Another week

Life is so busy right now; it seems that my intervals between blogs grow longer each week. From now until March 30, I'm visiting a homebound student three times a week after school to help catch her up. She was in my class last fall. During Thanksgiving break, when visiting family in North Carolina, she was in a horrific car accident. The photos of the wrecked car are chilling--the guidance counselor showed me. Tina had to stay in the hospital in North Carolina for two months until she was stable enough to be moved back to Richmond Hill. She underwent many surgeries. Needless to say, she couldn't finish the course. She wasn't doing very well anyway. She didn't read or study much and tried to get by on minimal effort. Now I'm bringing materials to her house after school to help her complete several important assignments in the curriculum, and prep her for the state End of Course Test. I am being compensated extra to do this, so it's not entirely a humanitarian effort; at the same time, the teacher in me wants to see her finish the course successfully. Preparing her materials, driving to the house, spending an hour to an hour and a half, then arriving home at 5:30 or 6:00 after a workday that began at 7:00 a.m. has been tiring. When I get home, Paul often needs help with one of his on-line courses, so I work with him. After dinner, I spend 8-9 o'clock sitting up in bed with the papers that never end. This afternoon, I felt tired and took a nap for two hours. It was a gloomy, chilly day, and the bed looked so inviting.

We'd had a busy morning. We went out for breakfast at the Pancake House. Our purpose for going out, in addition to eating, was to locate a notary public to seal my 1-9 form for Pearson, the company that oversees the grading of SAT's and other state mandated essays. Due to heightened security, blah blah blah, people who already have been grading for them have to submit paperwork again. I enjoy doing the on-line SAT's. I never fail to find some essays that are so thought-provoking and brilliant that they strike a nerve and launch mini-epiphanies. Therefore, I was willing to go through doing the paperwork again. We decided we'd stop at Kinko's after breakfast to get a notarization.

But---because of the restaurant's close proximity to Oglethorpe Mall, the three of us stopped at the mall first to look at the sales. Liberto wanted new shoes if he could find Rockports on sale. I'm sure I don't need to describe how tiring it was to wander slowly around looking at mercandise. Next, looking for the notary public, we drove to five places and still could not find one. "He/she's out today, she's on maternity leave, he doesn't work weekends, we don't have one...." I gave up. I wanted to go home. But on the way, Liberto wanted to stop at Savannah Mall to stroll through Dillards. My legs, strong as they are, had begun to grow tired and achy, as I stood waiting for Liberto to try on pants. It was after one o'clock and by then, the thought of a nap was becoming irresistible.

Pete has expanded his pee-range from the carpet onto the kitchen floor. Poor boy, he can't help it. I'm thankful he doesn't appear to have any pain or discomfort. He still looks fairly healthy. Recently, a cat that looks just like Gus but with longer hair has been coming into our front yard and sitting on the grass every afternoon at about the same time. Our yard must be one of the stops on its daily cat-patrol. It has a collar, is well-groomed, and has that expression of entitlement that well-cared-for cats have, so I know it belongs to a neighbor. I think I've seen it in one of the front yards on my walks. It's good, anyway, to see a cat again. I guess now that Gus is gone, the cat is no longer afraid to step onto his territory. Shawn says its spooky how much it looks like Gus. Paul and I decided to give it a name, even though he belongs to someone else, and decided "Augustus" is close to "Gus" but different.