Did You See The Moon?

I went to get the mail tonight, just after sunset.  It was still and smelled of spring.  

The rosemary had been filled with little yellow and red and brown things as I went through a Pilates barre routine on the other side of the window; tonight it was quite undisturbed.  

The roses were astonishingly healthy, filled with new leaves and buds ready to burst.  Fertilizing really makes a difference.  Even the yucca which share their garden bed were perkier.  The javelina gnawed them down to nubs last year; I'm hoping that they are mature enough to be unattractive this time around.  

There's a long mound behind my mailbox, right at the edge of the sidewalk.  Ground squirrels or rabbits or snakes or some other burrowing animal is very happily undisturbed out there at the edge of our property.  As long as they stay out of the house and the garage, I don't begrudge them their little slice of heaven.

And heaven it most certainly was today.  Temperatures in the high 60's, not a cloud in the bluest sky, and then, this evening, that just on the edge of full moon lighting my way back to the front door.  

Make sure to look for it tonight, when it's full.  You won't be sorry.

Virtual Garden Club

I admitted it to the teacher in an email yesterday.  I got nuthin'.

I'm never at a loss for things to do when we're in the garden.  Finding interactive projects for virtual garden club is more of a challenge.  We've been meeting since October, once a week for 30 minutes.  After photosynthesis and the parts of a plant and several adventures with seeds in red Solo cups, this week I came up empty.

Searching for online garden activities for kids introduced me to a wide variety of video games and apps to download !!!for free!!!!!  Virtual lesson plans were no more helpful.  I was up at 6:30, the sun hitting unfamiliar angles as I sat at the desk, hoping for an answer.

In the end, I went with my strengths - words.  Favorite Poems Old and New selected for boys and girls by Helen Ferris has been with me since elementary school.  The binding is collapsing, the cover was repaired while I volunteered in the kids' high school library, and that plastic overlay is now adorned by one of my granddaughter's gems.

I found Dandelion by Hilda Conkling.  I found a photo of a single dandelion stalk in a field of grass.  Together with my dramatic reading, the kids were amused.

O little soldier with the golden helmet,
What are you guarding on my lawn?
You with your green gun
And your yellow beard,
Why do you stand so stiff?
There is only the grass to fight!

The one the teacher and I liked the most garnered the most glazed eyeballs.

Lodged (by Robert Frost) 

The rain to the wind said,

"You push and I'll pelt."

They so smote the garden bed

That the flowers actually knelt,

And lay lodged--though not dead.

I know how the flowers felt.

Robert Frost should probably be reserved for adults.  But Frost led me to Auden, and this loveliness.  The words in bold needed explication.  

Their Lonely Betters (by W H Auden)

As I listened from a beach-chair in the shade
To all the noises that my garden made,
It seemed to me only proper that words
Should be withheld from vegetables and birds.

A robin with no Christian name ran through
The Robin-Anthem which was all it knew,
And rustling flowers for some third party waited
To say which pairs, if any, should get mated.

Not one of them was capable of lying,
There was not one which knew that it was dying
Or could have with a rhythm or a rhyme
Assumed responsibility for time.

Let them leave language to their lonely betters
Who count some days and long for certain letters;
We, too, make noises when we laugh or weep:
Words are for those with promises to keep.

We had some fun with the Robin-Anthem which was all it knew, and then we were through.  

I'm looking into a guest speaker for next week.

Feeling Old

I met my new physician today.  She's lovely.  The office was COVID protected in every way.  I left feeling secure in my future medical care.

I also felt old.

We talked about bone density, and my reluctance to take another medication.

We talked about blood pressure, and my reluctance to take another medication.

We talked about falling and low sodium diets.

We talked about longevity and my end of life planning.

It was a comprehensive review of all the ways my body could fail me.  It was sobering.  I've been coming to terms with the whole more-behind-me-than-in-front-of-me scenario for a while.  This afternoon, it was brought front and center. 

I'm very glad to be here to have the conversation.  I'm not that glad to be thinking about all that has and could go wrong.  

The Vaccine Saga Continues

Things were changing quickly.  

Notices went up and were replaced by the time Little Cuter clicked over to check them out.  What I read in the newspaper over breakfast had changed by the time washed the dishes and logged on to look for my eBook.  As Allison asked in a comment yesterday, Where did you hear that?

Long after Little Cuter's bedtime, the messages on the provider's website calmed down.  I thought that we were okay, but the wording was somewhat less than reassuring.  I shared the link with her to read when she woke up; and went to (fretful) sleep.  

Her texted reply was waiting for my early morning bleary eyes.  Yes, it seemed like he was okay, but call when they open to be sure.  

And that's when anxiety turned to delight.  I was midway through the comics when terminal hold started speaking to me.  I closed the newspaper and turned up the volume to better pay attention to the friendly young man on the other end.  

He understood my confusion, and repeated the facts, just to be sure.  He checked the calendar and thought we were fine.  He did a deeper dive and decided that only the Monday and Tuesday appointments were changed (to Friday), but that Wednesday and Thursday were fine.

That made sense to all of us; the doses promised were now able to be delivered.  The snow has turned to sleet on its way to rain, and the supply chain is open again.  I thanked him for checking for TBG and he paused.  He'd only run a general search of the issue; he wanted to go further into the data base and give us a more specific answer.  

Hmmmm.... we weren't in his MyChart information, but we were not to worry..... as my heart rate increased he offered mindless reassurances and logged into the POD database..... and was delighted when I told him the lane number under the registration number and there was TBG, at the right time in the right lane at the right site.

We'd been checked and rechecked and confirmed with a supervisor to boot.  As TBG, listening in as he cooked us eggs, said, We love supervisors.  I thanked the young man profusely, and he was gracious and charming and made sure I was completely comfortable before he wished me good health and let me hang up first.  

We smiled.  We texted the kids.  We looked with reverence at the printed appointment information.  We haven't felt this safe in a long, long time.  

Weather, Planning, and Vaccinations

TBG was the first in the family to snag an appointment for the first dose of Moderna.  That was the first deep breath we took since Pandemica arrived; on February 25th at 10:20am he would be on his way to health and safety.

Little Cuter and I manage to schedule two doses for me at Walgreens; TBG turned down my offer to schedule one for him there, too.  He had one appointment.  Why test fate by locking in an insurance bid?

We were all set.  Our two doses would be finished in time for traveling in April.  The transmissibility results were encouraging.  We were gently treading from cautious optimism to actual hope.

Climate change seems to have dashed those hopes.  

Anyone who doesn't think that rashes of fires in the west and snowstorms in the south and floods all over the planet aren't a result of our disrespect for our planet needs to take a basic Earth Science course.  I still remember It's all connected as one of the lessons I learned in 8th grade.  The Bride and her family are enjoying a light dusting and freezing temperatures in Alabama.  FlapJilly and SIR are spending hours taking videos of the slalom course he shoveled in the back yard for her sled-pulled-by-tractor runs.  

Note the home improvised Go-Pro camera on her helmet.  Duct tape, paper towels, and several failed attempts didn't dampen their spirits.  It was so much fun that they woke Giblet from his nap so that he could play, too.

But all that snow created havoc in the supply chain.  And that did not bode well for TBG's upcoming vaccination appointment.  I resisted checking the site.  For two days, I didn't look at all.  Then I read the newspaper.  Not only is Gov. Ducey reserving most of the vaccines on hand for Maricopa County and those Phoenix area Republicans,  he's reducing the number of doses we'll receive here in Pima County in the future.  

With that information percolating in my brain, I opened the MHC website.  The Community Clinic which was to inoculate TBG posted a well written, lengthy, thorough notice atop the usual website home page.  They explained the delays - political and meteorological - and laid the blame squarely at the feet of those responsible.

I can't wait until he tries to run for Governor.

Vaccines scheduled for last week were pushed to this week.  Those scheduled for this week (like TBG) are cancelled indefinitely.  

I took a few deep breaths before I read the rest of the blurb.  MHC promised to get in touch with everyone who was scheduled, both to notify and assist with rescheduling.  As of Sunday at lunchtime, we haven't heard a thing.  I can't blame them for not sending a sorry we can't help you right now email, but it would have been nice.  

Nicer still would have been a 45th President who made a plan while we waited for the supplies.  There is only one company making the basic lipids needed by all the manufacturers.  They are licensing their patent to other companies now, but couldn't that  have been foreseen last Spring? Government doesn't run by itself.  Hollowing out the infrastructure providing the manpower and the brain power only served to exacerbate the problem.

And now, we wait.  Little Cuter and I are on all the websites - Walgreens and Fry's and AZDHS and Pima County Health Department - and so are all my friends.  We have all promised to telephone one another if we spot a break in the dam.  

Unfortunately, the 12,000 people who were cancelled out of their appointments at the fancy schmancy UofA Mall site are also going to be in the hunt.  I predict another round of battling with clunky websites overwhelmed by anxious typists.

There had to be a better way.

Happy Birthday, G'ma

This is how she looked when she met my father.

This is how she looked when she lived in Tucson.

I never knew the first woman.  I enjoyed meeting the second woman, the one whose memory was failing but who always knew that I loved her.  

Some things never changed. There was always a straw in her Diet Sprite.

Her purse was always over her shoulder (see blue strap, above). She was cold, but never wore a hat - "I don't look good in hats!"

There were some things she never forgot. Good grammar was imperative and bad grammar demanded correction. Yellow was her favorite color and chocolate was her favorite food.  Wrinkled shirts and sagging hems were unacceptable; she made her opinions known even when she was no longer in charge of choosing the outfits herself.

.

Today would have been her 98th birthday.

I'd have brought her a prune danish for breakfast, accompanied by a gardenia corsage on the tray.  I'd have taken her out for a tuna-and-tomato-on-toast for lunch.   We'd have shared shrimp for dinner.

We would certainly have stopped for some chocolate ice cream along the way.

By the end, there were no books to share nor Scrabble to play.  There was her shell and her soul and the connection between the two became more tenuous with every passing day.

But now, on her birthday, I remember the smiles and the advice and the kisses.  Oh, the kisses.  She had the softest skin to receive my love.

I'm kissing the air right now, sending the love out into the ether.   Wherever she is, I know she's feeling it.  She's my mom.  We're attached, forever.

Happy Birthday, Mommy!  I hope that there is chocolate in heaven.

Getting My Shot

We drove to Casa Grande, 57 miles and 58 minutes away from home.  It was an overcast afternoon, with more traffic than we'd expected.  We were anxious, for no reason, but there it was.

It was 50 miles on the highway and 7 miles on two lane roads past trailers and rusted wrecks and flea markets.  The Walgreens was on what we call a Rte 13 - the McDonalds, Denny's, motel, car wash and other traveler's needs road that bordered Ithaca.   

We parked, double masked up, and entered a store together.  It was a moment - we haven't been in a store together since our last grocery outing on March 12th.  There was a short line waiting at the pharmacy; TBG took himself back to the car to stay safe.  I waited as the couple at the window filled out their paperwork (it was possible to do this before you arrived, thus saving everyone time and energy), and then as the lovely pharmacy clerk explained to the next customer, an Hispanic gentleman of indeterminate age who thought that his presence in line was enough to secure a vaccine.  She was patient.  He was sad.

I handed in my papers and got my shot and we drove home and everything was fine.... except my heart.

Everyone in line to be vaccinated was white and well dressed.  We'd overcome the obstacles registering and searching presented, and found ourselves with the golden tickets.  The vaccination sites located in underserved neighborhoods don't seem to be doing much to serve those who live in those neighborhoods.  

Scarlet's friends in Manhattan took two trains and a bus to Bushwick, a less than savory neighborhood in Brooklyn.  There, surrounded by dismal poverty, they and other well dressed white people received their vaccinations, surrounded by those less fortunate residents of the neighborhood.

There's something really wrong with this picture.  

Snow Day

Little Cuter and SIR helped FlapJilly enjoy her snow day today.  Their three day weekend was stretched to four, and nobody minded, not one bit. There was 8-10" of fresh powder outside and the sun was shining.  They concentrated really hard on e-learning in the morning so that they could go outside and play all afternoon.  Figure eights on the sled attached to Dad's tractor, following the path he shoveled for them on the big backyard, because the tractor can't go on snow.  He made jumps and bumps and then they built a tunnel with an igloo at the end.  They were very cold; Giblet brought Mama two pairs of socks for his feet. 

We don't get snow days in Arizona.  We get gloomy, overcast mornings until the thick clouds break up a bit and some blue shines through.  The snow on the mountains has melted; there are tiny waterfalls on the lower hiking trails.  The roses are starting to sprout new growth, unbothered by the cooler nighttime temperatures.  The vinca is another story entirely.  It was not happy, and its sad little yellowing leaves reproached me as I tried to help.  

It was 60 degrees and cloudy this morning.  Not-Kathy and I agreed that it was much too ugly to visit  outside, even for a little while.  (Have I mentioned that I hate COVID?)  

I am officially a weather wimp.

Washington, The Senate, This Weekend

History Channel's biography mini-series on the 12th and the 1st presidents kept us marginally interested this afternoon.  We're unable to listen to the political talking heads any longer.  They created Trump and they are still giving him a platform.  There is no reason to debate the calling of witnesses by the House Managers any longer.  Once again, the Democrats are eating their young. 

The acquittal was inevitable.  The facts were obvious to everyone, but that didn't make a difference.  With a few notable exceptions, those who are in love with the former president are still holding a torch.  

They are not alone.  There are members of my orbit who think it's all an antifa plot to besmirch the name of their fearless leader, who are cheering their victory.  They aren't hearing Mitch McConnell's after the fact, hypocritical,  pass the buck condemnation.  They feel like they won.

What they won is debatable.  That they are celebrating a victory is terrifying.  A coup that goes unpunished is a training exercise is making its way around the interwebs.   George Washington understood that, and he didn't let optics influence his response to the Whiskey Rebellion.  He stood up for the union.

He created the institution of the presidency, stayed on to hold the union together, and left us instructions in his Farewell Address.  I read it just now.  It's eerily prescient.  

Here is what I think about what happened this weekend; he says it better than I can.  I put some in bold if you want the gist.

All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels and modified by mutual interests.

However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.

Remember, they think they won.

Arguing over strategy is so beside the point.  We have a broken nation, just the way our foundingest founding father predicted.   Would that he were here now to lead us out of the morass.

Once More, With Feeling

This is the 10th anniversary of this post.

Mary Ball Washington gave birth to a boy child on February 22, 1732. Unlike many of the stories surrounding this man (think cherry trees and coins across the Potomac and standing up in an open boat as it crossed the Delaware) this is an indisputable fact.

Mary was not in labor on the third Monday of February.  She produced her child on a specific day - the 22nd day of February.  His birthday didn't move around with the vagaries of the federal holiday calendar.

Nancy Hanks Lincoln met her second son, Abraham, 217 years and 3 days ago.  Like Mrs. Washington before her, she was not in labor on an indeterminate day sometime in the middle of the month.  It occurred on a certain day, a day formerly commemorated by school children and mail carriers alike.

Alas and alack, these fine gentlemen have been conflated into Presidents and their birthdays combined into a generic celebration designed primarily to afford employees the opportunity for a 3-day weekend in the middle of the winter. 

What was wrong with the old system, I wonder?  As an elementary school kid I looked forward to those random days off in the middle of the month.  One day, breaking up the routine.  One celebration for each president - pennies examined on the 12th, leadership and lying (not) on the 22nd.

There was no time for a weekend away (not that G'ma and Daddooooo could have afforded to take us anyplace anyhow) and there was no competition between students for who went the furthest and had the most fun.  It was an opportunity to go sledding at Bethpage (the Black Course was used for many things in my youth) or to meet friends at the bowling alley and then walk to Smiles (our precursor to a 5-and-dime), where we cruised the aisles until our parents picked us up.

It was grilled cheese sandwiches with bacon on the side, eaten on paper plates and accompanied by the admonition Don't Tell Daddy since the bacon was not exactly kosher and he cared a lot more than did G'ma.  There were snow forts to be built, snowball fights to be fought, snow men to be built. The entire neighborhood roamed from front yard to front yard, creating and tumbling and finding warmth and drinks and the occasional bathroom in whichever house we happened to be in front of when the need arose.

And now?  Now President's Day is always an event.  It's a long weekend for which plans must be made.  It has no intrinsic meaning, no relationship to George or Abe or any of their colleagues.  Their faces are used to advertise white sales and car sales and furniture sales and The History Channel runs back to back episodes of The Presidents but that's about the size of the historical component.  What began as tributes to great men has devolved into spending opportunities for the masses.

Am I bitter?  You bet.  

A day off followed by another one 10 days later.... what better way to combat the winter doldrums than that?  A random day, a day to cuddle under the blankets with your sweetie or to do all that laundry that interfered with your weekend plans and so still sits in the basket, mocking you.  A day to explore the neighborhood and have lunch in that place you've driven by 100 times before..... a day just to be.

Sometimes, when I was a girl really was better.

Annual Meetings

After conniving (with love) to put Fast Eddie in the Presidency of our HOA Board, it felt only right that I agree when he asked if I'd be the Landscape Chair.  Although I vowed that I'd avoid HOA duties at all costs, this has turned out to be much less onerous than I feared.  A conversation with the maintenance crew, an email about a dead tree.... these are not big problems.

Our Annual Meeting is coming up this month, if Zoom is allowable and accessible to all.  Cars parked overnight in driveways is the major hot button issue; much less consequential than Impeachment, but no less fraught with partisan rhetoric.  We will get through it and move on.  It may not be pleasant, but it will get done.

Cornell's annual Leadership Conference is coming up this month, too.  I went last year at this time; Las Vegas was a ghost town as the pandemic ramped up and travel slowed down.  This year's event is, of course, virtual.  Even though the most enjoyable and useful parts of these gatherings happens between the sessions, at meals and in the halls, while getting settled in our chairs and noticing one another's identifying badges, I just signed up for 5 or 6 sessions.  I'm doing my best to stay connected.

And there's one more Annual Meeting to which I've been invited.  It's Beth David Cemetery plot holders annual meeting, to be held the first week of March.

My mom filled the last plot in the family's section.  I suppose I own the turf that contains her and Daddooooo, one over to the right, too.  I signed the proxy and mailed it back, acting on behalf of the current occupants.

I'm just a little creeped out by the whole thing.

Vaccine Weirdness

I got an appointment for both doses of the Moderna vaccine; the first one is this Saturday.  We'll be driving  about 45 minutes to Casa Grande, to a random Walgreens just off the highway.  

Little Cuter was on it from the early morning, and recruited me to the search via text. The site was clunky and kept crashing and sending error messages and showing three blue dots bouncing at the top of the screen as the site stopped to think. But I managed to get through and answered a few questions and found that there were 9 appointments and 27 appointments and 24 appointments remaining on the first few days that popped up on the screen.  

I might have squealed.

I figured in the drive time and chose one date and then another, one month later.  I printed out my confirmation code and appointment details on two bright white sheets of paper.  I've been carrying them around all day.

There is an end in sight for my total isolation from the world. You'd think I'd feel the weight of the world lifting off my shoulders.  You'd be wrong.  

I spent the entire day full of anxiety.  I kept looking at my papers, checking the dates and the times and looking up the address on Google Maps.  I called the pharmacy to ask which vaccine I'd be getting.  I shared my angst with Little Cuter, who totally understood.

I've been so accustomed to worrying about this virus, for such a long time, that I'm having a hard time letting go.  It makes no sense to my rational self, which self has been gradually asserting itself as the day's gone by.  But the morning and afternoon were filled with worry and concern and trembling hands and free floating anxiety.

The papers are still nearby, but glancing their way is enough to calm me.  The weirdness is passing, slowly but surely.  Maybe tomorrow I'll be able to be really happy.  For now, the fact that my kids are thrilled is enough.

I Know Why He Did It

The Twitterverse kept me up to date on the world's reaction to the charming boring moron and the angry boring moron representing the former social media personality who lives in Florida in front of what the boring one called a diverse group of Senators.

Castor, the charming one, supposedly changed his presentation on the fly because the prosecution's opening was so powerful.  What did they think was coming their way?  

Schoen, the angry one, is a religious Jew.  He observes the Sabbath.  

This is only important because, while standing at the podium in the well of the Senate, he seemed to be holding his comb-over in place with one hand as he tipped his head waaaay back to drink from his water bottle with the other.

It was an odd moment.  The guy barely stops to breathe.  He's hard to follow.  Everything is said in the same harsh tone.  And then he's hanging onto his brains as he exposes his neck and, silently, sips.

And then it dawned on me that he was grabbing his yarmulke.... except he wasn't wearing one.  Did he decide not to wear one today?  That seemed odd, too.  A quick Google search reveals that it is possible to use your hand to cover your head when eating or drinking with a proper head covering, according to modern Rabbinic teachings.  

The more I watched, the thirstier he became, the more often that hand came up.  His head stopped tipping all the way back, but the hand kept rising and covering his head. 

This is the answer to the only outstanding question of the day.

You are welcome.