(no subject)

The stupid mouth discomfort is frustrating. I might still have low-for-me iron, as the blood test came back with a value that falls between the value when i had the diagnosis of low and the value measured some time after that when i was "better."

Therapy on Wednesday was interesting: my therapist says she notices me being much more vulnerable in the last few sessions as i taper off the SSRI. I know i am going slowly and it's helping me acclimate to having much more reactive emotions. Still not noticing highs, more affected by frustration and sadness. But maybe, maybe, i will want connection with people more?

I did have an insight about work and how i am no longer really "on a team." I think i miss that. Being remote doesn't help.

...

In yard news, OH EM GEEEE! The cleared orchard area is amazing. The rapid removal of stumps that had become little sign-posts, reminders of clearing one thicket or another, the weather at the time, anxiety-causing hangups of trees in other trees.... I could still see limit of where the goats worked, where i had cast down fescue seed the first winter. All of those markers are gone: it's just a rich red clay swathe, with a little island around the triple-trunked massive tulip poplar and a dogwood.

I remember when that tree seemed far back in the woods -- i thought it was three trees. I remember the revelation of the base of the tree, fighting through honeysuckle and autumn olive.

There are swale and berms just uphill from the house. The berms are made up of buried sweetgum trunks from the two massive trees we had the father and son team cut down. It's all very rough because the guys just do everything with their equipment, as if they were wearing transformer suits to haul and dig and pull. Watching them encased in their equipment as they pulled the poison ivy out of the tree, i think back to all the honeysuckle i've thrown my full weight against and failed to budge.

Between now and my trip to Ohio, i want to broadcast buckwheat seed and rake out the berms.

The other thing they did for us was dig the rain garden, a basin with down-slope berms for runoff from the downspouts that are in a poor place for rain barrels. One of the most surprising parts of planning this garden is finding recommendations for plants for rain gardens that other sites say want dry soil. I assume this has to do with the feast or famine (flood or drought) quality of a sand filled clay basin. I'm also curious about definitions of shady, as i see blue eyed grass listed as for a shady rain garden. Given where i found blue eyed grasses this year, i wouldn't call it shady, at all.

Yesterday, driving home from getting my blood drawn, i stopped at a garden supply place and arranged to have 54 cubic feet of sand and 54 cubic feet of ground pine delivered and poured into the hole they dug. After work, i tried to mix the sand and "compost" as best as i could and smooth it out. I worry there's too little "compost" but i followed the extension agency instructions. I've buried the giant litter pan we used for the cross country trip to act as a reservoir for the two plants i have ready: a pitcher plant and a cranberry. I've not purchased the rest of the plants for the area, which i want to be themed in blue.

In pet news, Carrie has discovered there is room enough in the bed for her to crawl in next to me. Unfortunately, she also startles and jumps away every time i stir. This then wakes me. And then she jumps back in the bed. I suspect this means she'll sleep in my spot while i am in Ohio and it's going to be entertaining when i get back.