January Journal by Luanne Armstrong

January diary:

For too much of January, I felt like bad old sad old country song; lost my dawg, lost my car, lost my dear old Mom…plus it’s deep dark miserable January and it’s raining and so on and so on…and so on.
But mostly, in amongst the various griefs, I was (and am), also relieved; so hard to watch the dog get old, and older and struggle with keeping his dog dignity, running, barking, peeing and shitting outside. How do dogs understand old age anyway?
And all fall, going in to see my mom as much as I could manage, trying to be with her and watching her decline and decline. In some odd way, her death has given her back to me, my lovely, laughing, always busy Mom, who was never quite the shrunken white haired woman in the wheel chair watching the door for me to come in.
And the car is now fixed and spring will come and a whole week of family and visits and people and phone calls and organizing is over—over—over. Now can I have my nice dull writing life back, I hope. Before Christmas interfered, I was having a dull and boring life for the first time in my EVER and I liked it! Didn’t expect to and I was always only a hair away from boredom but it was all so manageable instead of chaotic. And I was getting work done, and keeping up with teaching and even having odd moments to go for a walk. Lovely! Amazing. Who knew order and lack of crazy busyness could be so liberating.
So tonight here I am again, alone, (except with a shiny new floor) rain on the roof and the deck, silence and darkness outside, only one dog snoozing on the rug, and the revisions to the new book sitting beside the computer.
It is ridiculously and unseasonably warm and I am paying no attention to the whispers from the greenhouse, the trees and plants. My brother was out pruning trees briefly today but we both know in our bones it is too early to pay any attention to the garden, even when the false and lying sun pokes out from behind the clouds with actual warmth in it. It isn’t warmth but light that triggers growth. For me, it is the smell of earth, when I am outside on a cold spring evening and I can smell the ground, a smell of cold and mold and earth and anticipation. But right now, the light is still telling me, sleep, sleep, and Sunday night, after the kids left, after the funeral was over, after the house was clean and quiet, after I emailed all my students, after a week of decisions and dinners and the jangling and jostling and banging of various people, emotions, sensibilities and ideas, I let it go, I curled under a heap of blankets back in my own bed, and slept and slept.
But then of course, the next day, and the next and the next, there are the banalities of the ordinary, bills, money (and the lack thereof), letters, emails, revisions, chores. I need a new thought, or a new project, or a new something, but as always, gotta finish off the old before the new will wander in the door.

But spring will wander in soon -- time to get those seed orders done!