A New Phase of Aimlessness

Pippa helps me study.

I'm currently in the most challenging semester of school so far. I've never cared for challenges, but I do still love the program. Human Rights is the class that's really working my little goldfish brain. There's a whole lot of bad news involved, and we all know about the assorted bad news bits, but when you do a historical deep dive overlaid with policy making and corporate greed.... well. That's like... a total bummer?

Additional Lue responsibilities include: volunteer commitments, a few weddings here and there, organizing a speaker event at College of Charleston, an ongoing and halfhearted job search, a bit of political activism ( I hung out with Andrew Yang a few weeks ago!), and never-ending home repair and animal control.

The farther I get into my school program, the more confused I feel about what my next move is. While I'm learning a lot about things to advocate for and the importance of educating the'm'asses on the impacts of their decisions, I'm not learning what to do with that information. My "skills" aren't so obvious when it comes to changing policy. "How about a great story about echo-stones, Mr CEO?" My classmates think I'm great and they shower me with compliments after each of my presentations....but they haven't realized that my toothy grin and comedic timing don't equal out to any numerical data or economic strategy. I appreciate their appreciation for my disposition... now give me something productive to do. It's awful to care about something but have nothing you can do to help. 

Can I entertain people into changing their lifestyles to end animal abuse? Is that a thing? Would this involve more social media? I don't love that idea. So anyways, I'm in a new phase of aimlessness. Does this happen every decade or so? 

Ferguson hinders my studies.

A Surface Level House Tour

We've been in the new house for about three months and though every wall and trim board still needs another coat of paint and we're still missing a few cabinet doors, I've decided things are close enough to what they will be.... until I begin scheming wall colors for each room. 
But paint colors and decor will have to wait until I like.... get to know the space?

I do want you to know that I took proper pictures with my good camera, but my computer won't read the memory card for some reason, so they're all trapped in my camera forever. I don't know what to do about that. Blurry phone pictures will have to do. 

I could really drag this out and tell you about each space and corner and roofline, but even I'm not that interested. Instead I'll just tell you that Papa Union is responsible for this transformation... with the structural help of Big Guy Eisenhauer. I only take credit for the whimsical details.

The big pink bedroom soaked up A LOT of paint. The motivation for the pink ceiling still baffles us today.

This last one here is the coolest. We turned the third bedroom into the master bath and closet area and it is SO thrilling to have a bathroom with natural light. Who knew I had pores and stray facial hairs? Well I do now. Because we can see!

Honorable mention going to this little nook which is my favorite spot in the house. Even though I have a proper office setup in the laundry room, I drag all my crap over to this table (that we found in the yard and covered with a big sticker that looks like marble) and sit there in the sunshine while fussing over papers and due dates. 

That view, y'all. It's all about the view. 

Kindness: A Real Burden

There was this girl who moved in down the street from our house when I was twelve or so. She was a year younger than me and three years younger than Ellen. Her family showed up, found two of the only three little girls in the neighborhood, and forced us to be friends with their daughter. It's not that we didn't like her, its that the three of us neighborhood girls (me, Ellen, and Ari) already had a thing going and this immature interloper didn't understand how it all worked. But also her parents were the worst. They mistakenly thought their kid was likable and that we should want to hang out with her. She was kind of whiny and definitely over-opinionated for being the "new" person. everyone knows the new person needs to show some respect by keeping their thoughts to themselves. We don't know you and you don't how things work around here. 

We tried to be nice. We had her over for sleepovers and brought her along for bike rides, but we just didn't click. She also lingered way past the obvious signals for her to go home. One weekend, Mom insisted we needed to say yes to her invitation for us to spend the night at her house. So we went, but I woke up at midnight with some kind of tummy troubles, and had to wake up her mom to call my mom to come get me. Ellen who can't stomach any sort of discomfort for the sake of others, decided she would just go home too because she didn't want to stick it out until morning. So this poor friendliness neighborhood girl woke up on Saturday morning and all of her friends had left. I'm sure that was confusing and disappointing - but also how did she not wake up during all of that? But then her hoity-toity parents felt that they and their daughter deserved some kind of apology and that's when my sweet mama had had enough. 

My mama is the nicest lady you'll ever meet. She's petite and soft-spoken and pretty and gentle. She befriends the downtrodden, volunteers with old people, pays attention to your problems and will add you to her prayer list which is at least as thick as a phone book for a good-sized small town. She likes desserts and cats and wears enough hairspray that I sometimes worry when she walks past an open flame. She is a lovely humane being and there's nothing my mama wouldn't do to help a person in need. 

But if you get unreasonable, the deal's off. Forget her manners, Mama will wave her finger guns at all y'all and be done with it. So when the bossy neighborhood girl started showing up unannounced, ringing our doorbell like we owed her something, Mama taught us that the best place to hide was up underneath the windows by the door. We'd hear the doorbell and the three of us would drop to all fours and army crawl towards the front of the house. 

She taught us that this is the most polite thing you can do when you don't want to talk to somebody. Is it straightforward and honest? Hopeful of resolution? Not one bit. But they walk away assuming you weren't home rather than them leaving in shame having discovered that you think they're just a relentless burden. It's not rude. It's compassion! I watched Mom employ this tactic for her own unwanted visitors, and watching my beautiful, feminine icon of a mother slink through the hallway on her stomach made me feel proud to be raised by someone so kind.

As an adult in my own home, I arranged my living room so that my couch was beneath the window by the front door. I realized the error of my ways when a new neighbor knocked on the door while I was lounging on the sofa watching Gilmore Girls. I knew I had less than a minute before this curious extrovert would press their face into the window and see me laying there, looking back at them. I was in no state to answer door and also, I was taught not to talk to strangers. So I grabbed onto the corners of my blanket and ever so slowly rolled over the edge of the couch, wrapping myself in a blanket burrito as I settled on the floor. Then I laid there and waited. I heard the footsteps recede. Mom would be proud. 

As I struggled to get up, the footsteps climbed the front porch again and knuckles knocked on the door. I became frightened. Why would they come back? Did they see me laying on the floor and decide to call my bluff? I wormed my way over over front door and sat with my back against it. They knocked again. What's with this guy? When I heard them go back down the stairs again, I stood up and peeked out the window. It was an older lady. She looked friendly, but also she wasn't leaving. Just standing there in the yard. That's when it occurred to me that she could need help, and my mama's kindness training kicked in. 

I shrugged out of my blanket, preparing to save the old lady when I realized it would make no sense for me to answer the door after this much time had passed. She's been loitering for at least four minutes. That's equal to a half hour in unanswered door time. I needed an excuse, a reason why I had heard the knocking but didn't come out until now. So I did want any normal person would do; I put my head under the kitchen faucet, threw a towel around my shoulders and then barreled into the yard apologizing for being in the shower. 

In the end she didn't need anything. Just wanted to meet the new neighbor. Just another relentless burden. 

This post is a result of sitting to write about the kindness and compassion... things didn't go as planned.

 

A Self-Focused Report

Ahh as I reflect back upon the past year (thats what I'm supposed to be doing, right?) I've realized its the first one that I can't really remember. That's not saying much because I can't remember most things that happen unless they are trivial. For instance, I can remember the names of all four brothers of this guy I went out with one time when I was 19, but can I remember what year it was when Olivia was born? Not a chance. 

But per my initial statement up there, I mean that this year chugged along with a sense of chaos and limbo and that makes for disconnected events punctuated by busy-ness, bouts of introversion, and lots of making decisions for future Lue. Thats something I've learned from Brett. He walks around everyday making decisions that will positively affect his future. Can you imagine?

When I'm stumped about something, he asks, "What will Future Lue wish you had done?" and I don't like when he asks me that, because I have to assume Future Lue will just be as lazy as Present Lue and she will understand why I chose what I chose at the time. "Well, she wanted to nap that day," I'll say to myself as Future Lue, looking back on the poor decisions of Past Lue, "I get that."

So sometimes I try to consider Future Me but that almost always means I have to work harder. 

When the year started, Brett and I thought we were going to leave our jobs and life behind to be traveling citizens of the world. This kept never happening because Brett couldn't find a convenient time to quit his job and I kept looking at houses for sale. That's how life gets you. 

As the year is ending, I'm further shackled to society by having made commitments (both time and monetary) to people and organizations beyond myself and my family. 

In the last few months I have made the decision to close down ole Lux n' U so that I can focus more on my animal advocacy work. I will finish the 2023 Spring season and then pack up my clippers and foam. This is a bittersweet decision because I've never done anything like Lux before and who da thunk I could pull that off? But I did! It's been paying for my life for nearly seven years and I still feel like I'm getting away with something illegal. So turning in my self-run freedom is the bitter part of closing the doors. 

The sweet part is giving into the bridal burnout and just telling people "no" when I don't want to do something. I never tell Lux people no. The other sweet part is refocusing my time and efforts on this strange new concept... something I'm interested in. What? Is this that motivating passion thing?

When my semester ends in March, I'll be halfway through my grad school program. Does that feel fast to you because I don't talk about it much? No one really acknowledges that I'm in school so I don't get to talk about it. I'll go ahead and tell you that I really love it and my drowsy eyes have been opened to a world of systems and trials and opportunities. Why don't you learn these kinds of good things in middle school? Additionally, all the people in my program are the most lovely, compassionate, slightly-strange-in-a-good-way, creative types and I'm very excited to get to meet them all this coming June when I have to go to the school in-person for a class they can't do online.

Ferguson attends Grad school.

While I will begin/resume a proper job search in the animal advocacy world soon, in the meantime I'm working on a presentation I have to give for a big national nonprofit that focuses on ethics and the like. This will be the second non-profit that has had me present juicy goodness to their members and I find it scary, amusing, and confusing. Apparently, people like hearing me talk. Now don't roll your eyes, I know people like when I tell stories. But these serious presentations that are void of accents and jokes, well, I'd have never thought I'd be the gal. 

Anyways, I'm nervous about this upcoming one because I don't really understand what I'm supposed to be teaching everyone. So...

Here's Nick dozing in the car. He's heavy and dense like a small appliance.

 The other day Mom referred to him as "Blockbuster."

This has turned into a much more self-focused post that I had planned on. I thought I'd do a full family update but I don't really know what's going on in anyone else's bubble. Brett and I have been so busy working in ours. More on that in a minute. 

My grad-school program people have gotten really excited about my writings and have encouraged me to compile essays on each of the subjects we study. They said it in a polite and intellectual way but basically they say I have a way with dumbing down difficult information, subsequently I'm a great educator for the layman. They are also mind-boggled by my use of humor on these subjects. I had one professor admit jealously after I read an easy to the class. I can now die satisfied. 

There's been talk of hooking me up with some publishers they know so I really feel the pressure to keep up my pace and get the little collection finished - which is a very good thing. I'm not usually held accountable for my own projects which is why I often abandon them once I become drowsy. 

A rare three-pet peace cuddle. 

We have accomplished many small house tasks since the holiday break began. They are the sort of fussy little things that you need to get done but that don't actually make your house look like you did anything. We are having an "Unfinished House HouseWarming Party" on Brett's birthday next week (you're all welcome to come) and I just finished ripping all of the plants out of the front yard. Retrospectively, I should have waited until after the big reveal party. Now the place looks like a big dirt patch. I'll post some photos soon - we just want to get a little further along. 

As of January, I'll be dropping down to just two posts each month. I did this once before back in 2016 when I was preparing for some big life changes; deciding what to do with my life, testing out jobs, quitting jobs, starting a business, trying to decide if my Jolly Lean Giant boyfriend actually loved me... you know, life altering things. 

I find it fitting that a similar circumstance would cause a needed break from self-imposed blogging demands. This time around though, I do know that Brett loves me. So I at least have that going for me. 

I'll keep you updated on the big things while I work out how to save the farm animals and still be able to pay my bills. Those are my new priorities. Let's see how it turns out.

The sweetest picture of the whole year.

Big Little Boat Days

Clint has purchased some sort of double-wide metal boat to keep in the marsh by our dock. Though the point was to have a lightweight vessel he could take fishing on occasion, it's a bulky cumbersome thing that Brett and he have to wrestle with to get it where they want it to go. Clint spent several weekends down in the marsh clearing a space for the new floating dock he would need to purchase and assemble. He was out there in the mud with a chainsaw and an ever blazing burn pile in our fire pit. Finally, the space was clear. He spent another few weekends acquiring and assembling the floating dock pieces. In the meantime, Brett and I took the girls for a ride up the creek. 

The houses get more and more thrilling the farther up you go. The best part is getting to see the old houses that aren't visible from the road, blocked off by thrilling, treelined driveways that drift off around a bend, leaving your imagination in the lurch. You can see 'em from the water and some of them are even better that you'd come up with on your own. 

While I admired the expensive and well-landscaped homes on the swanky end of our street, the girls paced around the little boat, forcing Brett and I to act as the counterweighted ballast stones. "Just sit down!" he finally barked at one of them. It was chilly out and Pippa finally settled into my lap which normally thrills me, but in this case I had to keep my arms in an upright and locked position that became very difficult to maintain. Grace eventually laid down in the back of the boat. She'd seen enough. 

This was the morning of Thanksgiving and on our way in we noticed a big, fuzzy raccoon in a trap in our neighbor's yard. I knocked on their door.
"Hi! You have a raccoon in your trap."
"Oh great!" he said.
"What are you going to do with it?"
"Oh we'll get get rid of it. It's been eating our cat food."
"Don't kill it!" I blurted.
"Well it's not really up to me. You'll have to talk to Pops."

Just as it was time to leave for Brett's families Thanksgiving lunch, we were able to barter for the coon's life, so we stuffed him in our tollbooth with a bit of dog kibble and left to go give thanks. We got home just before sundown, so still in our holiday outfits, we put the coon in the trunk, drove out to John Island, and set it free to start over in life. For some reason we did this under a bridge overpass and it seemed a bit seedy and suspicious. A cyclist passed us in the dark with our shovels, flashlights, and metal cage. Brett became worried about authorities. "Let's get out of here," he said, and we loaded up our murder equipment and headed home. 

"We saved a life today," I noted. 

A few weeks later, after Clint decided he needed to move the whole floating dock rig and boat situation to the other side of our fixed dock where the marsh had not been cleared out by much effort on his part, Brett and I decided to take the boat for a low tide cruise. Clint had accidentally taken the boat's kill-switch home with him, but Brett is an engineer, so he created a cable-tie based solution and had the motor purring in no time. We tossed the girls in and puttered out in a different direction. 

The oyster beds across the way are reminiscent of the french landscape after World War I. Peaks and trenches, sudden drop-offs and watery areas. Seeing as we aren't yet familiar with the topography of our new marsh, we beached ourselves on an oyster bed within ten minutes of leaving our dock. Brett turned off the motor. We had no oars or large sticks to push off with, so we tried bucking wildly. The dogs did not like it. When we thought we'd made enough progress, Brett fumbled with his zip-tie key in an effort to get us moving again. The tide was pushing us farther onto the oyster bed. 

I'll skip ahead and tell you that I had to step out of the boat and into the water with my winter clothes on. I rolled up my pant legs (wishful thinking) and plunged my sneakers into the frigid waters. I am Chris Union's daughter - I don't do cold water. And because I had just showered and applied lotion to my legs, a hundred tiny fishies arrived out of nowhere and pecked at my calves and shins. It tickled and was scary at the same time. I heaved all my weight against the boat and sent Brett and the girls out into the creek again, but my feet had sunken too far into the pluff mud. I had to stand there awhile, unearthing each foot over and over again. The fish followed my legs. Brett got the cable tie back in place and puttered over to me just long enough to let me flop myself back into the boat like tarpon. Despite my icy toes, I was ready to continue exploring. Brett was sensible enough to be spooked by the ordeal and took us back to the dock, heaved the girls back into the yard, and then threw a bunch ropes around a bunch of posts and used all of our strength to the get boat back on the float. 

I giggled to myself about the difficulties that this "easy little boat" has already caused. Clint has spent countless, worthless hours on it so far and still hasn't come up with a way to get it out of the water. There was a week that Brett and he spent looking at, shopping for, installing and uninstalling a few different wench systems, and at the moment, it's all just tied to our dock with ropes and the boat has gone all caddywampus, sitting diagonally on the float. 

I giggled at the endless misadventures of Grandpa Bob and Captain Chris and chuckled to myself knowing that the tradition will live on. 

We Moved In!

Heaps has happened in the last two months. I haven't had the time to tell you about living at Erik's house, nearly breaking my legs moving into our new house, the dogs adjusting to Ferguson, and a couple adventures out on the water. There's been Christmas decor, bathrooms to paint, cookies to bake in a scary new oven, and lots of time spent running errands with Mama. 

Approximately 3 hours after moving in, friends arrived with Indian takeout and games to play. 

Due to the ever-evolving nature of a new home, I haven't dared photograph things yet. We're still waiting on a few cabinet doors, light fixtures, the kitchen island, etc. Things that were there yesterday are in this room today. Technically this new house has an extra few square feet on our old place but because its all one big room, we have less space for furniture because there are only four walls available. Subsequently Brett and I have had a real time working out the office space (also the laundry room). Seeing as I "work from home" 5 days a week and Brett works from home on 1, it made sense that we prioritize MY office setup, but, thrilled by all the possibly of a new workspace, Brett felt his desk deserved a prized position as well. Only one desk will fit in the sunny laundry room so we elected to share one. 

Ferguson joins Brett at the office despite Brett's best efforts to make him uncomfortable. 

It was here I learned a lesson about the upbringing of boys and girls. I set my single monitor and basket of papers to tend to on either corner of the desk, and I worked there Monday through Thursday. On Friday, Brett arrived with a double monitor setup, a clunky keyboard and a mouse with an interminable chord. He had books and files and a big pad of graph paper. He balanced my monitor on a nearby window sill as he clamped the one oversized monitor around the overhang of my desk. He brought in a surge protecter that he filled with an assortment of electronic gadgets and then slowly lowered over the side of the desk to sit on the ground beneath his feet. My basket of "to-do" papers wound up on the floor near the washing machine and my desk chair was wheeled into the middle of the room. 

The first morning in their new bedroom.

Now first let me say that I welcomed Brett into the office. I happily cleared a corner of the desk for him and helped wheel in his office chair. Fridays are a light day for me - it made sense to let him take over. 

However, on Monday all of his chords and oversized monitors were still mounted to my desk. Where was my notebook? And the papers I needed to file? I rearranged the desk again, taking my monitor off the windows sill and replacing my file basket to its usual corner. Brett began working from home more than normal, thrilled by his new digs. I was glad he was thrilled, and I welcomed having him home with me. My monitor wound up back on the window sill and my basket off near Fergusons litterbox. I began using a file cabinet as my desk and holding my keyboard in one hand while typing with the other. I wasn't getting any work done most days. So I'd leave Brett in the office and go paint trim until his lunch break. Then I'd scamper in and fire off a few emails. I was honestly happier to have him home than not, even it if meant I got pushed out of my office. 

But then one day, I nearly missed a bill due date because he kept shuffling my papers around and disregarding my system - the system I use to keep our life running. I'm the CFO and COO of this family. For four years, Brett has never had to worry about bills being paid on time or taxes being filed. I'll make the call, wait on hold, send the email, etc. I'm glad to do it and I do it well.
But on this day, he had the nerve to suggest I need to organize our office space. "Lue, this shouldn't be on the floor," he told me, holding up our property tax information. "You need to come up with a better system."

Brett now works in the guest room, which is where I had suggested we put his desk long before we even moved into this home. The point though about raising boys and girls; Brett loves, respects, and considers me everyday. I know he never once thought, "Lue's stuff is less important than my stuff." Instead he thought, "I need a space to unroll these plans," and in the moment he put an obstacle (Lue's stuff) somewhere else. 
Meanwhile, my gentle ladylike upbringing never thought to say, "Hey Bubb, I need some space too." Instead I unconsciously decided it would be easiest if I work around the inconvenience. Don't cause a problem. I'd rather have Brett happy and home. 

I realized that fellas are encouraged to win - to come in and take what they need, while girls are encouraged to be peacekeepers, to wait and see if there is room or time for their idea. This is less of an attempted statement on feminism or "the patriarchy" and more of an observation of the stereotypical roles we see in movies and media, etc. Obviously Papa Union encouraged me to kick down doors and ask for what I want... I'm just much more inclined not to. A lot of that is my laidback weenie personality, but another part of it is worrying about being bossy, whiny, or a nag - words we rarely use to describe menfolk. 

An average evening these days.

What was I supposed to be writing about? Oh yes, we moved into our new house. 

And we love it.

In Conclusion

Oct 22 - Sardinia: Ports are beginning to blend together. More wandering and shopping. Dad is put off by traffic and noises. Ellen walks 20 yards ahead of us despite Dad's best efforts to herd the group into one blob. We'll lose Ellen in the distance, scan the area, and then find her at the top of a monument. Up we go to her, but she is gone again- this time we spot her across the square. 

I opened a stall door in a public restroom only to find Georgia standing there. "Hello Bob."

Oct 23 - Sicily: We all slept in today. I ventured up to the coffee shop to chat with Barbara, the Italian barista that I've slowly been winning over. I asked her if it was true that Italians won't drink milk in their coffee after breakfast time. Her straight face broke into a grin. "Yes, is true. Only for breakfast."
"But why," I asked. 

Barbra shrugged. "In the north Italy, you can drink cappuccino after lunch. Not in south."
"Have you ever done it just to break the rules?" Barbara took a moment to translate my question, then she bowed her head and said, "yes," thrilled by her defiance. 
"You're a wild woman, Barbara!" I quietly shouted. She showed me a toothy smile and then put herself right back to work. 

Ellen stayed on the boat but Dad, Mom and I ventured out and bought gifts from a thrilling olive oil store. Parts of town were dirty and uninspiring and then other parts were the cutest little areas. Very pretty architecture. Back on the boat Ellen joined us for lunch in the Grand Dining Room. I accidentally inhaled a small piece of lettuce, choked on it, and then had to go into the bathroom where I blew it out of my nose. We all found in fascinating, except Dad. He was disgusted.

Notes on the Family - collected throughout the trip: Carolyn can't shake a sinus infection and has to flush out her nose with distilled water each night. Georgia has taken to having margarita in the lounge most evenings. Dad is depressed about aging and fat people. Also, he is constantly being spoiled by this one (male) waiter who just won't charge him for anything he orders. Dad is equally parts uncomfortable and delighted about it.

Ellen and I continue to run into two guys we met in the hot tub one day. They've become very intrigued by the family's activities. Mom thinks everything she eats is delicious. Meanwhile Ellen is unimpressed by the food, service, and the water on board. She is "dehydrated" because the water "tastes bad" so she won't drink it. 

A 50 year old vineyard owner from Santa Barbara wants to dance with me so now I spend my evenings hiding from him in my room. 

Alston and Hailey spent most of their time with other people, and Dave and Dad bounce between the lot of us for card games, afternoon snacks, and evening activities. 

Overall we have a content, sluggish vibe going. Tomorrow the Union's head home while everyone else heads to Rome for a few days. Ellen did a great job maintaining a positive attitude and a willingness to participate, even if only for a short while. She says she is "maturing." 

.... she watched several Disney movies on the flight home.