Monthly Archives: November 2015

Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

Monday, Monday

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Samhain                                                                  Thanksgiving Moon

A midnight clear on a joyous night of old. The waning Thanksgiving moon has a huge moondog encircling much of the sky to the west. New snow, about five inches, so fresh white sparkling. Quiet. Wonderful.

Thanksgiving, our first here on Shadow Mountain, is behind us now. Memories have begun to accumulate, still fresh like the snow. That delayed kitchen remodel gets underway today. Over the last week we’ve been moving pots and pans, spices, plates and cups, flour and tea and coffee to temporary locations.  Todd and his crew will dismantle, then rebuild our cabinets, install a new fridge and dishwasher, a new countertop and sinks, build in some new cabinetry.

Our new refrigerator is in the garage and running, plugged into a wall socket. It will get the last of the old fridge’s contents today or tomorrow, depending on when those get removed. Logistics. The new cabinets come today and they have to go somewhere, probably the garage as well.

IMAG0769With the driveway covered again, I’ll have to blow it since we’ve got the kitchen crew plus the Jefferson county inspector for the final inspection on the solar panels both coming today.

We’ve also got a loan to close today. It will help us bridge the gap between paying the last payment for the solar panels and getting our tax credit money next year.

Hanukkah starts this Sunday as well. That means eight days of candles, prayers, grandchildren gifts. The high holy month will be well and truly underway.

 

Colorado, Politics, US History

Enough, Enough, Enough

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Samhain                                                                              Thanksgiving Moon

This week’s Colorado shooting. Yes, he’s a terrorist. Yes, a black man in a similar situation would most likely be dead. Yes, he lived in the middle of South Park, the huge high plain only 50 miles here. Yes, his home was a trailer without sewer, running water or electricity. Yes, he was from South Carolina.

No, mental illness is not the problem. All but a handful of persons with mental illness, myself included (Generalized anxiety disorder), do not pick up guns and shoot people. No, Planned Parenthood is not the problem. The escalation of the rhetorical war in the so-called pro-life movement is a contributor. No, religious belief is not the problem. The absurd use of religious belief to justify already existing biases and hatred is so clearly a problem: ISIS, al-qaeda, Jim Jones, mongers of all apocalypses.

This is the second mass shooting in Colorado Springs in the last few weeks. In the first incident the eventual shooter was seen walking the streets carrying a loaded rifle and other weapons. When police were called, they said they could do nothing. Open carry is the law in Colorado.

I’ll say again. Let’s put the NRA on the list of those providing support to terrorists. Let’s emphasize the well-regulated part of the second amendment.

I also like making gun ownership applications similar to getting a driver’s license and, like driver’s licenses, make owning a gun a privilege not a right. I also like making gun ownership application processes equivalent to the most rabid right wingers dreams for vetting women wanting abortions.

And, let me say too: Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh. Enough, enough, enough.

Cooking, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Holidays, Jefferson County, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain, Third Phase

The Year of Two Thanksgivings

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Samhain                                                                     Thanksgiving Moon

Grandson Gabe walked in the door and asked two important questions right away: Grandpop, what’s the password for your wi-fi? This was followed quickly by a pulled down t-shirt. See my new port! It was on his right side, had a small yellow butterfly valve in place temporarily and looked good. The end of a week long saga of hospital, surgery, recovery. That’s what he and his parents did on Thanksgiving day, Thursday.

So, we had a Thanksgiving brunch today: prime rib roast, popovers, squash from Jon and Jen’s garden, a rice dish from Barb, then pecan pie and homemade vanilla bean ice cream.

It was one of those children at the table holiday meals where the kids could hardly wait to get away. God, I remember that feeling. Stuck with the old people talking about grown up stuff. Boring. Really boring. I’m dying here. Let me go, please let me go.

Barb (Jen’s mother) recounted the story of her husband, Henry, and his family’s escape from Romania in 1964. Her father-in-law, mother-in-law and 16 year old Henry plus some other family members got ransomed by a group specializing in getting Jews out from behind the Iron Curtain. Henry’s parents wanted to go Israel. They got a flight to Vienna, then Genoa where they were told it would be six months before they could get papers for Israel.

Old town in Brasov, Transylvania
Old town in Brasov, Transylvania

Henry’s father knew there was a large Romanian Jewish community in Buffalo, New York, so they went there instead. Barb grew up in Buffalo. The rest of the story is Jen, Karen and Andy.

These are the long tendrils that any Thanksgiving meal sends out, connections weak and strong to ancestors who suffered, who triumphed, who slogged out their life and in that way allowed the people around this table to come together.

I’m grateful for each one in that great cloud of past lives who preceded this Saturday Thanksgiving on Black Mountain Drive. Yes, even those we don’t like so much. Without them, we wouldn’t have eaten this meal as a family today.

Oh. And the dogs got the four rib bones with plenty of meat on them. I’m grateful, too, for the doggy ancestors who brought this current pack of ours into existence.

 

Commentary on Religion, Faith and Spirituality, Family, Friends, Great Wheel, Holidays, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Weather +Climate

Black

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Samhain                                                             Thanksgiving Moon

At 4:30 this morning the Thanksgiving moon hung to the north of Shadow Mountain, obscuring Orion and most of the stars. Luna was the first light polluter. The lodgepoles glisten faintly, the snow on their branches catching a bit of the moonlight. It’s quiet, too, a Saturday on a holiday weekend, so few cars on Black Mountain Drive.

Black Friday has been on my mind. Maybe yours, too. This morning I contrasted the peaceful moments I have looking up at the night sky with those, who at the same time of day, waited in line in the cold for the chance to save big on some item or another.

It’s an easy target, Black Friday. The crazed shoppers banging carts to get there or there or there, first. The notion of a “holiday” devoted to retailers finally easing out of the red into profitability. The mission creepiness that caused Black Friday to ooze backwards into Thanksgiving Day. Trying to find a connection with the holiday of the incarnation or any of the wonderful celebrations of Holiseason.

Yet. For all the blackness and greed and confused motives Black Friday seems more sad to me than blameworthy. The assumption that somehow, if only I can get it, that cheaper something will heal me or make someone else happy. The frantic desire of parents to find the it toy of the season for their kids. The real underlying issue, the squeeze of the 99% by the 1%. Then twisting that squeeze into a way to wring more money out of the 99% and funnel it to the 1%.

Feels more like desolation, despair. Bordering on hopelessness.

Give me the Thanksgiving moon north of Black Mountain. The forest covered in snow. Orion above the house. And the gifts that are my family, the dogs, my friends, this wild and stony place.

 

General
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Samhain                                                            Thanksgiving Moon

“If the only prayer you said was thank you, that would be enough.” ―Meister Eckhart, “Selected Writings,” translated by Oliver Davies (Penguin Classics, 1995)

Faith and Spirituality, Family, Health, Holidays, Reimagine. Reconstruct. Reenchant., Shadow Mountain, Third Phase, Weather +Climate

Not the Thanksgiving We Got Ready For

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Samhain                                                                 Thanksgiving Moon

20151117_070312And so, we spent Thanksgiving on Shadow Mountain, watching the snow come down in lazy lines, thinking of Gabe and his second surgical procedure in a week, the roast and the pies and rolls in the freezer. It was downbeat, too quiet for a holiday.

Kate the clinician, a person with a bias for action, stewed. She wanted to do something, fix something, but the snow came down and no roast could be cooked, no salad prepared, no engagement with the medical issues of her only grandson. Impotence, or the feeling of impotence, is a terrible burden because it shrouds the capacity to act with an inability to do so. So many revolutions have been borne. So many political movements.

Later, after Gabe’s delayed procedure was over in the late afternoon, she relaxed. Jon had called and asked us not to come. The snow. The stress of the day. All made sense to me.

The holiday hung in the air like a sneeze not completed. Thankful, of course, for the good outcome with Gabe’s procedure. Thankful for the snow and the flocked lodgepoles, snowy Black Mountain, the dogs running pushing muzzles into the snow, rolling. Thankful that Kate and I were together, playing Bethumped, talking.

I ate too much of the sugar cream pie I made. Really more like a delicious pudding. It didn’t set up. No matter. We had shrimp with Bookbinder’s sauce while we answered questions about word origins, eponyms, general history, homophones and pushed our plastic markers around the board.

It wasn’t the Thanksgiving we had prepared for, but it was the one we had. And it was a good one.

In fact, this year we’ll have two Thanksgivings, yesterday and the delayed meal on Saturday around noon. Now, there’s plenty to do. Gabe’s better. Kate will have tasks to be done. And that prime rib roast. Well, I’m looking forward to that.

Family, Health, Holidays

Canceling Thanksgiving

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Samhain                                                                      Thanksgiving Moon

RRGabe250“Thanksgiving’s canceled,” Kate said when she called me on the intercom. I’d just finished my workout, was in a very different mental place. “Huh?”

“Gabe’s at the hospital. His port’s failed and is leaking into the site of the other port.” Oh.

Grandson  Gabe has a port embedded in his upper left chest, its purpose to provide easy access for the regular infusions of clotting factor. His old one failed a week ago and was replaced last Thursday. Hemophilia makes many things complicated.

This new development means surgery today, Thanksgiving. The pies and the breads, the prime rib roast, all into the freezer. We’ll celebrate when Gabe’s better.

Great Wheel, Great Work, Holidays, Our Land and Home, Shadow Mountain

Lights, Power, Holidays!

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Samhain                                                                    Thanksgiving Moon

So many things moving together at this time of year and at this time of our settling in on Shadow Mountain.

solar panels 11 22 middayThe solar panels are now all in place. This was midday today. A final inspection from Jefferson County on Wednesday, then IREA (electrical company) has to come out and install the net meter, maybe three weeks. At that point we can switch on the power.

holiseason3

Hanukkah comes fast after Thanksgiving, so we have two festivals colliding in the rich way of Holiseason, commenting on each other, sharing light.

holiseason2

We’ve also got a few holiday/Holiseason decorations, non-sectarian, ready to go for the Thanksgiving visitors. These two plus the pine cone wreaths and a couple of large red ribbons for the garage will satisfy my longing for direct participation in the season.

holiday fox2

The fox, the deer and the pinecone wreaths decorated in Hanukkah colors will go outside tomorrow or Wednesday.

The kitchen remodel, held up by Thanksgiving, gets started next Monday, the 30th. Even the generator seems to have regained its traction and may be actually functional soon. Then, finishing the loft, the downstairs bathroom and an external sprinkler system will be all we have left of the first round of make it our own projects. The boiler is in and working well.

We’re still under a year in the house, December 20th is our anniversary here.