This is it. The year of the red horse. I don’t want it to end because there will not be another for another sixty years. I won’t be around for it –that is unless they really do, as my dad once noted, come up with live longer pills.

So I am hoping that the days go by slowly. Oddly enough, the only way this happens is when life itself becomes boring. And I am seldom bored. I have the seemingly unique ability to find something to do when it appears that boredom is on the horizon. I’m actually practiced at it. This is because I fear it.

And it could be why I move quickly and am in decent physical space.

Today, the Sun shone – yesterday it rained. Tomorrow it’s supposed to rain. Thursday and Friday it’s supposed to rain.

Today I left home at 11:30 a.m. and got to the post office at noon. There was no line. I was returning a package that was sent to us but belonged to someone else. I hoped to trade it for the package that we were supposed to get. The woman took the package that I was holding, the one that was not ours, and went into the back room. She reappeared and said that there was no package in the back area. Her solution to the problem was for me to return with the tracking number.

This seemed to me to be a nonsensical endeavor because the tracker would not indicate where exactly the package might be in the building. I didn’t say this; rather, I said that we were waiting on a dog supplement, meanwhile our dog was going downhill. I thought she’d be empathetic but no, she was the complete opposite. How can people be so cold and uncaring? Now if I was that clerk, I would have gone out of my way to find our mail carrier and find out what happened.

The day progressed. Lots of volunteers today helping out. For a while, the former banquet room of the historic Eagle Hotel was somewhat crowded. Me, all I wanted to do (really) was sort the books in the way back room. I never did find the time to do this – instead, I had to be all things to all people.

I made the mistake, midafternoon, of looking at my email. There was a message there from one of the Arctic Entry administrators, saying they loved my story and wanted to hear it again. Oh, Oh. I know why they want to hear my story again – it’s because it was not good enough the first time. This was because I didn’t know that I was, when we first met online, to tell my story. And as I told her, I was between doing horse chores and eating my breakfast.

I had to flip the attitude switch. It was either this or bag the entire thing. I did want to say that I was going to pass on giving my talk. Instead, tonight I worked on an outline for my talk. And I will further revise it tomorrow. I am not a quitter. But right now, I wish that I was.

Next: 284. 10/28/26: Downstairs