So, I am back after my two month hiatus from OS.  I have 751 messages in my inbox. 

         I tend to disappear when I feel overwhelmed. When things get to be too much, I start to shut down.  It's like a meter in my brain hits a certain point and that's it, I go on standby. Survival mode.  Eat, sleep, read, work.   Quiet mode.  Anything electronic goes off.  It is quiet.  I recently worked 2 jobs to play catch up on some bills. I became exhausted and quit one then went into standby on my long deserved days off.

        People have told me it's a sign of depression. If that's true, then I must have been born depressed because I have been doing this all my life. Besides, I took all those depression tests and the results indicated I was not depressed.

        My Dad told me I did this as an infant. If there was too much commotion I would find the quietest place I could and just curl up and take a nap.  I would disappear.

       "Where did Poppi disapppear to?" was a common phrase in our house.

       I dragged my self home from my last day at the second job and I knew it was time to disappear. Shut the phone off, the computer, the fax, the mobiles. No ringing buzzing or beeping. No pager, no texts.  Just blessed silence.

      I stopped at the farm store to stock up on animal feed. I avoid stores when I disappear. so when I feel this need to go away lurking in my head, I stock up on everything.

     I walked into the fanfare of hundreds of chicks and ducklings peeping. Music to my overworked ears. I bought two ducklings. Little balls of downy feathers and 25 pounds of chick feed.

    Peep peep peeep all the way home. Five days off from work. Five days of glorious peace and quiet.

    Two ducklings, five kittens,mama and daddy and auntie snowcats, grumpy old orange boy kitty meowing.

     My husband fell in love with the ducklings. They were the perfect distraction for him while I went into invisible mode.

    I took a six hour nap that first day home. Then I read and drank tea curled up with the snowcats.

    "Poppi, does your brain hurt?" asked my husband.

     "Kind of, it's just too busy, I hate noises. It's hard to describe."

      "Hold the duckies, you'll feel better"

     Tea, jaffa cakes, a blanketful of kittens and ducks on my lap and a good book.  The wind howled outside, driving the rain against the side of the house.  The cats purred and stretched, happy I was there with them in their sleepy, content world.

    I  woke five hours later, not quite sure what day it was. The ducks and kittens were gone.  Eddie had put them in their beds and he was curled up on the sofa with the reindeer hide blanket and two of the big cats.  It was still raining.

   I did this routine for four days.  Sleep, eat, shower, clean pajamas, hang out with the animals, read.

   "Call your sister, she's been sending you messages"

    I open the cell phone to read her text:

    "Poppi, where have you disappeared to.  Call me."

     This quiet time has lasted almost two months.  I have shut the world off except for the three days a week that I am working. Ed barely watch tv, we've spent time with our growing ducklings and kittens. We haven't even opened the mail. We lived in a small world for a while. Read books we havent been able to for months, ate breakfast in bed and a few suppers too.  Watched a lot of sunrises, sunsets, falling stars and rising moons.

     We talked about everything and anything, the animals and their personalities, trips we had taken, people we knew, funny stories from childhood, places we wanted to go, where and what to plant this spring.

     It was like going back in time. Time before cell phones and computers and 24 hours news stations. Time was ours, to do with as we pleased. To cook and eat at leisure, not on the run. To light candles and a cozy fire and listen to the music of the rain and the singing of the wind.

    That's where I disappear to.  :)