Yesterday afternoon Avdi took me to an excellent performance of a play called “Skeleton Crew” by The Black Rep, at a theatre in U City ( STL’s university row).  The play was set in a Detroit auto plant break room around 2008, where they were about to lay off workers and force them to take severance.

The subject and plot were very familiar, having lived with and around people who were put in the same predicament in Dayton, OH when the GM plant shut down.  The four actors in the play did an outstanding job of recreating that human crisis.  The audience was a mix of mostly older Black and white attendees.  I found myself very absorbed and engaged in the production, and was glad to be able to experience some STL arts and culture.

Back at the old apartment…an aside first.  I want to be clear that I’m extremely thankful and grateful to A&J for helping me to find and move into this convenient location.  It’s perfect for my modest needs, and especially for walking to Avdi’s.  Sometimes I jokingly whine about living on “the other side of the tracks” so-to-speak, but I don’t mean it.

There was a character in the play, Faye, who had become unhoused and was secretly sneaking into the plant to sleep.  Then on top of that she was forced to take severance and lose her retirement benefits.  But her supervisor, an old friend of the family whom she had helped, when he discovered her plight, offered to take her in to his family’s home.

I’ve never been in that dire a situation, but I could easily have found myself there.  My son and his partner wanted to make sure that didn’t happen.  I could really feel for Faye, her pride and need for self-respect vs. her loss of housing/financial security, and how much it meant to have a son-like friend care that much.  That’s a lot like how I feel about my son and J. making it possible for me to live here, and offering rent assistance if I should need it.  Just to clarify.

And now back to my apartment…I removed the final five herbs from the hydroponic cube, and potted them up for A&J’s respective gardens.  I think in future I may grow all my herbs hydroponically, they did so well.  To that end, I’ve set it up again for another batch.

I managed to find a lot of necessary puttering around to do all morning, catching up on neglected chores (mostly hort-related, of course!).  Even though I’ve rotated most of the plants to Avdi’s, it’s impossible for me to not have growing things around me.  It’s in my DNA.

Later, I walked to CVS to find a gift card for my Gkid E’s birthday, and to get exercise.  I checked out a couple of other useful stores on the way back–a clothing thrift store that had the exact suede mocs I needed for Avdi’s, like new for only a few dollars, and a smoke shop that had all the good incense flavors!  I also discovered one of the large storefronts under renovation will be a new animal hospital!  That sounds like a promising development for that somewhat seedy strip mall and this area.

Tomorrow I have an initial consultation with my new dental group.  I’m nervously looking forward to it.  It’s way overdue.

I don’t mind being back in my apartment the way I thought I might.  It gave me a chance to catch up on business (e.g. extensive dental history docs to complete online for tomorrow) and chores, after being away so long, and just catch my breath.  I’m sure A&K can use the break from me!  I slept pretty well here.  When weather allows, I can always walk to Avdi’s and garden.  Not a bad life at all.