The person behind The Hermits' Rest blog and many others. I'm a certified Texas Master Naturalist and love the nature of Milam County. I manage technical writers in Austin, help with Hearts Homes and Hands, a personal assistance service, in Cameron, and serve on three nonprofit boards. You may know me from La Leche League, knitting, iNaturalist, or Facebook. I'm interested in ALL of you!
You know how hard it is for me to not share when something exciting happens. I’ve had to wait a couple of weeks for this one, and it’s been killing me. Good news is needed these days, and we have some! Let me tell you a story (which I will share on another blog, too, but that’s okay).
Back Story
Once upon a time, last month, Kathleen was taking a back way from the grocery store to the office. She passed by a house with a For Sale by Owner sign on it. Kathleen thought it was really beautiful and reminded her of her grandmother’s house. She kept driving by it, but didn’t mention it to me or Lee, since we are so busy with the Pope Residence project. She did call the seller and got information on it, but never went farther than that.
Look! It’s a cool old house!
It kept tempting her, though. So, finally she broke down and told us about it, the week before we were scheduled to leave on our vacation. She scheduled a viewing, but could only get it for the day we were supposed to leave, because the current owner lives out of town. We debated whether to put off the trip or not, but I really did want to see my family…
Look! It’s the other side’s equally grand entrance.
We were pretty excited by her description of this large 1885 house on over 1.5 acres that had been partially renovated, so we decided to drive over there and at least look at the outside.
Perhaps today is not the best day to talk about freedom, but that’s what the UU Lent calendar said to talk about. Freedom’s always been a hard topic for me, even without being confined to quarters/office and following so many rules and regulations (our home health agency gets new guidelines from the State every day, and we have meetings to go over them; as of now we have to take every client’s temperature every time we see them; glad I’m just the CEO and am sitting at my desk doing my other job).
Still free to enjoy doggie fun and games at the ranch!
Right now, though, I feel really lucky and privileged to be able to be outside and wander around the Hermits’ Rest, so I don’t get cabin fever. I’m still free on my own property.
Land stretching out so far and wide!
As for the concept of “freedom,” I always wonder how other people define it. I don’t feel free at all here in the US. I am afraid to criticize the government aloud, for example. I hesitate to express my opinions on a lot of topics, actually, since I’m concerned that maybe many people are wandering around ready to hurt or shoot people they disagree with. That may be propaganda aimed at people like me to keep us in line, but, this doesn’t seem like a free and safe time to me. I hope I just have healthy paranoia, not crazed paranoia.
Penney is glad she is free to attack and play with June bugs to her heart’s content. She watched this one a LONG time.
So, I plan to continue to concentrate on what I am still free to do, think, and write. I’m glad my blog is not censored. I’m glad my dogs can run and play and make me happy. I’m glad I am free to at least talk to my family and friends still.
Stay safe, and don’t be a paranoid like Suna. You always have the freedom to have another perspective from mine!
I hadn’t planned to do another renovation update, but then I got all excited. The office chairs that Chris and Kathleen got me for my birthday arrived, and of course I had to put the one I could find together and test-sit it.
A new chair, just crawling with flowers, just as I like it.
The color came out a little darker than we’d thought, but the red and orange will still be perfect in my new office. It certainly looks fancy in my old office!
Here you can see it matching all my stuff. It’s really comfy and short enough for short folks. Yay.
But, More!
A lot got done yesterday, so I’m going to share even though I just posted pictures yesterday. For one, all the drywall is now up, including along the future “break room” wall.
The last sheet of drywall goes up. Note that the wooden ceiling is also up, ready to be covered in tin.
The stairs are all covered up, and the old flooring removed in the new landing. This is unrecognizable as the same house!
All ready for a new floor.
The brickwork is moving forward. It’s now getting dusted and cleaned, and two of the rooms are now blocked off in preparation for sealing.
Do not enter!
All rotten wood is replaced, ready for trim.
Dusting off all the surfaces. Randy has a lot ahead of him.
Yep, it’s getting real. Shoot, we’re so close to being done that we ought to start on a new project, right?
When I saw that remorse was the UU Lent word to think about today, I got a sinking feeling. There’s something I’m familiar with and that I’ve really had to grapple with a lot.
Remorse is a distressing emotion experienced by a person who regrets actions which they deem to be shameful, hurtful, or wrong. Remorse is closely allied to guilt and self-directed resentment.
The Wikipedia
The key here is that remorse has to do with something that a person deems to have been wrong, not that anyone else might necessarily view it that way. And the part about guilt and self-directed resentment sounds really, really familiar to me. I don’t know that remorse is something we should be cultivating for good mental health.
Way too much of my life, this was my internal monologue.
I know. I did some things in my twenties that really were unfair to people I loved, hurt them, and in retrospect, I see are very wrong, even though I couldn’t see it at the time in my immature and very confused mental state.
The remorse I felt after that led me down a path of further poor decisions, because I was so upset with myself that I felt I didn’t deserve to look for a happy life, a good job, or close friendships. I felt like I’d just let everyone down. And the poor self image my remorse led to absolutely ensured I’d lose friends, chase away partners, and treat myself unkindly. Ugh.
The Instagram of the day. I did love that poopy, butt-scooting pug.
It took a lot of work after my divorce from my children’s dad to learn to forgive myself of my mistakes and stop trying to make it all better for people I disappointed. I learned to move forward and learn how to deal with my hormones and childhood abandonment issues in a respectful, adult way (with the occasional totally human slip-up).
My dog forgives me, so should I.
If you are feeling bad about yourself, you can get to a new place, too. Therapy is your friend. So is Brene Brown.
Right now, I’m experiencing periodic remorse about what happened to my relationship with my older son. I’m not even sure if I did something awful or he’s embarrassed about something or what. I try to stick to sadness over the loss of a relationship to dear to me, rather than blaming myself or imagining hurtful things I might have done. It’s tough. Remorse is hard.
Spiderworts behind the Pope Residence say hello, and are happy, even after being mowed.
Enough brutal honesty for one day, right? I’d love to hear your thoughts. enjoy some flowers.
It’s a parasite, but it feels no remorse (Texas paintbrush). At the Hermits’ Rest.
When all your workers live at or near your house, you can keep your renovation going! While Lee and I were on vacation, Chris, Easton, and Randy kept up the work at the Pope Residence. They concentrated on the back stairway area. and it was easy to see that a lot got done.
Stairs and drywall! The hole is for a sconce.
Almost all the drywall is up, and the second set of stairs got completed. You can now get to the second floor from the inside, if you are so inclined (which few of us are; it’s a mess).
The empty section is where they’ve made the landing larger.
They’re still working on the floor of the upstairs landing area, but what a great surprise it was to find out that they managed to make the area a bit larger. For one thing, since the first course of stairs was taller, there are fewer steps on the second course, so it ends farther from the door. That will give us a little sitting area/balcony kind of deal up there.
Chris is hiding while I show you the new window and how nice and light it makes things. The two holes in the ceiling are for matching chandeliers we already have.
A new little window was installed in the stairwell, too. That has made the back part of the house much lighter and brighter. Plus, the windows that were already there now allow light to go all the way down to the first floor.
Bathroom Update
Chris decided to put greenboard on all the bathroom walls, to add a bit of sound protection. Some of the walls will be covered with metal, which we are guessing may conduct sound.
This room is ready to be finished. Can’t wait to pee in the future toilet.
Preparation for Flooring
There is a lot of wood waiting to be used. There’s some nice wood that will serve as a stabilizing influence and go under the luxury vinyl tile in the downstairs rooms that don’t have tile or original wood.
Repaired flooring by the window, and lots of wood for trim.
And Easton did a great job of getting rid of the bad wood in the main “parlor” room and replacing it with wood from Lee’s office. That’s gonna look so great when it gets cleaned up!
More flooring material.
The rest of the wood is all the trim. There is a LOT of trim. It will match what was originally there.
Brick Repair
Meanwhile, Randy worked on brick. The area in my office with the window into the hallway got bricked up to the height of the wainscoting in the entry hall. And the place in Kathleen’s office that had crumbled now has nice, healthy brick.
Repaired brick in Kathleen’s office.
Chris says they are going to clean the brick really well, then put on a sealant that will really make the walls look spiffy. Argh, so exciting.
New brick in my office. The gap will be covered by trim.
We’re going to keep you updated, of course (and post this info in a couple of other places). It’s fun to see a plan coming together.
Too bad, but I’m just not up for writing an ode to the wind, as the UU Lent prompt would want me to. And my wind photos right now consist of mostly pictures of pollen and ducks. Here is pollen that needs to get blown around by the wind more:
These folks parked under an oak tree. Oops.
I’m like my mom in that I am not a big fan of the wind. It’s not as bad as my son was when he had his long rock-and-roll hair, but I am not fond of it. That’s one reason I cut my hair, so it wouldn’t get me all wind-miffed.
And happy holiday to you ethnically Irish friends. Note that I need a haircut and that there is a donkey poking out of my head. Oops.
The pollen has been pretty awful, as I’ve mentioned, and everyone in my little pod of containment has to explain to each other that really, really, they just have allergies.
I’m glad we can get outdoors, anyway. The wind blew n some whistling ducks this morning while Chris and I were talking outside, and I got to enjoy the look on his face when one of the ducks landed in a tree. He said, “I didn’t know ducks did that!” I told him just these.
I’m a special duck.
I’ll just share one more picture of a duck and a tree full of pollen, then I hope to have a fun Pope Residence update for you.
Two whistling ducks, one sort of hiding.
And yes, the dogs were glad to see us when we got home!
Change. I guess most of us are dealing as best as we can with all the changes to our daily routines. Nobody doing the UU Lent challenge will have any trouble with this as a prompt.
My friend Sara posted this message. A good one.
I’ve been trying to put things into perspective. There are always changes and challenges, big and small. My generation is lucky to not have been hit by something that requires sacrifice in a long time. But we managed 911 and the threat of atomic bombs and so on. If we stick together, we’ll handle the virus crisis.
Instagram of today.
I’m very glad for the perspective on change that my I’ll-timed trip has given me. It’s let me see that even from one week to the next, our planet changes. On the way out, the trees were bare and only white trees and red maples were blooming.
Still some beautiful white trees are in bloom.
Now, it’s a riot of colors. There is yellow jessamine throughout the trees, oaks and elms are going crazy, and the beautiful red bud trees say hello through the diverse woodlands we are driving through. Every week the show changes, and soon enough autumn colors will arrive.
More red buds.
I think this is why it’s so good to go out in nature, especially now. You can see the big picture and remember you and your problems aren’t the center of the Universe.
Not a bad view. We’re rolling along in the Mobile Social Isolation Unit!
I haven’t had too much to write about for a while, but I know there will be lots of changes to come once we get home. I can’t wait to see the progress on our offices, assuming that’s still going on. And then I hope to share more about our next project. Life will go on, even though I’ll be confined to home and the office.
Today we have resistance as our UU Lent word. Once again the Sunday word is ripe for sermonizing. I’d rather not preach. If you know me, you’ll know I’m part of the resistance against fascism and oligarchy and such.
Deep Instagram thoughts
As I try to get back to Texas in my Mobile Social Distancing Unit (Lee’s Car), I keep thinkingw oabout how some of us have more resistance to disease than others. That’s one reason for keeping our hygiene up, to protect the vulnerable.
Not planning to die. Just sharing that Donita’s neighborhood once was a graveyard. Many homes have headstones.
Most of my upcoming activities are cancelled, and I’m supposed to work from home for the next couple of weeks. I’m glad we got to visit Flo last week, because they place she lives no longer allows guests, even family. We are wondering if the State will require Hearts Homes and Hands to only provide vital services. I guess there’s a fine line between helping and potentially harming.
Take a breath and enjoy a night view in Swansboro. Resistance is futile. You WILL relax.
I have no conspiracy theories to share, other than to be reasonably cautious. I wish I hadn’t had this week chosen to travel, but we were careful.
I was so proud I got a shot while the blinking light was on. See. I can have fun with no people around.
What we could not avoid on this part of the trip was tree pollen. Oh my. Pines, elms, oaks and more have flowers or candles, in the pines’ case, in the Carolinas right now. Donita’s car turned yellow on our drive yesterday, and I know Libba and I sucked up a lot on our long walk last night, since my sinuses were running like a babbling brook last night. Lee says his eyes are crunchy. Poor guy.
Just a little truck stop pollen.
Now to keep my germ resistance up. Y’all do the same. Let me know how it’s going!
Since fresh air is good for removing germs, eat outdoors! Does alcohol disinfect your innards? Um. No.
We’ve been relaxing with Donita and Libba in Swansboro, NC. They live on the Intracoastal Waterway near the quaint old fishing town.
Me, relaxing.
While I have enjoyed my two days of shopping here and in nearby towns, it’s the birds and other animals that have made this trip special. You can see all sorts of marshes and barrier islands, which are just teeming with life.
Oysters by the sea wall
It’s a great contrast from Myrtle Beach, which is all big resorts. No natural beauty.
Laughing gull
Last night I saw an otter bopping around, which was really fun. Today I got to see a wild pony off of Beaufort. That’s pretty good viewing!
The otter was on the shore at left.
And the birds are fascinating. I saw an osprey and a gull fight over a fish. And there are so many waterfowl to enjoy, including many kinds of ducks, geese, egrets, herons, ibis, and so on. This is what makes me happy.
Ibis in Beaufort
Who needs people? I can just sit outside and observe.
Donita and Libba love boats.
What are your plans? When not working from home, I’ll be reading and knitting. And writing!
Throw me an easy one, UU Lent! I could blog for hours about music. Luckily I’m visiting relatives and don’t have hours. I keep getting distracted by wildlife, anyway (another post). Music has always been important to me (as for many of us).
I sang my whole life, mostly choral music, which I took to the second I learned what harmony was. Harmonizing with others brings harmony to my soul, and I guess it’s proven scientifically that it’s good for you, too. The years I spent rehearsing in my folk/rock trio, Trey Bone, were wonderful years. My friends Bill and Austin and I sounded so good together and really learned a lot as we put together songs to sing.
Back when I could sing. Eddie Collins, Austin Kessler, me and Bill Dower.
What makes me happiest, though, is that my children inherited my love of musical performance. I never could learn to play an an instrument, but both of them are experts. The one who doesn’t talk to me is an amazing mandolin player and takes his instrument everywhere.
Today’s Instagram about Declan and music.
And Declan can play so many things. I am so thrilled to see him playing stand-up bass in Big Dallas, but I’ve also enjoyed his guitar, bass, keyboards, and drum playing in other bands.
Both kids were in marching band in high school, and long-time friendships came from that. I firmly believe that learning music in school makes you a good thinker.
The markings on these shards look like music. All found off Swansboro.
While I lost my voice singing too much first soprano in a fancy choir, I still sing when I’m alone. I keep hoping my broken notes will come back. But music will always be there for me, and I hope it’s that way for you, too. It’s helpful at this time, because it can take us to other places in our minds.
Just be ready, though, I will cry hard if you play the Ode to Joy singing in the 9th Symphony of Beethoven. Tears of joy.
The Hermits' Rest 