried about catching up. Means you are done. I probably could live another ten years and not have caught up. Not that I want to live that long. I certainly do not want to be the last to die in my social circle. Though frankly I am getting too much experience in saying goodbye to others.

There was this period in my early 30's when I plunged into one of my periodic depressions worse than normal. Fate conspired to give me plenty of reasons to be depressed other than genetic cycles. And I seemed surrounded by friends also in the same pickle as myself. Thoughts of suicide became such a topic of discussion I and a friend hosted a Suicide Survivors Christmas Party. Oddly enough it cheered us all up. And may have well be the first suicide support group in history. Mother told me I was silly. I was just at that age (and all my friends) where it seems the thing to do.

Well, I am at that age now when all my friends seem overly concerned about their health. I really am not in favor of discussing results of bowel exams at morning coffee. Everyone my age seems to believe they are approaching their expiration dates, and yet I am surrounded by people in their late 70's and even 80's who are not wintering in Arizona to die.

I have always, since those suicide party days, believed I was living on borrowed time. And that has only been amplified by my ski accident in 2001. I am past due. So maybe I need to heed my father's advice and not finish my todo lists. At least not this winter.

BTW the opening photograph has nothing to do with the subject beyond the fact it was a really shiny chrome grill in a junkyard. There is a poem or essay in there somewhere.