When Knitting Was a Manly Art

It’s been a while since I last posted, but it’s been a rough couple of months.

Along with the snow in December — we ended up with 38″ on the ground and spent 5 hours on Christmas day scraping ice and snow off the greenhouse to prevent it from collapsing — both of the other residents here have had to deal with deaths.

A close friend of Vern’s died in mid-December after a long battle with cancer and then on the 7th of January, I came home after being out all day to find a message from Eileen’s Dad’s neighbor on the phone. She and her boyfriend had found Harold (Eileen’s 92 year old Dad) lying next to the fence separating the two properties. He had committed suicide with a small caliber pistol that Eileen wasn’t able to get out of the house. I had the unfortunate responsibility of telling her when she got home later in the evening.

It came as a shock to everybody. I’ve known Harold for more than 25 years and while I knew he was getting frustrated with the effects of aging and especially the onset of Alzheimer, no one really suspected he would end his own life.

And needless to say it been a busy couple of past weeks. Eileen is mostly dealing with here Dad’s affairs by herself (she was an only child), with Vern and I helping out when she lets us. Fortunately Harold left most of his affairs in pretty good order and except for dealing the Medical Examiner and the mortuary it’s mostly been about closing down his house and removing anything of value from the house, changing mailing addresses and the other little things that need to be done.

Once again, it’s probably going to be awhile before I’m back to anything close to regular posting.

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