Gloria died one year ago today. December 18th, 2021. In 2021 that was a Saturday. She died sometime between 7 and 10 PM. I went to sleep in the chair beside her bed at 7 PM and she was still breathing. I woke up at 10 PM and she wasn't breathing anymore.
Anniversaries generally are not a big deal for me. I have trouble remembering birthdays, even my own. I have trouble remembering even national holidays, except for the constant barrage of advertising that fills the public spaces to tell you that one is coming up.
So I didn't expect any particular problems with today. However, having awakened characteristically early, but on a Sunday, when I generally try and avoid working on the computer, I tried to find various things to do. I unpacked, sorted, and arranged to at least some semblance of order, my main (en suite) bathroom, which has not had a priority for me to clean it up, with the press of various other things that I have had to do since the move. With that, and a few other chores, I managed to make it through until about 6:00 AM, and decided that I could head out to McDonald's and get a cup of coffee, and then head down to south southport and map some wifi hotspots, before I had to go and do the soundboard at Trinity.
So, having purchased my coffee (with the usual attendant comments about exactly how many cream and sugar there were to be in said coffee) and headed out from the Mcdonald's, imagine my surprise to have a fairly major grief burst.
It's now about an hour later, and I have been wandering around and mapping hot spots, and, despite the promises in the weather forecast that we should be preparing for snow, the southern skies are fairly clear. It's about 7:30, so the sky is fairly light. The sky to the north is quite heavy with cloud and it is easy to believe that, yes, soon those clouds will roll down and we will have at least some snow. But the southern sky looks nice and I'm feeling a little bit better than I was an hour ago.
Well, off mapping more hot spots. I suppose the only note to make here is that the hospice office has a nice strong shot open signal immediately outside the front door ...
Only, after I dictated that piece about Gloria, heading north away from the hospice office, I seemed to walk through a cloud of perfume. Gloria, of course, did not wear a perfume, being allergic to Balsam of Peru, which is a component in a wide variety of perfumes. From what I can remember, Gloria would not have been allergic to this particular perfume or scent, and, in any case, it wasn't particularly strong. It's just rather odd.
And then, later, after I got to Trinity, I had another grief burst before the service, and one during. (As well as a major scare when, halfway through the service, the snow started dumping down, and I was wondering whether I would need to walk to make *sure* that I got to Jericho Road for the Christmas play when I wanted to drive since that service would be ending fairly late, but then it ended by the end of the service, and, in fact, we had some nice sunshine during the afternoon.)
So, the Christmas play was a go, and went as well as could be expected, and the girls came, and we had a nice time afterwards.
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