1. 14 days left at CSU!!! Yes, I have officially started counting days rather than weeks. After being in this space with these people doing variations of this work for 19 years, I’m now down to only 14 more days. It feels great and awful, exactly right and weird. It’s also like a break up where even if it’s mutual, there’s some grief for the thing that’s ending. And I know how things go for me: any big change, (and this one is major), leaves me unsettled for the next three years. It has always taken me that amount of time to make the full shift, to complete the transition, so this isn’t actually “over” in 14 days. All that said, I’m ready to begin.

2. I got my car back!!! Seriously, it seems like some kind of miracle. One extreme hailstorm, four months, and $10,000 worth of repairs later — just in time to get my snow tires taken off. It’s weird how many people heard the amount of repairs required and thought they should have just given me a new car. Um, it’s only two years old and still worth $30,000, WHY would they scrap it and give me a new one?! That makes no sense.

3. Morning walks. Eric found a den of fox kits that I haven’t gotten to see yet, so that’s my mission the next few mornings I walk — find the fox puppies and see them for myself.

4. Taking care of myself. I am very lucky to have the time, the support, and the resources to be able to do what I need to do for the places that hurt.

Relaxing with some heat and “stim” after physical therapy

5. My tiny family. They are the best, my favorites.

Bonus joy: a smart and kind physical therapist, aqua aerobics, sitting in the sauna, my infrared heating pad, writing with Chloe’ and Mikalina, clementines, everything turning so green, the sound of birds singing in the morning, computer glasses, reading in bed at night while Eric and the dogs sleep, wearing pajamas all day, having all the laundry done by lunch on Friday, lunch, fresh bread, sushi, good TV (finished Special on Netflix and started Ramy on Hulu), poetry, my daffodils coming back when I was worried they wouldn’t, coffee with Carrie, laughing with Eric.