grateful mope

Can I be a grateful-yet-mopey girl a little longer? And then I'll snap out of it, really. Because the weekend of fabulousness is nearly here. Until then, it seems, I must be sad-n-drearykins.

Today after work, I drove up to my house and filled 2 buckets with compost for planting my patio garden. Going up to the house and seeing other people's stuff in the yard is weird. Seeing someone's dog in the chicken coop--really weird. Not having my animals there--the most weird. After I scooped the old alpacapoo in the buckets, I went down the road to my neighbor's house. My neighbor L runs a llama rescue and has taken in my 3 llamas, and has 3 of my alpacas. It was good to see her because it has been quite a while. It was really good to see my kids. They look so happy and healthy. Dash came up and snuggled me, and gawd was it hard not to cry when he was nibbling on my face. My boy, my darling boy, my bu-bu. And there were 2 baby llamas, one was 3 days old and she was all black and looked so much like Brinca when she was a baby. And it got me thinking that my Angel should be due soon...another baby that won't be mine. And shearing time should be coming up in a few weeks. I need to get up there more, to go see my kids more, to help L more. To snuggle more on the sheep that she has, and her goats and her donkey that all came up to me to give me kisses.

I miss being around animals. I miss being around mud and earth and green and life. And so I'll create my own patio garden of love and maybe I'll go back up to my house and dig out my strawberry plants--they're getting buried under the weeds without the chickens there to scratch and forage. The chickens always seemed to like to attack the strawberry patch the most. Maybe it was all the slugs that would hide in there. I could totally container garden those strawberries with a whole lot of love.

Today I learned that Dot was the last chicken to die, and she died a little while back. She was taken in the night by something (fox, likely). And so I mourn all my chickens: Chicken and Spot and Stripe and Buffy and Big Mama and Pig and Ginger and Dot and Bunny and Baby and Bertha, and my duck named Duck. And I remember them with so much love. I remember caring for Spot in the little chicken hospital we made for her in the garage when she got injured, and how Spot's injury will probably mean I'll never eat chicken for the rest of my life. I remember how I became a vegetarian because I fell in love with chickens. And I remember how chickens and llamas and alpacas became my family, and I am so grateful and happy and sad all at the same time.