The Sunday Morning Muse, February 16, 2014

A cloudy, 10 degree morning.  Snow in the yard has solidified into ice 5 inches deep, cumulative, from these weeks of sleet, ice and snow. The smaller critters in the back yard walk on top...the deer still sink in. Plenty of tracks around the edge of the woods and the dump out back.

Went into the city to Value City Furniture for their President's day sale yesterday, looking for bedroom furniture.  This is something I managed to put off for 3 and a half years...as I've made do with a vintage 1950's set mom and dad bought when they got married.  All mirrors and not enough storage. Very Heavy.

Walking in I was immediately overwhelmed by the size of everything.  Big puffy furniture....  bloated and oversized couches and chairs big enough for 350 pound people.  Huge sleigh beds.... Ass high off the
floor just to get onto them.    Large pictures of Zebras and crazy patterned modern art for the walls.   I just stared with mouth open.  Crazy looking chairs shaped like giant shoes.

Nothing there for me.

Then went up the highway to Ashley Furniture. Another huge place with  BIGGER huge furniture.... Most of it very dark wood.... or Black laquer and super gaudy.   Stuff with mirrors built in.....  or wild 1970s patterns and oddly juxtaposed colors.  Dining room sets you could put in an old mansion. The kind with a dinosaur under the staircase...

Our sales woman was named "Cat."  She had big  Donny Iris type glasses and short razor cut hair and was about  60.  She had wonderful perfume. And perfectly manicured nail tips.

I asked about an oak bedroom set.  Something Simple.  And a headboard to fit a "full" size mattress. She got this strange look and said we have nothing like that here.   Oh...wait.... maybe in the back.....so we walked.   Then walked more,  and there really WAS nothing like that there.

She said "no one" has full-sized beds anymore.  Just queen sized.... or King.   Was I interested in a children's bed?  You want oak?  We really don't have anything with "light" colored wood.  Did you want White?

No.

My head hurt and I was not doing well at this point,  a bit anxious.  So we left.

On the way home, the brother in law said let's stop at the Furniture Barn. (It's a place in the very small town where he lives.  Just a half mile from his house.  The town has one stop light and it sometimes just blinks.)

We walked in the building, which at one time probably was a barn.  The "office" is filled with old pictures of the "original" store.... with vintage cars from the 1950's out front....and a framed roster of  Civil war veterans with some names "from the family"  hanging on the wall.   It is a humble place with  a can of wasp spray on the window......and the clutter of years of business.

I asked the old man for an oak bedroom suite.   He said we'd have to "go upstairs."   So we did.

And way at the back in the corner was a perfect oak chest,  small oak dresser, simple oak framed mirror, oak side table and a simple headboard, that fits both Full and Queen.  And that was all he had in oak.  It is made in the USA, he added.

And I bought it.  In 10 minutes.   Free Delivery.  And he knows where I live. Because he remembered selling me a couch 16 years ago.

I  told him I'd be back soon for a new couch.

It is Enough

I heard this poem by Anne Alexander Bingham on the Writer's Almanac on NPR yesterday. It reminds me of an essay I wrote in high school written with the same sentiments.  I wished I had saved it.  My great uncle, who was a lifelong teacher and flower/animal lover taught me about atoms, the building blocks of life. 
We are all stardust. 

It is Enough

To know that the atoms
of my body
will remain

to think of them rising
through the roots of a great oak
to live in
leaves, branches, twigs

perhaps to feed the
crimson peony
the blue iris
the broccoli

or rest on water
freeze and thaw
with the seasons

some atoms might become a
bit of fluff on the wing
of a chickadee
to feel the breeze
know the support of air

and some might drift
up and up into space
star dust returning from

whence it came
it is enough to know that
as long as there is a universe
I am a part of it.

Happy Birthday Janis

I always wanted to be an artist, whatever that was, like other chicks want to be stewardesses. I read. I painted. I thought.

Janis Joplin

Saturday Evening Muse

Time to sit and drink some hot tea and focus on the week that's been. I haven't done a Stream of Consciousness in awhile, and perhaps now is as good of time as ever.

On the homefront, the crockpot war is over. I call it a draw, only because I drew the line at throwing the thing out altogether, and...I did eat what I cooked, so I know it was at least edible. Crockpots are a lot like life. You can throw everything you can at it and hope for the best, methinks. The end result may not be pretty to some, but in the end, all that matters is that you were OK with it. I really hate cooking for other people. I get no pleasure from it and never have aspired to it. This said, I'm so very grateful to people who are good cooks and take pity on the rest of us. I ate some really good pumpkin cookies today from my Aunt.  Thanks.

Roy G. Biv. (Red orange yellow green blue indigo and violet.)

On the political spectrum....it's fun to have political discussions that put everything in such good perspective, that you know EXACTLY where you are in the scale of things. It's also a good way of honing your verbal skills while defending in honest terms what you believe. The blues and reds are so much more than simple, cookie cutter ideologies. I know a blue who is bluer than me. And that says something. But there are many blue hues....he may be an ultramarine blue... full of ideals and purpose, loves the Mother Earth, and hates war and nukes...and is also quick to criticize or defeat his own, in search of purity of spirit. He is noble and sincere and genuinely consistent in his values, no matter what color he finds himself confronted with. He really demands MORE from our elected officials. I admire him with my heart and soul and more than anything hope he finds his solace.

I see myself more in the Cerulean blue range.  Jaded. Certainly a true blue, but without the opacity of deeper blue hues. I can see through some of my blue ideals and forgive indiscretions, enter into "ends justify the means type arguments" and not feel judgmental about how things get done.  My expectations are lower, I guess. This way I am happy when I get "more."  And I will not cut my nose to spite my face. I'll support my own and take what is offered.

These ideas are subject to change with no notice, however.  That is the promise of a new day.  Someone can always emerge, and their presence changes everything....and that is where the hope lies in all of us.

The Glory of the Leaves, Change of Season

The view over the valley. To be honest, an older picture, but it looks pretty much the same. Those two colorful trees are just starting to shed their leaves like every year.  I remember them well from childhood, when my best friend lived across the street and the trees provided hours of fun as we jumped into their leaves or used them as "home base" in a game of hide and seek, or a game we played called Bloody Murder where one person hid and everyone sought that person, and screamed BLOODDDY MURRDER when spotted.  I'm sure the other neighbors loved that.

I'm treating myself to a new pair of boots, bought online. I never did that before. I hope they fit. I have one pair of dress boots and everytime I wear them, more people talk to me. Even if it is only to tell me how nice my boots are. It's nice to be noticed.

Lately, with all my life changes, music has taken a back seat. At a get together a few months ago I was handed a guitar and, for a second, couldn't really think of anything to play by heart.  An odd feeling for someone like me who once had 50 songs at ready, just needing an audience. Life happens. I managed to eek out a version of Layla and Margaritaville. Nothing special. It was a wake up call to hone my talents again. Perhaps I'll make a space in the basement. Hook everything up again.  A winter hobby. Something to do with the change of seasons.

Season of wither. I think that is an old Aerosmith song.  So few flowers left now. Marigolds....and the
Big amaranth...loves lies bleeding.....and a Pansy pot I put on the porch.  Color is going to be gone soon and the gray and white winter landscape is ahead. Yesterday I almost drove off the road looking at the blue of
the sky and the colorful trees along the road.  That blue is the color of my room. Real sky blue.

Drinking coffee again. Just a little bit more.  Warms the innards. Less calories than hot chocolate.  Winter jammies are washed and ready. Extra blanket for the bed. I bought new socks that are warm. That's nice about fall, isnt' it?  Turning on the electric fireplace again, airing out my favorite sweaters.  Snuggling up and watching a movie.

But there are no longer any children outside yelling  BLOOOODDYYY MURRRDER.

The Sunday Morning Muse

We're still a little while from sunrise as I begin this missive, but the streaks of pink are starting to form in the east just above some dark heavy rain clouds on the horizon.  I see a chemtrail of a plane in the distance, some early morning flight to somewhere. Warm enough to open the window for the cat.

It's been another week of nonsense and hostage taking in Washington. I've had it with the teabaggers. Bunch of ignorant fools willing to throw out the baby with the bathwater. Don't mess with my retirement money. I'm getting old and can't take the stock risks anymore. All this nonsense is having an effect on the markets. When you have to chose between your money and your pride, I take the money everytime. Lick your wounds and go buy something to sooth your fragile egos.  Perhaps it's time these imbeciles took advice from the fatcats out there, since they won't listen to the commonfolk.

Been musing about fear this week. Fear of the unknown, fear of being alone, fear of middle age, etc. The heavy stuff. Fears hold people back from many things. But they also keep us clinging to things. I read all this Zen stuff about letting go...allowing...don't push the river-type stuff, perhaps in an attempt to ease my mind and let go of my need to try to control things that happen. Little things are easily scattered....but if you let things go, they become big things. Not so easy to scatter...or make right....again. I am constant motion. Scattering things...watching so that things don't run out.  I spend time trying to anticipate so many needs...with my lists and work projects and all the day to day stuff of life. So much stems from fear. Being able to keep all the plates spinning.... even when life throws curve balls at you.

The Tao talks about about the Sage not flitting about like a fool. The words speak to the wisdom of finding happiness right where you are. The answers are not "out there" somewhere. It's in Here. Within ourselves and the circumstances we find ourselves in. I more or less live like that. I do find my joy close to home. Yet I have much work to do when it comes to letting go. Giving over and allowing things to happen as they may and not use up present moments in fear and worry so much.  In the end it's all about peace of mind, right? That's where I always end up, no matter whose thoughts I read, or what I listen to.

Oh, so much of all this isn't thought out perfectly this morning. But that's okay. I'm "allowing" thoughts to fall onto the page this morning without trying to be my own editor, too.

The sun is up over the valley. Another day to start again. Petting cats, cooking chicken, doing laundry, and making a bouquet of the last of the garden flowers.... while the snowblower lurks at the back of the garage.

Today's Thought

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

-Oscar Wilde

Wisdom

Thomas Paine Said...

The Sunday Morning Muse, September 9, 2012

  Celebrating another trip around the sun. Tomorrow I'll be 48 years old. I'll celebrate today and eat things I shouldn't and spending time with friends and family. I looked in the mirror today and had the strangest thought come into my head. What if, say 30 years ago someone could have shown me that reflection and said, this is how you are going to look at 48? What would I have thought? 

Or, if I could speak to that 18 year old, with all this wisdom of experience, just for five minutes, what would I say? Trite as it sounds, I would tell her, don't be afraid. You can do anything. Oh, and buy Microsoft! But sell it before the dot.com bubble breaks. Then buy APPLE! 

September is here. Temps in the 50's last night. "Fall" clouds in the sky this morning. Sunflowers still doing their best to cheer up the fading garden, but the other flowers are fading fast. I gave up on weeding all together. It is what it is.

Huge puffy mushrooms in the damp back yard. Wonder if they are poisonous. My they spring up fast.

One day nothing, next day as big as a baseball. I remember an old friend who used to pick the same sheepshead mushroom off the same tree every year. I tried some once on a steak. It was tough and not really that great. I couldn't get the sight of the bugs floating down the drain  when he cleaned it out of my head either. 

The Sunday Morning Muse, August 19, 2012

An unseasonably cool and cloudy morning as the cat peers out the window at the bird on the newly trimmed bush under the window. It feels like fall weather. August may not be more 90 degree days after all. And I'm good with that. We had more than our share.

It's nice to be outside. Away from the campaign ads assaulting the airwaves. I visited the county fair this week, and it was a perfect day... nice blue sky puffy clouds. Walking from the parking lot in the wide open field toward the main gate, I remembered how excited I used to be at fair time. The rides, the food, the demo derby. Especially when I was in high school. It was a time for seeing your school friends for the first time in weeks. Or how about throwing darts to win a big mirror with a picture of a Queen Album cover etched into it? I kept that thing, schlepping it around for 25 years of my life, finally getting rid of it when it was damaged in one of my numerous moves.

These days I am juggling a slice of pizza while walking around the booths and talking to people selling things. Perhaps some new casement windows for the house? Sure, come see me. Give me a bid. Or a stroll through the flower barn. A peppermint Zinna won first place. I have several of those here. I could of had a blue ribbon.... but my sunflower isn't that high. Sheesh. That big one must have been 15 feet.

Didn't want a picture of myself with a python for 5 bucks. Not even if they paid ME the five bucks to have my picture taken with their python.

Ate some fudge. Admired the new style fancy chicken coops (with windows and shutters and a gabled roof).
Sat on a bench for a while and saw far too many ugly tattoos. Why Why Why do people do that to themselves? Am I judging people or just expressing an opinion? Probably both.

Time to go.

A Lesson on Statins

I've been a bit under the weather recently so bear with me. I learned a valuable lesson this week. Statin drugs have a lot of side effects. By now everyone knows someone who gets joint pain from statins. Despite the marketing, it is a common side effect, not a rare one. I had that, and switched to another, and got the pains again, and switched to another, and got them again. And now I am on yet another. No joint pain, this time, but my stomach went to Hell, which caught be by suprize.

 I only mention this, not to whine, but to point out that this is a serious side effect. I suffered for a few weeks now and didn't really know why. I was waiting for the joint pain...and didn't even think about a statin causing such stomach problems. I refused to look up the side effects, because that always "works on your mind" and you end up with most of them. When I finally did, and saw the many patients who reported stomach pain and all sorts of other stomach trouble, a bell went off.

 Long story short, I quit taking the statin, and I am amazed at how quickly I got better. I feel like me again. I am exercising, and eating pierogis, and not clutching my stomach all the time, thinking I was destined for gall bladder surgery. Even drank a half a beer.


 I know I'll have to fess up to the doc and tell him I am not taking these statins anymore. And I'm sure there will be a conversation about cholesterol again. But quality of life is important, too. People suffer on these drugs. Why can I rattle off names of several relatives who have had to quit taking them, or just take two pills a week? The side effects are bad, and they are common.

The Sunday Morning Muse, July 15, 2012

"Be polite to all, but intimate with few." Thomas Jefferson


Good advice from a very smart man with big ideas and wild hair.Today I am musing about how Jefferson would have handled Twitter and Facebook. I suspect he would be quite perplexed at first. Why would anyone put out half baked thoughts and serve up their private life for public scrutiny? Isn't that what newspapers do?

After all, this is a man who worked on heavy things like the Declaration of Independence.


 He would probably warm to Facebook in some way. Accumulate a lot of "friends" but, on his Close Friends list....now that is where the real thought provoking ideas would go. Assuming he can figure out the privacy settings....which can confound  Mensa members, I'd say he would really love it.


Twitter is another story all together. I'd say Jefferson wouldn't tweet. That's just me basing it on nothing other than lack of gravitas. I think he'd want more than 146 characters to get his points across.  And he wouldn't tweet short sighted, unpondered thoughts. He was a letter writer after all. Loved to put quill to paper.

Losing A Sole

Being thrifty is a relative thing.

Like, I'm pretty thrifty. I recycle, I reuse plastic bags, I've been known to wander yard sales and thrift stores for bargains, and I don't own a lot of big gawdy jewelry or designer clothes. I've made birdhouses out of plastic pop bottles. Well, one, anyway. I have other birdhouses, too. Probably too many around here. We are switching to something called "chicken scratch" instead of bird seed because it is getting expensive to feed the birds, and that certainly is not being thrifty. Day old bread torn up and thrown outside would be the thriftiest choice, but I digress.

I pitch things or donate things I don't need. And I don't ask for a receipt either. To me that is not really "giving" just to give. I just give because I'd rather someone be using it than it taking up space here.

But on a scale of thriftiness I'm not, say, an extreme coupon clipper or someone who buys 10 of something to get a deal. I do own about eight pairs of tennis shoes but they have been justified (at least till now) as too good to throw away but something no one would want. I could "garden" in them or do really dirty jobs where you get muddy, and throw them away if they get too bad. Besides I have two other "good" pairs to wear in public. Muddy jobs have been few and far between for a few years. I'll be ready though.

Talking to neighbor Al today I got a better picture of where I stand on the scale of thriftiness. Al was wearing his "good" tennis shoes (I can relate) and mentioned that one of his other pairs (gardening type) lost a sole.

Huh? How do you lose a sole? I pondered the Zen-ness of this for a moment and then kept listening. Yeah, one day he was walking, and it caught on something or another and the sole got separated from the shoe. Just like that.

My first thought was, I wonder if they were made in China, but instead I said, well, you threw them away right? No.... the shoe part is still good, he said. But it felt too strange to wear them with one sole on and one without, so he ripped the sole off the other one and still wears them as "garden" shoes.

Mom suggested he wrap them back onto the shoes with furnace tape. I'm not even sure what furnace tape is, but I know she was kidding him.

Can you keep your sole by wrapping it with furnace tape? Zen again...

I glanced up at him.

For a split second, I think he considered it.

Coco Kitty-- Inscrutable Face

The problem with cats is that they get the exact same look on their face whether they see a moth or an axe-murderer.  Paula Poundstone

The Sunday Morning Muse, April 29, 2012

It's the last Sunday in April, and it is a beautiful Sunday. Going up to the 60's today. Nice.

I spent part of the morning going over the 1940 Census for my whole neighborhood. I scanned the
family names on neighboring streets searching for clues to my family research. Names jump out now and then as familiar. People long dead who used to own little neighborhood stores. An Italian family who owned a candy store on the hill. A Polish family who had the butcher shop. Funny how I could go through the entire township and, without looking at the street names, I could figure out pretty much where the census names were from, because many families still own those houses and passed them down.

I watched Who Do You Think You Are? on Friday night. Rob Lowe. Amazing story of his search into the life of his 5th Great Grandfather--who has the distinction of both fighting against us, and then with us during the Revolutionary War. He was a mercenary who came from Germany, who faught in the battle of Trenton, lost, taken prisoner, and was later given the option of going home to Germany, or staying here.

It's amazing to see the records that are out there for people to search out their own family stories. It is very time consuming however, for obvious reasons, but imagine the future, when so much is digitized. Tomorrow's children will really "know" their ancestors--through video recordings, audio journals, and who knows what else will be available in the future.

Or will they care? Will they want to look back? Will they seek meaning or advice or experiences from the past? Will the stories really be as exciting as the journeys made by the immigrants to America? Establishing a country? A neighborhood? Churches? A new life in a new world. There really is a charm to studying that
era. The personal struggles and triumphs are inspiring.

In the future, what if you find out that your great grandfather was just a ne'er do well? A guy born in Pittsburgh who spent his life drinking beer and going to football games? Never holding down a job for long. A couple of marriages and no real ambition to improve himself? Do you really want to see the videos he uploaded to YouTube of getting drunk at his friend's wedding?  Would you care who his friends were on Facebook? Would those things exist 60 years from now?

Thinking About Things...and Putting Off Others

Just back from the ER again. I feel I owe it to them to say it was a lovely experience in the day time as opposed to a Saturday night. No crazy people, no people with bright patchy red hair and tattoos....no screaming babies. Actually no one at all waiting.

After getting checked out, Mom got to come home instead of them keeping her, which is nice. Another crisis averted for now. 

The last couple of days have been a whirlwind of stuff, not just mom's issues, but also a funeral for my friend's mom. It was a lovely service and the cemetery is one that I haven't spent much time in. It's a great old cemetery, Graceland, not far from my favorite one around here, Oak Park, which I go on and on about. I love a cemetery with old family crypts and big old headstones. Oak Park sits on a cliff on one end, at the baby section, which is really creepy. But it is a peaceful place. Oldstyle wrought iron gates, a turn of the century mausoleum with big rusty doors. It's a place where the dead can feel at rest, and not on display. Photo is Suki on a gravestone there. I took this in the early 1980's.

Graceland sits on a beautiful property with rolling hills, and does have some old graves, but newer sections now too. The ones with the flat marker and vases in them.  It is also a very peaceful place.

 The only thing I didn't like was when I was sitting in the newer mausoleum at Graceland, I saw not only the "drawers" people have with their names on them but also these see-through cubes with urns. And people put photographs and little momentos there. My first thought was it seems like a bookshelf or curio. I couldn't imagine it being here a hundred years from now, like those crumbling, still legible century old graves outside. It didn't seem permanent, like being put in the ground does. Or having your ashes scattered somewhere... 


With illness and death come discussions sometimes we'd rather not have, but end up having. No one wants to think about their own death, of course, but you can't help but wonder where you will end up. By strange chance this week, I got a call from the cemetery where my dad is buried. It is a bit commercial to me. It sits right next to a road that has a lot of traffic. They also have a lot of rules. You have to have plastic flowers off at a certain date, you can't plant anything, you can't stick anything in the ground, etc.... no memorials really other than what you can stick in a vase. You see, they are mostly all "flat" graves, and they mow around them. It makes life easier for the living.But you don't really get to honor the dead. I stick plastic flowers in there for dad, but I don't feel really good about it. From the road it looks like every other vase with a plastic flower in it.


 A nice enough woman called, going on about how they are doing a privacy policy or some such thing and computerizing records.... and how she wants to set up and appointment with me. The cynic in me says she wants to sell me plots. I cheerfully informed her that I couldn't possibly meet with her, but by all means send me all the paperwork she wants and we'll sign off on it. (I'm not having that conversation just yet. The big one. A plot with my name on it.)

A Little Thursday Wisdom

If some longing goes unmet, don't be astonished. We call that Life. 


Anna Freud

Some Personal Thoughts on Healthcare

It's been hard to get a chance to sit down and write. Life has become all that more challenging for my mom, and now I have to expand my vast medical knowledge that I refer to as my internet doctorate degree even more to include matters of kidney issues, pneumonia and respiratory therapy. These areas of specialty were unknown to me as my nighttime reading veered toward Transverse Myelitis, Cerebral Vascular disease, and urinary tract issues. I do my best to keep up with information, so that I can take a proactive approach. Pay attention to what drugs she is getting, and make note of the care that she is getting so that I know someone is paying attention, and I can anticipate or recognize problems.

I share this personal information because at this very moment someone is raging about the alleged Evils of "Obama Care."  Fox News is making it an almost obligatory battle cry 24/7 by politicians wanting to beat the drumbeat for their base. Of course I doubt any one has read the entire Affordable Care Act or can justify very much of their outrage other than they are pissed off that everyone would be forced to pay for insurance. Changing the system will not be easy. But it is a must.

I haven't read the entire thing either, to be honest. I've been a bit busy trying to deal with the massively expensive, completely incomprehensible healthcare system we have now. Which, if any Republican has a suggestion about how to improve it other than "tax cuts" and "defeat Obamacare" I sure would like to hear it.  All I hear are crickets. And an an oxygen tank behind me, but that's another story.

Medicaid/Medicare is the biggest "problem" out there. I say problem because it is the most costly of all. I hear all the blame thrown around at the bottom feeders who run their child with sniffles to the emergency room. I see on TV the gunshot victims on life support after gang shootings who have no insurance and are clearly costing the system millions. But I also see the elderly who worked their whole life and now, through no fault of their own have found themselves living on social security alone, and after their savings are exhausted, they are accepted into Medicaid, and live out their lives in nursing homes at a cost of 72 thousand dollars a year. In Eldercare it's called "spending down to Medicaid." And our population is getting older all the time. Baby Boomers are retiring. It is going to be an even bigger drain on the national coffers.

My mom is home for now. It is expensive to keep her here and requires a lot of sacrifice by family. It is exhausting her savings and at some point she won't have the money to stay at home because she can no longer afford the care she needs. And at that point, she just may join the ranks of the Medicaid people. In a civilized society we have the obligation to care for the elderly, ensure that they do not suffer needlessly, and have a life with dignity. This aid is important, because it is a safety net. I don't think people understand just how necessary it is.

I'm sure the Affordable Care Act needs a lot of work. But don't just criticize and walk away. Find solutions, find alternatives, try to help people the best way we can. Or the future will be very bleak for us when we are old, and our health is failing. And we didn't go to bat for ourselves when we could.


Here is great column from Reg Henry on the health care debate, I find him spot on with his gentle humor and  his way of stating the obvious.

Richard Brautigan's Birthday

“I thought about it for awhile, hiding it from the rest of my mind. But I didn't ruin my birthday by secretly thinking about it too hard.” ― Richard Brautigan, Trout Fishing in America