Thank you

Today we pack up the truck.

Yesterday I finished training a new bookkeeper, got rid of a table and highchair, and drove to San Francisco to pick up our visas. About halfway there I realized I should have taken the train.

I am halfway numb and halfway hurting. We lost another friend on Monday night (the friend who was in the hospital) and I've never experienced anything like this- three dear people in the space of a month. We have friends (multiple) who have lost not only their brothers, but their best friends, once again in the space of a month. My heart breaks for these families.

The people who have left us I know are not gone. But they will be missed, here where we touch things still that are dirty and get up to wash our faces in the morning, here where people go into the hospital one day and a few days later leave themselves behind.

And in the midst of it, we pack up our truck. Nothing feels quite normal. Thank God for the wild children around here- drumming and dancing, demanding food three times a day. They keep things on the right track.

Today, as I work, I'm going to think of the wildflowers that will be exploding across the landscape in Humboldt. Maybe I will lie in a bed of them, maybe I will be able to cry.