7/11/14
In the last 4 days…? Its kind of a blur. Mom was cremated on Tuesday. We went to the funeral home, the see the lawyer in Plainfield that drew up the will we had, set a time and place for a memorial gathering, called a bunch of mom’s friends (Liza mostly did this for us), placed an obituary notice in the Yardley paper (Liza again),arranged for my kids to fly in for the memorial, took mom’s personal items from the hospice down to her townhouse in PA, found a new will from 2010, went thru a bunch of old photographs at mom’s, drove up to Augusta, trimmed the mares’ feet and gave them a bath (they look gorgeous), went to the alpacha ranch and bought some more yarn (they are the most adorable animals), played a few games of scrabble with Liza, watched 24 twice, and cried a little more. None of that is in order, I couldn’t tell you when I did what, but I am now in Augusta. I think I am going on a moonlight ride tonight to a restaurant for dinner with Kate’s friend, Ed.

Kate put in a 30 amp plug for me, I have regular ac now, really nice.

7/24/14
The last 2 weeks have been more of a blur. We had a memorial lunch down in Yardley, about 40 of mom’s friends came. The Copper Penny Players, of which mom was a 30+ year member, stood and sang songs a couple of times, we ate lunch and drank wine, people stood and said lovely things about mom, how loving she was, how she made people feel special, how much fun she was, how pretty she was, what a nice voice she had…finally I stood and said a few words but ended up crying which I did not want to do in front of everybody. Teddy hugged me while I cried. And I fell in love with him all over again, not that I ever was not in love with him. He is 21 now and the most amazing young man I’ve ever known. Emily and Teddy flew in for the weekend. We stayed at mom’s place and played board games and went thru old photos. Tracy came down too, he is Liza’s son, a year older than Teddy. It was such a special weekend. I must live close by to my children somehow. I miss them too much. I will never forget the euphoric feeling I had when I opened my eyes Saturday morning and remembered they were there in the next room.

I spent the last 3 days hunched over my laptop (my back required stronger pain pills for a few days), papers spread all around me. Switching windows from Google maps to traildirectory.com to Facebook Horse Trails and Camping to gmail to my trip spreadsheet. I printed out a ream of paper and used up a fresh set of ink cartridges in Liza’s printer. I am pretty comfortable about the rest of my SHLEP. I leave Saturday and Liza is joining me for New England, about 3 weeks.

Today I wrap up some of mom’s estate responsibilities then head up to Augusta to prep the trailer. The vet comes tomorrow to do new health papers and give the mares a rabies booster which is required in New England states. I have 20 states left to do, I am 60% done. I have been on the road for 10 months (including 4 months in FL with dad and 6 weeks in NJ with mom) and it will take 3 more till I’m done, 1-1/2 months longer than I had originally planned. But I will be finished before winter.

Things I lost:
my home & husband & lifestyle
my mom
my dog Tucker
my anxiety
a few gloves and e-cigarettes

Things I found:
God
sanity
peace
confidence in my future