Many Changes

Tonight I was and probably am going to make rice stuffing for the turkey someone gave me for Christmas. I just wasn't up to making it then. I'll put home cooked spiced fruit with wallnuts, onions, shredded carrots, and a mix of brrown and wild rice altogether. I learned to make this by experimenting because Ann couldn't eat anything with wheat, barley, or rye in it, or all the foods which contain gluten from wheat. Ann learned from a cooking show that if you make slits in the thawed turkey's skin and tuck in the stuffing, the meat picks up the flavor of the stuffing. It makes the turkey look funny, but tastes great.

I have some pears with sweetener, ginger, cinnamon, and fennel, (not sure how to spell that spice). Will moisten rice and veggies. (probably cole slaw mix and onions and green peppers, with pears. Before cooking, will add wallnut pieces, so they stay a bit crunchy after cooking.

In many ways which are individually small but may be large when added together, things are changing. I'm making a dish I only made for Ann on holidays. Just figured all of the deer burger spaghetti and fruit salad were eaten, and would enjoy turkey. Then I decided if I was going to cook it, might as well cook it with the stuffing we, now just I, like.

Also began setting up a room for reading my Braille books, studying Braille maps, and for meditation, with Buddhist altar in it. I have a small altar shelf or space in each room where anything important happens. Didn't have one in this room or the kitchen.
Thank you for info.. on window plastic kits, Phily Collector. After getting windows plasticed from inside by a very kind friend, she and I got curtains hung in all but one room. Figured that might help a bit with utility bills, having more than just blinds. She said that the place had looked a littlle Temporary without curtains and that it looked more "pulled together" with them. I guess it has Felt temporary all this time and still does, often.

Bought things today to offer to free (wild) creatures on day one year after Ann died.

Also got book about Japanese braiding techniques for clothing decoration, jewelry making, etc. on tape so can follow directions. Am hoping to buy some "fair trade" recycled sari yarn to use, but strings of seed beads can be used, ribbon, many things. And I Will dress a Chinese or Chinese American doll in Some color Other than red, kept that in mind, after reading it.

Missed all of the toy sales, didn't have transport after Christmas to stores. Still don't and now inventories are done, I think. But bought several larger dolls. It will be interesting to find out if I like sewing for fashion to 12 inch dolls best, (advantage is I can feel an entire garment easily with one hand, or for larger dolls, like American GGirl, (advantage is can use machine more easily.) Found an American Girl with a MAT for hair cheap on Ebay. After 4 or 5 hours, hair isn't new, but is good. Took a lot of work!

I've been feeling lately like one of the birds, possibly the canary, will die soon. There is a different feeling around the cage before one of them dies. Tonight I went in to feed and water them and found one alive, but down on the floor, bad sign, and there is no emergency small bird vet clinic open at night. Thought the bird Was dead, it didn't move when first touched. But when I began to gently lift it from floor, flew up onto a low perch.

I freaked. The three birds Ann and I had left when she died are all old. One is at Least sixteen, a finch who lives from 10 to 12 years in the wild, according to the bird care book we read before getting any birds, the youngest is probably about 8, not bad for a canary, they can often live until 10, if Not fed colored food to dye their feathers. This food slowly poisons them and can cut their lives in half. Ann and I never used it, but the canary she got me Was color fed for at least a season, may shorten his life. We always tried to take good care of our pets, but did allow the birds to die of old age and put down terminally ill animals when they began suffering and not enjoying living.

So why did I freak? Not sure. First death since Ann last Feb. 1st? Partly. Also, we always loved our pets and shared their deaths together. I will have to bury the first bird to die. Also, their have been times before when I've thought one of these three was ill and had to run my hand over bottom of cage to see if one was gone, had died. Until now, nobody was down, they always seemed to bounce back. Shocked me to find bird body lying limply on cage floor. Sometimes when birds have been together for years and formed a bond, as these have, if one dies the others will die soon after.

I did not touch Ann's body after her death. After touching my father's body when he died and I was fifteen, I am Glad I'm not the one who found Ann under the snow. It's not that I didn't or don't love her. It's that no one warned me how Different and Unreal a body feels in the funeral parlor, before I touched my father's body. I don't expect to forget it. With animals you know when they are living, they feel totally different, and so does the air around them, when they are gone.

The bird cage has that feeling around it now and a bird on the cage floor who allows you to touch it is a very Bad sign, unless it was used to being petted. Mine are used to me making their sounds and will usually answer, but they don't want to be touched, so I don't touch them.

First "family" death since Ann, a shock to touch partly living bird on the cage floor, I guess that's it.

Like I said, these changes are all individually small, but together feel large, hanging curtains, beginning to accept this house as home and wondering if I should, life has been very unpredictable for about a decade, only I feel like I might be settling here for a while, who can say? Learning a new skill, getting more of an inventory ready to go online, the holidays Over without Ann, and now probably burying my first pet alone here. Shall I get another canary if OJ (his original food had turned his feathers a bright peachy orange and when they faded back to normal color, name had stuck) dies? They are expensive now, $100 or more, not like $30 to $50 at a bird show. Now bird breeders are all into larger birds, many of whom will live longer than me. Pet stores take at Least a fifty percent mark up, so $100? Lot of money, probably not.

Oh yah, and cooking the stuffing I invented for Ann.

I have tried to keep in mind since Ann's death that it can come to anyone at any time, including ME. But somehow finding that bird scared me.

Jolly damn post, ain't it?