Home stretch

Yes, I'm alive. It's the busiest week of my work year, with commencement this weekend and the accompanying publications mash-up as well as my Web news site to update.

Michael's new digs, a.k.a. the Old Folks' Home. (It's a 55-and-over apartment complex!)

So much has been happening. Michael started his new job in Connecticut yesterday. He moved into his pied-à-terre in Bristol, CT, on Saturday in time to let the cable guy in.


Curious bit of outdoor "decor" at the Old Folks' Home.

This is the weirdest chapter in our 34-year marriage, living apart all week. We're both trying to keep it in perspective: a great opportunity for him, a good second income for us, affordable dental and vision insurance. Still... I miss him. I miss bumping up against his broad back in the middle of the night. I miss him shouting out the answers to questions on Jeopardy! every night at 7:30. I miss him fussing with the invasive Japanese knotweed across the road. More selfishly, I miss the dishes always being done and put away.

Melinda landed a fantastic summer job, full-time, with a Providence law firm. We commute in and home together every day.

Kevin and Livia, May 15, 2009.

Kevin has a few more weeks of school, which I hope we both survive with no drama. He went to his junior prom with a sweet, lovely girl in his class last Friday night; as always, I enjoyed joining a horde of parents at another girl's house for photos before the kids piled into a stretch limo bound for the dance.



I'm in the midst of a month of medical tune-ups: annual physical, annual gyn checkup, three-month shrink visit, annual mammogram, five-year colonoscopy, diagnostic abdominal ultrasound and soon a uterine biopsy, my second in as many years. My blood sugar is drifting on the high side and I need to lose 35 pounds. My psych meds were tweaked a bit and all is copasetic with my depression and my highway driving.

Warm weather is finally heading our way later this week. I planted a few vegetables, including the awesomely sweet "Sun Sugar" orange cherry tomatoes we grew last year. I put in some new perennials, having made a quick trip out to Four Town Farm on my lunch hour today. (That place feels like home: farmland, plants, and sprawling horse farms.)

Bottom line: Things could be a lot worse! When was the last time I could say that?

Meanwhile: to bed I go. Soon Daisy and I will be snoring a duet. This weekend Michael will join us for a buzzing nocturnal trio.