2021 Life Logs, Day 350: Marsh Mud
Date: Thursday, December 16, 2021
Weather: Mostly Cloudy, A Little Rain; High Temp 55, Low Temp 52 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
Nothing on my ‘to do’ list for today got done. Life got in the way. I keep forgetting that you have to cook, clean, do laundry, walk and play with Shadow, and shop for groceries. That’s what I got done today. I did all of that except for playing ball with Shadow, so just before sundown we went down by the water to play. Things were going great. There was a strong, but warm wind blowing and we were watching all the geese in the water.
About that time, I somehow I managed to throw the tennis ball a little too hard and it went into the water. I could see it right at the water’s edge, so I walked down the rocky embankment to retrieve it. It was low tide and all I needed to do was make one step on what looked like sand and I could reach the ball. Big mistake. What looked like sand was marsh mud with a light coating of sand. My right shoe went into the muck about 8 inches before I could pull it back. It was like quicksand. I had on my only pair of everyday shoes, other than my tennis shoes, and the shoe was covered in thick black muck as was the bottom of my jeans. I got the ball and headed back up the embankment just in time to hear my phone ringing in my back pocket. I quickly checked to see who was calling and it was a number from Virginia. What terrible timing. I knew it was a call from a relative of my Aunt Ethel that I had been trying to reach for two days. I answered the phone and tried to sound composed, but I could feel the mud squishing in my shoe as I walked back toward the house. I managed to slip out of the shoes at the door and come inside to finish the call. Then after the call I retrieved my shoe and started the clean up process. My bathroom still smells like marsh muck and now that the shoe is drying, I can see that it is still covered in a thin layer of muck. I soaked the bottom of my jeans in water and hung them in the shower, but they still stink to high heavens. I will have to continue the cleaning process tomorrow. But at least I was successful in getting more information about my aunt’s death.
