Diary Day, December 9
8 am
Up in a groggy haze after a complicated, multilayered dream, containing threads of events and people from the past two years. But where did the Chinese dogs come from, or the prince for whom I am repairing a damaged robe? Earlier, at 2 am, the cat woke me up trying to open my dresser drawers. She likes to pull out tees and jammies, so I have wedged the drawers closed with thick chunks of cardboard, which do not discourage her in the least. Coffee can’t come too soon.
Going to be a gray, oppressive day. As I look at the day’s schedule, it looks like I can stay in comfy lounge clothes. That’s a plus.
During the morning routine of opening the windows and lighting the seasonal battery candles, my mind wanders from noticing the birds at the feeder to recalling last night’s phone call from Southern California. A longtime friend is receiving Cart-T treatment at City of Hope after chemo didn’t finish off the lymphoma between his heart and esophagus. We are at that age when falls and scary diagnoses change lives all too quickly.
9 am
- made his usual steel cut enhanced oatmeal for our breakfast, while Idid the French press coffee. Cereal topped with yogurt, strawberries, grapes, blue berries and almond milkis standard breakfast fare, with WBST playing, of course. The day seems a little brighter, until the gloomy report from IU Ball. Hospital full, 23 of 25 people in ICU with COVID were not vaccinated. In a recent article, we read that one of important sources of anti-vax sentiment is the “erosion of the idea of a common good”, and behind the low vaccination rates “lurks a more profound social weakness.” For decades public health has been the poor step-child of medicine. Paired with widespread distrust of government, we have more than COVID to defeat.
In what I call “putz” time before my 10 am meeting, I putter about, writing a birthday card to an elderly friend and making sugar scrub for bathing, before I am lured away to eaves drop on R’s zoom discussion group’s conversation about public education and what to do about inequality of access.
10 -11 am
Church stewardship committee on zoom. We are designing the pledge drive for February. But how do you plan, these days, in December, for an event in February? I was interrupted several times by calls from N., who is going for the first time to pick up food at Second Harvest tailgate for a new Afghan family. The box contained pork, as well as enough food for several families. What to do? We found a second family and decided she would bring me the pork which I can give to a family for whom the church shops monthly.
11:30 N. came by with the pork. She was clearly emotional about the experience…meeting a refugee family and imagining what it must have been like getting here. We talked and she gave me a crushing hug as she left.
12:00
Dinner (crusty tilapia, steamed broccoli and chopped salad) then coffee on the couch with R, drinking from my “Milk for Santa Mug”, a much beloved gift from a student years ago. Printed on the inside at the bottom: “I have been sooooo good,” LOL
1:30 Zoom exercise. I have been AWOL for several weeks; it feels good to be back, but I need to be careful.
2:30 Continued writing out-of-state Christmas cards. We co-write a holiday letter, reflecting on the year and its happenings; I add a personal note on each card. Some recipients are people whose friendship goes back more than 60 years, to high school and undergraduate friends. For a while I thought about electronic cards (save paper and trees), but the pandemic called out for more personal connections. So we buy cards from “good causes”, such as National Wildlife Federation and UNICEF. I do love writing the cards and allow myself a generous dram of bourbon…even in the afternoon…so my tongue stays moist for licking the envelopes!
3:40 I spilled the last of the bourbon on three letter enclosures. Time to stop and put something in my tummy.
5:00-6:30 Nosh supper of homemade bread (made by a friend), deli meat and an orange.
As evening fell (so early these days), I reversed the morning ritual, closing the windows and lighting the battery candles. Sat in the growing darkness, listening to All Things Considered, enjoying the holiday decorations. No tree, as we are leaving, but on the breakfront, buffet, and piano are collections of snowmen, creche sets, and Santas. The oldest pieces are the remains of the cardboard creche set from my family home and the homemade Santa R’s sister made the first year we were married (she was 13). Over the years the collection has grown with gifts from students, as well as bazaar, craft show and travel purchases. Each of them has a story and I love re-discovering them each year.
Found a home for the pork chops and sausage N. couldn’t deliver to the Afghan family. R and I headed out in the dark to the Second Harvest family for whom the church shops.
7:00-8:00 pm Worked on my stamp collection. I am redoing and expanding the one from my childhood, but organizing it by theme (transportation, animals, agriculture, states, birds, etc.), not by country. My grandmother collected stamps, and she got me started when I was about 10. Some of my earliest history and world geography lessons came from what she told me about the events and people commemorated on stamps from around the world. I learned about the young Queen Elizabeth and the US chaplains during WWII who gave up their life vests and went down with the ship. For years she saved duplicates for me, and my mother purchased mint blocks as new US stamps came out. The album moved with me from state to state over the years, but I am only recently returning to it. In my parents’ home, after their deaths, we found bags of stamps torn from envelope corners; some pieces had fragments of their names on them. When I found a used album in a resale shop, my interest was re-ignited, as it contained many large, beautiful stamps. I am still soaking and sorting.
8:00-9:30 Finished all but the local Christmas cards. Scurried through house pick-up (it keeps me sane) and made a countdown list for dinner guests tomorrow.
10:00 Tubby and to bed with my gratitude journal and iPad (a few rounds of solitaire and sukuko).
I love Diary Day…it makes me more present and in the moment.