Imbolc and the Snow Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Luke. Leo. Shadow. The flying hearing aid. Cool nights. Great Sol. The hard time in the Mountains. Little food, hidden under Snow. Predators hungry. Hibernators beginning to move around in their slumber. Temperatures careening between Winter and Spring. Snow sliding off the solar panels. Sit. Down.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Finding my hearing aid

Week Kavannah:  Yirah. Awe.

One brief shining: Puppy paws and puppy claws plus puppy bouncy energy hooked my hearing aid, sent it in off on a long flight, hunting for it, needing it even more than my phone, where could it be oh god what if it’s gone what if she smelled the ear wax and ate it, lost things get found by a search pattern, ok here, there, wait, underneath the dumbbell? That’s it! Whew.

Kate. Yes. Always Kate. My ninja weeder. Quilter. Clothes maker. Physician. Traveler. Keen intellect. But most of all, my sweet Kate. The woman of possibility and promise. Music lover. Grandmother. Stepmother, but really second mother to my son. One who would not quit. Dead next month for four years.

Yet also here. In her quilts. In the Turtles and the small troll with the Norwegian flag. In the bronze Horse statue from Camp Holloway. In the art from our time in Mexico City, Paris, Hawai’i. In her Judaica which I use. Most of all in my memory, nestled in with all I most cherish, never to leave.

Thirty-five years from our marriage in St. Paul’s Landmark Center. Thirty-five years from our wonderful honeymoon following Spring from Rome to Venice, Paris to London, London to Edinburgh, Edinburgh to Inverness. The first of many journeys we made together.

Circumnavigating Latin America. Korea and Singapore. Greece. The Greek Islands. Kusadasi and Ephesus. Istanbul. Maui many times. The Big Island and Kauai. NYC. New Orleans. Mexico City. Oaxaca. Merida.

The journey we made from St. Paul to Andover. The Gardens. The Dogs. The Bees. The Orchard. Then on to Shadow Mountain. The Mule Deer. Black Mountain. Congregation Beth Evergreen. Ruth and Gabe. Sadly, Jon.

Her own last journey. In and out of emergency rooms, hospital beds, surgery suites. A gradual, but inexorable decline. Yet always working the NYT crossword each morning. Always engaged with the politics of the day. Always engaged with me. Precious time together.

Now in the four years since she crossed the vale between life and death still vital and present in my heart.