Retirement

I know I've said this before, but we've finished most of the projects we could manage and are now faced with TIME.  I've worked at a job, not a career, most of my life and am figuring out who I am.  You'd think by now I'd have it figured out.  I'd love to garden, but my attempts have been futile.  My brother sent down lots of flower seeds from the States and absolutely none of them germinated.  I really miss my trailing petunias, pansies and lobelia.  The only bedding flowers that seem to thrive here are zinnias and impatiens.  I am thrilled tho' with my hibiscus and bougainvillea.  Being from Oregon, these are so exotic. 

I'm also in a quandary about cooking.  I'm not a great or inventive cook and I really miss the foods that I knew.  We definitely have gringo tastes.  Strange that we don't get peas down here.  I finally found some frozen and won't make that mistake again.  The package was hard as a rock and when thawed the peas were grey and as ugly as canned.  Ick!  I've tried to grow a vegetable garden, but the bugs and critters defeated my efforts.  I'm going to see if I can cobble together some kind of a raised garden and give it another try on a very small scale.  

I think right now I'm just missing family and familiar things.  We have a few wonderful friends, but I think about how either of us will handle the farm if left alone.  Not a lovely tho't, but realistic.  I have also talked to our oldest grandson and he's graduating from high school a little early (January) and has enlisted in the Air Force.  He's such a treasure.  We spent several years with him and his brother with us much of the time and now he's grown up.  I know he'll do wonderfully in whatever he chooses, but we miss them all so much.  Be prepared, if you choose to move away from your family.  Emails are wonderful, as are phone calls, but they don't replace hugs, laughter and shared moments.   

Well enough of this sitting here on a lovely day and feeling blue. I have to take the old Trooper in for repairs and then back home and maybe dig in the dirt.   We are blessed, I just have to remember it.