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.

selfish

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Travelin’ 2010

When I stop writing for awhile I get . . . a sort of constipation of the spirit.  The creative spirit to be specific.  I don’t grows into I can’t.  And when I finally sit down to tap a few keys, I have both too much to say and nothing at all.

And I feel rather garbled.

Forgive me.  The only way to begin again is to just do it.  So . . .

I have been obsessed with travel plans— leave for Italy in 11 days — and the very long list that I’ve made for myself.  My pre-traveling lists, that I make for almost every trip short or long, could be judged compulsive.  It has all the planning steps, packing steps and what I need to do in the house and for the summer Mindful Circle workshop before I close the door.  I have my goals as to how much to do each day to arrived at the door closing with everything essential and a few good wishes done.  My joy here is crossing off what I have done each day.  Simple compulsive pleasure.  However, a long trip makes for a long list.

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mistake

imagesRainy, damp, more March than April and my internet connection is very weak.    My desk is cluttered with unfiled detritus.  I’ve noticed that my couch, the uber comfortable nest of family life, is looking rather shabby.  Bought for another house with a bigger living room, it has always been a bit of an elephant in this living room.  Something to be slightly squeezed around especially when the clothes basket goes downstairs or a big box is delivered.  For a millisecond I wonder if the money that I just spent on airline tickets “should” have gone into some household item—Ach, the driveway!—but the cloud passes very, very quickly.

I bought airline tickets for Italy.

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sleep

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The night began so well.  I was exhausted, just wanting to get to bed and sleep.  The day was busy enough, physical needs up to date enough to climb into bed right after tucking Julia in.  I tuned into the next Doc Martin episode — my current favorite television — knowing that I’d be asleep almost before the credits were finished.  I would, a little later, close the laptop, thereby dousing light and turning off media.  Yes, I know, I’ve promised myself to keep media out of the bedroom but I was too tired to even open the book on the bed stand and I’d be asleep very soon anyway.

I was looking forward to a solid eight hours, possibly nine if the stars were in alignment and the prospect of getting back to even keel — I have fallen off ‘keel’ lately, working on just one more egg, indulging in electronics and google searches way too late, even when kept out of the bedroom, and walking around bleary on next days.

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journeying

DSCN1887I know I’ve announced this before, at other noticeable stopping points, but once again—ta-da!—I am coming more into myself.

The self that I am coming into?

I am chatting up more wait staff and baristas— this morning at the Target Starbucks, I noticed that Oprah has a chai but not a coffee and we, the barista and I, bantered.

I notice that I am grumpy.  It’s not the grumpy part that is notable but the noticing.

I am feeling oppressed about falling behind, way behind, responding to email and I actually realized that all I have to do is to answer a bunch of emails to feel better.

A code appeared just today on the dashboard of my car and I noticed it and called the folks who service the car.  I remembered that it was not there yesterday and I acted in a timely manner.

I want to buy show tickets for next fall and see touring musicals.

There is also the travel thing.  In the last few years, I have insisted that I wanted to travel far and yet have not done it.  Yes, we did travel to Mexico last summer but I corralled Cheshire and another young friend to go with Julia and I. Cheshire is fluent in Spanish and so was an excellent buffer between me and any semblance of un-touristy Mexico.  We went to a rather touristy part of Mexico.  It was a beach vacation, not the exploration vacations that I most enjoy.  And so, Mexico almost doesn’t count as traveling far.

And now, today, and for this whole week, I’ve begun planning a trip to Italy. Continue reading →

Posted on by Suzanne Buchko 4

process

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The warmth of the beginning of the week wanes into a more gradual spring-coming that demands a coat and suggests gloves without insisting.  Julia groans and inwardly I mirror her reaction.  We want spring.  During the weekend and again on Monday, I raked garden beds. I usually make myself rake the lawn in front of each bed and so I tend to drag my feet with the raking.  Not so this year.  I’m doing the beds, all the beds, first and then attend to the grass.  My reward, as if gardening needs any, was the first sighting of a clump of snow drops.  Not quite in bloom yet.  Tomorrow.  And Julia will be happy to see them.  We are aching for this spring; however, it is March and not really yet spring in Wisconsin.

In my neighbor’s side yard the daffodils are emerging.  They are some of the first daffs of the neighborhood.  The side yard is a microclimate — a small place that tends, because of protection or exposure to be slightly out of step with the land around it.  I wish for microclimates but I don’t really have any.  Still, I enjoy the early daffs and few tulips.  My plantings will come up eventually and it is so nice to see color even if it is not mine.

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a blue sponge

imagesI was going to write this very nice piece about mindful activity.  An practice that is only beginning to take root in my daily doings, but there is the kinda’ magical thing that is going on that I need to jot down about a blue sponge.

Back in the long ago, David and I were always on the look out for the perfect dish sponge.  David really loved washing dishes — very zen experience for him.  I didn’t like washing dishes but I do have this thing for good tools.  This was not a passionate search but a recurring, alway-short discussion surfacing whenever it came time to replace the tool we used to wash our dishes.  Over the years we tried many things. We rejected the wash clothes of my youth and the sponge on a hollow plastic stick that David’s Dad advocated.  Yes, the pleasure of washing dishes was, in this case, multigenerational.  We used plain manufactured sponges and the more natural ones.  I’ve never been clear on how sponges are made or their history.  We used scrubbies of different varieties and many sponge plus scrubbies.  Size and shape were always wrong, never comfortable in the hand—we cut some in half searching for perfection but that left us with something too small.  The sponge plus scrubby models were never pliable enough to get into the corners and crevices of cups and pots.  Forcing the issue would result in the untimely separation of the sponge from the scrubby.

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power & control

Sunday snow.  6-9 inches.   Why does it always look like more in my driveway?  Who measures and where do they do it?  I used the new-to-me snow blower twice for this snow.  It works well.  Much too loud.  It is almost three times as large as my old snow blower.  When we got the old one-the last gift that my mother gave me which is somewhat ironic-I chose a blower that I knew I could handle by myself.  David had already gotten his heart condition diagnosis and I was going to be responsible for snow removal in perpetuity.  I could lift the small blower and put it in the trunk of my car when it needed a tune up.  True it couldn’t handle any really deep snow but that was a trade off—going out to blow snow every few hours during heavy snows.

The new-to-me blower takes on more snow and cuts a wider swath than the old one but it is too heavy and too big for me.  Two months ago when I was shopping for something new, the very personable sales guy worked hard convincing me that this was the size that I should buy.  He was probably right in terms of efficiency of operation and cost effectiveness but I can’t move it around easily and after using it twice I have painful shoulders.  Today, I have really painful shoulders.  I guess I will either toughen up or, and much more likely, look for something smaller at the end of the winter.

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ice walking

IMG_3293A friend gifts herself on her birthday with novel experiences like hot air ballooning and power sailing. I am not as ambitious.  In previous years, I wished for perfect days on my birthday — wearing favorite clothes, sleeping late, no housework or homework, good food and culture.  My definition of perfect was pretty broad but these days my definition is still too restrictive to strive for.  And so, time to change.

I’ve started projects on natal days.  Some years I ‘finalize’ resolutions that I just couldn’t get right at the beginning of January.  For many years, I didn’t want to make a big deal about celebrating my birthday but without a partner, if any deal is going to be made, I can’t keep my friends in the dark.  And I am grateful for the rememberings — a few packages, morning coffee with, a phone call or two from, theater in evening and afterwards food so rich my tummy ached, and a big bouquet of Facebook wishes.

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ruts

Blue-Moon-ExpeditionShould it be surprising that as it has warmed up slightly in the last few days—from below zero to almost 20 above—the nano-catastrophes of the last week have found solutions?  Perhaps I am warm brained.

We are settling into the cold.  Flannel duvets on the beds, insulated shades  in colder rooms pulled up only on sunny days over 10 degrees, lined pants and silk long underwear are not merely fashion statements and neither of us runs out of the house without coat, hat and gloves.  Recently, I has a conversation about living in New York City with someone who felt that he would never move to the city because of the high cost of living.  I thought it was about priorities—cultural, education and business opportunities, etc.—but he still couldn’t see it.  Then I said that we choose to live in Wisconsin even though we are predictably miserable due to cold for at least three months, and many years almost six months, every year.  Home, family, job, beautiful and vibrant town, public schools, etc.—a good deal of priorities.

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encores

IMG_2755It looks like Julia’s dancing ballerina dinosaurs will again be offered as part of a Paper Cloud Apparel fund raiser.  This time, they have asked if we have a local cause we would like to have proceeds going to.  I thought of the adaptive skating program that Julia is going to on Sunday afternoons.  Julia and a gaggle of other kids from very little to older teens work with volunteers in small groups and one on one to learn to skate.  The same folks offer an adaptive hockey team for older kids and adults and I know at least one person who is on the team.  Julia struggles a bit but she is willing to go each week and she is getting better little by little.

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