Beatrice

Trigger Warning for pet/animal illness, disability, death, grief, trauma, and loss.











We had to say goodbye to our beloved guinea pig,  Beatrice, yesterday, a little less than a year after having to say goodbye to her companion Annabelle, which seems wholly unfair. Beatrice was middle-aged and reasonably healthy until this month, when she began showing signs of weight loss and UTI symptoms. By Monday this week, she began to refuse food and water and so we packed her up and drove her the two hours to our caring and skilled guinea pig vet. There, they discovered she had several bladder stones, one larger than a pea, near the end of her urethra, and the vet was, miraculously, able to flush them out. The procedure went well, Beatrice recovered from the anesthetic normally, and we went home with her. And still, she would not eat or drink unless we force fed her, which we did. Worse, she was not eliminating. Back to the vet we rushed yesterday morning, and our vet kept her for the day and medicated her for pain and attempted to rehydrate her and get more food in her, but it was clear by 5pm that Beatrice was fading. We all knew her prognosis wasn't good, but there was a sliver of hope that with enough fluids and nutrition, she might begin to rally. Unfortunately, that was not the case, and she was in distress. Having prepared Olivia and Adam for this probable outcome, as we did regarding Annabelle, they had said their goodbyes and given hugs and kisses before we left. And with everyone in agreement via text messages filled with sad emojis and many hearts, Alex and I held Beatrice one last time, rocking her and whispering our love to her, just as we did with Annabelle.

Beatrice, you were a funny, adorable, fluffy, goofy, and bossy guinea pig and we adored you so. We will miss you.

Annabelle

Trigger Warning for pet/animal illness, disability, death, grief, trauma, and loss.










In my recent post about our guinea pigs, I mentioned that our sweet, satin-haired, guinea pig Annabelle had been ill since January. While it turned out that she did not have cancer, she never fully recovered from her injured leg, or so it seemed. Annabelle was, however, mostly immobile, and her back legs and back became more hunched and tense in these last few months. We did our best to keep Annabelle comfortable and happy, well-fed and entertained. She even got to meet Claudia last week. But with her increasing disability, she became clearly uncomfortable. She could not clean herself (which presents a whole set of other problems for guinea pigs), she was mostly unable to walk, and she could not live with another guinea pig.

Then last week, she started to decline even more. So we made the extremely hard decision on Thursday, after a morning of somber cuddling, and after a two hour drive to our wonderful vet, and after a long, difficult discussion about Annabelle's apparent muscular degeneration or dystrophy, (the x-rays showed that her leg had healed completely, but now her knees were completely inflamed), we decided to say goodbye to her. As incredibly painful that decision was to make, we felt it was the appropriate one given the level of pain she must have been in.





I stayed with her the entire time and held her against my heart and I rocked her like I rocked my children, crying our love to her.

We all miss her wheeks and rumbles and piggy smile and sweet nature. She was a little animal, but she has left oh, such an enormous hole in our hearts.

Goodbye, Sweet Annabelle. You were so, so loved.

The Return

I'm easing back into this space, snatching little chunks, reclaiming time to put my thoughts down and to do what is so dear to me, photographing and capturing how we spend our days. This transition to the farm has been a doozy in so many ways, both heartbreaking and heartwarming at turns, and I haven't always felt the desire or ability to write, here. To say our days are full is trite, but nonetheless, they are. And as just about everyone in the U.S. knows, this winter has been rough weather-wise, and rough on five people learning to live together in this new old place, this one filled with ghosts and haunts, some cold with longing and rigid with bitterness, at that.

I miss, too, the scent of our other home, our Mermaid House, the familiar corners and light, where spaces are now empty, shelves hold no books, and nails stick out from plaster as accusatory reminders of our abandonment.







That's what I think and feel on the hardest days. A homesickness so deep it draws great sobs up and bursting out of me until I am doubled over with...change. It's not loss, truly, it's only change. Change that we asked for and sought and work so very hard for. And it is wickedly wicked, some days.

Then there are moments, hours, days, where this change seems easy and natural. When order is created out of chaos, when photos and art find homes here on these farmhouse walls, when meals are eaten together, cooked in this kitchen, when new skills are acquired, when we spend hours rebuilding this place, and when we explore our greater community and extend ourselves.





























In these moments, I know that home is us, not the house. I clutch that knowledge, cling to it, letting it settle in my bones. Home is us. Not the house. And winter is almost done.

Merry and Bright: Yule: First Day

A week ago we took ourselves to a nearby tree farm and in the bitter cold and fading daylight, we searched for our tree. This is a ritual we've long held, only we've practiced it the last eleven years in a different home, and at a different tree farm. While the rituals - each ornament pulled from the carefully packed boxes pulled from storage, the songs playing, all remain the same as other years, we are each aware that these corners are slightly unfamiliar, a little less loved, yet, by us. The fresh paint that Alex and I applied in the days following Thanksgiving helped freshen spaces and certainly made much of the downstairs feel more like ours. And we're still in the midst of unpacking, shuffling belongings and spaces, weaving paths between tools, so unpacking yet more Yule boxes feels a bit too much at times. I'm a nester, and the frustration and nostalgia for my used-to-be home sets in when I can't find places for our beloved seasonal treasures. It's certainly no hardship, but it does make the tears come and my heart ache, just a bit, sometimes. I know these spaces will evolve and be set right by us in the years to come, and truly, much of this house is beginning to show signs of our Yule.









So we put the lights on the tree, as we do every year, sing I'll Be Home For Christmas in the shower until the tears flow (better out than in) and put paperwhites in each pottery bowl as it gets unpacked. We remember Nana, gone a whole year, as we hang each ornament. We know how to do this. We are good at making home and creating these seasonal rituals. Yes, this year is different, a year of transition; our first Yule here at the farm is bound to feel both wonderful and wistful. Merry and bright, that's just what this place, these hearts, need. We'll do that.

Record Breaking Highs And Lows This July

The heat index reads 103F, the fans are blowing, and my sunburn from earlier in the week is driving me mad with the itching (I somehow forgot about my back when I was applying sunscreen), and I am just now catching up in this space. We launched right into a full July calendar (so much for breathing) and other than the weather giving up whiplash (it's been soupy humid and rainy or humid and very hot), it's all been good.

We started July by catching up on some gardening. With all the busy, I never did get to planting containers, so we did that over the Fourth. We stayed put on the Fourth, too, as we do, which eases our worries about Mermaid House being harassed when people get rowdy in our beach town. We did have Auntie Heather over, for potato salad and food on the grill, and that was fun, but otherwise, we stayed off the beach and kept things simple.




We went up to the homestead the following weekend and did some work, but mostly so we could enjoy being on the pond. It was heavenly. And quiet.




We hated to leave the pond, but the weather took a turn to the soggy side, anyway, and we had to get back to Mermaid House to prepare the house for our friends' visit. I spent Monday getting the garden and house all spiffy and our friends, the poor souls, who had been trying to drive straight through from Cleveland with two young children, made it MA and ran out of steam. It was no matter to us and it gave them time, and daylight, to drive up along the coast and do some sightseeing, so it all worked out. Melissa and her beautiful family were here for just shy of a week and it was so good to have them. We quickly settled into a routine at breakfast, we'd go our separate ways or somewhere together in the afternoon, and the evenings were spent chatting, often until 1am. Their girls are very sweet and very good company and they seemed to get such a kick out of the everything. Now, if only we can convince them to move to Maine...

This darling is enjoying her leftover cake from our trip to Becky's Diner the evening before.



Shells collected, kids cleaned, and time to sit together for dinner.




After dinner talk. And watching the verdict come in, and sitting in shock, crying, together, yes, there was sadness, too. (And so much more to say in another post.)



A hot and sunny day at the beach. For lunch, the dads ran to town and brought us back lobster rolls and onion rings. It was a perfect day, and I hope, a happy ending to a Maine trip.








Our friends left on Sunday afternoon and Olivia went off to a poetry reading and suddenly, we were into another week. And a heatwave. Which meant more beach days, and now that itchy sunburn. And here it is, midway through July already and Sunday it will be back in the 70Fs. How time flies and something? Yes. Fun. We've been having fun. Mostly. Well, it's been intense, and good, and oh so sad. Oh, July, you're giving me whiplash.