I don't handle the holidays very well, and I am sometimes self destructive this time of year. So, a friend suggested we take a drive and spend a peaceful day just enjoying the scenery and being quiet with our thoughts on this Christmas Day.
It was a chilly windy day at the beach on the other side of the island, so I have my hair tucked under my sweatshirt. We had pulled over on the side of the highway on a deserted stretch of beach. Then we went up to the mountains for a while to enjoy the crisp forest air and caught the sunset on the way back down. A healthier way to spend the day than I might have on my own.
Beautiful choices and picture, you have a lovely friend.
Yes, it was nice to get out and visit the places my parents loved. We hit many of them. My thoughts are always with my parents on Dec 25/26, the anniversary of their deaths. So, it was comforting to share time with an understanding friend who also lost both parents and has a deep connection to the places we visited.
What makes you think I care about your hair tucked into your sweatshirt? Furthermore does it actually help your obsessive compulsive control problem? - lol at least if it blew & tangled the time you spend untangling it will not be spent on obsessing over your discontent.
Allow me to share my 25\12 with you. I start by directing your gaze to the photos. Firstly are the two cats who have taken a week to come out of hiding when I'm around. Then there is the feral cat Stripey who had me worried because he didn't turn up for his dinner. I was worried a fox had got him\her but today reappeared. The day starts by cleaning the cats litter box of their poo and sweeping up the litter kicked out of the box. The quantity is checked to ensure healthy throughput. Next all the cats are fed.
Next on the agenda is the hen's needs. Their morning feed, their water, collection of their eggs and setting up the fox scarer (a radio broadcast of jabbering opinions). On that day food prep included reducing my king size tiger prawn shells & heads into crumb size pieces suitable for hen size beaks - they rewarded me today with an extra egg.
Having attended to their needs I then attended to mine eventually preparing lunch of a salad with banana prawns that needed cooking, shelling & then covered by an interesting sauce of my own devising.
Part of my afternoon was then spent editing photos from Friday's shopping trip (last photo).
The evening was spent, after attending to repenning the hens & feeding them, giving the cats their dinners, in watching inconsequential tv, making a rum flavoured white sauce to cover the traditional pudding and eventually collapsing into bed at 1 am.
Totally alone but not lonely. Cat photos to come.
Have a fulfilling week - make a stranger's day by doing something spontaneous that makes them, not necessarily immediately you, feel good.
The cats:
I feel very lonely this time of year as does my daughter. The problem of being a widower really. If I were a divorcee then perhaps it would be different.
Should you need to talk or rant about life, the universe and everything just PM me.
Tony - and a very merry Saturnalia to you.