Respite...an interval of rest or relief

No, I've not finished posting pictures from our trip to Georgia and as you might have noticed, I've not finished putting in my little commentaries on the pictures I have posted. (Got that)?

I hope to bring that series of pictures to a close by the end of this long Memorial Day weekend. I would have finished it all sometime, but life just isn't giving me a case of "normalcy" at all. Since I've been back to Wyoming, my boss has gone into the hospital for some serious lung cancer problems, I've picked his wife up from the airport (she was and is just in the stages of moving here from Florida), I've had a co-worker whose wife had to have surgery this week, one of my very good friends has a husband with Alzheimer's who is getting worse, etc., etc., etc. So, with all this going on I've fixed meals, purchased lots of "get well" cards, lots of latex helium balloons and Subway sandwiches and have been up late visiting or waiting for people, etc., etc., etc. I'm not complaining though. I'm hoping that God looks upon these selfless (and they are) acts of kindness and remembers these things when I screw up or don't do what I should be doing. And, I know that any of these people would do the same for me as others have already done the same for me.

I cleaned house on Friday morning before taking Joe to get some lab work done, run to the grocery store and pick up the latest "gotta have" items, went to the county map department for a cool map so I can track down pioneer graves and other neat places, went to the post office, and was back at the hospital visiting two sets of family members of the co-workers, and went to dinner with my hubby cause I was too tired to cook, but did cook for others once I returned home (hmmm), etc., etc., etc. This left me free to do whatever I wanted to for the remaining three days of my holiday.

All this brings me to TODAY - Saturday. Today was the day I had a respite (see definition in the title line). I HaD to have this day with my husband before we killed each other - seriously! Joe has been hibernating in our Wyoming cabin since basically October 1st when we had our first snow and other than an occasional walk across the highway to our neighborhood Albertson's for first pick on Bavarian Cream doughnuts, he's mainly been home. Don't get me wrong, Joe does an excellent job keeping the dishes washed and maintaining our yard and would do the cooking and washing if I'd let him (but that's a whole different blog). But, the man has no social life because he refuses to get out and meet people. We needed time alone - time by ourselves.

Even though the wonderful Weather Channel people and our local weather forecasters (?) predicted rain for sometime today, I knew we had to chance getting out of this house, out of this city and get into our car and drive somewhere reasonably far away from all this to preserve the sanctity and sanity of our marriage. If I'd had more money in our checking account, we'd left the state and stayed gone overnight. However, I had to be content to just pack us a picnic lunch, have a full tank of gas, a charged camera and cellphone and hope that the weather would hold off. And it did. It was a wonderful day. Joe and I were almost 100% civil and loving one to another. Hey, at least we returned home in the same car and at the same time. That's good, right?

So, here I come to the end of a wonderful day with a slightly sunburned face and as I write this I'm listening to the rise and fall of Joe's tired body snoring away. It was a good day. It was a good day to take time for ourselves and leave our worries and concerns for others back in the dust for just a little while. We had some much needed medical attention done for us as a couple and hey, it never rained!