2023 52 Card Project: Week 2: Rumphy

[pegkerr]

This past Sunday at church, the first Sunday of Epiphany, our pastor handed out stickers with stars, each with a word superimposed over it. "These are Epiphany star words, which is a new tradition that some churches are beginning to do during this season. Take this word and meditate upon it this week. What does it mean to you?"

I perked up as I accepted my star sticker, 'Loyal.' Oh, cool, I thought, pleased. I won't have to struggle to come up with something for my digital collage theme for the week.



You will note, however, that this didn't turn out to be the theme of the week that I chose. Instead I chose the word 'Rumphy.'

Please note: This post will be slightly longer than usual and perhaps a touch whiny. You have been warned.

'Rumphy' is a family neologism that Rob, the girls, and I have used for years. Eric looked extremely baffled the first time I told him that I was feeling rumphy. "What on earth does THAT mean?"

I had to think back hard to re-uncover the meaning.

Here's the dictionary definition of the word 'harrumph':

verb: harrumph; 3rd person present: harrumphs; past tense: harrumphed; past participle: harrumphed; gerund or present participle: harrumphing

1) clear the throat noisily.
"he harrumphed and said, 'I am deeply obliged.'"

2) grumpily express dissatisfaction or disapproval.
"skeptics tend to harrumph at case histories like this"

Whenever Rob was in a certain mood where he got disgruntled about something, he would put on an old codger aspect and grumble 'harrumph.' Have to do too many phone calls to fix a problem? Harrumph. Stuck in traffic? Harrumph! Did your dinner get burned? Harrumph!

Eventually (as best as I can remember) we identified the underlying mood that makes you say the word 'harrumph' as 'rumphy.' It became an exceedingly useful word that we all used. When someone said they were feeling rumphy, everyone knew that some sympathy, kindness, and coddling (and perhaps gentle teasing) was the best response.

These are the reasons I'm feeling rumphy this week:

• Immediately after that church service, I went home expecting to see Fiona for her weekly visit. But she called to let me know that she had come down with the flu (with gross digestive symptoms). So instead of a pleasant visit with my beloved daughter, I just got a fleeting glimpse of her looking pale and miserable as I handed off some Gatorade to her on her front porch.

This only served to remind me that I was missing seeing Delia, too. Delia had not come to see me over the Christmas holidays because someone had hit her car during the snowstorm the week before, and she can't drive to the Cities until she gets it repaired.

• I've just discovered that apparently, I've developed high blood pressure. I was surprised by a high reading taken by the dental hygienist when I went in to have my teeth cleaned in October. I went into a CVS this week to check my blood pressure at the machine near the pharmacy, only to discover that apparently, the October reading was not a fluke. As I have been working hard to get healthier and have in fact lost fifteen pounds since July, this seems especially aggravating. It feels like my body is doing something that is totally uncalled for, not to mention unauthorized. I will have to go to the doctor and perhaps go on medication. My sister, brother, and both of my parents have a history of high blood pressure, too. Apparently, it's something probably genetically based that just shows up at this age.

• My sleep disorder has been acting up horribly. I am so groggy in the evening, but after I go to bed, I will wake up in the middle of the night and stare at the ceiling, unable to sleep, for hours. On top of that, I'm getting really fed up with using the CPAP machine. If I'm going to have to put up with the thing, at least it should WORK to make me sleep better, you know?

• I'm keeping my house extra cold this year, to try to lower my heating costs. I'm keeping the thermostat at 65 degrees during the day and turning it down to 60 at night. I find that keeping the house so cold puts me into a sort of torpor--I sit huddled up in blankets on the couch and don't want to do much of anything.

• Scam phone calls and scam emails--I wasted time dealing with both this week. People, just leave me ALONE.

• My employer gets its money from donations, and donations are down. There is a lot of worried talk at the office that the churches that pay our salaries with mission support have not sent in their pledged contributions. Understandable, because people are cutting back their charitable giving due to inflation--but conversely, inflation makes the prospect of not getting a raise this year even more appalling.

• The weather has been cold, gray, and miserable. The air quality was terrible this week, and the streets are badly plowed. The snow melted partially and then refroze, leaving a thick layer of ice over everything. This was worsened by freezing rain that fell Wednesday morning.

• On Wednesday, I fell on the icy steps trying to walk down three steps to get my newspaper. I wasn’t in any kind of hurry, and I was even holding the railing. I didn’t hit my head, thank god, so I don’t have another concussion. But I banged up my back and arm pretty good, and I am sure I will have bruises tomorrow.

And then, even more startling, I could actually feel myself going into traumatic shock after crawling back up to the porch. It was ten minutes in the cold on the porch, unable to move, trying not to faint, before I could get back into the house.

It’s my great fear about living alone, that I somehow get hurt or incapacitated and am unable to get help. I’m okay…but those were an awfully long ten minutes.

This is the fourth serious fall I've had in the past five years.

• I've been in a lot of pain the last couple of days from the bruises and from having my muscles wrenched so badly. Painkillers haven't been quite effective enough.

• In an attempt to make myself feel better, I took a long bath with Epsom salts yesterday. I went down to the kitchen and discovered water all over my kitchen island and floor that had apparently poured through the light fixture in the ceiling from the bathtub upstairs. So now I have to call a plumber.

• I can be prone to seasonal affective disorder in January. What's more, at the end of the month, it'll be the five-year anniversary of Rob's death. And I've been missing him. I've been missing him terribly. When I was out there lying on the porch, afraid and trying not to pass out, I just wanted to have him there beside me so desperately. And I've been missing having Eric with me, too. This week has made me all the more aware of how much I hate living alone. My relationship with Eric gives me a lot of joy--in so many ways, he's even a better match for me than Rob was--but we each have our own house, and so we're not living together. And so I'm lonely when I'm home by myself. As I've said before, I'm not meant to live alone.

It's funny--I remarked to Fiona once that being a widow and then falling in love again has helped me, a lifelong monogamist, really get polyamory in a way I never could before. I'm in love with two men at the same time--one of whom is my husband, who just happens to be dead. Eric is extraordinarily kind, gracious, and non-threatened about the fact that I still miss Rob--but I am not living with Eric either. I'm alone.

And that just sucks.

It's been a really hard week.

Background: a misty winter background of snow-covered tree branches. Over this background are a series of words in blue text: From the bottom, going up: 'Missing my boyfriend. Pain. Plumbing. Elevated blood pressure. Gloomy weather. Sleep disorder. Cold. Missing my daughters. Ice. Money worries. Taking a fall. Scammers.' Top, in semi-transparent text: 'Missing my husband.' Diagonally across the card in larger text, is the semi-transparent word 'Harrumph.'

Rumphy



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Comments

[princessofgeeks]

Wishing you all the best and an early spring.

[minnehaha]

Yes to much of this. The falls are very worrying, Peg! Do you need some ice bite or traction grit? Also, we lost track of a dinner date. Let's make it happen. Jan 16, 18, 19?

K.

[pegkerr]

Ironically, I HAD traction grit down--but the freezing rain that night covered it over, and I didn't realize it/see that because it was still dark out when I went to get the paper. Thank heavens I was holding onto the railing.

I'll text you about dinner--yes, absolutely, I'd love to get together.

[pameladean]

Oh, Peg, that is really a lot.

Is there any way to save money other than freezing yourself out? It's not actually that healthy or good for one's immune system to be cold all the time, especially as we -- sigh -- get older. Though you are a spring chicken compared to me, so perhaps this isn't so much of an issue. You sound so miserable, though. Rope caulk, plastic over windows, anything like that? Though now I type it out, I realize you've probably done all that stuff already, so I'll stop it with the useless advice.

I love the word "Rumphy." It is so useful and expressive.

I wanted to say too that polyamory, regardless of whether the people involved are alive or not, often means not having the arrangements you wish you could, especially when involvements begin later in life and everybody has years of accreted habits and possessions and routines. I lost more than a year of time with my partner I don't live with, from March of 2020 to May of 2021. Now that there are rapid antigen tests, we hope not to end up subsisting only on phone calls and masked outdoor meetings again, but it's very hard to predict the future. In my house, there was just an automatic bubble, but he doesn't live in my house, for a lot of reasons, including a serious lack of space.

Enough rambling. I hope many of your frustrations may resolve soon.

P.

[minnehaha]

That's good advice about window plastic or such. Also, I speak again for the homey comfort of a hot water bottle, wrapped in an old pillowcase and tucked into bed while brushing teeth or something.

K.

[pameladean]

I keep forgetting about hot water bottles! Though I have been known to heat up a wrap for a sore knee or shoulder and just put that in the bed.

P.

[ndrosen]

It is too bad that you’re being hit with all these misfortunes. I hope that you will enjoy better times ahead.

[naomikritzer]

Do you own any electric blankets? I use a heated afghan over my lap when I'm working at the computer in the winter, and I have an electric mattress pad to pre-heat my bed. The electric afghans in particular are pretty cheap ($30-40), portable, and versatile.

I would encourage you to think of a warm house as a pretty basic necessity because as Pam notes, being chilly can suppress your immune system. (In particular, it makes us more vulnerable to colds, since that virus prefers chilly temperatures.) I mean, certainly layer up and turn the temperature down a bit, but if you're still cold while in long underwear and a sweater, turn it up again.

[pegkerr]

I have an electric blanket on my bed, but I don't want to stay in bed all day. Bad for my mental health. I'm warm enough with the blanket I have on the couch, but as I said, that just...encourages me to stay under the blanket, on the couch.

Uhhhh. Balancing comfort and budget. It's a trade-off, and I'm trying to evaluate whether it's worth it.

[minnehaha]

Oh, yeah, and move more! If you're cold, get up and sweep, or move the laundry from basement to bedroom or wash the dishes, or... you know... use your body's ability to generate heat. Dance around to a 3 minute song and you will be warmer. This is good for sore muscles too.

K.