Living on a Country Hill

This hill could be a lonely place - I think when she was young, when Jack was a small boy, Rubilee must have found this windy hilltop too solitary at times after the bustle of living in Dallas.

I don't much think about the solitude here except to savor it.  I would not wish to lose the grass rustling in the wind  and that woodpecker's insistant tapping, the coyotes' yips and the owls' questioning calls over the lake.  I resent the sight of the neighbor's roofs glinting away off over the pasture.  I suppose I am not good at social niceties,  at chatting and small talk. This hill is my refuge from the noisesome teenagers and the hurry up of the day.

But what if I did not go to work, what if my day was just the farm?  Would that wind become tiresome?  Perhaps.  I don't usually feel house bound even in summer months, though last year I had the garden and spent such a lot of time working on school prep.  But I also have Rubilee.  I only go up once or twice a day, but I could go more if I needed an adult voice to Balance Bella's chatter.  When I go, I can drop in and pop back out, or I can stay while we hash out the latest book we both read or analyze Ree Drummond's recipe or lament Harold's stubborn ways.   She is 83, 84 soon.  She is the mother of the man I love, but has become such good company for me.  Last time I went shopping for fun, I cajoled her into going with me.  It had been forever since we had a day out. We were overdue for some girliness without man or child to infringe on our time.  It was a quiet day, and a short one since she tires easily, but we enjoyed browsing the colors of spring that were lining the walls of the shops and we did a fair amount of people watching and critiquing over lunch.  I love these days because I always get stories of Jack's childhood, and even better, her own childhood and her time as a young woman at Texas Tech. That day she told me about the clothes she used to wear and her roommates when she was working as a researcher, of the first book she bought for the boys after she married Harold, and of growing up in oil patch towns.

Rubilee had a hard weekend.  Her blood pressure was erratic - she worries and it becomes more erratic and she feels worse so worries more  and it just becomes a cycle.  Jack took her to the ER Saturday and it looks like she will need some tests to iron out and fix what is wrong, but she is stable at the moment. I know there will be some doctor visits in the weeks to come starting today.  I always think of Harold as being the fragile one  but I am reminded that they are both just so small, so frail, and so old.  I know death is inevitable.  I know we are here to help Rubilee and Harold as they more and more are no longer able to fend for themselves.  Right now there is a delicate balance of them mostly living life independently in their own home (if  somewhat limited in scope by their health) while we live on the edge, taking care of the things that escape them.  Delicate, threatened by every illness, by failing eye sight, by a simple stumble. 

The weekend was worrisome for us all.  I know Jack frets.  I didn't fret so much as I did just ponder their mortality and that of my Grandparents who are in very similar circumstances, but too far away to help.  I do know that am not ready to think about losing either of them.  This hill will be too lonely then.