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Category: meditations

Summer Garden Update

The garden was beautiful this spring, bursting with flowers. But did I take pictures? No. Did I write? No. I was still too busy beating myself up over all the things I had not yet done, and was not doing, to truly celebrate the beauty of all I have accomplished.

That is not really the best place to be, berating oneself for perceived failures. Sometimes my inner voice, that persistent echo of years of early training in the school of “not good enough”, gets the better of me. I know this voice is a false idol, something that attempts to lure me away from what is truly important in life. But sometimes I succumb.

As an antidote of sorts, I am posting pictures of the late June Garden. The June garden lacks the riot of color seen in early spring, and it is more overgrown with weeds, but at least those weeds are green. I am learning to accept that my dreams are far bigger than my energy levels, and, thankfully, Mother Nature will happily fill the gap. Better weeds than dead lifeless soil. What is a weed anyway but an arbitrary designation, a plant that is growing where a human does not want it? Although I have to work to pull them out, those weeds help the soil, help build an ecosystem and haven for smaller creatures, and will eventually become compost.

Two summers ago, the bed to the south and east of the hydrangeas above (two above photos) were empty, mostly home to grassy weeds. There are still some creeping grassy weeds in there, but it is not nearly as big a problem, and more importantly the perennials, which I felt I spent much of last summer just keeping alive, are thriving now. There are even some echinacea, even though rabbits consistently ate them to the ground before they ever grew tall last summer. Apparently a few of them survived long enough to nourish roots. This too gives me hope.

That bed has evolved, some plants I planted there have not thrived and have already been moved, others did better than expected and have led me to rethink the ways I will be expanding and finishing out the beds around the upper circle. That is one of the good things about gardening, as frustrating as it is. Gardens are centering, calming, and also humbling. I am constantly reminded that control itself, as much as I yearn for it, is a myth, a false construct. My garden will show me the way, slow as I might be to absorb its lessons.

This is one of the first beds I planted in the garden after moving back into the house and it remains one of my favorites. There are two narrow beds like this, flanking steps up to the circle lawn. I had envisioned matching beds, but that hasn’t worked quite according to my plan. The beds are similar, balanced, but not symmetrical or mirror-images. The light at the far east end of the two beds is far different from the light on the western end. I have to think about these beds more as a continuum or scale rather than as separate symmetrical static objects.

Progress is also being made on the shady side of the garden, but that tends to be more spotty. Some areas have thrived, others are more hit and miss; once again, a constant learning experience.

The chaste tree (with the purple blossoms) struggled the first 5 years of its life. Planted in 2018, it was battered, tipped over, and twisted by winds in storms. I wondered if it would survive, and then last summer it finally got its bearings and started to thrive, filling out like crazy just as I was giving up hope. The wattle fence around the small front yard, which was, for me, a defining feature, has fallen down. Knoxville has gotten even rainier than when I moved here, and although I’ve been in contact with the man who made it, getting it repaired or replaced has proven problematic. I am pondering alternatives, or if I even need a fence. That is something that is not going to be resolved this year, and inaction itself may prove to be the solution. It seems nothing is ever finished. No, that statement is both correct and incorrect. The goals are always moving, and very often the initially perceived finish line is but a bend in the road, leading us on to new ideas, new realities, new growth.

Much of the back is still wild and wooly, with more weed than garden, although I have made progress there as well. My vegetable garden is inactive this season. Last year I lost it to the bunnies, deer, heat, and inattention as I tried to make progress up front. I’m still thinking about long term plans, and focusing on what I can accomplish more immediately instead. Isn’t this always the way? At some point I felt as if I had hit a wall, and then suddenly one small change and whole new vistas and ideas open up. I am hopeful again, although I am still looking at the garden as part of a 10-year plan. Well, it is always a 10-year plan, even though I started it 5 years ago; why don’t admit it is part of my life plan. As long as I am here, my life and the space I occupy in that life is a work in progress.

There are always more things that I dream of doing than I can do. In fact I it seems I can accomplish merely a fraction of what I plan. That has been the curse of this garden in some ways. I took on a grand plan, and life threw in too many hiccups. My body rebelled. I hoped to do more this past spring, but, this past spring the act of simply standing up straight and moving proved to be bigger challenge. I was, in fact struggling far more than I was willing to admit, and chaos was piling up around me. I’m still working on that, but I’m making progress. I am gaining strength and mobility, which gives me hope and fuels my dreams further. I’m still far too pig-headed to admit defeat. Dreams are good. Plans are good. Hope is even better. The same for accepting limitations. It is not so much what you do, what your are given, or even what happens, either good or bad, that is important in life, but what you make of the life you live. The important thing is who you are, not what you do, although one may well inform the other.

Sometimes the best thing to do is to sit in the garden with a cup of tea or a glass of wine, admiring the garden, admiring the frolicking of birds, squirrels, and even rabbits. When I sit I realize how my failure to keep up to my own plan has created this haven. I glance benignly at the weeds, thinking: “Perhaps I’ll pull you another day”.

July 1, 2025
The View from My Window, Skittering Thoughts

(This post was written when I was in fact in New York City last week. It is only now that I have had time to revisit it and post.)

Here I am, in New York City and I find myself with this inexplicable sense of wanting to write you. Why? It has been months. And I have been content in my rather quiet life. I do have to admit though that the only reason I brought my laptop with me on this trip was a sense that I might indeed want to write.

This is the view from my window as I write. It makes me happy. The penthouse apartment across the street with the lovely patios, in a beautiful old building. The contrast of old and new appeals to me. The shiny glass building on the right; the scaffolding on the left. I’ve always thought that the signs of human industry are beautiful in their own ways — and yes, I can extend that to even our more brutal invasions such as power plants and mining sights. The beautiful ugly. Once I thought I would like living in the city. Now I see peace in my morning suburban walk, in the greenery. in my hands in the dirt, even as I fail, daily, to keep up with the weeds.

But I also recognize that all of this could change in any instant. I recognize that peace exists only in my own head and heart, in where I allow it to enter. It could be found anywhere; it could be found nowhere. The choice is mine. In this moment, in this window, I choose peace.

Openness to new ideas and curiosity; those are the important things. They are not the same, although they are related. And they are each thoroughly interior qualities. They are not about gallivanting about, throwing oneself into new experiences, although they could be, for some people, in some circumstances. But the opposite could be true. Curiosity can also be found in solitude, in quiet moments.

One can travel the world and do all kinds of exciting things, without ever changing one’s mind; a person can gather up facts and experiences, while yet remain closed-minded and set in their ways. I’ve known people like that. I also have known people who have lived in one place all their lives, rarely leaving, but who know more of humanity and the world, who are more open, more curious about ideas and experiences than most. The difference is not always obvious.

I had forgotten how early it gets light here in Manhattan. I shouldn’t have; it took me years to adapt to how late the sun rises in Knoxville, which is very close to the Central Time Zone line, much further west. I do miss this. I don’t actually know if my natural circadian rhythm is to wake early, or if I acclimated after living in New York State for over 35 years, but since I moved to New York in my late teens and early adulthood, I suspect that my rhythms matured into the rhythm of that particular environment. The Knoxville summer light still throws me even though I do often sleep later than I used to. It should not surprise me that an hour, here or there, should make a difference, but of course it does. Look at all the research on the health impacts of our semi-annual shifts to and from daylight savings time, and how harmful it is. Not that science changes anything when butting heads with tradition. Anyway that is not the topic of this post.

You probably noticed that this second photo is really the same view from the same window. The reflections seen in the window of the glass tower is, at least partially, my own building. I am sitting in one of those windows, reflected, small and insignificant, invisible even. I like that idea. I like the way the reflection is somewhat distorted, the layers of images, of life. It reminds me of how small my life and my choices really are inn the greater scheme of thing — insignificant really in the grander scale, in the life of cities, in the life of the human race itself. I might as well be true to myself, live the life that resonates we me. All of our power is in the small bits,

But even the life of the human race, even our impact, as great as it seems, is again a tiny speck, not really seen against the whole. Our planet, earth, has its own life, a life of which we are a tiny speck, occupying but a few seconds? hours? perhaps days? in an otherwise long life. An unseen face in a window filled with reflections, lost in the greater scheme of things.

I am reminded of Samantha Harvey’s novel, Orbital. In that novel, the astronauts are, at first, attracted and drawn to the sparkling lights they see during the nights of their rotation, the beauty of the human civilization of which they themselves are a vital part. And yet as their time in space lengthens, they grown more attracted to the daytime views of earth, where humanity is less in evidence, just the earth itself, taking on almost its own life and its own light.

Such an idea of the moment, that. The earth is its own life, and we are just a small bit of dust occupying its face. Almost a cliché; and yet no less valid. a thought and creation defined by our own moment in space and time, our own zeitgeist. This is not a criticism per se; that humans before us thought they were the center of the universe simply is a fact. That we have learned we are insignificantly small simply another fact. And I am not criticizing Orbital here; I love this book. And quite frankly my own musings are as ephemeral, of the moment, and inconsequential as anything existing in this world. They remain simply another example of the clichés and worldview of my own generation and time, but far less eloquently stated. A post going nowhere, circling on itself.

I am not putting my own thoughts down. I am not claiming anything. There is much in the word that may be good, and much that may be evil as well. In a sense we are each individual cells in a giant creation the is earth, if not the universe itself, and each of us has a role to play. We are insignificant and yet also mighty.

I am here, in NYC, in upper midtown, very much in my own comfort zone, both physically and, in many ways, mentally. Circling around the musings and mutterings of my own brain. It feels like I have been working my way back here for a long time. It is a comfortable a good place to find myself, even in a world that sometimes feels very much at odds with what I hold dear. To my own brain each echo of light and image in glass, each fleeting thought, each eruption and seismic shift in either the earth or humanity, is a significant event. How do I choose? I can only live in each moment.

June 3, 2025
Meditation on leaves and blossoms

Suddenly, all around me the world is unfurling waves of hope in the form of leaves and blossoms. Spring is undeniable. As always. And as always we humans want to complain. "It is turning cold again". "Winter is back". "My plants still might die". But as much as some complain, we inevitably look forward to spring, to the return of light and warmth and color.

Three days ago I took this photograph:

Such a simple thing. A tree has burst into bloom. But what appeals to me the most about this picture is not just the blossoms but the contrast, the duality even, between the tree filled with blossoms and the bare trees around it, even the branch of dead leaves. It reminds me that time and life is so fluid, so short and yet at the same time so eternal. That spring, and even summer, is precious and brief, something to be celebrated. And yet I don't want to forget about winter. About rest and renewal. It is only because the trees have gone dormant and dropped their leaves that they can burst forth anew, filled with color and life. Growth takes energy, and strength requires rest.

This is what actually struck me, this idea of dawn, of awakening. What I love about early spring is this delicate balance between the bareness of winter and the budding new growth, the same kind of gradual awakening we see at dawn. Yes, eventually there is the brilliance of the full sunrise, but the moment that seems the most filled with promise to me is the early lifting of the light, the promise that the cycle will renew, that tiny new buds will come forth, each and every day, each and every year, each and every life.

I was thinking how fitting it is that the calendar year begins in Winter, when growth has stopped, when, in many parts of the northern hemisphere there is nothing green and blooming to be seen, just bare branches, and earth. Not death but sleep. I am reminded that in the Jewish Calendar the day begins at sunset, with sleep, a sleep from which we awaken. That in Genesis, God separates the light from the darkness, or the darkness exists first, and the light comes from it. Rest that fuels life, the darkness, the repose, the silence. Out of the silence comes thought and creativity and creation, life itself, and that life will eventually exhaust its resources and need to return to rest.

The human body is designed to need to spend one-third of its time in rest. Surely if this were not important, and the most efficient way for us to accomplish all that we can be and all that we can do, our bodies would have been designed differently. The only things that are guaranteed us in life is that we will need to sleep and we will die. To me, this is not something to be feared and dreaded so much as a reminder that we must bloom and flower and each be the best person we can be given whatever soil and air and time we find ourself inhabiting. We must bloom, but in order to allow our blossoms to come forth, we must embrace rest.

Perhaps we have it backwards. It is not our accomplishments that define us, but how we rest, how we allow creativity to blossom from repose.

March 11, 2023
Two Concerts and A Book, or Slowly Finding My Way Back to Words
I hit a wall when I started thinking about what I would write about if I wasn't simply posting about knitting and sewing progress. Before I knew it six weeks had passed with no resolution to my writer's block.

Today, then, I am just going to write whatever nonsense and emotional drivel is channeled through my fingers and toss it out into the world unedited. There is no help for it, as I find I have become an expert at procrastination and can distract myself with all kinds of useless pursuits in order to avoid writing.

Granted, I began the year questioning the very notion of who I am and who I wish to be. Many of my prior assumptions seem no longer valid with many pursuits simply not paying off with either joy or satisfaction commensurate with the energy extended. How could I write when I didn't even know who I was? What I did know is that I don't want this blog to be a storage place for lists: books I have read, concerts I have attended, the things I have knitted, garments I have sewn. But I haven't known how to make the transition to whatever it is that this blog is becoming. It will continue on; I am not ready to give it up.

In order to get myself over the hump it seems I need to fall back onto hold habits. I attended many concerts in January and early February, two of which resonated deeply and continue to hand my memories. I also read five books in January, all of which I enjoyed, but one of which resonated deeply. I shall fall back on these things, concerts and books, and see where that gets me.

On one evening I attended an organ recital and the Mendelssohn Sonata, No 6 in D minor, brought me to tears. Not something that usually happens to me at organ recitals. They were not tears of sadness, perhaps simply of depth of feeling. I did not know the piece, but the first two movements seemed imbued with a sense of history and the weight of belief and culture, all wrapped in warm tones and beautiful playing; the fourth movement seemed transformative, as if that same sense of history was being brought into some sort altered present.

The other concert that surprised me was a chamber music concert which I almost did not attend. The concert opened with Ethel Smyth's Suite for Strings, which was followed by Jeff Midkiff's Mandolin Quintet #2 and Dvorak's Serenade for Strings. I didn't expect much from the Midkiff as I had been completely underwhelmed by the one work I had heard previously. I was surprised because I liked the first half of the concert far more than the second half. The Smyth was delightful and full of energy. It was a lovely romantic work that in places reminded me very much of Dvorak, and made me wonder if that was part of the reasoning behind its placement on the program. This was also a bit of conundrum because it was written too early to have been influenced by Dvorak's later works, and yet I felt (or imagined) a strong connection between this early Smyth and late Dvorak. Anyway, this had me wondering if there had been any Smyth music performed in the Dvorak and His World program at the Bard Music Festival decades ago. But I am terrible at remembering those things, terrible at saving papers, and was not blogging then, so I have no point of reference..

The Midkiff completely surprised me. The mandolin Quintet #2 "Gypsy" had a strong, even thrilling opening with a chromatic melody carried by the violins over an almost droning reverberation from the cellos. It was fully satisfying both intellectually and emotionally. A fiery and turbulent work, with alternating passages of "gypsy" and "folk" passages, this was a far more rewarding introduction to the composer. Dynamic and sophisticated, with complex harmonics, it completely changed my impressions of Midkiff's work, enough so that I would now seek this music out.

And that leaves reading matters.

2023 Booklist:
1. The Invisible Kingdom. Meghan O'Rourke
2. Everything Good will Come. Self Atta
3. The Secret Servant. Daniel Silva.
4. Pandemia. Alex Berenson
5. Where'd You Go, Bernadette. Maria Semple.
The Invisible Kingdom and Pandemia are both non-fiction and are outside my purview for reviews. That leaves three novels.

I have been working my way through Daniel Silva's Gabriel Allon novels, and read this one, number 7, in January. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The books contain enough history and historical fiction to prove both thought-provoking and compelling. They are not high-literature, nor are they for the squeamish, but I thoroughly enjoy them and I find the character of Allon fascinating and all too human.

Where'd You Go Bernadette was a reread for a book club. It is a light, effective, satire although it didn't quite hold up to a second reading. I still love Bernadette and her daughter. The first time I read the novel, this is what I wrote: "the aspect of this novel I enjoyed the most may be the way the author portrays the tyranny of those without imagination." I think I still have nothing further to add.

But the book that really captured my imagination, and which I still find cropping up in my thoughts is Nigerian author Sefi Attar's Everything Good Will Come. I rarely write reviews of the novels I read on the websites where I catalog my library and reading lists (Goodreads) and (LibraryThing), but this time I did. Even here though, I am not interested in writing a proper review, and this too is rough and unedited. A step beyond my journal notes, perhaps, I am only interested in my own impressions, and what resonated in the book with me, not some grand analysis of the book's worth or meaning.

Mardel's (rough) review from Library Thing:

Everything Good Will Come is a novel about Enitan, a child of Nigeria, a child of privilege, a child who becomes a young woman, who through the process of fulfilling one dream, the dream of becoming a mother also fulfills another dream, one that had existed, unspoken, but constantly present in her inner unrest — the dream of becoming not just a woman, but a person who decides for herself, not just accepting the decisions others make for her — the dream of becoming a citizen.

Much of the beginnings of the book are rooted in Enitan's childhood, in her friendship with Sheri, and in the ways she is both sheltered and privileged. In some ways the book seems like two novels, the novel of the young Enitan and Sheri, which occupies the first two sections of the novel, and a second novel about Enitan's road to self-actualization. In truth the first part is just the necessary underlayment for the second, but the reader may be surprised by the shift, and it does in fact take some time for the structure to play out, and the interleaving of thoughts, memories, stories, to coalesce.

I personally found the last portion of the novel to be the strongest but I can admit that it took some time and patience for me to grow into the rhythm of the narrative. Enitan is not always likable, but she is human, and thoughtful, and kind. She is also argumentative, and she struggles with her own demons, her thoughts often sabotaging her own happiness.

Her father always told her that people have choices. He didn't say that those choices were equal, in his world-view they were not. But Enitan also realizes that choice is a "condition of the mind" and that most of the time "I was as conscious of making choices as I was of breathing." As are most of us.

Atta takes care to show us how Enitan's thoughts and actions develop and evolve, often in small steps, often repeating and circling back upon themselves. How she struggles with her own internal dialogue about separating the personal from the political, the way that life is compartmentalized in her milieu, and her gradual realization that she cannot separate the two, that the personal and the political are one and the same.

There are flaws in the narrative, spaces where the prose shimmers with light, and other places where this reader stumbles. I can see how readers may become lost in the weeds, but through it all, I do think Sefi Atta achieves something marvelous here, and the book is well worth reading.

Favorite passage:
"When people speak of turning points in their lives it makes me wonder. I can't think of one moment that me me an advocate for woman prisoners in my country. Before this, I had opportunities to take action, only to end up behaving in ways I was accustomed; courting the same old frustrations because I was sure of what I would feel: wronged, helpless, stuck in a day when I was fourteen years old. Here it is: changes came after I made them, each one small. I walked up a stair. Easy. I took off a head wrap. Very Easy. I packed a suitcase, carried it downstairs, put it in my car. When situations became trickier my tasks became smaller. My husband asked why I was leaving him. "I have to," I replied. three words; I could say them. "What kind of woman are you?" Not a word. "Wouldn't you have tried to stop me too?" he asked. Probably, but he wouldn't have had to leave me to do what he wanted.
February 23, 2023
Hello Blog

Well, geesch. I feel like I have been on a journey even though I haven't been anywhere at all.

I feel like this blog has lost its way. Or perhaps I have lost my way and I have nothing more to say. I am not sure how completely I believe that, but I also must admit I don't completely disbelieve it either. I am tired of how constrained and deeply inside my head my life seems to have gotten over the past few years. I'm sick of it and sometimes sick of myself.

But hey, let's just shake out the cobwebs and see where we are.

A couple of weeks ago now. Garbo and I went to dinner and a jazz concert on Market Square in downtown Knoxville with a friend and her pup. It was a lovely cool evening, perhaps bordering on crisp. The jazz was fabulous. This was really the third or fourth musical performance I had heard this fall, as the Symphony and Opera seasons had also begin and I admit that I have just been revelling in the ability to go out and be enchanted and inspired by live music. I just sat back and enjoyed the flow of music and the happy atmosphere.

In the photo above I am waring one of the three summer dresses I made in May using the same pattern but different fabrics, and it may be my favorite of the three. This one is the least crisp and polished of the three dresses and also the one made of what is, to. my mind, the nicest fabric, a drapes, almost slouchy 90% linen, 10% tightly spun mohair blend. I always thought it might transition well into fall due to its muted color. It was deliciously cool all summer long and it was deliciously comfortable on this chilly evening with boots and a light turtleneck. I might not have done much sewing over the summer, but those dresses have served me well and made me happy.

I am back to snapping odd photos of bits and bobs of things that are meaningless to anyone but myself. Arches.

Bits of roof lines perhaps.

New clothes. (finally) A soft new blue sweatshirt for chilly morning walks with Garbo.

Playing with fabric.

Sunsets.

This isn't a normal blog post. But frankly I am not sure what normal is right now, or even if normalcy is a desirable goal. I just know that I am changing and simultaneously staying the same. Maybe insisting that there is a difference is the illusion. Maybe I didn't know it but this is where I've been heading all along. Does it matter where the path forward leads? What if the familiar has been the radically new all along and we just haven't opened our eyes to it.

All photos by me except the second one, on me and Garbo on Market Square. That photo courtesy of Cynthia Moxley, here

October 13, 2022
Adventures in the Kitchen

Slowly I start adding things back into my life. And yet. I think I will leave it at that, a fragment full of both frustration and hope. I grow frustrated. I grow tired. The eternal cry of "MORE" rears its ugly head. This has always been my curse, and perhaps it is the one lesson from my childhood that will be the most difficult to relinquish — the wanting to know everything, to see everything, to miss nothing. And yet, despite this struggle, I become increasingly unhurried, increasingly content to just be here, wherever, with less, worried about less. It is a good place to be, although I do not always manage to remain wrapped in its stillness and peace.

When I take the time to pause, I see that these frustrations are unfounded. Yes, I can grow tired. Who does not? Certainly I am doing so much more than I was a year ago, when, in the midst of chemotherapy, I was not doing well at all. And yet I wonder. Why this need for an accounting? I wonder if it matters, ultimately, in whether or not a life was well lived. Perhaps the pursuits of more, whatever they be — popularity, power, things, experiences – perhaps this life of pursuit is a life in pursuit of a mirage. Increasingly I think all that matters in life is that we love and find joy, our own joy, the joy that is essential to our natures, the joy that resonates and explodes our own essential selves into lights in the world. As I increasingly understand, joy is not a solitary pursuit. In order to live in joy, I must also share that joy with others. I cannot do it by myself for only myself. Self-centerdness is the opposite of joy.

Sometimes joy is quiet and calm. Sometimes it is active and riotous. Sometimes it makes a mess.

In July I started cooking again. Not "get dinner on the table" cooking, but cooking cooking. I started exploring new recipes and rediscovering old ones, playing with dishes both complicated and simple. Certainly the results were often delicious and satisfying. There was an occasional failure. But the joy came not just from the results but the very act of making, of exploration, of rekindling a kind of muscle memory. Cooking is a creative exploration, a gift to those we feed. Or it can be. We need to cook; we need to eat. There is necessity. One of our gifts as humans is the ability to elevate necessity into something beautiful, powerful, shared. The creation of food is also a gift, an act of creation and also of reverence of sorts, of honoring the things that nourish us, and in nourishing both ourselves and others in the process. Mostly I fed only myself. Occasionally I fed others. I tended to go overboard, but that was primarily because I was caught up in the act of exploration, of rekindling some previously misplaced neural networks and following them into new delights. But I have no doubt that the act of creating, of feeding myself even, not only of feeding others, percolates into every aspect of my presence in the world

A lot of this cooking came about because I would flip through my old recipe files and think about the things I have not made in a long time. I learned that my tastes have changed. Some recipes were successes. Some were failures. I am far more sensitive to tastes of preservatives in food, far less enamored of commercial processed food than I once was. Perhaps not oddly, I would have said, even then, that I did not eat that much processed food. But perception is relative. Now even less appeals. Except for Fritos perhaps. I still love Fritos. But my once-upon-a-time self could devour a bag of chips, hoarding them for myself, and now about a handful is all that I want before something shifts and the bag goes in the trash. Once I could eat a Frito plain, but no longer. It remains a great vehicle for something else, but even then the limits of my tolerance is easily reached. I would rather have a slice of turnip, or cucumber, or even a spoon with my hummus or my dip, but the spoon, of course, is not an option in a social setting. The spoon itself, the idea of eating a shared dish with a spoon, is an inward, and ultimately selfish act, a turning away from the communal. It is good we do not serve spoons with our dips. The communal table allows us to use appetite, a physical appetite, as a trigger, turning ourselves outward to others. I need to feed myself, but I cannot be whole, wholly myself, alone. "Our daily bread" is not just bread, it is the communal experience we need to survive: physically, emotionally, spiritually. We humans are selves only as part of a communal gathering. Nourishment is also communion. So also is creativity. The creative act might seem solitary, but in fact the very act of creation means that it flows beyond itself, sometimes even in ways that are not immediately evident.

Oh wait, I am writing about food, about cooking.

A significant amount of my recent cooking explorations revolved around a new to me cookbook, Mi Cocina, by Rick Martínez. I grew up eating both Mexican and Tex-Mex food. I spent a great energy in my 20s expanding my Mexican culinary horizons beyond what I learned in childhood, primarily because options for Mexican food in New York State were slim in the 1980s. We ate a lot of Mexican food, both simple and complex, exploring regional Mexican cusines, and revisiting my childhood Tex-Mex favorites. But after my husband died, I mostly stopped cooking Mexican food. Perhaps it seemed too much work for a solo diner. Perhaps it was simply too emotionally fraught of an exercise. Martínez has rekindled that love affair with both the flavors of Mexico, with the joys of flavor itself, of cooking something with attention and detail and yes, joy. He has also reminded me that although complexity in and of itself is not needed, detail is important. Nourishment, and joy also, often comes from the meetings of several simple things. I needed this.

Exploring new culinary ideas, finding new favorites, revisiting the once tried-and-true. Not all was measured and calm. I have always been a person inclined toward too-muchness, all in or all out. I repeatedly write about that here. It is another of my ongoing struggles. But our struggles and our joys shape our lives. I am not sure that this tendency, this bubbling forth and then retreating, is at all unusual. I look around me. The world is balanced, but it is rarely measured in its flow. Perhaps this too, this idea a life well-lived is a life of moderation, of calm, of evenness, is another mirage.

In some fit of energy, or was it madness, I looked at the freezer, which desperately needs cleaning out, and some detailed culinary plans started to come into focus. What after all is the point of exploring the new without also using what I already have. Accumulating more is rarely the answer in and of itself. I decided to make chili. Three big pots of chili in fact. Remember that part of my nature that tends toward excess? This is not in fact as extreme as it sounds. It does not, in fact, take three times as long to prep three pots of chili as it does one, as many of the ingredients overlap. Once the first pot of chili is bubbling away, the others fall in place. I made two long-time favorite recipes and one new one: one in the slow cooker, one braising slowly in the oven, and one on the stove top. The cooking also takes no longer for three chilis than for one.

Of course, one is left with a great deal of chili. A party perhaps? That would have been a great idea, and I will do it someday. This time I just put the chili in the fridge for 36 hours, allowed the flavors to meld and the fat to rise to the surface and solidify, then I reheated the chilis and canned the bulk of it. Does it make sense to move meat from the freezer to pantry shelves? Yes. Although it doesn't really eliminate the problem of having a backlog, pints of chili are more usable than pounds of frozen meat. There will always be days when I need to eat but really just want to reheat something simple. So yes, having chili, or beans, or spaghetti sauce makes sense. I would simply rather can, or freeze, my own than buy commercial. My pressure canner holds 14 pints. A pint is a good sized quantity for a solo household. And so I canned chili. I could have frozen sealed pouches of chili, but remember, I am cleaning out the freezer here. It needs to be defrosted, as well as reorganized. After two rough years, my priorities have evolved.

Little did I know the chili would prove useful sooner rather than later. Early last week, I went back into atrial flutter, where I have remained. Each day my energy would be lower than the day before. Rows of glistening jars of easy and nutritious chili and the pouches of colorful vegetable soups lining the shelves of my freezer, have been a godsend. Earlier this summer I mourned that I did not have the energy to grow tomatoes, to can them as I had a few years ago. I miss that, and my home-canned tomatoes were more filled with the essence of ripe tomato than anything I can buy the store. I wondered if I would ever undertake such activities again. Then chili happened, and I find myself blessed with bounty just when I need it. I am all about efforts that yield tangible rewards.

And my fluttery heart? We are addressing that also, I am in no danger, or no more than any of us are on any given day, and all is well.

August 22, 2022
I Have No Idea

What do you do when you have fallen out of a habit that you once found useful, calming even, but which now seems like a distant memory. Is it better to "let sleeping dogs lie", or is there some semblance of yearning still hovering in the inner recesses of the soul. Is this a true yearning, or simply a reminiscence, a remembrance of things past, nostalgia rather than growth.

I don't have the answer to any of these questions. 2022 has not been my best blogging year, but it has not been a year in which blogging was absent from my mind. Rather it has been more of a time of reacquaintance with so many things — chores, passions, energy, loss, newfound treasures. I suppose this is a long drawn-out way of saying some kind of reset has been required.

The month of May in particular has felt very much like a slow process of reconnection. There has been plenty to do, including things I used to write about: books and music in particular, but random navel grazing as well. These are all things about which I have spent time thinking even if not writing, thinking and wondering. There is a part of me that wants to return to the blogger I once was, before I knew anything about blogging, before anyone read my blog, when I just wrote whatever I felt like writing for the joy of it. A time when most of my friends thought the idea of blogging was suspect, and then, since they didn't know or care that I was blogging, I felt no sense of obligation to be anyone other than myself. Is there a way to recreate that bloggerly moment? Blogging is, in many ways, an anachronism. At least the kind of blogging I yearn for, not the commercialized, stylized, marketing-world blogging of today. But then, perhaps I too am an anachronism.

I am older now, and I am far less inclined to feel any sense of obligation to being anything anyone outside of myself expects me to be. But a yearning for the past isn't necessary a path forward, even as I think there are things to learn from that yearning. Our dreams, our thoughts, our emotions — not just these but also our indulgences — the things we read, the things we listen to, even the things we watch — all of these are our instruction manuals, if we are paying attention at least, our guides through the complex process of constant change that is life. I do believe we are attracted to and find the things that relate to some essential aspect of our inner selves, but whether we move forward or continue to look backward is up to us. Holding on to the past, to false stability, isn't growth

In early May I adopted a dog. Her name is Garbo and is is mostly standard poodle with a tiny sprinkling of golden retriever fairy dust. She is sweet, elegant, silly, and a great companion. She greets me all wiggles and squeaks when I come home, and she runs around improvising a small symphony in squeaky toys to show her gladness at my return. She is also a calm and patient studio assistant.

Garbo has also gotten me out of the house for two walks most days, a long walk in the morning, and a shorter walk most evenings, although there are some evenings when I am out at other events and our late walk becomes very short indeed. My goal is to gradually increase my walks to be 3 to 5 miles per day, not all in one walk, but divided between two, or even three walks, although three may not happen often in the midst of summer heat and humidity. At the moment we are up to three miles per day. In terms of energy, and cardiovascularly I am ready for an increase, but last week I had a bit of ankle tendinitis, and this week my left knee is bothering me, so best not to push. The knee is probably due to differences in gait caused by back pain last week, and that aforementioned ankle, and I do not think it will be a long-term setback.

I have also been catching up on the piles of stuff, and the many tasks and routines upon which I fell behind following chemotherapy, radiation, and then struggles with atrial flutter and two additional procedures. I am still working through cycles of physical therapy for damage to my right shoulder and chest musculature. It has taken me some time to get fully settled back into these routines: walking, stretching and exercises, housework, cooking and all the activities of maintaining a comfortable and valuable life, including reading, knitting, needlework and yes, sewing. The goal has been in terms of reestablishing habits. The writing habit has not yet been the priority, but the air seems to be signaling that said change may be in the works. The trick for me is, always, to maintain structure and habits, when my natures is now, and always has been, to throw myself entirely into the activity of the moment and allow all other things to fall away. This was not manageable when I was 20, but at that time I could convince myself I had time. Now I realize more fully how interrelated everything is, how fleeting the passage of time, and my increasing inability to bounce back from abandoned structures.

I can accept that I have not, prior to this moment, had time to write. Do I now? Once again I have no idea.

I don't want to return in any haphazard, piecemeal fashion. I want my writing, like my daily walks with Garbo, to become a fixture in my life, something that is a necessary part of existence whatever other temptations may arise to lure me away. I want my writing, like my walks, like cooking, like playing with fiber, to be something that is a necessary part of who I am, and therefore not subject to whim. I must walk, even when I don't feel like it. Garbo and I both need the walks, and the need to walk Garbo is enough to pull me out of my own periodic funks and reluctances. But rebuilding habits is a struggle. Is blogging the same? I suspect it is.

I suppose then, I am writing a long, navel-grazing statement of intent. I intend to blog. I intend to maintain the three separate blogs, as they play different roles in my mental and writing life. Does that mean that occasionally one or the other will be neglected? Probably yes. Just as in life. There was the week I cooked a great deal, trying new recipes from a new cookbook. All other activities fell back. This past week I have spent more time sewing, and my knitting has fallen by the wayside. I have knitted most days, but there are days when that knitting may consist of a single row, a tiny blip. The habit has not been lost, but my focus has been more about priorities than product.

Am I ready to add something new into the mix? HaveI a reached a state where the habits that I have formed are well enough established, like these flowers in the garden, that they will continue to blossom? Am I ready to fill in the empty spaces? It seems the only consistent thread in this post is that I have no idea of what the thread is, or where the answers may lie hidden. Here I am. Life is often easier than I expect it to be, and at the same time it is harder than I want it to be. But isn't that the basic conundrum of human existence?

June 6, 2022
Seeking The Light, or Advent.

Yesterday was a cold, rainy day. There was snow in the air in the afternoon but not on the ground, at least not where I live. The thing was, that even though it was a damp and depressing day, and I could not quite get the chill out of my bones as the dampness seemed to seep into everything, it was also a happy day. It was not a productive day, yet another in a long string of non-productive days, but it was a day of contentment, a day in which I smiled often.

I do not fret the lack of productivity. Increasingly I despair of this life, a life in which we count the accomplishments of days, a life in which we count everything: calories, sleep quality, steps, items on our lists that have been crossed off. The more we count, I fear, the more we become automatons and the less human, or less humane, certainly less filled with imagination, hope, creativity and even empathy. A world of checklists is not a world of possibility.

But then, of course this is a year in which I am not the only one feeling the weight of demoralization. And I am one of the very lucky ones. I have a home that is secure and safe, I have food, I have friends with whom I remain in contact even though I yearn to see them more, for human contact that remains just out of reach. I have the resources, financial, physical, and even emotional to see me through. Not that this means there are not days in which I struggle, days in which the world feels more bleak than at all optimistic.

My absence from this blog reflects my struggle against demoralization, exhaustion, relevance. The truth is that I sometimes feel so trapped in my own head that any attempt at writing just seems pointless. I feel the weight of my own thoughts more simply because there are fewer opportunities for those thoughts to be sifted, shared, and newly revealed through contacts with others.

Perhaps my brightening mood is simply due to catching up on sleep. I wondered, at one point, if my good intentions had overwhelmed my sense, if I was able to weather the process of adopting an older dog, a diabetic dog, a blind dog. If I had realized the first two weeks would be as hard as they were, would I have done it? I hope so. We need each other Poncho and I. And life has settled down into comfortable companionship. I need to be aware of, to care for, another living being in my life, to get out of my own head. I need to be reminded that spending half an hour walking in a circle is just as important as spending the same amount of time in pursuit of some fixed destination. In fact, I wonder if all the goals I have pursued in life were really just points on a bigger circle. It seems, as I grow older I also grow closer to where I began.

Hmm.

It is Advent in the Christian calendar, the beginning of the church year, a time of waiting and preparation. I find it interesting, this beginning of the year in the darkest period, at least here in the northern hemisphere, of the year. But this, the circumstances of light and dark, of seasons, the world in which I grew and developed shapes the paths my thoughts are likely to take in their meandering. The church year begins in the darkness much like the way, in Jewish tradition, certainly in ancient Hebrew life, the day began at sunset. The calendar year begins just as light begins to return. We begin the day waiting for the light. We begin our lives being born. We begin our lives, in fact live our lives, in preparation, and in hope.

See here I am, feeling all positive again. Darkness is merely a transition, something from which to emerge.

But to what are we emerging? That my friends is the journey of a lifetime. To celebrate those moments of joy, whether they be short or long, to be compassionate to each other and ourselves when the tunnel seems to long, when we struggle, when we trip and fall. I am not sure that what we find in the light is what matters, simply that we make the journey, and that we are kind to each other and help each other along. I cannot say I have mastered this, that I am anything more than the lowliest of apprentices. Compassion to others comes far more easily than self compassion to me. But I still need to make the journey. We still need to make the journey. Together.

December 1, 2020
A Couple of Bright Spots In A Tense Week

No need to talk about the tensions of this past week. We’ve all been through it.

Instead, I present Poncho. Poncho is a Brussels Griffon, Yorkie, Shih Tzu mix. He is 11 years old, blind, and diabetic. I spent the week driving up to Chicago to adopt him, and we have spent the last 24 hours mapping the house and settling in.

We are going to be just fine. The world is going to be just fine as well, although sometimes it does not feel that way. From my perspective the world feels more on track today than it did earlier in the week, but I am also certain that there are people who do not share my feelings. May we all have patience for each other.

And so I shall end with a hydrangea blossom. Why? Hydrangeas are not alone in reminding me of what is important in life, but in all their stages, through the occasional unexpected rebloom, to dormancy and dried flower heads in the winter landscape, they remind me of the importance of living through the full cycle, remind me that there is nourishment, and hope, in everything. I don’t always see it, but that is almost irrelevant. It is there anyway. Besides, is there such a thing as too many photos of hydrangea blossoms?

Have a good weekend and a good week-to-come.

November 7, 2020
Finding My Way Home

How does the world get away from me? I did in fact plan to write another blog post last week, and then, poof, like a puff of smoke, the opportunity was gone. Does it matter? Of that I am not yet certain. I know that my mind is still fragmented, working on little things, and even though those small details all add up to something cohesive, it often feels like cohesiveness itself eludes me.

And then without warning, something falls into place. In my life, realization seems to occur after the fact. I turn around and wonder how it happened that whatever unrest I was holding onto dissipated before I realized that my fists were tightly clenched on nothing but air.

Let’s look backward, just a little. The photo above was taken, and posted on Instagram, last Wednesday, the morning after the snow, and I was at the gym, suddenly fascinated by the small eddies of fog rolling across the water. The pattern of fog made me feel at home. In one sense then, I could say it reminded me of my time in New York State, of the fog on the Hudson, although the geology of the landscape, the rivers, and the fog itself are very different. But that is not it either. It wasn’t that long ago that I still felt like Hyde Park was still home, like I had left home, and not fully settled in this new place, even though I had been here a few years. The patterns of the fog in the trees one morning, a different morning, the patterns of the fog on the water, all of these helped to remind me that this is home now, that I am home, despite the fact that I still struggle on occasion.

But I also realize that we all struggle on occasion, struggle with wanting something we don’t quite have, or can’t quite put our finger on. Perhaps this sense of struggle is universal, part of the human struggle, the struggle between our dual needs for safety and creativity, the very thing that makes us human. Homo Sapiens Sapiens. The species that thinks and knows it thinks.

Perhaps this kind of struggle is endemic to people who move, who are willing to uproot themselves. I could argue that statistically this would apply to most of humanity. We were originally a migratory species. Even in recent history, specifically American history, the majority of Americans uprooted and moved during their lifetimes, separating themselves from friends and family in search of something better. It always strikes me as odd that, in this day and age when we can travel further, and more comfortably, when we have so much, that we are, in broad patterns again, living in the times of the least mobility, at least in terms of physical mobility. Let us not leap into excited discussion of interpretations and implication.

I do realize that no one really moves without a reason, sometimes overt, often covert. We are not particularly good at looking inward, we are not even certain, at least in any conscious way, of what we are looking for. Understanding often comes after the fact.

Moving is hard. Uprooting ourselves is hard. It is easier when you have a purpose that takes up your energy — a new job perhaps — but even then, I wonder if the focus on the job or the career can act as a pacifier as well, a way of distracting the mind so that one doesn’t really acclimate to one’s new environment. Is it possible to keep bouncing around, constantly looking for home, never realizing that what your are actually looking for has been there all along, elusively under the surface?

The roses above are from a floral arrangement, a centerpiece at a luncheon. I love the color, and also love that they reminded me that I need, when planning my garden, to not be singleminded and single-noted, to allow for complexity and surprise. All my cool greens and blues and violets, need a touch of orange or yellow to bring them to life. Perhaps this applies to my life as well, this need to be less single-minded.

Also, as I sit here, I realize that one does not actually have to leave a place to lose one’s home. It happens all the time. A loss, a betrayal, grand or small, it is no one else’s place to judge what hurts us, and what had previously felt like home can feel like a scam, a myth, itself a betrayal even though the betrayal had nothing to do with the place. Our immediate response is twofold — run and hide, or deny, sometimes both. But as soon as we do either, we have already built another wall. Sometimes, it seems, a big move can be emotional or psychological even though the place remains the same.

We humans are complex creatures. Things break. We glue them back together. We hold too tightly, not wanting things to change, forgetting that we change every day as easily as we slough off dead skin cells. That the only way for things to remain safe, to offer some semblance of continuity, is to allow, even embrace change, to adapt to the things we do not like and do not want, because they will always be with us anyway. If we run to avoid the unpleasant, we simply encounter a different unpleasantness.

We need boundaries of course, but how do we build boundaries without building walls? How do we learn to keep our fences low, to protect our own inner spaces while still allowing, ourselves to grow — not merely ourselves as individuals, but our worlds, our homes, as a symbiosis of which we are an integral part? Home can only be home when we engage with it. We can only be home when we allow the place to feed us as we feed the place.

November 18, 2019