Beware of What You Wish For - A Snippet

It's my fault.

I've been complaining that the news has to focus on Trump tweets because nothing new is happening.

Then a policeman knelt on George Floyd's neck.

This is not what I had in mind.  I was prepared to read about Disney opening theme parks. I wasn't prepared for policemen calmly watching as their colleague cut off a suspect's air supply. 

I thought I was anxious before, as masks began to deepen the separation between us.  But this.... this....

Summer is Here

It was too hot to enjoy my walk from the mailbox.  The sun is at that screeching into your eyes like the high pitched whine of a cranky toddler point .  The heat is bouncing off the pavement and scorching my shins. 

I bet you don't think much about your shins in the sunshine, do you? 

The yellow season is over.  The sweet acacia and the mesquite and then the palo verde have each shed their blossoms, in their own time, on their own schedule, unaware that their presence creates a pandemic situation for the pool filters, which bit the dust because their services were overwhelmed with the task presented. 

Skimming the pool is the equivalent of social distancing and wearing a mask.  The system was overwhelmed when steps were not taken; management of the spread protected the patient.  That is a good thing, since the temperatures are predicted to be over 100 for the next few days, precluding any other outdoor activity after 9 o'clock in the morning.

Masks are sweatier as the temperatures go up,  but the trio of sixty-somethings sharing conversation and drinks outside the bagel store last week smiled at my gaiter as I smiled at their bandanas and custom designed masks as I stopped by to pick up something fresh and new. 

More than 6' away, less than 15 minutes, everyone masked.... the store was as safe a space as exists these days.  Was I tempted to sit and enjoy a different view with my bagel and lox?  It was early and the morning breezes were drawing me into the chair before I stopped and considered and drove home to my own backyard where the air was just as sweet, and I knew all the germs in the area.

Summer is here.  In my backyard.  On my driveway. 

Saved By The Edgars

I finished Dana Stabenow's Kate Shugak series and her Liam Campbell series and after 26 books in a row I was left bereft. 

I tried to fill the gap with mah jongg on-line, and the mental nimbleness required kept me distracted and stimulated.  But there are so many hours in a day when you're sheltering in place, so many, many hours.  And Scarlet has a life to lead and isn't always available to amuse me. 

A  book is a friend you can count on, there when you need it, as long as the devices are powered up.

It's not that I needed to rely on the Kindle app, and Amazon Prime's monthly free downloads, and the vast collections available to me on-line from all sorts of libraries all over America.  I have a library filled with the best of what we've collected over our lifetimes - actual, physical, bound books.

But I've been staring at those shelves since March.  I've been doing Pilates in that room since March, often distracted by the titles.  But none of them jumped out at me.... although Plutarch and Thucydides almost had their moments, as did Jeeves and Lucia. After weeks of playing Tiles on the New York Times web edition, of cleaning grout, of spending hours on my cook top which has never glowed so bright, I realized that nothing would replace reading.

The library is open for curbside deliveries, but I'm not thrilled about bringing something new into my house unless I can sanitize it to within an inch of its life.  I've been consistent about staying safe and I'm not taking any unnecessary chances... even though the science suggests that the books will be okay. 

I'm going to wait, once again, for the first adopters to react to the situation.  Until then, I'm putting new ebook releases on hold.  Eventually, which is how I usually feel when I'm 184th in line for 5 copies, has taken on a new meaning of late.  Time is elastic, fungible, a commodity with some utility in a vague breakfast-or-dinner sense but not much beyond that.  Still, I had nothing to excite me.

I moaned about this when TBG and I had a BYOE (except we forgot our chairs but theirs had been out in the sun, untouched for two days, Not-Kathy, who's a nurse, decided that were okay) on Saturday night.   Dr. K said that he'd been reading the Edgar Award winners via Kindle.  Mysteries are one of his genres, too.  He's also a stickler for excellent writing, a voracious reader, and a very smart person. I took his advice.

I came home and searched and found and bookmarked the lists.  Novels and short stories and first timers and lifetime achievements and more have been honored in some form or another since 1954. Not all but a lot of the titles are available digitally, and there are enough of them on the libraries' websites to keep me occupied for a very long time.

Is it any wonder that I've been friends with him
for almost 50 years? 

I Earned a Certificate

Big Cuter and I have finished the Coursera Covid-19 Contact Tracing on-line training.  We earned our certificates.

The course consisted of modules covering transmission and incubation and isolation, giving us the tools to determine how long someone has been/will be infectious, how long someone should quarantine/isolate, and how to gather the information while respecting privacy/confidentiality.  

There was some jargon (the difference between a sign and a symptom) but mostly there were facts.  Big Cuter's suggestion to speed up the teacher's voice made it less time consuming, and, after a while, I fast forwarded so that I could read the verbiage and move on the practice test.  

I learned a lot.  I passed the test with a score of 94% (the arcane distinction between rephrasing and reflecting caught me).  I filled out the form to register for my certificate.

And then I read this:

By checking this box, I acknowledge that I provided my legal name, I am 13 years of age or older, and that I am not from Iran, Sudan, Crimea, or Cuba.

It was a weird ending to an otherwise interesting and useful experience.  Now, to see if someone wants to hire me to do the work.  Contact tracing is how the Ebola epidemic was quelled. I'll be proud to help out here at home.

Memorial Day

The first iteration of this post appeared in 2009.  

*****

I used to march in the Memorial Day parade. I was dressed in my Brownie uniform, and then in my Girl Scout uniform - replete with those embarrassing anklets. I wore them because the troop leader said we couldn't march without them, they were part of our official uniform.  Marching was too cool to pass up.  I wore them and bore the scorn.

All the school bands marched too, and the moms on Benjamin Road provided the materials and the labor to make the capes the high school kids wore. There must have been a military presence there, but I didn't pay enough attention to notice. I was marching and I knew that, all over America, other kids were being Americans and marching, too.

I belonged.

In Marin, the Memorial Day parade was always good for a controversy or two. Or three. Should the anti-war protesters walk alphabetically in the main march, or have their own march, or walk 50 yards behind the official march? I especially liked this discussion: should weaponry be allowed?

That was fairly disingenuous even for Marin.

There were bands at this parade, too, and with Bobby Weir as the Grand Marshal you know the music was worth hearing, especially at the picnic in the park afterwards. Not exactly your typical VFW-sponsored event, but no one was complaining. It was Memorial Day; there had to be a parade and a picnic and a coming together as Americans.

I've got the flag G'ma bought us for a housewarming present, which replaced the one Dadooooo got us in Chicago.  I'll wear the tie-dyed tank top the Cuters and I made early one July.  I'll remember the fallen and recommit to doing everything I can to make this country worthy of their sacrifice.

We have a long way to go, but I have confidence in the future.

"We Are The Ones We've Been Waiting For"

Happy Birthday, Little Cuter

Written in 2012, updated as time has passed

There's a lot to love about my little girl.  Just ask her husband; he'll be glad to share.  So will her in-laws..... and her brother.... and her co-workers....and I. Watch her childrens' faces when she enters the room and you'll see what I mean.

In first grade she came home flummoxed and out of sorts.  The girls in her class had made up a list to take the guess work out of who would get to sit next to Little Cuter at lunch.  Another child might have been flattered; my girl was annoyed.  Why?  What made them think that she was special? She hadn't done anything to merit such attention. And anyway, didn't she have a say in the matter?

I smiled, remembering TBG's oft repeated advice on how to be cool - just act as if you don't care. Her trick was that she really didn't care.  She didn't keep score.  She was friends with everyone.

Nothing had changed by middle school.  "Mom, why do the kids fight with one another?  If you're not mad at anyone you can sit anywhere you like at lunch.  Why don't they get it?"  It was a good question then and it's a good question now. She still gets along with everyone; it's just easier that way.

A high school carpool conversation ended with "He's so awful even Little Cuter doesn't like him."  Catching up with her later in the day, laughing as I shared the story, I was stopped by her expression.  She was perturbed.  Who did they mean?  She was trying to think of someone she didn't like.

She's a truth teller, in the gentlest way imaginable.  "Mom, I love you, but......" has started many a Mom Improvement Project.  We are honest with one another.  I, brutally.  She, kindly.

Thirty-five years ago you arrived on the scene, somewhat reluctantly if the truth be told.  Today, there's not a reluctant bone in your body.  You embrace the world and its challenges with open arms and a welcoming smile, and the world is a better place because you are in it.

Happy Happy Birthday!

Kindergarten Graduation

It's usually a 1 hour assembly, with group singing and dancing.

This afternoon, it was a 1 hour car parade, with signs

and balloons and horns and tutus. 

Not all the families had cars, so parts of the parade were on foot. 

The joy was palpable. 

It was bittersweet to see the teachers and staff from a distance.

The kids were either delighted or perturbed.

It was a valiant attempt to end the year on a happy note.

I left when Lilly ran up and hugged her teacher

who was standing a respectful more-than-6'-distance from me on my decorated stool.

I have promised my children to be extra vigilant.

I took my masked self back to my car, across the parking lot, and blew my paper horn in tribute to those who are being lauded by every other commercial, meme, and post - teachers.

I hope they stay safe.

Sending a Signal

Demanding your rights without accepting responsibilities is not freedom.... it's adolescence.

I'm considering making a batch of t-shirts with that inscribed above a stronger admonition:

Wear a Damn Mask.\

I had to drop two boxes off inside the post office today.  Sister tells tales of  New Jersey's post offices filled with masked marauders; that was certainly not the scene at the Oro Valley post office today.  The sign on the door was clear - PLEASE maintain your distance.   PLEASE Ten (10) patrons inside at one time.

Signage is wonderful.  But it only goes so far.  The paper has no power of enforcement, and there was no one around to see to it that the patrons adhered to the  PLEASEs.  Only one other patron was wearing a mask, and she was using a walker and looked like a poster child for Vulnerable Individual.  She and I were surrounded by 15 or so unmasked patrons standing maybe 3 feet from one another in a line that didn't seem to be moving at all.

I took my disinfectant wipe and used it to push the buttons on the self-service machine and to pull the door handle as I went out to affix the postage and then went back in with my wipe to push the boxes through the giant slot.  All told, I don't think I was in there more than 2 or 3 minutes.

I left the guinea pigs to wallow in their petrie dish and went to the bread store, where, once again, social distancing and protective equipment were fantasies from the life that I, alone, seemed to be living.  Two families, each a dad and two latency age kids, were in the store.  The standing area of the store is about as big as my kitchen.  If you consider the counters on two sides and the display table in the middle, 6 people, with or without masks, is a social distancing nightmare.  And, of course, only I was wearing a mask.

I waited for the first family to leave before I went in.  I said No, thank you to the dad who thought that chivalry demanded that he hold the door for an old lady.  I wanted no part of brushing past him to pick up my ciabbata.  Wear a damn mask!

Having called ahead to place my order, I left the second family to their dithering (don't they know they are not supposed to browse?) and traded my dollars for the pre-sliced-and-waiting loaf the masked saleskid passed over the counter.  I was in there for 30 seconds at the most.

I don't understand the reluctance to wear a mask.  It's good hygiene.  It's thoughtful.  It's respectful. And, as a friend noted, it sends a signal that I am ready to reopen the world, the world which is very different now, the world which will require us to change some behaviors if we are to move forward together.  I'm wearing a mask and that says that it's time to recognize the necessities and to arm ourselves accordingly.

I'm wearing a mask.  I'm sending a signal.

Summer Camp - A Snippet

I learned to swim at day camp.

I learned about homesickness at sleep away camp.

Most of the silly songs my children learned were ones I discovered at summer camps.  Tying a lanyard (in both barrel and box stitch) and learning to eat soupy oatmeal, listening to Taps and sitting around a campfire - I can conjure those memories without any effort at all.

And so, when Little Cuter announced the creation of Mom Camp, I opened the floodgates and let it all back in.  I was 6 and I was 10 and I was 16 and I was doing fun stuff in the summertime.

It's been a wonderful day.

Losing My Shit

I bumped my left elbow on the kitchen table yesterday.  It hurts, even with Arnica.  I lean on that elbow when I get out of bed, a fact I discovered this morning.  As TBG said at the end of this trauma, Kiddo, you shouldn't have gotten out of bed this morning.

Maybe he was right.  Maybe my balloon was just ready to pop. 

I went out to run an errand, the same errand I've run every week since March 12th.  I've always been alone on the road, catching up to a car or two at a traffic light or passing one at a stop sign. 

But Arizona is opening up, and there were a lot of cars vying for space on the way there, and more on the way back.  It upset me.  Where were they going?  Why were they going? 

Half the people in the two stops I made were masked, the others were blithely spreading their smiling germs hither and yon.  Only one person looked askance at my covered face, but, in retrospect, his smile might not have been as snarky as I interpreted it to be.  I was on a roll, and things were about to go from bad to worse.

I couldn't get what I'd been promised, and the worker, though behind a plexiglass shield from me, wore his mask around his chin, standing too close to a co-worker on either side.  I couldn't get out of there fast enough.

I got home and began to cry.

I sobbed, moaned, wailed, rocked back and forth for the better part of an hour.  TBG kept trying, but there wasn't really anything anyone could do.  It just had to come out.  And come out, it did. 

Little Cuter talked me off the ledge, giving me sound, Oprah-based advice about redefining the moment, while nodding in total agreement as I listed the things that were causing me to spiral down the rabbit hole.  She'd been there, felt that, agreed with every part of it, understood it all and was just as peeved as I was about the whole thing, even if, right then and there, she didn't need to melt down quite as totally as I did.

I went for a hard swim, got my adrenaline pumping and my heart racing - TBG's prescription for this situation is to become so exhausted you can't think of anything else.  That works for him, and the exercise always does me good, but my girl's shoulder to cry on, even from afar, worked wonders for me this morning.

And now, having written it down, it's over.  Thanks for listening, denizens.

Do I Miss Grocery Shopping?

I've been a big fan of Safeway's drive up and go service.  It feels safe and responsible and, after the first few weeks, it has been a timely answer to feeding ourselves.  I used to have to plan 7 days in advance to get an order, then 4 days, and now I can find a slot on the same day.

Little Cuter sent me the fixings for strawberry shortcake alongshelt with flowers and blueberries and ciabatta for Mother's Day via Whole Foods.  The supplies arrived an hour after she ordered them.

And now I'm wondering about the utility of my entering the stores at all, even when sheltering in place is not required.  I'm not impulse buying that interesting something or other.  I'm not buying a 4th bottle of ketchup because I can't remember if I remembered to resupply the pantry the last time I shopped.  (G'ma used a list; I never remember to bring mine from home.)

I do miss selecting my own produce; I know if I want green bananas because I still have 2 ripening at home.  Ordering steak is also problematic; you purchase by the pound, not by the serving.  That leaves me with one very thick piece of meat that is as problematic to divide in to two thinner slices as it is to bbq in all its stubby glory. 

Sometimes the substitutions make no sense. This:

is not the same as Haagen Dazs Vanilla.

But, on the whole, the experience is an efficient use of my time.  I can place an order between commercials, with TBG by my side to remind me about the Wheat Thins and the Cheerios.  I drive further than I would normally, since the nearest pick up store is 9 miles away, rather than around the corner and down the block, but I'm still spending less time collecting the goodies.  Someone else is walking up and down the aisles while I am at home, doing other things.

Doing other things..... doesn't that sound like fun?  I usually stopped into the store on my way home from doing those other things.



Looking into the

Feeling Marginally Better

I Listened to the Supreme Court.  My faith in America was restored.  The arguments were reasoned, thoughtful, and Justice Thomas actually spoke.

There's no answer yet, so I can smile without adding disappointment to the equation.

There's also Judge Emmett Sullivan, who's opening up the criminal case to amicus briefs as he wonders if Flynn perjured himself.  In Judge Sullivan's courtroom, no less.

There's still no safe way for me to restart my life, and no one I talk to thinks there is, either.  I don't relish the thought of months without hugging Giblet.  Thanks to FaceTime, at 22 months,  he knows who we are, and no doubt thinks that Grampa and I are every bit as real as Elmo.  We all come into his life via screens.

Don't I wish I could reply to FlapJilly's plaintive I wish you could come over and visit with I'm buying a ticket right now?  I've been sad about that particular matter ever since she said it.... and that was early on, when I still harbored notions of a family reunion for her mid-summer birthday.

But, for the moment, I'm going to concentrate on two pieces of American jurisprudence which, for a while, didn't disappoint me.

Following His Advice

POTUS was impressed with the destructive effects of ultraviolet light on the virus.

So, I washed the veggies and put them outside on the pool mat, to soak up some rays.

It made me feel a lot better.  It made a nice picture.  And, since the science he referenced spoke of the virus on surfaces, I felt justified in exposing my newly delivered treats to some UV... until it all just seemed a little bit silly.... and everything was dry... so we went inside.

*****

Quarantine.... when washing produce produces a post.  Be grateful.  There's another post on soap headed your way.