Black and White and Read All Over

I love this cartoon because it shows so perfectly why I still read a newspaper.  I can take it anywhere with me, including the bathroom for an extended visit.  I don't like this trend of newspapers failing, for people to stop reading them, for getting news from the computer or solely from the television.  I can't do it.  I've tried.  I have the NY Times sending me their news every day on my computer.  I look at the titles of the articles and of the OpEd and I end up choosing only one or two articles or editorials to read, if I read any at all.  I read the titles and then I think, oh, whatever, I don't have time to read that right now, I'm tired of being on this computer.  I have better things to do.

I don't feel that way about an actual newspaper.  I get the USA Today, because the Kitsap Sun wasn't serious enough and didn't have enough national news and not much content of any kind anymore.  My son has argued that the USA Today is the "worst paper" in the nation.  Maybe he's right, though he really doesn't have a leg to stand on because he reads no newspapers at all.  And I find that USA T. has lots of content.  I like the visuals, the graphs, the results of polls, the extensive national/international news.  Certainly it's not as serious or intellectual as the NY Times, but I truly don't have time to read a paper as big as that, and I'd want to read it all.  There'd be no time to clean the kitchen floor or do the laundry or to take a walk.  Wouldn't be able to accomplish anything--would have to read my Times.  Even with the smaller paper I get I end up having a pile of 2 or 3 of them that I haven't finished yet.

I like to hold a newspaper in my hand, I like to put it down and come back to it. I like to cut out an article and send it to a friend.  We used to like to get articles from my husband's Dad--sometimes we weren't sure why he sent them but they were still a nice way of communicating.  I don't even mind the black ink on my fingers.  I feel the same about books.  I want to turn pages, dog-ear them if there's something good on that page, loan them to people if I love them.  I'm not going to read them again, and most I will give away or take to the used book store for credit, but I like the heft of a book in my hand. I like the cover art and the accolades listed on the back.  My daughter has a Kindle--it's fascinating technology but I can't do it.  Don't want to do it--won't.  

Are people like me going to die off?  Is the hard-cover book business, the paper newspaper, going to go away some day as younger people get more and more used to getting their news from tiny little screens, by Twitters, by Facebooks, by Googles?  What kind of news will it be?  Will there be content or will it end up being just one-liners?  US Freighter Boarded by Pirates Today!  North Korea Launches Missile! Bank fails!  Taxes Increase!  Obama's Get Dog!  No whys or wherefores, just headlines.  No Woodwards or Bersteins doing investigative reporting, maybe an Ask Jesse on the news, but will it be enough to stay informed?

My husband has recently stopped taking the Kitsap Sun and reads it online now.  It works for him because he's always been a "headline" guy.  He can rip through a paper in 5 minutes.  If something grabs his attention he may read further, but usually not.  He watches the news and stays up on things, even arguing with what he hears there.  But because I read whole articles and editorials I know much more about what he has read in a headline and if I want to argue a point I have something to back me up.  I miss the Sun only because I can't get the Sunday Crossword anymore.  Do it online you may say, but no can do!  I have to have that page in my hand, and that pencil and I have to be able to pick it up and put it down and pick it up again. I've taken to begging my Mom for her copy because, sadly, the USA Today's crossword is pathetic.

I have to admit to not knowing much about what is going on in my own town and county anymore, but the Sun wasn't helping me out in that area much anyway (and the CK Journal is helpful for that and it's free!).  I could see that people were being murdered, that there were house fires, car accidents, domestic abuse, drug raids--as has been said, "What bleeds, leads", but it was more "scare news" than anything else.  The TV news is much of the same.  I want reporting that causes me to ask myself how I feel about that, what I think.  I don't want to be shocked over and over.  I want to muse on things.  If I want to know how Thomas Friedman is viewing the world or what Paul Klugman is thinking about the economy I can go to NY Times online, but in the meantime I'll stick with my USA Today, keep stealing my Mom's Sunday NY Times crossword from her Sun, and rely on Ralph to email me with any notices of alumni deaths.  I'll keep reading my news on paper as long as I'm allowed and my books, too.  I'll probably be part of a dying breed, but I'm going to hold out until the last.  And keep washing the printer's ink off my fingers.

Infernal Method?

I gave my husband a "page a day" calendar for Christmas.  It was titled The Stupidest Things Ever Said or something like that.  Every day he brings me the daily page home so that I can read the dopey things people have actually said.  I have saved some of my favorites and I'll share them with you.

The oldest quote in the ones I've saved is from 1861:

"I am tired of all this sort of thing called science here...We have spent millions in that sort of thing for the last few years, and it is time it should be stopped."  Senator Simon Cameron speaking about the Smithsonian Institute

********

Anybody who watches The Big Bang Theory will wonder if this is a Sheldon quote but it isn't:

"This is strictly a pantagraphic hauntography of proto-manic motherworlds.  Mysteriograms of toposonic radiances are deconstructed and raptoluminal resonances at residual numinophillic nemeta sites are reiterated in the mycoboreal precincts."  

This is from a press release for the music of the band Infernal Method.  Infernal indeed!!!  Hope they're taking their medication!  I've included a picture of one of their albums above.  I bet their music would make your ears bleed.

*******

This next one is probably just a bad interpretation, but an interpretation of what???

"Alternatively, you must follow my advice whenever I say 'maltose'."  An English subtitle in a Hong Kong kung-fu movie

*******

I would have had a hard time keeping from giggling if I'd been to the wedding where this was said:

"Come build with me a Temple, and not a Tavern, out of the lumber of our lives."  Contributed by Rev. David Peterson

*******

And finally a sentiment many of us could get behind:

"We don't all agree on everything.  I don't agree with myself on everything."  And that was said by America's Mayor, Rudy Giuliani, speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference

Hope you've enjoyed these as much as I did.

March 15th? Really?

Is this Winter of 2008-09 ever going to end?  My poor snow-laden daffodils would like to know, as would my frozen crocuses, as would I.  Sitting on the couch this morning, with a blanket on my knees, watching CBS Sunday Morning and once again watching the snow fall rapidly, building up 4 inches in less than 2 hours, I begin to wonder!  If this is Global Warming it's not what I expected.  I think it's supposed to be the First Day of Spring in 6 days....tell that to the robins.  

Pictures

Top:  Zuzu

Middle: Alison

Bottom: Their Daddy when he was about 16 months old

Last week I was redoing a photo album from 1977-78.  The album was falling apart and I was taking all the pictures out of it and putting them into a better album that wouldn't fall apart and would hopefully preserve the pictures.  At the time we took the pictures we thought we were taking lots of them.  We used up rolls of film like toilet paper.  We were always sending them off to get developed and waiting the week or so that it took to get them back.  When we got them back they went into the albums pretty quickly.  I didn't like photos sitting around in envelopes and boxes.  I wanted to look at them, in order, in a book.

How things have changed!  The difference in the quality of the pictures above is striking.  The two top pictures were, of course, taken recently with a digital camera, the bottom one with a film camera in 1978.  Even if the top two pictures had turned out dark like the bottom one, they could have been "fixed" immediately, without paying anything, without any directions to the photo lab, without waiting.  If we took a "bad" picture we kept it anyway because you only got 24 chances in a roll.  Nowadays  you can throw away anything that you don't like and still have plenty of pictures left to choose from.  

Oh, I wish I'd had a digital camera when my kids were young.  As I said we thought we were taking LOTS of pictures, but it was nothing compared to the documentation of my grandchildren, whose faces can be seen in literally thousands of pictures.  See www.flickr.com/photos/plasticporkbone if you want to get an idea of how many photos are there.  And those are only the ones that made the cut.  There were many more on the camera, because we can now take as many pictures as we want in pursuit of the perfect one.

I do love the digital age, especially when it comes to photographs, but there is a downside.  There isn't the need for photo albums anymore and so most people put the pictures they want to save on their computers and when they want to look at them, they go to their monitors and watch them go by.  Or they get a digital picture frame or they use their pictures as screen savers.  That doesn't do it for me.  I am still a member of the group, growing smaller and smaller, of people who like to hold a picture album on my lap and linger over the pictures, comparing them with pictures from a year ago, or a decade ago.  Look at how much she looks like her Grandfather!  The hairdos were so funny in the 80's!  Can you believe he's grown into such a tall young man?  Look at him when he was 3 years old!  I can't believe that's me!  I was so thin and my hair was so dark!

Pictures can still be printed but how many people are still getting photos printed?  Will we see the photo album going the way of the 8-track cassette soon?  When a teenager brings a boyfriend home will they have to turn on the computer to see the embarrassing pictures of their new girlfriend as a naked baby?  Will they have to go to the computer when their children are born to compare their features to those of their relatives?  Will they have to insert a CD into a slot to view their pictures from their vacation?  Or will all those thousands of pictures, forever preserved in digital form ever be looked at?  Isn't it so much easier to take an album off the shelf and leaf through it?  Isn't it fun when your kids come home to visit to pull out the old albums and sit with them and remember?

Granted it is easier and much faster to download digital pictures directly from a camera into a computer file.  It's takes more effort to choose pictures to be printed, pay the 15 cents or less for each one, put each into an album.  It takes some time and some dedication to keep at it.  But I truly think it is a worthwhile endeavor.  To linger over a picture, to relive the memory behind it, to study the images, to touch them, to compare and reflect is soul satisfying in a way that pictures on a disk or computer is not.  I hope there are young people who will continue this practice and that it won't become one of those bygone hobbies that only have meaning to the "old folks".  It would be a sad loss. 

The Academy Awards

My mother made me into a "movie nut".  She loved movies so much that when she wanted to see one in Bremerton, she loaded me and my brother into the car and the three of us went, no matter what the movie was.  I know I had seen other movies before it, but the earliest movie memory I have is of The Song of the South, the one with Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox and Uncle Remus.  It was a Disney cartoon with that wonderful song Zippity Doo Dah and those little blue birds flitting around Uncle Remus's head.  Coming back to our car afterwards I saw the first black man of my life and I was convinced he was Uncle Remus.  I was 4 years old.  

At home Mom had all the movie magazines she could get her hands on--Photoplay, Modern Screen, others I don't remember the names of.  When I got old enough to use scissors I cut out pictures of my favorite movie stars, Elizabeth Taylor, Tab Hunter, Rock Hudson, Debbie Reynolds, Natalie Wood, Robert Wagner, Jeffrey Hunter, and put them in a scrapbook with a wooden cover that my father had made for me.  I had an Elizabeth Taylor coloring book and movie star paper dolls.  I had magazine pictures of "stars" on the walls of my bedroom.  I was star-struck. I even wrote a fan letter to Elizabeth Taylor when the magazines claimed she was going to divorce Michael Wilding.  I didn't believe it, they made a beautiful couple and I thought the magazines were mean and making it up.  I received a postcard back with a standard thank you message and a couple of months later, Liz did indeed divorce Wilding. My first dissolution.

Over the years I have seen the inside of every movie theater that used to be in Bremerton--remember the Grand and the Tower?  We went to the Kitsap Lake Drive-In and the Big Bear and the Rodeo Drive-Ins.  I have seen hundreds, if not thousands, of movies but with the birth of video tape and then DVDs the viewing has become mostly in my own home.  We still watch almost 100 movies in a year.  I love movies and I think they are an important part of the world's culture.  And that's why I watch the Academy Awards.

Once upon a time watching the Oscar Awards show was so important to me that I'd make a special dessert in honor of it.  One year I went all out and made Chocolate Elcairs.  But now I just make sure I'm not going to be interrupted and try to get my husband to cooperate by keeping his opinions and his talking to himself.  I want total concentration. I want to see all the pretty dresses and jewelry and hear everything that is said, inane or not.

This year the awards program was tighter, better organized and different.  The orchestra was on the stage, not a single award recipient was hustled off the stage by loud music, there were some pretty good film clip montages, particularly the "action" collection.  I thought Wolverine (AKA Hugh Jackman) was an elegant, witty host, a talented fellow for sure.

My favorite dress was Amy Adam's beautiful deep red strapless number with the "bib" necklace.  I was happy to see Miley Cyrus teenage body in a dress more suited to her years--it was pretty and sparkly and had cap sleeves, befitting a young woman.  It reminded me of a nicely decorated cake. Sweet.  Mickey Roarke was dressed well as usual, this time with a little necklace that had a picture of his recently deceased Chihuahua, Loki.  I like a man who loves his dogs.  But I wish Mickey could find somewhere else to place his left hand other than in the waistband of his trousers.  And I do wish he would find a new hairstyle.  It always looks dirty.  Sarah Jessica Parker, in her "almost mint" colored strapless dress, looked as if she would soon pop out of it.  I didn't think she had enough on top to hold a dress like that up--I think adhesive might have been involved.

As for the presenters this year, I couldn't stop laughing at Ben Stiller's imitation of Jouquin Phoenix, mumbling and wandering around the stage.  I guffawed when Steve Martin looked at Tina Fey, who was staring up at him with admiration, and said, "Don't fall in love with me!" I liked the idea of 5 presenters for each big acting award.  Instead of showing clips of each nominated performance it was nice to have an individual look an actor/actress in the face and speak to them, telling them what was great about their performance and congratulating them on being singled out.

Of those nominated for best acting jobs, I have seen only Melissa Leo in Frozen River and I knew she wouldn't win.  It was one of those bones thrown to a person in an indy movie that most of us has never heard of.  I was pretty sure Kate Winslet would win in that category.  As I said, I am (still) so star-struck that I have read many articles about all the other movies and I had my picks.  I wanted Penelope Cruz to win and Mickey Roarke (because of his back story), who lost to Sean Penn, and it was pretty clear that Heath Ledger would win again.  It was sad to see his parents and his sister accepting his award.  They held up but his mother had the tortured look that mothers have when they've lost children.

For best movie it was clear all through "awards season" that Slumdog Millionaire would win the big one and I am dying to see it now.  I think it's one of those "feel good" movies for our depressing times.  It was fun to try to understand all those East Indians accepting awards.  It was easy to interpret their thrill.  The other movie everyone should see in order to get a good feeling is Wall-E.  I've seen it three times now and it makes me feel good each time.

So all in all, the ceremony was pretty good this year.  It went only about 20 minutes overtime, much better than in some years.  There wasn't anything embarrassingly over the top, except for maybe the dance number with the top hats--I liked Jackman's earlier song better, reminiscent of the songs Billie Crystal used to do to honor the nominated movies.  And I was happy that Sean Penn injected some controversy during his acceptance speech, because what's an Academy Award ceremony without a streaker, or an Indian Princess accepting Marlon Brando's award or Vanessa Redgrave demonstrating for the Palestinian Liberation Organization?!  I have just one question:  Where was Jack Nicholson?  I missed him leering from behind his dark glasses in the front row.

Even if the awards had disappointed, as they have so many times over the decades, I would still watch them.  I notice the ratings are going down each year and one day the networks might decide they won't be showing us the Oscars anymore.  It would be a sad day for me, the end of a long glittery era.  But until then, I'll be there.  

 

Thoughts

Last week at our most recent CK Alumni lunch a couple of people pointed out to me that it had been awhile since I'd made a post.  True enough and it was nice to have people notice and hanker for something new.

The truth is that I haven't been thinking about anything much, or at least nothing I wanted to expound on.  Random thoughts about random events, is all.  So, in order to post something, here are the random thoughts:

Jessica Simpson:  I think you all know how I feel about the media, pop-culture emphasis on body image, more pointedly the image of a skinny body.  And here we have Jessica Simpson, talentless perhaps, but beautiful in that blond long-legged way that America loves, apparently putting on a few pounds.  And we have the media jumping on her with both skinny feet, putting up a picture of her in jeans and a wide belt that shows nothing except that she is still as beautiful as ever, claiming she has let herself go!  I think she has said something to the affect that she's going to do whatever she wants to do and eat whatever she wants to eat and that she feels healthy.  Good for her!

Octuplet Mom:  Here is another example of the media telling us what is our business and doggone it, isn't everything our business these days?! The media seems to think so and they have managed to find many "experts" to agree that this young woman has no business having six embryos implanted in her very own uterus resulting in 8 new babies.  Am I the only one who thinks we should just let her be, let her figure out how she is going to raise all her children and let this all fade away?  I feel like we are peeping toms, for crying out loud.  When did we get to decide how many children people wanted?  Let her be.

Peanut Butter:  Boy, am I glad that first, I'm not allergic to peanut butter, and second, that I have a great big 5 pound jar of Adams Chunky that's still half full!  My peanut butter is very important to me and my toast and I'm bummed that we maybe can't trust it anymore....

87-year old Mom:  We helped my Mom celebrate her 87th birthday on February 12th.  She and her cousin used to call each other Abe, because they shared Lincoln's birthday and this year we are hearing lots about Abe and the 200th year since his birth.  As for me, I'm pretty impressed that my Mom is a healthy 87 year old.  I made her a roast chicken dinner and a cherry pie and after dinner we watched Meet Me In St. Louis, with Judy Garland, and we sang all the songs and then we sent her home with half the pie.

The Economy:  The more I hear about the Great Recession the scarier it gets.  The more I try to understand what happened the more confused I become.  The mortgage meltdown, the bank closures, the bailout, the TARP, the stimulus package, my Roth IRA worth 1/2 of what is was worth just a year ago, the layoffs, Bernie Madoff.  Good grief!

American Idol:  We have been watching American Idol since the beginning, missing only one season (the one where Rubin Stoddard won and Clay Aiken got the fame).  It's a guilty pleasure. I always feel squirmy listening to the judges give their non-constructive comments, Paula makes me cringe and I cover my face in reaction to people who think they can sing and most assuredly cannot.  There is always one singer that catches my fancy by the time we have come to the Final Twelve.  Once or twice we even voted.  I liked that silver-haired young many from season before last and what became of him?  It's the only reality show we watch so I guess it's not so bad to enjoy it.  This week will start the real fun--36 finalists vying for those last 12 spots.  The thing is, Idol seems to actually make a difference--many of these kids have achieved something since their wins, or almost wins.  It's a definite leg up in a very difficult business. 

Alumni Lunches:  We had another CK Alumni lunch last Wednesday.  I like this trend of getting together often.  We are forming a group of people that  are learning about each other in a more important way then just as people we "used to know".  We are finding out that we are fragile and need support.  We are learning that we have much in common by virtue of the fact that we are all the same age.  We are losing friends, we are caring for aging parents, we are dealing with grown children and siblings.  I like knowing that if something goes well or badly in my life I have a big group of old friends that care.  I like caring about them, too.

So, there you have it, my thoughts for right now.  The sun is shining, my youngest granddaughter, Zuzu, just started walking today and tomorrow I am having coffee with one of my rediscovered classmates.  It'll be a good week.  Hope yours is, too.

Say Amen

How often do you get to witness anything that is real history, that will be in the books that school children study? If you are almost 65 you have experienced some world history already.  Do you remember the election of JFK and his beautiful wife, Jackie? Do you remember 1963 and John Kennedy's assassination?  Do you remember the Viet Nam war?  Do you remember 1968 and the assassinations of both Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King? The moon landing? I remember all of those days and times--each of them spent in front of a television set, following the events with my eyes and ears and my heart.  Hope, exhilaration and then broken hearted, angry, dreams dashed, the beginning of cynicism, riots, marches.

I  remembered all those days and feelings as I sat transfixed in front of our big modern flat screen, savoring the images of the huge crowds in the Capitol, the millions of faces of every conceivable color together in joy, the radiance of those faces, the tears, the dancing, the laughter, the celebration.  I could not look away.  I kept being drawn back to the realization that it was history, that it was the fulfillment of so many of our dreams, that it was nearly miraculous, that it was really happening, right there, in front of all of us, finally.  The cynicism that had grown worse over the years washed away by this calm presence, this intelligent force, this promise.

All day I relished the network pundits words about "the first time", the young family, the momentous occasion.  I watched as the famous politicians arrived, the former vice presidents, then the former presidents and the first lady and the first lady-to-be and then, what we all had been waiting for, the President and the President Elect.  I wanted to cheer, all by myself here in my home, but instead I starting crying and a big lump formed in my throat.  How could this possibly be happening, after all those months of giving out buttons and sending money and telling people what Obama stood for--after all those months of hope--after all the debates and the polls?  Even though the convention had happened the votes were counted and Obama had won, it was still not a fact in my mind.  I could say the words out loud, "Barack Obama is going to be President", but the thought of it was so unbelievable that until he was sworn in and until he gave his speech and until he began to take charge, first at the lunch and then later at the parade, I still could not quite believe it was happening.  I kept having to remind myself it was real.  From the looks of the faces right there in Washington D.C., right there where they could see it taking place, I could tell I wasn't alone.  We were all pinching ourselves and may still be trying to wrap our minds around the fact.  When I hear Obama on the news now I run into the room to hang on every word, to savor those moments which as they become more and more familiar may convince me that we are here, that we have gotten to this new place, that we have all "reached the mountaintop".

I loved the reverend who gave the benediction after the inauguration--he spoke of the "yellow being mellow and the white doing what is right" and then he ended his words with "Say Amen, say amen, say amen!"  SAY AMEN!  I don't pray per se, but in my way I am praying hard now that nothing happens to mess up this moment in history.  I may have lost some of the cynicism but I haven't lost the fear of something good being taken away.  It's happened too many times. Say amen with me--say amen to hoping for the best--expecting success instead of waiting for failure.  Say amen to reenergizing the county, to remaking our image in the world, for getting things done.  Say amen, say amen, say amen!  Stand behind this striving young man of ideals and his family as their lives change and they try to change ours for the better.  Say Amen!

I shall try my damnedest to forget 1968 and put that bloody time behind me for once and for all.  I shall try to nourish hope again and be positive about the future.  I shall not expect more than is possible, but I will not accept less than I know we can do.  Look forward with me and say Amen!

New Year's Resolutions

If you click on the title of this post you will be taken to a very funny song about New Year's Resolutions.  In the spirit of the song, here are my resolutions:

1.  I will gain weight and then lose it and then gain it again during the Holidays.  

2.  I will read fiction all year, even though I will strive to read a "good for my brain" non-fiction book at some point.

3.  I will exercise sometimes and think about exercising more.

4.  I will watch a Netflix movie every Friday night.

5.  I will drink too much coffee.

6.  I will eat many cookies, lots of them homemade.

7.  I will spend time playing FreeCell when I should be cleaning.

8.  I will intend to do more in my garden than I will actually do.

9.  I will think about making goals.

10. I will watch The Big Bang Theory and The Office whenever they are on.

11. I will deny that I am in any way lazy and then read awhile and take a nap.

12. I will sit in the sunshine this summer and forget to use sunscreen.

13. I might clean out a closet.

14. I will pluck the hairs out of my chin and remember that I once told my Aunt Virginia that she had a mustache.

15.  I will continue my vice of accumulating more books.

That's enough of that!  I think I can live up to those lofty goals and I'd better not add any more. I don't want to set myself up for failure.

Edit

Auld Lang Syne many times over

This started with a You Tube video I saw on the Rotten Tomatoes site, with the Beach Boys version of Auld Lang Syne. It was so nice I wanted to share it and so I went to You Tube and lo and behold there were many, many Auld Lang Synes. These are the best ones. I hope you don't mind so many of them and that you won't be totally sick and tired of the song by the time you are done! Happy New Year!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qob_iH13tRA Beach Boys

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U9zXXRiTVA&feature=related Aretha Franklin and Billy Preston

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLAAHs1ohxg&feature=related Andre Rieu

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MX60CAaDbQ&feature=related

At the Scottish Parliament--do you see Sean Connery?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86_tlA9maA0&feature=related Robert Burns intended tune played beautifully by Kevin Thompson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bON8teERvg&feature=related The Alumni Singers of the University of Santo Tomas (Philipines)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V74AtU4rGT0&feature=related A piano improvisation with pictures by an unknown young woman

Seven People in the House!

Grandson, Alex, shoveling snow

Grandma and Granddaughter, Alecia

Daughters Erin and Carolyn with Alecia and Grandma

Daughter Erin and her Husband with Grandma and her mate

It was the week that was!  Snow, Wall-E, ham, extra blankets and pillows, computers, ipods, PDAs, cords, You Tube videos, cell phones, Christmas presents, music, lasagna, bumptiousness, a little fractiousness, tears, naps, Quiddler, dominoes, Legos, Star Wars, coffee grinding, dishwashing, Red Chili, waffles, last-minute shopping, mixed nuts, Barnes and Noble, Starbucks, books, knitting, picture taking, sausages with maple syrup, White Chili, groceries, more snow, slush, ice, UPS disappointment, soggy newspapers, Sudoko, crosswords, Boggle, hugs, kisses, meltdowns, laughs, jokes, hilarity, Get Smart (old and new), shoveling, boots, gloves, cookies, chocolates, cocoa and coffee, coffee, coffee.

At one point I said to anybody in general, "I feel like I've just run a marathon!"  My body was aching, my mind was dim, I was sleepy but somehow exhilarated.  Two of my three children were with us at Christmas and this was such an unusual event it may not be repeated again for 10 more years, but I hope that's not the case.  Our Christmases have gotten so quiet with just the two of us slowly and sedately opening our gifts to one another on Christmas morning, putting the spent wrapping in a bag to burn later, stopping to eat breakfast, then spending the rest of the day calling our kids and our mothers to wish them a happy Christmas, then napping, putting our new treasures away or reading them or playing with them.  But this Christmas was a whole new ballgame.  It wasn't like the wild Christmas mornings when the kids were little.  For one thing, only my eldest daughter and her husband were with us on Christmas morning.  And we are adults and we value our sleep, so three of us were late to rise.  The other one, my husband, got up at 3:30 a.m.!!!  He loves Christmas and couldn't contain himself but he was patient with the rest of us. He made the coffee and built a fire and turned on the lights of the Christmas tree.  He'd gotten a "wrapping bag" and scissors, because he is a tidy guy.  And he waited for the rest of us slug-a-beds to get going.

There was snow on the ground from a couple of snowfalls and it was snowing again.  All of us marveled at this, because it  hardly ever snows in Washington on Christmas and it never snows in Virginia on Christmas.  It was pretty perfect with Christmas carols playing on the stereo. With four adults the present opening went on longer than usual and it was lots more interesting.  I was filled with delight at my favorite present of all--the lovely marriage my daughter has made that was evident in the way she and her husband were with each other that morning and the week they were with us. That was a wonderful gift for me--not tangible, I can't put it on a shelf or in a drawer or read it or do it, but it filled me with pride and gratitude that maybe I had a tiny bit to do with it and even if I didn't, it is true and real.

The other daughter and her son and daughter didn't arrive until Christmas evening, just a little before the Christmas Ham dinner went on the table.  We'd made a huge salad and lots of mashed potatoes because this daughter is a vegetarian, though her kids aren't.  She appreciated the Yukon Gold potatoes that Erin's husband helped to mash.  The noise level ratcheted up a few degrees with now seven people in the house.  It occurred to me that my sister-in-law has 6 kids and so her house is filled with 8 people ALL the time!  I pointed this out to my husband and both of our eyes widened in shocked realization and appreciation.

There was more present opening for the new arrivals and then we watched Wall-E for the second time.  We had watched it on Christmas Eve--actually unwrapped the DVD and watched it with my Mom and brother and then rewrapped it for my grandson.  It's a perfect film for Christmas--sweet, funny, a fantasy with a little attitude for the current times.  

The days were filled with game playing and computing and conversation.  The daughters hadn't seen each other in 18 years and I hadn't seen my Virginia daughter for 2 1/2 years.  There was lots of catching up to do.  My husband spent a good deal of the time trying to communicate with UPS because a package he thought would arrive on Dec. 23 was still not here.  My oldest daughter left several messages for her two grownup sons who were back in Virginia taking care of the dogs and obviously doing their own thing on Christmas, to the dismay of their mother, who was missing them.  I spent my time watching everyone and marveling at what nice people I had in my house.  I asked some questions I'd been longing for years to know the answers to, got satisfactory replies, gave hugs I wish I could give every day, trying to save them up to remember later and reveled in the gaiety and warmth of cooking and eating together.

We said goodbye to Erin and her husband on the 28th and Carolyn and her kids on Dec 30th and then we were alone again, washing and folding up the bed linens, organizing the clutter, getting at the dust bunnies that took residence while we were having a good time instead of cleaning.  We put the breaks on the eating of cookies and candy and nuts and went back to our ordinary disciplines.  We quickly resumed our quiet lives.  It is strange to have the old quiet life back after tasting what it's like to have kids and grandkids in the house.  I miss the bustle and the opinions and the laughter. I rue the day I ascribed to the child rearing theory of teaching your kids independence so that they will want to see the world and not be satisfied with staying in the one-horse town they grew up in.  Where did I get such a silly idea? Well, that's water under the bridge. stuff under the thing, last week's wash.  Now I can hope everyone had such a good time that they'd like to repeat it again soon.  Hint, hint--nudge, nudge--wink, wink--say no more!

Merry Christmas to all Friends and Loved Ones

and

Even Those I don't know who Visit this Blog!

Snow Pictures

As you can plainly see, we have a little bit of snow at our house and the weather people are promising more.  No matter how much it might rain later we will have a white Christmas up here at 500 feet.  This morning the squirrels were outside, running around in the snow, probably trying to find their old caches of sunflower seeds and when they couldn't dig down far enough to find them they decided to use intimidation instead.  They stood facing the house, staring at me as I looked out at them.  So I bundled up and bowed to their needs and went out and scattered some more birdseed, which is supposed to be for the birds but I am a realist and know that the squirrels will get the bulk of it.  They are sweet, though loud, little creatures, and I know they are just rodents with good PR, but I like them.

Christmas is coming and we are getting fat, let alone the goose.  Lots of cookies and goodies are on the kitchen counter and I love to bake at Christmas, so I will be making more.  My oldest daughter and her fabulous husband are here now and we are all tapping away on our laptops and humming Christmas songs and planning to bake today--french bread and more cookies.  More snow is coming, and so is another daughter and Christmas is only 2 days away.  This will be one for the weather record books, and for the personal record books, too.  How long has it been since I had so many of my children close at this time of year?  It's been almost two decades.  18 years.  We have all changed and not changed.  I am still Mom and my daughters are still little girls to me, even if they have children of their own and my eldest was offered a senior discount the other day, though she is still at least 10 years away from qualifying.  That daughter still has a sneeze just like mine and loves sweets, just like me, and is smart and funny.  Youngest daughter sounds exactly like me and is just as opinionated. We start out right where we left off, even if it was 2 1/2 years ago.  Oldest daughter and I went to Scotland in 2006 and we are enjoying remembering our favorite parts. We be taking many, many pictures to remember this event because it isn't likely to repeat itself soon.  I'll put them on another post, so you can see my girls with their Mom.

I'm trying to convince someone else to go outside and make a snowman with me to surprise my little grandson who will be here on Christmas Day, but so far there are no takers.  We are readers, writers, thinkers and not big action takers.  Fabulous Husband of Daughter was outside chopping and hauling wood this morning, being very useful and he has helped with dishes several times, so his action-taking is at a pretty high level, but I can't blame the rest of them--it's cold out there.  I hope all of you are managing to stay warm and cozy and have all your shopping done and plenty of food in the larder.  Enjoy the beauty of the snow--we don't get to see this much of it very often.  So far the lights have stayed on and we haven't had any adverse affects, so we can be pretty blithe about it.  Hope all is going well for you, too!

"Our contemporary, semi-secular Christmas is similarly a collection of everything yearned for: warmth, plenty, peace, family, conviviality. Like Narnia, the holiday is a fantasy, but there are times when a fantasy is exactly what you need."  Laura Miller NY Times

In her editorial Laura Miller says she reads The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe every year at this time because it means Christmas to her.  She makes a good claim that our present celebration was pretty much invented in Victorian times, by Charles Dickens, Clement Moore, Washington Irving and I would add, Thomas Nast, who gave us the jolly red-suited Father Christmas.  Everything before that, that put Jesus' birth in December, the Christmas Tree, gifts, etc., etc., was handed down over centuries with only second, third, fourth hand reasonings from German, Roman and other pagan civilizations.  Why not celebrate it the way we do--who is to say that the way it has evolved is incorrect or sacrilege?

My daughter-in-law watches It's a Wonderful Life at Christmas time.  She is an admitted Christmas Fiend--the season means as much to her as my books mean to me.  She guards it's sanctity, but her sanctity is not the same as someone else's.  Hers mean that there is a live tree, that each precious ornament, collected over her 33 years and lovingly wrapped and stored, makes it's way carefully to the tree.  It means that Christmas carols are playing all day every day.  It means that her children understand that Christmas is a time of quiet adoration of the tree.  It means that her birthday (in the middle of December) not be confused with The Holiday.  It means that only 3 pieces of tape are used to wrap rectangular presents, so that unwrapping is not torture.  It means gingerbread men made with her kids and beautiful decorated sugar cookies.  It mean reading Christmas storybooks at bedtime.  She is not religious.  Christmas for her has to do with love--of the season and of her family and of the beautiful sparkling trappings of lights in the window and on the trees.

Can't it be that way for any of us?  Isn't it okay to make Christmas into what is good for you?  For me Christmas is my little tree, the beautifully familiar music, giving gifts and baking.  It is an excuse to be sentimental, to eat a little more sugar than usual, to spend money on those I love, to remember Christmases past and to put a glow on them that might not have been there originally, but who cares? Why would anyone care what Christmas means to me and how I keep it?  Why would anyone care if my Christmas is sanctified with Jesus and the Wise Men and the Virgin Mary?  Why would anyone care of I remember The True Meaning?  Everyone's Meaning is True.  If you celebrate Christmas by putting up thousands of lights on your house and making them blink in time to the Trans Siberian Orchestra that's okay with me.  If you chose to celebrate with a dinner of deep-fried turkey, that's okay with me. If you choose to celebrate by buying goats for families in Africa, more power to you. If you don't send cards and don't bake and ignore the whole thing, that's your choice.

I like the red and the green and the sparkle and the smell.  I like the hustle and the bustle and the Merry Christmas greetings from everyone, stranger or not.  Today I am loving the snow and wishing my husband's work would let him go home so that we could enjoy some hot chocolate together before nightfall.  We will build a fire and the flames will dance off the reflective ornaments on my little tree.  The fake candles on the mantle will flicker and if the lights don't go out we can watch Miracle of 34th Street again.  We can think about those we love and eat a cookie and put brandy in our tea.  And Christmas tonight can mean being cozy under a warm blanket with the one I love and the fact or fantasy that for this brief moment, all is well.

From The Land of The Great Yellow Cheese

Ali with Spot the Dog, Mr. Duck and Thirsty Baby Bear

Greetings from Wisconsin, where the men drink beer and cheese, the women make egg casserole and the children area all good-looking.

Would you believe (in the words of Maxwell Smart) that I started this blog when I actually was in Wisconsin and that I've been back since December 9 in the evening?  Would you believe that when there are two granddaughters to play with that there is NO TIME to make blog posts?  That's a fact.  How their Mama finds time to not only make short posts but also upload 1000s of photos to FLICKR I just don't fathom.  She is Wonder Mother for sure.

I had a wonderful time in the Land of the Great Yellow Cheese, though we didn't actually eat much cheese except as a topping for my son's fabulous chicken enchiladas.  Mostly I spent it playing Mr. Duck and Spot the Dog with my granddaughter Alison.  You haven't heard of that game, you say?  That's because it is an original created by Alison and her Grandma Christine.  It involved a stuffed duck, about 5 inches tall and a very small resin Dalmatian, only 2 inches tall at the most.  The game started with Spot asking Mr. Duck if he could possibly help with the large bones that Spot was trying to move to his doghouse.  The bones (plastic croissants from the kitchen set) were awfully large for the diminutive Spot and so Mr. Duck agreed to help out.  Mr. Duck's back story, as imagined by Grandma C., was that his real name or adopted name, was Arnold Duckinator, after his idol of a similar name.  Mr. Duck (or Duckinator) visited the gym regularly to keep his muscles in tone, therefore making it easy to help Spot whenever necessary.  Mr. Duck also had some kind of Arkansas accent and referred to Spot often as Little Buddy.  This game morphed eventually into a more medical theme, as Ali decided Mr. Duck did construction work for a job and was not very handy with his hammer and nail.  It turned out that whenever Spot helped Mr. Duck by holding his nail (a plastic celery from the kitchen set) the hammer would slip and poor Spot would get a wound on one of his paws.  This necessitated cleaning the wound, ointment, bandaging and medicine.  Poor Spot never learned that each time he held the nail he was in danger, so this "treatment" went on and on, day after day, with the washcloths, ointment, bandaids and medicine becoming more and more elaborate.  There were washcloth, bandaid, ointment and medicine cupboards and patterns for cloths and bandaids (the white with black spots bandaids becoming the clear favorite) and flavors of ointment and medicine that ranged from mixed berry to cinnamon.  Ali never got tired of this game and greeted me each morning and after afternoon naps with, "Can we play?"  Of course, I obliged, and I miss our game now and wonder what Mr. Duck and Spot the Dog are up to since Grandma C is not there to participate.  I preferred this game to the one called Farm School that involved Big Stomping Bear and his cub, Thirsty Baby Bear.  This game was shorter and had Baby Bear losing his hat every time and the search for it and Big Stomping Bear being hungry and demanding food.  It also required that the players be on the floor, not a problem for a 3 1/2 year old but a little challenging for Grandma.  The Duck and Spot game was a couch game--much more comfortable.

There were other things that we did.  My son and I visited Stillwater, Minnesota, just across the river, and a German ornament store that has become a favorite with me.  We discovered a cool coffee shop with used mugs and comfy chairs with blankets for chilly bones.  We did our annual visit to The Real Santa in Mall of American and Ali and I played in the snow in 23 degree weather.  It's amazing how relative temperature is.  23 degrees here in Washington is COLD, but in Wisconsin it's moderate for a December day.  I'd look at the temp and declare, "It's 23 degrees!  Warm!" and we'd prepare to go outside.  I got to be there for Zuzu's first birthday, even though it was a tiny celebration.  The real "kid party" would come after I went home.  Mom make a cake and cut it in half, so that the cake that would be destroyed would be Zuzu's and the rest of it would not have hand prints in it.  All except Mom got colds while I was there.  Daddy was trying to recover from a sinus infection and Zuzu was on cold #3.  Grandma and Ali came down with colds on the same day, one day before I left for home.

The 7 full days I was with my granddaughters went by in a blur.  I so wish they lived closer so that airline tickets and packing suitcases was not involved in a visit, but when you raise your kids to be independent how can you get mad at them for being so?

I am home now, looking at their pictures on Flickr and putting my own there, remembering the softness of young skin, the smell of clean hair, the look in Ali's eyes when her Mom told her Grandma was going home the next day.  She gazed at me for a long time, unblinking, her eyes locked on mine.  I wonder what she was thinking.  I was thinking that I love her beyond words to describe and that I will miss her every day until I see her again.  And I'll miss Mr. Duck and Spot, too.

Ho-Hum-Ho-Ho

Ali as close to Santa as she would get last year

I haven't felt much like writing lately.  Maybe it's the dark and the damp weather.  Maybe it's because Thanksgiving is just around the corner and it means Christmas is closer than I'd like to think.  Maybe it's just the other side of the political campaign and I'm tired.  Maybe it's because the physical therapy appointments for my Mom go on and on.  Maybe it's merely a down time--can't be up, up, up every single day, can I?

Thanksgiving is only 9 days away.  Our turkey-day dinner is the regular fare--with only my Mom and brother and my husband and me.  I invited my 88 year-old Aunt Billie to come but her son is driving all the way from Oregon to pick her up and take her down to be with her family.  Neither one of my brothers ever contributed any wives or children to the world so our family has gotten very small.  We'll eat turkey, stuffing, salad, homemade cranberry sauce, garlic mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes cooked in some fashion, Costco pumpkin pie (I can't make a pumpkin pie as well as they do) and a new pie I'll bake this year, Apple/Cranberry with a crumb topping.  The dinner will take all day to make and will be eaten in 15 minutes or less. Then we'll watch a movie (maybe Nemo) or play Quiddler.  I can't decide whether I like it quiet like this or whether I'd like a bunch of sisters-in-law and nieces and nephews around.  I don't get to decide.  This is what we have, so there you go.

Four days after Thanksgiving I'm on a plane to Wisconsin for the annual visit with my son's family. Every year we get in the car and journey to the Mall of America, across the river to Minneapolis, to have pictures taken with The Real Santa Claus.  This year there will be two little girls sitting with Santa.  Alison hasn't sat on Santa's lap yet, preferring to have him hide behind her, or lay on the floor in front of her.  We are interested to see what happens this year, with her little sister, who will be a year old on December 4.  Will Ali finally, at age 3 1/2, let Santa near her?  Will she be brave for her little sister?  What will Little Sister think of a rosy-cheeked, white-bearded, suspender-wearing stranger?  Zuzu loves all her grandpas and her boy cousin, Jessie, so she may think Santa is okay.  We'll see.  Regardless, we will have the pictures taken and laugh over them later.  

When I come home from Granddaughter and Santa adventures I will have much to look forward to.  My daughter, Erin, and her husband are coming from Norfolk on December 21 for the first time since they moved back East many years ago when husband, Kent, was still in the Navy.  And my second daughter will be coming from San Diego with Granddaughter Alecia and Grandson Alex on Christmas Day, to stay in the area for almost two weeks.  This will be a test of how much I like lots of people around at the holidays.  It will be so unusual that I will hardly know how to act.  I expect lots of baking and coffee drinking and talking and looking at old photo albums. These two sisters haven't seen each other in a very long time, so I hope their time together is happy.  They will have an opportunity to get to know each other again.  An opportunity like this may not come around for a long time.  Since I lived in the same vicinity as my brothers all their lives, it is hard for me to imagine losing touch with my siblings, though even living in the same county it was possible to let things slide.  Relationships between siblings is complex.  Jealousies, hurtful words, slights (imagined or otherwise), misunderstandings, disagreements, different views of life--all can keep you from enjoying one another.  And aren't we all supposed to love our brothers and sisters?  Doesn't it say that in some book somewhere?  As has been said over and over--you can't pick your family.

So that's what's coming up.  In the meantime, I'll cook, bake, decorate and take pictures and look forward to quiet and noisy holidays and then the New Year coming.  It'll be here fast.  I hope this rather dark mood lifts soon.  I think it will the minute I smell the turkey roasting.

Brown Shoes Nails It

Go over to Brown Shoe's blog:  http://middledaughter.blogspot.com to get another perspective on Barack Obama's election.  The writer of the Brown Shoes blog is one of the very best writers I know.  I wish she posted more often, but when she does, it is special and worth waiting for.  By the way, she is NOT my middle daughter, though I wouldn't mind at all if she was.  I think she may be too old to be my middle daughter, but she is an artist, a wonderful cook and as I said, a wonderful writer.  She is funny and sensitive at a dinner party (which is mostly when I see her) and a good and generous friend.  She'd make a great middle daughter.

Unbelievably Incredibly Real

I am having trouble believing that it wasn't all a dream. Did I really see the political map turning blue? Did I really see people dancing in Times Square, on Capital Hill, in Chicago?  Did I really see Jesse Jackson crying?  Did I really see and hear Jon Stewart call it for Obama and then take at least a minute to compose himself before he could speak again?  

I really did.  All those months, hoping and talking about why I wanted Obama to be President, giving away my Obama buttons and dreaming that this day might come.  The reality of it was more than I had dreamed.  Joy came out of me in the form of tears.  I cried when Jon Stewart proclaimed Barack Obama the next President of the United States.  I cried again when I saw the faces of the jubilant people in Times Square.  I cried more when Barack and his family took the stage in Chicago.  I cried again this morning when Bookworm called and yelled into the phone, WE DID IT!!!!  

This morning I wanted to keep celebrating, so I watched morning TV to see the images again.  This morning the pundits were wearing big grins, trying to hide them, of course, because they are supposed to be unbiased, but you could see how happy most of them were.  We are happy.  We are hopeful.  We are buoyed up by the undeniable fact that America got it right this time.  We are a sick country that finally chose health, after years of suffering.  We know we did the thing that will be best for us.  And we also chose to transcend race and to make Martin Luther King's dream come true. To be alive and present at this time in history is an honor. 

Dancing for Obama

I love what can be done with Photo Shop, don't you?

For a real assessment of the election, or a poetic view, or a personal view, or a world view, go over to Bookworm's blog.  Here is the address:  http://clearcreekgirl.blogpsot.com

As for me, I am glad it is almost over.  It's been two years and it's been wearing and lately it's been ugly.  I'm done and I've voted and I've given away almost all of my 45 buttons in only a week and it's looking good.  Bookwork wants us to celebrate now and in the way she puts it, yes, let's celebrate now, but I'm still afraid that those who tipped those polls to the Obama side and who have made even the Sunday morning pundits speak as if it is already a done deal, I'm afraid they will think they don't need to vote.  I heard someone on the radio this morning say, "Obama doesn't need my vote to win".  Yikes!  If too many people say that to themselves......

So VOTE, VOTE, VOTE.  And get your sticker and wear it proudly and make sure all your friends and relatives have voted, no matter which side they are on, after all, voting is the only way we have any say at all, no matter how small our voice might be.  Get rid of all the ones you think aren't doing the right thing for you and put in the ones you hope will do what you need.  I wish "they" would send one of those little I've Voted stickers out with our absentee ballots.  I'll just keep wearing my buttons, all of them, between now and Tuesday and let everyone know where I stand, just in case it matters to anyone.  I have given my buttons to grocery store clerks, physical therapists, nurses, certification experts, receptionists, a college student, a person who leases senior apartments.  All were thrilled to get a button.  I am hoping that means something.

I don't envy Obama if he does win this election.  My husband says, "Everyone will be watching and waiting for him to change things".  I expect it was that way with John Kennedy, too.  We had so much hope then--we loved his family, we loved how he seemed, elegant, smart, a savior.  It's the same now.  As Bookworm says, it's time.  The whole country, the whole world, knows it's time.  I didn't get to vote for Kennedy--I was only 16 when he ran for President.  I didn't get to vote for Bobby Kennedy.  I got to vote for many others, but it wasn't like now.  I didn't feel the magic. I didn't feel the urgency.  So this vote means everything. It means hope, it means my grandchildren's future, it means the future of our air and our climate, it means the future of young men in Iraq, it means the image of our country to the world. 

I'm sorry to any of the people who read this blog that don't feel the same way I do.  My husband doesn't either, so I don't live in an isolated world of only left-leaning people.  If the other guy wins, then I hope he can do all those things I want--fix the climate, give us more efficient cars, make our medical system work better, make other countries like us again,  bring those young men home.  I will be pulling for him if he wins.  It is time for everything to change and I think the other guy knows that, too, and Lord help us, he better not die while he's in office, if he gets in office!  Or we'll get mavericky!

  

How's Your Mom?

Mom in physical therapy with Kiley.

Many people, including those not in Blogville, have been asking about how my Mom is doing. She is doing amazingly well, thank you. I wish she knew all the people who are concerned about her, because it would make her feel better about the whole process of getting over her two broken bones, but she doesn’t appear to need to know how many are rooting for her. She has an ability to heal from her wounds that younger ones would envy. Recently her doctor said she was way “ahead of the game” as far as knitting and getting movement back.

We have been going to physical therapy sessions at the Silverdale Harrison for several weeks now and we have been assigned another one of those lovely angel girls to help Mom get her range of motion and strength back in her arm and her leg. This new angel is named Kiley. She is small and lithe, smart, interesting and gentle. When she spied my Obama button she knew she could talk to me about politics and we’ve been at it ever since. Each time we come in the second question, after asking after Mom’s progress, is “what did you think of the latest McCain statement, or the Palin pronouncement or the last debate?” We’ve been having fun dissecting the political scene while she massages Mom’s bicep muscle. Recently she was gone for awhile traveling to the Midwest for the Chicago marathon. While she was gone another tall, agile young woman took her place. Laura, too, took note of my Obama button and struck up a conversation about it. I think the therapists like to talk politics if they can and they really aren’t supposed to bring the subject up, but when they see a blatant sign, they jump on it. Laura liked calling my Mom Lou and watching her foot-o-meter, as I dubbed her pain reaction that showed up in her tensed feet. Mom doesn’t feel much pain, but occasionally when her arm is moved to a place it hasn’t been for 9 weeks, her feet flinch. She tries to be brave but her feet give it away every time.

We have been going to physical therapy sessions at the Silverdale Harrison for several weeks now and we have been assigned another one of those lovely angel girls to help Mom get her range of motion and strength back in her arm and her leg. This new angel is named Kiley. She is small and lithe, smart, interesting and gentle. When she spied my Obama button she knew she could talk to me about politics and we’ve been at it ever since. Each time we come in the second question, after asking after Mom’s progress, is “what did you think of the latest McCain statement, or the Palin pronouncement or the last debate?” We’ve been having fun dissecting the political scene while she massages Mom’s bicep muscle. Recently she was gone for awhile traveling to the Midwest for the Chicago marathon. While she was gone another tall, agile young woman took her place. Laura, too, took note of my Obama button and struck up a conversation about it. I think the therapists like to talk politics if they can and they really aren’t supposed to bring the subject up, but when they see a blatant sign, they jump on it. Laura liked calling my Mom Lou and watching her foot-o-meter, as I dubbed her pain reaction that showed up in her tensed feet. Mom doesn’t feel much pain, but occasionally when her arm is moved to a place it hasn’t been for 9 weeks, her feet flinch. She tries to be brave but her feet give it away every time.

Monday of this week Mom got to take off her leg brace, the huge black foam, plastic and Velcro monstrosity that has been keeping her leg straight since she cracked her kneecap on the evening of August 20th. The dang thing was made for someone much taller than her 5 feet. The bottom several inches of this thigh to ankle brace were cut off with scissors in the emergency room, but it has never fit properly and as Mom’s leg got thinner underneath it, it kept sliding down until it was resting on the top of her foot. I’d unstrap it, move it back up, restrap it and within minutes it would have slid down again. Both physician’s assistant and physical therapists noticed that after several weeks it was no longer keeping her leg stick-straight, but they let it slide and considered the fact she could bend her knee slightly inside of it to be a form of therapy. The day the brace came off was a day of celebration. I had authorized the removal of the arm immobilizer the previous week, it having been in place for 7 weeks, a week longer than the PA had ordered. We couldn’t reach him for his approval, so I made a command decision. I got a phone call from his office that afternoon verifying that it was okay, but I would have done it anyway. It was time to get that arm moving.

This Wednesday Mom went to choir practice, the first time since that night when she fell in her driveway on the way to get in Aunt Billie’s car to go to choir and this Sunday she will go back to her church. She is beginning to feel like a “human being” again.

This healing process, from that first stormy and scary night in the emergency room, through the six days in the nursing home that seemed interminable, through the immobile days at home while I tried to make it all work and now during the physical therapy part of the recovery, has been good for my Mom and me. I would not have predicted how it has affected our relationship.

Mom and I have not been close in the way some mothers and daughters are. I was never one to phone daily like some daughters I have known or to visit more than once a week. My weekly visits didn’t start until it was clear I had to take on the financial responsibilities for my Mom a year after my Dad died and I found the checking account and credit situation in shambles. Before that it was holidays and birthdays. In our family it was me, as first child, who became Mom’s rescuer, even as a kid. The story I tell to illustrate this is that one day I came home from school in the 7th grade, to find my Mom cradling my little brother in her arms, waiting for me to help her clean up a wound he had sustained on his leg. She didn’t want to handle it. But as a 7th grader, I took it on. Certain situations scared her and I was the one, if Dad wasn’t available, who stepped in and took over. It is odd because Mom has survived many physical hardships very well, as she has this one. A pot of boiling water spilled on her leg when she was three years old, leaving a big scar. She spent nearly a year in bed with Rheumatic Fever when she was 17. She fell in the well next to our house in Tracyton and clung to the pipe, hanging chest-deep in water for two hours until she was discovered by the local minister and the volunteers from the fire department fished her out. She had a stillborn baby. She lost her sister to cancer. She lost her husband in 2001 and her son in 2003 and in 2004 she broke her ankle in several places and healed well enough to take a trip to Scotland with me and my daughter after only 12 weeks of recovery.

She is a trooper and a survivor, but she has never been the advice-giving, warm, cookie-baking, house-cleaning, soothing mother that I had expected. What she has been is plucky, colorful, artistic, musical, lover of movie stars, reader of mysteries and celebrity biographies, appreciator of beauty and nature. She has never been a hugger or someone who expressed tenderness or told me she loved me. She pats rather than strokes. She has barely cried over the deaths of my Dad or my brother. I could tell she liked me and thought I was smart and sensible, but I also knew she didn’t understand what I was anymore than I understood who she was and why she operated the way she did.

But because we have been together so much in these last months, and because I have wanted so much to make her recovery as pleasant as it could be, we have come to know each other at a much deeper level. During my weekly visits I used to ask, “So how are things going Mom?” and she would answer, “Well, they’re about the same”. Now, of course, we have many more things to talk about. “How is your arm feeling? Do you have anything you need to have me do? Have you called your friend, Jay, yet? Can I get you a drink of water, a cookie, a piece of fruit? Can I help you with those buttons?” During our journeys to doctor’s appointments and physical therapy sessions the conversations have turned to the beauty of the Fall days, art, marriages, divorces, friendships, husbands, raising children, age, illness. As I listen to my mother expressing her views and and telling her stories, I find that I am more like her than I had thought. I see that my philosophy of life is very close to hers, that my opinions have, of course, been influenced by her, that my love of nature and life comes directly from her. I am a bit overly interested in celebrities, I love color, I am fascinated by faces, I am intrigued with discussing people’s motives, just as she is. Her artistic nature is in my love of photography and beauty. We disagree on religion, but neither of us really believes there is a Heaven or Hell. I am much more serious about politics, but she is interested, not apathetic. She is as fascinated in finding out how other people think as I am. She loves to watch people as I do. She writes, reads, works crossword puzzles, loves movies and TV and so do I.

We differ in how much emotion we display, I cry weekly, she rarely cries and never seems to get angry; in how serious we are, I read literary novels and non-fiction books about philosophy or politics and she reads celebrity biographies, I value friends more than she does, but we are both cheerful gregarious types, like to look nice, can chat with strangers, are friendly to those we are working with. Mom didn’t ever work outside her home. She tried but was intimidated by cash registers, making change and invoices. I worked from the time my kids went to school. The Mom I most idealized was Nancy Kvinsland’s Mom, who worked, kept a perfectly clean house, made fabulous meals, had a wicked sense of humor (and had her daughter ironing sheets and her older brother’s boxer shorts, incidentally). I’m not so sure I really would have enjoyed being her daughter, but I thought she was the cat’s pajamas when I was a teenager. Do we ever get the mother’s we think we want? I doubt it. I’ve asked many daughters about their mothers and almost without exception they wish their Moms had been different.

I still wish my Mom had been more demonstrative—it is hard for me to say "I Love You" to those I love—nobody said that in my house and hugs were not common. I wish she had been different with my brothers in some way that would have given them ambition, so that they could have gone out and had jobs and families, to provide cousins for my kids and so that we could have had lots of relatives and big family get-togethers. But that’s not how it was or is. Mom has given me half of what I am and I thank her for that because I like who I am. I can learn to say the love words and I can learn hugging and I have learned to accept what my brothers became. And now, at this late date, I have come to know my Mother in a way I never thought would be possible. And she has said more than once in the last 2 months, "Love ya, Chris". I can’t say that I would ever have wished such injuries to happen, but because of them we have become closer and that is a very good thing—a silver lining entirely unforeseen.

Mornings

Intended to: In September, 2007, after I retired from 9 to 5 work, I planned to get up early, put the coffee on, walk to the newspaper box 1/4 mile up the road, get the paper, come back, have coffee, read the paper.

Reality then: After a few days of cold morning walks to get the paper with no caffeine yet to fortify me, I gave up the notion of getting the paper before having coffee. I read the paper from the day before or sometimes went to get it. I did the crossword puzzles every day, except Saturday (too hard!). I often didn't actively exercise.

Reality now: After almost a year of the Kitsap Sun and its crosswords every morning I became dissatisfied with the Sun and now subscribe to the USA Today. I only do the Kitsap Sun Sunday crossword now, during the week, and get behind on my USA Todays because there is so much content I want to read every page of it, except for the Sports section. I am still drinking 2 to 2 1/2 cups of coffee while I read, still enjoying the KZOK radio in the background (The Bob Rivers Show), but now I start some days exercising with the guys of the Pentagon channel (Fit for Duty), Lt. Jason and others who lead me in Pilates or aerobics or kick boxing. I like them because they are no-nonsense types who tell you to get down on the deck now and give them 5 push-ups.

Interesting how things change. Who would have guessed a year ago that I'd be spending two days a week taking my Mom to physical therapy? I knew I'd be spending more time with her, but not this kind of time. And I thought I'd be visiting my old friends at work--I've been back exactly twice. Life is full. Time flies. There are not enough hours in the day. All those cliches apply.