December 2023

A Scrapbook Tree

/ wvfurandroot / 4 Comments

I’ve been standing here for 5 or 6 years.  She can’t bear to take me down, but she doesn’t spend any time in this room either.  She’s always called me a scrapbook tree.  Every ornament is a memory of a person, place, or thing.  There is a seahorse to commemorate her first trip back to the beach since 1980.  There is a graduation cap with a tassel to recognize the adventure that completing her degree in her 40s was.

There is a heart with a pink ribbon for the second best friend who died.  Oddly there is not one for the first best friend.  I wonder when that will occur to her.  There is a sunflower for the third and best best friend who died.

Her dad is well represented – a miniature Marine in dress blues as well as a “lid” with the Marine Corps insignia on it.  There is not an ornament for her grandchild.  She has bought them, but they lay in boxes waiting for her energy and desire to return.  She also has a COVID mask at the ready to remember the pandemic and resultant case of long COVID.

Most years, I am adored and celebrated.  She takes photo after photo.  She’s very proud of me. 

But she’s grieving.  Still the best friend, still the father, still her lover.  She is grieving the circumstances surrounding her only grandchild.  She is grieving her lost youth.  She is grieving her mother’s dementia.  She is grieving her physical decimation that COVID wrought in her body.

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Bubble Baths

/ wvfurandroot / 2 Comments

I am addicted to pleasure.  I am a full-blown hedonist and I make no apology for it.  Indeed, I celebrate and encourage this aspect of my personality.  My favorite word is AND.  Go big or go home.  Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think.  Etc. I have many mottos that at heart just mean I am into the good stuff. 

Photo by Cristian Palmer on Unsplash

And good stuff does not necessarily mean expensive stuff.  For instance, this morning I had a bubble bath. A long, luxurious one with a fine hand-milled oatmeal soap scented with vanilla.  I smell like a warm cookie on this very cold morning.   

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The Persimmon Tree

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The leaves are strewn about the foot of the tree and, if the sun is just right, the persimmon looks as if it was hung with Chinese lanterns.

Persimmon Tree by Behnaz Khanban

The tree bears fruit that is not edible until after the first frost.  The orange globes hang from bare branches and color a gloomy autumn day with their ethereal orange.  What a gift.

This time of year always finds me depressed and hopeless that the verdant mountains and abundant flowers will return.  We are all gray and black and brown.  The trees are naked and stark.  One persimmon here — up on my hill — would be a blessing.

To be like the persimmon – to produce vivid color in a black and white world.  To provide fruit when all else is spent and the earth waits for the snow cover.  To be a beautiful beacon of Mother Earth’s miracles.

I want to be a persimmon.

Chinese Food in London

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TripAdvisor wouldn’t let me leave a zero-star review. Pity that. This restaurant deserved it. Hence the one star. Abysmal, awful, horrible, and every other synonym for bad. About the only good thing I can say is it was clean. As far as I could see.

Yes, we were a large party, but I think that we were American was the bigger problem. Our sojourn in London began when we were overwhelmed by the choices and wary due to the reputation of English food. We were hungry. So, what does a large group of hungry people decide on? Chinese. It suits everyone.

We were the only clientele. That should have been a warning, but we were jetlagged.

Photo by Elena Koycheva on Unsplash

Nobody seemed to speak English–not even the language that passes for English in Great Britain. I have never been to a foreign country before where I had such a hard time understanding people. I think Mark Twain described it as two countries separated by a common language.

Anyway.

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