Category Archives: Fourth Phase

Dogs, Fourth Phase, Greenhouse, Health, Judaism, Paganism, Plants, Seed Keepers, Tarot, Torah

Artemis Blends My Pilgrimage

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Wednesday: Mezuzahs. Rabbi Jamie. For the greenhouse. For Artemis. Shadow coming in last night. Steroid injection. Ruth bringing my credit card. Cards We Were Dealt. New tarot class, taught by my friend, Luke. Halle, limiting my exercises yesterday. Trumpeter of his own doom. Tomatoes. Squash.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Mezuzah hanging

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei. Find the chi, the creative advance into novelty. Work with it.

Week Kavannah: Hearing on the side of merit

One brief shining: Sarah, the orthopedic p.a., had a sonagram wand in her hand as she asked me, “What fills your cup?” before she checked out my arthritic, labrum torn right hip, sprayed it with a cold numbing liquid and injected yet more steroids into my body. Ah.

 

Yesterday was an eventful day in the neighborhood. It began the night before…

Dog journal: Natalie offered to come over around five with her dog to help me get Shadow in. Monday evening. I tried turkey hot dogs. Shadow ate them eagerly outside, but when I put them on the floor inside, she turned away. I decided I’d need Natalie so I went upstairs.

When I turned around, there was Shadow. In the house. I closed the door downstairs, texted Natalie.

Before all this I had heard her barking her intruder bark. I went to check, thinking another Mule Deer might have been in the yard. Nope. Beautiful yellow Swallowtails dining on bright blue Penstemon, a front range Wildflower. As one left, another fluttered down while Shadow chased the one leaving. Barking.

 

Hip, leg, back pain: Drove over to Panorama Orthopedics in the morning. Ruth met me there to return my credit card. She and Gabe had gone to pick up pizzas for us and she forgot it in her purse. I told her I’d gotten under my patched duvet (her work) without a blizzard of Goose feathers. She smiled. We hugged and went our separate ways.

The injection took all of ten minutes. Same caveats as the spinal injections. Sometimes works. Sometimes doesn’t. Wait 7-10 days. No immersion in water for thirty-six hours. Why? Dunno.

 

Tarot: Restarting my Tarot practice by taking a class originally offered by Rabbi Jamie and Luke, now taught by Luke alone. I took the first one, got heavily into Tarot and Astrology for a beat. Figured a class would help me get back to regular readings.

A big class. Maybe eight at the Kabbalah Experience classroom, seven (like me) on zoom.

 

Artemis: Scheduled Rabbi Jamie to hang a mezuzah on Artemis this Friday at 2:30. Invited a few friends.

A mezuzah contains a tiny scroll with the full Shema written on it. If it’s on vellum and done by a sofer, a scribe, it’s considered kosher.

I want one on Artemis because it will blend my major sacred paths: paganism, Taoism, Judaism. The pagan path follows the seasons, the changes in Plants, Animals, and Climate that repeat in the cycle known as the Great Wheel.

Taoism encourages working with those changes, leaning into their subtle power, knowing the changes as the here and now expression of the sacred (or we might call it chi).

Judaism and its mystical path, Kabbalah, sees the movement of the sacred as a constant flow of divine energy that begins in the ayn sof, the great emptiness, proceeds outward toward the malkhut, this world of appearances, then travels back up again. Here in malkhut, the Shekinah, or the feminine expression of the sacred has her clearest presence. A process I see in miniature each time a Seed sprouts, a Plant grows, and I am fed by this true miracle.

Artemis blends my pilgrimage into one small building, especially when I’m accompanied by my Shadow.

 

 

 

Dogs, Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Mussar

Hearing on the Side of Merit

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Monday gratefuls: Relationship building. Shadow. Learning curve for us both. Still steep. Shadow the hugger. Morning darkness. Staying longer. Artemis. Kate, always. Natalie. Ruth and Gabe. The duvet. Ruth’s skills. Gabe’s skills. Each Tomato Plant. Each Squash. Syntropy. Entropy. Science and the Ancient Brothers. Indiana Fever. Those Twins.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Ruth’s sewing. Gabe’s bedmaking.

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei. Find the flow. Go with it.

Week Kavannah: Hearing on the side of merit

One brief shining: Ruth took on a difficult task, sewing patches by hand on my duvet where Shadow the render of cloth had worked to release many sneeze producing Goose Feathers; so good to see a woman sewing in the house again.

 

Ruth after sewing a heart on Gabe’s baboon.

Grandkids: Ruth and Gabe came up yesterday. I’d told them I needed help with some things. Patching the duvet was one. Shadow had torn it open in several spots a while ago and each time I used it more Goose Feathers would float up, up, up and away. Some tickling my nose. Achoo.

Ruth has the dexterity of her father and her grandmother. She sewed for two or three hours, also sneezing. When she finished, every hole had been patched. Some with sewing. Some with cloth tape. What a relief.

Gabe lifted my heavy (to me) foam mattress and put on new sheets and pillow cases. “These look like you, Grandpop,” he said of the blue Flower printed design. He also carried down a bag of dogfood for me. Also a relief.

We had pizza together. And talked.

We talk about books, about relationships, about grief, about school, about the future. We laugh and get teary. To have this sort of relationship with two I’ve known since infancy continues to be one of the jewels of my life.

They left around four.

 

Dog journal: The saga continues. Once again Shadow refused to come in to stay in the evening. Even though I’ve moved her second feeding to seven p.m. She came in to eat, but bolted again when I tried to touch her collar.

When I went outside, she came up and hugged me, as she likes to do, jumping up softly and putting her left front paw around my waist. After we did this several times, I picked her up and brought her inside. I don’t know, right now, any other way to keep her safe at night.

 

Mussar: Hearing on the side of merit. Judaism teaches judging others on the side of merit. Assuming good intent, thoughtfulness when encountering difficult interactions.

Rich Levine offered a twist on that: Hearing on the side of merit. As a lawyer and as a college professor, listening is a significant, major part of his work life. Hearing on the side of merit entails stopping, perhaps, when encountering a divisive or contrary idea, going to first principles and finding an area of agreement before answering or responding.

Easier to write about than do. Mussar suggests small, incremental changes in outer behavior, intentional changes that then reshape the inner self. Hearing on the side of merit is a good practice for this week.

Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Garden, Greenhouse, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant.

Learned Enough?

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Thursday gratefuls: Shadow. The leash. The last big hurdle. Tomato plants wilting in the heat, then restored by water. Rich. Susan. Tara. Marilyn. Joanne. MVP last night. The quarter Moon. The Elk Cow and her Calf crossing the road. Wild Neighbors. The second law of thermodynamics. Science. The Humanities. Colleges and universities. Learning is life. Loving is life.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Hearing on the side of merit

Week Kavannah: Wu Wei. Flow.

One brief shining: Shadow lies behind my chair, the yellow leash still attached, now in the third day of desensitization; when I take her outside for a walk, part of the process, she jumps up, paws on my chest, then her left one slipping around my waist in a clingy hug.

 

Dog journal: My empathy has often been close to exhaustion, not with Shadow, but because of her struggles. And mine. This relationship has not been easy. Climb one Mountain only to realize the next peak is higher and right next to the one just summited.

Natalie says the leash is the last big hurdle. God, I hope so. I’d like to settle in to a doggy rhythm with Shadow by my side. I know it’s going to happen. Not when.

 

Mental health: No doubt, dear reader, you caught the melancholy tones in my posts over the last six months. As so often happens for me, I only notice them much later than others.

The pain. Also exhausts my empathy, especially my empathy for myself. Avoidance comes to dominate movement. Move less. Hurt less. Though because, as Halle said, we’re meant to move, this tactic has self-defeat built in. Move less, hurt longer eventually more.

With those two drains on my empathy, Shadow’s struggles and the pain, I’ve had little left over to do what needs to be done. That is, manage all this in a healthy way.

Not to say life has been awful. No. But it has been stretched taut, leaving little room for dreams. Though.

The Greenhouse: Was a dream that is now a reality. I forgot, though Shadow should have more than alerted me to this, realizing dreams has its own cost.

This works. That doesn’t. The heat in the greenhouse, the point after all, reached 104 yesterday. I put a remote thermo sensor in it with a readout station in the house.

When I went out to check all of my Tomato Plants had shriveled, looked dead. I hit the manual button for the irrigation. It ran for twelve minutes and the Leaves filled back up. This means I will need a fan to help modulate the heat.

On the other end the temperature went into the low forties two nights ago. Tomatoes prefer night time temperatures in the sixties. Need that heater which I agreed Nathan could install later.

Learning and growth come when we move outside our comfort zones. Yeah. So I’ve heard. Well, I’ve spent plenty of time over the last six months way outside of my comfort zone. I must be learned enough by now.

Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Health

It’s a Pain

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Wednesday gratefuls: Greenhouse. Tomato Plants. Plant labels. Garden twine. Morning darkness. Shadow and the leash. Her anxiety. Her comfort seeking. Death of a beloved. Seeds. Seed Keeper’s Exchange. Heirloom Seeds. The Bird of Morning. Who makes firm a person’s steps. Tanya. Carla. Kenya. Kathy. Leisa. The Steffey women. Harder physical therapy. The Fourth of July.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Patriotism

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei. Follow the chi.

Week Kavannah: Savlanut. Patience.

One brief shining: The yellow neoprene leash disappeared underneath the bed last night and has not yet reappeared this morning though I’ve been up since five and six lies only ten minutes away, meaning my Shadow’s anxiety has not abated overnight.

 

Dog journal: Oh, the not so subtle agony of Shadow and the leash. I got it on her again near the end of the day. When I clipped it on her collar, she froze, then burrowed in between my legs, looking up at me with a familiar doggy expression: “Help me, please.”

Desensitization. I imagine that’s what Natalie has in mind. A phobia treatment where graduated exposure lessens the fear associated with the phobic situation. Natalie loves animals, that’s clear in her demeanor and practice. Not sure whether Shadow’s reaction to the leash fits.

Might be I forced Shadow too much when putting on the leash. Didn’t seem so to me, but Shadow is a delicate, reactive, and smart Dog. She sees bad intentions where none are meant.

This Shadow journey has proved fraught for both of us. Worth it when she finally let herself give and receive affection. Yet the journey has more than one temporary off ramp. Just hit another one.

We will both need savlanut to find the path forward again.

 

The rest of it:

When I wrote this paragraph yesterday, I stopped too soon:

“Or, and I didn’t say this with her, an end to all of it. No, not suicide, not that. Rather successful pain relief in my hip and back. Wanting it. Needing it. Not sure I’ll get it.”

There are times, not often, but more often than I want or desire, when chronic pain crosses paths with a sad or bad mood for other reasons. Sometimes thoughts then go like this. Oh, to hell with eating well, a heart attack would be better than a slow death by cancer. Or. Why do I even go to p.t.? Why not sit, read, watch television, wait for it to be over. Or, I’ll be glad when this life finishes.

This is not active suicidal ideation. No. But it does have in it the seeds of those thoughts. Note this is not about cancer, rather it’s about the slow degradation of life’s quality by either constant pain or knowing that any movement will produce pain.

Pernicious. Unwanted. Undesirable. Yet they occur to me, these thoughts. They disappear when the pain eases. When I right myself with patience, acceptance, persistence and grit. Time with friends and family. Not always easy to do.

Experiencing Shadow and her travails. Yes. Can create this sort of toxic nexus. Why, I think, they’ve been more common since she came. Not because of her, but due to that axis of frustration and resignation.

 

Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase

Shadow and the Psyche

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Tuesday gratefuls: Shadow. Her leash and harness. Natalie. Maddie. Dark thoughts. Greenhouse. Greenhouse thermometer. Happy Tomato Plants. Garden tools. Organic fertilizer. Seed markers. Twine. Gathering the tools. Learning how to use Artemis, a living part of my property. Living with pain. Thinking of Tanya and her sisters: Cathy, Carla, Kenya.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Tomato Plants growing

Week Kavannah:  Wu Wei.  Seek the way.

One brief shining: Shadow had an hour of leash training, walked with me in the front, stressed at first, calmer later but when back inside and Natalie had gone home, she crawled up in my lap-which she has never done-and would not get down, the leash still attached to her collar as Natalie suggested.

 

Dog journal: The leash. Natalie, whose own dogs had gotten in a tussle, came back after a three week absence. After a lengthy session with little apparent progress we moved inside and she slipped the leash onto Shadow with ease.

We went out the front door, Shadow on her yellow leash with me , and Doc, Natalie’s Border Collie, on his purple one. Terra incognita to Shadow. Cars passing on Black Mountain Drive. New smells, new visits.

Shadow spent time wrapping me in the leash. Circling me until her little body and mine meshed together, Dog and human, with a yellow neoprene bond. This went on for a bit until she got more comfortable, walking, sniffing. Going on what Natalie calls a sniffary. A word from dog training circles.

Natalie wanted me to leave the leash on Shadow 24/7. While inside on her collar, while outside attached to her harness and to me. I agreed.

But. When Shadow slid under the bed for the night yellow neoprene following her, I remembered her first leash. Which she chewed up while under the bed. Oh.

I unclipped the leash. She came up on the bed to greet me this morning as usual. I’ll have to get the leash back on her over the course of the day. Not easy. Gonna have to communicate with Natalie.

 

Maddie, the palliative care nurse: She’s a sweetheart, enjoying the drive up here from her base in faraway Westminster. Not sure how she’ll like that drive come winter.

We talked medical. My recent MRI. My trip to Panorama Orthopedics. She suggested a seat cushion for the car. Will try that. She pressed me about other symptoms.

I admitted to weariness. Chronic pain. Handling medical and domestic logistics. Cancer always hanging there, sometimes foreground, usually background but never gone. Wanting simpler, easier.

Or, and I didn’t say this with her, an end to all of it. No, not suicide, not that. Rather successful pain relief in my hip and back. Wanting it. Needing it. Not sure I’ll get it.

“I guess I’m feeling down, Maddie.” We discussed what to do. Up my sertraline dose? Counseling? Agreed to talk to Susan. Who prescribed a new anti-depressant. I don’t recall its name. We’ll see. A trial until I see Susan again on August 6th.

Family, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Greenhouse, Memories, Plants, Seed Keepers

A Family Tragedy

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Monday gratefuls: Keaton Cousins. Tanya. Kenya. Carla. Lisa. Cathy. Diane. Richard. Kristen. Ikie. Melinda. Annette. Sibs. Mary and Mark. Joe and Seoah. Ruth and Gabe. Shadow. Fire. Water. Earth. Air. The Greenhouse. Tomatoes. Squash. Planting today. Seeds. Beets. Radish. Lettuce. Kale. Chard. Salmon for fertilizer for the Tomatoes.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Tiny irrigation system

Week Kavannah: Wu Wei. Work with the chi.

One brief: She was my age, Tanya, one of the five Steffey girls who lived in Arlington when I was young, slender and delicate, pretty in a country girl way, married to David, a farmer, and she died two nights ago trapped in the garage during a house fire.

 

Family: Got an email from Diane yesterday with the news that Tanya, a first cousin also born in 1947 like me, had not escaped a house fire in her home in Rush County, Indiana.

We are close, we Keaton cousins. My mom convinced my dad to move back to Indiana from Oklahoma so she could be closer to her family, the Keaton side.

While I’ve not seen most of them in a while, except for Diane, all those Thanksgivings, summer family reunions, overnight visits, we knew each other well. And care about each other.

We lost Lisa, the youngest Steffey, a while back to a stroke. Ikie to complications from a spinal problem and Annette to the end of a tough life. Now Tanya in a house fire. A large extended family withering away, one by one, as the seasons come and go.

Sadness, loss, disbelief. Faraway from the Rockies, yet so close in my memory. My heart.

Since moving to the Mountains, I’ve not made it home much. The last time September of 2015, my 50th high school class reunion. Not long after my prostatectomy. Don’t remember if I saw Tanya on that trip or not. Mary saw her this summer while visiting.

I’ll miss her.

 

The Greenhouse: Planted the Tomato Plants yesterday. In the Greenhouse because they like/need heat. Had a large Salmon fillet I had cut into portions and frozen too long ago. Unthawed them and put Salmon beneath each Tomato Plant.

Nathan came later in the day and topped off the outside raised beds with compost, installed a nifty irrigation system, picked up his trash. We shook hands, wished each other well.

He’ll be back because he has to install the black mesh fencing to keep out the Deer and Elk, the heater for the winter, and Cedar lap boards to seal the bottom of the greenhouse. I enjoyed working with him, getting to know him.

This morning I plan to Plant seeds in the outside raised beds. More salad fixings. Radish. Beets. Lettuce. Arugula. Kale. Chard. Nasturtiums. A few Marigolds for companion planting.

The Greenhouse has come to life.

 

Dog journal: My Shadow spent her fifth night in a row outside. Protecting us from marauding Mule Deer who would eat our Grass during the night. She protected us all. Damn. Night.

 

 

Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Greenhouse, Health, Politics, US History, World History

Dance to the Music

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon II

Wednesday gratefuls: Mice. Rat Zappers. Shadow, the sleepy head. Monsoon Rain. The Greenhouse. Nathan. Chioggia. Lolla Rosso. Swiss and Rainbow Chard. Less back and leg pain. Motion is lotion. Halle. Plants. Oxygen. Carbon Dioxide. Mycelium. Fungi. Insects. Birds.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Shadow

Week Kavannah:  Roeh et hanalod. Foresight. Knowing what will be needed in the future.

One brief shining: The greenhouse nears completion, Shadow slept alongside me, back and leg pain has lessened, an orthopedist will look at my torn labrum tomorrow, and my last PSA remained stable: this is about as good as news gets at 78.

 

Yep, sorry to show a ray of Great Sol shine from the tippy-top of Shadow Mountain, but it feels warranted. Shadow and I have moved further in our relationship. Nathan will finish the greenhouse either today or tomorrow. Turnkey. Filled with soil. Watering system installed. Heater for the Winter, too. Getting up every hour has led to less pain, more agency around the house. I see an orthopedist tomorrow to decide what to do with my hip. And my PSA remains stable. This could be on old guy Country Western song run backwards.

Not winner, winner chicken dinner. Not at all. But geez. So much better than a month ago, or six months ago. Gotta dance to the music when you can.

Yes, my mobility still sucks and the pain has lessened, not gone. Yes, the greenhouse is almost a month late into the growing season. I have no idea what the orthopod will say.

My PSA might rise at the next blood draw. But not today, not in this June 25th, 2025 life of mine.

Today I plan to celebrate a life lived as fully as I can muster. Dig into reading the next chapter of The Violent Take It By Force, work on my new painting, read some more Harry Dresden, pick up a quesadilla at Taco Yazi after my physical therapy. Play with Shadow. Watch some TV.

It was a hard Winter, and cold. I didn’t see it until the fog began to lift a couple of weeks ago.

I watched too much TV. Experienced a lot of pain too often. Went through the motions of a life.  Discouraged by Shadow’s reluctance to warm up to me. Hampered by chronic pain. Worried about cancer’s role in my back pain.

I hunkered down, pulled my head in. Not a bad thing to do when confronted with difficulty, no, not at all. Self-protection is important. But I got stuck there. Glad my stubborn tendency to keep moving, legs churning, head down carried me past that time. Of course, yes, my friends. My family. CBE. Amy, then Natalie. Shadow. I had help. I did. And I accepted it. (Pats self on back.)

 

Just a moment: Trump’s having a moment. Did he just bring peace to the Middle East? A headline in the Washington Post. NATO agrees to raise spending. The Senate has his big beautiful bill. Don’t get distracted. He’s still a wannabe monarch seeking a golden throne, and the whole world as fawning sycophants.

 

Denver, Family, Fourth Phase, Friends, Korea, Politics, Travel

Family and Friends

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Summer and the Greenhouse Moon

Shabbat gratefuls: Shabbat. Ruth and Gabe. Alan. Shadow. Golden Stix. Nathan. The Greenhouse. Gladiolas. Lilies. Hot weather. Above 60 all night. Gabe reading. Ruth driving. Alan going to New York to see Francesca. Joanne. Ginny and Janice. Annie and Luna. Coming to visit. Back and leg pain. Labrum tear. Artificial tears. Jim Butcher. Marrow Bones. Wildflowers.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Talking to Ruth and Gabe

Week Kavannah:  Roeh et hanalod. Foresight. Knowing what will be needed in the future.

One brief shining: Ruth and Gabe lounged on the lower level while we spoke of family things, matters of consequence and difficulty, from the lens of old age, a college sophomore, and a high school senior, being with each other as listener, as witness, as grandfather and grandchildren, while Shadow moved among us giving out kisses and attention, her way of saying, yes, I hear you, too.

 

Family and Friends: Met Alan at the Dandelion for breakfast. The waitress knows us, smiles when we come in.

French toast and bacon for me. Corned beef hash and eggs for Alan. Speaking of travel, bones unhappy and bones made happier, brothers and sisters, friend stuff. We are easy in each others company, knowledgeable about each others past.

Alan and Cheri moved to a Denver downtown condo three years ago. Great move for them. They live within walking distance of the Denver Art Museum, the Colorado History Museum, the Denver Library, the State Capitol, the Courthouses. The Denver Center for Performing Arts sits right across the street where they attend ballet and theater.

No house maintenance. No threat of wildfire or home insurance problems. Lots of restaurants nearby. A good spot for urban living.

I prefer, still, the Arapaho National Forest, Wild Neighbors, Shadow Mountain, room to have a greenhouse. Might I change? I suppose. But not anytime soon. Too much artifice, too busy, too noisy, too little green in Denver for me.

I came home, took a short nap and greeted Ruth and Gabe who drove from Boulder to see me. Our visits always have depth, fun. Laughing and intense conversations.

Ruth told stories of her trip to Korea. How amazing it was to be a minority. To immerse herself in a culture other than her own.

She learned hangul, she said. The Korean alphabet. She could read words, but had no idea what they meant. Her Mandarin approaches fluency so Asian languages are not (ha) foreign to her.

She wants to do a summer abroad there next summer. I hope it works out for her.

Gabe has begun to read. That is, books of his choosing. He went into the loft, got Peter Pan, Night by Eli Weisel, Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse, and I,Robot. The books I give to him with one rule. If you take them, you read them.

Lunch at Golden Stix. A rejuvenated Chinese restaurant in Aspen Park.

 

Just a damned moment!  In closing I offer the first two paragraphs of this NYT article: A White Nationalist Wrote a Law School Paper Promoting Racist Views. It Won Him an Award. I give it the OMG award.

“Preston Damsky is a law student at the University of Florida. He is also a white nationalist and antisemite. Last fall, he took a seminar taught by a federal judge on “originalism,” the legal theory favored by many conservatives that seeks to interpret the Constitution based on its meaning when it was adopted.

In his capstone paper for the class, Mr. Damsky argued that the framers had intended for the phrase “We the People,” in the Constitution’s preamble, to refer exclusively to white people. From there, he argued for the removal of voting rights protections for nonwhites, and for the issuance of shoot-to-kill orders against “criminal infiltrators at the border.””

Ancient Brothers, Dogs, Family, Fourth Phase, Greenhouse, Memories, Men, Minnesota

Living, not dying

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Beltane and the Greenhouse Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Israel. Iran. The Middle East. War and peace. My son. Father’s Day. Korea. Commander. Seoah. Murdoch. The Jangs. Shadow. Our relationship. Dogs. Kate, always Kate. Evergreen Rodeo. Tourists. Maxwell Creek.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: CBE Men’s Group

Week Kavannah: Week Kavannah: Bitachon. Confidence.  “A feeling of self-assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s abilities or qualities.”

One brief shining: Touched the framing of the greenhouse, sturdy, and began to imagine the Garden beds filled with Lettuce, Radishes, Beets, Peppers, Tomatoes, Marigolds, a favorite salad ingredient, Nasturtiums, and standing inside a heated greenhouse in the Winter, Snow piled up outside and tending to the raised bed with Lettuce, Peppers, Radishes, Beets, Flowers growing in pots.

 

Life, tactile and warm, Shadow and the greenhouse, living, not dying. Nurturing life other than my own, right here at home. As I’ve been used to doing for the last 40 plus years.

This is walking upright in the world. For me.

Yesterday I attended the CBE men’s group. Rabbi Jamie said, “I’m seeing you in person.” I finished a ten session zoom class with him on Wednesday, and I haven’t been to the synagogue in several weeks though I’ve attended Thursday mussar on zoom many of them.

Driving has become such a literal pain that even a trip to Evergreen makes me uncomfortable. Working on it. SPRINT device in July sometime. A visit to an orthopedist on Wednesday for the tear in my right hip’s labrum.

Glad I have Halle and her spirited work, her sage advice. One hour then up. A walking meditation. Dog training. Making breakfast, lunch. Getting the trash ready. Yes. Agency.

 

Father’s Day: Talked to my son yesterday. His Sunday morning. Father’s Day. Being a father in my particular way began with my commitment to feminism. Doing my part for birth control. I had a vasectomy at age twenty-six. The Rice Street Clinic in St. Paul.

As a result, when the need, and that’s what it was, the need to become a father hit me, quite unexpectedly, at age thirty, I had to have a reversal. Which never woke my little guys back up. Low motility.

Which left adoption. Raeone and I worked with an adoption agency in Minnesota to find a baby who would die if they were not adopted. At the time, the late seventies, that meant India.

Women in rural Bengal would find themselves pregnant in their eighth month due to malnutrition. The would go into Kolkata to give birth, then the babies were discarded.

Unless. International Mission of Hope had arrangements with several of the “hospitals” that took in these women. In those instances the babies were taken to an IMH orphanage and made available for adoption.

Our first referral, a girl, died due to a salmonella infection that rampaged through the orphanage. It took another year for a new referral, little Jang Deep, four pounds and four ounces, delivered in a wicker basket by blue and white garbed nuns at the International Arrivals section of the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

 

Aging, Dogs, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Garden, Greenhouse, Health, Politics, US History, World History

Embarrassed to Admit

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Beltane and the Greenhouse Moon

Shabbat gratefuls: CBE. Men’s group. Carol. Paul. The Greenhouse. Door and windows framed in. Seed order from Seed Saver’s Exchange has arrived. Ordered garden tools. Shabbat. Shadow, the tender. Israel. Iran. Lebanon. Palestinians. Saudi Arabia. Mark in Al Kharj. Jordan. Syria. Egypt. Iraq. Kuwait. The Emirates. War. Peace. Morning darkness. Waning gibbous Greenhouse Moon.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Cool Mountain Breeze

Week Kavannah: Bitachon. Confidence.  “A feeling of self-assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s abilities or qualities.”

One brief shining: In a world scarred by war and diminished by autocrats daily life goes on, trips to the grocery store, conversations with friends, feeding the dog, until of course it does not. Or, cannot.

 

My Seeds arrived. Heirloom varieties all. A nod to the Seed Saver’s among us, purchased from the Seed Saver’s Exchange near Decorah, Iowa. The Greenhouse will finish up next week. With the addition of soil to the three raised beds I will get started planting.

With Shadow by my side I’ll return to the Andover/Kate years of Dogs and Gardens. At least in part. No Bees this time. No Orchard. No Kate. Still. Co-creation. Tending the soil. Weeding, nurturing seedlings. Harvesting. Eating. The true transubstantiation.

Once again direct engagement with the Great Wheel’s blessings of Rain and Sun, Night and Day, growing season and fallow time.

When Nathan finishes, I’m going to have Rabbi Jamie and maybe some friends over to hang a mezuzah on its door, bless it. Artemis.

 

Living with pain: Embarrassed to admit it. Halle suggested setting my alarm for an hour. Then, get up and spend five minutes moving around. Embarrassed for three reasons: 1. Halle can’t be more than twenty-five. 2. I’ve read, know about this life hack. 3. It reveals how much I sit these days.

Even so. When the student is ready, the teacher arrives. Halle, in spite of her youth, is my teacher. I’ve been doing this hack for the last two days and it really helps. Keeps the hips and legs lubricated plus I get something done.

Just now I went outside and played the stop, drop, turn and move on game with Shadow. Called her a few times. Five minutes well spent.

Next five minutes I’ll make breakfast. Will take longer than five minutes but that’s fine. Perhaps after breakfast, I’ll read for an hour, then at the five minute break head up to the loft to continue my painting that I started a week ago.

All easy enough. Yet habit and mood have kept me in my chair for too long for too long.

 

Just a moment: We’ve passed out of the world hegemon era to one of regional conflicts. Russia trying to assert itself in the old Soviet Bloc. Israel attacking all of its Shia enemies. China advancing its navy into the South China Sea, claiming once and always Taiwan. The renaming of the Gulf of Mexico.

A world of regional powers rather than a global one (or, two) is unstable. Many flashpoints. Iran. Ukraine. Island chains near Japan, the Philippines, Taiwan.