Done In

It started when I got up and realized I was still sick. I just didn't feel like I could take another day, since I was out Tuesday, then went back Wednesday and acted like I was fine...what an actress I am. I also had a Child Study Team Meeting on a conference call with a sending high school. Bad weather was forecast, and it sure did look, feel and smell like snow. I took some medicine which made me feel worse than the problem. I am so sensitive to any kind of medication, and I don't take a single pill a day - thank the Goddesses - so anything I break down and take works better...an advantage I guess. I thought, how bad can it be, there are bathrooms everywhere and I can sit down most of the day, even on cafeteria duty. Got myself to school and found out that FOUR of our seven people were out. Several sending districts had already made arrangements to pick up their kids early. My meeting was cancelled. Sure enough the snow started around lunch. I had to cover a teacher they sent home because she lives 50 miles away. I had to cover the teacher who has gym duty (no sitting down) and take kids back and forth to the gym on the other side of the complex all day. The weather got increasingly worse and finally all the kids were picked up. You would think they would let us go after the kids were gone, but no deal. This I do not understand. It was another dark, snowy, white knuckle ride home, with the typical big pick up truck behind me on my bumper for 15 miles of up, down and around. I will NOT go over 30 on snow so why don't they just go around me???? I made my stop, going up and down the aisle of the little market in the village looking at things I don't dare eat. I got my cat food and NY Times and went to the Homestead Feed. I had coupons for a bag of cat food, and have gotten it this way before at this store. The owner looked the coupons over and over, front and back, muttering okay, okay, okay. I got the distinct feeling she was wishing I gave her cash, that times are really hard and every purchase counts. I totally understand and felt a twinge of guilt. I also bought the same apples for the sheep that have been $1.39 for too many weeks. At least she got some cash for the apples. Another ten miles of darker, snowier, icier roads north to Bfield. I stopped to pay Mr. Simmons for next week's hay so it wouldn't disappear somehow from my account and my sheep would starve. Pregnant ewes are on a hair trigger with their well-being. Any change in diet and they can collapse into ketosis and it's time for the vet. Pulled in finally and the sheet of ice wouldn't let me up the driveway. I slid backward, missing Jan's husband's $7,000 trailer with the classic sports car inside, and almost hit the dumpster. Couldn't move. I decided to abandon the Jeep there and hike up. Some kitties came running down the drive to meet me. They know I always have goodies for them. I drag my things up and get inside. The doggies are crazy and I am dead. I get them out, more slip sliding, and tell Tanner what a good girl she is for holding it until Mommy got home. I check on the sheep and peak as far down in the barn as I can. No lambs. I listen, no lamb sounds. I hesitate to walk into the area where they are lying down, like sleeping babies a mother does not want to disturb. I can see the piggies from far off, napping in their hay. My next job is to get the fire going. There are still coals from the morning but it will take some doing. Rosanna's wood is great, hard and cured, but the logs are way too big and have to be split. No can do. I can't swing an axe very well and would probably chop my foot off, so I search for some slightly smaller logs. Half an hour later and quite a few sticks of Annie's Fat Wood and still no fire. I give up. I hate to use the electric with no insulation on top, and the wood stove does just fine, but it's a lot of work. Carrying the logs has exhausted me. Why do I want to write this all down? Someday I will be flat on my back ready to pass and Mia will read all these stories to me and I will say, I did all that?