Since this whole Covid business has hit, I’ve been here. At my house. Freaking the fuck out. I go to work, I go home. I go to JoAnn to pick up my items that I’ve ordered online. Curbside pickup, you know. For a couple months now I’ve been hiding. Thankfully for my anxiety, but baaaaaaad for my mental health.
Work has been fine, except a lot of rules have been relaxed. I’m a rule-follower. I’m a bookkeeper, a problem solver, a structure-based individual. When it comes to work and being flexible, I’m exactly the opposite of how I am in my “real” life. I don’t cut corners, I don’t make decisions on the fly. There’s no room for variables. As you might imagine, this makes one a teeny bit FUCKING NUTS.
So I ran away for a few days.
My very best friend in the whole wide world owns a ranch between Redmond and Bend, Oregon. She grows Piedmontese cattle; an Italian cattle that’s low in fat and fairly easy on the ecology of the area it’s raised in. They’re gorgeous cows and bulls, raised on grass like any other type of cattle, but when time comes to slaughter and process, I’d say (in my uneducated opinion) they are crazy low in fat and easy to cook and serve.
Now, don’t @ me since I said she “grows” cattle. I know they’re raised.
That’s not my point. My point is: I went to hang out with my friend who has been through so much bullshit with me, she knows me deep down inside, and she loves me even though I got drunk one time and dragged her poor ass around an outside venue because I fell down and got lost. (Seriously don’t know how she still even likes me.)
She’s my fucking ride or die.
We can hang out and talk or be quiet, we can watch a movie or stare at the fucking wall. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for her, and there’s nothing she wouldn’t do for me. She watched me in my first marriage and supported me through my dumbass decisions, she gingerly counseled me while I stayed married and loved me even though I was completely oblivious to the shit I was totally falling for. She supported me when I decided I’d had enough, and she listened and counseled even through her own pain and decision to end her own marriage.
There are many times I should have been a better friend to her, but she still loves me.
We don’t think of each other romantically, yet if you told me in 50 years we’d be living together and sharing space, I’d believe it.
Rhonda is my first choice of course, but if that’s off the table, I’ll be a cranky old lady with Cuyla. In fact; I can’t wait until we’re cranky old bitches together. That’s gonna be part of my living will. If it’s all three of us in an assisted living situation, we’ll take a two-bedroom unit. One for me and Rhonda, and the other for Cuyla.
Then only thing I’m worried about is: who’s gonna sneak the booze in?
