Nov
2008
Last week was “too many things at one time”
November 3rd, 2008 at 02:32 pm by Shari Thomas in Around the Farm, Day off, New Life, WeatherWednesday night (after we’d all gone to bed) the phone rang. We know around here that a call in the late night or very early morning is never good news. Sure enough, it was Cindy’s brother, Kevin, with the news that their father had passed away.
He’d been quite sick and had been placed in “hospice care” with six months to live about 10 days previous. He’s in a much better place now.
Needless to say, no one got much sleep that night.
We took Thursday off from the “barn demolition clean-up” to take care of as much of the necessary arrangements as possible. As it turns out, Cindy and Mom will fly out Friday night, November 7 and get to Ohio the next morning.
Dad’s being cremated and a couple of services are being planned, one on the “mainland” for Kevin and family, and the other at Put-In-Bay for Mom, Cindy and their friends and family. Iterrment is private.
This past Friday, Cindy and I finished the barn project after borrowing the neighbor’s lowboy trailer. We had better than a dozen 16 foot boards, two gates (doors), and other assorted long lumber, as well a pickup load of absolute junk wood. That’s the little stuff with more nails than we could count.
As if that weren’t enough, our neighbor Jill, has been unable to secure a “winter tenant” to live at/tend to her little farm, so we’re tending the animals (sheep, goats, chickens, dog and cat) while she’s up north during each week. No real problems, other than the sheep keep getting out of their pasture and helping themselves to the hay stack. The goats are nearly dry, so not much milking and the chickens are now free-range. They’re still laying pretty well, so we gather eggs.
The weather has turned very fall-like for a few days with rain Saturday night and fog today. It’s so unusual to have fog on the desert!
Oh, if you’ve had any problems getting to my blogs, especially Four Country Gals, it’s because our web host has been migrating from the data center in Canada to Texas, and those things never go smoothly. We’ve been communicating regularly with tech support as they work to get everything resolved.
Buy me a beer and I'll write more posts more often.
Comments
I’m so sorry for your loss… when it rains it pours.
Cynthia, thanks so much.
Actually, it was really for the best. Had he lived out the full six months, the expenses would have mounted for sure. Also as winter approaches, should he have passed in winter, the trip home would have been delayed until spring.
This way, closure comes much faster, and with the help of some incredible neighbors, Cindy and Mom are enjoying the 2nd week of their two week trip.
Even SS has gotten everything done, so Mom has her “widow’s portion” already and waiting, a very nice increase in benefits.
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