Category: family

the end of Just Jot It January 2019

Linda gave the final prompt for this last day of Just Jot It January: “your favorite thing/part/blog post of last year or last month.” I thought I would write two brief responses.

My favorite blog thing for the last month is that I actually managed to post every day this month. Given that my posting has been so sporadic for so long, this feels like an accomplishment. Bonus: It means that I am writing again, which had definitely fallen by the wayside over the last couple of years. I even have managed to write a few poems recently. Can I keep it up? Probably not the posting every day part, but I’m hoping to carve out some writing/revising time on a regular basis.

My favorite in-person thing of the last month was the return of daughter E and granddaughter ABC from their four week visit with our son-in-law L in London UK . Sometimes in the past when ABC travelled, she would not immediately want to come to us, but this time she broke into a big smile, called out to us, and wanted hugs and kisses. This gives me hope that, when she and E re-locate permanently to the UK later this year, we will be able to keep our relationship alive via videochat. I knew this was possible if chats happened on a daily basis; ABC definitely knows that L is her daddy when they videochat. I doubt we will be able to orchestrate daily calls once they are all together in London, but it seems that weekly ones may be enough to keep us in ABC’s memory bank.

Thanks to Linda for Just Jot It January and thanks to all the other participants! Write on!
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singing again

Last night, for the first time in over a year, I went to a (Binghamton) University Chorus rehearsal.

I have written posts before on the changes in the choral program* and the University which necessitated the transformation of what had for decades been a large chorus of community members, students, and staff which sang a major concert every semester into a much smaller ensemble that sings when needed to help the student groups perform larger works.

This semester, we are preparing to sing Ralph Vaughn Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, which I performed once before with University Chorus in 2003. This piece is being programmed a lot this year because of the bicentennial of the birth of Walt Whitman, whose poems comprise most of the text of the work. As luck would have it, the Smith College Alumnae Chorus is also singing the work this year; I will be joining our July tour to Slovenia, where we will sing two performances.

Most of my singing for the past year has been either in church services or with ABC, whom I can sometimes sing to sleep. Not exactly the caliber of singing required for Vaughn Williams. Fortunately, our director, Bill Culverhouse, is very good at getting our bodies and brains engaged, so I actually managed to acquit myself quite well, helped by the fact that we worked on the third movement, “Reconciliation”, in which we second sopranos get to sing a lovely, lyrical passage twice. It’s also one of the movements that stayed with me over the last decade and a half since I learned it. Some of the other sections are going to be a bit harder to get back in my head.

It is also hard to get used to rehearsing with a much smaller group. I was used to University Chorus being 80-100 voices and being one of about fifteen second sopranos. It’s somewhat more daunting to be one of five seconds in a group of about thirty. I anticipate doing a significant amount of preparation at home, as I did when we sang music related to St. Mark’s in Venice in December 2017.

I was very happy to see some of my singing friends again. And even happier to be singing together again.

* In looking back at this post, which explains a lot of my experience with the transition itself, there are several things that didn’t happen in the way I had anticipated. My mom, who had then been in hospice care, was decertified in October of 2018, and, while continuing to suffer from congestive heart failure, is happily still with us. The visa process for daughter E has been a much longer slog than we had thought. She and ABC are still living with us, probably until August of 2019. Lastly, the University Chorus hiatus was longer, as this academic year we are singing in the second semester rather than the first.
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balance

I’m opting to use the Just Jot It January prompt today, which is “balance.”

A large company in our area used to promote the concept of work/life balance.

They don’t anymore.

Now it is work/life “integration.”

This seems to mean that the employee is supposed to squeeze the rest of their non-work life and responsibilities into gaps in their work life. It also means that work can lay claim to what used to be personal/family time, such as evenings, weekends, and vacation, expecting monitoring of work email and helping to address problems over the phone.

I don’t think this is good for the employees, their families, or the business. It’s easy for workers to burn out and that is not good for anybody.

Let’s try to get back in balance.
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lunar eclipse

ABC didn’t sleep very well last night and I was helping out.

We looked together at the moonlight casting shadows on the snow in the backyard. We are experiencing a super moon, meaning that the moon is at its closest to the earth in its orbit, so the moon appears a bit larger.

By the time ABC went to sleep, the lunar eclipse was about halfway to totality. It was too cold for B and me to go out in the yard to observe it, but we could see it from our large, south-facing kitchen windows.

Even though it was called the “super blood wolf moon eclipse”, in our area the eclipsed moon seemed more greenish-white than red, probably due to our atmospheric conditions.

During totality, ABC woke up, so I was in her room for quite a while. By the time I could look out the kitchen windows again, the bright light of the moon was back, casting moonshadows from our trees on the snow.

For the record, I did eventually get some sleep myself…
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digging out

This morning we are digging out from a major snowstorm. We got about a foot (350 cm) of snow with a layer of ice buried in it from a period of freezing rain in the wee hours of the morning.

B and I went to work after a sustaining breakfast of steel-cut oats. He wrangled our big orange Ariens snowblower. It’s old, having belonged to my dad for many years; we inherited it when they finally hired someone to clear snow a few years before they moved into an apartment. Despite its age, it is still very powerful, so B set to work clearing the driveway and walk, as I tackled finding the buried Bolt.

B pulled out a large pushbroom for me from the garage; no little snowbrush was going to do. I brushed snow down onto the driveway that B had cleared and then used a shovel to get it onto the snowbanks.

The snow and ice combo was so heavy that I cracked a plastic shovel and had to move on to a metal one.

The freezing rain had coated the car doors, but I eventually was able to get into the Bolt and start it up so I could blast both the front and rear defrosters. Later in the day, we plan to move the Pacifica out to the driveway and put the Bolt inside so we can plug it into its charger to keep the battery conditioned, as we are expecting temperatures below zero Fahrenheit (-18 C) tonight and only single digits (-15 C) tomorrow.

By the time I had gotten the Bolt free, I couldn’t feel my toes, despite my heavy socks and boots. B wasn’t done, though. He raked the snow off the metal garage roof, used the snowblower to clear that away, and then took the snowblower across the street to help a neighbor who was attempting to clear his driveway, including the area that had been plowed in from the street, with a shovel.

We are both back inside for the rest of the day. The roads are still snowy and there is a state of emergency in effect, which means that there should be no unnecessary travel.

Maybe it is time for some hot coffee for B and white hot chocolate for me…
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SoCS: Sesame Street

Thirty years ago, our television was often tuned to Sesame Street on our local public broadcasting channel. It was an hour long and we followed the story lines of the human and Muppet characters. We had Sesame Street songs on cassette and some Sesame Street toys. We even had a Sesame Street songbook that served us well for many years and often sat on the music rack of our piano.

Now, our television is sometimes tuned to Sesame Street on our television, which is much thinner but with a bigger screen than it was thirty years ago. We still have it on our local public broadcasting station, but the episodes, which are only a half hour, are delayed by months, as the series is now on HBO. I admit that it bothers me, although I know that they needed to make the change to keep the series going.

Our granddaughter ABC, like many other young children, is more likely to watch Sesame Street segments on a tablet or smartphone. And, unlike our old cassettes, there are no tangles of tape as they got used often.

I hope that Sesame Street will continue to be produced around the world for many more years to come. I want it to be there for ABC’s children, too.
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return

So now my daily participation with Just Jot It January just got more challenging by a factor of two, but I couldn’t be happier! Daughter E and granddaughter ABC arrived safely yesterday evening after four weeks in London. Given the long day and the five hours of jet lag, they are both adjusting to being back quite well.

ABC was away for her nineteenth month and grew another inch while she was gone. She added more words, including a couple words of Tagalog. She is also pronouncing some of her older words more clearly. She clearly remembered us and the house – and her toys. She has been in quite a good mood, especially given that not only is there jet lag but she is also just getting over a cold.

The house is undoubtedly livelier than it has been. With more demands on my time, I’ll have to re-double my efforts to continue to post every day.

Can I do it?

Stay tuned…
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coming home!

This really will be just a jot today because we are getting ready for daughter E and granddaughter ABC to come home from London, where they have been visiting with son-in-law L for almost a month. We need to finish up the toddler-proofing that we had undone/ignored while ABC was away. There will be some time with Nana and Paco, as there usually is every day, but we need to leave for the airport mid-afternoon. Unfortunately, the flights didn’t work out to come to our local airport, which only has one carrier and three flights a day, so we will need to take an hour and a half drive to pick them up.  After dinner near the airport, we will all head for home in our hybrid Pacifica. Although we will get back here between 8 and 9 PM, it will feel to E and ABC like 1 to 2 AM, so there may be napping on the way. Everyone at my house and Nana and Paco can hardly wait to have E and ABC back with us!
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helping out

I decided to postpone my planned post for today to respond to the Just Jot It January prompt of the day – “self.”

As my parents have aged and encountered more health problems, I have taken on more of their household tasks myself. Because they have lived for a number of years in a continuing care senior community, some of the cleaning and cooking is taken care of, but I have been helping with laundry, shopping, banking, etc.

Today, I represented my parents at the funeral of one of the other residents, who had lived there almost as long as my parents. She was also a stalwart of our church. She had been able to be very active until the last few months, when she had a stroke and other complications.

I was able to speak to a couple of the other residents after the service. They were upset, as one would expect. One of them told me that she had told my father he needed to live at least another ten years, which given that he is turning 94 in March, is a bit of a tall order. Still, there is one woman who is in independent living who is 110, so who knows?
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another step

Our family has taken another step in reducing our carbon footprint. We replaced our 2005 Honda Odyssey with a new Chrysler Pacifica hybrid. Having had a minivan in the family since E was an infant thirty-two years ago, we like their versatility for transporting people and cargo. We wanted to keep that utility but cut back on emissions.

As it turns out, the Pacifica is the only plug-in hybrid minivan on the market. It has a full gasoline-powered engine plus enough battery to travel thirty-ish miles. That means that most days, we can run on battery power but have the flexibility to go on long trips without having to plan on stopping at a rapid charging station as we would have to do with our Chevy Bolt.

As it turns out, in order to get the most advanced safety features, we wound up having to get a lot of other bells and whistles, too.  I admit that I am having a bit of trouble adjusting to nearly everything happening by touch screen. Sometimes, buttons and knobs are easier!

It is nice to not have to go to a gas station very often and I appreciate that we have so drastically reduced our transportation greenhouse gas emissions. For those of us who live in places without much mass transit, transportation is one of the most difficult areas to achieve reductions, so I am grateful to have gone mostly electric, especially as most of our electricity comes from our solar panels.

It’s fun to go green!
Pacifica hybrid

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