A longtime member of NPR, I've never before actually joined PBS, until today. You can join for $60 a year, and what a bargain that is.
As I began to pursue my options, I found World on Fire for bingeing and thought it had only three episodes. So I watched those three and now realize that there are four more.
This inflammatory syndrome I have erupts when I eat flour (cake, bread, cookies, etc.) or when I am in the presence of mold. Every spot on my body aches, I get tired and frustrated, and I'm not inclined to talk until it passes. Taking pain pills is not a solution, but it does make me a nicer person and eliminates pain for six hours at a time while I'm vowing to get back on track.
I bagged up all my crackers and spaghetti, bread and pancake mix, and will either give it to Jan or deliver it to the firefighters at my next opportunity.
What I can eat when my sweet tooth starts talking to me are lemon pudding, coconut pudding, rice pudding, egg custard, etc. Tomorrow I will be sure to add ingredients to my next grocery list.
In the meanwhile, I just happened to have whipping cream and fresh Meyer lemons from Jan's tree, so I made a midnight cup to enjoy on Day 28.
***
The cardinals and other birds are having a party with all the bread-stuff I'm tossing out this morning!
Wednesday, April 8, 2020
Tuesday, April 7, 2020
Day 27
When Day created this blog seven years ago for my 65th birthday, it was for sharing memories of my "Traveling Solo" trip to the West Coast. When I got home, I'd gotten so comfortable with this page that I just kept on writing.
I want to than you all for reading my quirky little blog--a combination of scrapbook, journal and letter to my beloved people!
I've been careless with eating these past few days and the result is inflammation and pain, so I'm going back on the flour-free wagon for the duration. Walked 2000 steps, according to the heart app on my phone, and snapped this chalk heart on the road:
Tonight I've been doing Face Time with Nathan and Elena. Here's a screen shot of Nathan doing some special effects as we talked:
And here are a couple of gel prints I made today:
I want to than you all for reading my quirky little blog--a combination of scrapbook, journal and letter to my beloved people!
I've been careless with eating these past few days and the result is inflammation and pain, so I'm going back on the flour-free wagon for the duration. Walked 2000 steps, according to the heart app on my phone, and snapped this chalk heart on the road:
Tonight I've been doing Face Time with Nathan and Elena. Here's a screen shot of Nathan doing some special effects as we talked:
And here are a couple of gel prints I made today:
Monday, April 6, 2020
Day 26, Monday
1. What I'm going to show you today is not art--but I'm offering it to you in the spirit of playfulness, maybe meditation if you want to elevate it a bit:
One of the You Tubers who introduced me to willy nilly collage--gluing and taping and marking on a page with whatever is at hand--is Cat Hand. Another, Nina Ribina, calls these master boards: you do basically the same thing, but then you make color copies and cut them up into pieces and use them to make other things.
This is my first effort, displayed on my bedspread yesterday. Today I will see if I can pull it together in some way. I chose generic ink for my printer at its last change and the colors--should I try to copy them--won't capture the actual colors very well. Next time I'll but the name-brand ink.
The good thing about this particular background-making collage is that you can listen to podcasts or audio books or even watch films without subtitles while you make them!
2. A few years ago, Diana--one of the members of my Sunday writing group--introduced me to the blog of Sherry, her writer friend who lives in Bali. I love Sherry's posts. The one she wrote for today really spoke to me, a kindred introvert. Sherry's recent blog posts were about her trip to Italy, to celebrate her 70th birthday. Now she is back in Bali going through her own self-quarantine.
https://writingforselfdiscovery.com/author/writingforselfdiscovery/
3. "The Heart Guy"--the Australian series I've been watching on Acorn--is a good distraction, but I decided last night to watch a shorter series on Netflix today: Unorthodox.
One of the You Tubers who introduced me to willy nilly collage--gluing and taping and marking on a page with whatever is at hand--is Cat Hand. Another, Nina Ribina, calls these master boards: you do basically the same thing, but then you make color copies and cut them up into pieces and use them to make other things.
This is my first effort, displayed on my bedspread yesterday. Today I will see if I can pull it together in some way. I chose generic ink for my printer at its last change and the colors--should I try to copy them--won't capture the actual colors very well. Next time I'll but the name-brand ink.
The good thing about this particular background-making collage is that you can listen to podcasts or audio books or even watch films without subtitles while you make them!
2. A few years ago, Diana--one of the members of my Sunday writing group--introduced me to the blog of Sherry, her writer friend who lives in Bali. I love Sherry's posts. The one she wrote for today really spoke to me, a kindred introvert. Sherry's recent blog posts were about her trip to Italy, to celebrate her 70th birthday. Now she is back in Bali going through her own self-quarantine.
https://writingforselfdiscovery.com/author/writingforselfdiscovery/
3. "The Heart Guy"--the Australian series I've been watching on Acorn--is a good distraction, but I decided last night to watch a shorter series on Netflix today: Unorthodox.
Sunday, April 5, 2020
Day 25, 384 cases in Bexar County
This morning, I disinfected, donned my gloves and flannel mask (gift of my sweet friend Jan), and drove through the parking lot at Central Market. The three-deep line, if straight, would have reached into Incarnate Word's parking lot next door. Half the shoppers wore masks.
The saxophonist played to grim faces. In spite of the store's effort to infuse a few moments of festivity among shoppers who would, in normal circumstances, be celebrating Fiesta, wearing flowers in their hair and Fiesta medals on their shirts, nobody was moving to the music, not even a little, as they did a week ago.
Had I gotten there earlier, I'd planned to go into the empty post office and mail a Happy Mail to Day, but I decided to drive to a more isolated post office, go in with gloves and mask, and use the machine. The box--UPS was going to charge me $75 to mail it by the way--cost only $11 to mail from the post office.
Driving down McCollough, I passed the three streets we'd lived on in our first two years in Texas, three tree-named streets: Magnolia, Mistletoe, and Huisache. I wanted to take a look at my three former houses, returning in memory to a different life when we were young and hopeful and the future stretched out decades ahead of us. I tried to imagine the girl I was in 1967, 1968, back when the backdrop of that neighborhood included the new Hemisfair Tower. Back when my then-husband and his SAC students made a float for the Fiesta parade.
I remember making candy-cane striped curtains for the wide upstairs bedroom window in the two-story Huisache house, a quarter of a yard of fabric at a time all I could afford at Winn's as I walked home from my classes at SAC. I remember being sunburned in that bedroom after falling asleep on a Spring Break trip; my teenaged brother visiting and our German Shepherd Tony growling at him as if he were an intruder; my parents visiting and a robbery in our house while we were at Canyon Lake with Tony.
At 18 and 19, I never paid attention to the houses next door to ours, the trees on each street. An old person to my then-young eyes would have probably--let's be honest--been virtually invisible. Even my parents who came to visit were young, in their early forties.Young people tend to see what's close at hand, not the bigger picture.
At this stage of my life, I not only love and recognize grand old trees whose names I know, I pull my car over to look at a few of them in morning light, the budding of baby leaves on their branches. I notice the houses surrounding the houses we lived in. I notice old people sitting at bus stops, young men running, parents pushing strollers.
Back then, I might have wondered if I'd have babies; today I long to see my grandchildren in real life but was happy to get glimpses of the Texas ones on a text.
Driving home, I pulled into the parking lot of Julian Gold, an upscale clothing store, and snapped a few iPhone pictures of their window displays, seeming now like relics of another life:
In just one month, so many things we barely even noticed before look like anachronisms.
I watch movies and see people moving about freely, hugging, eating in restaurants dressed casually or glamorously, drinking and eating and laughing. I drive past churches on a Sunday morning and remember seeing people on lawns dressed in Easter colors. I think, wistfully, Oh yeah, I remember that world! Those were such good times!
The saxophonist played to grim faces. In spite of the store's effort to infuse a few moments of festivity among shoppers who would, in normal circumstances, be celebrating Fiesta, wearing flowers in their hair and Fiesta medals on their shirts, nobody was moving to the music, not even a little, as they did a week ago.
Had I gotten there earlier, I'd planned to go into the empty post office and mail a Happy Mail to Day, but I decided to drive to a more isolated post office, go in with gloves and mask, and use the machine. The box--UPS was going to charge me $75 to mail it by the way--cost only $11 to mail from the post office.
Driving down McCollough, I passed the three streets we'd lived on in our first two years in Texas, three tree-named streets: Magnolia, Mistletoe, and Huisache. I wanted to take a look at my three former houses, returning in memory to a different life when we were young and hopeful and the future stretched out decades ahead of us. I tried to imagine the girl I was in 1967, 1968, back when the backdrop of that neighborhood included the new Hemisfair Tower. Back when my then-husband and his SAC students made a float for the Fiesta parade.
I remember making candy-cane striped curtains for the wide upstairs bedroom window in the two-story Huisache house, a quarter of a yard of fabric at a time all I could afford at Winn's as I walked home from my classes at SAC. I remember being sunburned in that bedroom after falling asleep on a Spring Break trip; my teenaged brother visiting and our German Shepherd Tony growling at him as if he were an intruder; my parents visiting and a robbery in our house while we were at Canyon Lake with Tony.
At 18 and 19, I never paid attention to the houses next door to ours, the trees on each street. An old person to my then-young eyes would have probably--let's be honest--been virtually invisible. Even my parents who came to visit were young, in their early forties.Young people tend to see what's close at hand, not the bigger picture.
At this stage of my life, I not only love and recognize grand old trees whose names I know, I pull my car over to look at a few of them in morning light, the budding of baby leaves on their branches. I notice the houses surrounding the houses we lived in. I notice old people sitting at bus stops, young men running, parents pushing strollers.
Back then, I might have wondered if I'd have babies; today I long to see my grandchildren in real life but was happy to get glimpses of the Texas ones on a text.
Driving home, I pulled into the parking lot of Julian Gold, an upscale clothing store, and snapped a few iPhone pictures of their window displays, seeming now like relics of another life:
In just one month, so many things we barely even noticed before look like anachronisms.
I watch movies and see people moving about freely, hugging, eating in restaurants dressed casually or glamorously, drinking and eating and laughing. I drive past churches on a Sunday morning and remember seeing people on lawns dressed in Easter colors. I think, wistfully, Oh yeah, I remember that world! Those were such good times!
Saturday, April 4, 2020
Day 24
I love the sound of rain!
In an email this morning, Beverly mentioned that Larry was making homemade chili for supper. Larry is an excellent cook and I'm quite sure their chili is going to be delish! Ever since reading her email, the word "chili" kept rumbling intrusively through my mind, so I just went through the drive-through at Wendy's and got me some. It was--as I have to say--pretty darned good.
I packed up a small box of art supplies from my stash and wrapped them up to send to Day as Happy Mail whenever I decide to go to the post office past hours and use their machine to mail it.
I love my scattered tribe of family and friends, the way they pop in with texts and emails to share
stories, information, humor, and hope.
I love my five friends whose birthdays fell in a cluster these past two weeks, today being Lorraine's. Happy Birthday, Lorraine! On the other side of this, we will never take for granted the pleasure of having birthday lunches with our friends.
I love naps, music, NPR, writing on the blog, working on my small book about solitude in a pandemic, rubber stamps, You Tube tutorials, stencils, emails, cell phones, cheese, chili and poetry.
And today, I love Elena's painting of a guitar:
In an email this morning, Beverly mentioned that Larry was making homemade chili for supper. Larry is an excellent cook and I'm quite sure their chili is going to be delish! Ever since reading her email, the word "chili" kept rumbling intrusively through my mind, so I just went through the drive-through at Wendy's and got me some. It was--as I have to say--pretty darned good.
I packed up a small box of art supplies from my stash and wrapped them up to send to Day as Happy Mail whenever I decide to go to the post office past hours and use their machine to mail it.
I love my scattered tribe of family and friends, the way they pop in with texts and emails to share
stories, information, humor, and hope.
I love my five friends whose birthdays fell in a cluster these past two weeks, today being Lorraine's. Happy Birthday, Lorraine! On the other side of this, we will never take for granted the pleasure of having birthday lunches with our friends.
I love naps, music, NPR, writing on the blog, working on my small book about solitude in a pandemic, rubber stamps, You Tube tutorials, stencils, emails, cell phones, cheese, chili and poetry.
And today, I love Elena's painting of a guitar:
Friday, April 3, 2020
Day 23: April 3
Like everyone out there trying to resist the urge to overdose on bad news and feel enraged at a few blockhead politicians, I'm going to report some sunshine.
1. My dear friend Kara surprised me yesterday with this bouquet, delivered in a little pot I'd given her for her birthday. "I want the vase back," she said--and she will get it back with flowers in it after these wither. In the meanwhile, picked fresh flowers and greens are a spot of happy!
1. My dear friend Kara surprised me yesterday with this bouquet, delivered in a little pot I'd given her for her birthday. "I want the vase back," she said--and she will get it back with flowers in it after these wither. In the meanwhile, picked fresh flowers and greens are a spot of happy!
2. Day and I got this text from Nana/Carlene:
I am just back from Walk 2. Can't let my legs get wobbly. Our street is like peppermint--red azaleas and white dogwoods and trees look like a contest of which can stretch taller and I am sitting in freshly washed carport living room eating a beautiful apple and am perfectly miserable! Sympathy appreciated!
(She's actually doesn't DO miserable.)
3. I've been painting papers this morning and watching a video on Wanderlust 2020 by Mary Beth Shaw. I'd watched several of her videos on You Tube, but this class gave me some new techniques I can't wait to try.
4. It's a cloudy day in San Antonio, and I think I'll take a little walk after catching up with Andrew Cuomo, the man I wish were President.
3. I've been painting papers this morning and watching a video on Wanderlust 2020 by Mary Beth Shaw. I'd watched several of her videos on You Tube, but this class gave me some new techniques I can't wait to try.
4. It's a cloudy day in San Antonio, and I think I'll take a little walk after catching up with Andrew Cuomo, the man I wish were President.
Thursday, April 2, 2020
Day's Lockdown Prompts for journals or writing
It's a little hard to read them as they are small, but they are delightful and shareable and inspiring.
Day 22
Barbel sent me these wonderful words by the Irish French writer, Kathleen O'Meara (1839-1888). Her pen name Grace Ramsey because of the Irish Catholic racism at the time:
"And the people stayed home. And read books, and listened, and rested, and exercised, and made art and played games, and grew gardens full of fresh food, and learned new ways of being, and were still. And listened more deeply.
Some meditated, some prayed, some danced. Some met their shadows. And the people began to think differently. And the people healed.
And, in the absence of people living in ignorant, dangerous, mindless, and heartless ways, the earth began to heal.
And when the danger passed, and the people joined together again, they grieved their losses, and made new choices, and dreamed new images, and created new ways to live and heal the earth fully, as they had been healed."
"And the people stayed home. And read books, and listened, and rested, and exercised, and made art and played games, and grew gardens full of fresh food, and learned new ways of being, and were still. And listened more deeply.
Some meditated, some prayed, some danced. Some met their shadows. And the people began to think differently. And the people healed.
And, in the absence of people living in ignorant, dangerous, mindless, and heartless ways, the earth began to heal.
And when the danger passed, and the people joined together again, they grieved their losses, and made new choices, and dreamed new images, and created new ways to live and heal the earth fully, as they had been healed."
Wednesday, April 1, 2020
Capturing the roller coaster
Day inspires me with her art and the many ways she makes the best of bad situations.
So there she is in Northern Virginia, setting up online learning for her high school teachers, being a mom and a wife, and making a colorful book documenting the days of lockdown. As she wrote in her text along with these pictures: "Twenty days of Corona lockdown journaling. Trying to capture the roller coaster."
And yet, none of us is blasé about the pandemic. We feel a stab of agony just thinking that one of us could suffer or die from this virus. We know that we're never going to return to being just the way we were before. Things will change. We'll always live with a new vulnerability, as we did after 9/11.
But we're doing what we do--writing, painting, making art, making music, cooking, gardening--as our creative responses to all that we can't change.
So there she is in Northern Virginia, setting up online learning for her high school teachers, being a mom and a wife, and making a colorful book documenting the days of lockdown. As she wrote in her text along with these pictures: "Twenty days of Corona lockdown journaling. Trying to capture the roller coaster."
And yet, none of us is blasé about the pandemic. We feel a stab of agony just thinking that one of us could suffer or die from this virus. We know that we're never going to return to being just the way we were before. Things will change. We'll always live with a new vulnerability, as we did after 9/11.
But we're doing what we do--writing, painting, making art, making music, cooking, gardening--as our creative responses to all that we can't change.
Day 21
It's a beautiful day outside, and I plan to spend some time in the fresh air after my nap.
My one outing of the day (this Freda's birthday) was to drive to HEB in Helotes. Will shopped for me, and we kept our six-foot distance while he loaded my trunk. Then--thanks to Jackson's recommendation, and wearing the flannel mask Jan made for me--I went to the auto parts store and got a box of latex gloves.
We're all helping each other in any ways we can, feeling helpless when we can't, and doing the best we can to get through these days.
I feel a heaviness today. We see people doing well during and after the virus, like Chris Cuomo, and we hear of recoveries, but I'm feeling sad today for all the families who are losing loved ones to this brutal pandemic.
My one outing of the day (this Freda's birthday) was to drive to HEB in Helotes. Will shopped for me, and we kept our six-foot distance while he loaded my trunk. Then--thanks to Jackson's recommendation, and wearing the flannel mask Jan made for me--I went to the auto parts store and got a box of latex gloves.
We're all helping each other in any ways we can, feeling helpless when we can't, and doing the best we can to get through these days.
 |
| Thanks for the glam mask, Jan! |
 |
| My sweet son, always cheerful and positive |
I feel a heaviness today. We see people doing well during and after the virus, like Chris Cuomo, and we hear of recoveries, but I'm feeling sad today for all the families who are losing loved ones to this brutal pandemic.
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