I Wear a Mask

 

I just had an odd experience -- perhaps not "odd" for people elsewhere, but I'd not experienced it before. I was coming out of the grocery store and was walking across the parking lot when a man driving a nice, big, red pickup slowed down and called to me "You know you look ridiculous...) I thought he was referring to the bright pink color in my hair and I was in the midst of waving to him when he finished his statement) "wearing a mask." And suddenly it went from a friendly situation to an unfriendly one. I even felt threatened. With that he drove out of the parking lot.

When I got home, I told my husband about it and he asked if I had shouted back that he was a rude, asshole. I said, "No, but I did look to see if he had balls hanging from the back of his pickup. He didn't."

I just got my third Covid booster and my annual flu shot. I no longer wear my mask during yoga class, but I do wear it at the grocery store, doctor's office (required) and any public indoor venue where there may be a crowd or little children.

I have not, so far, gotten Covid. I do not want to get Covid, or, for that matter, the flu. I do not want to contribute to the spread of either of those viruses and by so doing, increasing the opportunity for viral mutation.

I do not wear a mask to rebuke any who do not wear a mask. It is no more a public statement than the fact that I wear my seatbelt in the car or take my morning meds. 

Our county is rated "Low" in its rate of transmission, which is good, but the data shows 74 people in our county were diagnosed with an active Covid case yesterday. And one person died from Covid yesterday in our county. Yesterday!

I do not want to have any part in data like these, so I will take what precautions I feel necessary for me, including wearing a mask. And I will not feel "ridiculous."

Assault on the Capitol

 

This is not Broadway's les Mis.
This is the assault on the Capitol of the United States of America,
my home.

It was yet another "where were you when" moment in my life. I am old. I am from Oklahoma. I am not unique. The only differences between you and me is our ages and where we live. We've seen too many of these moments. Disasters, natural and human-made. As I'm sure they did you, each of these moments frightened me. The human-made ones made me angry. The damage all of them did made me just so sad.

Watching TV. That's where it seems I've been when these moments happened. Of course I wasn't watching TV at the moment most of them happened. I was hunkered down in storm shelters or school basements for too many tornadoes to remember. I was in high school gym class when President Kennedy was shot. In college and working during Vietnam and the Civil Rights Movement. And when Senator Kennedy was shot. When Dr. King was shot. The 1989 San Francisco earthquake. (That one I saw live. I was on maternity leave watching baseball's World Series televised from Candlestick Park.) When the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City was bombed, I was working. I was in school again when 911 happened. The Iraqi War, Hurricane Katrina. The wild fires. All that and more.

Then 2020, aptly named "The Dumpster Fire Year" by a local TV newscaster. I have been "Safe at Home" since the middle of March. I've always read. A lot. During this nearly a year, I've read more. And I've watched more TV than ever before. Mostly binge-watching cop shows -- Icelandic cop shows, Swedish cop shows, French cop shows, Italian cop shows, British cop shows. Thank goodness for MHz Networks and Acorn. And subtitles. (I can't stand Blue Bloods' constant shouting and Danny's foot chases any longer! Haven't been able to for a while.) 

Oh, yes. There is a jigsaw puzzle in progress on my dining table.

For self-preservation, I cut my TV news to less than half. Thirty minutes of local news. Thirty minutes of international news from the BBC. Thirty minutes of national news from ABC. And PBS's News Hour. I count most of the TV journalists among my friends. After all, they come into my home every day and with the pandemic, I've been to their homes. I know what books and treasures are on their bookshelves. I know their cat. They give me a lot of bad news. More bad news than most of my real-life friends give me. Pandemic death numbers. Economic numbers. Election campaign rhetoric and bombast. Really, political news has been awful these past five years. But this year, the worst.

It's been a question of survival. The first goal was to survive the pandemic, but it's still going on. No more travel for us. No out-of-state visitors. No visitors of any stripe. Except the TV people.

Things I normally looked forward to -- a day trip into the mountains, a games party now and then, exercise classes, walking and coffee with my friends, going to the movies, eating out -- not gonna happen. My friends and I still walk. Our town has many parks designed and maintained to encourage walking. And our weather is usually comfortable enough year round. We wear masks and maintain the recommended six-feet social distance from one another. We carry folding chairs in our cars so we can visit in parking lots or in driveways. Not to tempt Fate, but so far we've avoided contracting Covid-19 or any of its variants. In fact we've had many fewer colds and no seasonal flu.

In years past, I would have looked forward to the Fourth of July with watermelon and barbeque. Then Labor Day Weekend, the final opportunity to drive to the top of Mount Evans before the road is closed for the winter and October before Trail Ridge Road through Rocky Mountain National Park also closes for the winter. But not this year.

So there was the election to look forward to and the very real possibility that Joe Biden would win. He may not have been my first choice, or for that matter my second, but by election time he was my only choice. The GOP's politics-of-hate campaign and their blatant disregard for the safety measures we were practicing would finally end. Trump would step aside and we could get back to the business of living our lives in an America for all. 

The election came and went. Thanksgiving came and went with no relief from the Trump lies and accusations, even though the election was over and he lost. Trump's rallies and rants escalated through December as the Electoral College cast their votes and those votes were certified by the States. 

The mood in the United States has been ugly for a long time, but it got uglier as Christmas neared. Too many people either followed the Trump/GOP line that the pandemic was not that serious or they had had  enough of it and they decided what-the-hell. They travelled. They rallied in Georgia for the Senate election there. They partied, including at the White house. Ignoring the CDC and Dr. Fauci's warnings.

Of course, I believed those dire warnings. I knew that the world and life do not blindly follow our calendars, do not observe our humanly fanciful time limits, do not adhere to our traditional dates of endings and beginnings. But didn't 2021's possibilities shine and sparkle in our imaginations. Vaccines to vanquish the pandemic. Children back face-to-face in school. Long term care facilities no longer locked down. A new administration in the White House. Jobs coming back. Couldn't we put 2020 behind us?

A metaphor for 2020/2021:   

     "Have you ever driven west through Kansas to get to Denver? You hit the Colorado border 

     and think YES, MOUNTAINS! But then you realize the first half of Colorado is pretty much just             more of Kansas. Slowly, you see the blue peaks [or white depending on the time of year] and            
     the joy of the mountains slowly becomes a reality." -- Charlie Worroll.

Interstate 70 through Kansas is the metaphor for 2020. The country is High Plains Desert. Not many trees and those not very tall. It is just flat land and high sky. You can see from here until tomorrow. 

From Salina, Kansas, to Limon, Colorado, is 343 miles. That's more than five hours of your life at
75 miles per hour, slowing to go through the very few small cities and smaller towns.Their church spires and grain elevators rise from the vast land into the infinite sky. 

At Limon you see this.

   

There,                                                
that faint white on the horizon.
Mountains!                    
Mountains?                    
Or is it just a cloud?                          

From there it's still an hour and a half to Denver where you can see this by looking west from the third floor terrace of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. You're still on the prairie and the mountains are another half-hour west. That's if there's no ski traffic.

After New Year's, I looked forward to January 6, 2021. The United States Congress would formally count the Electoral Votes that were certified and forwarded to them by the States. Joe Biden would be the 46th President of the United States. Kamala Harris would be the first woman and first person of color elected Vice President of the United States.

I was ready. At 12:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (10:30 a.m. Mountain Standard Time) I turned on my TV to watch PBS's live coverage of the confirmation of the Biden-Harris victory.

PBS did not air Trump's rally prior to the mob's surge down Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol. Watching PBS's coverage of the joint session, I had no idea what had gone on less than an hour earlier and just blocks down the street.

It begins.

Announcing the votes is done by State alphabetically. Alabama and Arkansas the votes went to Trump. Arizona the votes went to Biden. The first objection came from Ted Cruz, Republican Senator from Texas. The Joint Session was suspended. The Senators went to debate the objection and vote yea or nay to uphold the objection. The House of Representatives met for the same purpose. Two and a half hours or so later the Joint Session was reconvened to announce that the objection was rejected and the count went forward.

    

                          Lisa Desjardin, PBS journalist                Amna Nawaz, PBS journalist
                             Inside the Capitol                                          Outside the Capitol

These two women are my friends. They've been in my house. I've been in theirs. At least electronically. Lisa has a black and white cat who lounges or cavorts on the couch in the background while she reports for PBS News Hour.

Amna was among journalists, on air, covering the activities outside the Capitol. We could see Trump supporters milling around, hurling obscenities at the reporters. As time went on, we could see the mob clambering over the Capitol, unimpeded.

  

                                  I was truly afraid for the safety of the reporters outside

Inside, Lisa was on air when the mob started bashing at the front doors of the Capitol. She was on an inside balcony, the next floor up and could see the doors. We could hear the glass in the doors shatter.

The mob had breached the doors and was pouring into the building. Lisa could see no Capitol Police. She started looking for a safe place. I think she must have been videoing from her cell phone and she kept it on. I was terrified for her.

At one point she was crouched down behind a counter. When she raised up to try to see what was going on a police officer in full protective gear carrying what looked like an assault rifle appeared. He told her to get down and stay down.

She was soon escorted to safety along with members of Congress transmitting video the whole time. At one point, she blocked our view saying "We're not supposed to photograph this area." (I almost laughed at the irony.) She continued to do her job despite the fact that her life and the lives of those around her, was at risk,  And yet she followed the rules designed to protect the Capitol. 

The Capitol was locked down. National Guard were brought in, much too late. The building was cleared and secured.

Documents and papers of all kinds were scattered. I wondered where the boxes containing the certified electoral votes were. What would happen if they were stolen or destroyed?

 

When the Joint Session was reconvened the boxes were carried in ahead of Vice President Pence. The votes were safe. Pence gaveled the Joint Session into being, pronounced the Trump Mob a failure and the count continued.

The count went forward. To be considered, objections had to be in writing, signed by a Member of the House of Representatives and a Senator. Following the violent mob assault on the Capitol, Senators who had signed onto the objections for Georgia, Michigan, and Nevada withdrew their support. No interrupting the session for debate was necessary for those states. Thank Goodness.

That left the objection to Pennsylvania's certified votes. And yes, the Joint Session was suspended while the House and Senate separately debated the merits of the objection and voted to uphold the objection or dismiss it. 

I have a long-standing interest in United States Constitutional Law. These past few weeks I have read and researched, researched and read, afraid that this whole affair could go awry or be delayed. The night of January 6 bled into January 7 before we had a resolution. At 3:41 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, 1:41 a.m. Mountain Standard Time, Vice President Pence in his role as President of the Senate announced that the electoral votes had been deemed correct and counted. Joseph R. Biden, Jr. of Delaware was elected President of the United States and Kamala D. Harris of California was elected Vice President of the United States.

I could go to bed. And I did.

The vote may have been confirmed, but the storming of the Capitol by a delusional, hate-filled mob will take longer to deal with. Five people died -- a member of the mob was shot by a Capitol policeman, three people died of medical emergencies, and one Capitol Police Officer was bludgeoned to death. Rioters will be identified and prosecuted. Whether Trump will be held accountable for inciting the violence and destruction is yet to be determined.

It's like the I-70 metaphor for 2020 and 2021:
"The first half of Colorado is going to be more Kansas. We won’t hit Denver until the summer at the earliest. But not even western Kansas lasts forever, no matter what it feels like on the drive."

Reading Sets You Free

Reading Sets You Free
(Image from Blue Cereal Education)

Yes, it does set me free. It always has.

Amidst the Covid-19 Pandemic, books keep me from being "locked down." I don't care if the books are in the hard copy form of actual physical books or if they are electronic. As long as the words are there. As long as they take me some place and show me a thing or two or twenty-seven.

Many of my friends  are working jigsaw puzzles. Thousands of pieces puzzles. They rescue them from the backs of closets. They retrieve them from storage units. They order them online. They share them back and forth and back again. They have preferences: puzzles about travel, puzzles about cats, brightly colored puzzles, oddly shaped puzzles.

I can't do puzzles. I have a cat. My Kočka, would no doubt love for me to work jigsaw puzzles -- on the dining table, sans 24-hour guard.

He plays with things. Carries things around. Loses things. He probably doesn't think he's "losing" things. The only thing he loses is "interest" in those things he carries around.

Kočka is an unusually smart cat, but words in books are beyond him. In fact, the books themselves hold no interest for him. And because my e-reader, unlike my cell phone, does not respond to his touching the screen, he's not interested in it either -- soooo, he leaves them alone.

Consequently, I may lose my place in whatever book I'm reading, but I won't lose the book, be it hard copy or electronic.

Our public library is closed for the foreseeable future. You can go online and put books on hold. Hard copy books you pick up curbside. It goes like this. They send you an email when the books you want are available. You park in the designated area at the library, call them to tell them you've arrived and open your trunk, then get back in your car. They bring your books out in a brown paper bag and put them in your trunk. You get out and close your trunk and go home. (Kinda puts you in mind of receiving contraband, doesn't it?) No face-to-face contact. Minimal risk of spreading Covid-19. Or you can download the books you want to your e-reader with absolutely zero chance of spreading the virus. Either way, it's free.



This week I finished Diane Mott Davidson's Tough Cookie, a cozy mystery, one of Davidson's series featuring the caterer sleuth Goldie Schultz. Her books are set in Colorado and are liberally sprinkled with recipes. 

Of course, I have to interrupt reading to prepare this recipe or that. The only thing is, even though her books are set just up the hill from where I live, I still have to amend them for cooking at altitude. At a book-signing, she explained that she has a professional change the recipes so they work at sea level.



And then I read Fredrik Backman's Britt-Marie Was Here. Let me just say, if it's a Backman book, it's worth my time. He writes people I know and philosophy I understand.

         

                   "A human being, any human being at all, has so perishingly few chances to 

              stay right there, to let go of time and fall into the moment. Explode with passion.

                    A few times when we are children, maybe, for those of us who are allowed 

              to be. But after that, how many breaths are we allowed to take beyond the con-

              fines of ourselves? How many pure emotions make us cheer out loud, without
              a sense of shame?
                     All passion is childish. It's banal and naive. It's nothing we learn; it's 
               instinctive, and so it overwhelms us. Overturns us. It bears us away in a flood. 

               All other emotions belong to the earth, but passion inhabits the universe."

Those two books, I downloaded on my e-reader from the library. 

My next book was Nevada Barr's Liberty Falling. Several years ago while my Daddy was still living, one of his care-givers brought me a grocery bag filled with Nevada Barr books. For those of you not familiar with her work, she writes murder mysteries, a bit more action-packed than Davidson's. Barr's main character is Anna Pigeon, a Park Ranger. Each mystery is set in one of the National Parks. This one takes place at The Statue of Liberty National Monument, Ellis Island National Park, and in New York City's Manhattan.

Remember the old James Bond movies, back when they included not only flash/bang/chase scenes but actual dialog. And that dialog was snarky?  Like when Bond was on the dance floor with a beautiful woman and he saw reflected in her eyes an assassin aiming at him. He spun her around so that it was she who was shot. He danced the victim over to a chair, gently sat her down in it and said to a bystander, "Do you mind if my friend sits this one out? She's just dead."

Barr laces her high energy action with the same kind of humor. At one point, Anna ascertains that a fellow Park Ranger, though injured, is not in danger of dying and she must go ahead and save the day. 


Barr writes,

"Anna squirmed under the Dumpster and retrieved Andrew's gun. A Glock 9mm, a good weapon. She chambered a round. 'I'll be back,' she promised. Arnold Schwarzenegger had said the same thing in Terminator 2. It sounded more convincing with the accent."

And a few pages on:

"Regardless of how divinely inspired, New York frowned upon unauthorized persons shooting people with borrowed guns. Anna spent seven hours with three different law enforcement agencies giving statements, defending her
actions, accepting congratulations, being bullied and drinking bad coffee. Drowning in polluted salt water was beginning to seem like the good old days."



Despite the current administration's hurry to "reopen," the simple fact of the matter is Covid-19 is here to stay. Until there is a safe and effective vaccine, those of us in an "at risk group" or who interact with people in such a group should continue to stay home when possible, observe six-feet social distancing and wear masks when away from home, and wash our hands often or use hand sanitizer.

And do whatever we can to limit cabin fever -- work jigsaw puzzles, read, watch old movies, dance in the laundry room, sing in the kitchen, paint, bake, write, take online ukulele lessons -- make our own happy!

Y'all stay safe.

All Writers Should Be Poets

Writing is Magic
image from Dreamwidth Studios

Yes, all writers should be poets. And word musicians. They should play language, the simple, normal language of real people. Because simple, normal people (whether they have the time to see it or not) live in all the colors of sound and sight and touch. And thought.

Barbara Kingsolver is just such a writer.

From Pigs in Heaven:

              "Cash learned beadwork without really knowing it ....
                He never imagined ...
                he would have to do another delicate thing with his hands ...
                to pay the rent. But since he started putting beads
                on his needle each night, his eye never stops
                counting rows: pine trees on the mountainsides, boards in a fence,
                kernels on the ear of corn as he drops it into the kettle.
                He can't stop the habit, it satisfies the ache
                in the back of his brain, as if it might
                fill in his life's terrible gaps.
                His mind is lining things up,
                making jewelry for someone the size of God."

The words are Kingsolver's. The line breaks are mine. The experience is ours. Yours and mine in this time of Covid-19 when we keep apart from our old lives. We work puzzles (jigsaw and otherwise) or binge watch TV or read or sleep or garden or bake or any and all the things we each do to satisfy "the ache in the back of" our mind. To fill "life's terrible gaps" brought into such fine focus by our new, slow-paced, quiet time.

Maybe, in this new, slow-paced, quiet time, we are all "making jewelry for someone the size of God." .

My World

My world

     If I close my eyes and reach out my hands to either side, I can touch the edges of my world. On March 7, 2020, the Novel Corona Virus 19 contracted my world. On that date, I returned home from San Antonio, Texas by way of Houston. That's 1,226 miles. During the almost two months since then, the farthest I've been away from the hallway in this picture is 6.4 miles.
     This is my hallway. Behind us and to our right is the great room, my kitchen/dining/living room. My husband and I cook, eat, read, watch TV, and doze there. The first door on the right is the coat closet. Ostensibly meant to hold visitors coats. The last visitors we had were since our niece and her family. They stopped over on their way to go skiing in the mountains then back home to New Mexico. They left our house March 10.
     March 11, I went to my exercise class at my Rec Center. March 12, my rec center closed. And my public library closed. The two suns of my circumbinary social system went dark.
     On March 17, Colorado's governor and the State Public Health Department issued "Public Health Order 20-22 closing bars, restaurants, theaters, gymnasiums, casinos, nonessential personal services facilities, and horse track and off-track betting facilities statewide." (And here I didn't even know Colorado had a horse racing track. I knew there had been Gray Hound racing in Colorado, but it had shut down sometime before I moved here and was then banned in 2014.)
     At first Stay-at-Home was frightening and oppressive. The Rec Center where I went four days a week for exercise class was closed. That was my connection with the community. That's where I'd met my friends, where I interacted with them, where my walking group had been formed.
     I call it "my walking group" but it is truly "our" walking group -- a loosely knit group of people mostly over 65. We are from all over -- as global as Covid-19. And some are that rarity, Native Coloradans.
     Thank goodness, the Stay-at-Home Order has exemptions. We can walk in our town's public parks or on its streets as long as we observe six-feet social distancing and wear masks.  That's what the walking group does now, almost everyday.
     We used to go for coffee, or whatever, at various shops and bakeries after our walks. That's when we visited. By that I mean we talked about everything -- politics, religion, families, children, grandchildren, science, health, books, movies. You name it, we talked about it. There was always empathy and plenty of laughter.
   
     Those shops and bakeries are open for curb service only now, so we sit in empty picnic pavilions or set up our folding chairs in parking lots and driveways (maintaining social distancing, of course) and we visit. We still enjoy empathy and plenty of laughter.
(This photo was taken after the 6-feet, but before face masks were mandated and before those who live in Senior housing were restricted to their apartments and allowed no visitors and no communal dining.)
         
Oh, yes -- and now we have Zoom meetings. That could be a joke "How is a group of Senior Citizens like a kindergarten class?"
       

     One day last week, I understood that this is my world for the foreseeable future.
Oddly enough, recognizing that was very freeing. My world happens to be in the midst of the most beautiful landscapes in the world. Mountains and lakes, and wondrous skies with glorious sunrises and sunsets.

Sunrise and Sunset (Both photos looking west from my back deck.)  

   





We have walking trails that feel like we're away from the city, while still being in the city. The herons and cormorants and egrets, the geese and ducks and robins are all back from their wintering grounds. They're building nests and hatching babies. They remind me that life goes on.
   
     Life does go on and we observe the current restrictions knowing that we are protecting our families and friends as much as we can. And they are protecting us as much as they can.

This is my world.

The Best Night Out

Civic Center Music Hall

I grew up in small town Oklahoma. As a teen, we lived in a college town on the northern edge of Oklahoma City, it was still a small town and quite separate from The City, but....

The college afforded us access to things other small towns lacked. We could swim in the college indoor pool year round. We could use the college library in addition to our school library and the local public library. Plays were performed by the drama department. There were recitals and concerts, poetry readings, and art shows. We had a veritable smorgasbord of the arts by college students, instructors, and invited professionals. Consequently, I developed a taste for that kind of entertainment.

Now in the time of Covid-19, here I am living within easy access to a big city, complete with all these things from multiple colleges and universities plus the Denver Museum of Art, Colorado Symphony, and Colorado Ballet. Let me just say, Colorado Ballet is an excellent company and Denver has an excellent ballet audience.

We have travelling Broadway shows, and big-name concerts at top venues. Red Rocks Amphitheater is almost within sight of my house -- if you take away a couple of ridges and lots of trees.

But not right now. The doors are closed. The halls are silent. The lights are out.

So I'm remembering the best night out I ever had -- keeping in mind, I've had many best nights out.

This one, though, came when I was living in a different small town in Oklahoma. Guthrie, Oklahoma to be exact. A perfectly fine small town. Actually, as small towns go, it wasn't quite that small. It was and is the County Seat which means it had more than its fair share of lawyers and doctors. It had a daily newspaper, plenty of restaurants specializing in good, hearty food -- one that could actually qualify as fancy (and expensive.) A movie theater, a drive-in movie theater, and umpteen history museums (Guthrie was the Territorial Capital of Oklahoma.) The Masonic Temple sits on a hill overlooking the city. It has a very fine pipe organ and the nicest Ladies' Room I've ever been in complete with a baby grand piano in it's sitting room. The only Ladies' I've ever been in with a sitting room.

But you know, sometimes you just need to get out of your day-to-day life in your safe but too familiar small town. You need to see people you don't know.

A fellow single mother and I drove out of Guthrie to The City. Her daughter and my son were with their respective fathers so we had no immediate responsibilities.

First there was dinner at a restaurant fancy enough to have semi-private booths, cloth table cloths, and cloth napkins. Then we sat with hundreds of people we did not know at Civic Center Music Hall watching the Oklahoma City Ballet. Oklahoma City has the best ballet audience! They actually feel free and know when to applaud instead of waiting until the end of a performance.

From there we went to a jazz club for more good music and a drink or two, some good conversation and maybe a bit of flirtation.

The club closed, but we weren't ready to go home yet. Or at least not all the way home. So to the Hill Top Cafe in Guthrie. The Hill Top was one of those tiny 24-hour places with stools at the counter facing the grill, some booths around the outside walls and two long communal tables down the middle of the floor. It caught folks when the bars and clubs closed and, because it was just down the road from the VFW Hall, it caught all those folks, too, after they had danced and drank their Saturday night away. In The Hill Top at that hour, we could see any hair style, any clothing style, any age group over 21.

And even some people we knew. People who had also broken away from their mundane small-town life for whatever their style of best night out might be.

Finally, as the sun came up, she dropped me at my house. There is just something wonderful about ending your best night out, safe in your own small town at the hour you most often got up.

Some Days Are Diamonds

"Some days are diamonds, some days are stones" -- Dick Feller

It's Easter Sunday. 

When I awoke this morning, it was dark, 23 degrees, and snowing. The forecast is for snow the rest of today and tomorrow and tomorrow night. 

Travel is discouraged or, in some instances, banned. When we walk together, we walk apart and wear masks. When we meet for coffee, we have Zoom meetings, spending much of the limited time helping each other navigate the technology so we can be together virtually.

And today is Easter. Traditional sites for Sunrise Services are closed. Churches are closed. The world is closed. All now relegated to the virtual.

Traditions are now virtual.

The Easter tradition, for Christians, is a time to commemorate Jesus rising from the dead, promising  life. For Jews, Passover (which shares calendar time with Easter Week) commemorates the tenth of the plagues sent by God to force the Egyptians to free the Israelites. By marking their doorposts with the blood of a spring lamb, their firstborn lived while the first born children of their Egyptian neighbors died. A promise of life in a world of death. 

"Sometimes the hard times won't leave me alone"

In this time of our own plague, traditions that promise us hope and give us peace are especially needed, but are available to us in such changed forms, it's hard to know if they will provide hope and peace.

And right now, it is snowing.

 "Sometimes a cold wind blows a chill in my bones"

But if I am still and quiet, right here, right now, I can see that today is "diamond."

I am here, cossetted in my warm home. Not alone, but with the man I love. We have food and water and access to the world. We are well. Those we love are far from us but they too, are well.

The sun may not be shining on my home today. The weather is closed in around our neighborhood and we can't see the foothills, but we do have the bright white of snow. 

Snow bathes the world in the most beautiful silence. A silence accented with birdsong. They know it's Spring. 

This layer of snow somehow makes me feel separated and safe from the worries and fears that are today's Covid-19 plague.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      And when the sun returns to our beautiful snowy world we'll celebrate the light on our neighborhood and on the foothills.

So for now, I'll have a nice cup of coffee, some buttered toast (homemade, sourdough of course) and enjoy this Easter that the snow has made "diamond."

D is for Dear America

From Simmons Buntin, co-editor of Dear America, a collection of personal essays, narrative journalism, poetry, and visual art from more than 130 contributors:

     "Dear Reader,
          "When Alison Hawthorne Deming sent me her letter to America a week after the 2016 U.S.
     presidential election, I had just hung up the phone with my daughter, a college sophomore,
     biologist-in-training, and young woman who had just voted in her first presidential election --
     and now found herself devastated. It was the fourth or fifth time we'd talked since the election,
     and as her father I felt that I was in the position of talking her down from a ledge. A ledge on
     which we both teetered.
          "Alison's letter arrived just in time. A response to the shaken American landscape so
     vividly illuminated by Donald Trump's win, it was written -- she told me in offering the letter
     for publication in Terrain.org -- to encourage herself and others as we reeled with the dis-
     ruption in our sense of national well-being."

Terrain.org is a nonprofit literary magazine published online since 1997. It continues to accept submissions for publication -- including for the ongoing Dear America project.

I attended the Association of Writers and Publishers Conference in San Antonio during the first week of March. I, too, had "teetered" on that ledge. When I heard the first panel of writers from the Dear America I was reassured that I was not alone. Reassured that we need not acquiesce to the anti-American policies of the Trump administration. I was inspired. I was braced for action. And I spent my book budget on copies of Dear America so I could lend or give it to people I love.

The essays and poems in Dear America are not diatribes against Trump and his cronies. In fact, they are celebrations of the America I remember and still believe in. Celebrations of escaping urban noise and motion while fishing off the end of a pier. Of immigrant dreams. Of not racist treatment.

I have been afraid of how far we were falling away from our American values. The goal of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" for all people regardless of and respecting our individual differences. But not dividing ourselves into us and them.

Where once I thought of America as being the Leader of the Free World, I have watched in fear as we were led away from the Free World toward the oligarchies, and the tyrannies of the world.

And now America is experiencing a greater danger. One that is without national boundaries, without politics, without any concern for any individual or group of individuals.

We are being schooled by Covid-19 in just exactly how much good it does to "go it alone" -- as a person, as a demographic, as a nation.

And again, this book, this collection of writings from more than 130 people, this Dear America reassures me. That woman's letter which steadied Mr. Buntin from "teetering" on the ledge back in 2016 continues to steady us and call us to action.

"Think of the great spirit of inventiveness the Earth calls forth after each major disturbance it suffers. Be artful, inventive, and just, my friends, but do not be silent."  -- Alison Hawthorne Deming

Colorado Is Closed

Colorado has majestic mountains and towering skies.

Colorado hosted more than 86 million tourists in 2019, most of whom were actually Coloradans and residents of neighboring states.  Along with their more than a million international guests, Coloradans love their state. They ski and snowboard and snowshoe in the winter in the mountains. They hike and bike and fish and hunt throughout the state all year round. Colorado hosts music festivals, movie festivals, literary festivals, winter sports competitions, Broadway shows, concerts -- you name it, we got it.

But Colorado is closed.

Not the normal closure for winter. The road to the top of Mount Evans closes after Labor Day and doesn't reopen until late May or early June based on snowpack. Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park closes in October and reopens in late May or early June depending on the snowpack. Rocky Mountain National Park, however, normally stays open. Even the park is closed now.

I had a trip planned. The Air B and B was reserved for March 4 through March 7. The registration check was sent for the Association of Writers and Publishers Conference (AWP) in San Antonio Texas scheduled for March 5-7. Airlines tickets were purchased Denver to Houston for March 4, and the return flight March 8. My daughter would pick me and one of her partners up at Hobby Airport. We would have lunch with her husband there in Houston, then she would drive us to San Antonio.

Anticipation was high. Carolyn Forché, American poet, human rights activist, and my daughter's mentor would be there and I would get to meet her. I figured Jeffrey Brown, PBS News Hour's Arts Correspondent, would be there. (He has the perfect job for me -- he gets to interview novelists, historians, poets, artists, musicians. Not just movie stars and sports figures who are hocking a new movie or sneakers or some such.)

Before the day came to fly to Texas, I learned that Forché would not be there. Well, there was still Jeffrey Brown. 

As February wore on, reports of a new corona virus on the other side of the world were gathering attention. Warnings of an epidemic with the possibility of becoming a pandemic were sharing news time with snow storms.

Then I got an email from AWP saying that with the impending arrival of the new virus to the United States we could, if we did not want to travel, get our registration fee refunded or applied it to next year's conference. But the conference would go on as planned. And I went to Texas as planned. Even with half the expected ten thousand participants no-shows and about half the panel discussions cancelled, it was still great! And if Jeffrey Brown was there, I missed him.

When I returned to Colorado on March 8, our niece and her family were staying with us before they went up to the ski area at Breckenridge on Monday, March 9. 

I walked with my walking group Tuesday, March 10. Went to my exercise class at the rec center on Wednesday, March 11, and walked again with the group Thursday March 12. My normal schedule -- exercise at the rec center Monday and Wednesday mornings and Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. By that Thursday afternoon Jefferson County's (where we live) libraries and rec centers were closed for two weeks. The parks were still open for walking which our walking group did in the morning on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. After we walk we normally go for coffee at local shops. We continued to walk and go for coffee.

Sunday, March 15, I heard an announcement on the news that the Colorado Public Health Department was recommending anyone who had been in four Colorado counties during the previous week should self-quarantine for 14 day. Breckenridge is in Summit County, one of the four counties. I called our niece to see if she had heard. She had not. They had returned the day before to their home in Albuquerque on the Air Force base where her husband is stationed. She said "everything is changed." The Air Force base was closed. They were restricted to their home. Her children's schools were closed.

On St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 2020. Governor Polis set statewide restrictions including closure of Colorado's schools; restricted gatherings to no more than 10 people; set the six-feet social distancing; closed dining areas in restaurants and bars, allowing only pick-up and delivery services; stopped the ski lifts and ordered ski resorts to close until April 6.

(In the U.S. we get to pinch anyone who does not wear green on St. Patrick's Day. Here we are maintaining our six feet distance and remotely pinching Joe.)

On March 25, Governor Polis put the State of Colorado in complete lock-down, with a stay at home order. This started on Thursday, the twenty-sixth at six in the morning and was scheduled to last through April 11. It is now extended through the month of April.

Grocery stores some days have plenty of this and not so much of that. And other days, just the opposite. Inexplicably there has been a run on toilet paper (No pun intended) and, as if the situation were not disquieting enough, on guns and ammunition.

We are still walking, maintaining our six feet social distancing, both while we walk and while we visit after we walk. We bring our own drinks and treats.

And today we held our first audio/video meeting online. Some bugs definitely need to be worked out for this.

But we'll get it figured out. And we will get through this together.

A to Z Blogging Challenge -- America

Today is Day 1 of the 2020 April A to Z Blogging Challenge. In all the Covid-19 chaos, I did not sign up, but I need to write so I'm going to do it informally. The goal of the challenge is to post every day except Sundays during the month of April. Each day's topic will begin with the corresponding letter for that day. April 1's topic should begin with A. April 2, B. April 3, C. etc.

Today is Day 1, A -- America

In this day of the continuing Stay At Home edict, America is at risk from Corona Virus-19.

Many years ago on my first trip to Washington, D.C., I saw the America I believe in.
I worked for the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation, part of the Department of Agriculture in Oklahoma City. They sent me to D.C. for training. Alone.

I saw America on the subway despite my out-of-towner anxiety. Oklahoma City has very little in the way of public transportation and back then even less.

That first day I entered the Metro at the DuPont Circle Station. I carefully paid attention to my surroundings as I walked from my hotel to the station so I would know which way to go when I came back. The Colombian Embassy was right there, a red brick building across the street from DuPont Circle which was a small park.

Descending into the underworld, I was exposed to the high speed world of a big city. The locals literally ran up and down the impossibly high escalators, not just one floor or even two floors, but three or four floors without a break. Did I mention, I'm afraid of heights? I stood as far to the right as possible clinging to the railing with both hands, silently pleading "Don't touch me. Don't touch me." They ran past me carrying their brief cases and back packs and giant purses and shopping bags. I knew that if they brushed against me, I'd tumble all the way to the bottom.

On the train, I worried about how I would know which stop to get off? The train was filled with people. I was alone. I was scared enough that I didn't really register the sights and sounds of the people around me. Locals in their business professional attire. Most wore government id's on lanyards around their necks. The women wore sneakers, their heels stowed in those bags to change into once they got to the office. I had been advised to do the same, so I was in sneakers, too.

And there were tourists, too. It was June, so they were in their comfy vacation clothes. Some of them didn't know how to navigate the underground either. I listened as they discussed among themselves how to read the maps posted on the wall of the train. One group had been in town for a week. They were from Iowa. They actually knew where the Ag Building was and explained to me where I needed to get off. Luckily there was a station right across from the building I needed to go to.

When I returned at the end of the day, I confidently exited the subway at the DuPont Circle Station. However, when I reached the surface, I recognized nothing. I didn't see the Colombian Embassy. Even DuPont Circle looked different. What confidence I had gained during the day evaporated.

I knew the street my hotel was on. So I started walking in the direction I thought I should go. I realized I should ask someone which way. There was a group of upper elementary aged children speaking French. There were people in twos and threes speaking languages I didn't recognize. Finally I passed two men speaking English. I asked them how to get to where I wanted to go. They looked around thoughtfully then gave me directions and wished me well.

When I got back to the hotel, I found out there are two subway stations at DuPont Circle.

The second day, I was considerably more secure. I did know how to ride the subway. No one was going to knock into me on the escalators and both locals and tourists were perfectly willing to help a lost out-of-towner.

That afternoon on the ride "home" to my hotel, three young women each dressed in white and carrying a rose further represented this America that I love. They had just been to their high school graduation. One was a red-haired Caucasian, one was African American, and the third appeared to be of Middle Eastern heritage. Three enthusiastic young women embarking on their future.

I know people complain about Washington, meaning the American government. And I admit that if something can be mismanaged or someone can be mistreated, our government can certainly discover just such a way to do it. And even with all our languages, Americans can fail to communicate with each other. But, Washington, D.C. is a beautiful city, filled with museums celebrating America's past and people of all kinds building the future.

The city exemplifies the wonderful variety of America. And, along with the rest of the world, America will come through Covid-19.

America's Future

If Wishes Were Horses

If wishes were horses....

A wish-horse carried Donald John Trump into the White House.

Coal country wishing that Climate Change were not real. Wishing that those with Black Lung Disease did not depend on the extensions of eligibility that the Affordable Care Act accorded them.

Oil and Natural Gas Country wishing that Climate Change were not real. Wishing that Miles Per Gallon regulations were not enacted reducing the amount of gasoline needed by American cars.

Steel Country wishing that the ship for American produced steel had not already sailed.

White America wishing that the White Majority ship had not already sailed.

American Nationalists wishing that their futures were not intertwined with the futures of the rest of the world.

The Covid-19 Pandemic has stripped away the veil of wishes. Climate change is real. Steel production is not coming back to America. Coal is not coming back. America, indeed the World, cannot continue to depend on fossil fuels for energy.

Artificial boundaries setup by wishful people and their governments will not protect us.

Willful ignorance and bombast from wish-mongering leaders will not protect us.

Wishes are not horses and a World divided will not stand.

Being 72 in the Year of Corona Virus

A Silver Sneakers Class

Silver Sneakers is a program of physical fitness classes for people 65 years old and older. I have benefited greatly from these classes -- everything from increased endurance and improved balance to greater strength and flexibility at least as they relate to my physical self. (There are certain ethical and political issues about which I am not famous for being particularly flexible.)

I am 72 years old and in this time of the Novel Corona Virus pandemic, my age group are the most vulnerable to death as a result of Covid-19. Unfortunately most of my friends and a goodly group of my relatives are in this age and risk group. And, at this age, we are more likely to have "underlying health issues," which all and sundry take pains to point out are complicating risk issues.

I would here be inclined to extol my general good health, but I shouldn't tempt the Fates.

I walk with a group of people pretty much my age (and this is a very fluid group) three mornings a week and go to coffee together afterwards to discuss the world's problems and the successes of our children and pets. Plus I go to Silver Sneakers classes two to four days a week depending on what else is going on in my life. I feel that both activities are very important to my physical and mental wellbeing.

A friend recently said "I think we retirees need to stay home and go out for necessities when we need them at least for awhile to help the slowdown of people being infected. What are your thoughts." 


We walked at Addenbrooke Park and went to The Village Roaster for coffee Tuesday. The young woman at the counter wiped down everything customers touched.


Geese by the acre on Addenbrooke's Soccer Fields. That's Mt. Morrison in the background.

Yesterday morning we walked at Kendrick Lake. Another look at Mt. Morrison, this time across Kendrick Lake.











Then I went to class yesterday afternoon. There weren't very many people in class so there was plenty of space between us. I took disinfectant wipes and used them liberally on the equipment, including the chair I sat in. They have the scanning wand set up on the counter so they don't handle our cards to check us in.

I think walking outside presents minimal risk.

I think these things are all important to maintain my health, so I will continue to do them as long as I feel well. I don't have reason to interact with children, people in nursing care facilities, or hospitals. I think I will avoid entertainment venues that might be crowded, if such things continue to exist in the near future. And I'll probably do my errands when businesses are likely to be less busy. Again using hand washing, hand sanitizer, and disinfectant wipes.

The thing is, this virus is rather like fire -- as long as there is fuel available it will spread and the people of the world have no immunity (at least those of us who have not yet had the virus) so we are the fuel. Unfortunately this corona virus will run its course and we just need to stay as healthy as we can so if we do contract it, we have a reasonable expectation of surviving.

I am worried about my friends. We are in the age category at risk of worst outcomes, and many of us do have underlying health issues.

I am perfectly willing to make adjustments to my behavior as conditions warrant.

And I certainly will take appropriate actions including self-quarantine if I, at any point, test positive for Covid-19 or, indeed, begin to feel ill with anything. I don't want to share a cold or the flu with anyone either.