There’s a great line in Anne Tyler’s novel, A Spool of Blue Thread, in which one of the characters, Red, a builder and now grandfather, declares that caller ID is like cheating– It seems to me, he says, that you should have to pick up the phone and take your chances. (I don’t have it either.)
Then this morning, walking on the beach with my friend as we do every day, we re-capped the 24 hours since we last walked and talked– and as always there’s so much to share- she said it’s been crazy– “The phone rings and everything changes. Everything!” She threw up her hands. “And what’s incredible, is that it happens three or four times a day.”
Isn’t that the truth? And much the same can be said for emails and texts. Yesterday I worked on a column all day, and so did not answer the phone– or read all my emails– until last night, and it was one surprise after the other. I suspect my seesaw emotional responses to all this information has more than a little to do with the new responsibility of running for office – and there was one very long thread of emails with borough officials weighing in on a harbor uplands workshop that they agreed to cancel apparently — but it’s also career issues and important contracts to read, and as always– news from my family.
I have been a wreck with worry over my daughter’s dog Annie (left, looking at her boy James) who first took ill here, having a seizure in our bedroom back during the Fair when they were visiting from Juneau, and has gone down hill since then, and now has died. I cannot write about that yet, except to say Annie was the reason we got Pearl. I wanted a dog like her, and how when she was a puppy, Caroline, who was only about 1 year-old at the time and just learning to talk, thought her name was “Stop It”, because we said that a lot — when she nipped with those puppy teeth, or jumped, or licked too much. Learning Annie is gone was not a good text to read. It took my breath away, even though I thought I was prepared.
An easier message included a request to bake 40-50 brownies for the KHNS annual meeting tomorrow evening beginning at 5:30 at the Brewery. I can do that, and call in my daughters for reinforcements.
I will get caught up some on all these messages, and then join the other candidates at 12:30 today at the Senior Citizens Center for a forum with the seniors. Then I plan to leave the phone at home and take a bike ride. The best surprise right now is the beautiful weather.
