Breaking up with Mr. Zio

Mr. Zio is my heart monitor. We've been close these past two weeks, investigating all of the pings and rattles. Anxiety? Not anxiety? Who knows these days, right? But tomorrow, I peel him off my chest and send him packing in a box. Such wonders modern medicine provides! I'm a little fuzzy about what happens after that, but I'm sure there'll be some sort of report. How are you, dear reader? What's pinging and rattling in your life? I'm obsessed with making collages. No art background. Just pandemic online heart-saving classes. I'm mystified by the glues and finishes. I like my finished work to be smooth. I don't want wrinkles. I don't want shine. But I put together these masterpieces with all kinds of snippets, and some papers like one type of glue with other papers like another.

These two collages seem to me to be about luck. Luck feels like such a mover and a shaker to me these days. I'm planning a party--a missed major milestones party. I've ordered food and cakes (one cake for each of the four big occassions we've missed.) My son and his family are traveling from Phoenix. Hey, Southwest Airlines, I'm imploring you NOT to cancel that flight. Because 38 tacos. Because four cakes. Because I have not seen them for more than two years. I'm just so shocked every time I think or say that. More than two years. For god sake, dear pilots, I've already put the extra boards in the table.

Dear everyone, wishing you luck with your endeavors.

Pumpkin Custard

apple crisp, pumpkin pies, and pumpkin custard

I don't know how it started. Maybe once upon a time I made twice the amount of pie filling that I needed and because I didn't want to waste it, I had to do something with it. Hence, the tradition of pumpkin custard the night before Thanksgiving. The daughters and I are sitting on the couch with the Laker game on TV, each of us double-teaming with an additional device in our laps. C is reading about how to carve a turkey, M is playing some kind of game. We're eating pumpkin custard and talking about Giving Tuesday--which I have to admit I don't really know much about. Sometimes I get so lost in the day to day of life here in Pillville that I completely miss something that everyone else seems to have a working knowledge of.

Our dinner tomorrow will be our smallest Thanksgiving gathering ever. We'll all sit at one table, and mostly there will be one conversation going on, I'm guessing. That seems nice. I like small gatherings, as a rule. No pressure to mingle or figure out how to exit one conversation for another.
So, yeah, small seems good. My energy feels a little low. I forgot to put the brown sugar in the pumpkin pie filling and had to take them out of oven. C carefully stirred in the sugar and I think the pies are fine.

I had two mini-parties for my birthday. I liked that a lot too. The first one involved champagne and chocolate cake, the second a homemade cheese log and wine.

Whether your gathering is large or small, I hope the food and the company at your table are delightful.

HI from Kauai and Fun Facts

view from the back door of the birthday house

A flock of chickens lives under the house.

This morning it rained and the ocean looked just like a Winslow Homer painting.

It's hot. Hotter than Maui. Hotter than the Big Island, but the breeze here provides relief.

It's incredibly fun to whisper in the dark with a friend before giving in to sleep.

Eating with a full contingent of smart friends is beyond pleasant.

Word games amuse me greatly--even when I'm stumped.

There's nothing like a compelling personal story told around the table in the fading evening light.

There are no singing frogs here like there were in Hilo, but the ocean waves make their own song.

The back porch is shady and just large enough for T'ai Chi Chih and one-person yoga.

This is the closest I've ever been to the ocean while in a house.

There's great Indian food here.

I really love papayas.

I still get excited whenever I see a rainbow.

And I promise to avoid being arrested.

And a fine Christmas it was!

the daughters

Thanksgiving is our holiday.
Christmas is when the daughters go off to be with the families of their significant others.

This year was different. With  C's husband off doing his four-week shift of work out on a boat, and M's girlfriend with her family on the east coast alone, both daughters were here. Old friends had their adult children home for the holidays too, so I made dinner. I was waaay to busy to take pictures, so you'll have to believe me when I tell you the lemon bars were better than ever and that the flourless chocolate cake with the powdered sugar snowflake stenciled on top was divine. I made a green salad with mini heirloom tomatoes that looked like Christmas lights and  roasted veggies that were white and red and green with a little orange thrown in for good measure (cauliflower, red peppers, brussels sprouts, and carrots.) I made salmon in vermouth with dill and I grilled a marinated tri-tip that I wish had been more tender--but people ate it. My friend Ellen brought her  famous wine jello. There was pink champagne and ginger ale and lots of coffee, and I stayed up talking until 1:30 a.m.

I meant to take a picture of all the dirty glasses this morning, but I washed them instead.

I meant to tell everyone how happy I was that they were here--and I think I did that, but if I'd said it fifty times it still wouldn't have been enough to express how much I love these people I got to spend Christmas with.

And the day after tomorrow the son and his family will arrive, so the love will multiply.

the mothers

Report from Pillville: The CPAP, Blood Pressure Parties, and Oxygen

It's been a bit busier than usual here in Pillville. My mother's blood pressure was too high at her last cardiologist visit. Buy a blood pressure machine, the doctor advised, and check her a couple times a day. Then she pulled out her pen and wrote my mom a prescription for yet another medication. If she has to add anything else, the list may need a second page. I'm happy to report that the medication has had the desired effect, and I've been able to monitor my own slightly troublesome blood pressure as well--and it's been mostly fine, too. 

I'm skittish about hospitals and medical equipment. Where am I going to keep the blood pressure thing-y, I wondered. I didn't want to leave it out in the living room or kitchen, and my mom's room is just too full of stuff already. With the pots and pans? In the armoire in the dining room where I keep the device that checks her INR level? That thing only gets used once a week, but we need to check the blood pressure a couple times a day, so I  relented and keep it on the kitchen island next to the iPad. So, come over. Have a seat and read the newspaper on the iPad and see how your blood pressure is doing. We'll make it into a party. Maybe there could be alcohol involved, and I'll get a breathalyzer and we can test each other's blood alcohol levels, too.

And I'm thinking maybe we should have a Star Wars dress-up party now that my mom is going to start using her CPAP machine again. 

She looks like Darth Vader in that thing, but it's worth it if it helps her sleep without waking up shouting. Sleep apnea is a weird condition. If one is troubled with erratic breathing while trying to sleep, it's no wonder nightmares ensue. Who wouldn't wake up shouting? My mom never remembers any of it, however.

My mom also uses oxygen at night, and the CPAP will soon be hooked up to that machine. During the day, while she is unattached to any medical devices, we could have oxygen parties.

Let me know your favorite flavor so I can have it on hand. Do you suppose there's one that tastes like gin?

What the Yoga Teacher Said

"The surrender is the best part, " she said. "Surrender to the pose. The surrender is where the party is."

Surrender.
Party.

The best thing anyone could have said to me today.
Well, so far...
Maybe there'll be more partying later.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation

While many residents of the Twin Cities have undoubtedly gone off to their cabins to fish, and swim, and boat these past twelve glorious summer days, I have been happily clad in a pair of my daughter's old basketball shorts and a cast-off shirt doing what I can to reel in some upgrades for my 100-year-old condo. I have painted so many things white and caulked so much that I can fake a French manicure. I've entertained myself by watching you-tube videos on how to remove padlocks with lost keys/combinations. I've consulted with hardware store clerks about removing hinge pins from ancient doors, and then invented my own system (involving hair product and an un-inflated balloon) to simultaneously get traction and release on a hinge pin that hadn't been budged in a century.

closet re-design by Storganize

For "before" photo, click HERE

And I've consulted with the experts. Floor guys, strippers, electricians, and closet remodelers have paraded in and out of here as if we were a set for an HGTV show. It's a relief to know that the dining room chandelier is now unlikely to ignite and that the built-in buffet no longer requires a table knife to get into it, that the bathroom door can now be closed, that someone living in this century has a chance at fitting their clothes into the closet, and that I will know whom to hire to re-do my floors someday.

Meanwhile, M. and I have disciplined ourselves to eat in rather than out--thereby preserving the funds to keep me supplied with paint and sandpaper. We've cancelled the cable, discovered how to procure free bagels, and practiced the art of what I call "freeganing" in our kitchen. By no means are we embracing the true freegan lifestyle, but we've waved at it from across the street anyway. The four of us here have eaten wonderfully this past week and a half on far less than what our familial foursome would have spent on one typical Sunday dinner in our favorite restaurant back when we were living the big fat life. Utilizing what we already have on hand and buying whatever fresh ingredients we need to complete the menu has yielded remarkably decent results.

I've taken this approach at my place in L.A. the past couple of months, too. Harvested the pantry, fired  the gardner. Waiting on the contracts for cable TV and my cell phone to expire. But even if I never spend another dime on booze, I'm going to have to throw a serious party if I want to put a dent in my liquor cabinet. A painting party, perhaps, since I have a set of  home improvement projects to finish in L.A. as well.

Four years ago I had two packing parties as I prepared to leave the house I shared with Mr. Ex. There was a blender involved, and the only thing I really remember is trying to come up with the right answer to the question, "Would it be okay to put Cointreau in the Margaritas?"

Caulking and Cointreau? Paint and Pernod? Anyone?

photo credit for vintage post card: Minnesota Historical Society
closet photo was taken by me

Premonition?

Long ago I had powerful dreams that proved to be accurate premonitions. I dreamed my father died--that he had a heart attack while I was away at college--and he did. I had a series of  negative dreams about a college acquaintance I eventually lived with for a while in L.A--rather disastrously.

Then for years there was a dream drought. Now the dreams are coming like the rain.

Two nights ago I dreamed I was at a party with my daughter M.'s high school basketball team. "Where's M's dad?" her friend Niki asks me. We're in a gym and there's dance music and flashing party lights. I have to shout over the din. "He left me for a younger woman," I say. We're surrounded by  a crowd of people--basketball players, teachers, parents. A few feet away, M. is standing in a brightly lit area, and I see she's holding a glossy Christmas card with color photos. There's a big headshot of Mr. Ex's little boy with his name under it. Across from this picture is an empty box inscribed with "HD xx 2012." I puzzle over the symbols. Another baby, I think. Huge Dumb Girl. His Daughter. Harriet something....they're naming the baby Harriet? She will arrive in 2012.

But it's only 2011 now.
Happy New Year, Everyone!