Woke Up With Happy Images in My Head this Morning

I awoke this morning to ephemeral images of happy people dancing in a room beneath my eyelids. The images surprised and delighted me. (Even though you wouldn’t catch me dead at a dance hall. I am the quintessential wallflower/introvert.)

 

I kept my eyes closed and let the dancers do their things…they morphed into other scenes,  all of them cheerful and happy:  ocean beaches… animals grazing in fields… birds on the wing… stuff like that…

 

I didn’t want to get up. I wanted the images and the mood to keep me company, because I was smiling for the first time in a long time.

 

I guess my brain needed a break. I guess it needed to express its essence without me botching it up.

 

Because I “stayed and played” with the positive energy of the imagined images for a good five minutes before opening my eyes, when I did finally get out of bed, I felt lighter and less hindered.  I dived into the day with a peaceful, positive, can-do, will-do spirit and I’ve been sustained all day long in the essentially the same mood.

 

My brain seems to know when “enough is enough.” It knows when it needs a break. I honor it when it does.

 

 

My newest kitty, Charli, should have been named Velcro. Wherever I am, she is. If I’m typing here at my desk, she sits between me and my keyboard, or climbs onto my chest and falls asleep, purring. Every so often she insists on interaction, not just nearness, so I sit back and pet her for a while.

 

If I get up to use the bathroom, or make a meal, or read a book, or watch a movie, she’s right with me, stuck like velcro to whichever part of my body is available to her.

 

When I soak in the tub, she sits on the edge of it, looking worried, apparently thinking I must be crazy to willingly submerge my body in water. (She’s definitely not descended from tigers, servals or fishing cats, all of whom love the water!) She meows fitfully, asking if I’m sure I meant to do that or if she should go for help.

 

I spend half of each night on a recliner in my living room so she can sleep with me. Halfway through the night, I get up and go into my bedroom so my other cats, Hunter and Patches, can sleep next to me. (Charli doesn’t get along with Patches. If she wasn’t there, Charli would join Hunter on the bed with me.)

 

It was a beautiful day today. I should have walked, but I was tied to my PC all day, on-call for one of my clients who has massive communication needs right now because of the way the corona virus is affecting her business and she wanted me to check, proofread, edit and enhance what she and others are writing so it could go out right away to the intended recipients… so I didn’t get outside much except to mail a letter.

 

I’ve just updated my Power of Attorney and Powers of Medical Attorney and Advanced Directives, which has been on the back burner for eight months, but the corona virus has reminded me of the necessity of having my affairs in order, so I did those and gave instructions for updating my will, which is the next thing on my agenda.

 

I did a really dumb thing and looked at my retirement savings balance today, which has dropped $1500 since the corona virus came into being and threw the world for a loop… that’s about a third of what was in there a few weeks ago (and about what it was when I established it two or three years ago), so it took quite a hit, and I think it’ll probably get worse before it gets better.

 

The good news is that I don’t have to touch it until I’m 72 (three years from now) because of a recent change in the law as to when mandatory withdrawals are required, so it has time to recover what it lost, but under these circumstances, I have no idea if it will. But it is what it is.  It’s in as safe a plan as possible–but apparently there is still exposure, for sure, or it wouldn’t have taken the hit it did…

 

Hopefully my small pension and annuity (a combination of about $434.00/month) and my Social Security (a little over $1000/month, after Medicare and an additional 10% are taken out of it for part of my estimated taxes annual bill) will remain in place. They are supposed to, but who knows, in this once-in-a-lifetime crisis, or if the GOP gets back into power in November? They’re hellbent on cutting Social Security and Medicare…

 

Hell, if I catch the corona virus my long-term financial future will be a moot point anyway… I probably won’t be needing it, if that happens! I doubt very seriously I could survive it. (Which is why I’m hunkered down,  isolating myself, and going out only when absolutely necessary.)

 

A Facebook friend is sending me a R 95  mask to help protect me when I go out to shop for groceries (Thanks, Marcus Poulin!). I’m staying in my house except when I need to shop. (Oh, I’m walking on many days, but I don’t meet very many people on the roads I walk and they’re nearly always on the other side of the street, so the likelihood of contagion is extremely slim, or I wouldn’t do that, either.)

 

It’s lucky I’m an introvert. Extroverts must be losing their minds, being restricted like this. I’m okay with it.

 

My sister Jackie, on the other hand, is an extrovert. She keeps going out to God knows where and doing God knows what, which is why I’m sanitizing the door knobs she touches and washing my hands a lot. (We live in a kind of duplex and share a garage and washer and dryer, so she comes through my living room when she gets home or to do laundry… so I’m being careful to keep common appliances and doorknobs sanitized.) I pray she doesn’t catch the virus for lots of reasons, because she’s at higher risk, too: over 60 years of age, BMI above 25, etc.  (Triage nurses here in Seattle/Tacoma will screen us out if we get sick; we’ll have to deal with it here at home.)

 

I don’t think she’s aware of the true danger because she’s a Fox watcher and a Trump supporter–and we know he’s only recently come around (kicking and screaming, no doubt) to the fact that this isn’t some kind of hoax or conspiracy the DEMS have cooked up to discredit him… He doesn’t need any help getting discredited; he’s doing a fine job on his own…). So, I’m considering her Typhoid Mary pretty much: doing my best not to interact without holding up a cross and garlic.  (It would be funny if it weren’t so serious…)

 

Anyway, despite all this, my mood and attitude today has remained stellar. I hope it continues because it feels a lot better than the alternative.