Guard Dog

Started this one this morning.... while drinking coffee!

The GD soap opera (as the cheese turns)… final episode I got home from WI last night. I think it’s safe to say we’re doing really good so far. Especially since we just spent six days (SIX!) with each other. That is the dating equivalent to running a decathlon! I drove up early Monday and got to her place just before 6 PM. Well, first I stopped in West Salem and rented a hotel room. If for no other reason just so I could take a shower and change. Best sixty bucks I’ve ever spent. After over 11 hours driving I was beat and that recharged me. I hadn’t seen her house yet and it’s nice. She’s renting a small house a little ways out in the sticks. She had made a really nice dinner and our “first night” together was just perfect. Afterwards we stayed up talking until almost sunrise. It’s amazing we hadn’t run out of things to say to each other since we’ve spoken almost every day and even a few times while I was on the road up. Conversation with her is just so easy. The next day she had some rounds to make and I asked if I could come with and help. That was very cool. She is just a natural with animals. She told me she can relate better to animals than to people. That is something I can COMPLETEY understand. That night we went to LaCrosse and I took her and her daughter (her name IS Brie but she spells it Bri) out to dinner at this cool place called “Huck Finn’s on the Water”. So all through dinner this girl (she’s 20, college student) is staring at me like she was trying to bore through stone. G goes to the rest room and B pounces the moment she was gone. It was a short but memorable conversation that ended with “if you break my mother’s heart I will hunt you down!”. I have to tell you I respected her for that. Never had a conversation quite like that one, but I respected her for it. She is tough. A lot like her mother as it turned out. After we got back to her place we were sitting on the porch talking and she asked me what B said. I laughed and told her. She laughed but that was the segue into the first of several serious conversations we had last week. This was really the elephant in the room for her. She was divorced, I’m divorced twice. She wanted to know what happened. She wanted me to know what happened to her. I told her everything. Neither story was all that interesting if you ask me but she wanted to know every detail. I think she really wanted to know if I was still in touch with either of them. I told her the truth, that I had just broken three years of no contact with Steph but we’d only spoken once. I assured her there was no chance in hell of reconciling. I think continued contact with Steph would be a dealbreaker with her. Definitely something to think about since I have no feelings for Steph whatsoever. If casual conversation with her comes with a price it’s definitely not one I’d want to pay. Then she told me all of her story. Jesus. No matter how bad your s—t was I promise you there is someone who had it worse. A lot worse. He was B’s father and G’s only long term relationship in life. This f----g guy was just evil. I can’t imagine a better word to describe someone who spent 20 years putting them through what he did. Infidelity and emotional abuse and sometimes physical. The broken marriage trifecta. It sounds like he was a high functioning alcoholic. She said one of the things that attracted her to me was that I didn’t drink booze in any form. Anyway it had been five years since their divorce. The guy literally ghosted her after she had him served with a RO. He took all the money from their joint accounts and disappeared. He left them literally penniless. At the time B was only 13 and G was a 1/3 owner of the Vet practice she was working in. She had to sell their house and her stake in the practice just to cover the costs of the divorce, debts, and provide a basic living for her and B. Since the guy disappeared it took years and thousands of dollars to finalize. Finally he turned up, signed the papers and it was all over. Both her and B attended therapy for a long time to get over that. The next five years she dedicated to being B’s mom and trying to rebuild their lives. They are very close and both are amazingly resilient and tough. And both of these amazing ladies have serious battle scars on their hearts. I am always amazed at people’s capacity for cruelty to other people. Especially someone they had to have loved even a little. Anyway, some time after that she is sitting next to me on the couch, leaning her head on my shoulder, and said that she had never had or even considered another serious relationship since. Then she looks me in the eye and asked if that is what we have, a serious relationship? Now…. Here it the problem. And if anyone has any advice after the fact please speak up. I’ve already decided I’m crazy about her. If fact I was completely sure I was falling in love with her. But that male part of the brain is telling me not to rush in, to play it cool. Show a little but not too much so heart and brain were not on speaking terms at the moment. Annnd I froze. Words failed me and I said something lame. Ugh. I really thought I blew my chance right there. But… the next day I recovered. The first “I love you’s” were exchanged. LOL I think I was more relieved than happy! The rest of the week we just enjoyed each other’s company. We drove over to Sparta and double dated with my cousin and her husband. She (cousin) is overjoyed with how things are going. We went horseback riding on one of the equestrian trails in a park near town. G told me she had always been attracted to the “cowboy” outdoorsy type. I had told her I had half of that. I could expertly handle a revolver and my outdoorsman cred was unimpeachable… but I was no cowboy. A horse named Dottie certainly exposed THAT! I had no idea how to ride a horse and the horse knew it. The power in that relationship was definitely under the saddle not on top of it. But it was a lot of fun. Sunday came all too soon. I have some work to do on some of my properties this week so I had to come back yesterday. We talked about when we’d see each other again and it looks like it will be two weeks (a freaking eternity if you ask me) before she has a gap in her schedule. I told her I wanted her to come down and stay with me next time. I’d like her to see my place and let me treat her to a good time. She’s never been to Memphis. I got the sense the drive is off-putting for her. Can’t blame her there. It does suck. So this morning I got up early and bought a ticket on Delta from LaCrosse to Memphis, open ended, for two weeks from now. I put the ticket into a card I had bought for her and signed it with a quote from one of her favorite writers. I won’t say which or what it was because if you have gotten this far into the story and don’t think I’m already a total sap I don’t want to push you over. But I think she will like it. I put the card in the kitchen in front of the coffee maker so she will find it after I’d left. We shared a passionate goodbye kiss and I drove home. That was 24 hours ago and I already miss her. But she is coming here soon. Last night we were talking about the circumstances of our first meeting. She was actually supposed to visit Amy & Mark (cousin & husband) the day before we met. If she had, I would have been five hours north on the road from Bayfield. I told her how I came to be there and how Sunny’s passing had affected me. She knew I had recently lost my dog but not the details. When I want to get away I usually go to the Gulf Coast and go fishing. But because of Hurricane Ida I couldn’t. So I drove north with no particular destination and somehow ended up right where I was supposed to be when I was supposed to be there. It’s funny how the stars align. She said this was meant to be. Maybe it is, or maybe our luck is changing. Anyway, that is the third gargantuan ramble I’ve dropped on you guys. Three too many probably. It’s not the end of the story but it is the end of the beginning. If you have been reading I certainly appreciate you. If it’s TLDR I certainly don’t blame you. And if you have any advice on how I can avoid f—king this up please speak up!

LOL! Can’t sneak anything past you!

This would be a segue into one of my rants about the inherent evil of "government" but meh.... you've all heard it before so... government bad yadda yadda

That just sucks! Will you need surgery or just cortisone & physical therapy?

You guys are freaking KILLING me here! I met Gail’s daughter last night. Her name is Brie! Not BSing. Then I come here and read all this and spit coffee all over my phone! things are going well here. Very well! More details when I get home.

Hey you guys are awesome! Everyone of you. I’d be proud to call any of you a friend.

By this time tomorrow I'll be in Wisconsin. See you guys later!

How low can we go?

That is an interesting question. If you'd asked me 20 years ago if I loved my country my answer would have been an unequivocal "yes". Ask me now and I think I'd answer it differently. What is my country? I love my countrymen very much. Americans are generally good and decent people. On average we are generous, charitable, and are generally willing to help total strangers even if it's not 100% safe to do so. Plus we invented tailgate parties. You might argue that people living in prosperous nations where simple day to day survival is not an issue can afford to be so. But I've been to prosperous nations where that is not the case. Japan for example. Everyone is polite and respectful but if something bad happens you are own your own. Someone once described it to me as "millions of people alone together". That was my observation there as well. Social interaction between strangers just does no happen. It's not even uncommon in the US. I love that about us. On that note I found Canada & Mexico to be very similar to the US. I think because people travel freely between the three countries we all share more of a social culture than folks realize. There isn't much to love about the US government. Other than it somehow manages to not be it's worst self most of the time. That is something I guess. Mark Twain said "Patriotism is loyalty to your country all the time and loyalty to it's government only when it deserves it". I think that sums it up for me.

with all due respect to Dr. King I think a common enemy that could kick both of your butts would do a pretty good job of turning enemies into friends as well!

This is correct. Plus he is exploiting their concerns and giving them back very little in the way of help or relief in exchange for their support. Economics is complex. It cannot be distilled down to sound bites and political axioms. there certainly are things the government could be doing to help people who just want to work hard and provide a comfortable middle class lifestyle for their families. But, regardless of the outcome of any election they are not going to do it. The politicians will still shamelessly exploit the concerns of the middle class however.

That is amazing! I have been to senior living condominiums in assisted-living places before and they are seriously depressing. This sounds like anything but.

LOL just need someone to keep you warm!

I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it. When I bought this place I had this idea of a completely self-sufficient property. A home that could generate its own electricity, grow its own food, supply its own water. I sort of have that. Not 100% but pretty close. Well it was a lot of work though. I can’t imagine I would ever want to live inside of a city limits again. Traffic, city ordinances, noise, meddlesome homeowners association‘s, crime, I never have to worry about any of that. It’s quiet here. Peaceful. My front porch faces east and my back porch faces west. I can sit and watch the sunrise in the morning and watch it set in the evening. There is no artificial light for miles and you’ve never seen more stars than I see here every night. I hear coyotes down in Anderson Tully. Crows gather in squawk along the tree line following the creek. There is an owl that comes around and hangs out in the tree over the workshop. She seemed to be fascinated by whatever Sunny was doing when she used to patrol around the garden in the evening. Sunny and Tommy’s final resting places are here, down by the creek. I don’t know how I could ever walk away. But if that guy was right and I got even close to what he said we could get I could retire right now. very conflicted

Sorry, misquoted you. Now that you’ve corrected me that is what you said I remember.

Well in all fairness to them their rights ARE under attack. To one degree or another. Like Gromnir has said there is a constant tension between the rights of the citizens and the efforts/desires of the state. In the US we have an imperfect record of keeping the balance between the two. But for the most part we have done a good job. Better than some. I scoffed at the notion that “democracy was under attack” under the Trump years. We had an election. It was validated and the winner is in power. We’ve had sore losers before. There was no possible outcome where he kept power AND a United country. But more and more from the Bernstein book and other sources I wonder if he would not have happily burned it all down just to be President of the ruins.

Never considered it before to be honest. But I moved here from FL. So it’s been done before

Not ruling it out but it’s way too early for that! But I’m definitely going back up next week. This time she asked me to stay with her. We’ve spoken almost every day!

I have been going through my finances with a fine tooth comb the last 24 hours. Trying to come to some decisions about what I want to do with the rest of my life. It's been seven months since I accepted a severance from my job. I'm too young to retire but have no interest in finding another "job". I have a few business I am a minority partner in and I have an income from leased properties but it is really just enough to keep them cash neutral until their value goes up. I was more considering a new business venture with one of my former partners. But how to raise the capital? I own two empty lots inside the city limits of two nearby towns. I had been toying with the idea of borrowing against them to build houses on them and THEN selling them. I asked my lawyer if she could recommend a good realtor for the area. She sent me her ex-husband! I was joking with them that this was an inside job! Anyway the guy visited me today and advised against construction because the time would be 8+ months and interest rates MUST go up soon. That will cool off the market. So I decided to list them both with him. Then he dropped the bomb. He asked about selling my house. At first I laughed at the idea. I built this place! Well, the builder actually BUILT it but you know what I mean. The house is nothing special. Wood frame. Less than 1300 sq'. But I've made a LOT of upgrades inside and out. Propane generator, solar system. Two wells, one powered one manual. I've built a greenhouse, workshop, and smokehouse (mostly on my own). Perimeter and interior fencing. River access AND it shares a border with a state WMA. From the day I bought this place as empty woods until today I've put close to $400k into it. I own it outright and it's home in every sense of the word. But when he told me what it might be worth on the market today I was floored. So, now I find myself pondering what would have been unthinkable just a day ago. I'm really conflicted about this but leaning against it right now.

Take care of yourself LC!

Oh I wasn’t commenting about anything in particular that has been discussed. Just responding to Bruce in general. I have heard a lot of stupid stuff said about the United States here and elsewhere. I’ve even said a few of them myself.

Few people living in the United States have a real UNDERSTANDING of the United States. Most of them run with an expand on ideas they heard from somewhere else. Despite the evidence of their own eyes. Hell even I’ve fallen into that trap from time to time.

We talked about getting together again last night. Maybe next week. Have to work out the details. I’m up for another car ride.