Our pre-Thanksgiving party was this weekend. I didn’t get a count of how many guests we had. I think it was right around twenty. Some of the usual suspects were missing, which is a shame, but I’m sure we’ll catch up at the next party. Most of the leftovers were packaged up and carted away. Opening my home to a ton of people is a joy. Having a bunch of leftovers is not. Fortunately, this crowd knows what I will not eat and they take all that stuff with them when they go.
The pasture gates were open for parking. That meant the horses were locked up in the barn. They didn’t seem to mind. Every hour or so, someone would come out and talk to them, sometimes bringing carrots or other treats. Albert (dog) had fun following people around and collecting head-scratches.
Cooking the turkeys, back when I ate meat, used to be my duty. Now that chore belongs to Erin. She came over on Friday and we prepared potatoes and stuffing. Most of the other vegetables are prepared by Chip and Amy. Celeste makes green bean casserole. Tim and Bridget bring scalloped potatoes. Emilio typically brings cornbread. This year he brought macaroni and cheese. We always have a ton of desserts. I’m not a huge fan of “food talk,” so this paragraph has been difficult for me to compose. I don’t know why, but discussing food is one of my least-favorite things to do.
Have you ever bought ramen online? Just for fun, I sent my nephew a big box of ramen at college. For $8 (USD), I sent him twenty-four packages of noodle soup. When he doesn’t make it to the dining hall, I figured soup could be a reasonable fallback position. It’s hard to believe how inexpensive it is. He sounded so appreciative of that gift that I also sent him instant mashed potatoes. I’ve heard that some people don’t like the texture, but I think those are great.
Ugh—more food talk.
Saturday morning, while everything was still in progress, I had to sneak over to the feed store for hay and grain. The owner, Gary, pulled up next to me while I was loading the truck.
“Good thing you have that hay stashed away,” he said.
“Oh yeah?”
“If nobody mentioned it, hay is going to get scarce,” he said.
I’m accustomed to hay becoming scarce in spring—that’s why I don’t touch the hay in my loft until March, at the earliest. We’ve never had a shortage in November. This year is different. The guy who drives up to Canada to bring back trailers full of hay had a heart attack and passed away. There’s a load of hay and a deceased driver on the other side of the border for the foreseeable future. Gary hasn’t managed to form a backup plan yet.
I don’t have a backup plan either.
For now, the horses are oblivious to the upcoming plight. Poking around on the internet, I have a short list of establishments to call on Monday. Maybe one of them will sell me hay. I hate to dig into the emergency reserve before winter even begins. Perhaps I shouldn’t panic just yet. Gary might figure something out.
Last night, before I went to bed, I emptied the dishwasher and filled it again. When I empty it later today, I can put away all the party dishes and the kitchen will almost be back to normal. Same goes for the washing machine. Before I hit the sack tonight, I expect all the laundry to be folded and put away. I attempt to recover quickly after a large event. This is the time of year when I reset my priorities and gain a fresh perspective.
Someone asked yesterday, “Have you done any more upstairs, or did you stop with the dormer?”
I’ve done very little in the attic, honestly. I went to the dump many times, and over to Goodwill a couple of times, getting rid of things that I will never use. The attic is looking better than it ever has, but there’s still a bunch of work to do. I could elevate that project, or I could push it off once more. The condition of the attic doesn’t really have an impact on my day-to-day life. It would be better to turn my attention to something I will see every day, like rebuilding the shelves in a closet or something.
When I was a freshman in college, my chemistry professor did a demonstration with a large jar and some rocks and sand. It’s a pretty common visual device—maybe you’ve seen it before. He talked about the rocks and sand as if they were different priorities, large and small. Putting the sand into the jar first, he lectured that filling it with small priorities first left no room for the big ones. Sure enough, he couldn’t fit the sand into the jar. Then, he reversed the order and showed that if he put the big rocks in first, he could easily pour in the sand, filling the in-between spaces.
Visually, the demonstration made a lot of sense.
In practice, I find that if I keep tackling my big priorities, pushing off the smaller ones, I never get to the little tasks that have the biggest impact. I have a stack of mail (statements and nonsense) on the corner of my desk that needs to be filed. It’s a very small task, so I put it off until later. For weeks, I have been living with that clutter because I don’t think it’s enough of a priority to demand attention. That’s the kind of thing I want to turn my attention to now. I’ll start with the mail and then spend some time on the couch, watching TV. I’ve been meaning to do that too.
