A new start – perhaps.

I never really had a great deal of time to settle down before the next crisis.  Son John, tore  a muscle in his shoulder and it was arranged for him to have an operation at the Flinders Hospital.  It was agreed that  he would drive to Adelaide and I would then take him to hospital, stay the two nights in a hotel ( Andrew would feed Benji) I would then collect him from the hospital and then drive home. Yes well, I picked him up and drove to Adelaide and booked into the hotel. At 7am the following morning I had him at Flinders Hospital.  The following afternoon he was discharged and after a night at the hotel  I drove him home. He stayed two nights with me then moved to Andrews house. Three week later I  sort of repeated the process and drove him to Adelaide and back for a doctor’s appointment. In just over a week I will take him back down again to get clearance so he can get back into his  lab. He is still not allowed to drive but his boss will pick him up and take him home each day.  No one else sems to understand how to run the Lab. so his boss has been telephoning him  several times a week since he went off on sick leave.

T he garden is  not quite, but almost a disaster area, so I will have to get started on that sometime soon. However, the cold, wet and miserable weather we have had  have seen weeds sprout everywhere. I have weeds where I put down weed matting before the coloured gravel and the weeds are coming through that.  I  did buy some flowers which I have planted on raised beds so at least that’s a start. I know the usual Geranium was part of the flowers that I bought at the Garden Shop but the others I  don’t know. I bought them for the colour of the flowers and that they can tolerate full sun. John gave me a  Poinsette at Christmas and it is still thriving and it is outside. As the weather settled down I will try and get outside a bit more often.

The 23rd August came around fairly quickly. This would have been  our 56th Wedding Anniversary. The boys, with Rachel  ( Andrew’s Partner)  took me out to dinner at the Eyre Hotel.  It was a very good night and I was glad of the company. September 1 also came quickly – Father’s Day in South Australia.  The boys took me out for dinner and drinks at the Westland Hotel since the Eyre was booked out. Today is the 5th September – three months today..

Benji has passed his 14th Birthday and is now in his 15th Year. He has slowed down a fair bit and he can’t  walk the same 2.5 miles that he used to. I still take him out in the morning with the stroller and whilst I still walk the 2.5 miles I am sure  that under the blanket in the stroller, he is still walking with me.

We spend a fair  amount of our time down at the Wetlands – visiting the swans. Depending on how he is determines  if we walk and how far. If it is a really nice day, I will take the stroller and we will do a full walk of all the ponds and hope to see Percy, the Pelican. Presently there are two pair of Black Swans at the Wetlands and I think Percy and partner have gone off home – wherever that is. I hope to see them back next season.  In the last month or so I have started going back to the RFDS and the Camera Club, so I am slowly starting to pick up the threads of my life and I have even been on a planned outing with the Camera Club. As I said at the start another week or so and I will be driving John to Adelaide for ( hopefully) clearance. After that, well we will just have to wait and see.

John  and Benji