Category Archives: Health

Coronavirus, Dogs, Family, Friends, Health, Mussar, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Travel

One Day at a Time

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Summer and the Moon of Justice

Wednesday gratefuls: Simplicity. Does this idea bring me joy? Kondoing my thinking. Maybe. MVP. Rich. Susan. Marilyn. Tara. Judy. Zoom. Covid’s forced introspection. What matters in our daily life? What doesn’t? Seoah between Narita and Singapore. Picture of her with mask and faceshield on the plane. Kate finding Kep’s hotspots. Sano. Going down, coming back up.

On Shadow Mountain. The Sun rising, Black Mountain lit. The Air still cool. All the promise of a new day. Each day is the only day in which you’ll ever live. We’re all one day old, every day. Each morning we can choose to continue old patterns, the remnants of other days, or we can choose new habits, new actions. Even new thoughts. Each day is New Year’s. Old Mother Time melted away last night and the infant wrapped in the sash titled TODAY has succeeded her.

What will you do with this one wild and precious day?

We’re taking Kep to the vet. He has several new hotspots that have shown up on his back. Not sure why, not sure what to do next. So, we’re calling in Dr. Palmini.

Kate’s spirits took a dive yesterday when she discovered Kep’s hotspots. Seoah’s gone. She can’t hug Ruth and Gabe. Her stomach acted up. All got to be too much. She’s resilient though. Look at how she’s handled the multiple insults to her body.

Seoah will touch down in Singapore today. Or, rather, tomorrow. The mysteries of the International Date Line. Her flight gets in just after midnight Singapore time.

First Wednesday with no Kabbalah class since January. School’s out. Teachers let the monkeys out. Gonna take a rest over the summer, then pick up the Kabbalah thread again in the fall.

Groveland U.U., the congregation I joined soon after I left the Presbyterian ministry, wrote me a note yesterday asking if I would do some presentations for them over Zoom. An unexpected pleasure, made possible by your friend the Coronavirus.

MVP (Mussar Vaad Practice Group) met last night. The middot (character trait) we discussed was simplicity. As I’ve mentioned here before, mussar involved identifying a character trait and then creating a practice for yourself that you can use to strengthen it. There are many different lists of soul traits, some exhaustive, some short.

Once you find the middot or middah (plural) on which you need to work, you’ve defined what the mussar teachers call a soul curriculum. Judaism is very clear on the journey. You’ll make mistakes, regress. What’s crucial is to not stop. That may sound zealous, but it’s not. It’s a recognition of our humanity.

My practice, if I should choose to accept it, is to ask what thoughts bring me joy. Not sure yet whether I like this. I created it, so I can change it, but it seems interesting. Just not sure whether joy is a good criteria for thoughts. Even so, it intrigues me. I’ll give it a go for a while, see where it leads.

Aging, Anoka County, Coronavirus, Denver, Dogs, Faith and Spirituality, Feelings, Friends, Great Wheel, Health, Jefferson County, Kabbalah, Mountains, Myth and Story, Original Relation, Our Land and Home, Plants, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, The West, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

At Her Funeral

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Thursday gratefuls: Gauze sponges. Wax o-rings for Kate’s leakage. Stoma powder. The chance to care for Kate. A forty degree morning on Shadow Mountain after 92 degrees in Denver on Monday. That silly Rigel, not acting her age. At all. Kep, the serious. Dog groomer today. The Kabbalah class. Folks liking my presentation. Workout yesterday.

Pine pollen season. Yellow streaks on the asphalt. Pollen lying on wooden tables, adding some color. The winds rushing through the Lodgepoles, shaking loose enough for a yellow storm. Part of the turning of the Great Wheel. That I could do without personally. But, how would we get baby Lodgepoles otherwise? Sneeze and bear it.

Wildfire danger remains high. Dry, Windy. Yesterday the Humidity in the loft was 2%, outside 6%. The arid West. A positive note. It was 80 degrees up here and a slowly rotating fan was all I needed to stay cool. Rigel, we’re not in Andover anymore.

A woman in my kabbalah class wants my Grammar of Holiness read at her funeral, “…whenever that may be.” A strong positive reaction to it from the class. Rabbi Jamie’s going to reprint in the synagogue newsletter, the Shofar.

Always thought my reimagining faith project would be a book, a radical theology with chapters and footnotes and acknowledgements. Nope, two pages. There it is. It feels said to me. We’ll see if I continue to feel that way.

After reading several pieces about Covid and underlying medical conditions, Kate and I have decided to become coronavirus hermits. Our hermitage, Shansin, on top of Shadow Mountain. We’ll ride it out with as little flesh and blood contact as we can stand. Would sound bleak, but Zoom helps, and we’re introverts, happy with each other, ourselves, and our dogs.

And, given recent news, I will add: white, privileged, financially secure, and aging with good medical care.

Still no word from the Singapore government. Seoah may fly there next Tuesday. May not. Covid has impacted lives in so many different ways. This is just one of them, but it’s personal, right here.

From Shadow Mountain, where the sun is rising and the morning is cool.

Aging, Health, Science, Third Phase

Cyberknifed

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Wednesday gratefuls: Spaghetti. Marco Polo. China. Cool morning. Kate’s physical. Telehealth. Dr. Gidday. The loft in the morning. The heat. Wildfire. Trees. Lodgepole Pines. Aspen. Colorado Blue Spruce. Dogwood. Lilacs. Iris. Shrub Roses. The New York Times. The Washington Post. The spread out Keaton Clan. The Human Narrative. Holy Land. Holy Water. Holy Air. Holy you.

One year ago today: Cyberknifed. 1st of 35 treatments.

Since then. Luproned. Hot flashes. Suppressed testosterone. Fatigue. Weakness. In the pursuit of a cure. 9 months later now, after the end of radiation. I think much more about the Lupron than I do about cancer though cancer is always present. The Lupron reaches out and touches me while the cancer is either gone or asymptomatic. It feels gone to me.

Think today, for a moment, if you will, of all those impacted by cancer. Those living with it, trying to cure it. Those caring for them. Their families, their friends.

Cancer is global just like Covid. Deadlier, too. 9.7 million deaths in 2017.

Beyond the Boundaries, Faith and Spirituality, Great Wheel, Health, Jefferson County, Mountains, Myth and Story, Our Land and Home, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., The Move

A Year Ago

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Tuesday gratefuls: Lululemon, it delights Seoah so. Arlet, the clerk at Lululemon who wants to be Seoah’s friend. The Highlands neighborhood of Denver. Its shops and restaurants. Hwy. 285. I-70. All those other drivers. Evergreen. Safeway. Curb pickup. The Mountains. Snow on the Continental Divide. The winds.

Had an idea for yard cleanup. I’m going to text my neighbor Derek, see how much of our wood he wants. Then, I’m going to post on Nextdoor Shadow Mountain for anyone else who heats with wood. Free fuel. You move it, it’s yours. That’ll get rid of the trees. The slash will go to the curb for chipping. I should be able to handle the rest along with Jon. Some of the remaining stuff belongs to him.

One year ago today two Elk bucks jumped in our yard and began eating Dandelions. Shansin, or his Rocky Mountain avatar, sent those angels to our house. You belong here, Charlie. Neighbor.

Resonated then, and now, with the Consolation of Deer Creek Canyon from 2015. The Mountains rising on either side of Deer Canyon Road spoke, but I was still deaf to the full meaning. The unimaginable age of these young mountains, millions and millions of years since the Laramide orogeny pushed them up, let me put my diagnosis, just received, in a different context.

I drove back from Dr. Eigner’s office, stomach hollow and sour, thoughts flitting from imminent death to it’s a mistake to I can handle this. I can handle this. I can handle this.

Deer Creek Canyon helped me see it was just death. Nothing more. How many deaths since the Laramide mountain building? Uncountable. Insects. Deer. Elephants. Mammoths. Humans. Dogs. Whales. Barracuda. Coral. So much death. Yet, these Mountains were young. My death had nothing unusual about it. I would become part of that uncountable number. That soothed me. Not sure why. Maybe because I didn’t feel singled out, picked on, targeted.

With the recurrence a lot of those old fears and those old reassurances came marching back onto the field. No, said the Angels. This is new. We have come, neighbor, to tell you it is both new and old. The Mountains will embrace you each day as you drive to and from the radiation. Our brothers and sisters will hold you in their wild hearts, as you hold them in yours. We know death and pain and whatever your journey, your ancientrail becomes, we will not abandon you.

Three Mule Deer bucks stood in my backyard on Samain, 2014, when I came for closing on the house. We spent a long time together. They were the wilderness welcome I didn’t even know we needed, yet there they were.

This year three Elk bucks came. This year, probably not until November, I’ll find out whether I have a cure. Again. Reassurance again, from the wild hearts beating all over our home in these Rocky Mountains. More than enough for me.

Aging, Anoka County, Colorado, Cooking, Coronavirus, GeekWorld, Jefferson County

Imminent

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Saturday gratefuls: Our Kenmore 19 Frostless Freezer. Its good years of service. A good temporary solution to its imminent demise. Crowhill Appliance. Dave, the tech. Seoah’s help. Kate’s smile when Rigel lay down on her quilt. The gift of pleasant days. Pine pollen. Fish. Curtis Spitler Ellis. Gertrude Eliza Ellis. Judy. Raeone. Saturdays.

Symptoms of a pandemic. Remember all those folks buying toilet paper? Even though Covid doesn’t have g-i effects? Or, the whole PPE scandal with no masks for medical personnel? Out of stock items on Amazon like hand sanitizer, toilet paper? Discovered another one yesterday.

On Wednesday Seoah told me about an alarm going off in the garage. I spent my usual minutes of frustration trying to find it. Not the cars. What else could it be? Oh. The freezer. Temperature alert. Red light flashing. Uh-oh. Remember those meat bundles I bought from Tony’s? Yep. In danger.

I looked at it. Opened the door. No frost buildup. The meat might have just started to defrost. I pushed the quick freeze button, shut the door, and the alarm went off. OK. On Thursday it was beeping again.

We bought this freezer near the time we moved to Andover. That was 1994. It’s been a good mechanical servant for all those days. I even hit it with the car once and it kept on ticking. Had an incident last year when it frosted up. I removed everything, left it open for a day, and the frost melted. I loaded it back up and it continued to work. Until Wednesday.

Time for a new freezer, it seemed. I started looking first at Consumer Reports. OK. GE makes good freezers. I hunted for them online. Looked at Best Buy. Ah. They have it. $900. Reasonable. Wait. That button changed from yellow to gray. Oh, out of stock. Well, understandable. It’s a good one.

I checked Lowes. It was out of stock there, too. Appliance Factory. Out of stock. Specialty Appliances. Home Depot. All out of stock. Ok. I looked for one of the others Consumer Report recommended. Out of stock, too. Decided to check for any old freezer. Out of stock. Kate suggested I look for a chest freezer. Out of stock.

There is nowhere in Colorado that you can buy either an upright or chest freezer. I suspect that’s true everywhere. According to a salesman I talked to, only two manufactures of freezers remain, Amana and Frigidaire. They make all the other brands. Not sure what that means for all the Consumer Reports subtle gradations. Anyhow, they’ve told all their customers there will be no stock again until early to mid-fall.

That put me in a funk yesterday. I like to solve problems and when I have a problem that seems unsolvable. Not good. Hundreds of dollars of top quality meat in a dying freezer. Damn.

Went to bed for a nap. See if some sleep might refresh the circuits. While waiting to go to sleep, I remembered the freezer in our refrigerator. It’s a pull-out bottom freezer and has a fair amount of space. I imagined the packages of meat I’d bought from Tony’s. Huh. They should fit.

My funk lifted. Today Seoah and I will switch the lower value foods stored in the refrigerator with the meats in the dying Kenmore. When I asked Dave, the tech from Crowhill, how long he thought the freezer would last, he said, “A day. A month. Several months.” And shrugged.

They don’t do compressor repairs anymore. That’s because at $900 to $1,000 they’re more costly than a new unit. If, of course, you can find one. I thought briefly about going ahead, but then realized I’d have a brand new compressor in a freezer over twenty years old. Other stuff in it is old, too.

We’ll continue using the Kenmore until the compressor ceases to function. If we lose some popsicles, frozen veggies, or tater tots (yes, sue me. I like’m.), that’ll be ok. It was the thought of losing all that meat and not being able to do anything about it…

And, when Amana and Frigidaire crank back up, we’ll get ourselves a new freezer. Sometime this fall.

Aging, Commentary on the news, Coronavirus, Family, Great Work, Health, Minnesota, Politics, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Third Phase, US History, World History

Wow

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Wednesday gratefuls: Kate’s interstitial lung disease is stable. Now for almost a year! Her stamina let her, yesterday: go in for her pacemaker check, her blood work for her physical, and into Joann Fabrics to shop for mask making materials. She also got up early and got on the Clan call. Can’t imagine her doing this six months ago. The snow came. The snow went. Still cool though.

Yesterday was busy. Got up for the Clan call, ate breakfast, then talked with Michele, the home health care nurse, about Kate’s feeding tube. Nap. Then 4 hours plus going to Kate’s heart doc, the lab for her bloodwork, and finally to Joann Fabrics. No time to write.

Still tired this morning. My stamina’s not what it was either.

Understanding what’s going on right now? Priceless. And, impossible. The strong ropes of disruption woven by the coronavirus, the economic crisis, and, now, the rising and welcome wave of unrest will weave themselves together into a hawser capable of hauling us all into a new future.

There will be discontinuities with the past. Masks and social distancing will persist for months, as will staying at home for the older ones among us. How we can care for the hourly wage workers displaced, for the small businesses that go bankrupt or are severely damaged, for the economy as a whole could take years to sort out. The Black Lives Matter movement may unlock the biggest changes of all. And, of course, climate change continues its role as a disrupter of the past.

I’m excited about all of this. America, the world’s indispensable nation, has failed to live into its dreams of a racially diverse nation. That may be changing right now. We’ve never valued the low wage worker, dismissed them from our health care system and a path forward. These same workers saved our lives at risk to their own. Not by choice in most cases, but that’s the point. They work where they do because these are the jobs of our day. Important jobs. Each and every day. Small businesses, not Walmart or Target or Kroger’s or Wendy’s or McDonalds, make a place unique, local. They’re in deep trouble now which could mean a greater homogenization of our retail businesses unless economic reforms gain more traction.

Yes, it’s scary. No, the change will be neither consistent nor smooth. But it’s happening. We are responsible for guiding it in productive and valuable ways. Making sure we rid ourselves of the great divider is most important, but even a Democratic sweep in November won’t ensure success. A change of governance is essential, but insufficient. You and I need to watch, pay attention, act. For the rest of our lives.

Wow. What a time.

Dogs, Family, Friends, Health, Jefferson County, Mountains, Myth and Story, Original Relation, Plants, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, The West, Third Phase

Sanshin Speaks

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Sunday gratefuls: Two Elk bucks, eating dandelions in our backyard. Kep, stepping on my eye in his surprise at seeing them. Seoah, bleary eyed, “I got video!” Sanshin reminding me of the reassurance he sent last June, just before I started radiation therapy. Reassuring me now. Wild neighbors. Who go where they want, when they want. For whom humans are at best a nuisance. For my heart, which follows my wild neighbors

Kep likes to get up, then lay down on me in the morning. It’s part of our getting up ritual. When he does, though, he can see out our bedroom window. This morning he let out a bark and lunged forward, putting his right foot on my right eye. Ouch. Good thing eyelids move fast.

As I let Rigel and him outside, I saw what had caused Kep to react. Two Elk bucks stood on our drainage field, eating dandelions. Talk about the web of life. They are huge, as big as the Cow Moose I saw last week, perhaps a bit bigger.

Neither Rigel nor Kep barked at them. The two Dogs and the two Elk eyed each other. Kep and Rigel went off to pee and wander around the yard. The Elk continued eating dandelions. Elk Bucks, healthy ones anyway, can fend off Wolves and Mountain Lions, so Kep and Rigel were no threat to them. Kep and Rigel seemed to get that, too.

At first I thought these couldn’t be the two who came last June 17th to reassure me before my radiation therapy started. One of those had only one antler. Then. Oh. Yeah, the horns grow back each year. Could well be the same two, back to their secret stash of the yellow flower. Right now they’re resting among the lodgepoles in the northeast corner of our property. Last year they stayed the night.

Yes, the radiation has been on my mind. It was a year ago this month that my imaging work was complete, the new diagnosis finished. I knew the radiation would start, but I wasn’t sure quite when.

These two Elk, come again for our dandelions, have also come again to soothe the part of me that remains anxious, uncertain. No definitive news on the effectiveness of the radiation until November. Dave died last week and a needleworker friend of Kate’s died last week, too, also of glioblastoma. Cancer always wants to kill you.

Friends, Health, Memories

The Windows Were Wide Open

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

My friend Dave beat cancer. But, it killed him yesterday. As I mentioned a while back, Dave had glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer. He went years past the average lifespan after diagnosis, sixteen to eighteen months, living into the sixth year.

And he lived until he died. He ran a fifteen mile race at altitude in the mountains of British Columbia last year. He continued to work with his wife Deb at their boutique fitness center, On the Move Fitness. My last training session with him was December 12th. Then, the coronavirus hit, shutting them down.

My first time working out at On the Move was in early 2017 after my knee replacement surgery. I needed a personal trainer to help me get back in shape. Deb and Dave worked as a team and sometimes I’d have Deb, sometimes Dave. They gave me a new workout every 6-8 weeks, walking me through it, then two days later, checking my form. Afterward I’d go home and use it until it came time for a new one.

At some point Dave and I discovered we were cancer survivors. My PSA’s were good. His scans had gone from once a month to every three months. We both felt good, talking about dodging the bullet. Then in March of last year my PSA went up. I told Dave during one of my visits to On the Move.

He commiserated. Then, the next time I saw him he said a routine scan had found something. Our recurrences happened at about the same time. We discussed how a recurrence was scarier than the diagnosis. It means the cancer’s not giving up.

Well. Neither were we. Radiation was the treatment of choice for both of us and we shared radiation stories. I just want to live, so I’ll keep it treating it as long as I can, he said. Me, too.

For Dave, though, there came a time when more treatment would have forced a choice between cognitive function and healing. He and Deb chose to forgo treatment at that point.

This morning I received a message that included this from Deb: “Dave passed away peacefully yesterday afternoon, here at home. The windows were wide open, the aspen leaves were dancing in the breeze and a big gust of wind came along. I believe he chose that moment to leave, since he always loved the wind and it made him feel alive.”

The Moon of Sorrow.

Commentary on the news, Coronavirus, Family, Politics, US History

Lift the knee

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Wednesday gratefuls: Trash pickup. Silicone. Glass. Rubber. Books. Red books. Green books. Yellow books. Big books. Small books. Heavy books. Light books. Children’s books. Authors. Writers. Keyboards. Fingers on keyboards. Sounds. The wind in the trees. Neil Diamond radio on Pandora. The cello. Motorcycles. The hiss of tires on Black Mountain Drive. Rigel’s insistent voice. Kep’s warning bark. Kate’s voice in the night.

Social convulsions. Seizures in our cities, on our streets. This dystopian nation with all its flaws exposed. Exposed is a key word. The dystopian face of this nation has always been turned towards African-Americans and Latinos and Native people. They’ve seen it, slept with it, worried about their children being seen by it.

Some of us, sometime allies, have seen it, too. It has a scowl of disapproval, that face. The occasional smirk. A condescending laugh. That white face. Oh, didn’t I say? It’s your face. My face. Our face. Teresa of Avila said:

“Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”

I say, replace Christ with the Devil. Replace compassion with scorn. Replace good with evil. Replace blesses with curses. Then you’ll have the body that carries that face. Our original sin. Not original to us, of course. Racism crackles in all shades of melanin, but only through the conduit of power. No power. No racism.

It is, now, a time of sorrow. We may not emerge, may not find joy for some time. The disease will let up. The economy will recover. Yes. But racism? Without root and branch work, it will stay. It kills more people than Covid 19. It forces more people to dream about a stable life than any recession ever did.

When will we get our knee off the neck of fellow human beings?

Coronavirus, Family, Feelings, Friends, Health, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

Tuesday

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Beltane and the Moon of Sorrow

Wednesday gratefuls: Clean sheets and pillow cases. Socks and underwear. T-shirts and shirts. Washing machines and dryers. (remembering the agitator Mom had with the aggressive rubber rollers for wringing out wet wash) Gas stove. (though. climate change) Plumbing. Toilets and sinks and showers and baths. The boiler. Solar panels and IREA. Wiring. Outlets. Our well. Our aquifer. The septic tank and its leach field. The driveway. The garage. The house itself.

In a concrete mode this morning. Took out the trash, might be it. Seeing edges, corners. Feeling the cool morning air. Hearing the faint whine of the oxygen concentrators downstairs and the silence up here in the loft. Tasting the bitter coffee from my Conifer Physical Therapy cup. Nose twitching as allergens come on the air to greet me.

Clan gathered yesterday. Mary got up early, had to miss the call to sleep. Mark’s in a four-day, 24 hour lockdown for Eid. Eiding out, I guess. Diane says there’s a haze of marijuana smoke from the alley when the youngsters get together in her San Francisco neighborhood. We’re still staying home. Another day, another week, another month of this unusual, suddenly dystopian time.

After the call, I retrieved the pouch in which Kate deposits our monthly dope money, blue and red quilting with a zippered top. Went upstairs and ordered 8 packages of Wanna indica edibles from the Happy Camper. We no longer have to order online only, but it’s simpler.

Backed our apple red Rav4 out of the garage and headed down Shadow Mountain to Hwy 285. An l.e.d. sign courtesy of the class of 2016 announced Conifer High School’s 98% graduation rate. If we ever have to sell, good schools are important to our home’s value. The Stinker’s Sinclair station has gas at $1.99. Across from the station, two log cabins slump though they’re still intact. One has an added garage. It doesn’t match the cabin. Right angles. Dimension lumber against round logs, chinked with gray.

On 285 I’m headed south accorded to the highway, but west according to my compass. 285 does run south, all the way to Santa Fe, New Mexico, but the stretch from here to Baily is more like southwest. As I near King Valley, the intersection that has claimed many lives, especially motorcyclists, the continental divide floats on the far away horizon, snow covered. This is a declining grade with a 45 mph speed limit, often ignored.

The Rav4’s console beeps with an incoming text message. Ah. Happy Camper. My order is ready. It’s about a 20 minute drive and I was counting on them getting it ready before I got there.

On Mt. Rosalie road, a left turn, then a quick right up the hill. The Missouri Synod Lutheran Church whose property adjoins the Happy Camper’s gives a website for its services. Jesus on the left and marijuana up ahead. One toke over the line, sweet Jesus. One toke over the line.

A masked security guard checks my idea and asks me to pull down my mask. Feels risky. A paper bag with Charles B. written on it is by the cash register. The clerk, whose name I have again forgotten, hands me change and enters my phone number. Yes, even marijuana dispensaries have loyalty programs. I’m the only customer in the store at the time.

A short nap. Kate and I head off to Aspen Roots. Jackie, our hair stylist, has begun working again. Kate’s roots had begun to shed their color, leaving maybe five inches of gray exposed. She was eager to get her hair cut, a Michele Williams do, and return to her ash blond norm.

Jackie has customers come in with no masks. Is that ok, they ask? No, she says. She can’t social distance. Jackie’s not happy to be working, exposed and having to enforce sensible precautions on her customers. It’s not right to put the enforcement burden on small business owners. But there you are. It’s Colorado and my right to make you sick trumps your expectation of a healthy workplace.

Short. Beard and hair. Short. Jackie’s a sweet lady and I hate to see her put in this situation. I hope things get better, but logic suggests they’ll get worse first.

Back home around 2 pm. Exhausted. Wanted to work on the loft reorganization, getting close. Too tired. The lupron effects do get worse as time on the drug increases. However, I only to have think of Dave and Judy, two cancer patients, friends, one dying and the other back on chemo. I’ll take the hot flashes and fatigue.