Early days

I moved to a new country on Wednesday. It is now Saturday, and I have spent the last two days cleaning my house, stocking up my cupboards at Costco, befriending the kitten (including believing I had lost the kitten out of a window, crying in the garden thinking I would be dumped for being a negligent girlfriend, finding said kitten inside the house after all - hiding in the recliner), and attempting to get my head around the gargantuan to-do list. It's early days in the New Life.

I have also succeeded in eating badly, sleeping badly, overreacting, panicking, and my personal favourite: sitting in a stupor.

Cowboy is hiding from me this morning, while I scowl at the computer. Who knew it would be so difficult to find affordable, relatively nice furniture in an actual shop where I could go in and just get the furniture? I didn't realise how important it would be to me to have furniture. I've been living out of a suitcase for weeks now. It was fine while I was waiting to move, but now I'm here, I want to plunge some roots down and feel like I have a home.

It's becoming an ordeal. If I could hide from myself, I would.

On the flip side, things that I thought would be horrible, terrible, insurmountable issues as part of the move have turned out to be nothings, and the relief is overwhelming.

Yesterday I played with the horses in the rain, and began to see how good life is going to be. If I could only get some furniture...

Last minute

It is rapidly becoming the last minute. I am down to last minute meetings, last minute socialising, last minute packing, last minute shopping, last minute panicking, etc etc.

Today has mostly been about last minute hair dye, as I realised it must be almost a year since my mother slapped henna (I use Caca Rouge from Lush, and have done so for over ten years) all over my head and I propped myself up for several hours while the mud did its miracle thing on my hair.

With what feels like several tonnes of goop and clingfilm on my head at the moment, my neck is rather sore. That may have something to do with the killer upper body workout that Mark the Magician made me do this morning. His trainers matched the walls of the gym today. I was rather impressed, but I don't think it was intentional.

"Rather than mess about with more reps," he said, as I sipped water in a recovery break between push presses, "how about we just build up this weight to about that of a saddle?" This man has paid close attention to my goals, and I love him for it.

If I can now push 60lbs over my head three times, without dying immediately, hopefully I can avoid the shame of flinging Cowboy's saddle, forcefully and enthusiastically, into the side of my horse instead of over her back.

I've also ended up doing some last minute bonding with this little monster, who has spent the last nine months completely ignoring me.

She has finally realised that I will scratch her ears, rub her belly and bump heads with her at her every whim.

I'll even feed her. I'm that kind of cat person.

I think she might be a little sad when I leave, if she even notices, of course.

I'm not really going to miss her needle sharp claws being dug (with love) into my legs, arms, neck, feet, fingers, etc.

She can be a little over zealous with her affection.

She also likes to dribble on me when she's really enjoying the bonding session. Then she likes to shake her head and spray the dribble all over me, and whatever it is I've been doing whilst petting her. Thanks, Marmite...

You love her or you hate her. Her name really is appropriate.

"She's not doing well."

If he had meant to make me think that he was about to break up with me, Cowboy did a good job this afternoon. He sent me a few cryptic messages, and ended them with the dreaded "call me later and we can talk about it" phrase. I imagined all kinds of disasters, reasons for him to leave me, accusations and other awful relationship woes.

It was worse than that. It was news about Sunshine.



She had a cough and a runny nose when I was there, and we put it down to the cold weather. She has been this way for over a month now, and has lost weight. Cowboy sounded worried. That's how I know that serious shit is going down.

He's wormed her, and is giving her a course of antibiotics for a week. If she's not looking up by then, it'll be time to call the vet. I hope above all hopes that she bounces back and there is nothing more ominous that she has to endure. Here is more news that I am now waiting for...

It is telling that the thought of losing her makes me as emotional as it does. It might be just down to old memories of losing Domino so swiftly I didn't even fully understand how sick he was, but part of it is definitely about her. For all her issues, I adore her spirit.

Be better, Sunshine. Please.

"You're a dancer? You must be really flexible..."

So, perhaps my plans are about to be wiped out. Perhaps my best intentions are taking me along the road to hell. Perhaps my flexibility is about to be tested, pushed to its limits. It's bend or break time.

I've been in Washington for just over a week now, enjoying the crisp, clear winter weather (and the less crisp, less clear rain which is more typical), and hanging out with Blue Dog.


He had a bath yesterday, against his will. He smells so good now.

Then reality hit hard this afternoon. Plans about massage school got shaken, vigorously, by the discovery of some terrible internet reviews of my chosen school. I began to question my judgement. Some hyperventilation occurred.

Cowboy hugged me and said "It'll be fine, babe."

So, I took a deep breath. I sent emails to other schools. I reminded myself that I have more time than I think. I considered the possibility of living with my parents for longer than I planned. I considered the upsides to being in the UK for longer than I had intended - more horseback archery... Hmm. Not so bad.

Then I sent Cowboy to make me a cup of tea. I'm already feeling better.

If I had a pound for every time things didn't go to plan, I'd be a rich person. Better than being rich, I'm still surviving, so obviously it isn't the end of the world if plans change. Quite the opposite.

Therefore the stiff and unbending is the disciple of death.
The gentle and yielding is the disciple of life.

Lao Tzu (c.604 - 531 B.C.)