Also, a fall on some icy steps in mid-February left a colleague with a nasty concussion from which she is making a very slow recuperation. I picked up some work related projects while she has been out.  And pray for her full recovery.  Be thankful for each day – you never know when it might be your last, or at least the last of being the “you” that you now are.

And, piano has become a borderline obsession.  In fact the whole subject of music has grabbed my interest in a way that I would never have dreamed.  The morning routine has now settled in to accommodate this passion and secure its hold on my day, whether or not  a work day (Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and half of Thursdays.) Upon rising, there’s the immediate sit in the hot tub communing with my mountain (Mt. Juneau) and spruce trees (not to mention the heron roosting in its branches above the tub) followed by a sit in the living room with Bill, coffee, a few poems, and the newspaper. Then a bit of stretching, make the bed, get dressed, and head for the piano.  Daily practice is expanding its grip – and introducing to my life a great deal of satisfaction and pleasure at the (sometimes noticeable) progress.

Following a few Twitterers and finding some really good information from sifting through the junk).  So – to be blatant about it – I too am looking for followers.  Asking self “Why am I doing this?”  Answers:

• To learn how the social media works
• To keep up with changing technology
• It’s fun to be more in touch with old friends
• One day I’ll finish one of the books I’m working on and will want to market it
• I’m planning to do some social media stuff for two non-profits I’m involved with as (a) guinea pigs for my learning and as (b) marketing for them

WordPress now has a new poll function that I want to test, so here it is.View This Poll

I had put Juneau’s terrific sense of community and mind-blowing high level of cultural activities and involvement to the fact that it is small (30,000 souls) and roadless. If you want to go somewhere, it’s a major production involving cost and logistics associated with flying or taking the ferry.  So people stay put in a way that they don’t in places that are linked by major highways.

Laying in bed awake for a spell in the night (looking at the stars out the sliding glass doors through the branches of the spruce tree shading our deck) it dawned on me that, probably, the average commute for Juneau workers is not more than 15 minutes.  I, who walk to work, get to my place of (part-time) employment in just about that amount of time.  Likewise, the commute to the supermarket and everything else is minimal.

This means that, compared to dense urban areas where people spend up to 90 minutes or more at each end of the work day commuting to or from work, and then spend hours more each week visiting, shopping, and traveling to and from the other activities squeezed into their lives, people in Juneau have a lot more time on their hands.  They put it to good and creative use.

In line with my mission (?) to try to keep up with technology, at least as it pertains to daily living, I’ve been studying Social Media Marketing. Among other happenings, from a not-very-active Facebook user, I now routinely go there as part of my daily internet check (email (5 of them gdang it), news feeds, etc.)  Underneath the FB (‘scuse me, FaceBook) veil of trivia there is healthy connection to those far away (or even in the next room) – clearly the reason for the site’s phenomenal growth.  My favorite way to learn new technical stuff, though, is at Lynda.com which has a great course on Social Media Marketing and another on Twitter – Essential Training.  Hand in hand with that study, though, I need ways to apply what I’m learning.  Not hard to find, for organizations I work with.  So I’ve added some more projects to my never-ending todo list.  And, forgive me friends, but I set up TwitterFeed to automatically feed blog posts to the TrouserRollers FaceBook and Twitter pages.

Happily, my morning piano practice time has moved into the sacred zone, so this particular interest (?compulsion) seems not to be in danger of bumping into it.

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.

I expect I’ll be back.

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.

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…..