I’ve spent the last two days getting the house ready to have Jennifer come over to work with me on decorating the tree. Quite honestly, I don’t remember if I put the tree up last year I’m gonna look back and see if I have pictures. I know I went to Lauren‘s house but anyway this year I knew I wanted to put the tree up because of Jennifer and I wanted to do this with her and she was very happy and excited about it too so I spent the last couple days rearranging the furniture I had it in my mind that we would sit and watch a movie together Chevy Chase Christmas love the Cooper’s and I think I forget it’s Queen Latifah holiday something like that anyway point is that I had fantasies of of she I decorating the tree and you know watching a movie together, and I rearranged the couch so it would face the TV and we could sit together. I went through different renditions of that, including the two of us sitting on the single chair which would be ridiculous when I look back, but it’s it’s kind of interesting to see how things actually Kind of let them work out or let you give yourself time to think it out and that’s what I did and even yesterday as I was getting ready for her to come over I was obsessing about little things. I was dusting and Windex and getting the furniture set and I had put the tree up got the lights lit. I brought the decorations down and two containers never did open them to look and see or double check anything. I went over to meet with her friend Becky to have her sign the photographs to give to Jennifer and then I was kind of in a rush just to get home and get things set up so Jen can come over around 5 o’clock so I started making spaghetti sauce marinara with mushrooms and onions and I wanted to get the smell of fish out of the house and put garlic toast in the oven and then I went down with Zeke to get Jennifer And walked back to the house when we came into the house. She said oh it smells so good. Well that was exactly what I wanted. That was exactly what I wanted. I wanted the house to smell good to have an aroma that was you know pleasant, and Christmasy or homie and so that was a good thing and then we started decorating a little bit I opened up the Christmas containers and started taking out the contents and there were a lot of pictures and night before Christmas books and Christmas cards and then they were ornaments, but I discovered that none of the ornaments had hooks in them. I don’t know why this was but there was thank goodness a little container of hooks and we just started putting the hooks in there and then putting the decorations on the tree and Jennifer, you know did it with me and did it by yourself you know taking the ornament over to the tree by yourself and finding a place for it and that’s what I wanted. I wanted her to feel useful and needed you know for what she could do. You know I’ve been so busy trying to you know kind of wait on her hand and foot and you know make dinner and do this and do that and saying oh no you don’t have to do anything and then it dawned on me. Well, maybe she wants to do something maybe that’s a better experience than you know sitting there with me running around and you know we work together on her yard which again we’ll go down in history as one of our great days together, anyway we decorated the tree and we had dinner and dinner turned out to be great. My garlic bread was pretty good. It was ciabatta bread with melted butter and sprinkling on garlic, well melting the garlic powder and the salt into the butter that I melted, and then pouring that on the ciabatta bread, sliced lengthwise I had the carpenters Christmas playing in the background and earlier in the day those songs made me feel very melancholy. Very happy sad I guess in other words, I got emotional hearing some of those songs and Karen Carpenter singing is just a kind of a beautiful but heart rendering experience and but when Jennifer was here, I didn’t get emotional like that. I just know it was busy doing what we were doing and she loved the dinner. She loved the garlic toast and the spaghetti and we were very comfortable. It was a good feeling and then towards the end I said, so are you ready to watch Chevy Chase and I saw her a little eyes dart and think a little bit and then she said yeah sure something like that but we never did. We decided it was kind of too late. She said well what time is it we decided that it was too late to sit down and watch a movie and I took her at her word and I didn’t push it. I did I think the delay leaving by saying oh let’s put up the rest of these ornaments, but this was the point of a little bit of disappointment. I was thinking oh gosh, for some reason I had hung a lot of emphasis. I’m watching Chevy Chase Christmas. I watched it every year. Tess always hated it or at least in the last few years so I would watch it by myself or I kind of forced her to watch it with me when I go to Lauren Sam loves it when they visited we’d watch it so it’s been a family tradition and it’s always been funny and I think I relate to it a lot you know Chevy Chase, dear Old dad want to have a good old-fashioned Christmas and putting his heart and soul into it and you know kind of being ridiculous about it at the same time so anyway she didn’t want to she she and I did not watch the movie we walked home. We walked her home and then she said, do you want to go on the Megan bed and I said well yeah that would be good and so I did that and you know it hurt my back a lot to get started and then Zeke was whining and then she took Zeke out and he had to poop and you know we had a little very little conversation while I was lying on the bed, but I knew she was taken care of Zeke so that I could you know relax on the bed and I went ahead and did that instead of jumping up and taking them out and changing the mood of things and the reason I’m you know keeping this memory today is because I feel like I learned something again I learned something again and that is give things space in time you know I did feel a little disappointed why because I got attached to the prediction in my mind that we would be celebrating Christmas by decorating the tree and then maybe having a little toast of eggnog or chocolate milk with a shot of vanilla crown Royal and then we would sit and watch Chevy Chase Christmas with my arm around her and like a Cozy thing and also have the fireplace working and none of that happened and there was a part of me that was feeling disappointed. There was a part of me literally wondering, if kind of this is the end of our relationship and then by not pushing things, and by letting the evening, be what it was going to be and ending up at her place where we have no entertainment no music no TV no movies no nothing but we do have the Megan bed that I laid on but yet we’re happy down there. I’m happy down there and she feels at home. I know she feels at home. It’s for her place so my point in this is to say when I came home I watched Chevy Chase Christmas by myself, which is what I’ve done before and this time when I watched it, I realized that this is not really a fun movie for a woman maybe some people would get a kick out of it but really when I watched it and some of the antics with Chevy Chase looking at the pretty girl in the department store and and you know the whole dialogue about the Yule log and so forth you know it’s funny to me, but it may not be funny to her and it dawned on me that wow maybe this was another blessing that instead of doing what I thought I wanted to do we just did what we wanted to do together with what we both wanted to do and so now I’m glad we didn’t watch that movie because I’m now I’m thinking if we had started the movie and you know got into it and then she wasn’t laughing and she wasn’t enjoying it then I would’ve felt worse about it and I would’ve been more self-conscious about different aspects of the movie that I don’t know the bathroom humor that the sexual stuff and so now I’m glad that we didn’t watch the movie and I think we’ll watch the movie. Love the Connors. I think that has more meaning it’s gentler and so forth. It still has its funny stuff but really trying to learn how to have a new relationship with a new person and not set my expectations too high or too low you know just because we didn’t have the time that I was expecting doesn’t mean that our relationship has crashed and burned in fact to the contrary since she doesn’t know what I’m talking about here. I’m making this blog post myself. She doesn’t know. I was disappointed and there’s no reason for me to bring it up. There’s no reason for me to overexplain everything and I’m learning that as I go as well, you can get really sick and tired of hearing somebody just talk just the sound of their voice after all can get on your nerves so I really have to just pace it out, but I don’t need to artificially separate us and I think I’ve been doing that as well. Like OK we had a night together so I don’t need to be you know calling her today or doing anything today but she texted me this morning saying thank you for our Christmas party and she’s very genuine and you know I came back to her already and said thank you and how great it was and that’s that’s the fact that’s the truth. Zeke is snuggle down between my legs now he’s as comfortable as a snug as a bug and a rock as we used to say and you know this is as cozy as life can get. I’m so lucky I do project my fears I do project my my romantic fantasies as well, but my romantic fantasies don’t involve going to bed with a girl anymore having sex you know I do think about putting my arm around her, hugging her and kissing her good night, which is what we’ve been doing but you know we’re not gonna sit there and make out like a couple of teenagers or anything like I used to do whatever it’s been, I guess almost 50 years ago before I started before Tess and I became Pete test. That’s what I did with girlfriends. I would bring them home and we’d make out on the back porch and end up having sex and that ain’t gonna happen and it’s OK with me. It’s fine with me. I don’t want it to happen. That’s the irony of being 77 years old instead of 27 so this is a long blog post the beauty of a blog post is I can post it but then I can always delete it but right now these are my memories learning a lot through the Buddhist teachings, and you know all things are temporary at the law of and permanence you know the suffering we go through from over attachment. I’m really trying to learn from these things and by that I mean to love her as much and is willingly or as enthusiastically as I actually feel and B the same, but don’t press and don’t cling and don’t squeeze too tight just be honest and so I’m gonna sign off for now and see when tomorrow brings see what today brings