June 16, 2021
Summer’s here, ahead of
schedule, which of course doesn’t surprise anyone at all. Also arriving in this
part of the world last Friday, a few days ahead of schedule, was “step one of
the provincial roadmap to reopening.”
Yes, indeed, the “stay at home”
order has been lifted and some of the restrictions removed at long last, and I have
stayed at home, still.
The progress that I was able
to make with regard to this entire situation was to take advantage of our
province’s push to accelerate second shots of the vaccine. You may recall that
earlier in the spring the decision was made by our governments to delay second
shots in order to get as many first shots into arms as possible. We didn’t have
a robust supply of vaccine at the time, and seriously, I did agree with the
measure. The first shot gives some protection—actually more protection than I’ve
ever received from any flu shot—and while the experts have given a guideline on
when the second should occur it hasn’t been a vaccine that’s been around long
enough for them to really know if there would be a problem or not, stretching
that time frame.
Our second shots are now booked
for next week, which is more than a month sooner than our original appointment.
Two weeks after that, we will feel a lot more secure, as we will be considered fully
vaccinated.
When you’re over 65 with risk
factors, you tend to be very careful about something that has caused, world-wide
as of this past Monday, over 175 million confirmed cases and 3.7 million deaths.
This past weekend, since the “nonessential”
stores were finally open, our daughter and her daddy headed out to purchase the
lumber and other supplies needed to replace the front steps that lead up to the
porch. The railing had collapsed about a month ago, and at that time, David
pulled down the steps—in his words, “before someone had them collapse under
them, breaking their damn fool necks.”
We’ve been using our back door
to come and go, and had a chair placed out front beside where the steps had
been with a sign inviting deliveries to be left there.
This past weekend was our daughter’s
weekend off, and she and her father really worked hard to get those new steps
built. They did a damn good job of it, and by Monday morning, there were just a
few things left for them to do.
Our previous walkway, that
David had built years before using old, untreated railway ties, was beginning
to deteriorate, so the decision was made to replace the walkway using large
square patio stones. The new stairs extend longer from the porch than the old
ones did, which makes them a lot more user friendly for me.
I don’t know if I ever
mentioned that our son came to help on that long ago weekend when we needed to
build stairs off the side of the porch (the town had ordered the concrete ones
off the front demolished when they had to replace the sidewalk). He and his dad
bought a stringer and some wood and then together put the small staircase in,
and the walkway, too. I mentioned right away at the time that the stairs were a
tad too steep, but they both just shrugged. And a couple of years later, it was
our son who, looking at the stairs with suddenly objective eyes said, “crap, we
put them in upside down.” Now, I don’t know if that was true, but it made me
chuckle at the time.
These new stairs are not steep
at all. I can balance on my cane and just step up. No “hauling” my ass toward
the heavens any more!
But because they are not steep
and needed to extend further, the construction required that some of my flower
bed had to be dug up and the bulbs rescued. That was fine, especially since our
daughter decided to redesign the flower beds, putting in a new one across the
front of the porch, edged in grey brick.
The two of them worked very hard,
as I said, and as of Monday there were just a few more things to do in order to
call it all done. The patio stones had been placed but they needed to be
removed so that a base of sand/stone dust could be laid beneath them. David
wanted to get some carriage bolts to secure the railing as well and, of course,
we needed flowers to go in that new flower bed across the front.
In the fall, we’ll buy some
new bulbs to replace the few that likely won’t have survived the move—as well
as to compensate for those that I know have been left to languish beneath the
new walkway.
Our daughter and her father
share many traits, so I know darn well that they didn’t remove all of
the bulbs beneath the surface. It simply wouldn’t have seemed a good use of
that most limited of all resources—time.
Love,
Morgan
http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury
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