Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I've been observing some of our grandson's lessons, which his dad is supervising. This is TK, which is preparatory to kindergarden. They look fun and he tolerates it all with snack breaks. His afternoons are free and he's wound up like a top from sitting so much. It's way worse than actual school because no real recess and no running around mindlessly with cohorts. Hopefully, he will be safe for kindergarden in the fall. He needs socialization so badly. He and our four year old grandson tried to play Monday, but keeping social distance was impossible. They did best at a nearby park where they climbed trees. But digging in the dirt next to each other is what they crave. As I said yesterday, parents are stressed to the utmost, and there is not much help we can do to assist, even if we can now be in a pod. It's a mess, but again, there are some good signs, like 12-15 year olds have 100% success rate with the Pitzer vaccine. Another encouraging thing is the involvement of parents with what their kids are learning. They are taking a careful hard look at what education currently is, not what they experienced. We need so much more investment in teachers and schools and overall direction. But each district is a little fiefdom, and lack of equity is hurting us as a nation. I hope Biden can redress some of this deterioration. It will be a challenge.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I have a little five year old torando grandson and his dad staying with me for two weeks. It's exhausting! More books at bedtime, running up and down the stairs, not wanting to eat dinner but hoping for dessert anyway, full of enough energy to power a metropolis. I don't know how I did it with four kids! But I do know I was much, much younger! He's a cuddler, and tells me he loves me multiple times a day, and he's been isolated for a year from his preschool and friends. He's wired up, and T-K on line is helping a bit but not enough. They have to be careful because he's prone to ashma, and yet the tradeoff is horrible. I feel so much sympathy for parents. I did not have to deal with the internet or a barrage of technology. Maybe our culture was already trying to make us couch potatoes, but they were not doing a very good job. I rode my bike miles and swam and played softball and ran around like a manic, and now the pandemic has made obvious that we now spend our time staring at things. I was happy to read in Dear Amy in the newspaper today that when a reader complained of criticism on Facebook about her by a cousin, that Amy countered she used to get upset and disturbed by postings on Facebook, and she just closed it down feels happier. I KNOW I don't want to do Facebook, and I'm noticing I look at my phone too often. I keep my desktop out in my studio, so that I only do my email and blog one time a day. I can see how easy it is to be "checking". Checking what? That I got a message or sale annoucement? I do not want to be imprisoned by mostly unnecessary information. And I want to control my imput as much as possible, so my mind is free from messages I really, really don't want. I'm a Luddite, but the alternative seems to me so much worse.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our daughter just gave us the third season of "The Expanse", a scify TV series that we were skeptical about but have come to enjoy. My husband is more scify than I, but this series is growing on me. Visually it is glorious. I fell in love with a small space ship a couple of episodes ago, and when I think of it I smile. I have become attached to some of the characters, and I love the diversity on display: Asian, Middle Eastern, African, Native American, Samoan. It's so refreshing, and they have meaty parts, not just token roles. Though all the characters seem human, there are the Earth dwellers, the Martians, and the Belters, so the conflicts and delimas are human as well. Power, greed, altruism, and the urge for unity spin around the plots. The show reminds the viewers that we can't leave the planet and our problems behind, so we best solve our issues here on earth. But we just find it entertaining. And visually, it is a dazzler.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We're having gorgeous weather, and although we know it means drought and fires, the heart soars in joy for the beauties of spring. We've searched several places for a birdbath for our yard, this being our anniversary present to ourselves, but everything is either breakable or gaudy or both. We tried again today, but the lines were so long at a couple of nurseries that we gave up, and we won't try again on a weekend. THe whole world wants to plant flowers and tomatoes and blossoming trees. I understand. We want OUT of our houses and away from our laptops. I have discovered that garden statuary is pretty junky and ugly. We both like the Mexican pottery, but it's too bright and busy for our yard. The metal birdbaths are adorned with herons or splashing birds, turtles or frogs. Nice for the grandsons but not really our taste. My brother used to send terrible garden decorations that I couldn't bear to put in the yard. I gave them away, except for a resin fox that has orange fur. My brother was a redhead so I keep it behind a jade plant so I see it going up to the front door. But I would never have chosen it. Recently our younger son gave us a statue of a cat, white, with a broken off ear and another fracture. He said they were going to put it in the trash, and I think we are going to get to there. It's like having a wounded animal statue. My husband and I will find something we really want, but it seems like it going to take a while. Oh, well, it keeps us busy.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We met our daughter and her two kids at a park along the bay, and the day was beautiful and the two playgrounds wonderful. But at the toddler playground two dads were unmasked, and were yelling and running around with their daughters. At the second playground, there was an unmasked man again. After we looked at the bay and had lunch, we encountered two men unmasked, and had to go around them, and on the path, occasionally, a person or family was unmasked. Why endanger others? I just don't get it. There was also a man on a motorcycle roaring down the path when we just arrived. This path was for children, families, people walking their dogs and bicyclists. It used to be easier to ignore differences between people, but being unmasked says it all: "I don't care about you or your life, or your tiny children or grandchildren. You can't make me". It's deeply sad. It seems to be young men often feel the need to violate safety rules. Is the testosterone in their blood causing the risktaking? It reminds me of when I was a teenager and volunteered to be a Candy Striper. I was assigned to a rehabilitation facility nearby, and most of the ward where I helped consisted of young men paralyzed from the neck down or waist down from car accidents and dangerous adventures. Their whole lives were before them and they threw everything away carelessly. Perhaps they had hurt others in these accidents as well. I don't know how you teach concern and respect for others, but whatever it is, they had missed it by a mile. It was tragic.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We went to my favorite nursery this afternoon looking for an anniversary present for ourselves. Last year we did nothing, and this year we won't as well, but my husband suggested we at least give ourselves a gift. First he thought of a Native American store nearby, but we didn't see anything online that grabbed us. Then I thought of something for the yard, and we headed out looking for a birdbath. We'd had one that was my parents, but it broke years ago. We now have a lot of birds in the yard but no dogs or cats, so we could safely have one again. But when we looked, nothing really grabbed us. We found a little stone elephant we kind of liked, and a small stone stupa, then I found a plant I love, but after we'd wandered for a while we sat on a bench and admitted nothing sang to us. We had been hoping at least this place would have succulent gardens in dishes, but somehow they don't have them right now. Perhaps the woman who created them is gone, fired or the pandemic downsized the nursery. We are going to try a couple of other nurseries tomorrow, and perhaps we'll find a birdbath or something surprising that causes a zing. I'm at least touched we are celebrating the anniversary to some extent. Last year our daughter was dying, Covid was terrorizing everyone and celebrating seemed obscene. We are slowly healing.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Yesterday's shooting in Boulder was where I lived for seven years, and I still have friends there who might have been in King Sooper's but we not so unlucky. I am ashamed to be a part of a country that is so violent and adamant about not protectin its citizens from guns by enacting gun control legislation. I have been supporting Gabby Giffords' efforts for many years. Why is the right of a lone individual to kill whom he pleases set above the rights of ordinary citizens who don't want to be victims? It's insane. There is no safe place to be in our country. Not in your home if you are one of one in four victims of domestic abuse. Not in places where we buy our food, or listen to music or gather to celebrate. You need to be underground in a fallout shelter to keep the crazies at bay. When I was young and teaching in Fiji, the Marist Brothers from New Zealand, who were my bosses in the high school where I taught literature, confronted me about the Vietnam War, MLK's assasination, and RFK's murder. I told them we have always been a violent country, and had this John Wayne myth about not needing anybody's help. We've always exported arms. When Europeans landed here, they violently wiped out most of the native population, herded them into barren landscapes and then used slaves to do their work. We could decide that is not who we want to be. We could make reparations and attempt reconciliation. But since students are not taught our true history they feel there is nothing to be rectified. We need to commit to caring and concern for others: our neighbbors, friends, families we don't know just like our own and people different from us but trying to live a life in pursuit of happiness. But happiness that doesn't harm others. We are all interconnected and interdependent, but we carry the myth that we don't need anyone else, and if we're unhappy it's someone else's fault. We need our educational system transformed and made relevant, so we can see not just who we have been and who we are but who we could be if we are determined.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I'm listening to Yo Yo Ma. What is it about the cello? Its voice has depth and complexity, almost human. I once wrote a short story about a boy with a cello whose mother hears his music as a lamentation. My daughter is going to Trader Joe's this morning and asked if I wanted some groceries. I have my favorites from there, though Instacart is shopping for me at a local store with great fresh produce and mostly everything I need. But what do I crave? Hash browns, veggie sausages, a seafood blend of shrimp, calamari and scallops, frozen chocolate croissant dough that rises through the night and is ready to bake in the morning, bisquit dough you bake. All of those available at Trader Joes. These little treats become highlights in a pandemic. Yesterday I adapted a brownie recipe from Joy of Cooking so that it had no sugar, corn syrup or other sweetener. I folded in lots of walnuts, and found it baked fine and tasted pretty good. I warned my husband it was not going to taste sweet, but he wanted one anyway and pronounced it good. Score one for diabetics!

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I just spent an hour talking to my cousin who lives in the midwest. He's so fun, and we talk a mile a minute. He and his wife were my only blood relatives at my younger two kids' weddings. My brother used to stay with him and his family when we went back to visit, and I stayed with my girl cousin nearby. We reconnected when he began traveling here for conferences. He's a compound pharmacist and owns three pharmacies back there. He wife and kids are great and we go to restaurants together when he's here, but of course the pandemic put the kabosh on that this last year. We like to talk movies and music and travels and food. He was telling me today of a documentary film festival there that he knows I'd love to see. His mother is 93, and he drives down to her town each Friday night, takes her out to dinner and spends the night. She's a feisty gal, always was, and he caught her contributing to Trump recently and displaying a tote bag she'd been given. To say their politics don't agree is an understatement. When we were talking we found we'd both been reading the same books: Abram X Kendi, Isabel Wilkerson, and Obama's autobiography. We'd both just been thinking of Harry Truman as well; how ahead of his time he was about race in the military and other issues. I can talk to him about my brother, whom he adored, and remember the good times and how full of joi de vivre he was. I appreciate this person who lived my history with me. I told him something he didn't know about his dad as well. A story my aunt told me about how he stayed in a hotel room in another town to work in a factory when they were young. My mother was 15 and my aunt 17 so he must have been really young. He was my mother's favorite sibling.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I'm so happy our younger son and his wife got their first vaccine shot and are on their way to being protected. Our older son and his wife are vaccinated. Our son-in-law gets his shots this month. Only our younger daughter and husband are not protected, but this mornings' newspaper headlines both said everyone will have it in 5 1/2 to 6 weeks. Really good news. My cousin is in a nursing home but okay, my son-in-law's mother is home from her surgery, my friend is recuperating at her daughter's house, and another friend's husband healing up at home after surgery. I will try to send flowers and keep up the cards and good wishes, but maybe in a few months actual visiting will be possible again. Today we're meeting our older son, his wife and 5 year old son at a park midway between our homes, and it feels like such a treat to see a new place. It has a lake, and our kids are bringing lunch they are picking up from a restaurant. We're all feeling our way around that tiniest bit more freedom. Tomorrow our women's group gets together six feet apart and distanced outside at one of our houses, and it sure beats a zoom call. We're all thrilled to be on the same premises again!

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I made a chocolate cream pie for my four year old grandson. He likes crust. He devoured the quiche I dropped by last week. To return the favor my daughter dropped off beef stew today for our dinner. Yummy! When I was married the first time with two toddlers and in graduate school, a neighbor in my same married student housing complex and I made dinner for each other one night a week. We didn't eat together for the exchange, we just gave each other a break from cooking. It was just the biggest treat! She was my best friend in my twenties, and like me, only had one sibling, a brother who was challenging. We were sisters to each other, and promised to take care of each other's kids if something happened. It would have been meaningless for most people in their twenties, but my friend died at 29, and though I attempted to keep up with her husband and kids, after a few years, they were first in Arizona then Vermont, I lost track of them because of his remarriage and disinclination to remain in contact. I miss her still. I used to talk to her in the car if I was alone. Thinking of her beautiful face right now I almost burst with love and longing. I hope her two kids have grown up happy and creative. She was amazing with her intelligence, skills like weaving and furniture making, and her ability to transform every space, even the smallest, into one interesting and warm. One of my great losses. Now I'm worried about my cousin, who has covid and is in a nursing home. I know to have kept up frequently by phone and to tell her every time how much I love her. Parting can be sudden and surprising. I'm now more prepared than ever.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I picked out new glasses today. I flirted with the idea of going really wild, but ended up with modest differences: a little different shape, and sides a little bit untraditional, the colors different, but not wildly so. The thing is, glasses are so expensive, and I really had no justification for new ones except being tired of the old ones, so I need to wear these a long, long time. Rationality won out. The bigger the frames the less my saggy face shows, and they serve as camoflage. My hair keeps getting grayer, so the frames keep getting darker, though maybe that's not so rational. Andway, I was brave and looked into the mirrors to assess myself, despite my usual avoidance of mirrors. That is how I protect myself from the shock of aging, but I really did need to look today. Did I mention glasses cost a ton of money? Who knows how I'll feel when I pick them up in a few weeks. I may be horrified. But I doubt it. I'm relieved the choosing is over, and that more than makes up for the chance that I've chosen unwisely. So, now I've had a haircut and will soon have new glasses. Who knows what my next grooming adventure will be? Not me. Remember, avoid the mirrors.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

It is a beautiful day today, and I walked with a friend in a public park twenty minutes away that I'd never visited before. It was along the water, had great playgrounds for kids, and a spaciousness that was relaxing. We wore masks and distanced, but could step out of the way and not feel surrounded by people. We had a lively discussion, but without problem solving or attempting to fix anything. I listened to her, she listened to me. That's all I want right now. Complexity is a given, as is powerlessness about most struggles in our lives. We do talk about getting older and what it means, but without any grand plan, because, as they say, man plans and God laughs. We agreed that what we prized now in a friend is heart. Not personality, intellect, accomplishments, power, or prestige. Just heart. Because none of those other things will matter to us in the end. Heart connection is what we wish for. All the rest, well, it dissolves before our eyes. Each being is equally important, and the beings with whom we connect become our companions on our journey. We never lose them, because they dwell inside us.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We did get rain yesterday, and the mountains got snow, so every bit helps. I am reading a book "Hood Feminism" which is very bracing and passionate, and totally convincing. It takes white feminists to task who have not examined how their assumptions indicate their priviledge not reality. I ran into this when I worked in safehouses for battered women. A counselor would criticize the nutrition of the client's kids, not realizing that poor people do not have the luxury of salads and fresh fruit. I had to explain that our job was to support women, not lecture them. Not fix them either, because they were in life and death situations, and the last thing a battered woman needs is more judgement heaped upon her. And when we received donations of clothes, many donations had see through negligees and dress up heels and other useless items. What were they thinking? I cannot tell you how many middle class women have told me they'd be "outta there" the first time they were hit. Outta there to where? Where is the housing, the job, the support? Nobody leaves after one incident, not even rich women. We have to face what these women are facing with compassion, encouragement and tons of support. So this book I'm reading is a breath of fresh air, and if women really strive for solidarity, they will have to face class and race issues, and wake up.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My friend told me the other day she had lost eight close friends this last year, as well as her mother. Not all were about covid, but the grief for her has been heavy. I, of course, have been struggling with my daughter's death, but now suddenly my dearest cousin is in a nursing home, and I cannot even get much information, except that possibly she had covid. She lives in the midwest, and my relatives there, the ones of my mother's siblings, have been dying, one just last week, and even my cousin's son-in-law. When another cousin calls, she is full of surgeries, cancers, strokes and I feel overwhelmed. I don't know these people, and I have to protect myself somewhat. My close friend here has just been in the hospital and is now recuperating at her daughter's house. All this suffering, and I can do little but send cards, talk on the phone, and I feel powerless. Yes, I always was, but I'm one to visit and support people, but the pandemic has taken away all that. I cannot even see my granddaughter, up until now, but soon we will visit her for her birthday and Mother's Day, two hard events after the loss of her mother. Today, I feel overwhelmed, completely. Even my kids needs seem to clash with each other, and I want to be there for them, but cannot at the same time because of distance, circumstances, etc. It's like I need to be in four places at once. I feel I'm failing everyone. I listened to a dharma talk just now, and hope it brings some equanimity my way. I feel stirred up, like a cat with it's fur rubbed the wrong way.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our late daughter's novel has just been named a finalist in Foreward Reviews for Multicultural works for 2020. How I wish she could see and experience all the praise she is receiving for her novel The Royal Abduls. So many, many people have been touched by her book. We who knew her are so happy to have her recognized and honored. I think she knew it was a fine book, and all the reviews and press she saw when she was alive were positive. But not to get her book launch because of covid and to be so preoccupied by her struggle to remain alive, meant she did not feel all the joy that she deserved. We are all so proud of her, but I hope she's watching somewhere and knows how putting her whole heart into the book gave her many fans who found their hearts engaged by her characters and by the love that is expressed in the novel. Yesterday we helped our younger daughter get ready for going to the cabin by corraling the two grandsons while she packed. They got up to the cabin before dark, and lo and behold a tree branch had taken down the power lines, and it will take an electrician to okay the power company to fix it, so they spent the night in a nearby hotel and will head back this afternoon. At least there is snow up there and the four year old's dream of playing in the snow is being realized, but it was not the relaxing getaway they'd hoped for. My husband and I felt so powerless to help, and it is one of the unpredictable frustrations of a rustic cabin in the woods. There is always something, it seems. At least they'll have a funny story to tell when they return. And the grandchildren will have their fun in the snow.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We spent most of the day with our daughter and grandsons. After lunch they were packing up to go to the cabin, and we attempted to corral the boys while they did so. The one year old kept escaping down the driveway and the four year old helped him. In between, I played pirates and knights with the older and my husband herded the younger. We're pretty exhausted, but when my friend called I took a short walk with her. Now I am REALLY tired. I'll fix something super easy for dinner. I feel so relieved the vaccine has amped up and many more people are getting their shots. I hope my kids get it by May. I don't know when or if the grandkids will receive it, but maybe by the end of summer. My friends are relaxing bit by bit, and I feel it in the air. Spring also helps, though this weekend will be that doggone daylight savings switch again, which no one can see any reason for this torture. Least of all me.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My friend called me last night and she is going to become a grandparent! She's so happy and so am I. Her daughter and mine have been close friends since they were in kindergarden, and my daughter is so excited. Such joy brings smiles to everyone around it. I sat down this morning and wrote cards to my friend and the couple, and I know the happiness will keep reverberating. Yesterday it rained, too, which was pretty joyful in and of itself. And when we thought the showers were over, and so said our phones, more showers surprised everyone even into the night. The plants and flowers in the yard look bright and cheerful. I'm going to attempt to make my day as pleasant as can be, beginning with a good walk and later music as I read. I finished a terrific mystery last night: We Begin at the End, by Chris Whitaker. It's characters are gripping and the plot satisfying, and he takes his time to make us care completely about each of the characters, but especially the two children, Duchess and Robin. They are so fully developed I felt they were real. I'm saving it to take up to my son when I visit. I know he will love it.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My husband and I had a prebreakfast discussion this morning about a PBS show we'd seen on TV. It was about the life of the historical Buddha, and was done well, with multiple narrators. He didn't understand why Buddhism didn't take root in India, and I said I understood that Buddhism was an offshoot of Hinduism, a much more ancient religion, and differed in only one main respect, so it wasn't so fresh and new. It was Islam, from about the same time as Buddhism in the Axial Age, that seemed new and different. And both Hinduism and Islam were different in many obvious ways. He also wanted to understand why and how the historical Buddha knew he wouldn't be reborn, after thousands of lifetimes. I answered he knew he was enlightened not briefly or occasionally but permanently, and he did not want his followers to look to him as a diety. He wanted them to see and trust the Buddha inside themselves. It's the opposite of a cult. His journey was for the benefit of all beings, but it is looking inside not outside. In this way it differs from other religions. There is no "authority", though guides may help you on the path. You must recognize everything for yourself. My husband is curious about my practice, and has, in the past, gone with me to dharma talks, but he has never tried meditation, because looking inside doesn't appeal to him. I accept this. We are all on our own paths, and I have found many others to share insights with and lots of books, dharma talks and practices to aid me in my journey. We are different, but we coexist very well.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I've been thinking more about the forces that shaped me, and one big influence has been moving when I was a child. We lived five years in a midwestern city, then two years in a small southern town, then two years in the suburbs of a city then six years in a tiny southern town, then my last three years of high school back in the suburbs of the city from before the tiny town (500). I made friends, we left, I was lonely then made friends, then we left. But the move from the tiny town to the suburbs of a city was the toughest. I left a boyfriend I adored, a best friend I shared everything with, and the ease and freedom of a small place where we could walk in the woods from our house, or bike ten miles to the river and swim all day. In the suburbs my physical freedom was curtailed; I could not walk into any kind of nature, and I began the high school of five thousand in the sophomore year, so that all the cliques were formed and I ate lunch alone for months. I was not a rooted person, and my sense of place was confused. Now I have lived in the same town as my college years for almost forty years, and the thought of leaving is unappealing. I think my childhood left me with a feeling of not belonging, of not fitting in, and I am cautious and overly self protective. My mother had trouble with the moving as well, so she never supported or reassured me. I'm afraid I moved my children more than I should have, and perhaps I've made them insecure as well. My first husband wanted to move all the time, and with my present husband we moved first for work, then grad school, then work, but, he, like me, prefers to stick in one place. He was born and raised in the same town, in two houses nearby each other. But I carry this old wound around with me, though it is not relevant any more. We humans are strange, complicated creaturess, and investigating ourselves is sometimes a revelation, even after living a very long time.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My friend and I have been vaccinated and are past the two weeks after advice, so today we rode in the SAME CAR to pick up a polisher she bought from a woodshop teacher. No masks, no nothing. It was liberating. We're going to have dinner at her house tomorrow night INSIDE THE HOUSE. How radical is that?! After we got back from the errand we took our usual walk and sipped cappuchinos on our bench around the corner from the market hall. Things are changing. I returned home and a package was waiting for me with a turquoise ring I'd ordered for myself, and the day felt downright celebratory. Plus, there are dark clouds in the sky and it looks like the prediction of rain the next two days might actually come true. I sure hope so. Today is International Women's Day, and I'm joining a zoom event with Nancy Pelosi, Hilary Clinton, Stacy Abrams and more. I hope we can pass the ERA and encourage more women to become active in politics and policies. The old ones have paved a road from the 70s and now it's up to the young ones. We need to keep our eye on the prize: affordable, decent childcare, equity, equality of opportunity, and zero tolerance for violence against women. That's my prayer for today.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our five year old grandson was over today and we played with balloons and took a walk and had lunch on the patio. It's like trying to keep up with a Mexican jumping bean, and he won every race the two of us ran. Now his dad is driving him home, and he will sleep well tonight. I will too. He exhausted me in a good way. Our lunch was delivered from one of our favorite cafes, and we used to live around the corner from it and are now only six blocks away. Mediterranean food, with fresh pitas, the potato salad I love so well, tabouli and other salads and hummus. It feels healthy just thinking about it. My husband and I will have something light tonight, which means no cooking for me. I'll read the Sunday paper, get back to my book and then my husband and I will watch a movie. All in all, a delightful day.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I planted the flowers I bought two days ago, and it's so satisfying! To top it off, it rained last night, so all the plants look quenched and happy. I haven't really gardened in a year. I clean up, water, clip and neaten, but this was different. Of course, we all spend so much time in our yards that we are really treating ourselves. My friend and I have been buying each other cut flowers: daffodils, then tulips, then runicullas. We stop at every outside florist on our walks and admire the displays. My friend loves soft pale pink, and I like white flowers, but we're also both drawn to mixed bouquets such as orange and purple and lime green. Her son is an architect and when he visits, like this weekend, he orders flowers ahead and makes these huge, spectacular arrangements that belong in a hotel lobby. She gets a kick out of it, and he shows his love. The de Young museum has a spring floral show that has hundreds of bouquets from different florists, expressing their interpretation of a piece of art. This year it's been postponed until June, but it's tempting, very tempting. I have photos of many of the arrangements from two years ago, and I still pull them up on my phone to get a hit of beauty. Photos have been such a comfort to me.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We went to a regional park today with our daughter and two boys, and it was delightful. It is a working farm, and the kids loved the chickens, cows, pigs, ducks, sheep and goats, even though a rooster pecked the four year old's hand. I think normally they have feed for the animals, so they are used to a treat. There were flower gardens, fields, barns, and a 1800s farmhouse, though due to covid you can't go in it. Daffodils and Sourgrass were everywhere, and the animals looked well fed and happy. We had our lunch at a picnic table, and a peacock paraded around us about two feet away. Of course the one year old wanted to touch it, and we had to keep corraling him. He is walking, like a robot and with his legs far apart, but he did great on the grass and uneven ground. Because the capacity was limited, we really felt free and relaxed, though we kept our masks on. I keep getting to see all these parks I never would have without the limits of covid, and I'm loving the great outdoors these days. And seeing it through a child's eyes is the best. Petting the goats was heaven, at least they acted like it was.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My friend and I met at my favorite plant nursery today, and share a cart as we admired the plants and picked some to take home. I found two tiny succulents that look like worms for two of my grandsons, and also selected primroses, pansies, and a couple of plants that just caught my fancy. In line to pay, I discovered tiny watering cans in bright colors and got 3 for 3 of the grandsons. I had a conversation with the lady behind me about how many grandchildren I had, where I'd gotten my covid mask, and other perfectly normal interacctions I used to have daily before the pandemic. It felt great, even masked and distanced. I loved strolling through the vast nursery with my friend, but that serendipidous conversation with a stranger was somehow better still. Everyone was wearing a mask, everyone distanced themselves, but there was sense of relief and hopefulness everywhere. We're all happy about the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, the generic that India is vaccinating with, the sense that schools will begin again, and the feeling that more and more people we encounter will be vaccinated. It's a sunny day and I have a sunny disposition today.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We've been watching a couple of Doris Day movies on TCM. They were terrible except for her and her singing, so last night we pulled out our "The Man Who Knew Too Much" DVD, to admire her performance in a very good film of Hitchcocks'. She is amazing, and makes Jimmy Stewart look like a jerk. We root for her, and it's her intelligence and instinct that solves the mystery. She was sunshine itself, and yet they paired her with romantic leads that didn't appreciate her, like Jack Carson in those early films and Rock Hudson at the apex of her career. I do find chemistry between her and Howard Keel in "Calamity Jane", but mostly we're just glued to her, and the rest of the cast doesn't count. My mother had that blond, cornfed look, and she was often compared with Doris Day, Virginia Mayo and Mitzi Gaynor. The body was the same, and the legs perfect. My mother was what you call striking. The actors I just mentioned weren't beautiful, but they had energy and sparkle. Unless they smiled, they were ordinary, but the grin transformed their faces. Like Doris Day, my mother's outfits were impeccible, fitted to her body like a glove, and she had the matching shoes and handbag. She had a suit of soft yellow wool she had made herself, as she did most of her clothes, that was so exquisite I saved it after she died until the moths got it. My mother never had a hair out of place. It was the era of monochrome blond, so it was a blond clearly not found in nature, but my mother was faithful to her yearning back to being a towhead as a child. Her hair darkened after two kids, and she rectified that at the salon she frequented. Nowadays, women have highlights and it looks sunkissed and natural, but back then the craft hadn't been refined. Being a blond in my mother's era meant glamour and heads turning. I miss her whenever I see Doris Day. Though my mother couldn't carry a tune, so it was all about the look.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I'm listening to mixes my younger two kids made for me many years ago. Lots of Magnetic Fields, Springsteen, and others. My older daughter put a lot of her music on my Spotify when I would go up to see her. My older son gives me classical CDs and some jazz. My collection has been greatly enriched by the four of them. When they were little, we used to dance to the Bangledesh album or the Beatles or Leon Russell. They all love to dance, and so do I. When I first dated my husband, we would get a sitter and go to shows like Joy of Cooking, Old and in the Way and Asleep at the Wheel. Later we took the teens to see The Eurythmics and Heart and Fleetwood Mac. Tnen we got too old, except for seeing Green Day because their manager was a close friend of ours. Now I often forget to listen to music, and I don't know why. I'm trying more these last couple of weeks, and I listened to a 5 CD set of Bach (piano) the other day. It was perfectly compatible with reading. Certain CDs remind me of certain events in the past, like "Les Miserables". I once listened to it after a huge fight with my husband, and it swoops me back to that afternoon, but I also have exhilerating memories of seeing it with all the kids on Broadway, and seeing the touring show here with my book club which had just finished reading the thousand page book in four months. The Everly Brothers bring me back to my first boyfriend, dancing and sweaty and full of awakening body parts. I could go on and on. I'm going to keep reminding myself to include music more. It makes me feel more alive that reading or watching a movie.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I'm reading two books at once: Hood Feminism and Mantel Pieces. Since both are collections of essays, I'm free to dabble back and forth in each. Hilary Mantel is a pretty amazing writer, to whom I was introduced by my older daughter. She got me reading Wolf Hall, and subsequently the other two parts of that trilogy, but what I adore is her autobiography, Giving Up the Ghost. The writing is like nothing else I've ever read, and she gets inside her own child mind in a way that is so truthful and empathetic that readers can resee our own past. The essays are great too, including one on the royal family that is straight to the point. Hood Feminism is good medicine for white women who are not conscious of their own priviledge, and makes me grateful I'm involved with Moms Rising, which targets effectively the basic needs of most women: jobs, wage equity, childcare, health care domestic violence and racism. Moms Rising gets me fighting for those women who need to be visible and supported. A good use for those of us retired with time on our hands. We listen, then do what THEY say needs doing.