Mom's new roommate

90 years young

Good morning, dad!  I know you check the blog on your laptop, and Marji sent us these great pictures.

Dad's been recuperating at the Cripple Creek Care Center since he left the hospital in February.   Well, no surprise, he amazed his physical therapists by going from bed to wheelchair to walker to cane to "look ma, no hands" walking in just a few months.  Weather permitting, each morning dad and mom take stroll around the building to work up an appetite for lunch.

We just heard the good news that they will soon share a nice private room at the Center.  Dad made the excellent decision not move back to the house at this point (hey, it's still winter in Cripple Creek.) The Care Center will drive them to appointments in Woodland Park and Colorado Springs, and if dad feels like gadding around town, the Cripple Creek free shuttle will pick him up at the doorstep.

We're grateful for all the affectionate and thoughtful care at the Care Center. Best of all, they are together in their mountain community, where they are so respected and loved.

Happy Birthday, Duke

"Jazz has always been like the kind of a man you wouldn't want your daughter to associate with."

Duke Ellington

The great bandleader, pianist and composer Duke Ellington was born on April 29, 1899. He wrote over 3,000 songs in his lifetime, including my favorite,  It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. Although I never really understood the meaning until I picked up a ukulele and tried to strum and tap my foot at the same time.  Ha

Duke Ellington was born Edward Kennedy.  His mother taught him something that is rare these days: perfect manners.  His elegant demeanor and debonair style later earned him the nickname Duke.

Most people didn't know he was also a man of big appetites, and always concerned about how he looked on stage (he wore a corset.) His relationship with food was intense and complex.

Duke, who is always worrying about keeping his weight down, may announce that he intends to have nothing but Shredded Wheat and black tea. . . . Duke’s resolution about not overeating frequently collapses at this point. When it does, he orders a steak, and after finishing it he engages in another moral struggle for about five minutes. Then he really begins to eat. He has another steak, smothered in onions, a double portion of fried potatoes, a salad, a bowl of sliced tomatoes, a giant lobster and melted butter, coffee, and an Ellington dessert — perhaps a combination of pie, cake, ice cream, custard, pastry, jello, fruit, and cheese. His appetite really whetted, he may order ham and eggs, a half-dozen pancakes, waffles and syrup, and some hot biscuits. Then, determined to get back on his diet, he will finish, as he began, with Shredded Wheat and black tea.

From "Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington" by Terry Teachout

Salad days

I forgot to take Spanky a treat yesterday, so I let him graze for a while which he seemed to enjoy as much as a carrot or apple. There is something calming, almost meditative about watching and listening to a horse eat.  Talk about living in the present moment-- Spanky would teach us a course on "mindfulness" if he could only speak.

All the wild (and not so wild) grazing animals like to gorge themselves on grass salad in the spring.  Most horses just need quality hay or pasture to stay sleek and healthy. They know instinctively what's good for them.  But like humans, horses also have a sweet tooth and will scarf down all the rich grain, molasses, corn, alfalfa and sugar beet pellets you put in front of them.  That's the equine version of a Texas Sheet Cake diet. 

Well, Spanky is gleaming with health this spring, due to all the careful care he gets from Jen and Dolly.  It was a beautiful day in the foothills, and warm enough for some of the barn ladies to start complaining about the "heat."  But not this lady  :-)

Seaside holidays

Well, at least this isn't a figment of my imagination.  We really did live in the English seaside town of Felixstowe in 1977. I have Amanda's birth certificate from a hospital in Ipswich, Suffolk to prove it.

I ran across these great old British rail posters advertising seaside holidays. They make the English coastline look like the south of France.  Felixstowe is on the windy North Sea, the beach is shingle, the water freezing and usually grey like the sky.  I never saw anyone go in beyond knee-deep, but maybe people were heartier in bygone eras when cold saltwater baths were considered healthful.

By the 1970's Felixstowe was past its golden age as a seaside resort, but it still had charms: a nice promenade, a long fishing pier, a funky amusement center with a penny arcade and kiddy rides, ice cream carts in the summer and fish n' chips stands. On rainy days (which were often) the "holidaymakers" would eat take-out wrapped in newspaper while sitting gloomily in their cars.

I loved Felixstowe, although people in London would actually laugh out loud when you said you lived there. It was considered tacky and dull. But I was in heaven pushing my beautiful new baby around town in a pram. We had a large (slightly damp) furnished basement flat right across the street from the seawall. Felixstowe had a nice high street lined with little shops, and from the railway station we could travel easily and cheaply anywhere in Great Britain.  And I suppose that is still true, except for the cheap part.

Enjoy!

Memories

Pre-Internet diversions

The CenturyLink modem was misbehaving yesterday, and our little home technology raft was dead in the water.  Instead of writing a blog post and wandering around the Internet "looking things up,"  I cleaned out two closets, vacuumed and dusted the entire basement, did some laundry, played my ukulele and worked on a MOHAI project.  So much for "Internet productivity."

In the top of a closet I found a box with old letters, college exam papers, souvenirs from Europe and my daily diaries from 1969-1975.  Aha! We were living in Oxnard, California on Earth Day 1970, and I was a student at Ventura Community College. There was always a protest of some sort going on.

On April 22, I didn't mention Earth Day in my diary, or even going to class.  We were strapped for money and I wrote about a little scam job I was trying to get selling cosmetics. Of all things!  Surely if I'd been part of some big environmental demonstration I would have written about it.  I know I went went to marches and sit-ins, but perhaps on another day, another year, another campus.

Which makes you wonder about the nature of long-term memory, and those stories the mind repeats. Not exactly lies, but a cobbled-up version of the truth. When we can't remember the past exactly, I guess the mind is happy to make something up using wishful thinking, fantasies and similar experiences. 

This is from a psychology paper titled Memory Distortion: An Adaptive Perspective from the Department of Psychology, Harvard:

It is now widely recognized that human memory is not an exact reproduction of past experiences but is instead an imperfect process that is prone to various kinds of errors and distortions. Memory is inherently a reconstructive process, whereby we piece together the past to form a coherent narrative that becomes our autobiography.

Earth Day

The first Earth Day organizers: Denis Hayes, Andrew Garling, Arturo Sandoval, Stephen Cotton, Barbara Reid and Bryce Hamilton. 

Today is Earth Day, first observed in 1970.  If you're my age, you might remember Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson.  He started a grassroots conservation movement by tapping into the energy of the Viet Nam War protests. Gaylord (we loved his nerdy name) was admired and trusted by college students, despite being a member of The Establishment. He brought together a group of young activists who organized the environmental movement from the ground up.  They worked in a dingy office above a Chinese restaurant in a Washington DC ghetto.  Oh, to be a fly on the wall...

Twenty million people participated in the first Earth Day, and thousands of colleges and universities held protests and rallies. I remember feeling like part of something big that day, although unfortunately I can't recall exactly what I did. Perhaps something fun like this.

Anyway, that first Earth Day achieved a rare consensus across political groups at a time of great social strife.  Earth Day led to the creation of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water and Endangered Species Act.

Earth Day is celebrated by a billion people, according to the Earth Day Network.  And that would make Earth Day the world's largest secular holiday.  Since I probably won't be climbing up on some young man's shoulders ;-) I will celebrate by planting tomatoes today.

A horse is a horse

"Tater Tot" and friend

Yesterday was such a beautiful day.  Laundry can wait so I drove up to the barn.  It felt good to be outside. Our friend Jen brought her mini horses in, so Dolly and I watched them running around and playing exactly like big equines, which of course is too cute for words. I was laughing so hard I didn't even think to make a video.

But here's one from YouTube to make you smile.  "Shammy" has 5,000 followers on his Facebook page!
Ya' think he might be a little spoiled?

Partings

We made the trip home yesterday and our flights were on-time and uneventful, which is to say, we were exceptionally lucky.  The bad weather missed us; the airplanes behaved.

On the long flight to Seattle from Chicago, the seat-backs were equipped with nifty touch screens, and instead of a movie you could watch a Google Earth version of the plane creeping along at 500 mph with our beautiful world mapped out below.

I told John that Boeing should put that gizmo on all their airplanes.  It passes the time and helps put things in perspective.

On our last day in Columbus, we drove out to Union Cemetery with mom and left flowers at the grave of Grandma and Grandpa Terrible. 

And now John Sr. is the last of their seven children to join them in heaven. 

Mom said Grandma Terrible's favorite tree was the Magnolia, and her monument is near one that was in spectacular bloom.

So now Monday morning arrives with the usual work, chores, appointments, obligations and activities.  But as we move on with our lives, as we must, Dad will always remain close in our hearts and memories.

Thank you again Mark, for your generous hospitality and chauffeur service. We enjoyed visiting with family and hope to do it again soon under much happier circumstances.

A lovely farewell

Our family gathered yesterday at Resurrection Cemetery on a bright spring afternoon to honor and remember Dad.  We watched while his ashes were laid to rest inside this beautiful bench he will someday share with dear Wilda.  Our hearts were lifted by lovely words of Scripture spoken by Janice and Phil, and Rachel remembered a line from this poem:

Death is nothing at all.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
I am I and you are you.
Whatever we were to each other,
that we still are...

Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same that it ever was.
There is absolutely unbroken continuity.
Why should I be out of mind
because I am out of sight?

I am waiting for you,
for an interval,
somewhere very near,
just around the corner.
All is well.

 by, Henry Scott Holland

 Rest in Peace

A day in Ohio

John with Mom

After a long day of flying yesterday, we're enjoying our friend Mark's warm hospitality at his home in Worthington.

And we're grateful for the time we spent with mom today.  We went out for a Chinese lunch, stopped at the grocery store and I made a batch of granola. Well, nothing much but it was just special spending time together.  And of course we talked and talked about dad and other wonderful memories. John and I are looking forward to seeing all the family tomorrow.

Mom showed us this real labor of love-- a completely hand-sewn quilt she's been working on for a very lucky little girl in Twisp.  A beautiful piece made by a beautiful lady. Oh yes, we also got out the yarn and she gave some expert crochet tips to an appreciative beginner. 

On a spring morning

I Happened to be Standing
A poem by Mary Oliver

I don't know where prayers go,
      or what they do.
Do cats pray, while they sleep
      half-asleep in the sun?
Does the opossum pray as it
      crosses the street?
The sunflowers? The old black oak
      growing older every year?
I know I can walk through the world,
      along the shore or under the trees,
with my mind filled with things
      of little importance, in full
self-attendance. A condition I can't really
      call being alive.
Is a prayer a gift, or a petition,
      or does it matter?
The sunflowers blaze, maybe that's their way.
Maybe the cats are sound asleep. Maybe not.

While I was thinking this I happened to be standing
just outside my door, with my notebook open,
which is the way I begin every morning.
Then a wren in the privet began to sing.
He was positively drenched in enthusiasm,
I don't know why. And yet, why not.
I wouldn't persuade you from whatever you believe
or whatever you don't. That's your business.
But I thought, of the wren's singing, what could this be
      if it isn't a prayer?
So I just listened, my pen in the air.

Comfort

Gnocchi

Red sauce

Julie's perfect homemade bread

We stayed at home this weekend doing chores and preparing for a trip to Ohio on Wednesday.

John mowed during a short dry spell Sunday afternoon. When it stops raining, the sun is brilliant on the green grass and showy colors in our neighborhood, especially the blooming ornamental trees, right now in their short moment of glory.

Our useful plum tree (unfortunately) decided to bloom on a cool wet week in March.  The flowers have since dried up and fallen off without leaving cute baby fruit behind.  It was too early for the pollinators to be out and about.  There might be a few plums this summer, but not enough for the neighbors to fight over which is kind of a relief, actually.

My dear friend Julie came over Saturday and we rassled with our matching BeeBo cavatelli (gnocchi) makers.  They are temperamental contraptions that look like this, except for those perfectly formed dumplings coming out. My old machine has never been capable of doing that, and Julie's new one behaved even worse.  Our gnocchi might have been ill-formed but they were still delicious, and John was a content man at dinner.

Food is a lot of  people's therapy- when we say comfort food, we really mean that. It's releasing dopamine and serotonin in your brain that make you feel good.

Brett Hoebel

The Good Life

 John and Wilda

Our family is deeply saddened by the news that John Terrible Sr. has passed away. He had been hospitalized with complications from the flu, and died peacefully on Wednesday night. He was dearly loved and admired, and his memory will always stay in our hearts. He was 89 years old.

Part of the Greatest Generation, John Sr. was the son of Sicilian immigrants and served as a Marine in the South Pacific during WWII.  After the war he came home to Columbus, Ohio and married his sweetheart Wilda.  He worked a lifetime as a machinist to support his family, and John tells me he can't remember his dad ever missing a day of work.  John and Wilda raised four wonderful kids and I'm married to one of them.

John and Wilda lived life with the gifts of contentment and gratitude.  As John Sr. used to say, he would wake up each morning just wondering how they ever got so lucky in life.

They were a shining example of marriage at its best. In all the decades I knew them, there was never an unkind or harsh word spoken.

Not long ago I was browsing through an old-fashioned book, and ran across a poem talking about how husbands and wives should remember to treat each other.  It reminded me very much of John and Wilda's long and beautiful relationship.

Let us be guests in one another's house
With deferential "No" and courteous "Yes."
Let us take care to hide our foolish moods
Behind a certain show of cheerfulness.

Let us avoid all sullen silences;
You should find fresh and sprightly things to say,
I must be fearful lest you find me dull,
And you must dread to bore me any way.

Let us knock gently at each others' heart,
Glad of a chance to look within- and yet
Let us remember that to force one's way
Is the unpardoned breach of etiquette.

So I shall be your hostess- you, the host-
Until all need for entertainment ends;
We shall be lovers when the last door shuts,
But what's better still, we shall be friends.

by- Carol Haynes

Great teachers

Today Buddhists celebrate the birth of Buddha. 

Gautama Buddha was born Prince Siddhartha in India, in the sixth century B.C.E., and his parents were told by mystics that he would grow up to be either a great political leader or a supremely enlightened teacher. 

He was raised in luxury, married, and fathered a son, but when he was 29, he wanted to see the world outside the palace walls. He began taking short trips outside the palace, where he encountered suffering for the first time. He was amazed at how serene people managed to be in the midst of all their pain and sickness, and so he traveled the land for six years, studying meditation and living the life of an ascetic. 

When he was 35, he outlined the basic tenets of Buddhism, its "four noble truths." They are: 1) the nature of life is suffering; 2) suffering is caused by human cravings; 3) there is relief from suffering in the state of Nirvana, which is attainable; and 4) Nirvana is attainable by following an eightfold path to self-improvement.

From The Writer's Almanac

No Housework Day

Today is National No Housework Day.  All that weekend laundry will be just fine in the basket until tomorrow.  Watching Amanda keeping up with two little cyclones makes my house chores look easy, and I have the satisfaction of things staying neat for more than a minute.  The average married American woman does 17 hours of housework a week.

And moms do much more than that.  It doesn't help when nana and grandpa show up with messy toys :-)
Thanks Amanda and Tom for nice visit and the great dinners. What a fabulous Easter ham.

Seattle looked very green and lush when we got home yesterday. Spring is just getting started in the Methow Valley.  It was only 27 degrees on Easter morning.

The weather was cool and cloudy but we still got outside for walks. The trees along the river were just starting to leaf out.

Nova and I had fun at the Twisp City Park building pine needle fairy houses.

And Tom broke out the croquet set. Everyone is ready for summer camping in their spiffy new trailer.

Happy Easter

Nova finds an Easter basket...

Egg hunting on a chilly morning...

Maya

Teamwork

Nana and Nova

Cute faces!