Enjoying her influence

I woke up this morning positively aching for Sandy. My dreams weren't particularly meaningful, and they didn't seem to have anything to do with her, but my first thoughts were of longing. Not just for Sandy in the present, but for us in the past. For us and the Timberline, the LGBT country-music bar we frequented for line dancing and swing dancing before Sandy even knew we were dating. I longed for the sense of possibility, the anticipation and uncertainty of discovering a connection.

It was a welcoming, energetic space, but once we'd acknowledged our feelings for each other, we no longer needed the excuse of the weekly dance lessons. The Timberline closed several years ago, and we'd stopped going long before that. This morning, though, I wanted desperately to be back there with her, with our whole future ahead of us.

I suspect my longing had to do with the air, the smell and feel of fall approaching. We had a last spell of heat, highs in the high 80s, and then yesterday afternoon, the wind changed. The blue sky was muted with clouds, and the breeze became more dramatic, more blustery, pulling a new season with it. The night was still relatively warm -- with the window open, I needed just a sheet -- but the air this morning tasted like fall.

And fall is a time of coziness, of nesting, of settling in and cuddling up. I assume the Timberline memories came along with the smell of fall because it was in the fall of 1995 that Sandy and I worked on swing dancing together; her co-workers nicknamed me Wednesday Girl for the night of the week we saw each other. It was my first fall in the house, which I'd just bought, and I had no idea how to prepare it for the winter. (I know now, but much of what I know to do I still don't quite get to.)

I worried that starting my morning with longing would lead to despair as the day progressed, but I've experienced quite the opposite effect. The longing has remained, a sweet reminder of what I had and appreciated. But it's been embellished by all the ways the day has unfolded to remind me of how much Sandy gave me, how much she influenced who I am and how I spend my time.

I worked on the book this afternoon, having neglected it much of last week due to technical and other issues. Working on the current chapter meant using Sandy's laptop, as that's where the beta software I'm writing about is installed. And I needed to take some screenshots, which meant setting things up, changing the background to a neutral color, etc. In rearranging things on the desktop, I noticed a file whose name I didn't understand, so clicked it. It was a story Sandy read a few months before she died, and today I read it too; it was an intensely sweet story that left me wistful even while I felt gratitude that she'd shared it with me, however unintentionally, leaving it on her desktop where I'd stumble across it one day.

Later, I cut browning crocosmia leaves from the bed they share with the base of the honeysuckle, and I chopped them into the compost bin. Sandy planted the crocosmia (there and everywhere else it's grown to overwhelm various beds), and she built the compost bin. She was a dedicated composter, upset if I put "good" stuff -- that is, noninvasive material -- into the yard waste bin for the city. When she was healthy, and even in the summer of 2010 when she was on chemo, she created a steady supply of compost for us to use in cultivating and planting the garden beds. I've not been as dedicated since she died; the city's gotten plenty of "good stuff" because I've not had the energy to maintain her pace. So when I do spend some time chopping and stirring and shoveling compost, I feel close to her., like I'm pleasing her as well as myself.

The forecast for more fall-like weather prompted me to plan to make a casserole today. The recipe was called Baked Orzo with Eggplant and Mozzarella, and it turned out to be the perfect recipe for the day. (Pretty much anything with pasta, eggplant, and mozzarella is going to be comfort food.) I've made casseroles on my own plenty of times, but this one came from Smitten Kitchen, a food blog Sandy adored. When I finally gave in and set up an RSS feed earlier this week (knowing full well that it could spell the end of my career, further temptation to stray from my appointed tasks), Google Reader recommended several sites to me, and every last one of them was a site Sandy had read regularly. I even checked to make sure I was logged in as myself and not her. I don't know how Google Reader makes its recommendations; I'd only been to the sites it recommended once or twice and it didn't recommend any that I visit frequently. It felt like Sandy talking to me, once again, and I quickly accepted the recommendations. Which also meant I started reading Smitten Kitchen, and it truly is a lovely blog. This orzo recipe was the most recent, so tonight's dinner was courtesy of Sandy.

It was when I was with friends at one of Sandy's performances
with the Seattle Women's Chorus that I realized how sad it was
that I didn't know how to play any musical instrument. Shortly
after that, we rented a piano and I began, slowly, to learn. I
always thought Sandy an accomplished pianist, but a couple
of years ago, she told me she'd only had a few years of lessons.
She claimed she was only a little further ahead of my current
level, but because she could sight-read, she was much more
skilled and polished. It was always a joy to hear her play.

While the food baked, I cleaned the kitchen and then played the piano for 20 minutes. Another piece of Sandy. She's the reason I started learning, and we used to play for each other while we cooked dinner. She, especially, played frequently while I made dinner in the last year of her life. We'd start cooking together and she'd become restless and irritable, in too much pain to continue standing but not sure what she wanted to do. I often suggested she play for me, and she'd happily sit down and serenade me, usually just with the piano music but sometimes she'd sing as well. It was lovely to have the accompaniment while I cooked, but it was even better to have her happy, focused, and no longer frustrated from pain and fatigue.

As I ate dinner, I watched the new Doctor Who episode. I'd seen (and mocked) plenty of ancient Doctor Who when I was in college, but I wasn't watching TV at all when Sandy and I got together. She introduced me to shows I've enjoyed very much over the years, and when the new Doctor Who series started six or seven years ago, we fell for it together. It's possible I'd be watching it even if Sandy had never been in my life, but I associate it strongly with her, and I enjoy it all the more because I know she'd enjoy it too.

All in all, it's been a satisfying day. I've felt a sense of longing all day, yes, but not painful longing. More an amplification of the melancholy and nostalgia I always feel when the fall winds start blowing and we begin to anticipate the rain's return. There's much I want to get done before the rain starts in earnest in a few weeks, but right now, tonight, I'm content to stay in the present and appreciate the past.