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Week 16 - Daily Diaries - Tuesday takes us to pastures new

Edited BY

 

G P Kennedy

 

 This week we welcome a new arrival to our band of Storytellers. With Texas flexing its high competition drive the Lone Star State has become one of the epicenters of the ever-growing Coronavirus crisis in the United States.

 

 Our new Storyteller is Graeme, a part-time college instructor and journalist. Living in Fort Worth. The Panther City is home to around one million people and is often cited as one of the fastest growing cities in the U.S. Let’s check in to see what a not necessarily typical Tuesday brings.

 

Graeme - Fort Worth, USA


 Howdy. Thanks for the opportunity to share my day with you. More broadly, thanks for the opportunity to shine a light on what is a rapidly growing crisis in Texas. For context, our state has around 29 million folks living in it and we rattle around in a space larger than the whole of France (population c.67 million). Fort Worth puts the FW in the DFW Metroplex. The D is for Dallas, our larger, louder, and shinier cousin 35 miles or thereabouts to our east. 

 

 Let’s get to it ‘cos I don’t want to be accused of being all hat and no cattle.

 

 We just brought a new member into our family, in the shape of an adorable 8-weeks old golden retriever pup. Ziggy joins our five-year old rescue [giant] dog Zeus so now there are four of us – two humans and two canines…you get a dog, you get a dog, everybody gets a dog [h/t Oprah].

 

 Puppy parenting is as endlessly rewarding as it tiring. I am not a morning person to put it mildly. As I am on the long summer vacation from teaching English at community college I’ve had absolutely no reason to set an alarm since early May. Now I have no need of an alarm as Ziggy reliably wakes us before 8 am. He is getting better each day, in terms of sleeping longer as his baby bladder grows and he is able to hold out longer before his morning constitutional.

 

Ziggy - adorable

 Typically, he flops down under one of our couches and sleeps for a solid hour – enabling me to be writing this very Story, this very moment. Lots of coffee, some writing and a breakfast of toast or some kind of healthy cereal with unsalted nuts fill the early dog-sleeping hour.

 

 Since the return of Premier League soccer after an enforced hiatus, I have been cramming in the watching of as many games as possible. My team has long since added the League title to their European and World Champion trophies.

#YNWA #COYR

 

 Lunch is invariably some form of sandwiches with unnecessarily expensive but commensurately delicious deli meats. Right now I am all about the buttermilk sourdough with French ham and sliced tomatoes from the first batch of grown from seed great balls of flavor from our poolside jungle.

 

 This week I am making a concerted effort to do as little as possible with my down time. I am taking it easy safe in the knowledge that the start of August will bring three weeks of solid work to fully transfer all my teaching material online, ready for a 16-weeks semester of delivering for my students via remote learning. I am relieved that I have no need to enter the workplace this calendar year. Privileged? Probably. Blessed? No.

 

 So, through a combination of couch surfing, puppy playtime, poop scooping, catching up with friends and family overseas, my day idles towards evening. Typically, this would be the part of the day when I workout – miles on the bike, set up on a turbo in the spare room; laps in our pool; strength and conditioning on the patio upon which sits a vestigial boxing gym set up.

 

 Today I am puppy parent tired so I take five on the cleared patio, with a cup of tea and piece of chocolate. It is my absolute privilege to share this space and time with my best friend and love of my life. Together we while away the hours talking till the sun sets whereupon we share a dinner of grilled chicken with Caesar salad. Season three of the West Wing and a couple vodka tonics ease us to bedtime.

 

Come on in, the water's lovely

Last play and pee of the day – for the pup – then off to bed around midnight. We will be up at six-ish and perhaps once in the night. Honestly? I wouldn’t change a thing right now.

 

 Thanks for taking time out of your day to engage with mine. Stay safe and well.

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