PNewL PNewS 24-4

PNewL PNewS

Volume 24 Issue 4                   “All the pnews that phits.”                        Holiday 2016

Shoulder Season

     I am so sick of hearing myself talk about my bum shoulder and yet it is all I feel like talking about. I thought if I wrote about it here, I might get it out of my system. Let’s see if it works.

     I fell flat on my face in Namibia and I believe while protecting my camera and binoculars, I may have landed on my shoulder. When I got up, I was so thrilled nothing was broken (other than my confidence that I was able to put one foot in front of the other without tripping over myself), I moved on. Ribs were sore for a couple days but nothing dire. I was so pleased that I hadn’t hurt myself in a locale where dealing with it might have been a drag, I felt good. Until I didn’t.

     First, I realized it was very uncomfortable to reach into the back seat of my car. I stepped up my monthly massage to maybe every three weeks until Christa finally said, I think you should be talking to someone other than me about this. I googled shoulder injuries and found some tests—yes I can do that, ouch, no I can’t do that. Went to the doctor who gave me the same tests (and got her co-pay) and announced I was not a candidate for surgery. Got an x-ray that everyone agreed would show nothing (it showed nothing). Went to the physical therapist who (along with Christa, the massage angel) said the shoulder is a complex thing and I have made it painfully complex—it is frozen.

     So now I am having weekly and sometimes bi-weekly appointments with the aforementioned physical therapist (or physical terrorist as someone just called him) during which I either cry or almost cry, and I add to a lengthy list of exercises…some of which hurt and others of which make the other ones easier or harder to do. I have more pillows in my environs than I ever had in my life and Roger and I race to bed to see who gets which pillows each night.

     When I told my neighbors my shoulder was frozen, two of them said they had had frozen shoulders. (They both seem pretty normal now—this is fixable.) As time has gone on, my unscientific research makes me feel like one in four have experienced this agony. And it is agony. I have to move my other shoulder to remind myself that my arm could once do the movements my PT wants me to attempt. Many daily tasks are still nearly impossible. Putting on a bra. Washing an armpit. Scratching the back of my head. I have permission not to rake leaves. Nighttime is not the joy it has always been—for some reason the pain gets worse and I wake myself up moaning. As I said to the PT yesterday, who knew these parts of my body existed much less could hurt? I have found the shoulder rules a lot of real estate in my upper torso and arm.

    I feel there is hope finally (patience is not my strong suit so this is a big step).  I have greater range of motion than I’ve had in the last couple months but it still doesn’t even occur to me to reach into the back seat of my car. There are still odd pains—nerves that fire down my arms unexpectedly, aches that seemingly come out of nowhere. I call them wasabi pain because it comes on strong but goes away fast.

     I am not sure that rant really helped but there it is. Meanwhile, if your shoulder ever stops working the way you think it should: go see someone IMMEDIATELY. It just gets worse til you start the work to unstick it.

Things I am Learning

& Miscellaneous Observations

• I took a clay class this fall. It was a lot of fun. It reminded me how much I enjoy classes…if only to get that intense period of concentration on one thing I am so bad at getting at home where I can wander around…and wander and wander and forget why I was wandering…ah but I digress. We are hand-building so I am bringing home items that only a mother could love. With mine long dead, it’s unlikely anyone will appreciate my efforts, but it has been fun. No harm, no foul. And for some of you, Christmas is …well…look out!

• There has been a saying bouncing around Facebook that speaks to me. “They” say it is a Polish proverb. In English: Not my circus, not my monkeys. I love that. However, the other day, I was looking around the house, which is particularly messy these days (all I want to do is play, and anyway, cleaning upsets the dog), and I thought, “Uh oh—this IS my circus and the little black dog IS my monkey!”

• I don’t know why it is that the biggest macho-ist guys who work on my house are the ones who think Roger the Dog is going to bite them.

Thoughts on Christmas
• Whoever is stealing the Christmas ornaments on the road: I hope you are enjoying them as much as I did.

• Whoever left the frosted decorated Christmas cookies on that same road, Roger thanks you.

• Gatherings that include doing things—more than eating and drinking—are my kind of events. Thanks to Joanna and Kay for several hours in front of a jigsaw puzzle.

Roger had a big Christmas this year

Where to start? Well, I am past the mid-point of my 60^th year and I thought I would take this as an opportunity to do some of the things I have been thinking of doing. My family had a motorhome starting in 1966. I have always thought it was a great way to travel but a lot of what I see on the road are just too darn big. So I started investigating the options. Gini and I drove to Hickory to look at a couple Class Bs, which are smaller versions of the big boys. The first we walked into, I turned around and walked out. The layout was claustrophobic. The second was nice and drove so easily, but it felt like a lot of responsibility and breakable bells and whistles.

     In the early Fall, there was an event at a local venue that was something about living on the road. There were a whole bunch of folks exhibiting their versions of not quite RVs. This is where I learned about van conversions. I met some guys who were so low key about sales, I wasn’t sure they really wanted to get rid of any of their inventory. (When I added it up, these two guys on a gravel driveway in the middle of nowhere had over $250k worth of vans and didn’t seem to care if they sold them or not!) They had one van that hadn’t been converted yet—a blank slate to call my own. I sat with the idea for a while and kept investigating.

    One day I found a van on Craig’s List. It was in Floyd VA—it belonged to a woman who had bought it in California, driven it across country the long way, and was ready to part with it. It was the first van this guy had converted and he now has a full-on business doing this. It’s a Nissan NV200 that gets around 30mpg—I had never noticed these until I saw this one. Now, I see them everywhere—a lot of companies use them for delivery vans. His philosophy is that your weekend car can be your weekday car. It all felt simple—and the price was closer to what I had in mind.

     So to make this already too long story end: I happened to be driving near Floyd. I test drove it. I went home, pondered. Said I’d buy it…for Roger…for Christmas. Holidays ensued + trip to Sanibel. Finally got back to Floyd, thanks to Betsy and her new bionic hips, and brought her home. First trip on the agenda will be to the Folk School, I think—they have a campground on the campus—for blacksmithing. Then in late spring, Roger and I will drive west to see people and go to the Angel Island picnic. It’s a good thing.

Adventures with Foster Dogs

     I picked up a foster puppy in mid-November: Hope. How perfect is that in these hopeless days? She was precious (and absolutely terrified--just like me and Roger.) It was a short term foster—nine days. Things started going south shortly after the pick up. While she warmed up to us, she proved that she had no sense of where to go to the bathroom and almost seemed to go out of her way to poop on the only existing carpet in the house. I asked for help. Advice said to keep her in the bathroom—a larger space than the crate but contained. She must have claustrophobia because that is when the barking started. After 75 minutes of barking on Wednesday night and then close to two hours Thanksgiving night (when I went to try to calm her, I found the bathroom covered in poop. It was 1:14am), I wrote the organization and said I was done. I did it in the middle of the night because I knew, in the morning, I might suck it up and attempt to soldier through the next couple days. They said these things happen. I am sad. She is a sweet girl—a very affectionate, curious, smart puppy. I will miss parts of her, but certainly not others. I am also pleased that I took care of myself by not taking care of a dog I couldn’t help.

     Last week, I got Trooper who is here while his “real” foster mom is on vacation. He is here for two weeks and so far: very good! He and Roger are similar sizes and temperament. They get along famously and love to play. Trooper was a Puerto Rican street dog—he arrived in this country with mange and a broken leg. The mange is gone, the leg may never heal right. It doesn’t seem to slow him down. He’s a pretty happy guy and fits well in our household. And he’s darling. I spent 24 hours considering my second foster failure (Hope, see above, was my first but a different kind)—the kind of failure where the dog stays put. Then I looked at our life—Roger’s and mine—and the Tiny TogetherNest camper (named by Leighton neighbor Amy after the RVs of my youth) and realized we may not have room right now. Trooper won’t have any trouble being adopted—he’s a love.

Note that doesn’t go anywhere else:

I try not to get political in the pnews. I don’t think it usually matters to me how people vote (as long as they do). But this election season has been very hard on me both as a citizen of this country and of the state of North Carolina. I am deeply saddened by the divide. I am sad about people who are hurting, about the hatred folks are feeling towards people who are different and towards a president I think did a pretty good job, all things considered. I am—yes—terrified about the next four years. I hope things will turn out okay but I am having trouble with that hope. I fret a lot and cry some (the frozen shoulder and the holidays don’t help!).

   This is all to explain a late PNewS and one a little short on my usual holiday lists. (I know I am the only one who keeps track of this stuff, but I felt I owed an explanation.) Now, Roger and Trooper think I owe them a walk.

     Here’s to y’all. And to y’all a good night.

PNewL PNewS Volume 24 #3

PNewL PNewS

Volume 24 Issue 3                “All the pnews that phits               September 2016

Summer Stories

Good times in the Big City

Nora announced she was performing at Joe’s Pub in New York City and I thought: let’s go. I suggested it to a few people and gradually there was a swelling of interest. Every time I go to New York City, I wish I did it more often. Maybe now I will. It was easy. We had a great time. A group of old college friends wandering the streets, eating well and drinking plenty, seeing a show, riding a boat, and walking walking walking. (My fitbit recorded over 18,000 steps a day.) The last night we were there was Nora’s show. She was quite sick at the time and in a great deal of pain so we didn’t get to see her anywhere except on stage. It was the definition of bittersweet. I loved every minute and cried through most of it. The sweetest part was that several of her performance students performed with her, along with members of her family. She knew she didn’t have it in her to do the whole show alone. Watching her protégés look to her and sing her songs was heartwarming. It felt like they were showing us the future, in a nice way. Now, a couple of months later, I have learned that she died yesterday. No words. Thanks for a great show, my friend. I miss having you in the world.

Breakfast Meeting

I was invited to be an ambassador for Habitat for Humanity at a breakfast meeting of members of the community. I’ll do anything for Habitat but as soon as I said yes, I said to myself, what were you thinking??? Strangers? At breakfast? Conversation with people I don’t know?? Oh my. And as often happens at events I dread, it was great. Here were TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY people who were dressed and ready to face the day and have interesting conversations at 7:30 in the morning. Who knew this kind of thing was happening? Listening to community leaders talk about housing issues facing our county was enlightening. The fact that folks representing all kinds of different facets of the area were on a panel talking to each other gave me hope. Sat across from a representative of UNCA who can connect Women Build with college volunteers! People talking and listening…at whatever hour! Yay!

The Reluctant Gardener

Lately I have been planting and re-planting, and then there was the day that Robin came over and helped weed (bless her patience and kindness and darn her for noticing I needed help with the weeds…). Mostly it’s been kinda hot and humid to be out in it. Whilst planting and re-planting—that is moving plants—I was reminded of the rock problem we have. I planted a black eyed susan in the “meadow” (where I am not mowing) and started to unearth a giant rock that might come in handy somewhere when I realized I had probably used up my rock-moving favors from my fabulous neighbor Jeff so I planted right up next to the rock. In my yard, you have to learn to live with the hardships or move on—that’s what I tell the plants as they go in.

      That’s when I thought: I really need a servant. Perhaps I was born in the wrong era. I keep thinking a lackey would solve a lot of problems. Move that, climb up there, fetch this, chainsaw that. Instead, things get left as is and that is not necessarily a good thing.

TV and the Olympics

I love the Olympics. I usually spend some large percentage of it in tears. Joyful tears but often sloppy wet sobby kinds of tears. I love the pomp and youthful enthusiasm. The striving and success, and of course, the failures too. It’s inspiring and charming and so unlike much of what is going on in the news. It’s a suspension of reality, or a different reality or both.

     I have been kicking myself this year as I canceled my contract with a satellite company that shall remain nameless because I may say mean things and I don’t want them to come after me. They raised their prices without telling me. When I called to say I couldn’t get local channels any more which I was paying for, I was told I was only subscribed to 120 channels so what did I expect. Only 120 channels—ya know when I was a kid… Anyway, enough was enough. I quit. (Pardon—I think this is a repeat rant but it feels as good as it did the first time.)

     I thought I would miss it but I have become happily addicted to Netflix and Amazon Prime and Acorn. I don’t miss much…except for Survivor and a few others. And no commercials? Heaven. But I didn’t get it together in time to re-subscribe so I could watch all of the Olympics. Patsy thinks I should set my sights on reconnecting before the Fall TV season begins. We shall see. Meanwhile, I signed up for a free quasi-legal website which got me nothing. Then a 7-day trial with Sling TV which allowed me to watch Venus Williams lose in a thrilling tennis match. (I had to put down my knitting—I kept making mistakes…) But I will cancel that soon.  (I subscribed for an additional month but really only watched a lot of HGTV.) I don’t know what the answer to my TV dilemma is but hopefully I will have it figured out by the Winter Olympics in Korea in 2018. Oh but wait—I’LL BE IN ANTARCTICA THEN!!! Guess it’ll be the Summer games in 2020 (Tokyo).

First Day of School

My friend Henry, who lives next door, started kindergarten yesterday. All last week, he kept saying he wasn’t going but apparently he did. And he had a wonderful time, he said. A picture of him on Facebook showed a bigger than he seemed just days ago little boy with the biggest darn grin. I am so relieved. I am among a lot of people who are relieved (for so many reasons) by Back to School, I gather. He was so full of himself and so smart and sassy, I sometimes wonder how relieved the teachers are.

The Adventures with Foster Dogs, cont’d.

Considering how much I was in town this summer (and what a long hot summer it was though I think we got robbed of June. I have no memory of anything that happened in June.), I was a slacker in the foster parenting department. We had Sapphire, an adorable Chihuahua + something mix who wound up being adopted while I sat at the office waiting to take her home, for just 24 hours. Why they sent her home with me and over several emails determined she should come right back, mystifies all of us.

     This week, we have Mike, a large happy pitbull dog of indeterminate age, but probably on the large puppy end. He loves Roger who puts up with him part of the time and enjoys the rough housing the rest of the time

Summer of Balls

My new favorite foods are balls. They freeze well and return to the unfrozen world quickly. Perhaps I should do a cookbook. (I checked with Amazon and there are many cookbooks for Ball canning, meatballs and cheese balls but not covering the range of balls from my perspective.) Firstly, have you had chicken meatballs? Best. Meat. Balls. Ever. They have, to my mouth, a very different and wonderful consistency. I could eat them every day…and have on occasion. Meatballs of turkey and beef are good too, of course, but chickenballs are my current favorite.

     Then there are what Pinterest types call things like energy bites. They are balls, people. And yummy—and practically good for you while giving the hint of sweetness that is essential in life. Many are based on dates and nuts but the variety goes on from there. My current favorites are “Liar’s Balls” (a take off on the Lara Bars available… well, everywhere that I shop) and Lemon bites.

Things I am Learning

& Miscellaneous Observations

• My dad used to carry a copy of the constitution with him--he used to pull it out and say, to flight attendants and waiters and me, "When was the last time you read this? This is great stuff!" or something like that. I think it may be the same version Mr Khizr Khan, one of the speakers at Democratic Convention (it’s been long enough you might have forgotten him and his 15 minutes of fame) carries. Every time I hear stories of Mr Khan and his constitution, I wish Dad were here to hear them. Recently realized it’s the 10th anniversary of Dad's death. Wow. Seems like yesterday... and too long ago.

• We have a little gathering we call Cocktails @ the Mailboxes when people in the ‘hood bring their chairs and beverages and snacks down on an evening and enjoy each other’s company. We have met in sun, sunset and rain. It’s a pretty friendly experience. In September, we have a candidate for county commissioner coming. I couldn’t face having a meet n greet at my house so offered this as an option. She said she’d be there. One of my neighbors told me she thought I was a good community organizer. I know many serious community organizers. I had to laugh that I could be given that title simply because I had an idea and followed through with it. All it takes is sending the email, and you too can be a community organizer!

• Things that are annoying me today (8/20/2016): fruit flies, my knitting injured thumb, Ryan Lochte

(On the brighter side: the raspberries that just keep on coming, butterflies that are attracted to flowers I’ve planted, Roger the dog)

• Did I mention I am going to Antarctica? After much noodling on websites that offer such trips, we are signing on the dotted line this week. Sara, Betsy and Peggy do Antarctica (and the Falkland Islands and South Georgia, oh my!). I am calling us Team PBS. Jan-Feb 2018.

• It has been more fun than I expected having a young family next door. Watching Tatum go from the 5+ pounder she was 10 months ago to the substantial almost toddler today—and watching the aforementioned Henry (now 5) grow up has been fun and enlightening and a good reminder why people are parents when they are young. Henry joins Roger and me for walks sometimes. The other day he came up with a couple of those “Kids Say the Darndest Things” lines. When I asked him if he thought Roger was a good boy, he said, “Yes, he is SUCH a good boy.” And I looked at him, and he said, “Well, that’s what you always say!” Then when he came into the house unexpectedly, he looked around and said, “YOU have even more stuff than ME!”

Guess you had to be there.

“When you do everything yourself by hand and you put so many hours into something, it’s like it has your hair inside, it has your tears inside, it has your food inside. The work is really personal.” Sandra Backlund (at the Cooper Hewitt Museum)