Category: Journaling My Days

I journaled for years on paper and I expect to be doing it in some form until my last days. In short summary, I teach mindfulness to parents of kids with challenges; I garden as often and as much as I can in Wisconsin and I am working through the threads of grief six years after my husband’s death. I am very grateful for finding and chasing the joy in this unexpected life.

of murals, tears & voting

img_4845Morning mural painting at Randall School stretch way beyond the scheduled noon ending time.  A tryptic on the retaining wall that surrounds the gym equipment that so many of us worked for so long to become a reality.  Now, five years (Really, five years?) after the ‘new’ playground equipment was assembled, there will be art behind it.

The day dawned unpromisingly gray and I was so concerned that there would be very few people to paint that I texted Kati, the organizing teacher, that we would be a little late.  When we arrived, however, there was a bevy of painters young and old applying color to the walls.  It was noisy, frantic and busy.  I held my breath as we dove into the fray.  Julia has not always been able to handle happy, noisy crowds, no matter how friendly. Continue reading →

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panera morning

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Public art in Milan, Italy

I sit in Panera for coffee and a bagel tapping, answering email, commenting on Facebook, setting up a few meet ups with friends.  Panera, at least this one, in the morning is a senior zone.  Couples mostly.  Of course.  In small groups of a single gender or uneven, odd numbered mixes.  Is this what substitutes for the boomer bar scene?

I am content just sitting with carbs, fat and caffeine.  Observing.  There is a woman at the next table who is not.  Not happy.  She sits alone holding onto a paper cup of hot liquid in front of her.  No book or paper or electronic device to accompany her or pass the time.  She has not planned for independence.  She is waiting.  Her fingers tap the cup.  She looks at her watch.  She looks to the door whenever it opens.  The color in her cheeks rises.  Her eyes are troubled.  She avoids looking at anyone, including me.  I would smile at her given half the chance. Continue reading →

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capturing focus

When my friend, Cindy, wrote “What’s sparking joy?” on her Blog, Yarnstead, she asked the question:  “So, how to get back to that top ten, how to recapture the focus I came back from Alaska with last year?”

Good question!  So much on my mind.  I wanted to call her for coffee and chat, I expected her to be at Saturday service at FUS but instead, days later, I write.

I know, I know. Yes, yes!  I know.  How?  And not just how to recapture the focus for sparking joy, but also, how to hold focus in the midst of whirling chaos.  How to recall and return to it when the immediate fires are put out?  How not to dissipate that wonderful energy on those immediate fire that inevitably flare up.

Yes, good question. Continue reading →

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all that no longer fits

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Some of what is more than 24″ 

Yesterday was a day of issues and challenges.  Two to be precise.  Two challenges that I had no idea I was going to come home to.  Both require lots of energy and some decisionmaking. After 24 hours of fretting and feeling sorry for myself, for us, it was time for action.  Action, in some cases, is a number of phone calls, messages left and then patient waiting.  So a measure of frustration gets added to the mix, but I posted on Facebook and also on my neighborhood listserv about the appropriate issues and the response from neighbors and friends has been so supportive.  And I really needed that.  A hazard of living alone, no one to vent to or commiserate with.  Online friends are not the answer to all the hard situations of the world but it felt good to keep one eye on Facebook responses as I started cutting down my beloved garden.

Continue reading →

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first week of summer

The week passed very quickly.  It was Thursday before I realized the Tuesday had ended.  We did lots of “things.”  We both struggled with the transition from school life to vacation life.  As much as Julia has transition challenges, my transmission faulted time and time again and I did grind the family gears repeatedly as we sought the new normal.

During the week, I finished the big spring garden job of mulching.  With Julia’s help and forbearance.  On one hand, I hate the specificity of the process–clear all weeds, dig the defining trench and heap on the chips hauled in black plastic bags from our free town mulching site.  On the other, I get to make many garden decisions–what is weed, when is overgrown, what is taking over.  I get to edit my garden.  And I get to interact with every plant–congratulating the delphinium in glory, enouraging the new hollyhocks, clearing space for the little holly in the back garden and appreciating the bed that is growing up surrounding David’s bench.  To do all of this, with Julia either helping or sitting doing math and reading near by is no small task.  And we did it. Continue reading →

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lessons, gardens & travel plans

The days just move along and move along.  It is all a-whirl.

Seventh grade ends tomorrow.  This is only the second time that Julia has greeted summer with enthusiasm.  She understands enough about time to appreciate breaks.  I find the transition from school to vacation unnerving.  Work in school has been on the wane.  Her big “country project” for social studies was finished two weeks ago.  Her last book review and spelling test about a week ago.  Math has dribbled to a close. Continue reading →

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curmudgeon cracking

julia swinging in the apple orchard.

I’ve been wallow-y lately.  Lots of stuff going on and little of it easy or smooth.  Last week, I cried to the universe: Can’t anything in my life go smoothly!?  I think the universe answered: no.  Honestly, when I get like this, I’d really like to climb out of my skin and give it away.  Who in their right mind would take it?  

Self pity.  Ugly, messy stuff.  A gaggle of quotations run through my mind.  I get it.  Self pity. A dangerous elixir.  

Pouts:

The school year is not winding down gracefully.  Julia was late to school six days in a row.  A lack of focus on doing the tasks at hand is the raison d’être — redressing a doll, picking up some reading, working on a lego piece has all taken precedence to getting washed, dressed and ready.  The loss of focus happens in an instant, my back turns, I make my bed, I run downstairs to start the kettle.  And Julia has been disrespectful to teacher twice this week — refusing work, speaking inappropriately, being generally mean.  I live in dead fear that this will escalate and mark her as a trouble maker.  I fear alienating the very people, her teachers, who are her lifeline to the world. Continue reading →

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new machines

 

Gluten free banana pancakes with date spread.  I took a number of pictures of the stove and fridge and they looked silly here, but the food is okay.

Dreary early spring in Wisconsin.  Yes, a few brilliant days come our way but lots of cold, damp days.  Is this our British weather?  Julia wants to wear spring clothes, especially light jackets, but relents after opening the morning door and standing on the front porch.  I am no better, putting away hats and gloves and then retrieving them when I find myself shaking outside.  Still, my neighbor’s daffodils, the ones that are in her protected side yard and bloom weeks before mine out front, bloom.  They bud and stall.  They are beaten down by wind and hail.  I pick a few and put them on my kitchen window.  These three will have the benefit of light and warmth.  These three bloom for days.  Almost without end.

Last week, my new appliances were delivered.  They are not perfect—the fridge door is dented and the only fix is a new door to be ordered.  The top of the stove is cracked and there is a question whether there is some part to be changed or a new stove to order.  There is more to this in a paragraph or two but I have given myself over to the glory of fully working machines.

Continue reading →

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cake

IMG_4527Snow-rain-sleet stopped and the roads are looking better after the morning rush. My day  looks clear and it takes no time to fill it up with the gym, cooking, maybe baking, the wash, reading, and finally sending out a resume for what appears to be a ‘perfect’ job. Julia is in school late today so she can go to the Harry Potter club. The after school club rules require that kids first go to a homework club right after school and so she will come home without her usual math sheet. Reading and cello practice will be all that is on her agenda for the evening. She will rush through both so she can get back to her sewing. Julia is still hand sewing and using felt most of the time. I am determined to give her a good sewing machine lesson during the upcoming long weekend.  She still does not think in terms of what the machine can do for her.  I don’t want to stop her hand sewing but a quick, strong seem is a lovely thing!  And it stays together.  I question if she should learn pattern following right now or whether coming up with her own should just continue.  I am thinking of sewing along side of her, using a pattern.  Will she notice?

Isn’t it still January?  Continue reading →

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