But I keep trying. And will again.

There’s one thing (more than one!) that I’ve been wanting to say, ever since i closed the balcony. It is truly winter now and things are tucked away, stacked and wrapped. So sad to see it turn back from my summer home to a barren, cold, windswept slab of concrete attached to the side of the building. I have had different approaches and aids to the interment over the past sixteen years I’ve had it. At first it was easy because I was strong enough to lift the patio furniture myself, with the aid of a (female) friend. Things change. I grow old I grow old. Over the years I have had different solutions and different helpers, but never my older son. I began to pay for some of the services; getting things up and running also requires effort. I was told last spring that the staff (by appointment and well paid) did not do that kind of work any more. This fall I missed one wonderful neighbour whose wrapping and securing of the tarps on the furniture has for the last two years proved the most wind-proof packaging ever. He had a hernia operation so he was not available or able.

Time was passing. It was too cold to sit outside. I thought of Martha Ballard. And you. See, I’m so literate that I that I seem to experience life more fully in books than I do face to face, at least, I get my examples and clarity from the written word. Hence Martha Ballard.

And I’m about to be cut off by a tired battery. So I’ll go to bed too.

Anon.