Last gasp of winter…..

Be careful what you wish for. Many of us living in the Northern California area have been praying for rain and snow to help reduce the persistent drought conditions hanging by over us the past three years. Apparently, someone was listening. Last year it looked bleak along the mountainsides as you drove along the highways in the Sierra Nevadas. Trees, starving for water, had either leaves turned dark brown and wilted, or simply stood drooping, as if in mourning, in the midday sun. Many, dead from lack of hydration, fell in the forests or in the backyards of those choosing to live among them. I have to say it was difficult to watch. Well, at last this winter we got rain, and boy did we get snow. Then we got more rain, and we got more snow. Guess what is on the agenda for next week? You got it, rain, and snow. It’s not that this amount of snow is unprecedented in the U.S., but rather that it is unprecedented for our area. People living here are not prepared for it, and that makes it more difficult to manage.

When I was living in Massachusetts this amount of snowfall was simply called “winter”. My car was regularly the largest snowdrift in the yard after a heavy dumping of snow, and temperatures often dipped down below zero before factoring in the wind chill, making it feel even colder. I didn’t like it then, and I don’t like it now. We have had two clear days to prepare for the next onslaught which is due to arrive in this area this morning. Many of my friends in Nevada County haven’t had power in days and are still trying to dig out from the last series of storms. One friend, living in a higher elevation, had to leave his pickup on the main highway and hike waist deep a mile and a half in from the highway to get to his home. Brrrrrr. Never have I been more pleased I made the decision to sell my home in the high country and move down the hill after Rick died. I seriously would not like to be dealing with what is going on up there right now. Good news, on the glass half full side of things, no more drought in most of the state. In the Lake Tahoe area, the snow plows are running out of places to deposit all the excess snow. Pretty soon they will have to use available parking spaces. Stores in the more isolated areas around here are running out of food and supplies. Trucks are parked all along the freeway and in shopping center parking lots waiting for a good time to traverse the highways. This effects the supply chain because their loads are delayed. Hope this next couple of weeks doesn’t result in any more serious side effects from the weather. Really feel for those living on the streets at times like this. I saw a man walking down the sidewalk on the way to work today pushing a shopping cart with a little dog in the baby carrier. Awwww. Sometimes I wonder how the dogs survive, but somehow they seem to get along. The man was wearing a stack of blankets like a huge shawl. Must have been heavy, but I guess heavy is better than freezing.

The most interesting thing has been going in my yard since the precipitation started. Robins have migrated into my world. Many, many robins. Yesterday, there must have been forty of the chubby little red breasted birds hopping about excitedly in the grass. Following the feathery invasion, squirrels arrived en masse. There were four or five furry little buggers foraging and digging out there. Richard says they are after worms. Apparently, when the grass becomes saturated, the worms migrate toward the surface making them easy pickings for the local wildlife. I must have a bumper crop. The birds maybe, but squirrels eating worms? I looked it up because worms just didn’t seem like a squirrel entree. According to the article I read, worms, though perhaps not squirrels meal of choice, will do if nuts and berries are scarce. They will eat worms for the the nutrients they provide. As a lot of the lady squirrels are expecting this time of year, good eating habits, or so I would suppose, might become particularly important.. For me, this would be like having to resort to opening a can of sardines to sustain myself. Worse yet, a can of Vienna sausage, if there was nothing else to chose from in the cupboard. Ewwwww. For those of you who have read my blog for any length of time you might remember Vienna sausage is like my kryptonite. I once had only a case of the slimy little tubes of destruction to survive on for an entire week. That, as they say, was the last of that. If they ever wanted to pry world secrets out of my tightly sealed lips, holding a can of Vienna sausage under my nose would illicit immediate results. My digestive system has never fully recovered I don’t believe.

The first day of spring is not too far off on the calendar. March 20th, to be exact. This year is setting a rapid pace I have to say. I have several short trips written in on my schedule in the near future which I am looking forward to. The first to visit my son and his lively bunch in the Bay Area, and on the heels of that visit, a quick three day jaunt to Bodega Bay with Richard. For those of you old enough to remember, Alfred Hitchcok’s “The Birds” was filmed in Bodega Bay. There is not a lot to do there if you’re not interested in walking along the cliffs, doing a little whale watching, or don’t like to cast a line in the water, but it is a picturesque little fishing village with lovely coves and inlets to explore. There are several places to dine along the wharf known for their excellent chowder, which I’m sure Richard will avail himself of. Personally, I’m not a clam kind of gal. I don’t appreciate the texture. I’ll eat chowder, but you will find all the chewy little clam bits neatly placed on the dish next to my bowl when I am done. Whether filled with activity, or peaceful and still, the ocean is always a location I am happy to find myself, so I will look forward to getting away.

The walls and doors here at work are awash with leprechauns, balloon rainbows, and pots of gold at the moment in anticipation of St. Patty’s Day. One of the residents came up to me when I came in this morning and whispered in my ear, “word on the street around here is the leprechaun cut-out in the lobby is the new owner of the place and is going to be our new boss”. I explained I had heard nothing about such a hostile elfin takeover, but then I’d just arrived on the premises. I assured him should I get any information vis a vis the new ownership, I promised to update him immediately. Our young new trainee watched this exchange with open curiosity. The kid seems totally overwhelmed by some of the dementia induced story telling transpiring under this roof. I keep explaining to him, the object of dealing with the severely memory impaired person is to roll with the fantasies not to push against them. Picture it like a huge wave rippling on the sea and you are floating along with it, not an undertow you have to fight against. After four hours, he has begun to have that deer in the headlights look. I don’t want him to leave, because it is great to have a backup, and he’s very likable. However, this business is not for everyone. Perhaps because I am, by nature, a story teller of sorts, it comes more easily for me to join in. I do love to weave a tale. Should memory loss ever cloud my mind, and I fervently hope it does not, I like to think I shall still be able to come up with a good story now and again to keep people entertained. Another point in my favor, if that is the right way to put it, is my mother had dementia so I am up close and very familiar with how the disease manifests itself. Fortunately, my mother saw the effects of it very late in her life, and as it progressed she became sweet and more simplistic. Some people rail against it, becoming angry as the confusion begins to settle in over them. In either case it is sad, but since scientific minds haven’t figured out how to reverse the process, for the time being we are stuck with it.

To be honest, there are days when I get nervous about my own brain function. Last week, after being shut in for days, I suggested to Richard we take in a movie. There is a really nice theater about twenty minutes from his house with comfy seats. Like many new theater complexes, they even offer up adult beverages in a very nice bar should that be your poison. (Remember when it was just buttered popcorn, Junior Mints, and Dr. Pepper??. I do.) The website indicated they were showing the most recent Tom Hanks movie, “A Man Called Otto” which I’ve been wanting to see. My treat I suggested, as Richard is always taking me one place or another and I like to reciprocate whenever he will let me. Yay. I went online to my account, selected seats for the following day, and saved the code and receipt to my phone. Done and done. The following morning I got an email from the ticket site asking how I had enjoyed the movie. I chalked this off as a total website fail, until I actually looked at the ticket receipt on my phone and it became clear it was me who, in fact, was failing. Sigh. I paid for the tickets all right, but for two seats for the night prior. So, our comfy empty recliners sat there unclaimed as the movie aired while we wiled away the evening at home eating cheeseburgers and watching the evening news. Fine. The theater’s policy states tickets can be cancelled or exchanged for a different showing up to the showing of the movie time you purchased. After that, you are on your own. It was so incredibly dumb, I would have just bought new tickets for the right day and swept the whole mess under the rug, but for the fact the movie wasn’t playing anymore except for mid-morning when we couldn’t go. No choice was left to me but to fess up to being a total idiot, which I did. Richard just laughed. Surrrrre, wasn’t his $20. Duh.

My brain, if not forgetful today, is definitely tired. I could use a margarita, a warm sunny beach, and a little R&R. This too is in my future sometime this year. For now, I shall be very grateful I am warm and dry and not buried under a pile of snow and ice. Have a safe day.

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Baby, it’s cold outside…..

I woke up this morning to snow cascading down outside my window. It was of the fluffy white cloud variety. Boo, the Queen of Cats, was positively riveted at the sight of large chunks of white ice falling just beyond the pane. Several times, she swatted in their direction. I tried to explain to her there was glass in between her paw and her target, but you know how cats are. I read an article recently stating cats are capable of understanding, I believe the writer said 150, human commands, they simply choose not to do them. Why am I not surprised? Over the weekend, I took her on a field trip to Richard’s house. The drive, around forty-five minutes each way was thankfully uneventful. I secured her in her carrier for the trip. I bought her a new, lighter fabric carrier, last month thinking she might prefer it the hard carrier we have been using. As usual, the cat made up her own mind about the choice to be made. When I tried to ease her into the open end of the new crate, she proceeded to lose her little cat mind. After squirming and writhing nearly out of my grasp, and she is surprisingly strong, she spread out like a flying squirrel and dug her claws into the fabric and wouldn’t let go. She was not, and I repeat not, going to go into the hole without a fight. Fine. Ah well, another item for the donate pile going to the animal rescue. It will join the scratching board (she much prefers furniture), or and the ring with plastic mice running around in circles inside, (I believe she actually yawned when I showed her that gadget). Conversely, my old cat, Kitty, loved to to travel. When the carrier was produced, she happily hopped inside and waited for the adventure to unfold. Boo, not so much. She views the carrier as a device of extreme cruelty that usually signifies a trip to the vet. She would not shed a single tear if I threw it off a cliff somewhere in a remote location and never looked back. Rick and I once took Boo on a three hour drive to visit my mother’s in San Jose. An hour and a half of the drive, she crouched in the carrier and vocalized what a bad idea she thought this was. After 90 minutes of caterwauling, it was pull over and leave her at the side of the road (Rick’s option), or let her out to walk around in the car, (mine). The cat behaved far better when freed, so we opted to allow her to roam free again on the return trip. While standing on her hind paws to look out the rear window, she set a front paw on the window’s down button. When the window went down, she escaped into the street before I could grab her. Unbelievable. We spent the next hour trying to coax her out of the bushes in the meridian. Not doing that again. Once bitten, twice shy really applies to that piece of business.

She actually seemed to have a lovely time at Richard’s house. On blustery days like we’ve enjoyed lately, he keeps a roaring fire going in his fireplace. During our stay there, I found her often fully extended on the carpet before the hearth soaking up some of the lovely heat it brings to the room. There are four squirrels that stop by periodically during the day to mooch peanuts Richard puts out for them. He refers to the furry four as his “livestock”. Oh come on now, that is kind of cute. At any rate, my house has no floor to ceiling windows for her to look out, so seeing these four strange beings was something novel and new that really captured her attention. At one point one of the squirrels was nose to nose with Boo, each eyeing the other safely from the opposite side of the glass. Took the squirrels a few passes around the deck to understand the cat could not get out, before they would come close enough to grab the nuts on the mat. Was fun to watch the interaction with no bloodshed ruining the moment.

I drove to work this morning at a snails pace. This area gets snow rarely, and I am a tad rusty as to how to behave when it’s covering the ground. Several times, when either accelerating or coming to a stop, I found myself in a skid. I’m hoping by the time I go home, it will have melted off. When I was a kid snow was a treat. On school days, when heavy snow fell in Nova Scotia, my grandmother and I would have our ears pressed up to the small radio in her kitchen. If a snow day was called, I would be zipped into my snow gear and released to go play outside. Before long there would be a snowman in the yard wearing one of my mother’s old scarves and sporting a carrot from the vegetable bin for a nose. These days, though I still find it so pretty to look at, I prefer to admire it from a distance. I really have little interest in playing in it for long, and no interest at all in either shoveling it or driving in it. If it continues at this rate, pretty soon I won’t have any television to watch when I get home tonight. If enough snow accumulates on the dish on the roof, it will totally block reception. Ah well, I just went to the used book store over the weekend and stocked up on reading material so I won’t be without something to occupy myself with. All I ask is that the electrical grid holds. I start getting a little squirrely myself when the lights and heater shut off. My little house was built in the 1930’s. Insulation was not as sophisticated in those days as it is now. The heat, once the source is turned off, dissipates very quickly. The last time that happened, I ended up beneath a tent of blankets on my couch wearing earmuffs and snow boots watching my own breath freeze in midair. I would prefer not to have to repeat that behavior.

Richard offered to come get me should I be powerless, so to speak. He has four wheel drive in both his vehicles and being a retired truck driver, a little snow on the ground means little in his world. My hero. Truly, I really appreciate the offer. A warm fire trumps a freezing cold house every time in my book. Just sayin.

I’ve taken on some new non-profit work. Basically, they can’t find graphic artists in the area to do volunteer work, so word has gotten out I am willing to draw the short straw. I don’t mind, or I wouldn’t have signed up in the first place, but I’m not sure where I’m going to fit it into my schedule. Things are getting a bit tight in my life. Tomorrow I work, and then need to come home and whip up scalloped potatoes for a dinner party for ten on Sunday. Perhaps I will cheat and use a couple of package mixes. They are pretty good, and certainly beats thinly slicing all those potatoes. Promise you won’t tell. I had a dream in the middle of the night I was stooped over a huge pot of water. One hand was holding a potato, the other a potato peeler. Next to me, sat an open bag of potatoes, and covering my feet was a pile of discarded peels. I was crying and peeling, peeling and crying. Was it onions I was peeling this would have been understandable, but potatoes? This says a lot about how I’m feeling lately without having to delve much deeper into the subject. lol

Work, has proved a bit problematic of late as well. Hmmmmm, sounds like I’m complaining. Perhaps, because, I am. I work with five directors, each with their own set of priorities and way of doing things. One tells me one thing, the other something totally different. One wants me to gather a lot of information from the caller when a call comes in for them, the next one wants me to simply tell them they have a call and on what line it came in. Ach. When the calls are coming in rapid fire trying to remember who wants what becomes more of a chore than fielding all the lines that are ringing. Perhaps I am getting tired of working. Wish I could get tired of collecting a paycheck as well, but I’m not quite there yet.

Richard would like me to throw caution to the wind, pack up Boo, give my notice, and take off in the fifth wheel to do a tour of the United States. I have to say, this is a tempting offer. It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve run away from home. I toured the country with my first husband and my then toddlers for nearly a year, and did it once again for about five years with my last. Sometimes I get to wondering if I am imbued with nomadic DNA. I seem to end up roaming either on my own, or pairing up with someone who also likes to flitter and land. Seems like a bit of a pattern looking back on my life that apparently doesn’t intend to right itself anytime soon. This opportunity to have this kind of adventure probably will not present itself again. I have to decide if I still have enough adventurous spirit tucked away inside me to tap into and do it one more time.

Well, we’ve gotten through Valentine’s Day, President’s Day, and Mardi Gras. On to St. Patrick’s Day, which is coming up next month. I believe after that it’s smooth sailing holiday wise until the Easter bunny gets busy for another year. In between all the holidays littering the pages of my calendar, I have birthdays popping up all over the months. I have two children, who have seven children between them. Each of my children is married, so there are spouses. Now, I have Richard and his extended family. For these occasions cards are probably how I’ll commemorate them. Then you move onto friends with occasions like birthdays, hospital stays, grandchildren arriving on the scene, weddings. Whoa. My best friend called the other day and started our conversation by asking, “do you know what day this is”. A loaded question at best, I began flying through my memory bank only to come up with Tuesday, which I felt was not the correct response. When I said I had nothing beyond Tuesday, she said it was her wedding anniversary. Really? I can barely recall what I had for breakfast. I was her matron of honor, so I suppose perhaps I might have remembered at least the month they were married in, but it would have been a stretch even on a great memory day.

As we get older, we have a massive amount of information stored away in our brains. I like to think, that rather than becoming more forgetful, I just have more to sort through before coming up with the information I am searching for. Working with people each week who have memory issues, I am very aware of how important it is to exercise your mind as well as your body every day. I try to do puzzles when I wake up, read a lot, and challenge my mind to do more than write an occasional grocery list. I always have a crossword half completed somewhere I can pick up when gifted with a free moment. Keep those gears moving, I say, so they don’t freeze up. We can’t ensure that dementia will stay at bay, but there are steps we can take to keep it at bay.

Have a wonderful weekend.

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Up in smoke…..

There is actually rain on the ground this morning. Granted, not much more than a sprinkling, but I’m counting it. According to the weather lady on my favorite news show, much more is predicted to fall over the next week. This is a good thing. Our poor trees here on the water deprived west coast are looking sad, my friends, and that makes me sad. There is little doubt anymore the world climatically changing. I, for one, am happy I was born when I was, when there wasn’t much really to concern ourselves with on the weather front. Now, there were other things to occupy our thoughts certainly. We weren’t stress free back in the day by any means. For example, when I was in elementary school we had “duck and cover” drills. This was during the Cold War Era, when the red menace lingered on everybody’s minds. Duck and cover drills required students to crouch beneath tables and desks and put their hands over their heads. This posturing, it seemed, was to keep us safe in the event some idiot somewhere on the planet pushed the button marked “nuclear annihilation”. Even though I was but a peanut at that time of my life, the idea my desk was in any way going to save me from extinction should an atom bomb be detonated in my vicinity, seemed a ridiculous concept even to my yet unformed mind. Haven’t moved on that assessment as of this writing, by the way. To me, that solution was tantamount to holding a tennis racquet in front of your face to protect yourself from an acid assault. Really? Did anyone believe this? Please hold up your hand.

We didn’t have as many things to worry about as we have on the radar now. There was less information available on, well, just about everything. Smoking, for instance. Nobody worried about it. The information available on tobacco use was far sketchier in the 50’s and 60’s than what is at our fingertips these days. Smoking back in the day was a social phenomenon. Everybody across the social strata from milkman to movie star was doing it. Cigarette companies were not likely to publish anything alerting us to the dangers of their popular product, lest it put a damper on their ballooning bottom line. Everyone old enough to buy a pack of cigarettes, it seemed, had a cigarette pack on their person. Commercials pushed the product to the unsuspecting public. Billboards touted the killer weed with inviting captions like “more doctors prefer smoking Camel cigarettes than other cigarette”. Today, if you light up, you are practically a pariah, but back in the 60’s, people had gold cigarette trays on their coffee tables to offer to their guests. Nowadays, most rental units don’t allow smoking. All government, hospital, or public buildings certainly prohibit anyone lighting up either inside or on the grounds of their facilities. People, before we were educated about lung cancer, emphysema, and all the other top of the line tobacco related diseases, smoked everywhere. Theaters always had a cloud of smoke hovering around the screen. Bars, airports, offices, banks, markets, all had available ashtrays for people to toss their butts in once they’d sucked the nicotine out of their favorite smoke. You haven’t lived until you’ve flown five hours cooped inside an airline with everyone inhaling and exhaling. I smoked back in those days, and even I wanted to strap a parachute on and bail out an exit door. Once rumors of the side effects began surfacing, there began to be non-smoking sections for those wishing to abstain. The smoking and non-smoking sections were located directly next to one another. I always thought this such a waste of energy. The tables on the borderline of the non-smoking area weren’t getting much benefit from the delineation, or any of the non-smoking tables, if the truth be known. Smoke doesn’t have the discipline to remain only in a cordoned off section of the room, it tends to migrate.

You could get hooked for considerably cheaper in the early days as well. A carton of cigarettes ran you about $3.50. Today, purchasing. a carton won’t leave you with enough change out of a hundred dollar bill to come up with bus fare. Vaping, seems to be slightly more acceptable, particularly with the younger generation. Yesterday I saw a van driving along with what I believe were two riders inside. Looked to be the driver and one passenger. It was hard to tell who was behind the windshield, because they were vaping and there was so much smoke inside the cab at first I thought the vehicle might have been on fire. I don’t know if vaping is purported to be better for you than cigarettes, but sitting inside that bubble of fumes can’t possibly be good for you.

I am working today, though actually less working, than looking busy, which is a pastime I find more exhausting than plowing a forty acre field. Not that I’ve ever plowed a forty acre field, mind you, or any field for that matter. However, it seemed like a good frame of reference. The powers that be have told me should I find myself bereft of something to do, I am welcome to do what I would like. As it happens today, what I would like to do is write a blog.

Half the population of the retirement facility I work for, seems to be seated in the lobby with me. It’s cold and rainy, so no outside excursions, and the activity person, usually a presence on the weekends, has left the company for greener pastures. Finding a person to replace her, has proved to be a longer process than anticipated. I arranged with the kitchen to have a hot chocolate and snack cart delivered so everyone is on a chocolate and marshmallow high at the moment and having a good time. There is a fairly high turnaround in this business. People burn out like old candles after a while. The employees working in the memory units of such establishments really need a huge pat on the back. It is not an easy job, and to be good at it requires much empathy and an extra special dose of patience. Like so many businesses, we are short staffed this year. The pandemic really threw a wrench in the works when it comes to employment. The recruiting sites appear to have an abundance of jobs and I have admit I am curious as to where the workers who used to fill these positions have disappeared to. Applying for a job I’ve noticed has become a real process. I pulled an “application packet” for a prospective employee yesterday that should have been delivered on a hand truck. When I accepted the position here, before I could finalize my paperwork, I had to be fingerprinted, pass a background check, and get a complete physical. Then, I had to go through a grueling two weeks of watching mind numbing videos before I could actually begin to learn the job I was hired for. Amazing. If I was going to be pivotal in planning the next moonshot for NASA, it would make sense, but for a two day a week concierge position at a 56 bed nursing home it smacks a bit of overkill. Just my opinion, naturally, and as far as I know nobody asked me to toss it in the ring. For my part, I’m just happy to have found a little niche that I can fit myself comfortably in. I work two consecutive eight hour days and can call the rest of the week my own. I make enough in both paychecks to nicely pad my income every month thus allowing me to do some of the frills and extras I like to enjoy. This without attracting much interest from the IRS and having to give a lot of it back. All good on all counts.

One of the perks a little extra jing in my bank account will afford me, is I will be getting on a plane on Monday morning for a visit to Oregon. A friend of mine sharing a very close birthday date with me has invited me up to see her new apartment and do a little celebrating. Yay. I find myself unusually nervous about flying this time. Not because it simply isn’t fun anymore (to me it’s like boarding a bus in the sky), but because it’s all so different since twelve years ago when I last boarded a plane. I have to measure my cosmetics apparently and can only take 3 oz. of each. K. I am taking a carry on bag a friend gave me. Now, let me preface this by saying I am not well known for my light packing skills. Usually I take enough with me that should we say be snowed in for the entire winter, I will be adequately suited up without having to do a load of laundry. Looking at the suitcase open on my bed last night, it looked as if I put in two pairs of underwear and a pair of socks, I would have reached full capacity. Hmmmmm. So, I’ll carry a big handbag I figure. Perhaps I could wear multiple layers and then peel myself like an onion when I get there. If it’s cold here, it’s colder there, so I have to put something in my bag besides underwear and socks to survive.

I have not been in Oregon since 1990. My ex-husband and I made our home in Longview, Washington that year and often traveled down to Oregon to shop (no sales tax) or enjoy a day on the beautiful Oregon coast. If it wasn’t for the fact it insists on snowing there every winter, I really found the northwest a gorgeous place to collect my mail. From time to time when I get to examining the high cost of living here in Northern California, which is every time I get gas, go to the grocery store, or write out my rent check, I think about relocating north. Probably that is as far as I’ll ever get from actually doing it, but I do like to think about it on occasion.

So, I have put away the first four hours of my shift and will head off to lunch. When it’s slow like this getting away from my desk and getting a new perspective even for a half an hour can be helpful. If all else fails, I can drown my sorrows by digging into all the leftover Halloween candy left in the break room.

Have a great weekend. Stay dry, or dance in the rain, whichever is your preference.

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Before the parade passes by….

Well another fourth has been put to bed. As it happens, the fourth was also my maternal grandmother’s birthday. She always requested strawberry shortcake for the occasion. I think of her each year as the fireworks explode in the sky, and hope she’s slathering a mound of fluffy whipped cream on fresh strawberries somewhere in the universe.

I made plans to go to a local Fourth of July parade with a friend, and then attend a pancake breakfast at the Elks Lodge immediately following. It was warm, but thankfully not hot like in the past several weeks. We waited with other enthusiastic onlookers in the semi-shade about an hour and a half for the parade to begin. The first car carrying the “Grand Marshall”, a local celebrity of sorts who owned a string of car washes, went by followed by a small but merry group of flag twirlers. After the flag twirlers rounded the corner, three ladies came into view riding palominos each with an American flag painted on their flank. (That would be the equines with the flags not the ladies.) A few stray cars went by next, not associated with the parade itself, and then two fire trucks and some beautifully restored classic cars. The whole performance lasted about eight minutes. Well worth the wait, lol.

After the parade had passed us by, we made our way across the street to the Elks Lodge to stand in line to get tickets for the much touted all you can eat pancake breakfast. Breakfast, we were told, included scrambled eggs, unlimited pancakes, and sausage. Yum. My stomach had begun grumbling as soon as it smelled the maple syrup. Purposely, I had held off on eating before I came, so I could enjoy a stack of unlimited pancakes to my hearts content. Yay. The Elks had it set up so you gave your name to the ticket lady, who, in turn, handed it off to the volunteers in the kitchen. Orders came out one after another for about an hour with names being called to identify the table they belonged to. My stomach finally gave up the vigil and quieted down to a dull roar settling for a glass of orange juice until the pancakes arrived. About ten people before us, one of the runners announced they had run out of food. Really? We were told a tri tip and hot dog barbecue would commence in about an hour and a half. I was first in line for that one I guarantee.

Turns out while we were waiting for lunch to be served, a band was setting up in one of the great rooms inside. We milled in with the others waiting with us, to listen to what they had to offer. They weren’t bad actually. I wore flip flops because, a) it was warm, and b) I was wearing shorts, and my invitation to go dancing must have gotten lost in the mail. Dancing in flip flops is not the ideal footwear situation, but for the next hour I found myself doing exactly that. Turns out these Elks can actually bust some moves on the dance floor. At one point, 80% of the room got out there and did an amazing line dance that would have been impressive even in a Texas roadhouse. Wow. Must be taking lessons on the weekend. I’ve never learned to line dance. For some reason I can’t seem to hold on to the choreography. My ex-husband was from Odessa. There I believe line dancing and cow wrangling are required courses in grade school. He taught me a lot in the ten years or so we were together, both good and bad. I’ve forgotten most of the dances over the years but it was fun to watch. Made me think I might sign up for a class somewhere along the way myself.

I came home early before the fireworks because I had driven back from the Bay Area the day before, where I visited my son and his brood. After four days of busy activities my behind was beginning to drag along the asphalt. I’ve been riding myself pretty hard lately and the old bones are beginning to feel the strain.

Yesterday was my first eight hour day on the new job. For those of you who didn’t read my blog saying where I was working, I took a job at an assisted living and memory care facility two days a week. It continues to surprise me how much my mind is fighting this new development. I keep hearing phrases like “Where oh where is my prince?” swirling about in my head. Once I officially retired I think my mindset was to keep that employment designation, but as I’ve said sooooooo many times life doesn’t always read the agenda you have written out for yourself.

My official job title is Concierge. I know, very flashy, yes? Actually, administrative assistant more accurately describes what I am doing. However, I rather like the title they assigned me. Rolls nicely off the tongue. I spent the day seated in an incredibly hard folding chair in front of a small laptop watching videos. In order to work in such a facility you are required to be somewhat versed on the conditions at work in the people living there. In this case, that would be mainly dementia and Alzheimer’s. Because my mother had dementia in her nineties, I am fairly well versed in how the condition manifests itself as it moves along in it’s progression.

Being the “new girl on the block” prompted a procession of sorts by the door to my temporary office comprised of the men living in the facility. Men will be men, I have observed, no matter the age group. One after one, they circled the hallway most pushing walkers to get a look at the new face in the building. It’s probably one of the few places I could show up for work these days where I would be considered a member of the younger generation in the population.

After about four hours in that chair my body began to complain. By the time I rolled into the eighth hour I had assumed more positions in that miserable little chair then a professional ballerina performing Swan Lake. I go back to work tomorrow, and they are going to have to find me a softer place to land or I’m going to end up in traction by the weekend. I do feel like I am learning a lot in between the squirming, however. It is a little scary to think that most of us will develop dementia on one level or another, and many of us Alzheimer’s. Hopefully, medical science will come up with something to reverse or stop the progress of this disease. Makes you wonder though. The average age in nursing homes now is 80 years old. Used to be people didn’t live past sixty. If we live to be two hundred, I do hope they also combat the physical effects of aging or that might not be a sight I’d like to see facing me in the mirror every morning. I’m just saying.

Well, happy hump day to you. I lost a very dear friend suddenly day before yesterday. Thankfully, we had lunch several weeks ago and parted by saying “I love you. See you soon.” You never know, capture each moment, appreciate the clouds and the stars, taste the food on your plate with all your senses. Live every day to the fullest.

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Mom-eries…..

My mother will be celebrating another birthday milestone birthday in a few weeks. She has been on hospice for about a year now. That word always feels so ominous to me, but they have been wonderful in overseeing her care and I am glad to know they have eyes on her when I do not. There is no doubt she is slowing down. For me, this means getting as much out of each visit as I can to deposit in the memory pot.

While talking to my cousin in Canada last night we got into a conversation about flying. She related a story of hers where she boarded a plane with her ticket in hand. Locating her assigned seat, she found it already occupied by a gentleman. Explaining to him he was sitting in her seat and showing him her ticket to emphasize her point, he explained to her she, in fact, was on the wrong plane. Whoops. This brought to mind a story about my mother. Any of you who have read my blogs in the past, would know I do seem to get myself in messes. Telling this story last night made me think “the acorn does not fall far from the tree” in our family.

I will preface this story by starting with another. My mother was born with no internal sense of direction. For her, getting from the kitchen to the bathroom involved a map and a St. Bernard with a keg of Heineken strapped to its neck. As a child, I can remember riding shotgun with her and being given a map and expected to guide us to wherever our destination was supposed to be. No wonder I sucked my thumb. That’s a lot of responsibility heaped on an eight year old.

The first year we came to California my mother and new stepfather purchased a house in Fullerton, which is in Southern California. I was enrolled in fourth grade in the neighborhood school, and one of the first things I wanted to do was to visit Disneyland. Growing up in Nova Scotia, our perception of California was sun washed beaches, movie stars roaming the streets, orange groves, palm trees, and Disneyland. I didn’t see my first movie star until I was in my early twenties, but the rest of it was pretty much right on the money. After being in the area for several months, only Disneyland was left to fill out the list.

Anaheim, where Disneyland is located, was at best a fifteen minute drive from our house. I was so excited about going my mouth was moving a mile a minute. Back in those days you bought books of tickets at the gate ranging from A-E. The A tickets were for the less exciting rides, moving up from there to the premium rides which took an E ticket for admission. My mother spent $50 that day on the whole visit and went on about how expensive it was for days. Now that would barely cover parking.

After a fun filled day of rides, park food, and souvenir shopping our feet were tired and we were ready to head home. Again, home was a fifteen minute drive with traffic. As usual, I was handed the map. Mother had never driven the freeways before that day. When she merged into traffic she became totally unglued as cars and massive semis careened by us on either side. Orders were being hurled in my direction faster than a chef calling out meal requests on a bustling food line. Somehow we missed our exit. For whatever reason she never got off the freeway again until we’d merged onto several others and were totally lost. When we finally pulled off an off ramp, it was dark, and we were in Burbank an hour’s drive from our house. Thankfully, a police cruiser had pulled over to the side of the road. My mother pulled in behind him and explained our situation. I remember sitting in the car getting my thumb prepared for insertion lest she get arrested. We made it home well into the evening. It was a long time after that before mother ventured onto the freeways again, but I retained my job as navigator well into adulthood.

There are many funny stories in my mother’s repertoire. The one triggered by my cousin’s wrong flight story was one for the books. Mother was living in the Bay Area when this silliness transpired. Plans had been made for her to take the one hour flight to L.A. to visit a friend of hers who lived in the L.A. area. Not wanting to leave her car at the airport, she asked if I would drop her off on my way home from work. It was a Friday night, and the airport was packed. I asked her several times if she needed me to park and see her to her gate. Each time she said no, she would be fine. As I remember, it had been a long week, and I still had to fight the commuter traffic home, so with some reservations, I retrieved her bag from the trunk, gave her a hug, and told her to call me when she arrived on the other end.

Several hours later a distress call came in from my mother’s friend. It seemed she had waited at the gate where my mother was to arrive, but mother never got off the plane. Asking at the gate an airport employee said she had never boarded. What?

Before I could alert the media, the phone rang again. This time it was my missing mother on the other end. She was laughing so hard, I could barely get the gist of what she was saying. Seems she had gotten on board the plane after I’d left her. After taxiing down the runway and in the air, the pilot came on the P.A. to provide the passengers with a weather report for Seattle. Finding this odd, my mother asked the lady in the seat next to her why on earth he was telling them about the weather in Seattle. The lady replied, “because that is where we are going”. Amazing. So, the airlines, realizing they had a passenger on the wrong plane and they didn’t catch the mistake, put her up in the Holiday Inn and booked her a return flight to L.A. the following morning. Dinner was also provided. Good going, Mom.

Someone pointed out the other day when you have lost both parents the feeling comes over you you are now an orphan. Never thought of that before. I don’t know how I will feel when at last she leaves us, but I’m sure I will miss her more than I can say.

Thanks for the memories, Mom. It wasn’t perfect, but it most certainly has been an interesting run. I hope we have a dozen more years of memories to make together.

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Hair today, gone tomorrow…..

Looking out my window this morning, the patio chair closest to the house is barely visible. A heavy bank of fog has moved in making the landscape murky, and trees and bushes but shadowy figures moving in and out of view in the background. Growing up in Nova Scotia on the arm of the Halifax harbor, fog was an integral part of my world. At night, tucked in my little bed in the my room on the second floor of my grandmother’s large comfortable home, the fog horn was often the last sound I was to hear before drifting off to sleep. As I’ve said, repeatedly most likely, I do enjoy a little weather. I would not be content in a place where one season looks like the next, and a bit of inclement weather less likely than developing a case of smallpox. Change, in all things, is what, to me, makes life interesting.

Even if you must go to the same job every day year after year, I believe it is important not to follow the same route every morning in order to get there, or to bring the same lunch to put in the fridge in the break room you’d eaten the day before. Once I dated a man who had his clothes lined up in his closet according to the days of the week. There were his Monday pants, hanging next to his Monday shirt. On the floor beneath them sat his Monday shoes and socks waiting to be put on once his Monday clothes were in place. I dated him for two years and never saw him in other than his Monday shirt on a Monday in the time we were together. If he removed a catsup bottle from what he referred to as his “staples shelf” a bottle of catsup was immediately added to the list hanging on a clipboard on the wall to be purchased at the next trip to the store. Each moment of his life was neatly organized. I like my surroundings to be neat, but I don’t want my life too tidily in place as to not have room for movement.

Now, let me preface this writing by saying I am by nature a very organized person. I do run a tidy ship in my home and don’t find comfort sitting around in a bunch of clutter or disorder. That is just me. If you wish to sit in your house with old McDonald’s bags tossed in the corner, piles of unfolded laundry on the couch and your last dish sitting in the sink dripping maple syrup, it is not my business, nor would I judge you for doing so. This is simply not how I choose to live. Each of us has our own way of plowing through life, and I believe whatever works for you, is precisely what you should be doing.

I had a friend who went through a twelve step program for an addiction he was fighting. As his friend, I went to a meeting with him on several occasions by way of support. The speaker on the first visit was talking about how important how you keep your personal area is to your overall well being. I believe there is truth to this. Most likely if your living space would be suitable for Porky and his pals to take up residence in, your life might well be a reflection of this. But who am I to say? My house is clean, but my life has been untidy often and had many chaotic spaces in it. I’m just throwing the information out there. You may chew on it any way you might like.

Speaking of chewing, there is good news on the cow flatulence front. Cows pass gas or burp, it would appear, at an alarming rate which is negatively effecting our ozone layer. A farmer by the name of Joe Dorgan living in Prince Edward Island (PEI to us Canadians) discovered by feeding his cows organic seaweed it made the animals far less gassy. Go team Canada! They are still investigating how to make this seaweed accessible as a food source for all the gassy cows presently strewn across the globe, as well as determining whether this is a short term fix or a long term one. Either way it is quite an amazing discovery. Right on Joe.

I think of this, because yesterday I went to visit my mother. No, she does not suffer from gas. However, she is presently living in a board and care in a rural section of a Sacramento suburb. It is a lovely area, populated with large ranches situated on huge chunks of property. While driving along the back roads, I passed a flock of wild turkeys deciding whether or not to cross the road, a bee farm (I guess you’d call it that) and a huge flock of cows grazing in a pasture. There you go, the much needed connection to the previous paragraph. Having just read the article about the farmer in PEI, my mind naturally went to the the bovine gas producers as I drove on by.

There are currently three residents and not a single cow in the board and care where my mother stays. There were four, but one lady passed away several weeks ago. My mother and the other female resident both have varying stages of dementia. The third resident, the other woman’s husband, lives with her but is in fairly good health. He moved in to be close to his wife. I find that terribly sweet as I write it. He is always by her side. It is my understanding they have been married for years and when she needed more significant care he opted to join her without hesitation.

Last week, I went to the dollar store and purchased Christmas stockings and all kind of goodies to stuff them with. Then I went to another store and found warm socks for the ladies, and a wool cap for the gentleman in the group. I had noticed on my visits there were perhaps four hairs remaining on the top of his head. Rick, when I met him, was totally bald and always favored wool hats in the winter months to cover this exposed skin in the cold weather. The gentleman was so excited to get the hat, it immediately went on his head and was still in place when I was saying goodbye several hours later. He also told me he had never had a stocking in his life and was most pleased to be able to hang one up. I don’t know his story, perhaps it’s a religious preference, or just a personal one, but all in all it was really fun and a big hit on the other end. Funny how a little something like that can bring a smile to someone’s face. Small acts of kindness, really do have big impact.

The hat made me think of Rick, not that I don’t often have him on my mind. We were together nearly twenty years. That is not a vacancy you fill easily. As I said, he was bald when I met him, having begun to lose his hair in his thirties. With all the stress I’ve had in my life over the past three or four years my hair has taken a hit. Fortunately, I had quite a bit to begin with, but it certainly is less lush then it used to be. Once the hair went, Rick cultivated the middle aged manscape on his face, basically a moustache which was attached to a neatly trimmed goatee. The hair shows up on the face, I believe, as it begins to disappear on the top of the head. I thought he looked wonderful without his hair, and as I never knew him with it in place, never noticed the loss of it. He told me it was devastating for him, however, when his hairline first began to recede. I can feel that. I had a very dear friend who was much older. His hair had completely disappeared on the top of his head but he still had a healthy growth around the sides. His solution to this problem, was to grow it really long on one side and draw that up over the vacant space on the top. Once in place he sprayed it into submission. A comb over. Let me be the first to say, this is not a good look. If the wind comes up, for example, or you go swimming? The hair on the side either stands up or droops to one side and the empty field is revealed. Seriously, I would much rather see a cleanly shaved bald head any day then that. I’m just saying. In the end it is the person existing below the hairline is who is important not what’s growing on their head.

As we age, the things that seemed so important when we were young seem to fade into the background. People gain a few miles on them and aren’t as shiny and factory fresh as they were in their twenties or thirties. The good news unless we invent a magic elixir, all of us are going to age. As yet, I have heard of no effective cure for it. Oh, there is plastic surgery (sometimes scary), and there are a myriad of products out there touting youthful results if you use them, but in the end aging must be faced and accepted as part of the journey.

So, I am inside and cozy on this foggy, foggy day. Have many projects on my table in various stages of production so lots to keep me busy. Christmas is on the horizon and a new year with hopefully more exciting prospects and great bounty for all of us.

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Monday, Monday…..

Hamburgers are on the menu for dinner tonight at our house. You can pretty much gauge my mood by what I’ve got planned for the evening meal. Right at the top of my comfort food list you would find in bold capital letters and underlined, “cheeseburgers”. Funny isn’t it, how comforting food can be? Perhaps that’s why so many people in the country are overweight? Being handed a bowl of hot chili in the winter, is like being offered a warm blanket on a frigid night. Food is the obvious solution for so many problems to my mind. Your boss is an idiot? A Kit-Kat will make it all better. Your husband ran off with the cleaning lady? Wolf down an entire bag of double dip Oreos and that will mend a few holes in that broken heart. If we’re not eating away our problems, we are numbing them into submission with alcohol or drugs. It’s the American way. Let’s face it, none of us want to feel the pain in our lives, particularly when it becomes oppressive. So much easier to drown our misery in a caramel frapucinno or bury it in a couple of oversized tubs of brownie batter ice cream. I know for me, simply saying the words “I’ll have four number three’s please, oversize it” into a microphone, makes a bad day feel better. Easy peasy. Please believe me, there’s no finger pointing going on here on my part, simply making some observations. Why do you think cheeseburgers and home made fries are on my menu tonight? My hands are definitely not clean, if you get what I’m sayin.

Believe me I am hardly one to talk. I am a good pusher of feelings. Push, push, push. It wasn’t until things were spinning out of control in my early thirties, I realized this method of handling my innermost turmoil, was not proving to be an effective way to manage my life. Now, I didn’t exactly come to this conclusion on my own during an epiphany over my cheese omelet. Noticing my life was taking on water, and the boat slowly sinking, I sent up a distress signal. This resulted in me soliciting the help of a wonderful therapist who guided me through some of the rougher currents. With her assistance, I began to figure out why, though I was paddling really hard, I wasn’t finding my way to the shore. I hope you didn’t get seasick with all those ocean analogies. Please understand, going through that soul discovering journey does not mean I found all the answers to my problems. Not even close. I work on plugging up the holes every day (Sorry, I can’t seem to help myself today.). It only means, I took the time to stop and take a look at what I was doing, rather than just doing, and began to explore which behaviors worked for me and those I needed to cut loose and allow to move away from me. As I’ve said many times, I am a creature of many flaws. The difference being, now I can examine my flaws daily and manage to love myself anyhow, and have learned to make friends with these dents in my armor. Along with my finer qualities, these less desirable traits are an integral part of the whole that makes me who I am.

Though I may still enjoy a good juicy cheeseburger with all the trimmings when my life is threatening to overwhelm me, I try also to deal with what is on my plate, aside from consuming the perfectly seasoned ground beef. This isn’t always easy for me. For example, in the last two months four boils have risen up one after another on the lower half of my face. Fortunately, we are wearing mask, so no young children have been traumatized by these events. Also, thanks to a good dose of antibiotics, my facial features have returned to their pre-eruption smooth landscape. Whew. I am not subject to boils as a norm. However, skin, being the largest organ, as well as one we can see, it is often the first to reflect signs of stress in our bodies. Though stress definitely effects all organs in our body, skin is the only one where the effects become immediately obvious. When I was going through a particularly angst filled time with an ex-husband, I ended up with psoriasis over 70% of my body. Never had it before, nor have I experienced it since. It took me a year of light treatments, nightly soakings, a myriad of creams and prescriptions, and releasing the ex-husband, to right that ship. Not boarding that cruise again, so deal with my feelings I must and will do. Dramamine anyone?

Yesterday began like a Monday, and continued to behave like one all the way through the day. At 8:00 I showed up at the DMV to complete my application for my California ID. There are extensions in place for getting this done in place due to Covid, but I like to move things off my to-do list as quickly as possible, that way I don’t have to think about them. On the DMV website it was suggested you make an appointment. Right. You click on “yes, make an appointment” and are redirected back to “yes, make an appointment”. Fine. So, I completed my application, gathered the necessary supporting paperwork, put a bottle of water in my purse and headed to the DMV with no appointment in place. The seats were fairly occupied but there were several in the back with no one seated directly next to them. Everyone was wearing a masks except one couple. There is always one in the crowd. Also there was one guy who had a mask on, but it was pulled underneath his chin. I haven’t read the CDC guidelines word for word, but I don’t believe this is the suggested way to wear one. Just sayin.

My number was G12. The PA voice was calling G01 when I sat down. Didn’t seem like too long of a wait, but that was before I discovered there were “B” people waiting as well as “G” people. K. All about letters and numbers at the DMV it would seem. About an hour later, my number was getting close to the starting gate. The “G” man before me totally lost it with a clerk about a registration snafu with regard to his mother’s car. I know this, because he was yelling loud enough to trigger a car alarm in the parking lot. After enjoying a meltdown any two year old could have been proud off, he tore his mask off, threw it on the ground, and stomped out of the building throwing all his paperwork up in the air on the way out the door. We all watched as the papers floated to the ground, nobody saying a word, as if this is what one does when exiting the building. Love human nature. Fascinating really. “Next.” Oh, that would be me. I had to produce my actual green card. My name is listed on my immigration card with my middle name, as that is what is required by their office. All good. However, my driver’s license has only the initial. Apparently the DMV system didn’t like this, so it kept spitting out the application. Forty-five minutes later, it finally decided M was a good enough equivalent for Maureen and we were off to the races. Sigh. Next, the clerk had me stand in front of a blue screen to have my picture taken. She told me to smile, so I did. It won’t matter, I will still look like a felon when my card arrives, but what the heck, I’ll play. Holding the smile for what seemed like fifteen minutes, my lips were beginning to get stiff. Relaxing for a moment, I asked if we were done. Exactly at that moment, the flash went off. Should be an interesting shot. Anyhow, done and done.

Before leaving the house to go to the DMV, I changed the sheets on both beds. Love clean sheet day. There’s nothing like climbing into clean sheets after a long hard day, particularly if they were hung on the line to dry. Nobody does that anymore, I don’t think. When I was growing up, my grandmother always hung her sheets out “to get some fresh air” during the summer months. Coming home this morning with my California ID mission completed, I went in my bedroom to change and get on with the business of the day. Dead center in the middle of my freshly clean blanket was a huge mass of ewwwwww. At first I thought it to be some sort of creature that had possibly crawled up there after meeting a nasty end, but on closer inspection, I realized it was, in fact, a hair ball. Ewwwww, again, and it had friends. Friends on the pillow, friends on the carpet. Sigh. Last week I had taken Boo to the vet to be checked out for a suspected UTI (Urinary Tract Infection). They gave her a shot of a long lasting antibiotic that works on 65% of animals. Leave it to Boo, she has to be an over achiever, she obviously ranks among the unworkable 35%. The next step would be a urinalysis, and a culture. Those babies amount to $325 and change. She’s my cat, and I love her, so, of course, I’m going to do pay the ransom, but it doesn’t mean I’m not going to complain while I’m writing the check. Sooooooo, I called the vet and made an appointment for Boo to get further evaluated, then stripped the bed and threw the sheets back in the washer. Monday, Monday…….can’t trust that day. Go, Cass. That woman knew something.

Finally settling in with a soothing cup of chamomile tea, I picked up the stack of mail I’d brought in earlier. Second envelope in the pile had printed clearly in the left hand corner in bold letters “Internal Revenue Service”. It was addressed to my mother at this address. I believe I mentioned some blogs ago I was doing a couple of rounds with them over some unfiled tax returns of my mother’s. I spent $600 to get everything straightened out months ago, refiling the missing years. Before I opened this letter, I considered just burning it and not bothering to look at the document inside. The better side of me voted to go ahead and take a peek. Remind me not to get my better side her pumpkin spice latte next time she asks for a treat as we pass a Starbuck’s. Damn. After all the trouble my tax accountant and I went to, it was yet another demand letter for thousands of dollars which my mother doesn’t owe printed on half a ream of paper. Wow. Don’t they have more to do than to hound an elderly woman with dementia on hospice who’s only income is Social Security? I could give them a few leads to follow that would guarantee a much more satisfying end result. Let’s see Trump, Bezos, come to mind. Gets my Irish up.

So, Monday was a bit of a wash. Tuesday seems to be shaping up to look much better, but it’s early yet. We are all praying for our beautiful Lake Tahoe. Please put your good energy in the pile for the people living there and the glorious lake and landscape surrounding it. That gorgeous piece of California/Nevada real estate is now under siege by the Caldor Fire. So much of this lovely state has been devastated by the incessant and relentless fires, and fire season is just getting warmed up.

Keeping your chin up lately seems to require two men and a ladder. Have a great Tuesday.

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Misty, watercolor memories…..

I had a discussion with a young parent the other day I found interesting. She told me she asks her children what they would like to eat before preparing a meal. Things really are different then when I was growing up. I can honestly say I was never consulted about a meal really. What was put on my plate and served to me, I ate. If I chose not to eat it, my grandmother, at least to my recollection, never got up from the table and went in the kitchen and whipped me up something else more to my liking. Sometimes at breakfast, my grandmother did ask if I wanted my eggs poached, scrambled or fried, but other than that, what showed up on the plate was generally what I was expected to eat.

Now that I think more about it why shouldn’t children have some choice in their menu plan? They aren’t old enough always to make all the choices but I do think after they have tried a food several times and still have a strong distaste for it, perhaps they shouldn’t be made to eat it? This does not mean they can exclude every vegetable, fruit, or meat and substitute ice cream or candy bars, but within reason if there is a food they really do not like perhaps they need not be made to eat it? My son, for example, could not stand peas. His father, thought children should eat what was placed in front of them, and not waste food. The “starving children in China” script was pulled out often when food was left uneaten on their plates. This particular meal, the peas remained intact on my son’s plate and like the elephant in the room did not go unnoticed by my husband. “Eat your peas before leaving the table” was put out there. The gauntlet had been thrown. Dishes done, I came back to find my little one still staring at his plate. Stubbornness is definitely genetic. After a while the fork was lifted to his lips and he took a big bite of the dreaded little green bullets. The face was too much as the chewing commenced. Shortly, as quickly as they had gone down the chute they made a return visit all over my tablecloth. Having had enough of both men in my household, I scooped up my son and headed for the bathtub and handed his father the cleaning utensils to clean up the mess. Peas were no longer an issue at our house.

I never had to be forced to eat. I liked just about everything my grandmother put in front of me except for the dreaded liver and onions or the god forsaken beefsteak and kidney pie which were both my kryptonite. Ewwwww. Food was where she and I totally bonded. So many of my warmest memories of my younger years were created in my grandmother’s sunny kitchen. Sometimes, one of those memories will pop up in the most expected location. The other day while waiting for a doctor’s appointment, I had some time to kill. When driving into the complex parking lot I’d noticed a “Grand Opening” sign on a sandwich board in front of a new antiques and collectibles store. Antiques not really my decorating style, I decided it still might be interesting to take a look and see what they had to offer. On entering the store, it gave off that same musty, dusty smell most stores of that genre seem to have. Since the store (at least according to the sign out front) had only been open a couple of weeks, it got me to wondering if that scent actually came in a spray can, like new car smell at the car wash. Perhaps it’s the Moldy Oldie fragrance collection by Air Wick or the Granny’s Attic grouping by Fabreze. At any rate, while looking at the eclectic assortment of oldies but goodies for sale along the cluttered shelves, I came across four little china egg cups. Seeing them on the shelf took my mind immediately to childhood breakfasts in my grandmother’s family home on the hill in Halifax. The main focus of the room, was the lovely picture window looking out over Halifax harbor. Always I loved being in that kitchen with my grandmother. I can see her busy at the stove, apron in place, and if I inhale deeply I can almost smell all the delicious aromas wafting through the air. Our evening meals were usually taken in the formal dining room replete with all the bells and whistles. Breakfast, however, was served with far less fanfare at the little formica table by the window in the kitchen.

My grandmother woke up precisely at 6:00 every day. If asked why in later years why she still got up so early when she could have languished in bed, she said “you have plenty of time to sleep after you die”. Before coming out to greet her day, her nylons were in place neatly secured to her undergarments beneath one of her house dresses as she referred to them. These were cotton dresses all cut from the same pattern in varying fabrics, with short sleeves and a parade of buttons marching down the front. Specifically they were worn for working around the house to keep her good clothes from getting soiled. Up until she was in her eighties, when my mother finally convinced her pants on women were not the work of the devil, did I ever see my grandmother’s knees covered by anything other than a suit, skirt or dress.

The first order of business each morning was always to prepare my grandfather’s breakfast. A urologist, his days often began quite early. Breakfast was served to him on a tray each morning in bed, accompanied by his morning paper. Very health conscious, and dealing with some health concerns himself, the menu was shredded wheat with berries, a glass of juice, one half a grapefruit and a slice of whole grain toast. A small vase with one flower from the garden was added during the summer months next to a colorful little china pot filled with Gammy’s delicious homemade marmalade. Once my grandfather had opened his paper and begun to eat, she tended next to the needs of the smallest member of the family, namely myself. Eggs were often on the menu breakfast. They came dressed up in a variety of ways, my favorite to this day being Eggs Benedict, basically poached eggs perched atop a split English muffin then smothered with buttery Hollandaise sauce. Yum. These days no one has time to whip up homemade Hollandaise, or at least I don’t. Back then, there were no packages to buy at the store to add water to. If you wanted Hollandaise, you dragged out the double boiler and whipped up a batch yourself. Another way I loved eggs was soft boiled and served in an egg cup. The shell was left on with the top sliced through (it’s hat, as my grandmother would say) and you lifted it’s hat, and dipped your toast in the gooey yolk.

Funny how smells, tastes, sounds and pictures can trigger an immediate memory of perhaps an easier time or those you particularly enjoyed. Of course, these sensory reminders can also be of traumatic or unpleasant experiences, but I’m trying to look at the bright side of the moon at the moment so let’s stay there for a while. My memories are often associated with food it seems. Always I have loved to be in the kitchen. Although I have to admit these days I do find myself tiring of coming up with new dishes to tantalize my guests. As I’ve said before they need to introduce a new meat, or at least a new vegetable for those of us who love to cook to play with. Perhaps they’ll just create a new one. My granddaughter, a vegan through and through, says other than organic vegetables and not all of those, you don’t know anymore if the vegetable you’re eating is real or was created in a lab somewhere. I think we need a new blue something, something. At the moment blueberries are kind of holding down that fort all by themselves.

I bought the little egg cups as it turned out. Did I need them? Nope, not in the least, but want won that argument and they are sitting in my china cabinet waiting for a soft boiled egg to bring them back to a useful life.

This has been a rough year. I thought last year was full of potholes but that was just the preliminary match, and, unfortunately, this year seems to be the main event. I am working on my grateful self. I am grateful the virus seems to be getting under control. I am most grateful it got a hold of me and my partner Dale, and then threw us back relatively unharmed. I am grateful all my family and his, and my friends and his, are still here to talk about what a strange year it truly was. I am simply grateful for so many things.

On the downside of things, Dale, my partner and companion, has cancer. Being asked to be grateful about this is certainly an uphill climb. Rick, my partner in crime for nearly twenty years, as I’ve mentioned many times, passed away nearly three years ago from lung cancer. In a stroke of synchronicity even I find hard to grasp, Dale has been given the same dire diagnosis. The oxygen compressor is once again humming in my spare room and questions without answers are swirling and twirling about in my head.

So, I pull up some happy thoughts and fond, fond memories of being young and free and unaware of all the sadness that life insists on being peppered with. Memories, I always feel, are tucked away to be pulled out perhaps when you need a hug and don’t have one handy, or are feeling blue and want to remember the pure joy of laughing out loud. Memory really is such a gift, and probably one we take for granted. One of the hardest things for me is to watch my mum slowly loosing her grasp on all those wonderful mental highlights she has stored away over the years. I am her memory these days and I’m okay with that. Again, I lean to the side of gratefulness and remind myself she remembers my face and that alone is money in the bank.

Sorry if this post is a bit of a song with sad lyrics. Usually I am upbeat, but even a stand up comedienne has days when he or she can’t pull a joke out of the hat.

Have a good one. Remember to not put your “I love you’s” off until a better day, there is never a better day then today. Talk soon.

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For mom……

Last night we watched Nomadland. Though beautifully acted and directed, let me just say this is not a movie choice you want to make if you are having a particularly bad day. Steeping you quickly into the darker side of the human reality, Frances McDormand takes the viewer on a realistic and poignant journey of loss, homelessness, and isolation. Got to give it to her. She put forth her most unadorned self freely, with no apology, which for me, who has difficulty going to the grocery store without make up and hair in place, was so refreshing.

I understand full well the feeling of not having a roof overhead. Back in the early 1990’s I spent two weeks with no residence to call my own, no money in my pocket to rectify the situation, and only a case of Vienna sausage, two large bottles of water, and a bottle of Chardonnay with which to sustain myself. In my case, I knew there was light at the end of the tunnel, but still was it was a life lesson I shall never forget. The experience allowed me to appreciate even the smallest of creature comforts such as flushing a toilet, or slipping into a warm, comfortable bed each night.

I believe our time here on earth to be a series of connected lessons. Perhaps this is not true for others, but my life certainly has been. Often, when I did not take heed of the message the universe was trying to convey to me, the same lesson repeated itself until I fully understood the point of the information being transmitted. Sort of like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. Hopefully, I have waded knee deep through most of the karma I created in my younger years at this point, and shed the bulk of it in the process. I try to be the best version of myself possible each and every day. This does not mean I always attain that goal, but that is my intention when waking up in the morning.

Many of the earliest lessons I learned from my grandmother and my mother. My grandmother, gone for many years now, left many life lessons behind for me to lean on. She was a steady, consistent force of nature and she taught me much in the nine years I lived under her roof. My mother, before the dementia claimed much of her memory, showed me both what to do with my life, as well as at times, what not to. Both paths helped me to find my way. Mother is getting along in years, there’s no denying. Sometimes, I don’t want to look at this, because when I do, I have to imagine my world without her in it. As she loves to say she is my biggest fan. No matter how badly I screwed up, my mom still insisted on digging around in the detritus, until she found the good in me. Together, we’ve shed tears, laughed until we cried, shared grief, helped raised my children, been a part of raising theirs, and never allowed miles, however many spread out between us, to break our bond. Always, I knew my mother to be a safe port in the storm. When lost, unhappy, sad or just in need of a hug, her door would be the one I would knock on, her number the one I called. In her eyes I was infinitely special. Though I have often viewed myself as a highly flawed being, somehow to her, I was perfect. No one, I am sure, will ever love me again quite the way she does. When I think of saying goodbye after traveling these many years together, I recognize the pain will be great. Along with the sadness, there will be such gratefulness for having been allowed to spend this time with her.

Certainly, it would be a fairy tale to say our relationship existed without bumps. My mother was a helicopter parent before the term was ever coined. I was her “only chick” and if I didn’t give her something to worry about, which I often did, she’d look around until she found something she could land on, and worried about that. Mothers and daughters, the eternal struggle. I know I feel this at times with my sweet daughter. I wonder on occasion if I should simply initiate our conversations with “I’m sorry for everything I’m going to say or do wrong before we hang up”, just to cover myself prior to opening my mouth. I hear this from many of my female friends with adult daughters. Perhaps it is that we still perceive these wonderful strong women as our little girls. I really don’t have the answers, but I do know it’s not without peril this mother and daughter dynamic from time to time.

So, this Mother’s Day means a lot to me. Sunday we are coming together as a family to honor our oldest member. Thankfully, the pandemic has begun to release it’s tight hold on us. With everyone freshly vaccinated, there will be opportunities for hugs and I’m sure a special time spent together. Life seems lately to move forward at a record breaking clip, with adjectives such as fast and furious setting the tone for how we barrel through our days. There is little time for quiet reflection, or being in the moment. Sometimes we forget to stop and actually see the people populating our world, to hear them, or touch them. The virus offered up a gift with all the pain, surprisingly, allowing a spotlight to shine on this missing connection, the forced isolation highlighting how very important those we love are to our well being and peace of mind.

Today I agreed to allow hospice to begin to share in the care of my dear mother. As the doctor explained, this is not a death sentence, simply an additional layer of personal attention to promote her well being. Uh-huh. I can feel her hand slipping out of mine. People will say about older people, “they lived a long life”, or “they had a good run”. No matter how many birthdays they’ve celebrated, I’m not sure if it ever feels like it’s time for us to them to go. I can see she’s beginning to get tired, so I will allow the universe to unfold the story in whatever way it must and simply be content to be a player on the stage.

If you have your mother still with you, give her a hug and remind her how much she means to you. If you do not, then lift a glass to her, I’m sure she’ll get your message. Have a good one. Happy Mother’s Day, Mama.

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Sea you in my dreams…..

The thermometer is going to push 90 degrees here, in what feels like perpetually sunny California of late. Another drought plagued season in this beautiful state will not bode well for what our firefighters will face as the inevitable summer heat presses down on us. Sigh. Already we had the first power outage of the season in our area Sunday. Predictably, the power went off right around dinner time. Not late enough in the day to have dinner prepared and on the table, but rather right in the middle of cooking time for my pork loin in the oven, and pot of corn on the cob happily boiling on the stove top. Fortunately, it came back on before we either had to order in, or label our dinner an early breakfast. Typical. If not in the middle of the meal, the power is guaranteed to go off immediately after I’ve purchased a large amount of groceries and meat at Costco. It’s like a signal goes off from the cash register directly to the power grid reading “Susie will be storing $300 worth of perishables in her refrigerator. Initiate two day shutdown protocol”. I have a generator my son gave me to use when when an outage occurs. They seem to be coming more and more often which each passing year. Summer before last, I threw out an entire refrigerator full of food three times. At least that is not a worry I will have going into this summer, hopefully. I have never used a generator before. From what I understand, you have to be careful how you use them, because if they are too close to the house or are used in an poorly ventilated area, they can prove lethal. This, I have to say, makes me a bit less enthusiastic about a trial run with the damnable thing. Being one of those people who can get her finger stuck in a manual can opener, anything with the word lethal in the precautionary hazards, is a bit worrisome to me. I am working hard on holding my grateful place so rather than complain, I will look for a positive spin to this. Let’s see, I am thankful I am blessed to have a new generator with which to off myself with. I’ll leave it at that. Good old PG&E.

It’s been a rough couple of weeks at my house for some unknown reason. Though not in a bad mood, I also haven’t been my usual sunny self. Could be spring fever, or cabin fever, or simply part of emerging like a pupa from a cocoon after a long period of hibernation, I don’t know. Seems a lot of friends and close acquaintances I’ve talked to lately are going through some transitional pains while beginning merge back into public gatherings again as well. I went out to lunch with a friend of mine on Friday. Both of us noted, sitting inside at a table felt both familiar and strange at the same time. Certainly it looked different. Notably, while we waited for our order to arrive, there was nothing on top of our table but our elbows. No napkins, utensils or condiments, as I would have expected to see pre-pandemic. When my friend asked for salt and pepper, a pile of small packets on a plate were delivered to the table. I’m so glad we didn’t own our restaurant during something like this. Restaurant ownership on the best of days is a stressful existence, but trying to work with these kind of restrictions must be like trying to do up the laces on your running shoes with your hands tied behind your back.

People ask me often if I would want to own a restaurant again. That, I have to say, is an answer requiring little deliberation on my part. NO!!!! Sorry. Was that too loud? Now, my response would be much different was I asked, “are you glad you owned a restaurant”? That answer would be a resounding, “yes”. It was an experience like no other in my life. I am both thankful to have been a part of it, and even more thankful to have come out the other end. Rick was the one carrying all the restaurant experience both going in, and going out. What knowledge I had about restaurants was limited to where to go to get the best Cobb salad, or where not to go for bad Chinese. However, by osmosis, I soaked up information along the way and managed to learn some of the ins and outs of the business for the two years we were open. Who knew? Not I certainly. I didn’t even have the usual street creds young people have on their resumes like “Waitress” or “Server”. Other than a brief, and might I add highly unsuccessful, Memorial Day weekend cocktail waitress debacle on Martha’s Vineyard in my early twenties, I was totally a restaurant virgin.

You know, rethinking my answer about ever owning a restaurant again, I have to say I have day dreamed about a little place that just served breakfast and lunch somewhere by the sea. Even perhaps a lunch truck of some description. I’ve also thought I’d like to work or run a bed and breakfast by the coast one day, but these thoughts are definitely can be found under the “dream on” column of my to do list unless I either hit the jackpot or marry well in the future.

Lately, the ocean has really dominated my thoughts. How I miss it. Sometimes it is an actually longing, like missing someone you love. For me, growing up smack up against water on all sides, it became a part of me, and, I, in turn, became a part of it. The Atlantic, where I grew up, is a far different beast than the peaceful Pacific here on the west coast. That is why people flock here, I would suppose, to enjoy the endless coastline decorated with long stretches of white sandy beaches, warm waters, and gorgeous sun soaked vistas. If one can afford it, of course. In my case, one can’t. Both oceans, to my eyes, have their own style of beauty and mystery.

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The Atlantic always felt to me a far more angry stretch of water than the Pacific, harboring (no pun intended) darker moods and deeper hues. The sea, depending on you location, shows itself in many ways. The waters surrounding Hawaii, for example, have a light and yes, tropical, feel to them. Almost as though they know they are playing in paradise and wish to reflect the mood. The ocean there is a clear azure blue. When walking into the surf on Waikiki Beach the water was so translucent my feet were clearly visible on the sand below me.

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I also enjoyed the beaches in Ft. Lauderdale, during my one and only visit there. Florida offered up some prime coastal experiences. If it wasn’t for the extreme humidity, frequent hurricanes, outrageously large insects, and flourishing alligator population, Florida undoubtedly would be a great place to live. If I was disposed to move to that part of the U.S., which I am not, I would prefer to live on the Keys. Key West is the only one I’ve visited but that would suit me just fine. Each night I would find my way down to the beach and sit with the locals enjoying the glorious sunsets and possibly indulging in a little cracked crab washed down by an icy margarita. My mouth is watering simply imagining it. Massachusetts had some nice coastal stops as well. Cape Cod waters are far more brooding and dark, the beaches there wearing a more windswept and scruffy look. Cape Cod, I believe would be a lovely place to write a novel or find oneself after being lost.

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If I cannot be there right now, I can at least remember times that I have been. Memories are such lovely parts of our makeup. I’m glad whoever shaped our existence thought to include them in the factory rollout package. At times they can be both a curse and a blessing depending on the content, but being able to bring up the pleasant times in our lives like slides on a screen and to recall the smells, feelings, and colors of our experiences is a wondrous gift I have to say. Like pictures in an album, our memories lose their clarity and richness as the years pass. Still, they can be called up to be revisited from time to time and bring us joy. Often, I feel sad for my mum to have lost so many memories over the last few years, but dementia knows no master. Truly, I am blessed I am one face she never seems to forget.

So with thoughts of the sea on my mind, I am definitely adding a trip to the coast over the summer months. It’s about a four hour drive, which isn’t too much of a stretch. Rick and I often went to Little River, one of my favorite spots. Situated atop the craggy bluffs south of Mendocino, Little River is more a dot on the map than a thriving metropolis, only boasting a bustling population of 117. I have not gone there since he passed and am not sure how I will feel when I do. I do know I will go again when I’m ready, because it is such a beautiful place to visit. When we are left behind, it is up to us to find joy in the time we have, and I know he would always want me to do that.

Anyhow, I’ll leave you with thoughts of sea breezes, calling gulls, salty smells, and foghorns until next time.

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