Sep
27
Back in the family rafting/Rogue river days, we would always stop at the Galice Resort for vanilla soft serve cones and drinks on their giant deck overlooking the water. It was an iconic part of the visit, a deeply enjoyable and familiar place. And then in 2021, it burned damn near to the ground, some sort of electrical fire that left nothing but a boat shed and a gravel parking lot.
Even when you know bone-deep that the world does not stay the same, sometimes a thing can catch you completely off guard. Like what do you mean this place we went to over and over and assumed we’d always be able to go to just, like, burned the fuck down?
They built part of it back, eventually. It’s not the same, but you can still go get a drink, listen to some live music sometimes. And of course our little family is not the same. I doubt there will be a time when the four of us are there again.
Is it harder to lose something important when you don’t see it coming, or when the ending is planned? I would say the former is worse, it can be shocking and there’s no way to prepare. On the other hand, you can be ready for a thing and then it’s nothing like you imagined.
Well. Yesterday I said my goodbyes to Little Joe. I can’t say I took him for granted, exactly, but even with his age in mind I suppose I just pictured riding him forever somehow. I could and could not believe that I was cleaning his stall for the very last time, taking him out for one final graze.
Everything is temporary, the moments we want to wish away and those that we want to cling to with pry-them-from-me-when-I’m-dead fingers. I feel like that is the greatest lesson of aging, how important it is to experience the things we enjoy as best we can before they too are gone.
Comments
-
My product review site:
[
I’ve been reading you for over 20 years. You’re such a smart, fun and honest piece of this weird world of the internet. I’m very proud of you!
Der Text erinnert sehr schön daran, wie schnell sich vertraute Orte und Lebensabschnitte verändern können. Oft merkt man erst beim Abschied, welchen Wert kleine Gewohnheiten und alltägliche Momente tatsächlich hatten. Gerade deshalb lohnt es sich, die Dinge, die einem Freude machen, bewusster zu genießen.
Manchmal hilft auch ein kompletter Themenwechsel, um den Kopf freizubekommen. Ich schaue mir zwischendurch beispielsweise neue digitale Angebote oder eine Online-Demo an. Entscheidend ist für mich weniger, womit man seine Freizeit verbringt, sondern dass man sich dafür bewusst Zeit nimmt.
Your writing always gives me Big Thoughts and I wish I could express them as well as you do. But the picture makes me want to go and smell a horse.
It all feels so permanent and then is all revealed to be ephemeral. Glad for your time with Little Joe.
I’m retired now, but when I was working in the corporate white collar world where employees are inundated with messaging about change and how change is good, I once turned to one of my bosses and said, “I can handle change, it’s the stupid change I don’t like”. I stand by that. Btw, I love your TikTok pet videos. They give me a jolt of good cheer. I still think you should write a book. I think this whole blog could be a book.