And I barely noticed. Two solid weeks in the house is a lot.
Which is why Ken drove us into the Center this morning so I could do my 20-minute walk somewhere besides out front here. I really liked looking in all the shop windows. The wind was fierce.
Healing continues apace. I’m about to graduate to a cane for indoors. Then it’ll be a cane for outdoors. Then it’ll be walking without support. Turning in bed at night has gotten a lot easier and already I can put my own socks on.
I’m happy to report that I can hobble about the kitchen and make some meals too. For lunch today, for example, we had zucchini fritters with a shallot, cilantro crème fraiche dip, a tart crunch salad, and sweet potato fries. It was good and exhausting enough that I expect someone else to make dinner.
Of our national crisis, I shake my head. One of the most helpful things I heard this week was about grief. How we aren’t meant to “go through it” but to fully inhabit it. I don’t know why, but it really helps to acknowledge how much grief I feel about our country.
Talk to you later!
Dee, great to hear how you are gaining each day!
My that lunch looks delicious!
Quite randomly started talking a with a geneticist in my cycling class this AM, about, what else? politics. but when he told me what he did I could keep from asking him how he’s dealing with all this. He said and I paraphrase: this country will not lead in scientific research again in our lifetimes; it may take 150 years to return to the top position we have held for so long. I feel a lot of grief, too, for all due to this absolute malevolence that has descended on everyone, with no goal but cruelty. It touches us all. I have personally lost nothing, yet!
What I am excited to see happening are the protests. And 11,000 out in Denver to hear AOC and Bernie!
AOC and Bernie get the assignment! And I’ve been reading about the brain drain. It’s as heart breaking as anything else.
Such encouraging progress (yea!) and an absolutely delicious looking lunch! I wish I could keep pelargoniums blooming inside during the winter. Those red blooms zing. Mine are looking like mush where I had hoped they were protected.
The geranium was my sister’s. I’d never had any luck overwintering these guys but hers? It just blooms and blooms.
Man that lunch looks fantastic and a lot of work. I’m really happy that your healing is going well and how nice that Ken took you on a field trip. I’m grateful that I’m back with the Ukuladies it is already helped lift my spirits … the other day we played at a memory care facility. I can’t change Washington but I can make a difference in the lives of people in need of song and dance. We have 3 lady that dance the hula to the Hawaiian songs we sing. Thanks for the update.
Just reading about your group Tina makes such a difference for me, brings a smile and makes my heart feel good. This is sich a precious gift that you and your group are giving to so many. The three hula dancing women are my kind of women!
I had the same response! What a gift.
Oh and thank YOU for affording such joy — not just to the people you play for, but for anyone who reads about it with a smile.
The blossom that stood out for me, signaling spring is not your red flower photo but you, in your comfy sweater, doing so well. Talk about an uplift and then to see your food, something that I’ve always loved that you share with us, well the day is good…and we need this kind of good.
We all have times of upheaval in our lives, worries but when you overlay the state of America these days, it feels like being crushed with a steam roller! So we turn to the every day, the making of a fine meal, a walk, a good book, a conversation, even a hip shaking dance- we look for ways to deal. Some pundits such as David Brooks feel that protests and taking to the streets have no effect; what works in his view, is talking not shouting to a MAGA and informing them of what is being taken away from them by this regime…Others like Jonathan Capehart feel that you can do both.
I’m not sure I have it in me to take Brooks route. Equally I am a little tired and feeling a bit old to take it to the streets. Tonight, my daughter and son-in-law are attending a town hall given by their Congressional Representative for the 12th district in CA, Lateefah Simon. Rep Simon won a MacArthur Genius fellowship when she was 26 for her work at the Center for Young Women’ s Development. For me, attending town halls combines the best of both of these approaches and I’m hoping to find a local one to attend myself.
For those of you who still have fire in the belly, a nationwide protest will be held on April 5th, titled Hands Off. From the website, “Donald Trump and Elon Musk think this country belongs to them. They’re grabbing everything they can, and it’s up to us to push back. On April 5th, we’ll take to the streets with a clear message: Hands off!”
As usual, you articulate things so well. I’m hoping I’m mobile enough to attend an April 5 protest near me.
Dee~ Ooh, you meal looks so good! Your dip reminded me of my mom’s Dill Dip, which was so yummy. Glad to hear you are progressing so well. It is interesting to hear of someone just doing one hip. What a difference! Take care.
I’ve been thinking often of you and J. Can’t quite imagine doing both hips at once. As in, how was it even possible?
Well…they were one at a time – 6 weeks apart. But, when he did the first one, he was healing with one still soooo bad and one just out of surgery. By the second one, the new hip was doing pretty good and then he had to heal up the second one. Fun times 😉 – which are almost a blur of a memory now!
Well I should have remembered that because it would NOT have been possible. Still, to undergo another surgery three weeks from now? Yikes.
Glad you are healing well.
And yes, the grief is real and omnipresent. I need to figure out how to manage it.
Thanks, Roberta. Americans of Conscience has an emphasis on good news. Just what you need, right? Another newsletter/email/substack? But I find it helps. Otherwise, the judicial victories and acts of resistance can get lost in the whirlwind.
I always get hungry when you have a plate of food image….Happy to read you are doing well with the hip thing…seems to be getting easier as the years go by. Doctors have learned how to simplify the procedure..
They do seem to be better at it. Both of my at-home PTs have oohed and aahed at how small my incision is.
Don once asked his MD cousin whether he would prefer a doctor on his first day out of med school or his last day before retirement … the answer was the first day guy for diagnosis and treatment, but the last day guy for surgery … practice makes perfect?
Interesting.