Time flies...

 January 31, 2024

Another month is finishing up, and really, if I didn’t sit down so much, I think I would be dizzy from the speed at which time is flying by. The last week has been marked by temperatures that have been above the freezing mark. We’ve had rain, which has pretty much rid us of the snow that we’d accumulated earlier. Three cheers for that, because the presence of snow usually means there’s also ice. Those two substances are a challenge for those of us who can no longer walk unaided.

I do have an “ice claw” on the end of my cane. For those who had no idea there were such things, and would like one, they’re available at Amazon, and they’re not expensive. The ice claws are easy to put on and then take off again. Mine goes on just after the first snow falls and comes off in the spring.

No snow on the ground also means if I go out somewhere—and for me it’s most usually grocery shopping—I can wear my shoes, instead of tugging on my boots. For these times, and to ensure extra warmth for my ankles, I have leg warmers. I went out so dressed this past Monday, and my ankles stayed nicely warm.

Leg warmers are one of those fashion items that is on the “style pendulum”. They’re in….and then they’re out—before they’re in, again. The ones I have I obtained during an “in” time a few years ago, and I’m very glad that I did so.

This past Monday, I asked my daughter if she would go with me on my biweekly shopping trip, so her dad could stay home. It’s difficult for David on these trips, especially if the air is cold. I thought it would be nice to give him a break. She agreed, and as we were planning the outing ahead of time, we decided to make two stops, total. The grocery store chain we now use has a location at the local mall, which I also wanted to visit. As well, there was another store that she thought might have some of the non-grocery items we had on our list, so we stopped there first.

It had been a good year or more since I’d last gone to the mall. It’s not that easy for me to go there on my own—I need my motorized scooter for that. My scooter lives in the back of my SUV (except for the battery which lives in my office during the winter). I cannot, however, put the scooter together myself. It’s just too heavy for me now. I have a walker that I can and do take with me if I am going alone and anticipate needing to walk no more than a couple of blocks, all told. But if I’m going to tour a mall, or the entirety of a grocery store, I need that scooter.

After the business of shopping was over and before we headed home, we stopped at the restaurant at the mall and had lunch, just the two of us. We don’t eat out often. David is the one who really enjoys having meals out, most notably breakfast. So if there is a restaurant visit on any given day, it’s the two of them. Generally speaking, I’m happy to eat the food I have here at home.

But we had burgers at a restaurant, my daughter and I, and enjoyed the experience very much. I’m very grateful that we get along as well as we do.

Today being the end of January, means that tomorrow is the first day of February. And because that is so, it is also true that both my husband and my son are eagerly looking forward to this coming Friday, February 2nd. As two men who have spent their professional lives primarily outside, year-round, Friday is their most sacred day of the year. Friday is Groundhog Day.

It’s a day that is special to them, but subjectively so. Whether or not the rodent gives them an early spring or a guaranteed six more weeks of winter is key as to how this day will be received. I recall one winter that was so punishing, our son threatened to shoot the groundhog if it didn’t give the right prediction.

And this is a man who has never held or fired a gun in his life.

One thing that is a sure bet when it comes to this family: we do a good job of coming up with little celebrations or observances that help us get from the hard now to the hopefully easier then.

It’s not that we are at all wishing our time away. Nothing could be further from the truth. It’s more that we’re intent on adding flavor to the time we have, as it happens.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

http://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

Be kind to yourself...

 January 24, 2024

There’s one more week left in the first month of 2024. Time keeps moving as we busy ourselves with important things, as well as things that are just for fun—or peace.

Here in the Ashbury household, I call those moments “pieces of quiet” and I treasure them when I get them. They’re not as few and far between as they used to be, and for me, at this point in my life, that is the definition of fun.

I understand that I have become somewhat boring, and that’s okay, too.

David had met someone new in the neighborhood last fall on one of his daily dog-walks. A new family down at the end of our street, apparently. The gentleman has a son who’s about 12. That young man, through the dad’s negotiation, now comes and shovels our sidewalk and walkway when it snows. My beloved is happy to give a young person work. It’s working out well now. But at the start of the season, David did have to remind the father of their agreement: that there had to be at least two inches of snow, and that, unless the pile of snow was an onerous amount, the young one needed to do the chore himself.

Both my husband and I believe it’s not a bad thing for children aged 12 to have to do hard things once in a while. It really teaches so much that can only be learned that way. I believe that children should learn as they grow how to work hard, how to focus, and to not think they’re too good to sweat, or to get their hands dirty.

My mother-in-law once confessed to me that if she’d had it to do over again, she would have all of her children do dirty jobs around the house.

Speaking of snow, we do have some on the ground. I think this is our second accumulation that has lasted for more than a few days. But I understand that it will be melting in the next few days—according to the Weather Network. We’ll see. I did have plans to go out today, but with the almost certainty of freezing rain, and fog that’s already here, I’ve decided that I can go out tomorrow.

Ten—or even five—years ago, I would feel relatively ok driving out under the conditions we have now. But in the last couple of years, I’ve noticed my responses behind the wheel, my ability to maintain situational awareness, is not as good as it once was.

Translation? I won’t drive out if things are only a little iffy. One thing I absolutely refuse to be is one of those little old ladies, hunched behind the steering wheel, who drives all over hell’s half acre, just tempting fate. I’m very aware that my driving days now have an expiry date; I don’t know exactly when that will be, but I am making peace with the fact that it will happen, likely sometime in the next few years.

My husband is aghast at this pronouncement of mine. I’m sorry for it. Most things I can and will negotiate. Not this. This is a definite red line I will not cross.

There’s a difference between understanding one’s limitations, and completely surrendering to them before the time is right. Or worse, using them as an excuse to be lazy. And I’m not just talking about driving, here.

I do, sometimes, take a lazy day. It’s not something that I’m known for, but there are days when all I really want to do is read a book. Imagine that! So when the urge is strong to do just that, I give in to it. I try not to take too many of those days close together, because that, to me, is just another slippery slope.

I won’t use my age as an excuse, either. Sixty-nine is not elderly, not in my book—and I hope, not in yours. Sixty-nine with a few chronic conditions, well, maybe that’s an age to be a bit kinder to oneself. I’ve always had a problem being kind to myself, at least mentally. I do tend to hold myself to a higher standard, because, well, under most conditions I consider myself one who knows better than to wallow, or not go the extra mile, or not pay close enough attention, or give up easily, or.... well, you get the idea.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot, lately, and I have come to the conclusion that if I really want the world to be a kinder, gentler, place, that has to have a starting point. I think that we all, together, can make it so.

But we should all begin by being kinder to ourselves.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

https://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

We need kindness and respect...

 January 17, 2024

Like a lot of people, I sometimes feel those thoughts forming in the back of my mind. You know the ones I mean. “Why, when I was younger, …”; or “Well, back in my day we didn’t…”; or “I remember how it was, those were good old days…”

The problem with allowing those thoughts to take hold of you is that they’re inevitably followed by another, possibly dangerous one. “This is all just so confusing. I wish we could go back to the way things used to be.”

I had the recent thought that the reason so many people feel that way could very well be, that the times they’re recalling occurred at some point in their childhoods. Trust me, that is a common thought that most people think from time to time. How do I know this? Well, if it weren’t so, the meme with the caption, “I don’t feel like adulting today” would not be so popular.

Many people have that nostalgic wish for a happier, easier time. The problem arises when that wish becomes central to your way of thinking. Because once you let that thought take possession of your soul, you can begin to slide down a slope of substituting what is fantasy for what is real.

People who are caught up in this fantasy reality are good people, for the most part. But they’re also people who feel out of place in life. Feeling out of place can make a person look for something – anything – that will make them feel more comfortable, something that they can understand and hold onto. Something that will make them feel as if they belong.

Sadly, there are deeply unscrupulous folks out there who will promise those seeking souls anything and then use their bartered loyalty for ill.

But you know what? I don’t believe that’s anything new in the human experience. We’ve had false prophets since the day we were warned about them in the Bible. As for the pall we feel in our spirits from time to time? That recognizable quote, “These are the times that try men’s souls” was not written in this century. It wasn’t even written in the previous one or the one before that. It was written in 1776 by Thomas Paine.

I believe that it’s inevitable for folks to feel a little out of place in their lives. To feel as if the world is spinning out of control, sometimes. For those of us who are older, that sense can come from no longer being out there in the world, working and doing. As one ages, one’s capacity to think and do and learn can slow down. In our golden years, we tend to relax more (maybe because we tire more easily?). I no longer find I can learn things as quickly as I used to. I still want to learn new things, but it is a slower process.

I know damn well, for example, when I watch an interesting video about something I didn’t know anything about, that I likely won’t retain a lot of it, if I only see that video once.

The principal difference between our past experiences as a civilization and our present one is that here in the present we’re no longer only living in our own communities, in our own village, if you will. We have social media, and so while, say, in the early 1900s your village may only have had one idiot you were subjected to hearing from, today in the 2020s you get to hear from every village idiot in the whole damn world!

I don’t know what the solution to this dilemma is, but whatever we discover it to be, I’m quite certain that one ingredient will be kindness.

We need to treat people, always, with kindness and respect. We all have family and friends who get carried away by different ideas, and some who fall prey to conspiracy theories. It can be hard to spend time with these people, and friends? They will likely never “listen to reason”. But they will respond to your kindness.

And really, they’re the people who may need our kindness the most. Especially if the ones they look up to as being the holder of the answers to all of their problems lose their sheep’s clothing, revealing the wolves they truly are within. When—not if—that day comes, there will be a lot of disillusioned folks out there.

And we can handle that—hell, I believe we can handle most things—if we remember to treat everyone with kindness and respect.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

https://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 

 

Food and family...

 January 10, 2024

We had our in-town family Christmas dinner this past Monday, bringing to a close our Christmas season celebrations for another year. Every gift has been given and received, and every morsel of turkey and stuffing are either eaten, or about to be (God Bless leftovers).

As usual, our second daughter presented us with a wonderful turkey, basted to perfection and so tasty. How tasty, you may ask? Her turkey is the only one my dear husband will eat.

Prior to sitting down to the meal proper, Sonja had laid the table with all sorts of appetizers, from a veggie platter to olives to shrimp and potato chips.

I prepared my recent-years specialty, a warm crab dip. And since I had taken it out of the oven just a half hour before we left to go across town to Sonja’s, there was no need to heat it up, because it was still warm.

Sonja loves this dip, and always sits to have some as soon as we arrive. The two of us are the only ones who really love the dish, and that’s just fine with us. The recipe yields about 5 cups, and I always give her about 2/3rds of it. Yes, I do retain a bit for myself. If you refrigerate it, you can scoop out a bit at a time to warm gently in the microwave and return to that happy-taste-bud heaven.

I also provide the stuffing for the turkey, and usually the sweet potatoes. I also made my mother’s traditional carrot pudding, and friends? That dessert disappeared this year in record time.

The day before the dinner, I prepared the stuffing, a very moist combination of bread, with chopped fruit (less than a cup’s worth for two loaves of bread), mushrooms, onions, butter and sage. The moistness comes from about a cup and a half of apple juice that the dried and chopped fruit goes into, with cinnamon, to simmer just a bit, and chicken broth. This is a mixture I came up with when I found a recipe for stuffing that included some of the above ingredients, and a host of others that didn’t appeal. I discovered that recipe several years ago, and have been making more than just the bread, herbs and butter variety of stuffing ever since. Once the stuffing is ready, it is delivered into Sonja’s hands, so she has it for the next day.

The three remaining contributions I brought to the table this year were all prepared Monday morning. And as I sat at Sonja’s, just being with some of my grand and great-grandchildren, prior to the mealtime Monday afternoon, I had an epiphanous moment.

I can still do a fair number of the things I always could. I just have to do them much slower, and they take a hell of a lot more energy to accomplish than they ever did.

It’s all really just a matter of choice. You see, like most people, I find that I resent the changes brought on by growing older. While acknowledging that growing older is better than the alternative, I can still not like some of the mobility and stamina issues that accompany that state of grace.

So I choose to do those hard things, understanding that, depending on how much I push myself, it could mean I need to take it easy for a couple of days afterwards.

I won’t lie to you. Monday morning, with preparing three dishes, was brutal; but Monday evening spent with my loved ones made it all absolutely worth-while.

Our after-dinner entertainment is a dice game I’ve mentioned before called left, right, center. We originally played the two rounds of this using one-dollar coins, or loonies as they are called. The last few times, including Monday, we used the two-dollar coins, aka “toonies”.

Everyone except the youngest, Sonja’s five-year-old granddaughter, played. And lest you worry that our 10- and 9-year-old great-grandchildren are forced to gamble when they play, I provide them with the coins to do so.

And happily—and with no plotting on the part of the adults—once more, one of those two kids won one of the games. His nanna, (our daughter) will be taking him shopping on the next Nanny Tuesday so that he can get something special.

The laughter and the love of our family times are woven together to become the soul-blanket that keeps me warm throughout the year.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

https://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury

 

 

Happy New Year!

 January 3, 2024

Here we are, in the brand-new year of 2024! Did you get to put your party on as the clock counted down? Or did you pass the moment more peacefully?

Some folks love to have a loud and busy party to sweep out the old and usher in the new. Some go to bed well before the witching hour, and instead of noting the passage, awaken to a done deal.

In our years together, near the beginning, we did have occasion a couple of times to attend New Years Eve parties. But as our family grew, we chose to put our resources toward giving the children the best Christmas possible, rather than spending on ourselves. At the time, we contented ourselves with the thought that we might turn into party animals once our little ones were grown, but alas, that never happened.

We’re not now nor are we ever going to be party animals. We’re more for the quiet, and the peace—and that only becomes truer the older we get.

Once, in my early teens, I did spend New Years eve skating out the old year and skating in the new. So, I’ve tasted of those more exciting ways to mark the end of one year and the beginning of the next.

But mostly these days, David and I simply choose a music program on television to watch (or use as background music to our reading, depending) and then witness the dropping of the ball in Times Square, New York. We hold hands as the seconds are counted down, then wish each other a Happy New Year. For us, it’s a good way to celebrate.

I’m not one for making New Years resolutions, either. My experience with those is not a happy one, as I never made a resolution that I was able to follow through with. I’ve come to the conclusion that the promises one makes in life, especially those promises made to the self, should be considered and well thought out. If you make a resolution in the midst of the holiday, in the spirit of the moment, it might not be a resolution you’re truly ready to keep.

It’s serendipitous, I think, that this first essay of 2024 falls on the third of January. This morning, I took a quiet moment to mark this day, the sixty-first anniversary of my father’s passing. I do have some memories of him, though not as many or as vivid as they might have been if I’d had more than eight years with him. But there are some good memories, and they make me smile. They’re remembrances enough for me to know that though my time with him was short, he loved me.

I no longer think myself odd if my throat goes tight, or a tear comes to my eye, thinking of him. I’ve come to understand that everyone grieves differently. Grief isn’t an aberration; it’s a byproduct of love.

Life is not static, because, well, it’s alive, isn’t it? And being alive, it will ebb and flow, it will pause, and it will change. We change, we humans, through the course of our lives. That’s just a part of our nature. We need security, yes, and balance too. But those are ours to forge, ours to create in whatever manner we choose. And because that is so, there is no wrong way to do that.

This year, I managed to get through my holiday season without any great highs or devastating lows and I consider that a win. I took a break from working on my manuscript and instead re-read a trilogy from one of my favorite authors. I’m glad I did, because I needed that mental break. I needed a few days to just be.

I’m almost ready to dive into my work. Almost. I need to take a bit of time to organize my messy office, and I’m almost ready to do that, too.

But for this moment, I think I’ll take just a little more time to relax, to remember, and to give thanks for all the blessings I’ve been given.

 

Love,

Morgan

http://www.morganashbury.com

https://www.bookstrand.com/morgan-ashbury