Category Archives: Aging

Aging, Far Right, Fourth Phase, Friends, Politics, US History

Transformations

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Yule and the Moon of Deep Friendship

Thursday gratefuls: Rich. Dick. Tara. Laurie. Susan. Ron. Marilyn. Jamie. Joanne. Roxann. Tom. Shadow and her bone. The Dog run. Nathan. Kalispell. Dreams. Visions. Growing with the soul. Tarot wisdom. Furious Minds. The alt-right. The far right. DJT, wrecker of a nation. Rebuilding our country. NATO. Allies and enemies. Kong.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Minneapolis

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah: Daat.    The Bridge Between Mind and Heart

“If Chokhmah (Wisdom/Inspiration) is a seed and Binah (Understanding/Analysis)  is the soil that develops that seed into a plant, Da’at is the nervous system that carries the vital life force from the brain to the rest of the body. It is the point of transition from “thinking” to “being.””

art@willwordsworth

Tarot: Ten of Bows, Responsibility

  • Prioritization: A call to assess what truly matters and learn to say “no” or ask for help.

One brief shining: One scoop, a cup, prozac in a pill pocket, crunching sounds, check her water, listen to her lapping it up until she comes next to me, asks to go outside, open the door, and Shadow disappears into the morning darkness.

Aging diary: No, not mine this time. Others.

Thinking about Dick’s sudden, unexpected death. A gut blow to his family and friends. Yes. As a way to die, which is something those of us in our golden years have to consider. And do, from time to time. Yes, please. Now I lay me down to sleep.

A friend, recovering from his own no good, terrible week, has his beloved suddenly scheduled for surgery. Aging demands so much of us at times. Collapses matters that would bring us to our knees in midlife into days and weeks of insults. Calls on reserves, resilience, often more than we may feel we have. When friends and family can step in, shore up the wave punished dock of our soul.

Another friend. Finally sold his business. This last month! So happy for him. A creative guy. Musician. Actor. Playwright. Scriptwriter. Author. Married to his best friend for forty years. Released now.

Go with your soul in all these instances. Link life changes to the deep purpose you and only you can fulfill. Then we can die with grace, console and comfort each other, once again let our soul free to create.

Just a moment: Our elected agent of chaos gives voice to and puts the unparalleled power of a waning hegemon behind racism, xenophobia, downright madness. An unwanted wrecking ball to years of liberal hubris. Imagining we could proceed with half measures, leaving out this constituency for the next one, not paying attention to the realpolitik of our nation.

We remain a creedal nation, one devoted to the dream of a place where many peoples have a chance, and only a chance, to learn how to live with each other in spite of the abysses of otherness. Somehow gaining strength and joy from staring right into the chasms between us, then eagerly building bridges across them.

I see today and yet hold fast to a new nation, one reimagined and committed to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. For all.

Aging, Ancient Brothers, Fourth Phase, Health, Memories, Mountains, The West

Glad I’m Old

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Yule and the Moon of New Beginnings

Wednesday gratefuls: Joe, coming today. Dr. Josy. Healthy Shadow. Paying bills. Tom in recovery. Alan, too. The great American medical contraption. Books. Leads for books. Notebooklm. Pan. Lycaon. The enchanted world. Zeus. Athena. Hera. Poseidon. Hephaestus. Hermes. Hades. Arcadia. Ancient Greece.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Dr. Josy

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Year Kavannah: Creativity.   Yetziratiut.   “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” ― Pablo Picasso

Week Kavannah:  Wholeness. Shleimut.                                                “The concept of shleimut extends beyond the individual, applying to relationships (finding a life partner with whom one feels complete) and the community (mending societal cracks to achieve collective creativity and flourishing).”

Tarot:  Eight of Arrows, Struggle

“…profound personal struggles require calm, decisive and resolute action. Reach down into the very core of your being and summon all the reserves of your courage and wisdom. See honestly what the issue will require for you to resolve it…View this necessary sojourn with clear eyes and a resolute heart, for to overcome these tests of life makes us stronger.” Parting the Mists

One brief shining: Old age is an eight of arrows life phase, a time when the cycle of an individual life nears its end, yet also when  a lifetime of contemplation and courage and love drives a personal distillation, the alembic of a lived life able to transform the dross of work and care into the golden fleece of wisdom and self-compassion.

Old age presents its insults. Those of us in our late seventies and eighties know. Could be maturing cataracts. Might be regrets. A certain hitch in the step. Maybe balance uncertain. All those family issues, good and troublesome. Of course, some sort of physical decline, could be serious illness.

Then there is the end of this story, once infinitely far away, now looming not far out of sight. Even with a death-friendly outlook, which I have, I’m still with Woody Allen: I’d prefer not to be there when it happens. Kate knows. Regina knows. Jon knows. Mom and dad know. All ancestors know. Death loves us all.

When I couldn’t open the jar of sauerkraut or the sour Cherry preserves, it hit me hard. Weak, so weak. When back pain constantly gnawed at my day, my composure, I let myself fall, often, into the slough of despond. Cancer’s various moments of deep uncertainty had the same power.

Yet. I’ve been reading. No surprise. My mind follows the threads of political change, for example, from a unique vantage point. One earned in years, decades of action and reflection. Or, as I research Pan, the great Arcadian God of the natural world, my heart and my imagination open up, seeing connections, linkages from other years of reading, learning.

Or, I have the insight, as I did yesterday, that I’ve stayed the course in many difficult situations: with Jon and his troubles, with Ruth and Gabe, with Kate in her final years, with so many Dog’s in their final weeks, with Shadow through our mutual angst. Even with myself.

Yes, old age has its insults. It sure does. It also has depth of compassion earned. Love emboldened and strengthened. Knowledge gathered, connected, created. A calm that comes from kicking the hamster wheel of achievement to the side. I’m glad I’m old. How bout you?

Aging, Ancient Brothers, Fourth Phase

Living the Good Life

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Samain and the Shadow Moon

Monday gratefuls: Broncos v Packers. Whadda game. Happy Camper. Holiday gifts for Ana, housecleaner, and Mark, mailman. Later, Shirley Septic workers. The Ancient Brothers on gifts, gift giving, what do we really want for the holidays. Hawai’i. Hanukkah. The shamash. Nathan. Subway.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Hanukkah

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Took a Washington Post quiz and found myself in the meaningful life bucket for living a good life; the other two, a happy life and a psychologically rich life, also seemed ok, but meaningful did capture my life overall, its summary sentence: “I’ve made a difference!”

 

I mention this Washington Post quiz because Ode’s theme for the Ancient Brothers included the question, what do you really want for the holidays? He specifically pointed us away from things like world peace and toward our own lives, right now.

As you might imagine, the first thought for me was: no more cancer. That’s not gonna happen, I know. Press deeper. Taking that quiz, I realized I had my answer. I want my life to continue to be meaningful. Not productive. Not successful. Not achievement oriented, but meaningful.

What’s meaningful for me at 78, slowed down by fatigue and cancer, will not be, is not the same as me at 40, or 50, even 70. Now meaningful living lies in nurturing relationships of long standing. Nurturing and backstopping family. Developing in the moment kind and loving connections with everyone I meet. Continuing to write Ancientrails. Continuing to deepen my Jewish journey, my pagan journey, my life journey.

Realizing this is what I wanted, really wanted, not only for the holidays, but throughout the year gave me a gathered calm; my life has had this trajectory for a long time, my task now is to live it in my fourth phase, life with a terminal disease.

It means sticking with Shadow, making the necessary adaptations to have her as a permanent part of my life. It means planting Artemis, harvesting food for my table. It means going to mussar, bagel table, CBE men’s group. It means keeping up to date on our changing country, our changing world and commenting on those changes.

Live until l die. A meaningful life.

 

Just a moment: Living my meaningful life has, I realized, important implications for how I live in this fraught time, a time when the actions and struggles that have long made my life meaningful find hostile pushback. Trump and his ilk do not have the power to ruin my life. Only I have that power.

What can I do in this worst of times? Live as full, as rich, as collaborative a life as I can. Which is what I’ve been doing.

How about you?  Happy life? Meaningful life? Psychologically rich? The good life beckons. Yes, even now.

Aging, Cancer, Dogs, Fourth Phase, Friends, Health, Humor, Judaism, Mussar, Politics

Humor as Moral Compass

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Samain and the Shadow Moon  (2 sessions to go)

Wednesday gratefuls: Rich. MVP. Shadow away at boarding school. Clement weather. Polska Kielbasa. Bananas. Tangerines. Celery. Baby Potatoes. Andouille sausage. Scallions. Cherry Tomatoes. Pork loin chops. Sheetpan dinners. Nathan and the Dog run. His next summer move to Kalispell, Montana.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Rich

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Malchut   Wonder.   A feeling of surprise mixed with admiration caused by something beautiful or unexpected.

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Made a mistake, went to MVP, my only night out during the month; even though Marilyn drove, a combination of radiation fatigue, head drop, and this damned hernia acting up made me first lie down on a couch, then ask for a ride home. Geez.

 

I knew better. I’m exhausted from driving to radiation and getting radiated. But I love these folks: Jamie, Susan, Joanne, Ron, Marilyn, Laurie, Rich. Missed last month and missed seeing them all. When Marilyn asked to meet at the usual place, I said yes. Should have said no.

Rich drove me to my car, followed me home, shoveled my deck, and saw me into the house. What a kind and loving man.

Not the return to the group I wanted.

This just in. Marilyn texted me, offered to drive me to my radiation today. Rich must have gone back and reported to the MVP group. I feel blessed to have so many who love me, care about me.

 

Dog journal: Nathan came by from a project just up the road. We discussed the Dog run. He’s built many and has his tricks for working in the Snow on frozen ground. Relieved. Now if that doghouse I want will come back in stock…

 

Just a moment: Sleepy Donald. I can relate. I’ll be 79 in two months and I just had a night. Glad I’m not working hard to cancel the political work of the last century or so. Gotta be tiring, making up enemy lists, figuring which shithole countries to diminish and ban, which cities to occupy, deciding how you can gig the poor yet again. Not to mention acting as warmonger and peace maker in chief. The contradictions alone would level a lesser man.

Don’t know if you watch South Park. Don’t recommend it even though the real South Park lies only an hour’s drive from Shadow Mountain. A former Conifer resident is one of the pair who created it.

It’s gross. Over the top. And, yet. They’re satirizing Trump, Vance, Bondi, Stephen Miller in ways that do make me laugh. Especially Stephen Miller who is portrayed as a creepy, I may lead to your doom, sycophantic butler.

If you can stand it, the satire is spot on.

Humor has always had an uneasy, even dangerous relationship to power. I’m sure more than one court jester lost their head by taking a joke too far.

I admire the South Parks, the Colberts, the Jon Stewarts of our time. Laughing at tyrants exposes them for what they are: weak, petty, cruel leaders who seek power for power’s sake with no moral compass. Humor, oddly enough, is exactly that: a moral compass.

 

 

 

Aging, Cancer, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Hermitage, Memories, Myth and Story, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain

Alchemical work

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Samain and the Radiation Moon

Thursday gratefuls: Joanne. Diane. The Alembic. Jung. Freud. Rogers. May. Frankl. Maslow. Satir. Fromm. Adler. Horney. Erikson. Paul Goodman. Adorno. Marcuse. Benjamin. Habermas. Unamuno. The hermeneutics of suspicion. Ricoeur. Guides from my student days. The theology of liberation. Cornel West. Shadow Work. Ivan Illich.

Sparks of joy and awe: A day of rest

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:  Hakarat Hakov   Gratitude.    “Who is rich? Those who rejoice in their portion.” Perkei Avot 4:1

Tarot: Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Shadow, shadow work, the work done but unrecognized, unpaid, unappreciated housework, child rearing, transporting yourself to work, self checkout, pumping your own gas, making your own travel arrangements, assembling products that come in pieces, maintaining a yard and a vehicle noticed and named by radical thinker, Ivan Illich, in his book, Shadow Work. How much shadow work do you do?

Alembics. “…historically used by alchemists and for producing medicines, perfumes, and alcohol, the word can also be used metaphorically to mean something that refines or transmutes.” Gemini

I’ve begun to think of my life in terms of alembics. When was I thrown into a life situation, either by my own choice or by outside circumstance that resisted logic, yet compelled me to respond in unexpected, unusual, new ways?

A major early almebic? The death of my mother. No way to reason my way through that. A moment of dark transformation, carried without thought into the dark recesses of my heart, clashing with a changed world, and not well. In spite of being in a family, I sat in this alembic alone, feeling the fires of fear, doubt, grief lick up and around my stunned self.

This transmutation produced no gold. No, it produced a broken soul, one ready for abandonment, for sudden shifts from light to dark, from innocence to intoxication. Yes, the second alembic, which contained the first, grew from days at Phi Kappa Psi and Wabash where I learned to smoke and to drink.

An alembic that would not shatter until March of 1976 when I began treatment at a Hazelden outpatient clinic in Minneapolis. Getting sober allowed me to gather in pieces of the dark time and begin to transform them into psychic gold. To understand that the grief, the agony, the isolation (self-imposed) had forced me to mine my inner resources in ways and at a time most people went to prom and figured out what to do with their lives.

Other alembics. The Peaceable Kingdom. Seminary. Adopting Joseph. Vietnam era protests. Studying philosophy and anthropology. Marrying Kate. Andover with its gardens, dogs, bees. Writing. Shadow Mountain. Kate’s illness and death. Cancer. CBE. Converting to Judaism. Old age with a terminal illness, the fourth phase.

I like the use of alembic to describe these times because it recognizes that the pressures and fractures and falls and emergence shape us in ways unpredictable, unknown, yet in which we have no choice but to participate as best we can.

Are you in an alembic right now? Or, have you emerged from one recently? Or, long ago. How did it transform you? How is it transforming you?

Aging, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Great Work, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Tarot

Keeping it real

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Mabon and the Harvest Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Synthroid. TSH. Thyroid gland. Shadow, coming in more often, more easily. Who knows? Good workouts. Cook unity. Chewy. Natural Balance. Rabbit Bites. Dog treats and toys. Lidocaine. Mitzvah committee. Luke. Susan. Steve. Dr. Vu. Mountain View Pain Center. Increasing darkness. Artemis.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Magic of the Ordinary

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei

Week Kavannah:  Malchut.  Wonder. “Wonder is the beginning of wisdom.” Socrates

Tarot: Gonna take a rest here. Has become too routine.

One brief shining:

 

A life in full: Still struggling, beating my soft moth wings against the window of my soul, trying to see if it’s enough, this time, these days. But from the outside looking in. How to sense, how to live from my nefesh rather than looking in, wondering if its purpose has become real. Velveteen Rabbit real.

Have I loved my nefesh enough, carried it in my five-year old arms from bedroom to living room, into the car, often onto the playground. Have I told it the stories of my five-year old heart which wondered about dogs and spiders and Mom and that new baby. Do I listen to it now, a grown and old man, for the wisdom of its unique path?

Only to live my tao. My way. That is it. To follow the watery course of my buddha nature as it flows downward from the peak altitude of my birth, through the canyons and valleys of my life, to the wide ocean of our collective unconscious, where it becomes one again with the tao.

You know, I have. My velveteen soul has expressed itself often, guided my neshama as the world of experience shaped me against the anvil of my true self. However I feel about myself in one joy filled or angst filled moment, however you may feel about me, peering in from the abyss between us, I have remained true (of course not always which is nonetheless also part of my tao) to that five-year old’s tender, wonder-filled embrace of an often puzzling and frightening world.

Which means, I feel, that this time filled with the dog, the greenhouse, books and movies, study and esoterica, friends and faraway family, ancientrails, medical this and medical that, is  on that path. Is not a deviation but a continuation in the idiom of today’s possibilities.

So. Why not let it be. Mother Mary, come to me. Whisper words of wisdom. Let it be.

 

Just a moment: I’ve let the activist go dormant while l dealt with cancer and sick, dying Kate, then mourning followed by Jon’s death and a close group hug with Ruth and Gabe.

The rhythm of a life lived in love and in awareness. The activist cannot return, not as he was. Again, a rhythm.

And yet. I see this: He got an entire country running on clean energy. Can he do it again?. My commitment to the Great Work, creating a sustainable presence for humans on Mother Earth cheers. Wants to duplicate, triplicate, over and over and over until we walk again with the sun, the wind, the tides, the heat of Mother’s inner core.

 

 

 

Aging, Far Right, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Health, Politics

An Overly Medicalized Life

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Mabon and the Harvest Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Close friends Tom, Paul, Mark, Bill, Alan, Tara, Marilyn and Irv, Rich, Ginny and Janice, Luke. Shadow. Artemis. Rain, Rain, come again. Monsoons. Yes. Cool nights. Days of Awe. Mark with the Camels, Goats, and Sheep. In Hafar. The Burger King at the U.N. “…it was foreign affairs journalist Ishaan Tharoor who captured the larger story of Trump’s speech. “A senior foreign diplomat posted at the U.N. texts me,” Tharoor wrote, “‘This man is stark, raving mad. Do Americans not see how embarrassing this is?’” quoted by Heather Cox Richardson

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Long, cool Rains

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei

Week Kavannah: Yirah. Awe and Wonder

Tarot: Five of Pentacles, (Druid Craft)

  • Endurance of personal hardship: The card focuses on the endurance of the solitary journey through a desolate landscape. The message is to face and acknowledge the difficulty of the situation rather than ignore it. 

One brief shining: The five of pentacles recommends facing and acknowledging the difficulty of my situation rather than ignoring it; sound advice, I’d say, yet when the situation requires constant acknowledgment, persistent recognition a resilience fatigue can-and at times-does manifest, a weakening of resolve, of the head down, keep pushing attitude I try to maintain.

 

The Burger King and the U.N.: Hangs head in shame. In case you haven’t seen this, I’m appending a youtube collection* of clips from his remarks at the U.N. Thanks, Mark.

“I hate my opponents. I do not wish the best for them.” DJT at Charlie Kirk’s memorial service. “Out of control migration is ruing your countries. Your countries are going to fail.” Speaking to representatives of the world’s nations at the U.N. “I’m really good at this,” he said.

Dear leader needs to get on a heavily armored train, build a bridge across the Bering Sea, and go visit his buddy Kim Jong Un whom he praised to South Korea’s President during a recent visit. Then we can blow up the bridge and leave him in the Hermit Kingdom.

 

Feelings: A long gauntlet of medical matters. Next week the lidocaine injections that will guide the nerve ablations two weeks later. Four appointments in all. On October 8th a P.E.T. scan to see what might have caused my PSA to move up a titch. Follow up appointments with my pain doc and my medical oncologist.

When these matters have been handled for now, I plan to move on to the neck brace for my wobbly head. Also, Maddie has follow-up calls with Panorama Orthopedics about my torn labrum.

At times, like last night, I push myself into a dark corner. I compare myself with others my age, what they’re doing with their lives. Tom and ESI. Bill and his present moment approach to life. Paul with his hospice work, political organizing, and Maine Humanities Council. Mark visiting his friends, working on his art. I’m not doing anything comparable.

That sends me into a tailspin. Not self-berating, rather a wistfulness for the time when I had the energy to get out there. Sadness about the truncated, overly medicalized life I’m living. That’s why the message from the Five of Pentacles lands with a thud.

 

 

Aging, Family, Far Right, Feelings, Fourth Phase, Friends, Holidays, Judaism, Politics

Teshuva

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Mabon and the Harvest Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Shadow’s regression. Her sweetness. Cool, Rainy, Dark morning. Rosh Hashanah. L’shana Tova. The beauty of Shadow. Rain. Sweet Tomatoes. Great workout yesterday. Working out. Prolia. Bone health. Tramadol and acetaminophen. Yum. Beavers, nature’s engineers. Lodgepoles. Aspen gold. A Mountain Fall well underway.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Fourth Wing

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei

Week Kavannah: Yirah. Awe and Wonder

Tarot: #17, The Star

  • Connection to intuition: The imagery encourages listening to your inner guidance. In the Druid Craft deck, this is an act of “coming home to yourself” and being true to your core essence.
  • Renewed purpose: This card can signal a deep spiritual awakening or a renewed sense of purpose. It reminds you that you are connected to the greater cosmic and natural world. 

One brief shining: Rain has pelted down overnight, the Air cool and moist, temperature in Artemis down to 55, outside the comfort range for Tomato ripening, the Rain though, the Monsoons, have given us surcease from Fire, made the Mountain Meadows and Lodgepole covered slopes green, and given the Aspens reason to respond to its Midas touch.

 

Tarot and Rosh Hashanah: Teshuva, often translated as repentance, is the main point of the Jewish new year. We greet the new year with a soul refreshed and cleansed. I prefer the word return as its translation.

In that sense of teshuva the major arcana of the Star correlates well: “an act of “coming home to yourself” and being true to your core essence.” When we perform teshuva, we return, as one sage put it, to the landscape of our soul. To do that we have to clear away the schmutz, accretions to our self that block our nefesh soul from shining through.

Nefesh, buddha nature, true self. Who you are as an extension of the sacred. Your core essence. I love that the Star showed up for me on the 1st day of Rosh Hashanah.

I’m coming to believe that my life as I live it now is my core essence. Time with family and friends. Intentional conversations each week with those I love. Seeing the ancient friends on Sunday morning. Reading. Studying. Playing with Shadow. Co-creating with Great Sol, the soil, and Artemis. Living in the Mountains. Living a Jewish life through mussar, the men’s group, Talmud Torah, saying the Shema, touching the mezuzahs, celebrating holidays. Also through my many friendships at CBE. Writing Ancientrails. My ancientrail.

In other words my teshuva snaps me back to this Shadow Mountain life. One lived with kavannah, intention, connected to the past, alive to the present, accepting of the future. A good feeling and one on target for this 5786th Rosh Hashanah.

 

Just a moment: We need to call out red tie guy’s lies. At every opportunity. No tip toeing around this Burger King tyrant. Kick him in the shins each he says crime is out of control. Each time he says stealing money from the poor to give to the rich will make America great. Each time he demeans transgender folks. Each he claims the insurrection was a peaceful protest.

No Kings. October 18th.

The left Reverend Dr. Israel Herme Harari

Aging, Feelings, Fourth Phase

My life. Now.

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Lughnasa and the Cheshbon Nefesh Moon

Monday gratefuls: Mark in Hafar again. Writing with his students. Shadow, bone lover. Rabbi Jamie. CBE. Evergreen High School. Marilyn and Irv. Artemis. Her children. Hello darkness, my old friend. Mystery. Awe. Sacred. Divine. Everyday life. The Shadow Docket. The Fed. Red Tie Guy. Our poor benighted nation.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Cooling temperatures

Year Kavannah: Wu Wei

Week Kavannah: Derech Eretz. The way of the land

Tarot: Seven of Pentacles, (Druid Craft)

  • Patience and perseverance: While you may not see the final results yet, the card affirms that your consistent effort will pay off. 
  • Harvest and reward: The card signals that a significant, long-term reward is coming. 

One brief shining: A Druid in a green cloak takes his golden sickle to harvest mistletoe from a standing oak, embracing the mistletoe, green even in winter, as evidence of eternal life, dropping it on a white cloth below the tree before offering it up in rituals for healing, fertility, and protection.

 

Life review: Constant, chronic pain and carrying my own personal assassin push life review into bleak moments. When bending over or playing too hard with Shadow or standing too long cooking, or when an intense hot flash brings nausea with it, pain or the side effect from medications make me pause. Is this the day, the moment, when life goes into full decline?

What follows. A quick look back. If this is an inflection point, what have I done? What could (sometimes should) I do with the time I have left?

These are common questions for those of us in our late seventies and eighties. I’m telling you what brings them up for me. Of late I’ve wondered if I’m doing enough (of what?) right now. Is there work that could/should fill those empty afternoon hours?

Mornings start around 4:30 to 5:00 for Shadow and me. We do some training. She goes outside. I write Ancientrails which takes around two hours with illustrations and revisions. Sometimes I finish before I feed Shadow at 6:30, sometimes not.

Because dogs (and me) like routine, I stop at 6:30, scoop three half cups of Natural Balance Lamb and Brown Rice into her bowl, then sit down and feed it to her by hand, a practice recommended by Natalie. After that, my pre-workout routine, then a half an hour to forty-five minutes of cardio and resistance.

Around 8 am four days a week I have zoom conversations. After those, I may have a doctor’s appointment, lunch with a friend. On Friday mornings, most times, Alan or Alan and Joanne. Breakfast.

Some weeks Tara comes with Eleanor, or Ginny and Janice with Annie and Luna. Thursday at one is mussar, either zoom or in person. Shabbat mornings, often Bagel Table to study Torah or the Morning Service.

I spend some time each day with Artemis, checking on Kale, Spinach, Beets, Carrots, Nasturtiums, and Tomatoes. At least twice a day I go outside and play with Shadow.

The rest? The news. NYT. Washington Post. Substacks. Heather Cox Richardson. The Atlantic. Reading, both serious and not. Some TV. Perhaps a movie. Food preparation, too.

As I wrote this, realizing I have full mornings, other times during the week with friends, with study both in groups and in private, with the routines of self care, my life feels full.

My looks back tend to be brief. First, I know I can’t change the past. Second, I long ago decided my life has had plenty of oomph. I was able to work always within my principles and values. I had concrete accomplishments. Raised a son. Loved three women enough to marry them. A couple of others, too. Worked on my damaged psyche well enough to point myself forward.

So. Enough. Enough. Daiyenu.

 

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.