Coffee couldn’t come at a better time this morning. I have so much I want to do today and I am sure not all of it is going to get done. Honestly, it doesn’t need to get done. It is just something that needs to be done over time and a few jobs that no one likes to do.

We have a dumpster and we need to finish going through the effects from my mother in law who passed in March. Covid 19 has made this all the more complicated because all the donation sites are closed, you can’t have a garage sale etc. The storage unit she had for her stuff needs to be cleaned out so we aren’t paying storage for things that don’t need to be stored. We have to go through stuff yet again and part with it. We cleaned out her apartment in March and this feels like opening up old grief. It is something I have had to do a few times in my life and I hate it. I bring more stuff into my house that I don’t have space for yet I can’t part with it. Old pictures, jewelry boxes, Harry Potter books and such.

If there is any room left in the dumpster we will fill it with things in the house and garage that we have been trying to get rid of for a while. Old junk, broken things and stuff that should have been dumped a long time ago. It is a difficult job because parting with some things I have is really hard. I would rather have this one nice weather day and work on my yard. Trying to do these outside jobs has been complicated with really poor weather for two months. Heck I would rather clean the bathroom than do this job. Going through my stuff and parting with things is never easy.

A long time ago I learned about the grief cycle in college. I am at the Overwhelmed stage and it is because of the Covid19 complicating factor. A difficult chore has been made more difficult. We have nothing but time on our hands outside of work and then we have to do the tasks that we never wanted to do. Plus, the stay home order follows the same grief cycle and we are never in the same place on the two cycles ever. And that makes it that more complicated.

Hopefully once this messy part is done, I will be able to work on the yard and fairy gardens. It hasn’t really been spring and my plants are just starting to grow. I have so many ideas on what I would like to do and it will take all summer to get it done. We aren’t going any where so I keep telling myself it will get done this year. Starting with redoing the raised flower beds. We have a plans to put a bird bath in and feeders. My husband is going to do lots of the work. We have the tools to do it this year and the time. Most things will be labor and not much in cost for the yard. There is a complication in all of this as well and it has to do with my neighbor deciding to do things that encroached into my yard and now we have a huge mess to have to deal with. That is a story left for next week and hopefully they will be doing more work so it isn’t as big of a mess as it is today,

I write all this down because I think I/we forget that during the pandemic we are dealing with the loss of the life we had before all this started. Everything I have had to do including my working from home to getting groceries becomes more and more complicated as the weeks go by. I keep hoping it will get easier and it doesn’t. The underlying stress of it really becomes a grind. Doing all the things I love to do really has been hard in addition to the things I have to do. Some if it is lack on brain space and energy. Some of it is sourcing materials. Some of it is the total disruption of my routine that I spent years cultivating for maximum use of my time available outside of work. And at the end of the day, I am really tired and tired of it all. As I am sure we all are. We are overwhelmed. Add in the additional consumption of media and social media… well my brain is fried.

So I remind myself that I will feel better when the chores are done. The next phase of life will go on and I will embrace it. The next level of work will get here and I will do it. The time for my beloved projects and creativity will come back. I am looking forward to a time when life is a little bit easier but overall, I am just a little inconvenienced really in the grand scheme of things. It is all a game of mental toughness as well a mental flexibility. I am keeping it simple and straightforward. One step at a time.

We are still under lockdown here. I am also conflicted on how I am feeling about the next phase of society opening up and gathering. I am not ready for that yet. I will figure it out when the time comes.

Keep safe everyone!

Vicki