VT Comes Through Again

Yesterday I was driving back up to VT and it was pretty warm outside. Most of the snow had melted in Massachusetts. It was making me nervous.

The progress of Fay's immune-mediated myelitis has plateaued over the winter. She's been doing pretty well since she got over our trip to California. In CA, where it was eighty degrees out, she was dragging both legs behind her. Back in New England where it's cold she's using her back right leg as best she can and only dragging her back left leg. She's feeling good and acting like herself. It seems to me that higher temperatures might contribute to the progress of her disease.

I'm not a summer person under ordinary circumstances but this upcoming summer has the potential to be really lousy for me and Fay. I'm thinking it could do her in.

Winter is definitely my season although I love autumn as well. I feel safe with a big blanket of snow on the ground and with the animals asleep and out of danger(ish) Everything's frozen, stable and not moving around very much. I've always been able to get the most and best work done between January and April. It's like a clear space for my brain.

Spring usually messes me up considerably. Things start waking up and moving around. The ground stirs and gets restless. I'm serious - I can feel in my bones the dirt moving around. It's unsettling. Roadkill numbers rise. The frogs, snakes and salamanders come out and then I have to worry about stepping on them or hitting them with my car. In this part of the world you can't go a day without killing something one way or another when the weather's warm enough. This year we'll be worrying about the bats as well.

So there I was feeling apprehensive about the warming weather, cooking up a plan to deal with my dread. I decided to make fear my new best friend. If the summer's going to suck I might as well take it head on. I'm going to immerse myself in things that scare me silly. Productive things - not jumping off bridges or anything. Things like sending out promotional art packages that include my embarrassingly thin resume. Like being sociable when I don't feel like it and talking to people who intimidate me. Things that will take me out into the world. If Fay's health is going to tank then I'm going to need some beneficial activities to get my mind off of it. If I'm going to be uncomfortable I might as well try to get it to work for me.

I like the plan. I wonder if I have the nerve to go through with it?

I went to bed resigned to the coming season.

I woke up to this:



This was the view from my kitchen window this morning. A reprieve.