Explore

Once or twice a day I check in on a couple of wildlife cams I follow on Explore.org.  I am particularly in love with AfriCam and have seen some wonderful views of animals in the wild. But today, this one puzzled me. But when I zoomed in, I saw it was just a herd of wildebeests lying down near the Tau water hole. 

Of course, I check in on bird cams such as the Decorah Eagles these days. And throughout the winter, I look to see if the northern lights are playing in Churchill Manitoba. This is a great free resource for not just education and information, but personal zen as well.

A new president, a vaccine, a new lease on life

Yes, I'm delighted with new President Joe Biden. What a few months it has been since the election. The fallout from insurrection at the capitol is just beginning, I'm sure. But Joe has gotten right to work and many wrongs of the Trump era will soon be corrected and the country can move forward in a kinder, healthier, more optimistic manner.

As for me, I was surprised when they opened up the Covid vaccines to the 70+ crowd in my state. I logged in the minute it opened and I was one of the lucky ones to get an appointment. I had the first dose of the Pfizer vaccine yesterday and will go back around February 12th for the second one. Today I woke with a sore arm and had a sore throat which has now diminished. So far, so good. Meanwhile, I will continue to practice all the recommendations for masks, distancing, hand washing, etc., as there will still remain a small chance of being infected. Once a large enough percentage of the population is vaccinated, we can all start to relax a little. Honestly, I never expected I would be among those vaccinated in January.

At the first of January, I wrote a one word resolution for 2021: Downsize.

I truly believe this is the year I will leave my home of over 40 years and move to something smaller and without stairs. There are some lovely such homes in the neighborhood where two of my sons live, and I am watching for just the right model to come on the market. Every week there is a new listing there. I've been watching those homes as well as sales of homes in my own neighborhood for at least two years, so I have a good idea what to expect both in cost and features of the homes available as well as what I could likely sell my own home for. With my knees on a steady decline, the stairs are keeping me from enjoying life fully. The time has come to make this move.

My downsizing efforts relate to a number of different things, actually. Obviously, I'm ridding my house of anything I don't want to move into the next one. And I'm always trying to downsize myself--taking off weight to feel better and be more active. This week I've been downsizing the amount of paper I have in file boxes. My attitude in the past was "when in doubt, save it". But a lot of what I've saved is readily available online. Plus my files have a lot of real junk, like old utility bills. I'm not entirely satisfied with what I've done this week, but I sure did manage to throw away or shred a great deal of paper. This is just one example of many things in my house getting reduced. I'll continue this project a little more every week now.

I'm also downsizing my wardrobe. I have saved some things for a very long time, mainly because I either paid a lot of money for them or they are tied to a special memory. For example, I have a darling skirt and top I bought in Paris in 1982 when we took a family trip there. It's too small and I will never wear it again. But I have loved that outfit and hate to part with it. I have some large boxes full of clothes now ready to go to a charity shop, including some household items as well. Again, there is much more I can do in this area, and I will continue. The more I give away, the more I realize I don't miss the things I give away.

I've been talking about selling my grand piano for a long time. I don't think I have admitted to myself how hard this will be, and I haven't done it yet. I fully acknowledge it is one major impediment to moving to a smaller place, and I must get it done.

I will be selling some furniture as well, including the sweet Queen Anne style desk I used all those years of working from home. I'm not going to have a dedicated office in the new place and I won't need a big desk. I mostly work with my laptop in my TV room now. Or really, I mostly use my tablet or phone. I got rid of my big desktop computer but I'll keep the printer as I need it from time to time. It will occupy a corner of some room in the new place. Bye bye lovely desk. I really have loved you. You made the workday a little nicer.

Simplify, simplify. Every thing I let go of is one less thing tying me down to maintenance and care. One less thing preventing me from moving to the next phase of my life. The more I let go, the freer I am. 

Thanksgiving Solitude

Home Sweet Home

 We didn't do a big family dinner this Thanksgiving. Each of my kids did separate dinners just for their own households. I spent the day with Frankie: cooked scrambled eggs for breakfast and heated up a turkey pot pie for dinner. Frankie enjoyed sharing. Chatted on the phone and online with members of my family, and watched some BritBox -- my new favorite streaming source. In my family, we're taking this disease very seriously and all are trying hard not to get infected. It means doing things differently this year. But it really has been fine.

We change our traditions, we make new ones.

I've read a lot about senior citizens who are sad and lonely at missing the big family gatherings this year. I am not one of those. I wasn't sad at all. In fact, I really enjoyed not cooking a turkey for the first time in 42 years. I enjoyed being lazy and watching a lot of television and spending a little time outdoors with my Frankie on a beautiful fall day.

I grew up in a crowded household of eight children and parents somehow fitting into a 4-bedroom, 1-bath home. I went directly from home into marriage and in a few years began adding children. I would be 60 years old before I would know how it is to live entirely alone. I relished it. I love my family deeply. But I soon learned the beauty and peace to be found in solitude--something I had never known before that time. I remember at that time I wrote an essay about aloneness vs. loneliness. The former does not necessarily equate to the latter.

I understand not everyone sees aloneness as I do, and they crave human contact and association. But years of working from home really prepared me for the substitute of online, distanced communication -- both with co-workers and even my family.

These months of distancing due to Covid-19 have not been difficult for me. I do see my kids and friends once in awhile. In the summer time we had lunches on the patio. Sometimes one or another of them will drop by and we visit but keep our distance across a large room. And now I drive my grandsons to and from school one day a week (wearing masks, utilizing hand sanitizer, etc.). My monthly movie group has resorted to watching movies streaming online and then following with a Zoom online meetup to discuss. It works very well thanks to a local theater that streams indie and foreign and other popular movies of the sort we like. This all feels like sufficient contact for now. Christmas and New Year will come and go and we'll all survive.

 Next year, Thanksgiving will be different. Now that my kids have successfully done a dinner on their own, we will be able to share duties, as a family, putting on the dinner. I don't see myself doing it all myself ever again. And, if all goes to plan, I will have sold my house and moved to a new smaller place by then, too. I'm dreaming of that change--but more about that another time.

Things will eventually change in 2021, and we'll be back to close personal visits, meals, gatherings. And I'll love it when that happens. But I'm still going to enjoy a few more months of some precious solitude. I choose to think of this time as an opportunity I never had growing up or while raising my family. I will embrace the time I have for this.

Covid, Elm bugs, Staying Sane

This year has been anything but normal. The onset of Covid and our social distancing in March was just the beginning of so many unusual and unexpected events. I wasn't even going to blog about this because it seems so mundane. But taken all together, things start to weigh you down and I feel myself sometimes teetering on the edge of depression.

I am generally a positive, upbeat person and all about problem-solving. I like to remember a lawyer I once worked for, a brilliant man who was later an appeals court judge for Utah, but no longer with us now. When something went wrong, he would predictably blow up with loud yelling and swearing -- for about 30 seconds. Then he was over it and got down to solving the problem. He never yelled at people, just the universe. I never took it personally, even when the mistake was mine. But I learned a valuable lesson in problem solving: it's fine to rant and vent; but the sooner you can get to figuring out the solutions, the sooner you're going to be feeling better about it. "All right," he would say, "here's what we're going to do." And from there on it was a pragmatic exercise in finding the best options and getting the thing done. And often, he ended with some humor and good-natured kidding.

Normally, I try to approach problems that same way. Pragmatism is my middle name. And humor is my anti-depressive medication. I'm not going to put up a laundry list of my summertime troubles now. Suffice it to say, I've plugged along with the yard and house responsibilities fairly well. I finally hired a guy to mow just the front lawn to help me out. And I've decided this week to hire a guy to finish up weeding the yard for me as it's getting just too hot.

The yard cleanup and fixup has been slow because I'm old and slow. I have to stop when I have too much pain. But I am really pleased with the things I've gotten done. My patio had become a place of beauty and serenity. I invited people over as it was a great place for social distancing while socializing. We ordered in food or brought our own lunches. It felt good to have human interaction and feel safe about it. But all of that ended this week with the invasion of the Elm Seed Bugs -- the thing that has finally gotten the best of me.

This is a relatively new pest to Utah, arriving around 2009. This is my first year with it. They feed on the seeds of the trashy Siberian Elm tree, of which there are two gigantic ones on my neighbor's property, hanging over mine. These trees have been a source of great irritation to me over the years. This year brought an especially prolific number of the white round elm seeds which covered the yard and looked almost like snow, impossible to rake up.

My neighbor's house sits atop a steep hill above the trees, and he has multiple levels of block walls holding the hill in place. He believes the trees help stabilize the hill. He once threatened to sue another neighbor who removed an elm tree that was literally knocking down a fence. So, I know this is already a touchy subject.

To add insult to the nastiness of the tree, this neighbor needed a place for first one and then two ugly storage sheds, which he decided to place on the bottom tier of block wall, right next to my property line and under that obnoxious tree. The sheds are two different sizes and color and look hideous right there next to the corner of my deck. But I have tried to take it in stride, training some ivy to climb along the side to eventually hide the ugly things. But that irritation now pales in comparison to the elm seed bug invasion.

A little over a week ago, I walked out on the patio, to see hordes of tiny black bugs all over the walls of my house on the southwest corner by the elm tree. I sprayed with my usually effective insect spray. And lots of bugs died. But more kept coming to replace them. And, yes, some of those died, but many didn't. They started coming inside the house. Then I walked out the front door (which I rarely use) and saw a terrifying sight of thousand of bugs all over the tall outside entry to my house. It was sickening. I used the hose to wash them all away and realized I was dealing with something bigger than my little sprayer could handle. A question to my gardening group on Facebook produced the name of the bug and enabled me to research and find out how to deal with it. I looked closely at the limbs and leaves of the elm tree; there were literally thousands of the bugs within my immediate view. I called an exterminator and had the entire outside of the house sprayed as well as the tree, to the extent possible. I did some selective spraying also on the inside.

And now I wait. Every day there are new dead bodies. Every day, I use the leaf blower to get rid of them outside and vacuum inside. There are fewer and fewer each day, but they are still arriving.

These things are not harmful: they don't bite, they don't eat your garden, they don't eat furniture, clothing or food. They are just gross simply because of the sheer numbers and how they collect together. For now, my patio furniture is all bunched together at one side, covered in plastic awaiting the end of the plague. I've educated myself on these pests, and I know eventually they will go dormant. But it could be weeks until then.

I'm exhausted and disgusted with cleaning them up. It feels like I'm neglecting so much else and I'm getting a little behind. I'm very sad I can't use my patio which is so pleasant, even on the hottest days. There are still too many bugs. Did I mention these pests also fly? My best option for having people over is no more.  My escape spot for evening sunset watching or morning coffee drinking and enjoying the birds, the flowers and the fresh air is no more. It really hit me hard when I realized how much of a loss that was to me in this year of Covid, with no idea when I can use that patio again.

When will things return to normal? Suddenly, I felt so underwater with everything. Even depressed.

This weekend I saw a little doe eating flowers in my yard. I took a picture of her. She was completely unfazed by my presence and continued eating. There was something almost calming and pleasant in watching that sweet non-threatening animal. Something normal in a year of insanity. Watching her made me laugh because that has certainly been one consistency in all my years living at this house--the deer eat my flowers. My pragmatic self returned.

Okay, I have to keep on diligently cleaning up dead bugs. What other choice do I have? And I'll meet up with people in other ways, keeping as safe as possible. I'll keep working on my to do lists for inside and out. I may even sell my house this summer if I get everything ready. I think the Elm Seed bug invasion has finally made me look forward to that major change in my life. But that's another topic for another time.

Distancing

It has been a strange few months. Who would ever have expected life would take this turn when the whole world is fighting a terrible, highly contagious and deadly virus. Who would have expected that schools would close, businesses would close, people would work from home where possible, and, people stay at home practicing social distancing.

Social Distancing:
Wash hands
Don't touch face
Wear a mask
Stay at least 6 feet apart
Stay home as much as possible
If sick, get tested and don't go around people

By extension, for me, this has meant ordering my groceries online and picking up at the curb. I am lucky I have multiple options for this and, for now, all are offering the service for free where they would normally charge a fee. I've become a regular customer for a local bakery that has curbside pickup just because the grocery store tends to smash the bread. I also found hardware stores that deliver to the curb, and have been able to get everything I need either there or by ordering online.

My movie/lunch group has been cancelled for months now. I stopped (for the most part) visiting grandkids, kids, and my mother. In fact, I really stopped going anywhere. During March and April, that was not so bad. I watched a lot of Netflix and Hulu and kept in touch with everyone electronically. It's something you can do for awhile. But it does wear thin after awhile.

May brought more opportunities to be outside working in the yard. But I have found it hard to really do justice there. It has taken me all month to finally hit a good pace. I have visited a couple of outdoor garden shops. I wore a mask but found many people did not. It does not make me feel confident being out and about.

Life just feels so strange, so different. No previous routine works anymore. And I haven't yet figured out a new routine. I have come to appreciate how beneficial it is to have routines.

Now states are opening up and businesses are opening up, I feel a little more need to remain sheltered. The virus is particularly deadly for people of my age and I continue to need to stay well. But we have learned more about spread of the virus and I am willing to have a little more personal interaction. I have visited my son's family and grandkids a couple of times. We stayed a good distance apart and no hugging or direct contact.

I've planned a lunch on my patio with a friend on Tuesday. We'll each bring our own lunch. I'll make sure all surfaces are cleaned and disinfected, and we'll stay well apart. Then on Saturday, I will host a birthday party on the patio with my son's family. We will follow the same rules, bringing our own food and keeping distance. But the backyard is pretty. There's lots of space and seating on the deck and patio. And being outdoors, we can still have fun without getting close.

I still have to be careful around my family because my son and daughter-in-law are both working in the office one or more days a week. I will probably start visiting my 91-year old mother again, but only outside and I'll probably even take my own chair. Some other members of my family are around her all the time and I fear she will be exposed by those who are not cognizant of the possibility they could carry infection to her.

 Before I can drive to Ogden, I need to get my snow tires switched to summer tires. But my tire shop is not Covid-friendly. Normally, I would drop off the car and either wait in the waiting room or get a courtesy ride home. Now, neither of those options is okay for me. But they will not give me a fixed appointment--I have to just come in and get in line with everyone needing tire work. I explained I'm in a high risk group and asked if they had some way to accommodate people like me. They said, no. So, I will try showing up before they open the doors and try to be first in line, and take my own chair and sit on the lawn to the side of the building.

Today, our country will probably cross the terrible threshold of 100,000 deaths from Covid-19. The pandemic is not over. But to my amazement, people all around the country are acting as if it doesn't exist anymore and ignoring social distancing rules. I understand the wish to be out doing things and living life as normal. But the virus doesn't stop infecting just because we pretend it's not there. I believe this all means I will need to continue my own distancing practice for much longer while more people become infected and until there is a vaccine.

Life is forever changed. I look forward to some kind of new normal. Meanwhile, I will tend my garden.

Earthquake - 5.7 magnitude

Here in the greater Salt Lake (Utah) valley at 7:09 a.m. we were all startled awake by a strong 5.7 earthquake centered west of the city, just west of the airport. I am normally up and awake at that time, but had had a sleepless night and after hours awake, had managed to get back to sleep only to be thus awakened.

When it began, I first felt aware of Frankie next to me on the bed shaking his tags loudly, as he does to let me know he wants to go out. But the bed was shaking too -- hard. What the heck, Frankie? Within a second I thought earthquake, tried to get up. I was still halfway in a dream that seemed to flow into the event, though I can't remember now anything of the dream. By the time I struggled to stand up, it stopped. I let Frankie out and dove into a series of texts and calls from all my kids.

Since this morning there have been over 50 aftershocks -- most of them small -- but two strong ones at 4.5 and another 4.6 just an hour ago. I had a false sense of security for awhile, as the aftershocks had dropped off and were quite small -- and then that big one hit. Now, I'm seriously rattled and just waiting on edge for the next one. Frankie is starting to get edgy, too.

All my kids and grandkids checked in with me right away. Family is all okay and no damage. Around the valley, only minor injuries have been reported and some damaged buildings. The airport suffered damage and was shut down for awhile, but is back in operation now.

I am already staying home practicing social distancing due to the coronavirus plague. I have quite a few projects lined up to keep busy around the house and yard. But today, I'm taking a break from productivity and just do some extra self-care. Starting with writing about the experience.

 On the home front, my favorite neighbors are now getting their house ready to sell and I expect they will be leaving soon. It has made me realize I don't want to stay in this house anymore. For a year or so I've been looking at nice little one-level homes in the neighborhood where two of my sons and their families live. It won't take me long to get my house ready to sell. I have a few little things inside that need attention. Outside, I need to finish the cleanup I didn't do last fall. But I won't engage in all the planting I usually do. Just clean up, fertilize, mulch, edit out any plants that aren't looking well, and probably add some annuals for a pop of color.

It's a big step to think seriously about leaving the home I've lived in for over 40 years. But the world is a changed place. I need a new normal. We all do, really. There will be long-term effects from the pandemic. In addition, there's been an explosion of apartment and condo building just a few blocks from my house, and traffic, noise, and other issues are starting to change greatly in this neighborhood. I guess it's as good a time as any to make a big move.

Yes, I'm still a little shaky. I keep thinking we're having another shake, and then I realize it's me that's shaking. Our earthquake event is apparently not over. But now I've written about it, and I'm hoping the worst of it is behind us.

What next, world? What next?

UPDATE: Here we are 5 days later and 100s of aftershocks later. I had experienced one large earthquake prior to this, but did not have this much aftershock activity. After a 4.0 shock that  was felt all the way to Ogden yesterday, and many questions on Twitter, the USGS tookk the time to explain more about aftershocks and that this is actually normal and not indicative of something bigger to come. I do appreciate the reassurance. But this whole thing really is unnnerving; especially in conjunction with the virus pandemic.

Another Painting Class

During the summer, I signed up for a watercolor class at our local arts center. I have been missing the pleasure of painting, and I felt I'd like to brush up on some basics. Unfortunately, the regular instructor was unavailable, and the substitute she sent was under the mistaken impression we were all advanced students not needing any real instructions. In truth, the class was advertised as beginner to intermediate, and, indeed, about have of our 20 or so classmates had never done any watercolor at all. The instructor was forced to make some significant changes to her teaching plans.

I didn't learn a great deal in this class. But the upside is that it got me painting again. I got all my materials out and looked at what I had and got past that thinking of "it's just too much trouble -- I'll do it another time."

So, for my own benefit, here's a little of what I painted.

Some practice in perspective, light and shadows and creating 3D forms. I'm very bad at this. And it's hard to do in watercolor because sometimes you want a dry dark color and it runs away a bit.

The teacher wanted us to paint from our own photos and not violate any copyrights, so I did this one of a Black-headed Grosbeak in my yard. When viewed small, it looks pretty good. But it's about 6"x8" and is actually pretty rough. I worked on it a lot and finally called it done.

 Finally, I chose a scene from the Antelope Island causeway. I wanted to take on the difficult challenge of clouds. In watercolor, you leave white space as white--you don't paint it. In oils and acrylics, you can use white paint. Somehow, it's very hard for me to paint clouds in watercolor. So I spent the rest of the weeks of class working on this. I know I ruined some parts and maybe overworked it. But again, I finally had to say, done!

So there it is, my return to watercolor. I'm not really proud of the work I've done. But feel good to have begun again. I've chosen a few more subjects I want to paint. Once I have Thanksgiving dinner behind me, I will drag out the paints again and set up on my kitchen island.

Oops, almost forgot this one. On the first day of class, I was so disappointed at having no instruction and no direction, I went home determined to paint something anyway. The first thing I saw was a cute Mexican serving dish I keep on my kitchen island. It shows no skill or technique, but at least my grandkids recognized it right away.

Better Eyesight

Just an update on my eyes. I did finally have one last laser touch-up to correct a cloudy membrane covering the right eye lens. I could see distance better immediately after that. However, reading improvement has been occurring gradually over the four weeks since then. At my final followup visit to the eye doc, my vision was 20/20 in the left and 20/30 in the right. But 20/20 together. But most remarkable was my reading vision. I don't remember how small the text was I could read, but it was pretty tiny with both eyes together. Interestingly, neither eye alone was that good. But the eye doc explained that our brains do a thing when combining sight from both eyes, the effect is better than either eye alone. Well, all I know is I can now even read easily the tiny numbers on my phone that indicate remaining battery power. Even with contacts, I used to squint for those.

I am enjoying reading books again after a long sad period when reading had become really unpleasant. I will still wear reading glasses when the text is light in color or on a colored background. Also in dim lighting.  I keep some reading glasses in my purse, especially for reading packaging in the grocery store that is often either very small, or printed in white on a colored background.

In the final tally, it was definitely worth it to have the more expensive lenses. I am glasses-free now and really seeing well. And still my vision continues to improve.

Oh, I almost forgot about the PVD.  The flashes have gone away but I still have one large floater that insists on being front and center. The eye doc explained that floater might eventually just sink out of sight. But if it doesn't, there is laser surgery to correct it. I'm definitely waiting this one out. The floater is annoying, but I've had my fill of eye doctor visits for now (10 visits this year!) and will only consider the surgery after giving this a long time to resolve itself.

Summer of Cooking Lessons

It has taken me long enough to get around to writing about summer with the grandsons. It has been a strange year -- largely due to my vision issues. I pushed myself hard to make summer really memorable. This may very well be our last such summer as the boys are getting so much older now. We've had a great run with our themed summers for I don't know how many years now. All memorable. The kids like to talk about those special summers. I know we've made lifelong memories.

We covered an amazing amount of ground with our cooking activities. I think I'll mostly list what we made and not add a lot of details just in interest of length.

Yesterday, I finished printing all of our recipes and compiling them in a cool recipe book, one for each kid, with built-in stand and plastic page covers, so they can look at the recipes while cooking and keep them clean. I forgot to take pictures of the books before delivering them to the kids. Ah well, never mind, here's some of what we did this summer:

Basics: We learned about reading recipes, using knives safely (and which knives to use for various purposes), how to measure ingredients (how double or half ingredients and some substitutions), cooking organization beforehand and cleanup after. We learned about baking and broiling in the oven, and cooking on top of the stove. We learned how to use food processor and various kitchen tools and utensils. We learned saute skills and how to chop onions and garlic and herbs, which was the start of many of our recipes.

Sandwiches: We began with a week of all different types of sandwiches with different types of breads, fillings, toppings, sauces. We toasted in the toaster and under the broiler. Survival food for kids away at college, right?

Sauces: We made homemade spaghetti sauce and homemade teriyaki sauce. The spaghetti sauce was used both for spaghetti dinner, and leftovers were frozen and used for meatballs subs and pizza sauce later on.

Meats: We made homemade meatballs (used in both our spaghetti dinner and meatball subs). Also fried chicken, teriyaki chicken (with our homemade sauce), Sloppy Joes, and oven-baked bacon.

Eggs: We learned how to crack an egg without shells. By the end of summer, the boys were highly confident in egg cracking. We cooked eggs three ways: scrambled, over easy (served with toast soldiers), and perfect hard boiled (and we learned to peel hard-cooked eggs).

Potatoes: We cooked a variety of different types of potatoes. Boiled (parsleyed new potatoes with skins on), mashed, baked, fried. We even made a batch of potato chips.

Vegetables: In addition to potatoes, we learned how to wash, peel (or not) and cut up various types of veggies and a variety of ways of cooking; including steaming, frying, baking, boiling. We made perfect rice which was served with our teriyaki chicken. 

Breads: We made homemade bread, which was really fun for the boys and was a highlight of our activities. The guys produced some amazingly perfect loaves which we all enjoyed. With the same bread dough, we also made cinnamon rolls, dinner rolls, hamburger buns, pigs in blankets (with smoky sausages), and even some cinnamon twists with leftover dough. We made honey butter for the hot bread right out of the oven. I almost forgot to mention banana bread, too.

I managed to get a good picture of the bread while distorting the kids. Oops!

 Desserts: We made Apple Betty, which was simple except for some extensive manual peeling of apples with paring knives. I didn't realize I had three paring knives. We also made a six-layer rainbow cake. We used a cake mix for our cake as we were focusing on the design, coloring, and assembly. It took two white cake mixes, each divided into thirds and colored before baking. We assembled with icing we had purchased. The one mistake we made was to try putting some raspberry filling between some of the layers, which caused the layers to slide due to the weight of layer above. But with some fast-thinking and chilling, we got it to stay. What a triumph!

Combo Foods: Under the category of breads, we also made pizza dough, and then added various toppings of the kids' choice to make dinner for their parents. We made shepherd's pie using our mashed potato and sloppy joe's recipes and adding veggies and baking.  We cooked perfect pastas incorporating some of the other items. We made mac and cheese, spaghetti, Afredo chicken, maybe others I don't recall.

Mac n Cheese

I think that covers it. I may have forgotten something. But clearly, our summer was very busy -- especially considering they were on vacation for a couple of weeks and I was out of commission for a few days for eye surgery. We all felt really satisfied with our efforts. I wish I had taken more pictures. But no matter, we made memories.

A few complications

Now seven weeks post surgery on the first eye, and I have a few complications, though nothing serious. At four and six weeks, I had followup appointments with my regular eye doctor, and it seems I wasn't seeing as well as immediately after the surgery. In fact, my vision was 20/40 -- barely enough to pass the driver test which I have to do later this year. He referred me back to the surgeon to see if some laser tweaking was called for. The surgeon discussed with me three issues I'm having:

PVD - Posterior Vitreous Detachment. This condition actually just occurred a few days before I was to see the surgeon. I googled the symptoms and correctly identified this. It helped that a good friend of mine just recently had a bout of this herself. It is when the vitreous material in the eye separates from the retina resulting in noticeable floaters and flashes of light in the peripheral vision. It is fairly common in older people, though I hadn't heard of it before my friend had it. It is more likely to occur in near-sighted people, and also post cataract surgery. As we age, the vitreous material shrinks and pulls away from the retina (this is different from detached retina). In most cases, including mine, the retina is not damaged and the condition will usually heal on its own in about four weeks or so.

Cloudy membrane. Sometimes, post cataract surgery, the membrane that contains the new lens can also become clouded. This has occurred with my right eye (the same one with PVD). The fix is a simple laser procedure in the office. However, as my eyes are still healing, I won't get this procedure until mid-September. Both this procedure and the healing up of the PVD should improve my vision in the right eye once again. At this time, the left eye doesn't appear to have this problem.

Astigmatism. I guess I don't have an ordinary astigmatism. I have an unusual shaped eye. The surgeon did caution me that because of this I may not have the perfect correction I desire. He did do some laser work on my eyes during the cataract surgery, but he is reluctant to do anything further now as it could actually harm my vision. So, we've gone as far as we can on that issue. I will wait to see how I am seeing after September. But it seems likely I will need readers for some reading (as I do now). And I may need driving glasses.

Oh well, at least I'm not blind.

I can see clearly now

The second cataract surgery was completed earlier this week, and I am the proud owner of some pretty wonderful, powerful eyesight. My distance vision really could not be better. My reading vision is good and improving every day. I knew there was a caveat with the reading vision due to a deformity in eye shape, but the doctor did a bid of laser surgery along with the cataract procedure to make the most of the multifocal lenses. And here I am, reading and writing without glasses. I still have a little difficulty with thin letters like i, l, t -- especially double letters -- and some punctuation. But I'm delighted to be reading well for the most part, able to see my phone and computer, and to read fairly small text without much difficulty. I may still wear reading glasses for long episodes of reading -- like a book or news articles. We'll see.

The whole experience was truly interesting. I accepted the Valium they offered, but no other calming medication. The eye area is totally numbed and I was awake and aware for the entire procedure. At a few points patient feedback is needed. It sounds awful, but really is not. Even having your eyelids held open is not weird. You feel like you are blinking normally and it doesn't bother you at all. The entire process takes only about 10 minutes, although you do spend additional time for a physical and numbing process beforehand. Really, the longest appointment was the preliminary one a few weeks before surgery, where they do many tests and measurements. My overall impression was that it was a really interesting experience to have and to "watch". It was more fascinating than anything. No pain at all, and only tiny moments of discomfort.

Perhaps the hardest part is arranging rides to and from the clinic on three different days. My kids all have work and other things happening in their lives. I know it wasn't easy for them to arrange. But they all came through and helped me out. I noticed other patients in the office struggling to arrange rides. It's not easy for anyone, I think.

I came out of the first surgery with amazing clear distance vision immediately but blurry reading vision. That reading vision has now improved to 20/20 but with a slight "smeariness" to the text. I could actually read the 20/10 line as well. The second eye remained blurry for both distance and reading the whole first day, and I was worried there was some problem. However, by my followup visit the next morning, I was seeing very well and able to drive myself. The reading level was only at about 20/40 and that was a reach. But that has improved a great deal and reading in both eyes continues to improve.

One thing I am learning is that I look through these implanted lenses in a different way than I did multifocal contacts. With contacts, I tended to narrow my eyelids to sort of hold the lens in place while I looked through the bifocal part of the lens. It's a habit I need to unlearn. The implanted lens is not floating on the surface of the eye; and holding my eyelids like that has no benefit at all. It's better to hold my eyes open and simply tilt my eyes and head as needed to access the reading part of the lenses. Just relearning this and retraining my brain is bringing about better and better results.

It is amazing to have perfect distance vision without glasses or contacts. I keep feeling like I need to put my glasses on or take out my contacts. Just habit.

I have been following doctor's orders to a "t" following the surgery: no heavy lifting, no yard work for a few weeks, eye drops on a specified schedule for four weeks, etc. The hardest part is refraining from yard work. But I care too much about having good outcomes from the surgery to do anything that might diminish the good results. I did what I could before the surgery. I got some yard help before the surgery. And now the yard projects will just have to wait for a little while.

So, all is well in the vision department. I'm definitely glad I opted for the multifocal lenses as I do have pretty remarkable reading capability without glasses so far. It was worth it to me.

This was just one of the turning points in my 2019. More to come.

A Turning Point

Well, look who's back. Yep, I haven't posted in five months, But, here I am at last with an update. I ended last year on a down note, so there was nowhere to go but up. And in many ways things are looking up. And I am approaching something of a turning point in my life. I'll break it down into tidbits.

First, I am finally having the much needed and much anticipated cataract surgery. First eye is next week, and the second eye the week after that. I had put off the doctor visit until after the holidays. Then I learned the bad news that I had to wait three to four months while wearing glasses and no contacts because I had worn hard or gas-permeable lenses for over 50 years. I followed orders and wore only glasses. But it was tougher than I thought it would be. In the bad eye, I now see only light shapes and dim colors -- glasses offer no help. With the remaining good eye, glasses definitely help, but as the shape of the cornea changes, so does my vision. I am left with pretty poor vision at this point. I'm okay to drive, but I stick to short trips on back roads. Any fears I may have had early on about the surgery are far outweighed now by my desire to see well once again. The other bad news is that I am not an ideal candidate for the multifocal lenses due to a slight malformation in my eyes. This means they may not be able to correct perfectly for reading and I may sometimes need reading glasses. The doctor seems to believe, however, that in good light and with rested, hydrated eyes, I won't need the glasses. The cost of the multifocal lenses is thousands of dollars more than the single focal lenses. But after much thought and a bit of angst, I decided to go with multifocal anyway. It's a gamble and I may end up disappointed. But I had set aside the money for this long ago, and with some hope of success, I am willing to take the chance. I will update more after the surgeries.

This week is the last week of school for the grandkids and the last week of elementary school for the youngest grandson. This means I will no longer be needed to help get him off to school in the mornings. Next year in junior high, he and his mother will leave the house at about the same time. And the boys are old enough now they don't need supervision in the afternoon for the hour till their dad gets home. Frankie and I will miss many aspects of being so involved in the grandkids' lives. But I won't miss needing to wake up at 4:30 every day. Or needing to shovel snow before I leave the house in those early hours. And possibly most of all, I won't miss the school parking lot and drop off circle -- one of the nightmares of modern America. I could write a whole post on this (but I won't), but 95% of parents are considerate, thoughtful, careful drivers. The other 5%? Just be on your toes every second.

Yesterday I had a party at my house to celebrate my oldest granddaughter's graduation from Salt Lake Community College. And incidentally, I'm quite proud of her for doing it all on her own and working and paying her tuition and costs as she went. As I was talking with the grandsons, I commented that I didn't imagine they would want to spend as much time at my house this summer. On the contrary, they said they loved to come to my house and looked forward to those summer days. I was surprised, since they are getting older and I don't have the fun games and electronics they have at home. But I think they like that we have great lunches and talks together and then we DO things. We read, we do music, we go on field trips. Following on last year's successful year of music, we will continue to play our instruments every day, and I will give the boys a piano lesson once a week. But this year they want to make it the year of cooking lessons. So that's what it will be. And even Brittany, the new graduate will join us on the cooking days. So this will be fun! I will modify the schedule this year a bit, however. I will spend a couple of hours at home in the mornings taking care of things in the yard and house while the boys get their own breakfasts at home, get ready for the day, and do things they need to do. I will show up at 11 a.m. and we'll go from there. It will be very good for me as I continue to take more of the maintenance responsibility in my yard.

And that brings me to THE YARD. Some of my friends keep telling me it's time to sell the house if the yard has become so difficult for me. But, when I see a new sunset, or I watch the little birds that always return to the feeders, including the little chickadee family that produces a new brood every year from the little blue birdhouse, I know I'm not ready yet. I have worked hard in my yard this spring and got a lot of cleanup done myself. With my son's help, I tested the sprinklers. I replaced a couple of spray heads and tweaked some drip lines. There is a certain Zen-ness in working in the yard. Even pulling weeds. But this week, the guy who mowed my lawn last year stopped by and asked if I needed help to finish the cleanup. Since I had the party coming up, I hired his crew for a day. And since I had done so much already, the cost to me was not so much. It allowed me time to get some of my patio pots planted. This crew, honestly, did not do as great a job as the old Alberto crowd, but they at least did not pull up any perennials. And such nice, personable guys, too. I will not need to do as much planting this year, but will continue to tweak here and there. I have plants that need to be moved. I want to add some more ornamental grasses. I'll continue tweaking the drip irrigation to make it even more efficient. Octavio's guys will mow and trim every other week for me. I will mow the in between week. With my electric mower, it's pretty easy for me now, and I'd like to stay in practice. I honestly feel I can manage the yard now with just that much assistance. And I feel so much better having such micro control over everything in the yard.

A new sunset, very like the others, but always just as wonderful

At the end of summer when the kids go back to school, it will be the first time since long before I retired that I didn't have some regular responsibilities. It will be a true turning point. A chance to rethink how I spend my time. A chance to finish those projects that have languished. A chance to renew my efforts at music, painting, birding, photography. It will be the first time I will actually feel retired. However, that's not to say I will stop helping my kids in whatever ways I can. As long as I'm capable, I want to help them and be an extension of their efforts in maintaining home and families. Plus, Frankie needs to see his humans often and we need to make sure of that. But the real change is that there will be no regular schedule. AND I will be able to sleep longer in the morning and get up at a half-decent hour. Who knows what will come after that. It will be a new phase of life and I'll wait till it gets here to make any plans.

So, that's the big stuff. I'm still alive and kicking, though less inclined to blog at the moment (partly due to vision issues). Life holds many challenges big and small and I can't write about them all. But despite the difficulties with my eyes this year, I feel far more upbeat about things and feel more on top of my responsibilities than I did last year. And that's progress of sorts.

December 2018 No Resolutions

Today I am reviewing what went right and what went wrong in 2018. One thing is for certain, my resolutions were a bust. I've decided to make no actual resolutions for 2019 -- more of just focusing on what needs to happen in a given day/week/month.

There have been some successes that arose out of difficulty. I lost my snow removal service before the winter was over. And even more devastating, I lost my landscaping guy I've depended on for many years. I actually fell into a sort of depression over this. It was tough thinking about how I would deal with my large, demanding yard. The good that came from this is my taking new ownership of things in my yard. I spent a good deal of the summer planting new things and tweaking my new drip irrigation system to deliver water just where needed. In the final tally, I saved a significant amount of water and managed to keep things alive for the most part. I lost some patches of thyme, though I don't know why. But it felt good to get down to a micro level of managing my water usage in the yard and to do so well in the first year. I will do less new planting this year, but will continue to tweak the system.

I also began mowing my own lawn again after a number of years. And I found with my electric mower, it was a much easier task than with the old gas monster. By July I had hired a guy and his nephew to mow every two weeks for me. But, I may try to mow through the entire summer this year. As long as I start early in the morning, I can handle the heat. And, incidentally, so far this winter, I am shoveling snow and managing just fine with some occasional neighborly help.

My summer of music with the grandkids was a success that keeps on giving. The boys really love their new-found skills and continue to build on them.

Also on the plus side, I began receiving some withdrawals from my 401k and IRA accounts. I was able to give each of my kids significant financial gifts this year. It was a time when they each could really use the money for medical expenses, to pay off a down payment loan, to pay off a student loan, to help with moving expenses. I know they would have worked things out without my help, but it pleased me greatly to help them and share what I have.

On the downside this year, I've done some backsliding in my indoor projects and I'v failed to lose weight and get more fit. I also did not get the cataract surgery as I was thinking. However, I can tell now one of my eyes is getting noticeably worse, and I'll be doing that soon, I'm sure. Also on the downside, I have done little birding and no painting this year. I have put my own fun on the backburner while helping out family members in need. I really need to find more of a balance.

Also in the negative column, though definitely not my fault, this fall and winter have brought the most devastating invasion of gophers I've ever had. I've been fighting them with smoke bombs, poison pellets, even cayenne pepper, with only marginal success. They have mostly been tearing up lawn areas. However, to make lemonade out of the damage from those little bastards, I've decided to remove grass in those areas.

I'm not going to reseed the grass on that steep back hill that is now pockmarked with piles of dirt. Having grass on that hill was always a bad idea. My plan now is to remove the remaining grass, haul in some dirt and mulch, and plant striped vinca vines like I have on my front rock wall. It spreads fast and looks thick and nice. This will give me an opportunity to extend my drip irrigation to the three trees on that hill. All other trees in the yard get drip, but those trees are still getting overhead spray. I can convert the existing overhead to drip for the vines and extend the larger tree lines that are already in place for the other trees in the yard.

In the front yard, the gophers have attacked two areas that are very hard to mow. In both cases, I believe I'll just remove the remaining grass and extend the area that is already just mulch and low water plantings with drip irrigation. In one area next to my neighbors house, I won't plant anything, just add landscape fabric and bark mulch as the area is not visible from any angle. This will reduce the amount of grass I am watering and mowing, which is certainly a plus for me. These projects will require some help with heavy lifting. I'll find someone.

In the coming year, without the big picture goals of resolutions, I will zero in more on keeping up with house and yard maintenance and remembering to have a little fun. And personal maintenance and improvement as well. Gotta get those eyes fixed, and focus on maintaining the good health I've been so fortunate to enjoy. And lose some weight.

And one important thing this year, as I maintain yard and house, I want to look toward getting my house ready to sell, as that becomes more of a possibility as I age. I have had a long-standing practice of doing an "emphasis" room each week, which has meant do the extras, like a spring cleaning and updates, for that room. This year, as each emphasis room comes up, I want to look at the room through the eyes of buyers and try to do what's necessary to make my house more attractive and sellable. I don't necessarily plan to move anytime soon. But I know the time is coming when I should sensibly find a place without stairs and with a smaller yard. This will be on my mind this year.

Okay, so every year has its successes and failures. 2018 was no different. And I can expect some of the same for 2019. There will be disappointments, failures, and challenges. All I can do is meet them with good old-fashioned problem-solving skills, hard work, and remembering to take care of myself. And remembering to savor the successes, too.

Pianos of my life

I bought a piano. I know, crazy, right? I already have a beautiful grand. Well, with great reluctance and misgivings, I've decided it's time to sell the grand and plan for my eventual downsizing. I haven't actually put it up for sale yet, but I think that will happen in the coming year.

But for about a year or so, I've been looking at electronic pianos. Studying up on features, reading reviews, as I do for every purchase I make, large or small. I had already decided my next piano would be electronic instead of acoustic. But it needed to have as near a real piano feel and sound as can be had. At first I thought I wanted a portable one on a stand that I could take places. But then I realized, where do I need to take a piano?!  Haha! So I finally narrowed it down to the Yamaha CVP model, the newer, the better. I've seen a number of used ones for sale, but the ones in the price range I had set were older and had old technology. So when I ran across a 701 model which is one of the newest, for the same price as people were asking for 10+ years older models, I felt like I needed to jump on it. Problem: it was located in Wyoming, a couple hour drive from my home. And then how to get it home. It's too big for my car. I could borrow my son's truck, but even then, I'd need someone to go with me. But I contacted the seller anyway. And as luck would have it, not only did I manage to negotiate an even lower price, the guy offered to deliver it and set it up. The piano was in pristine condition--had been played maybe 15 or so hours since it was new. It was owned by a 50-something guy who late in life wanted to take up piano, but couldn't stay with it.

And you know what? I love this piano. It is so much fun to play. It has thousands of combinations of settings. It has maybe 20 different piano voices, two of which are "sampled" from live Bosendorfer and Yamaha pianos. That means the sound is taken from live recordings of the piano sounds and not synthesized. Of course, all the other pianos and instruments are synthesized. But when I want to play something classical with a big beautiful sound, I have it. And if I want a honky tonk sound, I have that, too.

Yes, I love it. But I can't quite put the grand up for sale. Yet. But I will.

So this is my fourth and probably last piano. I thought it would be fun to show all the pianos of my life in this post.

Here's this beautiful old piano I bought in my first year of marriage while living in Dover, Delaware, where my husband was stationed.

I bought this, my first piano, for $25 at Spencer's flea market and auction. And with only $6 left between my husband and I until payday, I sat and played my new old piano and hoped not to lose it. An older, somewhat inebriated black man sat down at the bench with me and asked me to play Si-a-lent Night. I played, we both sang. And when he heard my dilemma, he found someone who would deliver my piano to my house for exactly $6. We were so poor, but I so wanted a piano. I wish I still had that old piano. I sold it for just what I paid for it when we moved back to Utah.

I was without a piano of my own for a few years as we made it through two more military assignments. Once back in Utah to stay, we bought a house, and I bought my second piano. This one was $500, which was not a bad price, but a lot for me. My dad loaned me the money and I paid him back in a few months.

I had this sweet little piano for 37 years. It saw the fingers of many little piano students of mine, years ago, trying valiantly to impress their teacher with their achievements of the past week. After I bought my grand, I simply kept two pianos for awhile. But eventually, I had this piano all repaired and tuned and delivered to my daughter's house where it is still played a great deal to this day.

Finally, as life improved, I reached a point where I could obtain something I had desired my entire life: a grand piano. I have all my life loved pianos, and desired to have one that produced the loveliest sound I could afford. And finally, I was able to have that, my Yamaha C3. Expensive, but I don’t apologize for it. It is the one and only luxurious indulgence of my life. I've had it now for many years, and it has been really played -- a lot. But, I'm afraid I don't play as much as I used to. My eye sight is getting poor, I can't remember my memorized pieces as well, and I can't see the music well in order to play. I try, but give up easily.

For now, I have two pianos in my house. The new smaller piano will be ideal when I downsize to a smaller home. It makes so much sense. But that move isn't imminent. So, I will probably take my time selling the grand and try to enjoy both pianos for a little while longer.  As I told my daughter, we can play our two piano duets for awhile now!

Now, if only I could find a picture of the old upright my grandfather bought us when I was six years old. That was the piano I learned on and played until I left home. Maybe mom has a picture somewhere.