423: small calamities

It's strange the way losing someone in an unjustifiable way can conversely allow peace to descend upon your otherwise murky life. The loss causes reflection, forces you to consider that life, allows you to extract all of the good things and buoys you up. You think of your own life, think of what is important, what warrants upset and what can go by the wayside.

When, a week ago, my lowness might have caused the small things to keel me over, now, instead, it becomes little amusements, still the shrug, but, after all, they're only small calamities.

Above: a coughing fit caused a blood vessel to burst in my eye. As the Mayo Clinic explains, it is not dangerous but sure does look "hurty," as Meryl put it when she first spotted my strange red streaks. I shrugged and said I probably got some Burt's Bees in it, but clearly, once I finally got a look-see myself, this wasn't the case. Ryan told me I looked like I had strawberry in my eye. Someone else, who probably would prefer I did not name her, claimed a cough like that would cause her to pee her pants; this caused me to laugh, which made me ribs ache. The cough really was awfully dramatic, apparently, with all sorts of residual troubles.


Our other major breakage comes in the form of a window: Ryan came home a few nights ago to shattered glass and a chilly kitchen. He tells me not to blame it on one dog in particular, but we all know that it was our dear Zephyr, the charging rhino, whose fond nickname, after all, is the bowling ball, and we know he spotted something absolutely delicious or curious (or bland) and had his own coughing fit, bark-bark-bark-bark, lept onto the window and smash. Fortunately, both dogs are fine: no blood, no scratches, just a pile of broken window. By the time I got home, Ryan had gotten all the glass into a box, we swept it away, and shoved insulation to await the new window. (Last window broken was completely my fault when I killed a yellow jacket by throwing a book at it. Whoops.) Ryan and I decided we ought to stuff leftover insulation in all of our windows so they'll match. We'd be warmer, but oh-so-ghetto.