Bad days, good days, and a really good dinner

 

My Asian dinner

Yesterday was a tough day; today, better until an awful catastrophe hit our community; and last night I fixed one of my better dinners. What a mixed bag!

Sophie would not eat yesterday, and Jordan and Christian had to force her medication down her throat, though Christian finally discovered he could put the pill in chicken baby food, fill a syringe, and shoot it in her mouth. Not pleasant but effective. Soph was shaky on her feet, restless in the cottage, obviously not feeling well. I was tired and out of sorts from not having slept well. At three o’clock in the morning, I was convinced we were losing her and lay awake until almost time to get up.

This morning, the doogie internist called (how wonderful is that? To have a doctor call to ask how things are going, when you haven’t even called him!). When he heard the report, he took her off antibiotics and all medication except the steroids and insulin. Within a couple of hours I heard this strange noise, looked down at the foot of my desk, and she was eating kibble. She did that again mid-afternoon. Not much, but voluntarily eating. And much of the day she slept soundly, much better than the restless nights. The mother in me sees all this as healing. She’s drinking and peeing and went for a walk. It may be a long haul, but I think we’ll get my girl back. I’m so relieved I slept hard this afternoon and had a difficult time waking myself up. Sophie woke me by banging her water dish on the floor, her sign that it’s empty and I should refill it.

So we called it a good day, until four o’clock, when word came of a shooting at a nearby Whataburger. Two teenagers were shot, and one has subsequently died; the other is in critical condition. The shooting came way to close to home: the Whataburger is catty corner from Jacob’s high school, and he was in his car, at the stoplight, when it happened. One of our good friends was in the pick-up line, getting food for her kids. We don’t have the full story, may not get it for days, but I cannot stop thinking of the mother who sent her son off to school this morning and will never see him again. Jacob told us recently that he was at a post-game party where a girl got shot in the leg. As I said, it’s all coming too close to home, and I have no idea what we can do about it.

Texas, it seems to me, is a cruel state, indifferent to the individual human life, especially as long as it is someone else. For the mother of that boy, it wasn’t someone else. Gun advocates are strongly entrenched, and it will take a national law to change the lack of gun control in Texas. I applauded, still do, Clinton’s ban on assault weapons, but it would have done no good in today’s shooting, which I am sure was with smaller weapons, probably easily concealed in a backpack.

And while I’m decrying public policy in the state that I love and hate, I heard today that maternal death rates in childbirth are markedly higher in states with strict anti-abortion laws. There is a meme on Facebook proclaiming if bacteria on the moon is considered life, why isn’t a fetus—which is such spurious reasoning I can’t even think about it.

The whole angry movement—enthusiasm for guns, hate for abortion, hate for anyone who is different—seems a religious right perversion of Christianity, a religion that is supposed to preach love. I persist in the belief, maybe a fantasy, that such hidebound, rigid, hate-filled people are a minority, but then why are they in charge?

On a brighter note, yesterday morning I was so tired and down I told Jordan I couldn’t cook the meal we planned. Christian usually cooks the Asian meals around here, but I was going to tackle something called Three-Cup Chicken. I had ordered bok choy but the grocery substituted Napa cabbage, and I was left defending cabbage to two adults who dislike it intensely. By late afternoon, I had gotten myself together and fixed dinner—and we all thought it was a fine meal. The chicken was marinated and then simmered in a mix of soy, some dry sherry, and a bit of brown sugar, seasoned by ginger, lots of garlic (I cut it in half) and red pepper flakes. Served over rice. Good last night, good for lunch today.
I worried over the cabbage but decided on salad. Shredded it, tossed it with salt and let it sit 30 minutes, rinsed, spun dry, and dressed with lime juice, olive oil, and a bit of honey. Both cabbage haters ate it and pronounced it good. They didn’t exactly rave, but they liked it, and Jordan and I had leftovers for lunch.

Tonight I am ready to curl up in bed much earlier than usual. I have not gotten out of my pajamas from last night, haven’t made my bed beyond pulling it together. The family is fixing beef bowls tonight, but I have opted for cream cheese and smoked salmon in the cottage. It’s been that kind of a couple of days.

 

 

 

Scary Moments and Placid Gardens

Scary moments this morning. McLean Middle School, where Jacob is in sixth grade, was locked down. Although we were late for a doctor’s appointment, Jordan insisted we’d drive by the school (it was on the way). About three blocks away, we saw a cluster of police cars, an ambulance, and a TV van, along with a group of people held back by barricades. A helicopter circled overhead. But at the school all seemed quiet. Still, a police car was stationed at every intersection nearby.

Jacob texted and was, understandably, scared. The morning dissolved into an onslaught of texts and emails. While waiting for Jordan to come back and pick me up, I got an email from TCU: two people had been shot, one survived. The shooter was on the loose. He’d been sighted near the middle school and then near Albertson’s Grocery—right where we were headed. Apparently, the incident was a disagreement between three adult roommates, none of them connected to TCU.

We got the grocery to find business as usual and one lone officer standing in the parking lot. Jordan speculated on whether the shooter could be hiding in the back of the store. Unlikely. She finally decided we should live on the edge and shop. We did, uneventfully, and on the way home got word that the lockdown was lifted.

Still haven’t heard tonight if the shooter was found, taken into custody, whatever. It didn’t seem to be on the local news I watched. I did hear they didn’t believe he was still in the area, a “belief” that is not much comfort.

Came home to my yard, where ground cover has been installed in a large portion of the yard. It looks great, and Christian, who is enthusiastic about the whole thing, says the biggest plus is that they carted off all the rocks which were in the yard—we live in an area of extremely rocky soil. 

Shout out to John Filarowicz and his Five Star Landscape Company.They did an excellent job, left a clean site behind them, were polite when they were here. With a nice neighborhood twist, both John and his wife, Sara, grew up in our Berkeley neighborhood and Sara was Jacob’s first-grade teacher at Lily B. Clayton Elementary, across the street from our house. I couldn’t remember her first name this morning, and Jordan said that was because we always heard Jacob call her, “Mrs. Filarowicz.” Keeping it in the neighborhood is sort of like keeping it in the family.

Sophie of course could not resist this morning. She did not tiptoe through the tulips—she romped and ran through the ground cover, merrily chasing squirrels. Both the squirrels and the dog were energized by the cold weather.

I am delighted by the ground cover, which is protected with a heavy layer of mulch, because when it takes hold we won’t have a mudhole in the half of the yard where it’s too shady for grass. Sophie has been bringing in mud, too often depositing it in my bed. I suppose now I’ll get mulch in the bed, but it seems less objectionable.

Tonight, the Christmas lights blaze, the yard is peaceful, and I suppose the shooter no longer lurks in local streets. We’re locked in, just in case. Stay safe and warm, folks. It’s another nice wintry night.

Adjusting to standard time

Don’t count me as among those grateful for another hour of sleep. Even as a teenager, I never could sleep late. Nine o’clock was a record for me, and when I had teenage kids of my own I was astounded that they could and did sleep till noon. These days I never set an alarm clock, but I’m almost always up by eight.

Last night Megan spent the night on the couch—her boys were all in the house. She pulls every blind on every window and turns out all lights. The result is that the cottage is a dark cave, even when the sun comes up. I was acutely aware of not wanting to disturb her, so I managed to doze until 7:45 the new time. But then I’d had it. I crept around, making a cup of tea as quietly as I could and turning on my computer. Finally, one of her boys came out to ask something and woke her. Then the world started to turn as it should.

We had biscuits and sausage gravy for brunch—delicious, though Jacob passed on the gravy and wanted honey. His two cousins thought he was crazy. Then everyone sat and talked for a while, and the Hudgeons family was off to Austin by eleven. At one point, Jordan said, “It’s only ten o’clock. I’m loving this.”

I came back to the cottage and worked a bit, but I was off my stride, and my body had definitely not adjusted. At one o’clock—which would have been two o’clock, I was unbearably sleepy. Napped, but that meant I got up with a long afternoon ahead of me. Somehow, lying there, I scolded myself for being lazy and unmotivated, so boy have I gotten a lot done.

Hung up several days accumulation of clothes, tried on some shoes I ordered and discovered as I suspected they were narrow, not the extra wide my feet have demanded since surgery (sob, the days of thin feet and trim ankles are forever gone). Took me the better part of an hour to arrange the exchange, print out the label, and package up the shoes for return. Washed dishes. Talked to the son of an old friend about a complicated family matter for a long time. And wrote my requisite thousand words for the day. I’m beginning to feel my way slowly with a new novel—very slowly.

The world goes on its shaky way—the shooting in Texas has everyone horrified, and I’m with those who are tired of prayers and hugs. We need action, but most of all we need to overcome the divisions in our nation, the sanction that’s been given to hate and anger. Who knows what makes people snap, but who can doubt that the uncertainty of our world contributes.

I was scolding one of my grandsons for talking about hating someone, and Brandon popped up with, “I hate Donald Trump, and I’m enjoying it.” I said that was like drinking a cup of poison and expecting Trump to die, but he denied it. Said his insides were not in a turmoil—he was just enjoying the hate. I doubt that’s a fair assessment. My brother said tonight a friend had said, “Oh, woe is me. I just found out one of my sons is a liberal.” When I asked how anyone could be anything else these days, he cut the conversation off. My sneaking suspicion is he won’t talk about Trump and Republicans because he knows how cruel and wrong they are.