The Life Tax

Seeing the Holiday Market listed in the Weekly's calendar this week was amusing. I have had dreams already of manipulating my inventory, trying to figure out how to sell the next day and feeling too late, somewhat like those missed-exam dreams that are so common. It reminds me how fleeting things are; they seem so important but then they are history and everyone is on to the next thing.

I've been somewhat bereft of subject matter this week, since this blog has been so Market-focused. No one wants to hear that I've set up my inventory sheets and will spend the next week counting and resorting all that stuff so hastily packed at the end of HM. I do want to give a huge thanks to my maturing son and his wonderful girlfriend, who helped me pack and were the great kind of help who need minimal instruction, since decision-making is so impaired at the end of shows. He is the world's best packer and we did use the car, getting it all into two loads and three hours. That was all terrific, and some resting was done over the week now ending, that special, quiet week that is suspended time between Christmas and New Year's, extending a few more days this year with the weekend. The town is empty, everyone is lazy or off skiing or something, and I normally don't do any work at all during this week.

However, my cousin popped in on Monday, which was my first real day off since my son was here until Sunday. He insisted that everything was hinging on me making a label for my aunt's pickles, which he has grand schemes to sell. They are pretty good if you like sweet pickles, and apparently take two weeks to make, and are part of this lovely service he has been performing, having my aunt, who is in her nineties, teach him to cook all of her specialties. They are good old Nebraska recipes and mostly very comforting and delicious, although she puts bananas in her coleslaw which I never have gotten used to. Anyway, I did her label, spending hours drawing the lettering and the rendition of a photograph, drawing little cucumber vines around her head. I hope he likes it. I hope she likes it too.

Of course he promised lots of money (eventually) but I told him to pay me in pickles and fish, next time he catches some. I only resented the work a little bit, because in truth I get uneasy without work. Fortunately there is always plenty to do, with the house and the yard and my various ambitious and plebeian projects and the many steps in between from one to another. I went out today to see if I could buy dyes because I want to paint things, am hungry to paint scarves so I can feel productive and already started on my new year.

I didn't find any, but bought a few other little things, and got a pile of library books to do some research. Maybe I will sit around and read this weekend. I hope I will. I biked yesterday because the sun was out and it was kind of warm, and hung some washing out today which promptly froze. Had the washer repairperson in to assess my appliance, my Speed Queen which I love. It got the death sentence. Parts and labor are so expensive, more than what I paid for it originally. I just don't think I will fix it myself, though it could be doable. There are just enough little things I don't know to make it likely that I would spend the $300-400 on parts and mess it up in some small way that would put me right back here. I can only hope that I can replace it and someone else will rebuild this perfectly useable high quality washer.

I might change my mind over the weekend, but it's just a bit too stressful to try to do everything myself. I know I could probably do it, but I don't think it's the best decision. It's kind of a stubborn decision. I'm trying to be less stubborn. It's the kind of thing that reminds me how nice it would be to have a partner, though. A washer-fixing type of partner. I did luck out and my good friend Pamela went to Xenon with me for lunch, where we commiserated on broken appliance stories over some divine comfort food. I feel fortified enough to blithely ignore the passing of the Old Year in favor of the New Year. By ignore I mean I am not going out. I don't have to.

I will soak some black-eyed peas for tomorrow though. One must eat them on New Year's Day to insure prosperity and abundance or some such thing. Then next week I will pay the life tax and buy a new washer, dispose of the old one somehow, and maybe even take my cat to the vet and work on my year-end bookkeeping, because it is certain that if I don't pay this installment of the life tax, another will soon be upon me, and I will wake up anxious and feeling that I am late again. I've missed the exam and will get a bad grade and fall and break my leg and lose the house and then I'll be cold and wet and catch pneumonia and die. I'll find out I am human and it will spoil my day. I have a big plan to watch a lot of birds, play with art, write some stories, and generally enjoy the next few months under no pressure, and I am determined to make that happen anyway. So anxiety doesn't fit. Nothing but sweet dreams, lots of warm bread and good books, just the right amount of heavy cream and olives and capers. I think it might be a good year. At any rate, it will be a turn of the calendar page, and a cold slog until spring.