That Was the Week That Was

..and we've only just begun.
So to move us beyond television and song titles, I will just plunge right in on sharing some of the high(?)lights of this past week.

Burfday: Since I had already had my MamaMiaMeltdowns in advance, I was able to welcome my birthday with open and eager arms. I refrained from doing work and even my errands were elevated in joy. (I gave more thorough details in the previous post).

In-between day: It felt as if task gods held everything in limbo to respect my birthday play day but then opened the floodgates the next day to offset anything I missed.

Mom's anniversary date: One year since she died. Still have trouble grokking that--a year? How is that possible? Enough little things have transpired to convince me that she is gone from this plane and yet...

Moving madness: Back on track to getting things handled towards the move next week. Making calls to set up utilities and cable service in Chico. (By the way, we won't have internet till Wed. August 20th. Send prayers and wi-fi outlets). Everything was going just fine till I called Cox Communications--your friend in the digital age. NOT!!!
Spoke with a young woman to arrange the cancellation of the service for August 15h. I was in the middle of giving her our new address in Chico, when the phone went dead. Nada. Waited several minutes and no service whatsoever. Crap.

Had to leave to meet my client for a final session so I had to let it go. At the office, I called Cox and this rep said that yes, she had entered the order incorrectly and discontinued my phone. He took the rest of my information and then asked me to hold while he investigated how to restore my phone. One of the advantages of digital phones is that it will display how many minutes you are actually connected to a call and therefore, how many minutes one can be placed on hold. The counter read 28 minutes and I was getting very angry listening to annoying muzak and not having the rep return to tell me what was going on or how much longer my wait would be. Then the annoying music changed to different muzak and then a female voice came on the line and answered as if I was a brand new call. Crap.

At least, this nice representative, Shanay apologized profusely for her predecessors but said that now the office was closed and I would have to wait online for tech support to see if they could possibly restore my service. I returned to a few more minutes of being on hold but by now, my client had arrived so I just hung up in frustration.

Being in prayer with my client certainly helped my mood and allowed for me to wait till I got home and watched the first part of the opening Olympics ceremony before I called Cox again. Abe told me that I would have to call Customer Care on Monday but he would turn my situation over to T2 and my service would be restored within 24 hours. And by 11:30 on Saturday, it was.

Sayonara: It was time to say so long to some dear friends here. A few very close folks thoughtfully put together a small farewell party to wish us on our way. It was so generous of Billie to open her home to us and for folks to drop by. I even got to meet some of Don's close friends he hasn't seen for quite awhile. I was glad that I was able to be present in body and mind to really connect with people and say goodbye. Not that it was easy to do that. Yikes. This was probably the first time I really got that these folks--some I have not seen for years--I would not easily be seeing them again for a long while. Gulp.

Also learned that e-vites are not 100% reliable. It appears that several folks never got their e-vites even though their names were listed and emails sent. We didn't get to see everyone we thought we would before leaving this week. Bummer.

As is often the case for me at social events with church folk, I didn't get to eat much; except I had to have a piece of the homemade chocolate cake that Reni Williams made for us. It was soooooo good and it was trimmed in pecans which had personal significance to me. Stacy Williams and her friend, Casey came and represented the playful side of things. From covering me in silly string to writing sweet blessings on our VW Beetle car, Daisy.

One of the sweetest things is that Jeanne and Michael came by briefly so that I could say goodbye to their dog, Bosco. Bosco is one of my buddies and he would often come and stay with me in my office at church. Jeanne knew that getting to see him would mean so much to me.
And it did.

Don and I were pretty emotionally drained by the time we came home and went to bed early.

On Sunday morning, I took my neighborhood walk and to say goodbye to Dan the Man. He had his Mercury Eight cruiser car in the driveway all shined up and ready to rock and roll. His birthday was 8.8.08 and he turned 76. Neither of us really wanted to deal with the reality of my leaving. And then his neighbors started coming by and we had to part rather casually. I went ahead to my mountaintop for my morning meditaiton and said goodbye to San Diego.

Realistically, this might be the last post from San Diego as I need to focus on packing and such. I will have much to report in the coming weeks and the blessing and beauty of the internet will make that possible and my readers won't know what zip code from which this blog is generated.

Adios Amigo, San Diego.
Gracias.

Till we meet again...