Channeling Grandma

I rinsed out the just emptied spice container and got ready to toss it. (As a 5, it is not a recyclable plastic in our town.) My Grandma Skatzes stopped me.

Not literally, of course. Grandma has been dead 22 years this month. But like many people who make a deep impact on my heart, she is still with me.

As a child in a multi-generational household, I spent many hours listening to my Grandma's stories. Many of her stories were about the Great Depression and how she and her family and, indeed, the whole community, got through those years.  She made sure her family was fed and clothed, and she did everything she could, on the precious few pennies she had to work with, to make sure neighbors did not do without either.

I have carried her stories with me for six decades. As an American history major in college, my greatest disappointment was I was never at a campus where a class on the 1930s was offered. My thesis was on Isaac Ingalls Stevens, the first governor of Washington Territory, and the treaty talks he held with tribes in that area of the world. It was a good, solid thesis, but what I really would have loved to write about would have been something along the lines of "Living Through the Great Depression: The American Homefront."

Over a decade before World War II brought the slogan to every home, Grandma lived by "Use it up, Wear it Out, Make it do or do without." That is what stayed my hand with the spice container. The uncertainty of what is ahead as we as a community, state, nation, and world go through this pandemic causes me to reassess what I need, what I do not need, and, yes, hang onto a few things that normally would have hit the trash or the recycling.

Or the yard waste pile, for that matter. Two months or so ago, while lazily talking out loud about this year's garden, I announced to Warren that I was going to dig out the sage plant that continues to winter over and produce each year. We don't use a lot of sage in this house and it takes up a lot of space, even with being cut back each spring.

The sage after being its pardon 

So when I started out to work in the garden this Saturday past, I was resolved to dig it up and be done with it. Then I looked again and thought of Grandma. And...ended up cutting it back but keeping it.

As it turns out, you can make pesto with sage. Really? I will be planting a large basil patch again for traditional basil pesto, but the thought of adding another type of pesto to my repertoire (and the freezer) delights me.

Thinking of you, Grandma.

The More Things Change

"The more things change, the more they keep changing."

I admit it: I stole that line from the our Juvenile Court judge, who is my employer, a neighbor (our backyards connect), and a longtime close friend. Because that pretty much sums up life around here.

As I type on this 29th day of March, the wind outside is picking up as our part of Ohio moves from balmy springlike weather (it was 72 yesterday!) to what will be a drop into the 40s and 30s. I believe we are also under a High Winds Advisory from the National Weather Service for good measure.

As I mentioned in my last post, I have been walking daily, taking my camera along, and posting what I photograph on Facebook. Friends both near and far have been watching to see what I come up with each day. chiming in with stories or memories or their own shots. It has been a lot of fun.

I did not walk today, despite the sunshine and warm temperatures earlier.  The unwell feeling from the myeloma has been building over the last several days, so I skipped the walk. Instead, I posted some of the shots I had taken over the last week or so but not used before. I shared my health situation; my status brought a comment from a concerned friend (ranting against the myeloma) that led me and my friend and boon companion Anne, lawyers both of us, to riff on the application of the law of adverse possession as it relates to my myeloma. I don't know if the author of the initial comment appreciated our levity, but Anne and I certainly did. (I also realize that last sentence is probably incomprehensible to anyone who has not sat through first year Property Law.) You know you are in quarantine for a long time when you make law jokes with good friends.

I have been watching friends and family build community through these times. We cannot visit, but we reach out through other ways. At the Facebook site for the Central Ohio Symphony, we are posting a video every day: our musicians, our conductor (a world class trombonist), pieces by some of our composers. (You do not need a Facebook account to reach the Central Ohio Symphony's postings; they are open to the public.) Other friends are also sharing and posting music, visual art, and more. Today I joined the church service at All Saints Episcopal Church in Vancouver, Washington. So what's a Jew like me doing in a place like that, be it the venue (a church) or the distance (2400 miles)? Because the churchman conducting the service, Father Joe, is my child-in-law's father and my grandchildren's grandfather. In short, family. Family that I love and miss. Like so many other places, his church is closed because of COVID-19 and today was the first livestreamed service. Of course I watched it. And afterwards I said the Shehechiyanu, a Hebrew prayer I recite often, giving thanks to the Creator for the fact that I am still alive and sharing the moment. (And while I was watching the service, Warren surprised me with making and bringing me lunch. You bet that prayer of gratitude includes the fact that I have this dear man in my life.)

This post is all over the board, but so is life today. So I'm going to close with the best example of resilience I have seen in a long time. When it was so warm yesterday, I spent over an hour in the morning starting to clean out the vegetable garden, which I had brought down but not cleaned out last fall. Last October or November, I had tossed out a potbound planting of thyme, burnt out from a hot summer and fall. The clump of roots and soil had been in the garden upside down all winter. I turned it over and found new growth on the old thyme. Despite being burnt out, despite being thrown out, despite being left to the winter blasts, the thyme came back. Now that's resilience!

See that little bit of green to the left? That's new thyme! 

And yes, I replanted it, this time in the garden.

Another 100 Words

COVID-19.

Pandemic.

My oncologist imposed lockdown: no office, no store, no visitors, no visiting.

At all.

Legal Clinic: canceled.

Poetry Night: canceled.

The Symphony's season finale: postponed.

Our library: closed.

I may take walks. Solitary or with Warren. I take my camera along.

In these strange times, being forced to slow down makes me realize how much I push myself. Even working part-time, I drive myself too hard, too long, too much.

In the evening, I do yoga. Sometimes I stop and take deep breaths just to center myself.

Breathe.

I am still here.

Breathe.

We are still here.

Breathe.

Observations About February Money

It is March 14 as I type, midafternoon, and looking out the window I see...snow.

I have been late in writing about February expenditures on groceries and eating out because, frankly, COVID-19 has shoved aside a lot of things, especially in the last two weeks. It shoved aside Pi Day (in that I did not even remember it was today!), although, ironically, when my sister-in-law wished me Happy Pi Day, I had just taken one out of the oven for supper with friends tonight.

Our Court is moving to a skeleton staff and most of us are working remotely from home for the indefinite future. Our schools are closed until at least the start of April and will likely be closed further after that. Our library closes Monday night, not to reopen until April 5 at the earliest. Warren is working on COVID-19 plans for our Symphony; the Mansfield Symphony, in which he plays also, cannot put on its concert next week as our governor, Mike DeWine made some sweeping closures (including the schools) when announcing the state of emergency in Ohio, winning admiration from many of us who never voted for him to begin with (me).

Our March Legal Clinic is canceled; our local Hunger Alliance met in this week in a lengthy session to ensure that those without food get it in these times.

The Methodist church two blocks from our house just canceled all services for March, hoping to reopen in time for Palm Sunday.

These are strange times. And to borrow from my judge, who is keeping Court staff and the bar on top of things, by the time he types an email with the latest updates and hits "send," it is already outdated.

And that doesn't even address my personal situation, except for me to note in quick passing that I see Tim, my oncologist, Tuesday for infusion and he is to weigh in on whether I should even be in our Court building, even on a limited basis. Given the infusion drug I am taking and have been taking for two and a half years, a powerful immunosuppressant that every myeloma specialist identified weeks early as putting one at high risk for serious COVID-19 reactions, I'm expecting the answer to be along the lines of "You even have to ask?"

In short, it is not business as usual and it will be months before it is business as usual, if ever.

So what does that have to do with what we spent in February? Quite a lot. Because when I look back at February spending, everything was pretty much on track to keep spending under $180.00 with ONLY SIX DAYS TO GO in the month until I did some stocking up for what was clearly going to be a long haul with the COVID-19 outbreak.

How much stocking up? Well, our grocery expenditures finished the month at $214.49, with almost $67.00 of that in the last two days of February. Add another $17.11 for household purchases (including, yes, toilet paper) and we finished the month at $231.60.

Yowsa.

The only ray of sunshine is that our eating out expenditures continued to be rock bottom low: $3.60 for a hot chocolate with espresso when I joined a dear friend for a long overdue talk.

So here's the thing: March is going to be worse. Because we did some more stocking up this month, based upon my concern that supply lines will be interrupted when the employees of distributors and freight haulers fall ill. It turns out I have a siege mentality in me after all. And, frankly, with my wacky health, I don't want to be stuck at home and out of food. We have already gone past the $180.00 monthly mark (although presumably except for perishables, we don't need to buy any more food). It's not pretty.

But I get it and I don't regret the dollars. I'm grateful we have them to spend. What I worry about is our community: all of us staying as healthy as possible, all of us getting our basic needs met.

I try not to worry about myself, even though I am so high risk. I video-chatted with Ramona last night; her school district (Vancouver, Washington) shut down yesterday until April 25. As a savvy 2nd grader, she knew why. So we talked about staying healthy and then she looked at me and said in a very quiet voice, "I don't want you to get sick, Grandma April."

Oh, sweetheart, I'm trying not to.

Let's get through this.

100 Words

Warren and I had a long evening last night for First Friday. We ate at home, then went back down, Warren working,  Amanda and I chatting with parents looking for their children’s artwork on display.

Once back home, we were tired and cold and hungry.

“What about popcorn?”

So we made a bowl of popcorn and sat together on the couch eating, the shared contentment reminding me of my childhood. Popcorn was the go-to snack in my family when I was growing up: it was cheap, it was easy to make in quantity, it was filling.

There was always enough.

Small Moment: A Glittering Evening

In a few hours, my husband and the other musicians of the Central Ohio Symphony will take the stage for the March concert, which is always held on a Sunday afternoon. Two guest artists, violinist Simón Gollo and violist Randolph Kelly, will play the Mozart Sinfonia Concertante for violin, viola, and orchestra. Right now, Simón, who stayed with us for the weekend, is upstairs warming up before he and Warren head to the concert venue. I'll follow in a few hours.

For the last two days, Simón  and Randolph sat in our percussion room, emptied of its timpani, and played together, working out the rhythms and pairings that two virtuoso performers need to share to put on a stellar performance. So all weekend I have had the supreme pleasure of listening to world-class musicians work together, collaborate together, compare techniques and approaches on this measure or that passage, laugh together, and fill the rooms of this house with exquisite sounds.

Last night Warren and I hosted Simón , Randolph, and Randolph's wife Barbara in our home for a small, informal dinner. (Dinner followed a two-hour rehearsal in the percussion room.) The meal was simple and delicious, there was homemade apple pie for dessert, and the five of us sat and laughed and talked and shared our lives for two hours. Randolph especially had many, many orchestra stories to tell, as he is ending four decades of a stellar orchestral career. Conductor and musician names were sprinkled liberally throughout, most of whom I had only the vaguest idea of the person. Some of his stories centered around his relationship with "André," and he was well into several emotional stories about his last conversations with "André" before I realized "André" was André Previn.

Even I know who André Previn was. Those are the kind of stories shared last night.

 Our talk ranged far and wide, from instruments to music to childhood memories to tomatoes to, yes, end of life.

It was a glittering evening of good talk and good laughter and good fellowship.

And good pie. There is always good pie at the heart of it all in this house.