A Few Curveballs

Just before Christmas, there was a damp smell in Stella’s room. It smelled vaguely of pee, which neither of us acknowledged out loud. We stood in the middle of the room, pivoting. Calling on my notoriously sensitive nose, Stella said, “Mom. Find the smell.” I sniffed around until my nose led me into her brand-new suitcase, sitting empty and open, ready to pack. Our cat, Flower, had urinated in it. I felt like this was a red-alert level threat to our departure in two weeks.

After various enzymatic sprays and airing outdoors, the suitcase still smelled bad from across the room. Finally, I stood it in the shower, sudsed it with laundry soap and borax, and rinsed and rinsed it. After drying by the woodstove for two days, it was declared fully rehabilitated. My trip threat level returned to green.  

Meanwhile, Covid derailed our Landis family Christmas gathering, and we awaited the New Year at home alone. Sprout demonstrated a burning hatred for our house sitter’s beagle upon introductions, so my parents heroically agreed to keep him during our absence. Then we found our sheep, Rhubarb, laterally recumbent with grave neurological abnormalities and euthanized her that evening. After some discussion, we planned to rehome her friend, Parsnip, so she wouldn’t be lonely.

The snow receded into January rains—a thaw that allowed Andrew to dig a sheep-sized grave in our field while I worked a particularly emotional 14-hour emergency shift on Sunday. It was the first day of 2023 and my last shift there. I hugged everyone who stood still long enough since I’ll really miss them and that work, even with all the intensity of it.

This Monday, we met my parents at the enormous Cabela’s in Pennsylvania to trade Sprout for Christmas presents, which we opened in the parking lot gathered around the open tailgate. As we browsed the crowded store, Sprout was relaxed and sweet to everyone—perfectly behaved until he hunched over beside a rack of fishing rods and defecated on the tile floor. I still cried when I kissed him goodbye. He has settled right into life on my parents’ laps, relishing their low sunroom windows and punctual mealtimes.

On Wednesday, Flower projectile vomited in the bathroom and refused breakfast. I took her to my last shift at the local veterinary clinic and ended up performing surgery that afternoon with my kind coworkers. I removed a large hairball plugging her small intestine just beyond the stomach. I left her—still groggy—in our bathroom right before going to Sam’s last wrestling meet, where I sweated and yelled through him wrestling three intense matches. We drove home through fog that swallowed everything around us, wondering if we would stay on the road.

On Thursday morning, I took Sam to the orthodontist, where I had to explain for the fourth time that we would not be able to return in eight weeks for a recheck. After lunch, Andrew and I wedged our enormous Romney sheep into the Honda CRV for a ride to her lovely new home. The roofers here replacing our sunporch roof, so they probably had a good view of our sheep wrangling antics but were kind enough not to mention it.

At three this morning, I lay awake on red alert, convinced that the roof was done wrong, that Flower would be dead by morning, that one of us would get Covid in the next 72 hours, or the wheels would generally come off our plans. None of this has happened yet.

My alert level is back on green this afternoon, at least for the moment. Our last few days are devoted to details like refilling prescription medications and making Verizon plan arrangements and buying toiletries. We’ve started weighing suitcases to determine how much we can cram into the corners. We are crossing off our lists, from underwear to snorkels. Skip is keeping her stuffed platypus close while she watches all of our nonsense. It seems impossible that in four days we will be in our little island house near the beach, ready to re-invent ourselves for a while.