Home sweet something

I think we purchased this sofa about 25 years ago. It still looks good, although it's had more use in the last 3 months than all those years combined.

I lay there reading and listening to music, messing with my laptop in the early morning while John is still asleep (like now) and sometimes take a nap during the dullest part of the day-- early afternoon.

It isn't even all that comfortable, but I can't bring myself to get in bed in the middle of the day. You just don't do that unless you're sick, and thank goodness we're not.

Here's a picture of my friendly bunny, taken from the bedroom window yesterday. Life would be sadder without our birds and little wildlife sanctuary. 

Not much "sofa time" yesterday, according to my FitBit, I walked a respectable 10,000 steps. Note to self: harder feeling sorry for yourself when you're busy.

I took a morning walk and then worked outside in the afternoon. The garden is beautiful from all that attention. Inside, we've been cleaning out old files, weeding the huge CD collection, organizing stuff. Endless stuff.

If the thrift stores ever open again, there should be a bonanza of new donations. Everyone I know is cleaning out to some extent, with some stress to relationships. One spouse takes it out, the other puts it back. Or vice versa. Ha!  Everyone stuck at home-- a good time to take stock of what we have squirreled away.

Anyway, no end on sight for the Washington State stay-at-home orders, which were supposed to expire next week. A few restrictions are eased, like access to state parks and recreation. Everything else "non-essential" remains closed. Which is just about everything. Another month of bad hair days.

The lost month

What happened to April?

"If you're hitting a wall, you're not alone."
Excerpts from an opinion piece by Jill Filipovic, CNN 
April 29, 2020

"A longing to hug a friend, a loved one, a far-away child, your mom is more than just "I want a hug" -- it's a primal and fundamental longing for the way touch is so often short-hand for everything we don't find the words to say."

"No, we are not being asked to go to war or survive one. But what we are being asked to do is profoundly antithetical to our natures as human beings; it is profoundly destabilizing and difficult. There is little more human than the desire for connection, touch, stimulation and novelty. This is all so hard because in going without those things, it's not hyperbole to say we have to find new ways of being -- or at least feeling -- human."

"Compared to illness and death, these are small things. Being alive matters more, and so of course we have to continue to live this way for as long as is necessary to keep ourselves and others safe and healthy."

"But it's also OK to grieve the pieces of life that we're missing, to express the feeling so many of us have that we can't take it anymore. It's necessary to understand that missing the fullness of life, including pleasure and connection, doesn't make us selfish. Feeling destabilized and disoriented or pushed to a breaking point doesn't make us flaky or weak. It makes us human."

Little House on the Prairie

"Pa" laboring with the rotor-tiller

Amanda said they like watching "Little House on the Prairie" reruns with the girls. I was teasing her, because it looks like they're turning into a real life Ingalls family.

They own acreage outside of Twisp, and spend most of their free time up there. The previous owners put in a well and built a small yurt.  The property has great views of the river and valley below, and Amanda and Tom hope to eventually build their dream home there. 

In the meantime! They're planting an orchard and a large vegetable garden this summer. The soil looks surprisingly soft and rock free. Still, an ambitious project.

The deer fence is essential.

Nova with her nectarine tree.

Planting potatoes and seeds-- a good family project in these strange times.

"When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd"

There's something comforting about the same old progression of flowers each Spring: crocus, daffodils, tulips, bleeding hearts, lilacs, then peonies and roses. All familiar friends that bloom just once a year (except for roses, although the second flowering is never as good as the first.)

The lilacs are blooming outside the front porch, and I love how the smell comes in the house. There are so many huge lilacs in this neighborhood, all planted many years ago.
   
A tough, long-lived shrub, lilacs can grow almost everywhere, from ranches to city gardens. We had lilac hedges! on our farm in Pennsylvania.  Mom loved the scrubby lilacs at the old family house in Cripple Creek, Colorado. They survived Rocky Mountain winters at 10,000 feet.

Syringa vulgaris (common lilac) originally came to Europe from the middle East. The name is from an old Persian world for "blue." A beloved flower, lilacs are often referenced in literature.

Lydia Huntley Sigourney (1791-1865) wrote these romantic lines about Persian lilacs:

Lilac of Persia! Tell us some fine tale
Of Eastern lands; we're fond of travelers.
Have you no legends of some sultan proud,
Or old fire-worshiper?
 
My favorite lilac poem, "Portrait of a Lady" by T.S. Eliot, tells a story of sorts. A young man visits an upper class English lady of a certain age, with whom he's had a relationship. He says he's leaving on extended trip abroad. She puts on a brave face, but has a few sharp words about the cruelty of youth:

 Now that lilacs are in bloom
She has a bowl of lilacs in her room
And twists one in his fingers while she talks.
"Ah, my friend, you do not know, you do not know
What life is, you who hold it in your hands";
(Slowly twisting the lilac stalks)
"You let it flow from you, you let it flow,
And youth is cruel, and has no remorse
And smiles at situations which it cannot see."
 
I smile, of course,
And go on drinking tea.

"Yet with these April sunsets, that somehow recall
My buried life, and Paris in the Spring,
I feel immeasurably at peace, and find the world
To be wonderful and youthful, after all."

And the most famous lilac poem written by Walt Whitman, about the death of Abraham Lincoln. The lines begin:

When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd

And the early star droop'd in the western sky at night...

Manners

"Manners maketh man" as someone said.  A crisis brings out the best and worst in people.

This is the long check-out line at Safeway yesterday at 6:30 am.  Next time, I won't go quite so early, and hopefully avoid all the people trying to avoid all the people. When I left at 7:30, the store and parking lot were almost empty.  Duh.

Everyone was quite nice though, from customers to checkers. Or maybe just too dazed and tired to be rude at that hour.  I found everything, including a $28 package of TP.  Really?

I have to admit, it bothered me seeing some people wearing better PPE masks than our daughter gets on the nursing front lines, where they are grateful just for cloth masks. 

Spotted on my walk yesterday.  Speaking of that...

Once upon a time

Cherry blossoms drooping down with moisture on a grey, misty morning.  No traffic, deserted sidewalks, so quiet and dreamlike, it was like walking around in an old Simon and Garfunkle song.

Remember this one?

What a dream I had
Pressed in organdy
Clothed in crinoline of smoky burgundy
Softer than the rain
I wandered empty streets
Down past the shop displays
I heard cathedral bells
Tripping down the alley ways...

If only it was just a dream.
Off to the grocery store this morning for a dose of reality. 

Bad hair days

I'm not desperate enough to have John trim my hair with the kitchen shears. Yet.

At least it's long enough now to wear up. But my messy bun looks nothing like Megan Markels'. It just looks messy. Life is not fair, in case you haven't noticed lately.

Hey, why not go down to Georgia this week for a haircut?  While we're there, might as well take in a massage and a movie. What ARE they thinking?

I follow some blogs from England and Wales, and there's more of an attitude of "we're all in this together."  And they have such a sensible Queen, who sits them down for encouraging little talks.

America has certainly pulled together in past crisis, but it's a free-for-all in this one, with each state writing their own playbook. Of course, the sense of unfairness and lack of consistency across the country makes suffering even harder. There's no easy path out of this, folks.

The latest from our Washington Governor Insley?  The good news is stay-at-home order is working, the bad news is another long month (at least) still ahead of us before things start to open up.

"A blessing and a curse"

That's what Amanda calls the new Chromebooks, provided by the school.

Nova and Maya look like poster children for distance learning here. But as we all know, staring intently at a screen doesn't necessarily mean we're doing something productive.

With a typical jigsaw puzzle, all the pieces are different. There might be slight differences, but at the end of the day, there's only one way the dang thing can go together.

This diabolical puzzle has dozens of tiny identical pieces, meaning there are umpteen mathematical combinations for fitting it together. Only one is correct.

The puzzler has to match up the colors and patterns of what is basically an optical illusion disguised as pinecones.  Took him three days.

My peacock is still a work in progress, but hey, some people have other stuff to do around the house.

The weather is changing. Rain is in the forecast for the next 10 days. Yesterday morning after I mailed some packages, I drove the long way home along deserted Alki Beach.  It was cold and windy, but I opened the window to breath in the briny clean smell, which reminded me of fresh oysters and happier times.

From The Writer's Almanac this morning:

Signs
by Luci Shaw

In time of drought, let us be thankful
for this very gentle rain,

a gift not to be disdained,
though it is little and brief,

reaching no great depth, barely
kissing the leaves' lips, think of it as

mercy. Other minor blessings may
show up-- tweezers for splinters,

change for the parking meter,
a green light at the intersection,

a cool wind that lifts away summer's
suffocating heat. An apology after

a harsh comment. A word that opens
an unfinished poem like a key in a lock.

Dressed Alike

 Marji and Suzy

First day of school
1956

Here's a lovely poem my sister wrote recently in her Creative Writing Class.

Marji, Thank you for everything. You're our family treasure.

Dressed Alike

We are only two years apart,
And our mother dressed us alike.
Same dresses- different colors.
One pink- one green,
One blue, one yellow.
Hats and gloves, pretty shoes with frilly socks, Easter baskets.

One blonde, one brunette,
I wanted to read,
She wanted to ride.
We both got what we wanted.

She's 70 now.
Her last visit was in January,
That first morning I got up,
Threw on my new robe
And went out to the kitchen for my coffee.
She came in from the guest room with her cup in hand.
Same bathrobes!
One pink- one blue.

We just laughed
And sat down together
And shared some memories about our Mom.

Weekend potpourii

We had a gentle rain on Saturday morning. The ground was so dry from the strong April sun. Only 2 days with rain so far this month.

So another weekend gone, feeling like any old days of the week. We missed a Seattle Symphony concert yesterday, which would have been back in the happy time when we hugged our friends and shook hands, sat in cafes and went to concert halls together. 

It's especially unlucky, because our season tickets were heavy with performances in April, May and June.  So we're missing a total of five concerts, more than half the season.  

Right before the pandemic, John renewed our next season (bad timing) and it's unlikely the Symphony will perform at all this year, and maybe not even next.  Can performing arts organizations even survive without a live audience? The world seems crushed with collective disappointment. We can only hope things start to get better.

On to happier topics. See above bird bath. We have many different birds species in the yard this spring, more than usual. Even in our tiny urban corner, the wildlife take notice when the dominate species stay inside.

It's fun watching their carefree splashing. I fill the birdbaths each morning with clean water for the little ones. Then the crows show up later, to dunk their stale bread and leave empty peanut shells in the water, which seems weird.  But who can figure out crows? They seem needier than usual--maybe slim restaurant pickings. 

Other than the frustration everyone feels, the days are filled. There's Facetime, phone calls, email, text messages from friends.  Good food. Occasional shopping. Endless cleaning. Endless knife sharpening. Puzzles. Books. Music. Long walks for me. A nap doesn't hurt either, when a person just can't take any more reality. 

In the midst of this, moments of strange and simple contentment. OK, the 5 o'clock wine sure helps. But can we ever go back to how it was? All that rushing around.  Incredibly, we haven't left West Seattle for 6 weeks.

Nova and Maya love sewing and reading. This is a picture of a cute book bag Maya (7) made. The girls are really creative with arts, crafts and play. They don't have regular television in the house, so have to entertain themselves. Amanda said one of the benefits of this isolation is how well they're playing together. Hardly any sisterly bickering anymore.

On Monday, the bus drops off books from the school library and a packet of work from their teachers. The girls really miss school. And so do parents everywhere.

My sou chef's knife skills continue to improve. He's come a long way from rough-chopped cabbage. Look at the perfect (shall I say, finicky?) dice on these vegetables.  He's slow, but we have all the time in the world these days.

More yummy lettuce wraps.

And peelings for our resident bunny.

Wildlife Rules.

Husband Appreciation Day

Yes, April 18th is Husband Appreciation Day.  Thank you, John, for so many things, including the sharpest knives in Seattle.

And lucky me. These are new Wentworth wood puzzles he ordered from England over 3 weeks ago. A nice surprise in the mail yesterday.

I love these meditative puzzles with the adorable novelty shapes...

Best of all, Mr. Puzzle Buttinsky promised this peacock is mine-all-mine, start to finish, even if it takes me to the end of the pandemic, he's not "helping." (As he puts it.)

We'll see!

Domestics

We've had a fabulous stretch of weather, and it hit 70 for the first time this year. So much beauty somehow makes the situation even more unreal. I'm grateful for our private yard, but it's almost a shame no one can see these red tulips I planted from Costco.  Flowers should be looked at.

Speaking of Costco, virus aside, I don't know when I'll ever go back. Once a quick trip over the high rise bridge, it now requires a circuitous journey through jammed aerials down to another smaller bridge south of here. Then a slow backtrack north on surface streets to reach Costco on 4th Ave.

The latest news about the West Seattle Bridge couldn't be worse. The cracks are possibly beyond repair, and at minimum, we're looking at 2 years of long detours to go just about anywhere. And I can't even imagine life when traffic starts up again. 100,000 cars typically cross the bridge each day.

 

On a happier note, the chickadees might be nesting in this birdhouse.  There were some birdy real estate discussions going on between Mr. and Mrs. Sparrow and Mr. and Mrs. Chickadee. Usually, the sparrows win the prize, they turned their noses up on the deal.

The Western Scrub Jay is a recent arrival in urban Seattle. As climate warms, their range is expanding north from Oregon.

Yesterday, I watched a pair collecting coir fiber from my pots to build a nest.

A beautiful, brash, almost fearless bird, they seemed to enjoy posing for pictures. 

Well, that's all the exciting news from the domestic front. Which of course, is the only front these days.  

Oh yea. We did our weekly early morning shopping. The ordinary grocery selection at Metropolitan Market is skimpy at the best of times; they are more about expensive prepared food. But the store is clean and uncrowded, so we'll stick with them a while longer. We got almost everything we wanted. Fresh meat was dramatically more expensive this week. Fortunately I still have a stash in the freezer from Safeway. 

I splurged on another free-range roasting chicken and cut it into two frugal halves. One saved for later; the other roasted on the grill last night.  

Goodness, they grow fast

April 4th

April 14th

Essential trips

“In joy or sadness, flowers are our constant friends.” 

Okakura Kakuzo 

Seattle is one of four key cities that has made some progress "flattening the curve." People here are following the stay at home orders.  In other places on the west coast, the number of new infections has also stabilized.

So far, Washington hospitals are coping. The emergency field hospitals set up at Century Link Field never had a patient, and were sent elsewhere. But the virus is still very much here, and the only way to slow the spread is with a massive change in public health behavior.

Giving up the right to go wherever you please is almost un-American. I'm kind of surprised (and proud) at the level of compliance in liberal, outdoorsy, free-wheeling Seattle. Not just here, but everywhere around the world, people are doing the same thing, isolated from friends, family and social activities. We're all coping the best we can. 

Anyway, what's an "essential trip?"  Well, John and I go to the grocery store once a week. He brings in the recycle cans from the alley. He mowed the lawn. I'm outside more, walking around the neighborhood for exercise or working in the garden.  I've been to the cash machine. I mailed a box. But that's it for the week's essential outings.

Are spring flowers and tomato plants essential to health? Depends who you ask.

Yesterday morning (they open at 6 am) I drove to Home Depot with my disinfecting wipes and hand sanitizer. The outdoor nursery breezy and sparkling in the sun, deserted, except for a couple of other old early risers wearing masks and carefully avoiding each other. My cart soon filled with gardener eye candy: 8 red geraniums, 2 tomatoes, 1 hot pepper plant, violas. Two big bags of potting soil. Heaven. 

A stop at Home Depot is suddenly a tremendous treat? Gosh, the things we once took for granted.

The geraniums are punier than the bushy Costco ones, but with some TLC and fertilizer, they should soon fill in the kitchen window box. I spent the rest of the day outside, potting and planting my treasures.

Just another Tuesday

Credo
by Donna Hilbert

I believe in the Tuesday's
and Wednesday's of life
the tuna sandwich lunches
and TV after dinner.
I believe in coffee with hot milk
and peanut butter toast,
Rose wine in summer
and Burgundy in winter.

I am not in love with holidays,
birthdays-nothing special-
and weekends are just days
numbered six and seven,
though my love
dozing over TV golf
while I work the Sunday puzzle
may be all I need of life
and all I ask of heaven.

The key to happiness:
Lower your expectations.

No, lower.

:-)

Easter collage

The day was filled with phone calls, text messages, shared photos and videos.  A nice ham steak dinner for Marji and Dad in Las Vegas, also for Rachel in Florida, and scalloped potatoes with ham for Dave.  My friend Julie sent this picture of her yummy lettuce wraps.  So many of us alone on this strange Easter, but in honor the day, making a nice meal.

We also enjoyed Face-timing with Janice and King and their kids in Cincinnati, and got to see the adorable twin girls in their high chairs. Their first Easter.

In this house, a rich scalloped potato casserole.

And a small but delicious ham from Metropolitan Market.

After the morning excitement, Amanda, Tom and the girls went to their property and planted more fruit trees. Looks like quite the orchard going in up there.

Nova and her nectarine tree. 

And hardworking Amanda made a beautiful and healthy dinner too, including spinach salad with strawberries. She goes back to work at the clinic this morning, and down the valley to her school nurse job on Thursday. We love you, stay safe and well!

Finally, an exhausted baby chick falls asleep. Easter can be very tiring.

And the lesson of the day? Don't fret over what's missing, take stock of what you have. We are rich in all the important things: family, friends, health, love. And a few extra napkins doesn't hurt :-)

No napkins at the store last week, but when I looked in the dining room cabinet yesterday, I found this big stash I'd forgotten all about.