All posts by Charles

Aging, Family, Health, Science, Third Phase

Apres

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Fall and the RBG Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Kate. Our ancientrail of man and woman together. Dr. Gustave and his wife, the artist Lindsay Smith Gustave. The cataract, the eye. Its evolution from one-celled life. The hand and the eye together. Art. Seeing and making. UFO’s in Ode’s mind. The threat to our democracy. Our opportunity to act.

In the car to see Dr. Gustave. One day after. Bright light. Eye still dilated. Colors more intense, more clarity. Less sfumato. In closing the dominant left eye, the one with the new lens replacing its cataract, I can return to the sfumato that the cataract created. Damned if I don’t prefer it in some ways. Aesthetically it’s pleasing to me, the gentle blending of colors, their slight smokiness, which I couldn’t identify before. Guess I’ll have to high these eyes to a gallery of Renaissance painting after the second one’s done.

You had an extra large cataract. Yes! So I take out a cataract shaped like a walnut and I slip in a lens shaped like a plate. When the two sides of the eye close over the plate, there can sometimes be a fold. If you get a straight line in your vision at night, that’s the fold. No matter. If it’s still there, we’ll just laser it out.

This morning, here in the loft, as I look at my banks of track lighting, they have a lance of light through them at about a sixty degree angle. It does not impair my vision. We’ll see.

My distance vision is already 20/25 and will get to 20/20 in time. I could watch TV without glasses last night. This computer screen is far less fuzzy than it was on Wednesday.

At the lower left of my left eye, I have a sensation of light. Not a big deal. If it hung around though…

No resistance work for a month. Can do aerobics. No heavy lifting. (see the resistance work) Not sure what I’m gonna do with the Chewy order when it comes.

Watched a live, real time video of cataract surgery last night. Takes about 8 minutes or so. Involves slicing the mature organelle into quarters, then vacuuming them up with a teeny vacuum. The lens slips in through a tiny incision, unfolds, then gets straightened out, flattened. The edges of the eye right there are polished to prevent problems later.

All this time a retractor has the eyeball served up like an over easy egg. John, the nurse anesthetist, told me not to fight the retractor. I didn’t. Didn’t even know it was there.

Surprisingly tired both Thursday and yesterday.

Around 4:15 p.m. Kate and I drove into Swedish hospital. She had to get a drive up Covid test before her catscan on Tuesday and the draining of the fluid on her lungs the next day. Really hope this gives her some relief, She needs it. Meanwhile the stoma site has begun to heal. Almost normal looking.

Aging, Health, Science, Third Phase

Aarggh.

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Fall and the RBG Moon

Friday gratefuls: Alan. The Tesla experience. The kind folks at Cherry Hills Surgery center. The Latina who placed my IV and gave me enough eye drops I thought I was being waterboarded in a minimalist way. Savannah, my nurse, who kept giving me warm blankets. John, the nurse anesthetist. And Dr. Gustave, eye surgeon. My dominant eye, now pirated. Kate, for her encouragement and support. Tom and Paul for notes yesterday. Cheri Rubin (Alan’s wife), too.

I was back home by noon after going down the hill with Alan in his computer on wheels, as Tom calls the Tesla. At a recent cosmetic visit to repair dings Tesla replaced, at no charge, the car’s whole motherboard and added software updates. One of them added the ability to read signs and, I think, included reading speed limits. Very, very cool.

At the surgery center I filled out the usual absurd number of forms which got added, I assume, to the absurd number of forms I had already filled out. I got more forms on the way out. How many trees died for my eye surgery?

Pre-op was a series of bays separated by curtains on a snaking metal fixture attached to the ceiling. One interesting feature. I got to keep my clothes on! I guess the head is far enough away from the rest of the body.

My legs went on a triangular pillow and my head rested on what looked a hell of a lot like a mortuary head rest. Similar to Chinese pillows. Savannah gave me drops. Then the Latina, whose name I did not get, came and gave me more drops. and inserted a needle into my left hand.

I felt bad for her. When I asked her to repeat something because I was deaf in that ear (left, the side she was on), she said, “Oh. that’s o.k. I’m Hispanic and people say I talk really loud. So that’s sort of normal for me.”

“I know a lot of loud Caucasians.” I wanted to tell her not to denigrate herself, not for me, not for anybody, but I didn’t. She was quick, efficient and cheerful. Good at her job.

Savannah, my nurse, would have been at home in Minnesota with her blonde curly hair and blue eyes. She had an unusual amount of eyeliner, emphasized by the mask. Are you in pain? Not yet.

More eye drops. And, then, a much longer than 20 minute wait. Staring at the ceiling, considering all the eyedrops, where did they go? What would I do when I get home? No, be here. Do deep breathing. In through the nose, out through the mouth. Reverse that. In through the nose, out through the nose. Variations.

Thoughts of aging, maturing cataracts, the disturbing article about the upcoming election I finished in the waiting room. Cataract surgery as a metaphor. Wait, they’re cutting into my EYE?

Dr. Gustave came. What are we doing? Why doesn’t he know? Taking a cataract out and putting in a lens. I agree. Which eye? Geez. That, too. The left. I agree. Are we going for the distance correction or the reading correction? Distance. I agree. He was agreeable.

John picked up the ball by asking questions I’d already answered twice. Any drug allergies? No. Bad reaction to anesthesia? No. Anesthesiologist questions. He wanted to anesthesia in the sun. Which seemed unlikely to me.

In the operating room a name I know from astronomy loomed above on a robotic arm. Zeiss. That makes three robots who have been critical parts of my health care: the DaVinci, the preying bird of radiation, and now this Zeiss. It looked far more delicate than the other two though bulky, or blocky.

After that John hooked up the versid and I leaned into the drug, falling away. Mostly. I could see during the operation. In the eye that was being sliced and diced. I saw three large purple gangly things, topped with white. Felt pressure, some pain part of the time. Not long, maybe twenty minutes.

Recovery was fast. A Latina, older than the one before, took me by the arm as if we were about to walk down the aisle, and led me to the car.

Alan asked if I spoke pirate now?

A clear plastic shield covers my left eye. I still see circles and haloes around lights, but I can tell already that the vision is clearer, more distinct. Much more on an eye to eye comparison. And, yes, the white’s are much whiter.

A bit achy since I had to sleep on my side or back and I’m a stomach sleeper. Other than that, ok. I go see Dr. Gustave today at eleven. Driving there is the test of the eye, I suppose.

Anyhow. Done for now. No lifting heavy objects. Might mean I can’t exercise for a month. Arrggh, matey, not what we wanted.

Aging, Commentary on the news, Cooking, Dogs, Family, Friends, Health, Mountains, Politics, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

I Can See Clearly Now

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Fall and the RBG Moon

Thursday gratefuls: Alan. Dr. Gustave. Kate. Angelique. Rigel. Kep. The night sky. A decent night’s sleep. Cool. The Denver Post. Life. In all its forms. Animacy in its unexpected forms. The turning of the Great Wheel. Old friends. The buck in our yard yesterday afternoon.

A Mule Deer Buck jumped our fence yesterday afternoon to eat Grass. Kep and Rigel were outside, wandering around the back, too. Just us animals here. No barking. No disturbed looks from the Deer. Yeah, we all live up here on Shadow Mountain. Our place.

Alan’s coming by at 7:30 to take me to the Cherry Hills Surgery center near Swedish Hospital. Old cataract out, new lens in. Dr. Gustave at the robotic controls. With Kate’s multiple medical procedures, appointments, conditions this surgery seems ho-hum. I’m neither excited nor fearful. Gonna go do it. Come home.

Go back on October 8th. Repeat. Tomorrow I have an appointment with Dr. Gustave. Post-op. Another on October 2nd. Then, post op the 9th. And follow up on the 14th. Then, a month after that. Lots of miles for a better way to see the world. Way worth it.

Used gift cards to buy more easy entrees for Kate. More meatloaf. Mongolian beef. A salad. Easier for me, what Kate wants to eat. Perfect match.

Tomorrow at 5 pm we go to Swedish for a drive thru Covid test. This is for Kate prior to her catscan on Tuesday and the thoracentesis on Wednesday. Hope all this provides her some relief from her extreme shortness of breath.

Continuing the medical theme. Kep sees a doggy dermatologist next Thursday. The last two times we’ve had him defurminated he’s broken out with serious hot spots, lesions on his back. We need to figure this out so we can have him groomed. Otherwise his hair piles up around the house.

Speaking of Dogs. Brenton White, the kind man in Loveland who is caring for Murdoch, had a small tragedy. Seventeen days ago he brought home Mocha, a very cute chocolate lab puppy. Murdoch loved him. They played together. Then, two nights ago, he died. Heart. Likely a congenital anomaly Kate believes.

The Atlantic Monthly sent out an article by e-mail yesterday. Said it couldn’t wait for publication. I haven’t finished it yet, but it’s about November 3rd and the potential democratic crisis. The Election That Could Break America.

Commentary on the news, Politics, US History

Our Id. Our Shadow

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Fall and the RBG Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Mountain Waste. Amy’s Cheese Enchiladas. Orion. The dark. The night. Amber. Dr. Gustave. Cataract surgery. Cataracts. Maxwell Falls, upper and lower. Shadow Mountain. Its solidity. Welcome, Fall. The Harvest. The turning of the Aspen’s high up on Black Mountain.

Oh. As the evangelicals love to proclaim, we are being tested right now. Can this nation, or any nation, live divided? Trumpian fingernails, worn near the quick, scrape across the blackboard of TV and written news. One insult after another. Bad ones. The action is in our reaction.

With the pandemic already heavy on our souls, the death and replacement of RBG feels like too much to bear. As if the heavens have opened and instead of compassion and grace, their god sent psychopathy and misery. Is their orange deity this powerful? Is he this tone deaf to his electoral defeat, his trashing of religious values, his arrogant misogyny? Yes, I guess he is.

The Chinese find courage and sadness in the fall. I do, too. This fall. Right now. Today. This moment. Sadness and just behind it anger. Courage, too, though. I will not retreat into despair or lose my love of this nation. I will not lose my core belief that we are all in this together as creatures of mother earth, of this vasty and mysterious universe.

Trump is, I guess, this nation’s id, forcing us to confront our shadow, our long and shameful treatment of those different from our white Anglo selves. If we can stand the chaos, then there are great days ahead, because this shadow has the energy to carry us into a new era. Not quick, not today, but in the weeks and months to come.

This means that no matter the results of this action or that we hold tight to our dreams, to our children, to the future. We continue to act, to push ahead. Not for any particular result, but because it is who we are and how we stay with the pulse of change.

Aging, Asia, Beyond the Boundaries, Commentary on Religion, Great Wheel, Holidays, Humanities, Mountains, Myth and Story, Original Relation, Plants, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

Courage and Sadness

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Mabon (Vernal Equinox) and the RBG Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Kate resolving the missing $5,500.Rigel eager to get up this morning. Orion in the south. Mars in the west. Venus in the east. Sirius in the southeast. Small bursts of color. The Great Wheel, turning.

The vernal equinox. When the night hours increase. Daylight shortens. Crops come to fruit. The Earth begins to gather back to itself the plants that grew in fields and meadows.

The Elk rut. That strange strangled cry of the bugling bull Elk. The cough of the mountain lion as they hunt in the dawn and twilight. Bears in their hyperphagia phase (a new word for me), 20,000 calories a day. Preparation for hibernation. Upturned trash cans, detritus on the roads.

Orion returns to the night sky. Getting the paper while feeding the dogs. In the dark now. Seeing the stars. Or, rather, their cataract driven explosions of light.

Earth/Sky, a favorite website, has a fascinating short article about the Chinese sense of autumn. This observation I found significant: “…it’s part of Chinese culture to maintain and add to ancient wisdom. In contrast, we in the Western world tend to replace old ideas with new ideas. So – although our Western way of thinking encourages advances in things like technology and economics – the Chinese understanding of natural cycles remains far deeper than ours.”

The emotions associated with autumn for the Chinese, courage and sadness, rise in full measure this 2020 harvest season. Sad. The feeling of Leaves falling, Grasses withering, light diminishing, the Sun’s angle shortening. RBG’s tzaddik death. The pandemic. Our beleaguered and chaotic nation. Isolation and its discontents. Courage. Facing the election, doing what’s necessary. Mourning, then fighting. Going on as the Vegetative world dies, changes. Living with the pandemic instead of in spite of it. Leaning into the third phase for those of us old hippies and radicals still here.

The Great Wheel is ancient Western knowledge. I have chosen to maintain it and, I hope, add to it. As the Earth/Sky article notes: “To the Chinese, nature means more than just the cycling of the seasons. Nature is within and around us…” It used to meant that in the West, too, but our emphasis on reason, on results, on arriving at destinations, on a monotheistic creator who controls nature, have become mature cataracts for us, occluding our vision.

We see what we believe useful. We find the laws of nature, then proceed to own them, use them. This gives us the impression that, like magic or miracles, we can control nature. The rapid warming of our planet gives the lie to that.

I’m neither a Luddite nor anti-reason, anti-science. I am sad about what we’ve lost in our rush to understand and after having understood, manipulate.

I find comfort in knowing as autumn comes to the Rockies, it has also come to me. My life has matured, has headed for the fallow season, the long season in which I return those borrowed elements, become again one with the universe. Though of course I’m one with it now, too.

Which makes me feel the turning of the wheel, it tugs on me, pulls me toward not only death, but also spring. The cyclical renewal. Who knows? Maybe autumn prepares us not for annihilation, but transformation and renewal. It does for Mother Earth. Why not us?

Family, Feelings, Shadow Mountain, The Move, Third Phase

Over the Hills and Through the Woods

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Lughnasa and the RBG Moon

Monday gratefuls: RBG, social justice warrior. The American people. We won’t get fooled again. Our flawed democracy in all its tattered glory. Surgery eye drops. Kate’s several good days. Rigel and her healing. Orion right at the end of the driveway at about thirty degrees. The equinox tomorrow. This bittersweet quote: “We’re still able to do all the things that need to get done without pumping biofuels into a beautiful, beautiful fading world.” Kate Winslet, Vanity Fair

Visits now. Somewhat fraught. Will they bring the virus with them? Should we wear masks all the time, inside and out? A frisson of doubt.

But God how good it was to see Jon cooking Salmon in our kitchen. Cutting up heirloom Tomatoes from his own garden. Zucchini’s, too. Ruth helping. Gabe wandering around.

Gabe took off with Grandma’s phone and Ruth’s assent. Just don’t killed, ok? Big sister love. When he returned, he had photographs of two mule deer bucks with big racks. They let me come close.

Ruth talks, an adderall influenced pace. Fast. Chatty. Engaged. They’re all excited to be here, to be with Grandma and Grandpop. This soup is good, Grandpop.

The Yam soup I made a couple of days ago. Do you want to see a picture of the Yam? Sure. That is huge! It was the biggest Yam I’d ever seen. Part of the produce basket from Easy Entree’s. The recipe called for two and a half to three pounds of Sweet Potato. This one Yam sufficed.

Jon had roasted Salmon, cut up Butternut Squash, ravioli, Zucchini, and Cherokee Purple heirloom Tomatoes. A meal together. Our Colorado family. Sweet.

Ruth and I went up to the loft. She sat in my reading chair and I sat in the one I’d put together for her. Both from Ikea, the same.

Tennessee Grandma and I go to Ikea a lot. I saw these chairs there. They even have rocking ones. I bought a lime green rocking chair for my room at Stapleton Goodwill. $15.

Is this at your mom’s? Yes.

Tik Tok’s a big part of the culture right now. I spend hours on it every day. I decided to rearrange my room at night late. It took me two hours because I couldn’t make any noise. At your mom’s? Yes. She recorded some of this for Tik Tok. I only have four pieces of furniture, but it’s a small room.

Let’s cut up that oil painting paper. O.K. We bought a large roll of paper sized for oils a few months back, pre-Covid. I put the paper up on the art table and Ruth held one end while I cut with an exacto knife. Oh, you’re scoring it? As it turned out, yes. Maybe a three foot, four foot long piece. Good enough for several paintings.

After they left, I got out a new canvas and set it on the art table. Have you started painting again, Grandpop? No, I hadn’t. Why not, I wondered?

All three of them are at ease here. Jon takes a nap. Gabe plays with Kep, walks in the backyard. Ruth sits with Kate and talks sewing, cooking.

Before we went to sleep last night I said to Kate: I feel our family’s doing well. Like it’s whole. That makes me happy.

She agreed.

Commentary on the news, Politics, US History

The Anvil

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Lughnasa and the 5781 Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Jon and Ruth cooking lunch up here yesterday. Gabe asking me to sharpen the knife I got him. (which made me think about starting a charity, Knives for Hemophiliacs). Jon getting the new axle on his Subaru. Kate’s calm during the visit. RBG. Orion. Four Republican Senators. With courage and heart.

Kate lost sleep after RBG’s death. Tom, profoundly sad. Our nation has begun to grow up when a woman’s death has serious political consequences and her life defines a role model for men and women, boys and girls. The contrast between her 100 pound frame and what it contained with the 240 pound frame of the orange one and what it contains. Well.

The political struggle over her Supreme Court seat may define us as a nation every bit as much as the election on November 3rd. Hypocrisy’s seat is already taken by Mitch McConnell. Trump’s callous disregard for real heroes and for the country’s well being will be on full display. A Peacock of Presidential disdain. The Republican party’s soul, what tiny shred of it still hangs on, will get a chance to grow. Or, finally sink into oblivion.

My first reaction was to turn away, hide myself. My Trump scarred psyche didn’t want to face the next few weeks. They will be painful in the extreme. At least for me. Decency is in retreat. Honor gone. The nation’s well-being headed for a storm sewer.

Who can stand up now? Who will? The answer to these questions are key. Lisa Murkowski. Susan Collins. Two more at least are needed. Cory Gardner, maybe?

Let it be that the contest over RBG’s seat becomes the anvil on which our restoration gets hammered out.

Cinema and Television, Commentary on the news, Dogs, Family, Feelings, Friends, Politics, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, US History

An Age of Wonders

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Lughnasa and the 1% crescent of the Labor Day Moon

Thursday gratefuls: A better day for Kate yesterday. Chewy prescription order shipped. Mahi-Mahi in tomato sauce. Easy Entrees. Mary, Mark, Diane. Generous, kind. Tom and his knotty gift. Knotical. The Ancient Ones, my FFs, friends forever. Alan. The compounding pharmacy for my surgery eye drops. Rigel, the Yipper. Kep, the Snuggler.

An age of wonders. Peak TV. There has never been so much good television, ever. And, there might not be again since Netflix spends money as fast as the Mississippi flows into its delta. Right now I’m watching the Turkish series, the Gift, an English limited episodes drama, The Third Day, and the Sony production, Away. The Gift and the Third Path fall in the folk horror genre, like the movies Midsommar and the Wicker Man. Away stars Hilary Swank as commander of the first expedition to Mars. Great Britain and Korea also make compelling television.

Every Tuesday morning I speak with cousin Diane in San Francisco, sister Mary in Singapore, and brother Mark in Riyadh. At the same time. With video. On Sundays I speak with the Ancient Ones, my FF’s, friends forever, in Minneapolis and Maine. Every other Thursday Alan Rubin and I have a video chat. Without Zoom the pandemic would be so much worse.

Another wonder. I wonder who will rid us of this troublesome President? Several million of us, I hope. Gotta work to make it happen. Encourage friends and co-workers. Family. Vote! Make phone calls. Send e-mails.

I’m reading Rage, Bob Woodward’s book. It’s the only Trump era book I’ve read, finding my Trump box always filled to overflowing and not wanting to add that last word. It’s not revelatory so far, except for the big news of Trump’s early understanding of the nature of Covid. That’s a major item. He goes back to the beginning of Trump’s administration to put this story in context.

Early in the book Woodward tells the story of Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminum. He told his cabinet, after they tried to dissuade him, that he wanted the tariffs. Just implement them and we’ll see what happens, he said. His finance cabinet folks said the U.S. economy is nothing to play with. Do it anyway.

This after they pointed out that we’re no longer a steel producer or an aluminum producer and tariffs would therefore have the result of raising prices on imported products, not invigorating our once dominate foundries.

He went ahead.

An early signal of Trump’s discounting of experts and privileging his gut response.

I also read, yesterday, this troubling article by NYT columnist, Thomas B. Edsall. Most of us know, I think, that we live in partisan bubbles these days. Our friends, our news sources, our own analysis of the political. Even families. We don’t talk politics on Thanksgiving or at the reunion. Our lives are hermetically sealed from the other.

I’m guilty. I see the Trump base, the MAGA reactionaries as I think of them, as both deluded and obedient. Edsall shows that this sort of us/them thinking might end in violence around and after the election. Our descent into Banana Republic status has gained momentum.

What do we do? It’s not as easy as “having conversations with those with whom we disagree.” First of all, most of don’t know many with whom we disagree, at least not well enough to start a civil, literally, conversation. Second, even if we do know a few and engage them, our minds tend to be as made up as theirs. Where’s the gap, the space, for understanding each other. It’s thin at best.

My admittedly partisan notion is that we first need to lower the intensity of public discourse. I believe electing Biden will do that. Then we need to do a careful, honest, and serious review of our own attitudes. Push white supremacist ideologues back to the fringes where they belong while opening ourselves to the pain and anguish of Trump’s base.

This does not mean denying our own convictions. I won’t give an inch on eliminating racism, providing health care and food and housing for the neediest in our nation. Even so, I need to consider the sort of policies that would also benefit the white working class, would address the fears of white suburban women that their safety and their children’s is at stake, would reassure the small business owner that we care about their survival.

An anti-big business conversation might yield interesting results, for example. Debt relief. Job protection and job education for those below middle class income. Higher pay for “essential” jobs since we know how essential they are.

Aging, Cooking, Dogs, Family, Health, Holidays, Judaism, Myth and Story, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

Getting to 5781

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Lughnasa and the Labor Day Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Kate. Always Kate. The night sky. Venus. Life on Venus? Rigel. Kep. Deb from on the move fitness. Her grief. The new workout. Cool morning. Mountain Waste. Rage, by Woodward. The internet. DSL. The Gift on Netflix. Borgen, too. Dark sky spots in Colorado: Dinosaur National Monument. Great Sand Dunes. Westcliffe. Black Canyon of the Gunnison. More.

Up early for the Clan call, forgot to post yesterday. Forgetting is rare, but it happened. Mary, Mark, Diane. Singapore, Riyadh, San Francisco. The wonders of our age. In real time, no lag other than the one I understand Zoom introduces to create smooth conversation.

Kate didn’t feel up to it. The pleura effusion continues to create problems for her. She now has some pain in her right chest, the side of the effusion. No imaging study scheduled yet, but she’s going to call today. It makes her shortness of breath worse, restricting her movement.

Some sleeplessness for me Sunday night. Wondering where things were headed with Kate. Rumination. Not my usual fare at night. Not for a long time.

We decided not to see Amber this week at Advanced Wound Care. We needed a quiet week. No medical appointments. With my upcoming cataract surgery I’ll have a few of my own.

As the Labor Day Moon wanes, it moves us toward the High Holidays. The Jewish lunar calendar starts each new month on a new moon, Rosh Chodesh. The head of the month. Rosh Hashanah, head of the year. Each new year celebrates the creation of Adam and Eve according to legend.

Since 2020, based on the Gregorian Calendar, has sucked, I recommend choosing 5781. No more of that 2020.

Got a new workout yesterday from Deb Brown. She lost her husband, Dave, to glioblastoma in the midst of early lockdown. I hear Dave’s voice often, I told her. I love to teach deadlift technique. Hold that band out from your chest as long as you can. She hears it, too, she said. Only louder and a lot.

We met on Zoom. A little clunky for this purpose, but it worked. The exercises: goblet squat, flat bench press, dipper, staggered stance row on stability ball, bicep curl, skullcrusher, stability ball prone back extension, plank, 1 leg balance with transverse step.

I like switching up my workout every six to eight weeks. It helps keep me interested, but more important, it changes up muscle use. Muscles don’t become acclimated to the routine.

Easy Entree tonight. Cod in a white wine and tomato sauce.

And, a trip to Happy Camper this morning.

Aging, Dogs, Family, Health, Politics, Third Phase

Marriage is stronger

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Lughnasa and the crescent Labor Day Moon

Monday gratefuls: Kate’s better day. Rigel’s bland diet. Kep snuggling with Kate last night. Jon bringing up Ruth and Gabe this Saturday. Finally, the appointment with Taryle. The crescent moon with Venus in the eastern dawn sky. Lengthening nights. Instapot and rice.

Kate was in much better shape yesterday. Breathing easier, color better, more chipper. Her Friday in emergency mode while I drove Rigel to the VRCC for her antibiotic overdose drained her battery. She has few reserves. Saturday was struggling to get back to some equilibrium. She made it.

Today we see the pulmonologist. Try to get a handle on her pneumothorax. She could end up back in the hospital depending on Taryle’s assessment. She needs relief and I’m in favor of whatever will bring it to her. We’re packing a bag.

It’s a difficult time.

Rigel, recovering from her self-medicating, continues her interest in things on our table. Yesterday she chewed up the small pouch that holds our marijuana money. She ate a fifty, chewed up a twenty, and took a healthy bite out of a hundred dollar bill. And left no change. Geez.

Yes, we need to stop putting things on the table. She’s not done this before, at least not this persistently or comprehensively. We have to adjust to her. Otherwise she’s feeling perky. Ate all of her rice and hamburger, took her meds, seems happy.

Medicine and the medical took over our lives well over two and a half years ago. It continues and has gotten more pronounced in the last six months. Not unusual with aging, but still disruptive, heart rending at times.

Our marriage is stronger than ever, mutuality and intimacy at a peak. Love does not know illness or fatigue; it does not decline. Instead, it increases. Kate’s mental acuity and her composure during these troubles is a thing of wonder to me.

In less than two months, a major source of chaos and disruption will be gone. Trump will be dumped. That should mean a much better pandemic response, too. Eliminating one and reducing the other will help all of us.

BTW: No, I have no crystal ball. I’m stating my belief. Just a bit stronger than hope right now.