Yesterday turned out to be both interesting and shitty. The shitty part was how horrible I felt at the end of my day but the interesting part was what the termite inspector found. He didn’t mention the T-word, which is good but he surprised us with something else. We were making small talk when he was done with his inspection and he noticed the old books on the bottom shelf of the bookcase. We told him they were left by the previous owner. He’s a history buff, so I told him to help himself to whatever he wanted since we’re leaving the books behind. He took one book and then on his way out he asked how long we lived here. We told him it was coming up on 8 years and he then asked if we ever had a dog and we said no.

“There’s a dog down there,” he told us. “A Chihuahua. The skeletal remains of one.”

I was shocked. I don’t know how he could tell it was a Chihuahua but that’s what he said. I’ve racked my brains trying to figure out how it could have gotten there and not one possible scenario makes sense. My biggest question is how did the last inspector that went into the crawl space miss it? Plus the one that inspected the place when we moved in.

One possibility is that one of the previous owners didn’t feel like burying it when it died and so they dragged it under the house. But then wouldn’t the smell of decomp stink no matter what time of year?

Another possibility is that it got trapped down there when the opening to the crawl space happened to be open which would be the only way it could get down there in the first place. But then wouldn’t people hear it barking?

Another possibility is that it was buried there before the house was brought in in 1984. But then wouldn’t even the bones be gone by now?

Regardless, it made me wonder right away if there could be a connection to why I’ve felt so bad here, but Tom laughed and said he doubted the spirit of a dead Chihuahua was affecting me. Yeah, realistically, I doubt it too, along with there being any connection to the cemetery nearby. Although a hell of a lot smaller, we’ve lived closer to cemeteries before where our lives were pretty damn good.

Anyway, it ended up being the same old shit…heart racing, feeling warm, feeling breathless, and then tired. I know that these can be symptoms of heart disease except I don’t have any other symptoms and my heart has been listened to recently. Then there’s the fact that just under 5 years ago I had a stress test and an EKG. So there shouldn’t be anything wrong with my heart despite my family history and my high cholesterol and blood pressure. In another decade, maybe. But now? Probably not.

I’m just tired of feeling like shit so often and how nothing I do to try to help myself seems to make much of a difference. It’s really sucking the life right out of me. My life could be damn near perfect if I just didn’t have this interfering with things. Every day I wake up and wonder if my own mind and body are going to torture me. And I wonder the same damn things I’ve been wondering for years now…how much could be changing hormones versus the medication? I feel like this hell will never end and I worry and wonder how I’m going to manage such a big move feeling so bad so often.

By the end of next week, we should have a moving date because that’s how much time she has to decide whether or not to back out. She better not! I just want to get this over with because I know some of the stress has to be coming from that. I just want to get settled in the new place, wherever it is! We’re hoping to get the moving pods around the 18th, get out of here and into a hotel on the 23rd, close on the 24th, and fly out on the 25th, but life isn’t usually what we plan it. As it is, things have been going so amazingly fast so far that I fear the carpet being yanked from under our feet any second now.

Aly has been gone a month now and there is still a horrible hole in my heart and my life without her. No one can ever replace Alison P. When I learned of the dog I wished I could share it with her and see what her opinion was. It’s hard not being able to share this whole process of moving with her.

Nancy is now moving in. I wish she’d waited till we got out of here just in case she’s a company or project junkie. But then she’ll probably be a good neighbor because we’re moving.

I had a nightmare that woke me up 2 hours after I crashed which definitely didn’t help my mood and makes me wonder. In the dream, I was crouched on a cement walkway by a river. Tom was sitting on a chair nearby when I spotted a raccoon in the water. But then it hopped up onto the walkway and I noticed the end of its nose was flat like a pig’s. It looked like a possum with a blunt nose. It stood right by me and I was afraid to move not knowing how it might react. I told Tom to get up and scare it off but he just sat there silently. Then I lost my balance and tumbled into the river. The water was icy cold and had a surprisingly strong current that pulled me away from the edge of the walkway and toward a waterfall. Yet despite knowing I was going to drown, Tom remained speechless and motionless as if he were in shock.

Then I had weird dreams like suddenly realizing I was riding my bike without pants on and hoping my shirt was long enough to hide it.

Then I was sitting at the side of a street just outside a friend’s house that was around the corner from mine. I was there to show support after some people in the neighborhood had picked on her. She stepped out for a minute to dump trash but if she saw me, she didn’t say anything. Then I realized it was stupid of me to be out there because I was opening myself up to trouble if the troublemakers decided to visit her, so I quickly gathered the bowl of popcorn I’d been eating and scurried off to my place.

When I entered what was the kitchen of my house, I asked Alexa to turn on the lights. Not surprisingly, she asked if she was talking to me since I wasn’t using my regular voice. I was trying to keep my voice down so as not to disturb anyone else in the house.