I seem to have (temporarily) gone off blogging. In part because it’s so easy to keep in touch with far flung friends and family via Facebook. In part because lately I’m totally turned off by what passes for “News.” I read the Juneau Empire (for its good coverage of happenings in a genuine community, plus a bridge column and Dear Abby.) Beyond that, it’s piano practice, walking the dogs, the part-time job. Am I turning inward – is that what happens in old age?
On the other hand, I might say it was winter, except we haven’t seen it since November. It seems to have decamped to points east and left this part of Alaska bathed in a very very very early spring.
Lot’s going on, missed posting. Too much work (but seems to be productive) and trying to scale back. Did a day-long training workshop on Strategic Planning followed by a day-long retreat for my favorite non-profit. Took a lot more prep time than I recalled. Since it’s a decade since I had my head in that bucket it was a bit like re-inventing the wheel – thank goodness for Bill’s help. Like much of my life, couldn’t have done it without him. Bill spent 3 days in the hospital a couple of weeks ago hooked up to an IV machine after some (one or more) bacteria/fungi blew up his left foot. Nasty it was. The buggy culprit(s) not yet identified, but he (or rather his foot) is fully recovered.
The big news is that I have found a wonderful piano teacher. I think it’s OK to say her name out loud (Mary Watson) since she’s a well known and respected Juneau gem. Can’t tell you how psyched I am. She let me make a copy of her tree of keyboard masters and students (Bach, Mozart, Clementi, Beethoven, Czerny, Liszt, Leschetizky, Kullak, etc. to the present) showing who of all the greats had been her teachers, all the way down to me…. Mind blowing. So far I’ve had 3 one-hour biweekly lessons. I feel like I’m making unbelievable progress and my motivation has moved through the roof. This morning’s practice I finally felt like I made the piano SING!!!!! Reflected on my 8 years of lessons when I was young, and my self teaching since then floundering around as a mediocre intermediate player. Think I never did have a good teacher – and all of a sudden I’ve landed in a gold pile. My vision of being able to play the piano for hours on end when I’m a stuck-at-home very old lady (if I make it that far) may now become reality. Heartfelt kudos to good teachers of everything, everywhere. Plus, I signed up to take a 5-week Marimba class at the Canvas beginning February 7th. Looking forward greatly to that. Bill’s friend John came over last night for their weekly guitar get-together and the 3 of us had a fabulous 40 minutes gabbling about all kind of things musical before the two of them went off into the music room.
Romeo has disappeared. Juneau’s favorite black wolf hasn’t been seen since September. His canine and human friends are very sad.
Strange weather – warm and sunny, not much snow left at sea level.
Recently I overheard a Father and daughter in their last moments together at the airport. They had announced the departure.
Standing near the security gate, they hugged and the Father said, ‘I love you, and I wish you enough.’
The daughter replied, ‘Dad, our life together has been more than enough. Your love is all I ever needed. I wish you enough, too, Dad.’
They kissed and the daughter left. The Father walked over to the window where I was seated. Standing there I could see he wanted and needed to cry. I tried not to intrude on his privacy, but he welcomed me in by asking, ‘Did you ever say good-bye to someone knowing it would be forever?’
‘Yes, I have,’ I replied. ‘Forgive me for asking, but why is this a forever good-bye?’
‘I am old, and she lives so far away. I have challenges ahead and the reality is – the next trip back will be for my funeral,’ he said.
‘When you were saying good-bye, I heard you say, ‘I wish you enough.’ May I ask what that means?’
He began to smile. ‘That’s a wish that has been handed down from other generations. My parents used to say it to everyone…’ He paused a moment and looked up as if trying to remember it in detail, and he smiled even more. ‘When we said, ‘I wish you enough,’ we wanted the other person to have a life filled with just enough good things to sustain them.’ Then turning toward me, he shared the following as if he were reciting it from memory.
I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.
I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.
I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good- bye.
They say it takes a minute to find a special person, an hour to appreciate them, a day to love them; but then an entire life to forget them.
The start of a new decade – with luck less disastrous for the US and the world than the last one. Provided moral support to Rorie and the boys at the annual polar bear dip at Auke Rec. A big crowd. Had friends and dear ones to dinner in the evening, made BiBimBap, a favorite Korean dish. Followed up with fresh pears poached in white wine and honey, with chocolate pudding (embellished by melting a bag of chocolate chips in it) and cream. Nice time, good company. Food turned out good, a chance to use the rarely used Mandolin but coralling and serving all the food bits overwhelmed our small space. Bill stepped up to the plate like the sweetheart he is and cleaned up. This morning, nice hot tub under the remnants of New Year’s Eve’s blue moon. A brisk 12 degrees F, under clear skies. Another blocking high sitting over Juneau spreading its chilly cheer.
I’m reading The Next 50 Years, a collection of 25 essays by leading scientists. Sounds like a strange world, not sorry I won’t see it. Reminded me that a bunch of future experts made predictions in the late 70’s of how the world would change by the end of the decade – they got about 30% of their guesses right. Never envisaged the Internet, which of course is a bedrock (if pretty shaky) of current life. Wonder what earth-shaking invention of that magniture will show up between now and 2050.
Finally found a piano teacher, Mary Watson. I’m absolutely delighted. Discovered that the piano teachers I had when I was young probably weren’t very good. Finding amazing discoveries and insights under Mary’s tutelage and my interest and enthusiasm about progressing as a student has catapulted into high gear. Which reminds me, it’s time to stop and go practice…..
I’m a dog lover and enjoy nothing more than taking a hairy companion on a walk. While I often wondered about some odd features in certain breeds, not until I watched a recent BBC documentary, Pedigree Dogs Exposed, did I understand the implications. Watch this video if you’re thinking about getting a pure breed dog – especially if you chose it for some peculiar physical features. If you’re squeamish, it’ll make your stomach churn. Many of these animals endure great suffering and permanent distress solely to titillate a human owner. After making the documentary, the BBC refused to air coverage of the annual Crufts dog competition, which is as prestigious in Britain as the Westminster or National Dog Show is in the U.S.
Laying in bed the other night I reflected on how we humans seem to have an instinctual need to nest, make a roof over our heads. Even though we’ll occasionally sleep in the open, in every culture (I think) we “nest” in caves, tents, igloos, cabins, boats, mcmansions, and all kinds of other dwellings. Is it the need for a roof – or is it because we’re hoarders/collectors of stuff and either we don’t want it to get wet, or we need to mark it as “ours.” Territoriality infects everything we do. Property lines, and town, county, state, and national boundaries. Me, mine. How truly silly. Our world is ruled by that imaginary idea called ownership, the source of interminable conflict and fueled by greed. We’re on this earth for a brief moment in time, then we’re gone. And we can’t take nothing with us…
Not just humans, but birds and bears too find or make nests. Nice article in today’s Juneau Empire about where the local bears hibernate. Maybe the one hanging around our neighborhood in the fall is hibernating under our new deck. If so, he’s welcome. And if he’s a she and produces cubs in the spring, perhaps we’ll have a cub to enjoy instead of a new puppy….
Among other careers in my next life (?lives) I’m going to be an ocean pilot, a tugboat captain, and an anthropologist – if there are any humans left, that is.
Been busy lately, forgot to post. Bill is now home again from his month-long sun-soak in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Extremely happy to see him, we missed each other hugely.
But in the interests of maintaining some documentation about my meandering internal world (if for no-one other than myself), here goes.
First, some links that caught my interest in the last week or so:
Tonight we have a dilemma. It’s the First Friday Art Walk (see above link) which in December each year is huge. It’s also Family Fun night at Harborview Elementary School where one grandson goes, and we have tickets to see Leading Ladies at Perseverance Theatre. Tomorrow we eat a 5-course Cuban dinner at the Canvas at REACH as a fundraiser for studio scholarships, Sunday it’s A Wonderful Life put on by Perseverance in the new (and lovely) Thunder Mountain High School theatre/auditorium. Other tickets on our desk are for Dracula (Perseverance students, including a grandson) on the 12th, The Nutcracker (Juneau Dance Unlimited) on the 13th, and The Gift of the Magi/Last Leaf (Opera to Go) on the 18th. And the best part of all of this: the admission fees are low, the performances are high quality, and we can walk to most of them…….
Quite a storm at the moment, here’s our current weather forecast:
SOUTHERN LYNN CANAL-
400 AM AKST SAT NOV 14 2009
...GALE WARNING THROUGH TONIGHT....TODAY...S WIND 35 KT INCREASING TO 45 KT IN THE AFTERNOON. SEAS
9 FT. RAIN IN THE MORNING...THEN RAIN AND SNOW SHOWERS IN THE
AFTERNOON.
.TONIGHT...S WIND 35 KT DIMINISHING TO 25 KT LATE. SEAS 7 FT
SUBSIDING TO 5 FT LATE. RAIN AND SNOW SHOWERS.
.SUN...S WIND 20 KT. SEAS 4 FT. SNOW SHOWERS.
.SUN NIGHT...N WIND 20 KT. SEAS 4 FT. SNOW SHOWERS.
.MON...N GALE TO 35 KT. SEAS 6 FT. RAIN AND SNOW SHOWERS.
.TUE...N GALE TO 35 KT. SEAS 7 FT.
.WED...N WIND 25 KT. SEAS 5 FT.
Power went out around 7:30am, so decided to go tour the area. The entire town is in the dark. A power boat had broken loose in Aurora harbour and driven by the gale had pinned an also loose sailboat to the breakwater. Found a small leak at one window frame, and the cover to the stack from the boiler blew off – retrieved for safekeeping until things are calmer. Mother nature at her most powerful. Reminds me of my childhood in Oban, Scotland - same latitude, same storms.
Power came back on at 8:30am, good job AEL&P. Be interesting to find out what was the cause, and if the additional power from the new Lake Dorothy power station reduced the need to use backup diesel generators.
After watching 60 Minutes last Sunday on Sabotaging the System about the potential for hackers to get into computer systems that run crucial elements of the world’s infrastructure, such as the power grids, water works, etc., very thankful to be “off the grid” and reliant on hydro power which, given the amount of rainfall here, is a renewable resource.
No hot tub this morning – how fortunate I am to have this as my only complaint. The World Food Program states that, for the first time, a billion people are hungry and without food security. It has launched a campaign – a billion for a billion – to help raise funds for the starving.
Even though I believe that feeding hungry people is simply keeping them alive until the next crisis, and that such crises are nature’s way of controlling the human population explosion, from a humanitarian perspective how can one not contribute without being callous? The human dilemma: we can control neither our exploding population nor its consequences. Pass the word…… [Note: I earmarked my donations to "provide meals to more school children, especially girls, thus allowing them to stay in school." It's my belief that the best way to control population is by educating girls - not to mention ameliorating the over-abundance of testosterone that has produced our present climate of global violence.]
I ran across a story that finally hit the Internet news only this morning though it was first published 2 months ago (at least as far as I can find.) The gist of it is that 70% of the nation’s young people 17-24 are ineligible to enlist in the armed forces because of inadequate education, criminal records or being physically unfit – ie obese. While issues of early childhood education and poverty obviously matter, what struck me about this as well as the debate on health care is the lack of discussion about the food industry and agribusinesses’ role in destroying the nation’s health – purely out of greed. Then last night I watched Frontline’s documentary on the Medicated Child. It’ll make you cry to see little kids on as many as 8 behavior-controlling drugs, with devastating long-term impacts on their lives and health.
We live in a money-driven society. The role of corporate greed in climate change, war, and ill health comes ever more into focus. Follow the money. Where are the profits? They’re in the arms industry, the food industry, the drug industry, the insurance industry. Until the collective we faces up to and deals with this elephant in the living room, we’re putting a death wish on this country, and most likely on our species.
What time is it? Right now it’s beginning to feel like “0 dark 30″ to quote our friend Dana. Losing 5 minutes of daylight each day we still have 7 weeks to go to winter solstice with its 6 1/2 hours of daylight. For today sunrise is at 8:07am and sunset at 5:15pm, so we’re basking in 9+ hours of day. Not bad, especially since the first part of October had a lot of dry and sun. But now it’s gone back to being true to it’s usually rainy form and the darkening of each day is palpable. The upside is that overnight the snow line crept down Mount Juneau and a white paintbrush passed over the evergreens up the hill from our house. A good reminder of how beautiful this place can be during the winter. And, we took our evening tub on the new deck last night around 9pm. What a privilege to sit under a roof of spruce branches with drops of drizzle on our faces, soaking up the healing warmth of the tub’s 104 degree water.
Interesting news item on the ‘Net – herself is now 40 years old. That means we’re living with two generations that don’t know what it was like without her. Me, myself, I didn’t even see TV until I’d passed 21. Who knows what the next few decades will bring in the way of technological advancement. Wouldn’t it be nice if our collective social and political skills advanced at the same rate?
