Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Yesterday we had a leisurely birthday feast for a friend, distanced and masked, except while we were eating. I had picked up a fabulous meal from our local best Mexican restaurant: beef brisket, chicken tamales with mole sauace, rice, beans, tortillas, fresh tortilla chips and red and green dips,and a salad with beets, avocados, carrots and the best dressing, yogurt based. For dessert there was a rice pudding, not sweet at all, with pistachios, raisins and orange peel. Needless to say, my husband and I had no dinner last night, we were still so full from our leisurely lunch. The weather cooperated and there were sunny skies most of the time, though we wore our coats. Doing something a little bit different is such a treat now! These friends are such treasures. And it's moments like this that pull us through the uncertainty and difficulties of the pandemic. I hope by summer more times like this can occur. I'm praying for it.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My husband and I watched "The Best Years of Our Lives" last night, after I protested it was going to make me weep. Which it did. It's a beautiful film made right at the end of World War II, and stars one of my favorite actresses, who never received an Oscar, which shows how underappreciated she was, Myrna Loy. Two actors were awarded Oscars: Frederick March and Samuel Russell. All the acting is dazzling, but most importantly, everyone is a complicated human being, and traumatized. There are good endings to the three main characters' stories, but not fairy tale ones. They will all continue to lead hard lives, but they are all loved, which is what living boils down to in the end. When I see this movie I think of my parents: married during the war, having me on an army air force station, starting their post war lives with hope and heartache. My mother's fiance died in an airplane, and her father died when I was a baby. My father lost his hearing in one ear due to an explosion. He never flew again after the war. He went back to the factory where he'd been working cutting bolts of cloth, then got a job in Kansas City. They never talked about the war, or my mother's fiance or even her dad. My parents were lucky in that all their siblings survived the war, some because they were too young. But there must have been wounds. We never heard about them.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We followed our daughter and her two boys to a nearby park, about a fifteen minute drive. Everything was wet and green, with a lot of fallen branches from the storm. The boys played in the playground, then we ate on an isolated picnic table, later walking into the forest, which was dark and streaked with flash flood marks. There we discovered a grove of tall pines and redwoods, and a sign that told us at one time in the mid eighteen hundreds, the redwoods here (now cut down) had been the beacon ships used to navigate where they were coming into port in the bay. After these giants had been cut down, sprouts grew up and now are pretty tall themselves. Further down we found a plaque that honors Japanese troups of the 442 division who fought valiantly in World War II even though many had been interred in the camps. So two surprise bits of history in this modest park off a highway in the hills. Our four year old grandson asked us to read each plaque, and I don't know what he made of these bits of history, but he listened intently. His big disappointment was no banana slugs, which we'd all hoped would appear because of the rain. Then he got scared when he went to fetch the stroller with his grandpa, somehow ran off thinking he saw his mom, me and his brother, and I ran back toward the woods and called his name. He appeared quickly, but he needed a big hug and reassurance. I flashed back on all the times my kids had disappeared, luckily to be quickly found again, once in Target, and once in Madison campground in Yellowstone. My blood pressure is still heightened a bit now.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We've already had a downpour today, and perhaps there is more on the way. I'm in my rainboots, and am prepared for the atmospheric river that is supposedly coming, but, cynic that I am, I'm not holding my breath. No, I don't want mudslides and disasters, but just plain old rain would be nice. There is cat who visits us every day, soft gray and white, and very talky, as some cats are. He/she was sheltering under our palm tree as I went out to get the paper, and I talked to her a minute. She seems to want something, but she has a collar and is well fed, so I don't want to lure her over to us, but she finds our yard attractive for some reason. And if she catches a mouse or rat, well that would be very nice. I miss not having a pet, and am working up to another dog. In the meantime, I talk to the two crows who live in our Incense cedar in the front yard, and often greet me if I'm outside. Up at our cabin I love the ravens, who are huge and make gargling sounds and also any animal sound they choose to imitate. They sit in the Ponderosa and Sugar pines and laugh and clearly ridicule us as we walk by, but I'm in on the joke. We are RIDICULOUS. Us people out in nature, but not really. With our water bottles and hiking boots and sunscreen and sunglasses. I agree. We are silly. I'm willing to share a chuckle at our expense.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We got some REAL rain last night, and this morning, as we walked with our daughter and eleven month old grandson, we noticed many branches down and one car smashed from the wind. We live in an area with huge trees, and many old ones, so it's not surprising. There may even be lightening tomorrow. I was awakened this morning by a call from a cousin in the midwest who was informing me of the decline of one of my aunts. My mother was one of 13 children, and now many of those are dead or dying. One of my favorite aunts was the mother of this cousin who called, and she described again her mother's decline after her son died of cancer. My cousin didn't realize how telling me that her mother gave up living after his death was not the most tactful, but I am really only an abstract being to her, after not being in the same room for over thirty years. I listened, because that is what she really wanted, to her life and heart problems and back problems and expressed sympathy. She first reached out to me when my brother died six years ago, but though I appreciated the thought, the conversation was all about her and her husband's health issues. She appears to be a little bit short on the empathy spectrum. Anyway, I heard some news, which I will not act on in any way. The laws of aging are in effect everywhere, not just in my family. We bear up as best we can, and pray for those suffering. Our turn will come, but for now, I'm appreciating my health, family, and friends.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My friend and I cleverly walked this morning, before the rain began, and though, because she was a doctor, I am used to phone calls interrupting us, now that she is retired, I realized today she is in the habit of picking up because a woman might be in labor, or a nurse at the hospital needs to reach her. We used to go to movies and I never knew if she'd have to leave and we'd never see the end. We once had a subscription for a theater company, but about only one out five times did she make it to the end of the play. Luckily, with that situation, she always took her own car, so my husband and I didn't have to leave. I can only wonder what it would feel like to be that interrupted that often. It would rattle me. I guess when my kids were still at home I jumped to answer the phone if one of them was out. But this was mostly before cell phones, and so the calls were not that relentless. I probably should ask her to please not pick up. I usually don't even bring my phone for our walks, and I am courteous when in the company of others. When I taught, I had students contact me through email, so I had control over when I was interrupted. My friend is quick to respond and act in all cases. It's a life and career skill she's mastered, but I believe the toll it has taken on her may be great. I've spent the last forty years meditating, doing retreats, and generally being out of contact, so we couldn't be more at odds that way. I have a new sympathy for the stress a doctor experiences, even if she's a retired one.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

It's cold here today, but I went for a walk with my daughter and her eleven month old. We admired yards - everyone's doing succulents after all the drought issues we have, and chatted away while my grandson in his stroller chimed in to keep us company. He's almost walking and actually took several steps when we were back on the deck in the sun. When I returned home, I decided to make lentil soup, and threw in carrots, onions, garlic, yukon gold potatoes, celery and two sliced beef hot dogs. Hearty fare for a winter day. Then, in a moment of grace, I discovered cornbread in the freezer and set it out to thaw. Cornbread, hot with butter, is there anything more divine? So dinner is all set and it's two pm. I'm so brilliant I can hardly stand myself. The wind is kicking up, so the cold is going to get worse, but I'm culinarily prepared!