Trigger Warning: Childhood Sexual Abuse And I Mean It

 I changed my mind last night about the tofu and veered into the soup lane. I'd read a recipe in the New York Time's cooking app for an onion, cabbage soup and that just sounded so good. And I had an entire head of cabbage. 
Of course I used their recipe as a starting point and went from there. I added spinach and sun dried tomatoes and potatoes, too. And it was delicious. 
Thought you'd want to know that. 

An "Anonymous" asked in a comment what the head of the little boy was in the picture I'd posted of Hank as a bebe. 

That was easy enough to answer and so I did. Here's a picture of the whole carving the boy is in.

Many of you have literally seen this same image dozens of times. The Lady there is the Virgin of Guadalupe, aka Reina de Mexico, aka Our Lady of Guadalupe. The male figure is representative of a guy named Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin (don't ask me to pronounce that and don't ask me to spell it again) to whom the Holy Mother appeared four times in 1531. Supposedly she chose him to convince a bishop to build her a church on the spot of her appearance and in order to convince the bishop, she performed several miracles  which gave proof of her authenticity. Look it up if you're interested. And curiously- of all locations for this church, Our Lady chose the exact spot where an Aztec goddess, named Tonantzin, had a shrine. 
I doubt there's any image in all of Mexico as prolifically displayed as that of Ms. Guadalupe's. She is beloved. I cannot speak to the authenticity of her holiness and miracle-doing abilities and it has been several centuries since the whole thing supposedly occurred so I'll just say that, ummm...
Okay. 
And I sort of love that Queen too. This representation of her I have was bought at a little shop FILLED with all sorts of iconic wood carvings and I knew I had to have that one the second I saw it. 
And that's the story of that. 

It did indeed get cold last night and has been too cold for me all day. I took the compost out a little after noon, came in and said, "That's it for me." I may have also said, "It's too fucking cold."
Okay. You know I did. 
A lot of people did not have water this morning due to frozen and/or busted pipes. Hank and Rachel's entire neighborhood's water system was down. They report they're getting a little water now. And it will be cold tonight again. This is so hard on so many people. We simply are not prepared or set up for cold like this. 

I have a lot to say about the new Epstein files dump but I really do not have enough information to know what are accusations and what might be proven facts or truly anything and I do not want to assume that everyone and every deed mentioned in them is factual. I'm sure that sentence is grammatically incorrect but you know what I mean. 
However, having said that, there are now images I have in my mind which are so much worse than what I was originally led to believe happened although that was more than bad enough, and plenty to put a whole lot of men and a few women behind bars. For the life of me, I cannot understand why these people are walking around, free as birds, most of them profanely rich (there's the answer, of course) while the children they abused will never, ever be free of the trauma of what happened to them. 
Look- I am not easily triggered but some of the things coming out have triggered me. I am not going into details. That is not my purpose here. I'm just saying that as a victim of sexual abuse in my childhood, hearing what went on at that island, in mansions and private clubs, causes me to want to creep into a shell and bury myself deep under the sand where I am hidden and all is dark and quiet.
Or at least, the child in me does and the adult understands and is in agreement. And so what are the victims of these evil, debauched, predatory, mostly men, feeling? I don't think many of us can know. 
What kind of a justice system do we have when the worst among us go about unafraid and protected by their money, their power, their positions, their names? And you know what? Most abusers are protected by the power they may have over their victims and which they use to keep those victims silent. BUT, if the victims do manage to tell someone, and if the abuse is reported, there is at least a chance the perpetrator will be charged and have to stand trial and possibly imprisoned. With these men who are listed over and over again in the Epstein files, there seems to be not even the threat of justice being served. 

I can't write any more about his because at the moment I am feeling rather numb and powerless- another result of childhood trauma. So I'll just end it here, say I hope that if you were a victim of childhood sexual abuse and are being triggered on a daily, even minute-by-minute basis, you know you are not alone. Our names are legion for we are many or whatever the hell that saying is. Oh, I just looked it up. That's what the demons living in the possessed man in the New Testament told Jesus before He cast them out to be transferred to 2,000 pigs. 
Isn't religion great? Too bad Jesus doesn't cut to the chase and cast out the demons that live among us. Or the Old Testament God Dude doesn't smite them. 
I'll shut up. 

I am loving all of us tonight. 

Ms. Moon

It Almost Snowed!

Could a picture better illustrate a winter day in North Florida? I think not. Gibson and Maggie were outside, hoping to see some of the snow flurries being reported all over social media and also, via personal sightings by both Rachel and Lauren. Snow! Snow in Florida! Again! 
But look how Maggie's dressed- suitable for snow with mittens and a hooded jacket while Gibson is in shorts and a t-shirt. I'm not sure if they got to see any of the tiny flakes or not but I bet you anything Gibson went back in the house to add more clothing if he spent much more time out there. For us, it is bitterly cold. 

If it feels like 18° at 34°, what's it going to feel like tomorrow morning when it's 19° or 20°? 

I haven't even stepped out of the door today. The compost can begin its decomposition in the kitchen. There is nothing in the garden I want badly enough to go out and pick. Mr. Moon stayed inside today too, mostly doing online shopping for flooring for the downstairs of the cabin and a glass shower door. Also, quite possibly a truck because his has reached the point of not being worth repairing and the man has to have a truck. He is already calling this new one- the one he hasn't bought yet- his last truck. And it won't be a new, new one. Trust me. I'm not sure Glen's ever bought a new vehicle in his life. 
Oh wait! I remember he did once. He sold it almost immediately. 

But now, he's gone to town. There's a basketball game and he offered to take Levon and August but it was decided that only August would go so that he could have some one-on-one time with his Boppy. 
I love that. 
So I'm home alone which is fine. I think I'll make myself some tofu which I haven't done for awhile. I shall once again use the pre-boiling method of preparing it because I think that really does make a nice texture if I press it after it comes out of the water. It may be that I really only want some good dipping sauce with something crunchy to transport said sauce to my mouth and tofu is a fine answer to that. 

I've done very little today. Some laundry because of course I did laundry. And I watered all of my plants in the house. I patched a bit on a pair of corduroy overalls I've been working on for eons now. Before long, the entire garment will be made of patches but that's fine with me. 

It could actually be said that perhaps in my case, visible mending is not the best idea but, oh, whatever. Those patches are strong and they are colorful. My goal has been accomplished. 

While I sewed, I watched an Agatha Christie thing on Netflix, or at least a few episodes of it. "Seven Dials," I think is the name. My biggest take-away from it so far is the verification of my belief that Helena Bonham Carter is one of the most beautiful women in the world. She is older now, of course, 59 years old, but to my eyes, she is every bit as gorgeous as she was and truth be told, her face is even more interesting. I will say that she is a quite youthful 59 year old but not in a way that makes one thinks of fillers and procedures. If she has had work done, it's good work.

Speaking of good work on an entirely different level, the anti-ICE protests across the nation have been astounding today. I watched footage from one in Salt Lake City which looked to be huge and let me just say- Salt Lake is hardly a bastion of left-wing liberals. 
This is all heartening. 

I've been wanting to share this picture of Hank when he was a baby. I remember when it was taken quite vividly. We had just recently moved into the house I spoke of a few days ago, the one without running water and with gaps in the walls and floors. Our friend Chloe took it and gave me this copy. 

In so many ways he looks just the same. My first baby, my precious child. It was winter and cold then too, but he looks pretty happy. He was, in fact, a happy baby and a happy child, too. I love that picture and it lives on the hallway altar. 

That's a picture I took last night of the moon behind the twisted, bare branches of a pecan tree. I love the clouds and also the light from my back porch. We were outside, checking out the new camper Jessie and Vergil had just bought. 

Looks cold, doesn't it? 

It was. But not as cold as it is tonight. 

Be warm. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Just When You Think Things Can't Get Worse

Today has not been anything like I thought it was going to be. We did not go to the coast because it was spitting cold rain that felt more like sleet and was gray and nasty and after our appointment with Jalisa, we said fuck it, and came home. Also, we were not in the best mood as I had jumped all over Mr. Moon for pointing out where he thought the card should be tapped when I was self-checking out with my limes and avocados at Costco and although it does sort of look like the place he pointed to would be the logical tap target, I knew in fact that it was not because I go through that line once or twice every week of my life and for some reason this just pissed me off. 
I tried to explain it to him (womansplain?) but he didn't get it and I don't think he will. Such a stupid little thing but boy, did it light me up. I really don't know why that triggered me so much but it surely did so today hasn't been the best day but it's much better now because, as you can see, we have two fine young men here who are now watching some science show on Netflix Kids but who also asked me to read to them before that and so I did. We are already in the nostalgia phase of reading books wherein they love for me to read them their old favorites and of course I love that too. 
The reason the little guys are here is because Jessie and Vergil went to Apalachicola today where they bought a travel trailer in which to live their soon-to-be-realized dream of taking off for six months to journey across the country and see what can be seen and do what can be done and have adventures. The plans are not all in place but their little home has now been bought. 
So Glen picked the boys up from after-school and brought them here and Jessie and Vergil will soon be here to pick them up and show us their camper thing. RV? Whatever. I am so excited for them and at the same time I'm devastated that they'll be gone for six months. We'll have to make plans to meet them somewhere which means I'll have to leave the North Florida/South Georgia area which is pretty huge for me. 

This is all just stream of consciousness because I'm hurrying. I need to get something in those boys' tummies. When they got here I made them their usual snacks which is a cheese toast for August and the gourmet peanut butter, honey, and raisin sandwich for Levon. 
"You did that so fast!" August said when I made Levon's sandwich.
"She's a grandma pro," said Levon. 

Yes. Yes I am. 

I'm reeling at the news that Don Lemon was arrested and spent the night in jail. Here we go. Get rid of the journalists who criticize the big orange blob, deny them their first amendment rights. This just gets worse and worse and fucking worse. It's all a huge clusterfuck mess of shredding the Constitution and Rule of Law with a Supreme Court in the Pedophile's pocket (well, some of them, enough to make a majority), and Republican lawmakers who don't have a pair of balls between the lot of them. 
Again. Some of them are stepping forward, stepping up. But so far, not enough. And even if they were, why should we think Trump would give a shit? So far he's ignoring everything he wants to ignore. There is no authority he seems to respect in the least. 

There is not enough Ativan, Xanax, and antidepressants in the known universe to calm the terror of so many of us. 
But oh yes, if we would just meditate and exercise and promote peace and love in our own communities, everything would be better. 
Would we have told that to the Jews in Europe who were seeing the path Hitler was bound and determined to take? 

And on top of it all, we've lost Catherine O'Hara, one of the greatest actors and performers and collaborators of our time. 
It's all too much. 

Sorry. Nothing very positive here today. I just don't have it in me. Even the prospect of clean sheets and martinis isn't helping. 

I need to go make those boys something to eat. 

Hey y'all- it's Friday.

Love...Ms. Moon

Sink To Soup To Song

 

This is my view of the sink when I'm using it. That's my compost bucket which has rusted through several times but Mr. Moon somehow patches it and don't ask me how. Mr. Moon Magic, perhaps. 
He's a magic man? 
But I just think that is the prettiest sink ever and I love the color so much. It honestly brings me pleasure to just stand at it. How lucky I am! I remember back around 1977 when my first husband and I lived in a shack (there is no other word to describe it) which had no running water although we had an iron hand-pump out back. I had several metal wash pans that came with the house and I'd pump water into them and wash dishes in one, rinse them in the other, and then lay the clean, wet dishes on a towel on a bench someone had built there. There was room for the washing pans too. We did not HAVE to live in a house with no plumbing but we were the back-to-the-land sort of hippies, or at least as back-to-the-land as we understood it to be. We had an outhouse, too. And Lord, was the shack house cold. Insulation had not been invented when it was built. It was made of pine and you could see the ground beneath the floors between a few boards and light from outside between cracks in the walls. We did have electricity but we got our heat from a wood stove. 
It's a wonder we didn't die in a fire in that place. It did eventually burn down when a person renting it decided to plug in a window unit AC which was way too much to ask of the wiring. Rather unbelievably, neither of the two people living there died but, being drug dealers, they had all their money in cash which burned up along with all their other possessions. 
I know I've told this story already but it's a great story and explains a lot about why I am so damn grateful for things like running water and ecstatically grateful for hot running water and central heat and air. 
Oh- I forgot to say that Hank was about seven months old when we moved in. 
Boy oh boy. But we survived! And no one got chilblains! In fact, it wasn't such a horrible experience and I still have vivid memories of the way the front and back doors sounded and felt when I closed them. They were built of the same heart pine as the rest of the house, sturdy and thick as castle walls. The band my husband was in at that time often rehearsed there and I cannot for the life of me remember why. Perhaps we had the largest house of anyone in the band. This is possible although there were only two very small bedrooms, a kitchen, a living area, and a hallway. No bathroom! Or perhaps we were far enough out in the country that no one would complain about the noise. 
Who knows? Not me.

It's been a stay-at-home day but not a particularly lazy one. Glen asked me this morning if I'd like to drive over to the coast area to get stone crab claws and oysters to bring home, and stop at the amazing plant nursery Just Fruits, to see if they have any other fruit trees we want. I did want to go but just not today. I had been looking forward to a day spent at home and suggested we go tomorrow after an appointment with Ms. Jalisa which will probably be the last scheduled one. And so that is now the plan. 
Also, I've really been wanting to make the NYT's app's Best Black Bean soup and that takes all day long because black beans are loathe to give up their structural integrity and go all soft. The recipe, which is a very, very good one, fucks up in one regard- it claims the beans will soften in 1-2 hours and that's just a lie. It even says not to presoak the beans and not doing so adds hours to the time it takes to cook them. But I am aware of this now and include that in my estimate of how long it's going to take to make the soup. I generally end up transferring the beans to my pressure cooker at some point and today was no different. After four hours of cooking, they were not even in the same neighborhood as soft but I pressure cooked them for half an hour and that did the trick. The soup is still on the stove, simmering at a very low temperature. 

Two very meaningful things happened today, one to Glen, one to me. 
One of the daughters of Anne-Helene, the beautiful and wonderful Norwegian woman who lived with our family for awhile in the late eighties and who died back in June of last year, sent me a Facebook request a few days ago which I instantly accepted. I woke up this morning to a message from her that was so beautiful and loving that I could not even begin to take it in. This daughter and her sister had heard stories about me and my family their entire lives and after Anne's death, they found my blog and I'm sure did a search on it for their mother's name and were able to read the things I wrote about their mother. Or, as the daughter wrote in her message this morning, "The best mum in the world." 
Sometimes I love the internet so damn much. I will be in touch with this daughter and her sister too, if she wants, and tell them stories of what I remember about Anne-Helene, which is a lot. And all of them are filled with love. 

And the thing that happened to Glen was that a woman he'd known years before he ever met me called him to tell him that her father had died (at the age of 97!) and she wanted to tell Glen that her dad wanted Glen to have his woodworking tools. 
What an honor! 
The father had helped Glen build the cradle he made for Lily back in 1985 and let him use his wood shop and tools then. Glen hasn't talked to him in decades but he somehow made such an impression that he made sure Glen would get these tools. 
I just went to take a picture of the cradle and this is what I found. 

Yes, that's Maurice employing her ET method of camouflage. 
That cradle could easily last another two-hundred years. 

Pretty crazy that both of those things happened today. And yet, they did. Voices from the past. Loving voices of the past. 
Both of us graced and gifted by them.

Bruce Springsteen has written a new anthem, as only Bruce Springsteen can do. Years ago I realized that that is what he does and he does it like no one else because his soul and his heart are deeply embedded in each one. 
Look. There is no one like Bruce Springsteen. Ask anyone who's been to at least one of his concerts and they'll tell you that those concerts are life-altering, mind-blowing, expectation-shattering experiences. 
I've been to two. The first one I went to, which I believe was in 1979, left me realizing that there are people among us who are truly of a different realm. Later on, I began to think of him as a rock and roll Bodhisattva. 
Look. I don't have the words. He's Bruce Springsteen and no one else ever was or is or ever will be. 

The point here is- he wrote a song about ICE in Minneapolis on Saturday, recorded it on Sunday and released it yesterday. He names names and there is no pussyfooting about. Bruce Springsteen doesn't mess with that shit.

Go ahead, Trump. Spew your tainted, sour, bile. 

You can lie but artists will never not call you out. 

Woody Guthrie

Enough.

Love...Ms. Moon

I'm Not Really Bitching, I'm Just Saying

My god but it was cold this morning. I did not want to get out of bed so early to get to pottery but I was going to do it, come hell or high water or frozen birdbaths or frost on the lawn or whatever. And I did. I always have a terrible night's sleep on Tuesdays, waking up over and over, wondering how much more time I have to sleep, worrying that I'll oversleep, frustrated that I can't get back to sleep...

That's just the way it is. 

When I got in my car to drive to town, it was 28° and I swear it took at least fifteen minutes for the car to warm up enough for me to stop feeling like I was getting chilblains. I am not entirely sure what chilblains are but I AM certain I was this close to getting them. 
Okay. I just looked them up and no, I didn't get them and I've never had them as far as I know but I just love that word. 
Chilblains. 
Doesn't it sound like something they got in that little house on the prairie?
Despite all of that, it was damn cold although eventually the car did warm up and I went to Jessie's house to get a snuggle with Sophie and pick up my motivator, the boss of me, my youngest daughter. 
Here. I took a picture of a picture of August's that was taped up in their hallway. 

I really like it. 

Sophie greeted me with her stuffed chicken toy in her mouth, waggling her tail and wiggling her body, and just being her sweet, funny self. Although I do not want any more dogs of my own, ever, ever, ever in this lifetime, I am glad that my kids have dogs that I can visit and pet and talk to in the way that people only talk to dogs and which dogs seem to love. 

Pottery was slightly different today. One of our class has gotten a job as a kindergarten teacher and so today was her last day. Added to that, another member had made empanadas to share with us all and they were so very, very good. I also did more talking with our new member and was glad to learn more about her. It's hard for anyone to walk into a class where everyone already knows everyone else. It can be lonely. It can be hard. There are only seven of us in the class and that's including the woman whose last day was today and over time, we have found our lives, our stories, becoming braided together, as so often happens. And our teacher is part of that too. We all know when one of us has a trip coming up or a difficult situation going on or a new interest and I think we all have an idea about how we all think about certain things. We laugh easily, we are self-deprecatory, we praise each others' work, we ask for suggestions, we give suggestions, we share tools and ideas, and in short, do what groups of women do. 
And that is really the best thing about pottery class for me. 

It took me a very long time to get going on my bowl this morning, but eventually, I did. I gave it all of my attention for two hours and came away feeling less positive about it than ever. It needs to dry another week before it can be fired and I have no real belief that it's going to hang together in the kiln. We shall have to see. I didn't even take a picture of it. 

Lily came to lunch with Jessie and me after class and that was a beautiful thing too. All of my kids have great senses of humor and I think we love to laugh more than anything but Lily? That girl will make you laugh. She is naughty and she is smart and she is not afraid of shocking her mama which makes me feel so very honored. 
And sometimes... I even shock them. They know I'm no saint nor ever have been. 
Here's a picture of what the effects of laughter can look like. 

And that was the important part of my day. The core of it. 
I came straight home after dropping off Jessie and I drove a different route than I usually do, down a skinny country road through pines and oaks and palms and pastures with cows, kneeling in the afternoon sun with eyes closed, the better to bask.

Glen's not home yet from a little jaunt up to the cabin to do...something? 
I have a vague idea and it may involve the boat but I'm not going to pretend I really know when I don't. 

Going to be cold again tonight. Hell, it already is cold tonight. Although I come (at least on the maternal side) from sturdy Yankee blood, it surely has not been passed on down to me. Or, more likely, it has been thinned to nothing more than salty red water by my years here in the semi-tropics. 
We have discussed this before. 
We will probably discuss it again. 

Stay warm and don't get chilblains. They look miserable. 

Love...Ms. Moon

We Dwell On The Ground, We Can Look Up At The Heavens

I'm running very late this evening because I had a full day in town and then when I got home, I had a few catch-up chores to do and groceries to put away and my afternoon cottage cheese and fruit to eat which is very important. But mostly I had to catch Mr. Moon up on the things that happened today. 
One of those things was about my appointment with the nurse practitioner at the urology clinic, of course. 
That went pretty well. I did learn a few things and now have a little more basis on which to determine whether I want to pursue a retrieval procedure for the two (count 'em!) large stones in my right kidney which are too big to pass on their own. I knew I had one, I did not know I had two. 
Before I get any further with this, let me just say how impressed I am with the speed and efficiency in that clinic. I don't think I've ever waited as long as two minutes in the initial period after check-in before my name is being called and I'm led back to get a urine sample. After that, I wait in another area but never even as long as ten minutes at which time I'm led to a room where the doctor (for the first appointment) and the NP (for this one) make an almost immediate appearance. And then you get right to it. 
I liked the NP. She was knowledgable and forthright, and patiently listened to all my questions and gave the answers she had. One thing she said that I did not and do not believe is that it is highly unlikely that one of those very large stones is causing the discomfort and symptoms I experience sometimes, especially after exercise. "Well, then, what could it be?" I asked. 
"Musculoskeletal?" she asked. 
"Nope. That is definitely not it," I told her. I still think it's the stones. Or at least a stone although she says they are pretty well settled in there. So that was a bit disconcerting. 
I asked her if there was any real danger to having a "wait and see" attitude and she said that was an option however, the larger stone is so big that it should probably be attended to. 
Mmmmmm...
She recommended I get an X-ray in order to see if they show up on X-ray to have a better idea of their movement. I guess you can only get so many CT scans before your kidneys get burned up or something. I have no idea. I said that was fine, but could she please promise to call me when they got the X-ray back? She said that if I wanted, we could go over them right after they took them and within five minutes I'd had the X-ray and was back in the room with her. The stones did show up on the X-ray which I understand is a good thing. 
So now it's up to me to determine what I want to do here. And I have the additional decision to make which is that if I decide I DO want to go for the procedure, do I chose the doctor at the new clinic or my old urologist? Throw in the fact that the new clinic is not associated with the main hospital in Tallahassee which has a brand new surgical center which is where I got my first stone laser-blasted, and I don't know what the fuck to think.

BUT, all of that wasn't the first thing I told Glen about. That would be the phone call I got from a neighbor who was distressed about a situation in front of our houses involving a deceased cat and I am still not sure about the details but someone's cat had died and they found the cat and were carrying it down the sidewalk and crying. 
The sequence of events and clarity of the details was a bit murky so I had to keep asking questions. But then, she said, "And since Harvey's in jail..."

What? 
Hold on. Harvey's in jail? 

I am NOT going into details here because again, the sequence of events was not clear and the details I received were murky. I do believe that Harvey probably is in jail and I do believe that he is having, uh, challenges. 
I noticed awhile back that his property had become a complete mess with stuff scattered and strewn all over the place. This was not like Harvey. He kept his yard tidy or at least tidy-ish, and although he often changed things around and added or subtracted one sort of religious folk art thing or another, it was not a scene of chaos until recently. 
A few weeks ago I noticed two men who were doing something with a shovel in front of one of the trailers that I suppose Harvey was using for shelter although I have no idea what but I think that possibly they were relatives trying to help. Soon after that, the yard was tidied and neat. These details I saw for myself and so feel okay to post them. Nor do they cast any aspersions on Harvey. 
So I really do not know what is going on but the chaos in his yard may have been reflecting chaos in his mind. I say "may have" because I just don't know. It was just so out of character for him. 
In a way, I'm almost glad he's in jail because at least there he's sleeping warm and getting three meals a day, even if they're not great. He has no electricity or plumbing on his property and that, too, is a fact. If he is going through some sort of mental crisis, he does not need to be in jail though, but in some sort of mental health facility. 
The county we live in is very poor and I don't even know if there is such a facility. I've never heard of one if there is. 

Life is so fucking complicated and the truth is, sometimes there is just no easy answer or even completely definitive answer, whether we are talking about kidney stones or the extreme difficulties of the impoverished and possibly not-quite-mentally healthy. 

So I related all of this to my husband and we discussed it and there are other considerations I have not mentioned. Of course. But basically that is it. 

The picture at the top is one I took at the seafood restaurant Jessie and I went to today for lunch. The woman behind the counter told us that yes, they'd put up the "Please do not eat our display" because people were indeed eating their display. 
Excuse me? 
Well, fried green tomatoes are mighty delicious and when they come with cheese and other tasty things, I am sure they are even more so. 
Still...

I knew I was going to be with Jessie tomorrow for pottery and then probably again for lunch but I just really needed to be able to discuss things with another human and Jessie being a nurse, that helped with the kidney stone thing. I am sure I talked TOO MUCH but she is kind and patient with me and we did a lot of laughing and sat at the table for a long time after we'd eaten. 

And then, (OH MY GOD!) I went to Costco, got gas and groceries, went by my bank to make a payment, and on to Publix. 
I went to "my" Publix instead of Lily's because we had a prescription ready to pick up at their pharmacy which is the pharmacy we use and in a shocking development, I discovered that since last week they have put in new, more energy-efficient refrigerated spaces which changes the location of some things although things in the aisles seemed to be about the same. I was shocked, mostly at how fast all of this has been accomplished. And the pharmacy section, which I think I mentioned last week, is being expanded and rebuilt and yet, is very much still functioning. It is a bit disconcerting but change is inevitable and I'll get used to it all within a few weeks or months, I'm sure. I just texted Owen because that's the Publix he works at. He said they've been working after closing every night to get the work done. 

Oh, the excitement in my life! 

To top it all off, I used my garden sink for the first time today. I rinsed out my compost bucket as I said I would and it is far easier and more convenient than rinsing it out in the spigot. 
Today Glen hauled more pine straw for me to mulch the camellia bed as I get things cleared and he asked me if I would like him to pull out all the monkey grass growing in it. Would it make me really, really happy?
ARE YOU KIDDING ME? 
That is one hell of a job. 
Should I be worried? 
I hope not. 

Going to be very cold here tomorrow and the whole next week is not going to be what we might call balmy. 

I do very much realize that for many of you, these temperatures would be absolutely balmy and I will not complain. But- HOW DO YOU DO IT? 

Pottery tomorrow. Look what arrived today. 

Stroke and coat, baby! I won't be using it tomorrow because I have no glazing to be done but it's there when I need it, and for Ms. Jessie, too. 

There was a moment today when I looked up, as I try to remember to do so frequently and there was the pale more than half a moon but less than full, ghostly white against the impossibly blue sky and although of course this is something I've seen thousands of times in my life, for whatever reason, today it gave my soul something it needed. It sustained me. It reminded me that despite all of the evil and cruelty and insanity going on here right now, some things are eternal and not in the least affected. Or at least as eternal as we can imagine. A heavenly body that pulls our tides, that calls forth our babies, that illuminates our nighttimes, that shines silver against a velvet sky, from the tiniest cutting of a baby's fingernail to that full-bellied globe that rises orange and gold and then hangs above us. 

There is beauty. There is order. There is a rhythm and reason to be found in our natural world which cannot be destroyed by mere humans. 

I felt this today as I looked up at that pale moon, bright enough to be seen in the blue, daytime sky. And it's all there for you, too. 

Love...Ms. Moon

 

Another Day, Another Post

I realize that's a fairly pathetic picture but it's one small group of the plants Mr. Moon and I moved from the front porch into the house today. Those are in the Glen Den. I had said I was going to let my plants root hog or die but seeing the below freezing temperatures we're going to be having for at least a week, I knew that if I didn't want to lose a bunch of them, we'd have to move them in. So I unwrapped them and was surprised and quite happy to find they all looked to be in pretty good shape, actually. I think wrapping them in plastic before I wrapped them in sheets really did help. And all I'd done was bag them up in kitchen garbage bags which are back in the cabinet now, ready to be used for their intended purposes. I've got some in the Glen Den, a few in the library, and some in the dining room. Most of the ones in the library and dining room were brought in a few weeks ago as were all the plants in the hallway, because they were light enough for me to handle by myself. The huge ones though, Glen put on the hand cart and we trundled them in that way.

The ones that have been in the library look very happy. 

Okay, that Monstera plant on the right looks a little yellow but I think it's okay. Can you see the jigsaw puzzle I've got going there on the left? 
Pro tip: If you need a magnifying glass to do a jigsaw puzzle, it may not be worth the effort. Oh well. It's not the completing, it's the doing, right? 

A few random hallway plants. 

And some of the dining room plants. 
Every year I vow and declare that we are too old to bring my babies in and every year, we do it anyway. Glen actually almost insisted this year. I kept trying to convince him that it wasn't really necessary. I mean...they're just plants. But he wasn't having it. He is a sweetheart. And as I said to a friend today, he is just undaunted. Me? Anything can be too daunting to even consider. Like getting up to pee in the middle of the night. Too daunting. Cleaning the baseboards. Oh, WAY too daunting. Raking leaves for garden mulching? Please. No way. 
But he just burns on through one task after another and sometimes he even inspires me to help. 

So we did that and then he went to town to get pine straw to put under and around the garden sink and I swept up the litter that bringing plants in always causes and I watered all of them. And then, because I was being so darn domestic, I cleaned out the dishwasher filter which is always a rather nasty job but not that bad, really. Just one of those things you put off and then, having finally done it you wonder why in hell you put it off for so long. It's not that big a deal. I did laundry and I tidied a little and all in all, not such a bad day. 
A cold day though. And getting colder. I will NOT complain, however. 
You know I lie. I will complain. 

Tomorrow morning I'm going in to get that follow-up on the CT scans of my kidneys. I am very curious to find out what they showed. Did I already say that? I'm sure I did. But the truth is, I am. And I'm probably asking more of the urologists and P.A.'s than they'll be able to give me which is some sort of prophecy, I guess, about whether or not I'm ever going to have another stone which makes a serious attempt to escape the kidney and I doubt they can really answer that. Also- what are the odds that the "too big to pass" stone is going to fuck me up? 
Again. I don't think they'll have any definitive answers. 
But it will be one more thing to check off my medical "to do" list and that's always good. 

I really don't have that much more to say this evening. I thank all of you who read and/or read and commented on yesterday's post. Suddenly, I had to say something. I spit it out like someone who has mistakenly taken a swig of spoiled, soured milk, uncontrollably and without thought although of course, I did think about it as I wrote it but there was no more holding it in. 

This will probably happen again. 

Of course it will happen again. 

Meanwhile, here's what Tim Walz, governor of Minnesota, had to say to Pam Machine Gun Lying Lips Bondi today in a press conference. 
I generally tell anyone who reads here that there's no real need to watch any video I post because watching videos can seem and be a real waste of time if you're just not that interested or invested in the subject matter. However. If you can, I'd recommend watching this one. It is short.

In a parallel universe, that good man, that no bullshit man, is the vice president of the United States of America and none of this horror is happening and none of us feels the need every waking moment to know what horrendous event has taken place since we last checked because Kamala Harris is our president and Walz stands squarely behind her and they've got it covered. 

Well. 

Stay warm. Take care. Love the ones you're with and show them that love in all the ways you can. 

Like this. 

Love...Ms. Moon