I am doing a little better. There are moments when I forget my Mom just died. And mostly, when I think of her, I smile internally. She was such a gentle loving person, it makes me happy to think of her. But other times, I start crying at the drop of a hat. Advice if you are wanting to be helpful to someone grieving: don't ask, "how are you?" or anything similar. Do offer your sympathy and a remembrance of the person from your perspective.

Yesterday morning, Ray had to be dropped at the Botanical Gardens for his department retreat. Classes start Monday and he has a lot to do. Then I zipped over to the Fellowship, where he had left his phone Wednesday night. It's handy having a key. I got to ALT about 9:30. The few people that were they said hello and how sorry they were. I went to my desk and turned on my computer. There were about 20 or 30 emails, but most were trying to sell me something. I asked nathan and he gave me one new volunteer information form. I felt like I hadn't really been missed, that there was nothing I needed to catch up on. It was sad not to be needed.

When Heather got there, she brought me a lovely peace lily and a card signed by everyone. It was really nice and I started crying again. She said, "you can take as much time as you need. Is there anything we can do to help?" I said, no, I needed to be busy really and anything she could find for me to do would be good. We talked a little. She has been working with a moderately famous local guy on designing a new logo and doesn't really like anything he's done, but she took bids and his was the lowest. I also showed her the Vertical Response report from the one email we sent a few weeks ago. 30% opened it, about 80 people, which is not horrible, but a little depressing.

I left after a couple of hours to meet Janna for lunch at Marti's. She was there when I got there, on time! She bought me lunch and listened. It was good.

After that, I returned my Dad's call and met him briefly in a parking lot. He had been running some errands to get out of the house and needed to go back and make himself some lunch. I went to Ray's office and did a tiny bit of tidying until the pool opened at 2, when we headed over. The last day of the season. The water was lovely and it was not very crowded. The Captain joined us maybe an hour later and he enjoyed it too.

We went home about 4:30 and Ray started on his famous tuna-noodle salad. There were 6 messages on the answering machine, including 2 from the shrimp guy. Driving to Hull to pick up the shrimp we had ordered before my mother died was not what I wanted to do right then, but I called my Dad and he didn't either. So I did it and it was fine. We will eat them in her memory and enjoy them.

We went to the community center and had potluck supper with a few of our neighbors and enjoyed it very much. Sky had brought Boggle and we played a few rounds after supper.

It was hot and sunny and dry. We watered some.

I made a fish recipe with cod I had bought and need to use, to be baked tonight.

We enjoyed an episode of Doc Martin and I read a bit, going to sleep a little later than I should have, and waking up at 5 when Ray got up.