Useless Desires

An uneventful Valentine’s Day, which was part of the problem. A tough day not to think about lost love.


“Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye old friend
I can’t make you stay
I can’t spend another ten years
Wishing you would anyway
How the sky turns to fire against a telephone wire
And even I’m getting tired of useless desires”

Java and I went skijoring in the morning. We did a pretty fast clip as it was breezy and cool. That meant two falls, one on each shoulder just to even things out.

“Every day I take a bitter pill that gets me on my way
For the little aches and pains
The ones I have from day to day
To help me think a little less about the things I miss
To help me not to wonder how I ended up like this”

Java and I drove around and looked at townhouses. I know I said “no way” to the townhouse idea but then I was thinking that I hate being in an empty house now, so I’m gone as much as possible. So maybe what I live in doesn’t matter that much. Without the horses on the property or someone there to spend time with, a house is just a place to eat, sleep, and keep my stuff.

But then I looked at the association fees at townhouses and I’m flip-flopping again. At the place I like the most, the association fee is $325 a month! Are they insane! I can’t afford that plus the $250 a month for horse board!  So I’m back looking at houses as they are actually cheaper and I’ll just have to deal with the upkeep.

“Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye old friend
You wanted to be free
Somewhere beyond the bitter end is where I want to be”

I broke down and went for a massage tonight. How can IMMENSE pain make your muscles and tendons feel so much better? Maybe it’s just that the pain of the massage has stopped. No, everything feels so much looser now. The massage therapist kept muttering, “Hmmm” and “Oh my” and “Wow”.

There was a lot of popping and snapping going on as knots gave under pressure. She even used hot stones to warm up my muscles so they’d give better.

Of course, it was a quick fall from euphoria to reality when I tried to let the horses in and the barn door wouldn’t slide. The snow melts and drips during the day, then freezes after dark. So the bottom of the door was stuck in ice. I had to smash the ice along the edge of the door with an ax. Ouch.

But my back and shoulders still feel better than they did. I’m going to see a chiropractor on Wednesday because it also hurts to move my neck or twist my spine. And I think I’ll be going back to the massage therapist once a month if it helps as much as it feels like it might have.

I know what some of you are thinking, but these injuries aren’t from the skiing; they’re from lifting and there’s not much I can do to avoid that. And skiing is one of my more useful desires.

“How the sky turns to fire against a telephone wire
Burns the last of the day down
And I’m the last one hangin’ around
Waiting on a train track, and the train never comes back
And even I’m getting tired of useless desires “