Mel Curtis

Despite the loss of sleep, I am managing. I made up for some of it by sleeping thru a football game yesterday afternoon and then going to bed early. The rains are putting a damper on my morning walks. I take short ones, but when my feet get soaked, I have to head home. I go to the grocery store…

Sounds like you had a nice Thanksgiving. I get the family thing. I didn’t own a home until my 40s and this house until I was 48 and had been living alone up to that time. So, at holiday time I was the single person always invited to dinners since I had nowhere to go. When I finally moved into…

I assume you are having the cool wet weather we are. I actually rather like it and enjoy walking in the misty mornings. I almost always see folks walking with their dogs and invariably I think of Barney. I am still grieving pretty hard and still tear up when I think about him for too long or talk to people…

I had a weird thought this morning on my home from the art museum. The autumn colors are fading and blowing away in the wind. And the rains return. October has always been my favorite month and one that goes by all too quickly. So, I was thinking about the passage of time, and it made me wonder how many…

Went for a long walk in the rain this morning. The atmospheric river came through last night and it was quite the storm. Big howling winds. But no damage as I could see.  I took my standard walk around the neighborhood. When he was young, Barney loved to walk with me. I just had to shake the leash, and he was…

I got a bit of a break from the blahs last week. I wanted to start writing for my new website folios and decided to start with the one about the University of Washington. But before I could write a word, I had to think about what my first project was there. I thought about it for minute and thought…

I know grief passes, but one can never predict how long the process takes. For some reason, lately I have been doing a lot of research about when events happened or when I did such and such project on the house. Not sure why, but it seems to occupy my time and fulfill some need for answers. The best way…

One winter on my walks with Barney I began to pick up stones to add to my growing rock gardens. At first it was just one. If picked up more than one, it had to be in odd amounts for some reason. So if I picked up 2, I had to find a third. They almost always came from near…

Barney was with us for 13 years. He was a six-month-old puppy when we got him. It seems he was the last of the litter and no one wanted him. But we sure did. Unfortunately, he wasn’t house trained and when he moved in, he determined where he would do his business and what chair would be his throne. He…

Today’s distraction was yard work. My yard guy was here today, so I decided to jump in and get dirty myself. Mostly moving dead plants from the deck and putting pots away for the winter. I usually wait until more plants die and use the deck into the fall. But I just didn’t feel like it this year. I don’t…