Charlie doesn’t know that we’ll be leaving Pleasant Hill in just three weeks. I haven’t had the heart to tell him that we’ll be heading back to country where the snow gets so deep that he has to be carried. He loved Sunnyhill for most of the year, but he didn’t love the winters. Projecting,…
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The sale won’t close until March 30th, but I signed all the paperwork on March 9th to sell the house that Joe and I bought some 29 years ago. When we went house hunting the only guidance we gave our Realtor other than price was that Joe didn’t want an Eichler. She dutifully showed us…
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Jay and I drove to Sacramento on a clear, cool Wednesday. In a park near the capitol we met a few of my first husband’s friends, gathered at a monument to veterans to remember Terry’s life. Chuck, who was closest to Terry, had initiated the gathering and invited me. I hadn’t seen or communicated with…
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We walked up the pathway from the Quinn’s lovely old farmhouse in Hartwick towards our car after dinner. Their porch light went off and we were suddenly again aware of the deep black country sky we had lived under just up the road. Orion was high in the sky, and brilliant. I had not forgotten…
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I had foot surgery on December first, to correct a bunion and a hammer toe on my left foot. Jay, who had been through foot surgery several years ago (before we met) had warned me that the recovery would be long and painful. He didn’t exaggerate. The first week was hydrocodone and helplessness. Now, half…
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Sukkot was one of Mom’s favorite holidays. In my memory, the extent of our celebration was building a sukkah, and it was only much later, building our wonderful huge sukkah with the chavurah, that I learned there were rituals to be performed in the sukkah. Sukkot was a grand tradition in the chavurah – one…
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We’re in the fifth day of a heat wave, with probably two more days coming, temperatures well over 100. Driving home from an afternoon of Mah Jongg and friendship in Lois’ blessedly air conditioned house yesterday I saw 115 on the thermometer as I passed the exit for Peasanton. Jay and I took Charlie and…
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Dylan Thomas’ beautiful Poem in October contains these lines: My birthday began with the water birds And the birds of the winged trees flying my name Above the farms and the white horses And I rose in a rainy autumn And walked abroad in shower of all my days I wasn’t born in October, but…
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More than six months have slipped by since I last wrote. We are now just about half way through our sojourn in Pleasant Hill, thinking more and more about our return to Otsego County. I’m not sure why I’ve taken such a long break from writing, but I’ve certainly been busy. Jay and I made…
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