So Long 2021

Today is (soon to be was) the final day of 2021, so of course the Song of the Day must be Auld Lang Syne sung by actor, singer, and songwriter Lea Michelle. Written by Robert Burns in 1788, the song is traditionally sung at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve to bid farewell to the old year.

History

Sometimes I pause, and I look back at my life, at where I began and where I am. It might be a stack of old papers that trigger the nostalgia. It might be a stack of old photos.

My life is a long trail of breadcrumbs leading from the far past to an unknowable future. The breadcrumbs, in this case, are writings and drawings and photos and homemade electronic gadgets I built long ago and computer programs I wrote long ago. 

I used to write short stories of the science fiction variety, and poems, now and then. I used to create  drawings; pencil sketches mostly, but oil paintings too. I used to build electronic gadgets and write computer programs. I've peered down the barrels of microscopes (I've owned three) to examine a part of our world right under our noses that we never see. As a child, I've mixed chemicals that today's society would consider dangerous, and more than once I've nearly electrocuted myself after I grew big enough for my hand to reach an electrical outlet.

I've had pain, physical and psychological, but I don't like to talk about pain because it's an important and private part of a person. It's part of who we are and it shapes us. But sometimes talking about pain is the only way to share who we really are when we're with someone who cares.

But while the breadcrumbs are interesting to look back at, their totality points nowhere. Not to greatness, not to success, not to anything our society considers worthy. And that is okay. We each have a path, and we each learn something while we're on our path. Our path will end when it is supposed to end, and hopefully we're wiser because we traveled the path. The important thing is to know that you're okay; we're all okay, even if it seems like we're not. Maybe you're a mogul and maybe you're a peasant, but that isn't important. Our financial status, our social status, the things our culture considers important: those things are just stage props on our spirit's journey. It can be helpful to keep that in mind.

Ocean Memory

This is memory:

I look out at the ocean. The shallow water is pale green and flat. Calm and peaceful. Tranquil. Pretty, even. Today. The ocean is beautiful today. Another day, the ocean will be angry. It will be a killer.

Life is like that. One day life is calm, peaceful, beautiful. Another day life is in turmoil. Perhaps the ocean is a metaphor for life. Or, perhaps life is a metaphor for the ocean. After all, the ocean was here first. The ocean gave birth to life. Life is a child of the ocean. We all carry a little of that ocean in us. It is part of our blood, part of our sweat, part of our tears. Our body fluids are based on the sea. The sea is our mother.

But enough of memory. Today is cloudy and wet. A cold rain falls. I have moved my chair in front of the fireplace. I have a fire log burning in the fireplace. It casts its heat and light onto my bare legs and body. It feels very good. For me there has always been something almost primeval about warmth, especially on a cold day. I suppose if the ocean is our mother, then the Sun must be our father. Surely light came first. Light and the warmth it provides preceded everything.

I have nothing to say today. So I sit in my chair in front of my fireplace, holding my phone with both hands, with my elbows propped on the arms of the chair, and I dictate into the phone. The phone writes down everything I say and when I am done, a few taps on the phone will transfer what I have spoken into a post on my blog. What a world we have created!

On Christmas Day in the Morning

It's Christmas Day in the morning, 7AM. I tried to get an early start to this blog post but there was the handing-out of gifts and then the figuring-out how to operate said gifts, which is always the fun part.

Christmas always occurs on December 25th. For centuries people would wander around asking strangers, "Is this day Christmas?" but no one could answer, because the Gregorian calendar we use today wasn't introduced by Pope Gregory until October, 1582. Before that, if you asked someone "What's the date?" they would only shrug. I'm kidding. Before 1582, people knew exactly what the date was. It's just that they were wrong.

The time is now 7:22AM, which happens to be the exact time of sunrise where I live. I'm watching Pentatonix singing their Christmas show on BYUtv. The name of the show is Christmas Under The Stars with Pentatonix. They (BYU) have the show every year, and every year it features different singers. This year, they chose Pentatonix. It's a good show with lots of good Christmas music.

Here's the link: Christmas Under the Stars with Pentatonix

Merry Christmas to one and all.

Pentatonix

Today is Christmas Eve, 2021. It's a busy time of year. Tomorrow, almost all stores will be closed and everyone knows it. So, from Christmas presents to grocery food, if you want to have it tomorrow you had better buy it by store closing time today.

I've been listening to Pentatonix songs this morning. The group has many beautiful music videos on YouTube, including many Christmas music videos. This song (My Heart With You) is not really a Christmas song, but the lyrics deliver a Christmas message.

The song of the day is My Heart With You from the album Evergreen by Pentatonix.

Expiration

Central Virginia, Monday, December 6. The outside temperature is 72°F. The sky is sunny, the air is breezy. Clouds are on the way. Change is coming.

Forecast for Tuesday, December 7. High temperature: 41°F. Snow likely. 

That's how it is in winter in central Virginia. One day you can take a nice walk around the park in sunshine. The next day you go outside and freeze your buttocks off. So stay inside. If you can.

Nuria is going through my kitchen cabinets and cleaning out food items that she thinks are expired. This has prompted some disagreements. I say that white flour lasts forever; she disagrees. I have flour that is twenty years old. If you make bread or a cake with old flour, shouldn't the heat of baking kill any germs?

Another item had an expiration date of 2005. I let that one go to the trash can. Some items are not worth an argument.

I had perfectly good brown sugar that she wanted to throw away, just because it had become as rock hard as concrete. I argued that we could break off a piece of the sugar with a hammer and chisel. She disagreed. So we tossed it.

Nothing really expires on the date listed on the package, except for garden salad. The manufacturer always includes some leeway, just to make sure it's still good on the expiration date. So, let's say that something I bought in 2016 has an expiration date of 2019. We know it's still good in 2021. Don't we? Because that's the theory I've been using. For example, I just drank a glass of water with psyllium fiber that expired in 2019. And I feel okay. I still feel okay. I feel...somewhat okay. I feel...excuse me. I have to go now.

Morning

I awaken at 6AM. I roll over to face Nuria, who is lying on her side with her back toward me. I run my fingertips over Nuria's back. Her skin is smooth as silk. I rub her back lightly, running my fingertips over her entire back, her belly, her hip, and down her thigh. "I love that," she says. I love doing it. Finally she rolls over to face me. We lie in bed cheek to cheek, but I continue my fingertip massage. 

"You woke me up at one thirty," she tells me. "You shook me and said, 'It's one thirty, you have to get up.'"

"What did you do?" I asked.

"Nothing."

"What did I do?"

"You went back to sleep."

"No, I didn't go back to sleep. I was asleep the whole time." 

I do that kind of thing more often than I would care to admit. I do things while I'm sleeping. I have no memory of doing these things. I am asleep, probably dreaming, when I do them. 

"It's almost six thirty," Nuria says. "Time to get up." She means it's time for her to get up. But I know I won't go back to sleep.

I roll my legs off the bed and switch on the small lamp on the dresser beside my bed. It's a cool little lamp. I like that the on/off switch is on the lamp base, very easy to reach. And there is a USB charging port on the side of the lamp base that I plug my phone into overnight. 

The house is cool and Nuria slips on jammies and a flannel shirt, I pull on warmup pants and a t-shirt, and we go to the front room. Nuria makes her morning coffee then sits on the couch and watches TV news. I sit at the computer and start this blog. When it's about half written, I interrupt it to go and sit with Nuria.

"Te amo," she whispers to me.

"Te amo muchisimo," I whisper back. And because I'm in the mood, I add, "Te extraño, te necesito, te quiero, te deseo."

After a while, Nuria asks me what I want for breakfast. "Do you want gallo pinto?"

"With egg?" I ask.

"And sausage," she suggests.

"Sounds good."

Nuria goes to the kitchen and I go to the computer to finish writing this blog. Another day is beginning. Who knows what it will bring, where we will go, what we will do.

Tis The Season

Day One: 

I was walking the aisles of the grocery section of Wally World, when I saw a sign advertising "homeless chickens."

"Wow," I thought, "homeless chickens! That sounds so sad. And now they're just waiting to be bought and taken to someone's home, only to be killed and eaten. From homeless to dead."

Then I got closer to the sign and I saw that it said, "boneless chickens." Oh. Well, that's entirely different. Same dead chickens, but now I need an eye exam.

Day Two:

I submitted a refill request to the Walmart pharmacy. After four days passed, I called the pharmacy and asked where was my prescription. They told me that a request had been sent to my doctor but they had not received a response. So I called my doctor. A nice young lady answered the phone. I described the situation and asked, "Why haven't you responded to the pharmacy with a refill order?"

Her answer was, "Our system has been down for five weeks."

Five weeks?! An essential medical system on which hundreds of patients depend can go down for five weeks with no one able to fix it? Am I in Burundi or the USA? I was not happy. But I got my refill the next day.

Day Three:

I found myself hanging drapes with Nuria. We got the windows of the great room at the front of the house decorated with new drapes. We got the windows in two bedrooms upstairs decorated with new drapes. It was a joint operation with Nuria. She found the drapes and used needle and thread or some similar magic to make them the correct length. I hung them on curtain rods.

Day Four:

I found myself stringing Christmas decorations with Nuria. We've got decorations outside and inside. Some of them have lighted bulbs. Some of the lighted bulbs blink on and off. My house looks more Christmas-y than it has looked in twenty years.

Day Five:

The water bill came in the mail. It's 30% higher than it has been. Partly, that's because Nuria has been living with me for a few weeks. And partly it's because the damn toilet runs constantly and it's getting worse. So I have to (a) replace the mechanism inside the toilet tank—the float valve and the flapper valve—or (b) replace the entire toilet, the bowl and tank. I haven't decided what to do about this. It's just one of those decisions hanging over my head.

And I need to buy presents for Nuria and I don't know what women of her age (a grandmother) would like to have. I've always hated buying gifts because it's always a struggle to divine what's in the head of another person. Nuria says I don't need to get her anything, but of course I know deep down she's hoping to get a few gifts. But what? What? If anyone has any ideas, please put them in the comments. And, thanks.