Category Archives: Family

Aging, Cinema and Television, Family, Friends, Health, Weather +Climate

400 episodes down, 50 or so to go

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Winter and the Future Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Kate. Always Kate. The last quarter Future Moon with Mars. Mars. Kim Stanley Robinson and his excellent trilogy: Red, Green, Blue Mars. New hips. Old hips. Brother Mark and the others who teach ESL around the globe. Sushi Win. Evergreen. Shadow Mountain again.

Kate took me out last night to Sushi Win. A thank you dinner after a tough week. Appreciated. Better rested this am. Not fully back, but a long nap yesterday morning helped. By tomorrow or Monday.

The winds were howling, bending the lodgepoles, testing their carefully evolved capacity to withstand the winds without breaking. The aspen, with no leaves, just let the air move through their branches.

Big winds mean changing weather and it’s much cooler here today, 12 this morning. Though. Friend Tom Crane said it was -2 yesterday on the shores of The lake. Snow coming, enough to cover the gopher holes. Conifer doesn’t measure up to Minnesota winter standards except in snow totals. Much, much more snow here. But it goes away. Solar snow shovel.

What do the animals do during the big winds? Hunker down, I suppose. Wind chill affects them, too, though not as much as us hairless apes. Kep seemed unfazed by it, running around outside last night for some time after we got back from Sushi Win.

I’m on the 50th episode of the 5th season of Resurrection: Ertugrul. Yes, it has soapy operatic threads and I enjoy them, too. Will Ibilge ever find a place in Ertugrul’s heart? Etrugrul’s wiliness, Bamsi’s double swords, Turgut’s ax, the battles. I like those, too. The narrative speed varies between fast and slow. Fast when battles or chases or rug weaving or eleventh century medicine dominates, slow when Islamic scholars or imams explain, say, the various names of Allah.

A narrative from the perspective of Islam privileges how Islam works positively in the lives of Turks. I find this fascinating and it’s what’s really glued me to this series. Resurrection weaves Islam together with Turkic tribal traditions and creates a rule bound world where duty and tribal loyalty supersede all.

Some of it makes me squirm, but that’s good. The unquestioned greatness of Allah in matters of war, family, love, justice gives the characters strength and confidence. The main characters share this worldview. The plot gains tension from the firmness of their beliefs.

In an episode yesterday Ertugrul and his Kayi alps (Turkic tribal soldiers, fierce warriors) rode into Sogut, a town and bazaar that Ertugrul established. He and his alps had conquered Sogut and the land around it in battle after a proclamation of Sultan Aladdin identified it as their territory. The Kayi tribes blue and white flag had hung everywhere Sogut.

Another tribe, the Umuroğlu, get Sogut from an ally, Mongol field commander. They put up their yellow flags and take down all the Kayi flags. A Turkic tribal tradition, however, privileges lands taken by the sword over those gained through political means. This means Ertugrul and the Kayis own Sogut.

When Ertugrul takes all of the Umuroğlu flags down, a swords out, lots of glaring battle ensues. Ertugrul admits his actions may cause trouble for everybody, but he’s defending his honor, defined by tradition.

Not for everybody I know, but it has fascinated me since October. Getting close to the end. But. Showing on Turkish TV now is Resurrection: Osman. Fortunately for my time, this is its first year and it won’t be on Netflix until the full season is over. Only one season to watch instead of 5.

Aging, Family, Feelings, Health, Mussar, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

Fumes

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Winter and the Future Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Debra Cope, who came by for dinner. Safeway for deli salad and the baguette. The E-collar that solved the Murdoch no come in problem. Kate’s advice in that matter, and in so many others. Gertie, who will not let up on being a rascal. Mike who put in a wall socket for our new microwave.

Exhaustion. Creeps up, miss a nap here. Have Gertie chewing on a box in the sewing room after leaping out of the bedroom window there. Murdoch not wanting to come inside. The constant Game of Rooms necessary to keep Kep and Murdoch apart. Also, of course, the long term stress of first Kate’s Sjogren’s and loss of weight, then her bleed, then all that came after. Toss in a dash of cancer recurrence and a soupcon of COPD.

Plain weary. Short tempered. Thoughts not as crisp. Ashamed of myself for not being able to reign in my anger. Not new. Anger is hard for me. It comes, rising red and proud, sudden. Pushing. Demanding release. I do not have the mussar attitude here, lengthening the pause between striking the match and lighting the candle.

Right now. Up. Tired.

Dogs, Family, Friends, Memories, Poetry

Through our life together

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Winter and the Full Future Moon

Saturday gratefuls: the full future moon lighting up Black Mountain Drive when I went for the Denver Post at 6 am. The crunch of the snow. The starry sky. The groomers at Petsmart for spiffing up Gertie, Rigel, and Murdoch. Kep’s on Monday. Kate’s weight at 101. Her increased energy and good spirits. Stefan and Lonnie in Vail. Stefan’s new hip.

Buddy Tom Crane, a cognoscenti of contemporary poets, found a book, A Dog Runs Through It, by Linda Pastan, former poet laureate of Maryland. Thanks for the gift, Tom.

Here’s a stanza from her poem, Envoi:

“We’re signing up for heartbreak

We know one day we’ll rue it.

But oh the way our life lights up

The years a dog runs through it.”

Those years have been, for Kate and me, thirty plus. And not just a dog running through them, but an ever renewing pack, sometimes as large as seven, now down to three plus a guest.

My first dog, Diamond, a puppy with brown and white fur, a misshapen diamond mark on his forehead, I barely got to know before someone fed him hamburger with ground glass. It still makes me sad, 64 years later.

The second dog, whose name I can’t recall right now, a black and white bouncy one, went after a five year old girl who leaned into the stroller to pet my infant brother, Mark. Dad told me he went to a “farm in Tennessee.” Uh huh. One of the reasons I lost trust in my father.

Steppenwolf, a German Shepherd. Dundee, a Sheltie. Both went to better homes than I could provide. Steppenwolf due to divorce and Dundee to my ignorance about how to care for dogs.

Kate was a long time dog owner when I met her. She had Buck and Iris, Whippets, and Bemish, who was old and died before I could get to know him. I learned from her how to be with dogs, how to love them, how to accept their love, how to care for them.

Since then, we’ve had Irish Wolfhounds, many, more Whippets, two IW/Coyote Hound mixes (Vega and Rigel), and two family rescue dogs, Gertie, a German Shorthair pointer, and Kepler, an Akita. Murdoch, also an Akita, is here for eleven months, then he’ll return to his mom and dad.

My heart is full with dog. Licks, kisses, wiggles, jump ups, digging, running, hunting, killing, barking, growling, fighting. Joy over their happiness and grief over their pain and their deaths. So many memories, so many deaths. So much joy. So much sorrow. Life. Life. Life.

When we consider our life situation, it’s not only about us, but also about the dogs. Part of our reason for staying on the mountain is our fenced in yard. Easy for the dogs. Good for them. No heart worm. No fleas. No ticks as long as they stay in the yard.

Hilo who would crawl up into my armpit for a nap. Gertie who lies with her head on my pillow at night. Celt stepping on my snowshoes. Sorsha with a squirrel in her mouth and another in sight, frozen in place. Emma standing on the big downed cottonwood surveying her realm. Vega and Rigel digging holes in Andover. And so many, so many more.

Dogs run through our lives, Kate’s and mine. Sharp teeth, four legs, wagging tails, floppy ears and alert ears, noses, always noses, taking in a world we humans cannot access. Asleep in our lap or near our chair. Eating. Getting treats, heads turned up, expectant.

Beyond the Boundaries, Commentary on Religion, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Feelings, Great Wheel, Kabbalah, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Third Phase, Torah

Rocking my inner boat

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Winter and the Full Future Moon (98%)

Thursday gratefuls: for the Geek Squad guy who came to install our microwave. for his calling out an electrical problem. for Altitude Electric for coming next Monday. for the Geek Squad coming back next Saturday. for the first session in the Human Narrative, the Kabbalah class using Art Green’s book, Radical Judaism. for Zoom which allowed me to both here and there. Bi-location!

Kate and I have been doing sixty second hugs. As Paul Strickland mentioned in his review of a conference he and Sarah attended. What a great idea! We hug anyway, but often short ones. Sixty seconds encourages intimacy. More intimacy is welcome.

Also, we’re dancing with zero negativity. Same conference’s idea. For us, a real challenge. Not so much because we’re negative toward each other, but because both of us have minds that veer easily toward the critical, the analytical. And, we both know a lot so challenging each other’s conclusions comes with breathing. Still. I know where this concept heads and I would like to get there. So…

I describe myself as a neo-pagan by which I mean that my faith is located in this reality, not in some other, supernatural place. And that my faith reads revelation first from the ur sacred text, the book of Nature. This does not exclude other sacred texts as sources of wisdom, inspiration, even revelation, it places them second to seeing what you’re looking at. (Casey Reams) Or, being mindful. Or, deep listening. Or, respectful touching.

It also means that I’ve backed myself into an interesting corner, or, maybe, an interesting geodesic dome. If the cosmos itself reveals the sacred to those who see, the sacred underlies the whole cosmos. If the sacred underlies, is within, permeates the cosmos, then the Kabbalistic notion of divine light, ohr, waiting for us in everything begins to make sense to me.

If that makes sense to me, then the notion of an underlying unity also can come into focus. Is that unity the shekinah? That is, the feminine aspect of the divine said by the Kabbalists to constitute this material world? Not ready to go there yet, not sure I want to put a label on it. But, the idea of the shekinah does work for me at the level of analogy, metaphor.

Challenging. Rocking my inner boat. Yes.

Family, Great Wheel, Great Work, Health, Jefferson County, Mountains, Park County, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

Mountain Strong

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Winter and the Future Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: For Paul’s idea of the 60 second hug and zero negativity. For Bill’s call yesterday. For Rabbi Jamie and Art Green, the class at Kabbalah Experience by Zoom. For Sandy, who cleans with energy and whose tumor has begun to shrink. For all the good dogs everywhere. All dogs are good dogs. For Mountain Waste who takes away the stuff we can’t use, don’t need.

Mountain strong. See that a lot up here. Bailey’s town motto is Mountain Strong. Has a sort of defiant, libertarian meaning to most. Clues: lots of comments about guns as a primary home defense system. About citiots. (city idiots) Griping about service up here when we know the difficulties involved.

Also, though. We can handle it our own. We’re neighbors, let’s help each other. Respect the wildlife. Keep the night dark.

I like it. Mountain strong. That’s how Kate and I feel. We’re mountain strong. Can it be difficult up here? Oh, yes. The thin air has caused both of us problems most of the time we’ve been here. On certain days the snow is so good we can’t go anywhere. IREA, the local electrical company, has miles of lines in difficult to reach, yet sensitive to weather places. Like up and down whole mountains. Outages are not uncommon and Kate needs O2 24/7. Generator. Delivery is episodic rather than consistent though we have an exceptional (for the mountains) mail carrier. Not to mention that it’s far away to all the services we need.

All true. What I call the Mountain Way. Just more molasses to crawl through for certain aspects of daily life.

However. The bare rock, the lodgepole pines, the aspen groves, the cold rushing creeks, the deep valleys and tall mountain peaks, the moose, the elk, the muledeer, the fox, the lynx, the bobcat, the mountains lions, the bears, the magpies and the Canada Jays, the crows and the ravens, the curvy roads, the changing seasons. And the clear, dark nights with the Milky Way and Orion and Ursa Major, Gemini and the whole zodiac. The clouds, the lenticular clouds and the clouds with a long straight front coming over Mt. Evans. When they’re lit by the rising or setting sun.

And for me, the two visits from the mountain spirits. The three mule deer bucks who greeted me when I came to close on the house on Samain of 2014. The two Elk bucks who stayed in our yard for a day eating dandelions. The day before I started radiation treatment.

Mountain strong. They promised that, welcomed me on the close of the Celtic year. They promised that, assured me on the day before the Cyber Knife visits. We are neighbors, mountain spirits and humans. We need mutuality to survive. The mountains themselves have greeted me and come to me as companions. Our mountain journey is now five years old and only just begun.

Mountain strong.

Aging, Cinema and Television, Commentary on Religion, Dogs, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Health, Myth and Story, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

Cancer on my mind

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Winter and the Future Moon

Monday gratefuls: Those who discovered and manufacture lupron. The makers of the Cyberknife and those involved in radiation therapy. Dr. Gilroy, Pattie, Camela, Nicky, all those who took care of me then. Dr. Eigner. Anna Willis. Shelley, the lupron lady from Georgia. And a second time on the clear PSA.

Yes, cancer is on my mind this morning. At eleven I have my third lupron injection. Not sure about half-lives, but this will kick me back up into therapeutic range. Which means, a chance of mood swings and scattered hot flashes followed by continuing sarcopenia. Inner weather influenced by true chemtrails.

With the recent PSA I’m more sanguine, that much more willing to put up with the side effects. If I have another clear one in March, that will be my last lupron injection, setting me up for the critical PSA in June. It should tell the tale of the radiation. Did it burn out the fire that had kindled?

No, cancer is not all consuming. Most of the time I don’t think about it though it’s always lurking in the background, skulking like a thug in a dark alley.

In other medical news my bandages are off and Kate takes out my stitches today. A week ago this evening. We have become that much more vigilant. Doors closed, intercom calls to check on Kep’s location before moving Murdoch.

Kate felt good enough last night that she wanted to go out to eat. She felt cooped up in the house. A good sign. She has the psychic reserve to realize a need to get out. We went to Brook’s Tavern. Sort of tired of it, but it’s close.

There was some poignancy, realizing how little we get out together now. Also a realization that eating out has lost a lot of its luster. Too much of a production and the food’s not as good as I can make at home. IMHO. At least at Brook’s.

Resurrection: Ertugrul. Wow. This is a really long commitment. I’m on episode 84 of season 4. There is a season 5, too. Which I’ll watch. I’m a completist here. Why would I do this?

Fascination. Religion is so much at the core of this show: Islam, the good religion of the Turks. Christianity, a bad religion when it consists of Crusaders and Knights Templar, tolerable when its villagers, merchants, craftspeople. Paganism for the Mongols, portrayed as crude, barbaric, bloody, mystical. Definitely bad. Representing the polytheists who assaulted Mohamed in Mecca, I think.

I find it very interesting to watch the writer’s portrayal of Islam, how it effects daily life, political life, inner life. I don’t have much experience of Muslims living their lives. A bit, but nothing like the insight available in these shows. The history may be somewhat fanciful, the characters sometimes stereotypical (though there’s a lesson in stereotypes, too), but Islam is treated respectfully and fully.

More on all this when I read Season 5, the end. Sometime in the not too distant future. In shallah.

Dogs, Family, Health

?

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Winter and the Future Moon

Saturday gratefuls: Jackie, our hair stylist. Kate’s ability to get into Jackie’s place without the rollator. Ruth’s text yesterday. No more bandages. Pickup at King Sooper. The long nap. Good fitness. Makers of Blizzak snow tires.

Wow. Funday Monday wore me out. That plus the fatigue from the Lupron. And, not getting the fitness boost while waiting for my stitches to come out. This Monday Kate will take them out and I can get back to it. I need the psychic charge from working out. Not to mention that I’m grateful to those workouts for my ability to be in the mix with Kep and Murdoch.

On intervening in dog fights. Conventional wisdom, don’t. If it was a random dog fight, I probably wouldn’t. Unless. It looked like a smaller dog was going to get killed. Then, I might. Haven’t encountered this. I have encountered fights among our dogs many times over the past thirty years.

I’ve intervened in every one of them. Tully, a sweet IW girl otherwise, tried to kill our whippets. Often. Before we figured out a good management plan, I had to pull her off. Vega and Rigel had Gertie between them. I pulled them off of her. Got a small scar. Kep has attacked Gertie a half dozen times. Again, I intervene.

Kep and Murdoch. I intervened. I said why before, so I won’t belabor it. Their situation was different than the others however. Murdoch did not have a collar. On me. I hadn’t put it on. When I grabbed Kep to pull him away from Murdoch, his collar came off over his head.

They were roiling, snarling, tumbling, biting and I had no handles, just what purchase I could get with my hands on their fur. Finally Kep grabbed Murdoch by the lower jaw and hung on. That gave me a chance to get the scarf wrapped around their mouths. Still twisting and bucking. It was hard to keep Kep’s head between my legs. I sat on Murdoch’s head.

I got up, accepting that I couldn’t do anymore; they split, backed off, and I was able to get Murdoch in the house. Until. Snarling, biting again. Upstairs. Oh, Kep had come in through the open back door and Murdoch had found him again. This time I got them apart right away with a full voice bellow, NO!

With Kep back in the sewing room with the door shut and Murdoch up in his room, the incident was over. Kate was out of breath. Adrenaline pushed through me, warding off pain and fatigue.

Slowly an awareness of my arm, not pain, wetness. Removing my shirt, I saw into my left arm. It was a triangular gash that would take 10 stitches to close, 5 inside, 5 out. The wound didn’t bleed much. It would have been a different incident if the ripping tooth had nicked the blood vessel that showed through the subcutaneous fat and skin. Lucky, in that regard.

Darkness had fallen. Urgent care was ahead.

Since then. What was I thinking? I wasn’t thinking. I acted. Later, it was over and I had driven out to Highlands Ranch and back. The dogs remained separated and we got ready for New Year’s Eve. Had to flag off Sandy, our housekeeper, from coming that day because our doggy population was still jumpy. Not a good time for a relative stranger to be in the house.

Was it worth it? Yes. I did what I could, neither dog sustained serious injury. My bite was much, much worse than anything on either of them. Saving them from seriously injuring each other was the point and I succeeded. Can’t know what would have happened if I hadn’t stopped it, but I know one of them would have been mauled. Probably Kep.

Still reverberating all the way into the next decade after it happened.

Dogs, Family, Health

Ouch

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Winter and the Future Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: the folks at OnPoint Urgent care, especially Leah and Trevor. Jon, for coming a long ways. Adrenaline. Murdoch and Kepler, that they didn’t kill each other. The replacement of Kate’s feeding tube. That 2019, not a great year for us, will soon be in the rearview.

Life odder than fiction. Here’s a story. A while ago a dog came to visit for a year. His name is Murdoch. He’s young, bouncy, a genuine joy. On Sunday he bounced his way down the stairs and got tangled up in Kate’s feeding tube while she was walking on the lower level stairs.

Pop. The feeding tube came out. Not out of the feeding bag, which hung suspended from her shoulder, but from her body. Geez. It’s the second time a feeding tube has come out, so it wasn’t quite the shock it might have been, yet it’s still her primary source of nourishment.

Call the oncall doc. Go visit your primary care doc on Monday. We did. They found a place to have a new feeding tube put in, but I only heard Adventist hospital and took us to the one closest to the doctor’s office. Wrong one.

Found the right one about a half hour late, but the doc had been working on someone else anyhow. Kate went in and came back out in twenty, thirty minutes, new tube in place, able to take nourishment again. Not a pleasant process, but not a huge deal either.

By the time we got home we’d been out of the house since 10 am and the clock had ticked over 6 hours plus. It was close to 4:30 pm. We were tired. It was a long day already.

I asked Kate to let Gertie and Rigel out while I put the Rav4 in the garage and let out Murdoch who had spent the time in the loft. He was bouncy and happy and at the door when I got up here, so I let him out. Meanwhile, unknown to me, Kepler had squirted out the door with Rigel and Gertie. Uh oh.

When I came out of the loft door after putting Radical Judaism and my notebook on the table next to the computer, I heard squeals. There, in the snow, in 20 degree weather, a brown, black, brown, black furry action movie was underway. Kep and Murdoch, finally in the same space, had done what we feared, gone for each other.

I ran down the stairs, deposited my book, Automatic Eve, and my phone on the cement landing at the bottom, and rushed over to the two fighting dogs. Never intervene in a dogfight. Well, sure. Unless the dogs look like they’re going to kill each other. And, these were two Akitas, bred to guard. When they bite, they’re serious about it.

Besides, who would want to call their son in Singapore and say, sorry about Murdoch? Not this guy, for sure. So, I intervened. It was red in tooth and claw. Kepler and Murdoch had already wounded each other and were snarling, way past growling, as they grappled. Collars came off in my hand. No handle.

I sat on their heads. Kepler had Murdoch’s lower jaw in his mouth. My scarf was all I had. Taking it off I tied it around their jaws, limiting their movement. Kate couldn’t help. Too far out in the yard for her oxygen. Besides, the feeding tube.

It went on about 10 minutes. Not sure I helped at all because I finally had to give up and stand up. They sort of quit on their own.

In the melee however I sustained a bite. The worst bite the p.a. who sewed me up said she had ever seen. Oh, good. It was a triangular gash, opened to the fatty tissue underneath and with a fortunately intact, but visible blood vessel right in the middle.

Jon came to the emergency room and helped me. I drove myself there and back. Got home about 9:30 pm, ten or eleven stitches later. Leah, the p.a., sewed my inside skin together first, then closed the gash. Lidocaine kept it from being impossible for me.

Not sure about doggy injuries though I know Kep’s rear left leg is hurt and Murdoch has a slash on his cheek. I left for Urgent Care after we got the dogs situated and when I got back everybody was asleep.

Come to me, 2020. 2019 be gone.

Art and Culture, Family, Health, Painting, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

Artistes

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Winter and the Future Moon

Monday gratefuls: (I like this practice, so I’m going to continue it for awhile. Maybe keep it here.) Being with Ruth yesterday. Going to Meininger’s Art Supply with her. The stuff in Meininger’s. Stanley Market Place. Maria’s Empanadas. Coming home to the mountains after driving in the city. The bare rock on Berrian Mountain. The flocked trees.

Took Ruth to Red Herring Art Supply. Again. Seoah was with us the last time. Like last time, it was closed. The holidays. We drove along Colfax, “the longest street in the U.S. that doesn’t turn into a highway,” she said. Makes me think of Lake Street. Colfax runs through several ethnically diverse neighborhoods and changes its character as it does. Near its ends, west and east, are old tourist motels now the cheaper equivalent of SRO’s.

We took it into downtown Denver, turned right at the State Capitol Building, and followed Broadway to Meininger’s, Colorado’s primary art supply store. Ruth educated me again. Explaining the use of mediums for oil paints, why she likes synthetic brushes, and a type of paper on which you can do oil painting.

We bought some of that paper, a small bottle of medium, and some brushes. The next time she comes we’ll cut up some of the paper into sizes she would like to use.

The ancientrail of art is not only for the gifted. Making things with our hands is a primary human act, from houses to Space Shuttles, quilts to sculptures. When creating objects that reflect our inner life, make the world beautiful, show and enhance our ability to see, we expand our own life.

We got Gabe a Chromebook for Hanukah, a very low end, yet still useful laptop. Jon predicted he would be, “very happy.” After he opened it up, Gabe said, “I’m so happy.” Sometimes grandparents are the wish genie.

We both have concerns about Jon. Still. He inherited depressive genes from the Johnson line, maybe the Olsons, too. Very bright, creatively gifted, incredibly self sabotaging. And, 51. I hope in this next decade he can find the traction he needs.

His art is wonderful, colorful and conceptual, using old smashed metal pieces he finds along the road as objects to print. His grasp of politics, of the workings of his school, of home renovation is keen. When he’s not down, he’s a lot of fun. He skis and makes his own skis.

Tough, very tough, situation.

Aging, Family, Health, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

Easy, boy

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Winter and the Future Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Ruth’s mint candy. Her delight in staying with us. The snow storm that could. All the delivery people in the mountains. Rest time from working out. Being easier with myself. The clear, cold sky.

Ruth. Our favorite granddaughter. Our only granddaughter. She stayed Friday night after a day of skiing with her Dad. She slept with Rigel and Murdoch since the guest room now belongs to them. But, they were willing to share.

It snowed yesterday. An unpredicted round which exceeded six inches. A frequent poster on Pinecam.com, Weather Geek, lives on nearby Conifer Mountain. He says we’ve had 55 inches this season, before yesterday’s snow. Say 61 inches now. 5 feet, 1 inch. Deep enough to bury Kate. That’s since October.

Being easier. Over the past year plus I’ve been pushing, pushing, pushing. Do this. Get that done. Keep doing this. And that. And that. Don’t let up. Keep moving. Realized I’d put myself in an impossible situation.

Even though they’ve reduced in the last month or two, doing the activities of care giving put me in a peculiar tension. I viewed all the domestic activities as necessary, good in themselves, but as barriers to creative work, work I did for me. The tension between caregiving and writing, caregiving and painting, caregiving and reading made me devalue the domestic, not resenting it, but feeling pulled between the needs of my Self and the needs of our home. When I talked about this with Kate, she said yes, the housewife’s dilemma.

Though it came rather late, my solution was to be easier on myself. To let up on the pedal. Immediately things got better. It was enough, this cooking. This workout. This grocery pick-up. The tiredness was ok, not something I needed to shoulder past, but an indication that it was time to rest.

I’d robbed myself of the satisfaction in cooking, shopping, running errands, and in the creative work by feeling always pulled between them. This is life now. Kate and the dogs and the house. They come first. The rest is bonus, important, but secondary.