Despondent

I've taken the last few days of the long Labor Day weekend to gather together all my camera gear.  I couldn't fine half of it--appropriate chargers, batteries, cards, lenses.  After half a day of searching, it is all accounted for, all together.  I sit in the middle of the evidence, lenses and cameras covering tables and chairs and flooring.  It is an overwhelming photo wonderland.  Still, it doesn't represent all of the $16,000 (eBay replacement cost) of the gear that was stolen from me this year.

I have a few more working years.  Not many.  But I thought I could look forward to some leisure and creative time doing what I have always wanted to do.  I would walk about and see things.  I'd sit in strange places and make notes, perhaps write vignettes and stories.  I would make photographs.

The future is collapsing on me, though, like a bad movie.  After dinner at my mother's last night, I came home and sat in one of my leather chairs.  The arm and side of the chair was wet, but not the rug beneath.  I was ready to kill that cat thinking that she had sprayed it.

Then a drop of water fell from the ceiling.  I looked up.  A leak.

Let me recount.  No vacation for two years because:

Bathroom floor collapsed
Bathroom wall collapsed (not the same time or repair)
House had to be re-plumbed (walls tore out, etc.)
Sewage pipes under house had to be replaced
Replaced deck
House and two-story garage apartment painted
Windows re-glazed
Stairs to apartment rebuilt
Interior wall in apartment replaced
$7,000 car repair

Surely I am forgetting something.  I've have been overdrawn at the bank for a month, since paying for the car.

Now this.  New roof will be approximately $8,000, I think.

There is still the air conditioner and the electrical wiring that needs updating.

I am tired.  I don't want to deal.  I am going to be retired and in debt.

There is definitely something wrong with me, my life.

I need to keep in mind all the fun I've had.

New computers, software, cameras, bikes--that doesn't seem to be in the working plans.

Coupons and Value Meals do.

There is so much more yet to go wrong, so much more yet to come.

So I'm despondent.  That is what we'll call it.  Despondent.

I can't make poetry out of it yet.  Maybe that's to come.