Autumn Winds, This N’ That

 

The last week or so has been so odd. The fall is coming. I can smell it in the morn, the days are getting shorter, the nights get cooler and I’m reminded that soon I will blow away on the same winds that carry off the leaves each year. Old injuries ache in predictable ways, and serve to guide and remind me as I strive to avoid new ones. Few young ones might mistake this for some kind of wisdom.

An email scam last week just threw me into a complete flather, thinking my estranged daughter might finally want to talk after 6 or 7 years of stony silence. It put me into a short lived funk actually. A few hours on the range took the sting off, and then I was back to my usual extroverted retardation. But the bandaid on that wound had been half torn off… and I figured it was time to rip it right off and let some air get at the wound underneath.

I know both a lot and very little of my daughter at the same time. I used to keep tabs on her on the internet because I knew where she hung out, her screen names and those of her friends. I have some idea of the happenings in her life, how she thinks about certain things… enough to know she’s still alive and alright. I had troubles letting go of her when she left… and this type of spying was all that was left of our relationship. It’s pathetic. I finally stopped keeping tabs when she married her horse faced life partner last year. That was the event that finally convinced me she was gone, and wasn’t coming back, and I had no place in her life and path. I’d known it in my head for years… but a father’s heart wants what it wants. Mine finally gave up wanting what it could not have. Or so I thought.

In the wake of the email I decided to pop in and check on her again. I know, I know. But hear me out: when you rip the bandaid off, and then dance around in hideous rage and pain…there’s that short period where you wonder if the wound or cut underneath is causing real pain, or the hair (or fur, in my case) getting pulled out by the roots is. As the pain subsides… you slowly discover your cut has healed over and most of the pain from the bandaid removal was psychosomatic. I was checking up on my girl because I wanted to, not because I needed to. That is a big deal - for me at least.

She’s still alive. She had flunked her driver's test (she’s 36)…but at least she’s in the process of getting wheels and growing up. She’s working again. One of their friends is getting her tits cut off and is transitioning to be a man. She is still the same person. I closed that window on her life, and sighed. She has blown away with the autumn leaves. And ya know what? It’s alright. New ones will grow in both our lives. But she’s alive. That’s good enough, that's all I need to know. The rest was TMI.

After church it’s Battery Time. I gotta pull the cells on the mower and the camper and put them downstairs for the winter. I gotta push the mower round one more time and then it will be just raking leaves I suspect. Maybe I will get one more cut in before the leaves fly. I have to pull the pump off the car wash and take it in for the winter too. 

It’s good to stop and savour the cool fall winds especially after the summer heatwaves we’ve had… but the chores await, and i have to get on with them. I’ll let this bandaid flutter away on the breeze with the first leaves… and get back to it!

Thanks for popping in everybody. I hope your Sunday is grand, and that your chores and heart are light.

The kid is her father's daughter.

I suppose she runs against the wind too.