Some Days Are Stone

Some days are just rocks

It snowed Easter. It snowed all day Easter and the day after. We set a record low temperature for Easter's date. A record set in 1933. We dropped even lower the day after Easter, breaking the record for that date set in 1933. And we broke the record for the lowest high temperature for that date, also set in 1933.

PLUS the sun didn't shine for those two days. Yesterday the sun did shine but it was too cold for me and for the group I walk with to walk. My Rec Center is closed indefinitely. That means no exercise classes. I know. I know. There are exercise classes online that I can exercise with "in the comfort of my own home," she says sarcastically. (And by-the-bye, why is sarcastically spelled that way? Five syllables! Nobody says it using five syllables! Four are quite enough.)

But my friends won't be in my own home. Well, not until after lunch. And then by ZOOM. It is better than nothing, but we spend most of the free 40 minutes helping each other get both our faces and our voices on. Yesterday we watched one friend's left foot most of the time and my voice kept disappearing. "Twenty-first Century technology, PFAW!" she says spitting on the floor. (No, I didn't just spit on the floor. I'da had to clean it up.) 

I never did Zoom until this whole coronavirus mess. And quite frankly, I don't want to do it long enough to get good at it.

I used to watch the local news in the morning. We have a meteorologist here who is great at explaining Colorado's weather and I love weather. Since I'm from Oklahoma where the weather is nothing if not exciting, Colorado weather is wonderfully different, positively exotic. Who ever heard of giving the weather forecast based on altitude?! "...above 7,000 feet will have up to a foot of snow." And graupel and virga. Graupel is soft hail -- tiny little snowballs. Virga is rain that doesn't make it to the ground because the air it's falling through is so dry that it all evaporates.

Since 'rump moved into the White House, the news is not so pleasant. (I use the contraction of his name, because it would be impolite to call the President of the United States "ass.") I thought his bleeding in and around my weather news irritating, sometimes infuriating. Since covid-19, it's gotten scarier and sadder. 

So I just can't watch the morning news. I can't go to exercise class. And I can't walk with my friends when it's so cold. Not even observing social distancing and wearing a mask. To think, a month ago, it wasn't this bad. Four months ago, I didn't know having to live like this -- here -- was even possible. 

                                                                  Although the death toll includes people of all ages, it is especially high among certain groups. Seniors and those with underlying health problems. At my age, I and most of my friends, are "Seniors."                                                                                                                                  Lord, even the Rolling Stones have postponed their North American tour due to Coronavirus. But then, they're all older than I am -- though just.

"Some days are stone."

Even my online newspaper leads with this roundup of the news "Coronavirus spikes in homeless population, unemployment FAQ, more snow and cold coming." Yep, snow's coming again tomorrow. And we're supposed to get more snow than the seven inches we got Easter Sunday and Monday.

That old John Denver song is right. "Some days are diamonds, some days are stones, sometimes the hard times won't leave me alone." But you know what? Today we have sunshine and I will walk with my friends observing social distancing and wearing a mask. Today the sunshine will make stones sparkle like diamonds and as far as the snow goes, well --

Me and Scarlet O'Hara,  we'll "think about that tomorrow."

The Women's March

from the Denver Post

Two weeks ago yesterday people all over the country took to the streets. Denver's 2018 Women's March was more than 50,000 strong and I was one of them.

Last year I couldn't participate, because I was between knee surgeries. This year I could and did. My friend Lou and I caught the light rail at Federal Station, the second to western most stop on the  line. Waiting at the station were people of all ages and genders. A good number of marchers were already on the train. As we got closer to Denver the train filled nicely. My daughter Grace and her fiance Bob joined us at the Sheridan station. Along with many others on the train, Grace and Bob wore pink pussy hats. (Well, technically Bob's was a Pokemon hat, but it was pink with ears. Close enough.)

We stopped for breakfast, then took one of the 16th Street Mall buses to Civic Center Park. The Regional Transit District added cars to all the light rail lines and were running extra buses on 16th Street Mall.

Even so, the buses were packed. There were a few people on the bus who were trying to get to work. You should have seen all the jockying around and stepping off and back on to let them out. (Reminded me of those videos of the Japanese trains where uniformed transportation folk push and shove, packing riders into the train.)

Luckily Lou and I were able to get seats. It was a good thing, too. Even with our new knees the milling around in the park before the walk and then the walk were tough tests of our endurance.

         

                                   Grace and Bob had hats              I didn't, so I wore pink hair!

Early in the week, the weather forecast for The March was, cold and cloudy with snow flurries. By the day before The March, the local meteorologists were promising sunshine and no snow until after dark. It was still pretty chilly, so most everybody was layered up.

We got to Civic Center Park early. As you can see,

we had bluebird skies.

Signs, Signs, Everywhere a sign!

Some determined

   

            Several men and children carried these           And a bit of a tribute to Teddy Roosevelt.
             with their arrows pointing to all of us.

There were signs supporting a grand variety of Civil Rights Issues -- "Women's Rights are Civil Rights," "Girls just want to have fun-damental rights," "Black Lives Matter." Signs supporting DACA. Rainbows to include the LGBTQ members of our community. My favorite was "This is what Trans looks like" (carried by a very tall trans woman.)

 Many were anti-'rump and quite witty.    

   

                                   
 

Some of the anti-Groper-in-Chief signs were in (shall we say) questionable taste and I didn't take pictures of them. There was one I wish I had. It said "Grab him by the mid-terms." And to that end there were people everywhere registering people to vote, though I think that most of us there, who were qualified to vote, were already registered.

There were so many people in the park that once it started, it took us more than an hour to get to the ACTUAL starting line. Grace described The March as more of a Shuffle. Between the sun and all that body heat we were coming out of our jackets.

The ACTUAL starting line.

By then Lou and I were about tuckered out, so we peeled off and headed back toward 16th Street Mall and somewhere for lunch.

All the eating places from sidewalk to upscale indoors dining were crowded with pink hats and signs!

There was no way to get on a bus to make our way back to the light rail. Too crowded. Sooooo, we walked  -- 22 more blocks, to be exact.

Next year, we're not going to wait in the park for The Women's March to begin. We are going directly to the ACTUAL starting line. And you can bet we're going to vote this fall.