restingmotion

A Short Walk Around My Neighborhood

 

I am painfully aware that it has been a couple of weeks since I last wrote, and there is basically no excuse for that except that my head has been wandering elsewhere.  And yet, as much as I want to say something, anything almost, my head is not really focused.  It is turning out to be not such a good day here.  I had my last chemotherapy session on Wednesday and today I have been hit with nausea and neuropathy and my head is completely discombobulated.  The good news is that as bad as it gets, it is all going to get better from here on out and I just have to cope with my body, with my head, with the water leak in the kitchen, with whatever else life throws my way.

 

 

The photos in this post are all from my neighbor's gardens, here meaning neighbor in the broadest sense, taken on my walk Wednesday morning, just before that last chemo.  Just a walk through a suburban neighborhood, with suburban landscaping and flowers, but also in many ways a true neighborhood, where neighbors walk and stop and talk to each other, a neighborhood where one day, when I was just up to walking again after my last bout with neuropathy, I was stopping for a rest while holding on to someone's mailbox.  A neighbor stopped and asked how I was, and he later drove around the block to make sure I was still up and moving and would get home ok.  I was almost home at that point and did not need a ride, but gratitude and warm feelings filled the rest of my day, and truth be told the rest of my week.

 

 

I continue to think about this, about community and neighborliness, and where we choose to live.  It is a subject that has been on my mind a lot of late.  Partially because I used to be a bounder, a person who when I would get unhappy would just up and ditch it all, but I learned that doesn't solve anything, because unhappiness is often the one thing that you take with you everywhere, or at least the seeds of that unhappiness.  First of all one needs to figure out oneself.  Yes, outside forces can push those boundaries, and this year of COVID lockdowns and health issues and cancer and feeling miserable have not helped with those inner demons, with that battle between inner and outer, and the matter of self-determination. Adversity pushes us to question what we really want, but at the same time, we have to dig deeper, to look below the surface.  Because there is always that layer of outer frustration that we may want to slough off, only to find we have stripped away too much skin, made the wrong choice, and left ourselves either numb or raw and wounded.

 

 

I am not raw and wounded right now.  My mail person just came up and dropped off a pile of catalogs, catalogs I might normally toss right into the recycling bin.  But today I will lie settle on the sofa with a cup of tea and let my mind wander as I turn the pages.  I will watch US Open Tennis.  I will eat something healthy even though I don't feel like eating.  I will do this because I refuse to give in, even though I am so behind on everything I sometimes question whether that is really true.  But I can also admit that there are days when mindlessly browsing through catalogs is perhaps more important than chasing a few dust bunnies around the house, not more important than mopping up a wet floor, but hey, catalogs then become a reward.  Eventually I will pick up the newest Louse Penny, which I have been saving for this weekend, but my mind is not yet settled enough to read it.  

 

 

This last photo, this is from my house.  I posted it, or a similar photo, on Instagram earlier in the week. You can see these apricot drift roses against the fence from the street.  They are still in their nursery planters.  I still haven't gotten them planted, but they appear to be happy here nestled between the small azaleas I did plant in the spring.  The roses will not be against this fence when they make it to their final location, but for now they offer a bit of promise, both because they look good even when I do not feel good, and hence they make me happy, but also because they are thriving despite setbacks, a reminder that the ability to thrive is not dependent on avoiding the bad things, just learning to navigate them.  I hope that is a lesson I can continue to grow into.

 

 

 

Monday Morning

Why is it that I post the least when I am also doing the least?  Is lethargy a deep soul-sucking sinkhole?  Do I simply have nothing to say?

 

Long ago, when George was still alive, he would occasionally see me quietly lost in thought and ask what was on my mind.  Often I would reply "Oh, nothing." and his response was invariably, "I don't believe that for a second."  He was correct, but I often wasn't ready to share, or it seemed irrelevant somehow.  Is that where I am now?  My mind has not particularly been at rest, but my body, and my energy, oh my, they have been mired deeply in the mud.  Don't mind my ruminations then, rough as they are, at the moment they are all I have.

 

 

Admittedly, it hasn't been all bad.  I went up to Hancock county to see a friend's new farm.  There was fabulous food and fellowship, and an overnight as well, my first trip away from home since chemo started.  I had to take a nap and retire early, explored less than others, communed less as well.  But there was something about stirring, half awake, hearing the murmur of voices late in the night, that was soothing -- such a change from over a year in an empty house, alone.  It was good for my soul.  

 

 

I posted this photo on Instagram.  It seems I have been remiss, even there.  Early morning fog on the river.  This morning scene, and the entire visit in its own way, brought up bittersweet memories.  The morning fog on the Hudson as the nights cooled.  The many trips George and I would make on weekends, hiking and wandering in the Takanics, the Berkshires, the Green Mountains.  These are all a part of the Appalachian chain, and there is some similarity in the sense of place to me.  This is one of the things that made me feel more comfortable as I moved here from New York.  For whatever reason, I always preferred these various segments of the Appalachian chain to the Adirondacks and Catskills, which are separate ranges.   These places always felt like home, even though I certainly was not "from" that place.  We would spend many a weekend wandering and exploring. George would talk of retiring to Vermont, either in a small town, or on a small farm, but only if it had a flat driveway.  He was tired of plowing our steep hill.  He wanted to be away from people. I would agree, but only if we could go to New York or Boston, or somewhere three or four weekends a year for live music.  At that point I didn't know George would never voluntarily retire. Sitting on that front porch, looking at that fog, made me think not so much of Tennessee, where I was, but of the Berkshires and southern Vermont, of dreams and longings.

 

I don't actually know if I was yearning for something real or something imagined.  This could have all been a whisper of discontent, rising out of my general dissatisfaction with life at the moment.  Chemo is not fun.  My first infusion of paclitaxel, or Taxol, was a bit of a shock, despite having being reassured that most people found it easier.  It is possible that my worst days on Taxol are not as severe as my worst days on doxorubicin, but the truth is that, aside from the day after treatment there seemed to be no best days. I don't know if that is because of the Taxol or if it is because I experienced some complications and the second infusion was delayed a week, until tomorrow.  Today I feel better than I have since June  (the last time I missed an infusion due to health issues), but I am still tired and short of breath, and have a few remnants of peripheral neuropathy.  Six more weeks. 

 

 

The other news, which is sad news indeed, concerns this little guy.

 

 

Moises went outside last Tuesday, as is his way, and for whatever reason, either initial willfulness or a dreadful accident or encounter, he never returned.  People keep telling me he might yet show up, and he might, but it seems past the point where one might hold one's breath.  He is generally not one to wander far.  I knew when he decided, at age 10, that he was going to become an outside cat, that this day might happen. That was four years ago, and I was probably more upset about the possibility at that time than I am now.   I know he was pissed at me.  I went away for an overnight.  I took him to the vet.  Moises would tell me he would rather go die in a noble battle or in the woods than go to the god-damned vet.  Fourteen and a curmudgeon.  Nonetheless I miss him.  I still hopefully look out the doors, step-outside, call his name.   

 

It has been a hard year.  Strange that, only a year since I broke my nose, found out I had a heart issue.  I lost Tikka last August.  Poncho. Cancer. Moises.  It feels like a lifetime. Life is not really about avoiding pain or loss; they are inevitable and we see that constantly in the cycle of the seasons around us.  As much as we hope we can escape, it is impossible.  It is not the avoidance of pain that makes us who we are, but the experience itself, the diving into it, the refining, much as raw gold is smelted and refined into something beautiful.  That doesn't mean that the dive itself is fun, and that we don't sometimes cramp up and think we will never make it through.  I will make it through.  This is only a moment.  

 

Who will I be when I reemerge?

 

 

 

What Was I Thinking?

Whenever I get too deeply in my head, too deeply in my own obsessions and excesses, my too-muchness, life has a way of reminding me  to slow down.

 

 

Way back in January I said I was going to resurrect the old knitting and sewing blogs.  I had plans.  Big plans.  I should know better. I was always the kind of child whose eyes were too big for her stomach.  I still am that child.  I want to do everything, to know everything, to miss nothing, and even as I recognize that I cannot physically do that, neither can I manage it psychologically.  Another part of me wants to sit on the grass and stare at a dandelion for hours, to be lost in dreams, to play, and to let my imagination run wild while the world slips by unnoticed.  

 

For a while I managed three blogs.  For a while I didn't even manage one.  You know what?  It doesn't matter.  But what does matter is that I rediscovered something and that is sometimes my own tendency not only to overthink, but my tendency to allow my own ideas and inspirations and general mental peripatetic overdrive leap far ahead of what is actually important.  I am not a knitting person as distinct from a sewing or needlepoint or embroidery person.  I am not a gardener or a cook.  I am all those selves and more.  There is no one thing I am driven to come home and focus all my energies on, at least not consistently.  The more I try to compartmentalize myself and my interests the more confused I grow.  I need to hop from pile to pile, and sometimes I need to knock all my piles down and let them reconfigure themselves in news ways.   

 

All of this is a long way of saying that all I have energy for is one blog.  Actually, all I have interest in is one blog, one life, one me.  So sometimes, if you are not interested in x or y, I may bore you to tears.    There are days when I bore myself to tears. So be it.

 

 

So what has happened in the ten or eleven days since last I wrote?  Precious little.  Precious little is a good thing.

 

I spent two days mostly knitting, not this past weekend, but the one before that.  I finished the sleeves on the purple cashmere sweater and blocked them.  You can see them just above.  While they were blocking I finished the front edge of the sweater.  All that is waiting now is for me to seam those sleeves and attach them to the body of the sweater.  Haven't done that yet, the story of my life.  

 

That same weekend, I rounded up the remaining yarn from the multi-yarn striped cardigan I have also been working on and divvied it up into two equal parts.  I wanted to make sure that the sleeves would be identical in their stripe sequence, and that sequence already varies slightly from the body of the sweater because I ran out of two yarns.   Very little knitting has been done since, but I do hope to finish this second set of sleeves over the course of this week.  No rush.  I cannot wear either sweater until the weather cools, and yet I am itching to start something new. 

 

 

I also opened my birthday presents from 2020.  You might remember that I promised to buy myself some fermentation crocks. Smaller crocks than the giant 3 or 4 gallon crock I already own, which is too large for me to lift when empty, much less haul around when it is full of cabbage, or anything else for that matter.  Since I am not feeding an army of teenage boys, there is no reason for me to make gallons of sauerkraut at a time.  But Covid-19 also happened last year and I was not able to order the crocks I wanted from Sarah Kersten studio until May.  As you can see I went a little overboard.  Remember what I said about excess?

 

At least they arrived before this year's birthday.  Due to my reduced energy levels, it took me a day to open all the boxes and unwrap the crocks.  They are still sitting on my dining room table.  Now I have to figure out where to keep them.  I had already prepared a nice fermentation shelf downstairs in the cool basement, but if I want to actually use these crocks this summer, they need to be in the kitchen, because I don't have energy to chop and prep and haul pottery up and down the stairs.  As it is, it took me three days to clean up all the packing materials and haul it out to the recycle bin.  But I did.  And before recycle pickup.  Sometimes my joy in small accomplishments is almost too big to contain.

This past Saturday was one of those days my cardiologist warned me about, one of those days where the best option was staying in bed or perhaps lounging on the sofa.  I suppose it could have been a perfect knitting day.  Instead it was a cookbook reading day, a reminisce and dream about food day.  I have owned Marcella Hazan's first cookbook, The Classic Italian Cookbook, since 1980.  Marcella Hazan taught me about Italian food, and the book is now, 40 years later, stained and falling apart.  I knew I would need to replace it but had been dithering, loath to part with an old friend. Then I happened upon this book, a compilation of Hazan's first two cookbooks, in my local second-hand bookstore for 75 cents.  Of course I bought it.  I spent Saturday in my pajamas, wrapped in a cuddly blanket, reading both cookbooks and cross referencing the recipes to be sure that everything I cared about in the first book was included in the second. Only two recipes failed to make the cut, and I understand the rationale, even as I myself am loathe to give them up.  I am not planning on letting go of the original book anyway, at least not at this point as I have space and it holds too much sentimental value.  Needless to say, I also discovered a lot of new-to-me things I want to cook, next time my cooking hat is on anyway.  And those two recipes?  They are pretty much a part of my culinary DNA, my mental repertoire, but a back-up copy has been made.  I have forgotten things before, doubtless I will do so again.

 

Hope you are having a great week.  Today is chemo day, and another cycle begins.

 

 

Five Things Friday

Just a quick update.  A little shaky this time around, chemo #2, but not as bad as the first round. A dose reduction has helped and some acceptance that I am, and always have been, sensitive to medications, especially those that affect heart rhythms.  A bit of a boost now though hopefully means that the end of the summer will also be a bit more manageable.

 

Garden time always brings joy, and this glowing pink hydrangea peeking out from behind the Japanese maple brings me joy each and every day.  I could just sit on the lawn lost in its loveliness.  The daylilly in front of the maple is also going to bloom.  I have forgotten everything about it, its name, its color.  Too much digging, too much trauma.  It hasn't bloomed in two years, but apparently has survived and is now coming back with strength.  There is hope in that don't you think?

 

Agretti.  A new to me green vegetable, which I adore.  Simply served here with a drizzle of olive oil and a dusting of lemon zest and Aleppo pepper.  This came from GirlnDug Farm, my winter vegetable indulgence.   I am going to try to grow some next spring although apparently it is tricky and a bit difficult.   But that is what makes gardening fun.  I don't want to stop supporting local farmers, and yet there is joy and satisfaction in harvesting a. bit of one's own food, of fresh peas from the garden, a fully ripe tomato, perhaps a vegetable one loves but does not find easily.  Earlier this spring I attempted to grow spigiarello, another new to me Italian green related to sprouting broccoli.  A late start and neglect resulted in a tiny yield, but perhaps next year will be better.  I had visions of sharing spigariello with all my greens-loving friends. Plagued by hopes and dreams and visions of excess, I can't help but seem to be carried away. And yet the trick seems to be not in disappointment over dreams not fulfilled, but in the joys of discovering precious new things, new growth, tiny bowls of Italian greens.

 

Ah yes! Hidden in the middle, but perhaps most important of all!  Hair.  The requisite car selfie after leaving the wig shop.  I love my new hair.  I love the silver highlights.  Admittedly I had silver highlights but not this many, and long covid hair appeared more dark, too dark for my aging paleface.  It was time for short.  And my hair, or at least my old hair, was too fine to hold this kind of off the face look no matter what I put in it.    I like the shape of my head.  I like a hat or a turban. I fully believe that there is no shame in cancer and no reason not to embrace the fact of it.  But, I also love my wig, and yes, it has brought a spark of joy.

 

The Shade Garden.  It does seem that so much of my joys revolve around moments in the garden this year and I remain grateful for that, that enough is planted that I have these peaceful vignettes, these places of escape and repose, where all is good with the world and my soul is washed clear of its troubles.  I sat in one of these chairs one morning, facing away from the hydrangeas, facing toward the vegetable garden, watching the cardinals eat my peas, battle over who got the best peas.  I have had my own good fair share, so I don't mind.  It seems there is always something new to learn, some new drama, some newly discovered peaceful release.

 

 

And then there are all the little things. Having the energy to fill the two small planters in the front yard with flowers.  A kind neighbor who brings my garbage can down to the garage from the street after trash collection.  Surprise gifts of cuddly blankets.  Family who stop by with shishito peppers just because they know I love them, love both family and the peppers in fact.  A snuggle from my grand-puppy.  All these things are a world in and of themselves.  Sometimes I think we, or at times I at least, get wrapped up in thinking about all the grand things to see, to do, but in reality, perfection is in these little things. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In The Market and In The Kitchen

This past Saturday I went to the Farmer's Market. It was a lovely morning, perfect for a stroll and shopping. I tend to circumnavigate the market first, eyeing the offerings and letting my brain buzz with excitement and inspirational visions of various dishes and menus.  Then of course, to sit, and collect those thoughts.  In this case also to remind myself that I would have chemo again in a few days, and my energy levels are unpredictable at best.  I overdid it the previous week, but more about that later.

 

Despite all the wandering, I seem to purchase from the same farms again and again.  This week, suitably chastened about excess, I tried to rein in my purchases, not completely successfully. Here is my haul from this past weekend.

Not shown is a bunch of local asparagus, purchased at the local co-op, which was promptly roasted for lunch.  

 

Note the carrots.  Lots of carrots.  This is where my exuberance got the better of me. Blame it on the previous week. As my energy level was fairly high and the carrot top season short, it seemed I could justify a little, controlled, abundance.

But why the reference to the previous weekend?  Above is the Memorial Day weekend haul, and, as you can see, it is somewhat smaller in total volume, but actually higher in cooking effort required. The broccolini and raspberries were promptly consumed, as well as the Japanese turnips, which are good for both cooking and thinly slicing and eating raw. Then there was a lovely bunch of carrots, only one, and a lovely bunch (head?) of celery with gorgeous leaves.  The flavor of celery is more concentrated in the leaves and inspired me to make soup.  Celery and carrots with plentiful leaves are a seasonal treat here in Tennessee, whereas they were a much more plentiful staple when I lived in the mid-Hudson region of New York.

 

Cook I did. I had already planned to make a big pot of venison chili, and thought I could make a couple of batches of soup at the same time, packaging everything up in quart-sized vacuum-bags for future meals.  I managed to do that despite the fact that my energy was at its lowest since my first chemo, about 25%, 30% on a good day, of my normal.  Having recently inventoried the freezer, I knew there were two boxes of washed and chopped carrot greens remaining from last fall, when I was inspired to purchase them but too low on energy to actually cook.  The fresh greens plus the frozen greens yielded four quarts of soup and the fact that the frozen greens were already washed and chopped saved me a great deal of effort. It says much when chopping 4 to 8 cups of carrots greens uses up one's energy and requires a multi-hour nap for recovery.

Over the course of the three-day weekend I managed to put away 10 quarts, or roughly 20 meals. (shown above): 3 quarts of chili, 4 quarts of carrot greens soup, and 3 quarts of chicken and celery soup.  It sounds like a lot, but in my past life, at full energy, I could easily have cooked and packaged three to four times that over the course of a long weekend.  Also admittedly this was a more esoteric selection than I usually put away, as I like to keep food on hand to deliver to people in need.  This was meant for personal use.  I couldn't quite manage running two pots at once, as I needed too much rest time between work sessions. Nonetheless, it was a satisfying accomplishment. 

 

By. Monday I realized that my heart rate was consistently lower than usual, my body temperature was low, and although I could raise my pulse, I needed excessive rest time. Tuesday I ended up in the hospital where I got a few days rest and some strategies for dealing with future chemo sessions.  I was mildly nauseous after the first chemo session, but tiredness seemed to be a bigger issue than initially anticipated.  I do have a congenital heart defect, and my pulse tends to run on the low side, which I tend to ignore for the most part, always refusing to see myself as someone who is, or can do, less than anyone else.   After a little worry on the part of the internal medicine department, a lot of rest on my part, and consultation with my cardiologists and several others, we decided that my heart is strong, even if atypical, and that no intervention was needed other than rest and some strategies for dealing with future chemo sessions.  

And before I knew it, I found myself at another farmer's market.  Of course the freezer was already rather full.  But the season for carrot greens is rather short, so yes, I did indulge.  When I got home I trimmed and chopped the carrot greens and washed them in several sinkfull's of water.  A nap was undertaken during one of those washing cycles.  My guess was that the four bunches of carrots would yield approximately 4 quarts of soup, which was close.  I ended up with 4 1/2, all now happily packaged and frozen,  The local onions went into the soup, the tops have been chopped and frozen with bags of vegetables for the making of stock.  

 

The chicken stock supply has now been exhausted. Although I have bags of chicken carcasses, necks, and vegetable trimmings in the freezer, stock making will not commence for at least another week or more, either due to exhaustion or the pending nausea period that immediately follows chemo.  I am not certain that nausea and a house that smells of chicken stock are compatible forces.  Not that I need stock.  Between the cooking festival over the past two weeks, the five 2-serving moussaka's that remain in my freezer, and other soups that have been frozen periodically, as well as a selection of fish and chicken frozen in single serving portions, I should not need to do any serious cooking for some time.

As an aside, and not really related to this post, here I am all masked and turbaned, port connected and ready for chemo yesterday afternoon.  The turban helps keep the requisite mask, hearing aides, glasses, and yes earrings, in place and hopefully adds a bit of mystery.  Acceptable wigs have not yet arrived, and I remain comfortable without them but am open to experimentation.

 

All that remains to be dealt with from Saturday's haul are the actual carrots.  I am one of the odd people who prefer my carrots cooked, unless of course they are perfectly fresh young carrots such as these.  However I don't believe I can eat them all raw so I plan to make carrot puree with the rest and freeze it in 1/2 cup portions.  Carrot puree requires minimal effort, especially when the carrots are this young, fresh, and flavorful, and the puree makes a wonderful delicate sauce for use with fish, or probably chicken as well.   

 

Gardening in Slow Motion

This is my front yard as seen from the master bedroom window.

I took the photo a week ago, Sunday the 18th.  Since then the field of green weeds on the right hand side of the center island has been filled with little yellow flowers, flowers which gladden my heart, even though, yes, I know they are weeds.  I love violets too, and apparently do not care if there are violets or clover in my lawn.  Something to consider for the future, but at the moment the lawn is something green I don't have to think about.  The same can be said for those areas of the garden that I am not yet ready to plant.  Weeds are Mother Nature's interim plantings.

 

Weeds and all, the vista makes me smile.  The center brown area, between the slates and the road, contains the blueberry bushes, and I hope to have small annuals beneath them, preferable to my eye over mulch, or, eventually, some form of ground cover.   I am the kind of gardener that wants the beds filled with a panoply of growing things.  To the right of the stones is where the three peonies were transplanted, and I am still in the process of  planting Columbine and other perennials to fill the space.  Something similar will take place to the left of the blueberries, in the still-weed-filled green patch.  More peonies, a rose, some delphiniums -- all are planned but not yet planted.  I hoped for this spring but plans may have been interrupted.  More about that later.

Next photo.  Still looking north, slightly to the east of the first photo.  This bed, along the east side of the house, was the only part of the yard I disliked when I bought the house, now it is much more my garden.  Hydrangeas, coreopsis, daffodils, irises, nepeta, even a stray peony are located here and are beginning to fill in nicely.  The laurel that is falling down has finally been removed, and replaced.  I suppose I should update the photos, but that is not going to happen today, not for this post.  

Ther azaleas between the fence and the driveway are thriving, blooming intermittently, and there are more plants to go around the curved wall near the steps to the circle, all planned and ordered before I knew the course my summer would take.  If you look you will see plants lined up, awaiting new homes, in the lower portions of the top two photos.  I will get to them in time.  Life is like that sometimes, and I grow annoyed with interruptions, but there is nothing to do but live with them.

 

The top two photos were taken two days after I had a partial mastectomy for a breast cancer that showed up on my mammogram in March.  Remember that week I was crying?  I was crying because I had to have a biopsy, my first, and I was tired of doctors and hospitals, tired of illness and exhaustion, of broken noses and broken heart rhythms.  I felt it was silly to cry over a biopsy as 80% are negative.  It was as much frustration as it was fear: I was finally starting to feel good, starting to walk and work in the garden and it didn't seem fair.  Well, no one ever said life would be fair.

 

I've gotten over that now.  There is no help for it.  Now I am in fight mode.  It seems I have an aggressive little breast cancer but it also appears we have caught it early and my summer will revolve around chemotherapy with radiation to follow in the fall.  Many women have done this before me. Many more will follow.   My primary goal is beating back the invader and reclaiming my body. My body is a war zone and I cannot make predictions as to what I will or will not do, when or what I will, or will not, write.  

The last photo is of an iris, a Louisiana iris, that opened the morning I had my surgery.  I missed it at its peak.  We had cold temperatures and it only lasted a day or two.  In this photo, taken that same Sunday, two days after surgery, it is already waning, but still beautiful. I love it even as it begins to curl and fade -- the grace is in the living not the perfect moment of full actualization, something ephemeral that we somehow always seem to miss anyway both in the world around us, and in our own lives. Even these photos, celebrating a past already lost in the mists, reminds me of the multi-faceted nature of every moment, reminds me of the fractal geometry of memory.

 

Life really isn't about what happens or doesn't happen, it is about how you chose to deal with it, or chose not to deal as the case may be.  It is about where you chose to find beauty and joy, and what, when, and where you chose to let go.

 

Good grief I say! Enough is enough.  And if I were talking to you in person I would probably say exactly what I can't write -- I am going put every effort into kicking this M-F-B (imagine the swear words here) in the balls.  I will knit or sew or cook when I can as these things all soothe my soul. My hands will be in the soil.  I will write whenever those splintered moments of clarity arise.