Seventeen

My junior year of high school filled with friends. I got out on my bike regularly. Got some small measure of space for myself away from parents. Hired for a camp counselor job, one that I shouldn't have taken and failed miserably, quitting once the reality of being responsible for kids barely younger than myself set in. But then got a job at the local branch library that I would keep for nearly three years. The first fragile steps out of a crisis childhood into an uncertain adulthood. A hopeful year, a year that worked. The year I got the highest scores in my school for both the SAT and ACT.

When I was 34, I'd just gotten through my first year in the OR, starting to attain competence. It's a long process, there is so much to learn, and turn into habits. That was the spring D shattered his elbow. I buzzed my hair off, and concentrated on doing what needed to be done. We came to really appreciate each other that year. The last really hard year in a series.

On my third iteration of seventeen, we are doing austerity. Second year for the garden. Other plans for improvements - using as little money as possible. House telling us where the small pinches are. A different kind of stability. A different set of tasks, work to be done.

D's parents stopped by with a thoughtfully chosen gift. A lot of these bamboo chimes tend to thunk. This set is audibly tuned, a rather lovely series of cords, very Eastern sounding.

Thought about putting it in the back, with the garden. But if the wind is up, the constant chimes would certainly keep us awake in the bedroom in the back.


Moby sometimes likes a good hug.