FEAR

I am so lucky to have parents willing to help me yet I have been struggling all afternoon trying to make myself make the phone calls I need to make today. I'm just sitting here crying. Annie Wilkes was home today presumably due to the ongoing tuck-pointing project that started today. Like she needs to supervise. All I can think of is her trying to look through my back door while people are removing all the trash. Or I imagine it costing $10,000 or that the services come to give estimates and refuse to take on the job because it is too big.   That last is ridiculous because any service with experience dealing with this will have seen worse.  I have such a headache from thinking about it. And then I will have to have the water shut off at least one day for plumbing repairs. I'm not even sure how to get that permission or where to turn it off.

Last night I only managed one trip downstairs and I chickened out of using the back door - my new back door. I opened it to pour some bleach  on the concrete slab to circumvent the smell of dried cat shit or bird shit or whatever that was that had been there for years.  Annie Wilkes had moved all her plants over close to my door to keep them away from the tuck-pointing dust (she can't just bring them inside?  They are huge and she even had one of them sitting on the steps, which is an obstruction) and I lost my nerve.  In addition, I'd already made so many trips up and down all those stairs my body wasn't going to let me and the dumpsters were so full nothing else was really going to fit.

Truthfully, I hadn't been in the kitchen for at least a year and it's worse than I had recalled. I'm betting there are thirty bags in that space.  It makes me want to see how many I can get downstairs tonight but I'm also betting they are heavy.  They are piled waist high in a space roughly 4 feet by 8 feet.  Back then I used to pile as much in a bag as I could instead of limiting the heavy stuff in smaller bags and using the big bags for light stuff only.   There are so many windows in the back courtyard and the steps in back are so narrow.  I have to do this though. I have to make a path.  (I have to clean before the cleaning people can come)  I have to bring my cat to my mother's guest room because of this. I don't want her to get lost in the shuffle, plus I would die if she got scared and ran out the door. Also, if I can get rid of her box for awhile, that's one thing less to clean.  I don't know how long I can be without her though.  It breaks my heart.