Once again, I have “busy-ed” myself so much so as to not have time to drift into the ethers and commune to create.
Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow?
Not Drifting
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Tag Archives: life
Turns Out, We Can Save Ourselves
Mother Earth is not happy. She’s turned up the heat and has been shaking us with repeated earthquakes.
I don’t blame her. Mother Earth is a living organism and we have been abusing her forever. She’s only doing what lifeforms do – trying to protect herself.
We have shown, in recent history however, that we humans can actually change our behavior and dramatically improve the quality of life here on Mother Earth.
During the COVID pandemic of 2020 we humans stopped driving, flying and reduced industry pollution. The result was a measurable improvement in the air we breathed worldwide. Nitrogen dioxide was down 30-70%. Particulate matter was down 10-40%. Carbon dioxide from fossil fuels was down 5.4-6.4 %. (Source: Reuters)
AND, for the first time in years, you could see the the beauty of Mt. Everest from the ground in Nepal and Bhutan. The air pollution was gone and Mother Nature could show us her beauty.
Unfortunately, we humans snapped right back into our old habits after the pandemic and we are choking ourselves again.
So, let’s take a look at our own behavior. Can we walk instead of drive? If we can’t walk, can we cycle? If we can’t cycle, can we take a train or other public transportation? If we can’t do any of those, can we drive a hybrid–or not take the trip at all?
Can we finally stop using plastic bags and plastic straws (oil based products)? What other things can we do to save ourselves and love Mother Earth?
Can we still believe that we can DO SOMETHING?
Love.
A Tsunami of Goodness
May there be a tsunami of goodness this November in the United States.
The Neighborhood Elders Are Dying
Mareska Glass, Dot Lawson, Johnny Jarrell, Drudy Jarrell and, just yesterday, Euel Spriggs.
These are the neighbors who were twenty-five to thirty-five years older than me and became my friends. They have all died. Thee last three in just the past two months.
Mareska, aka Marsha, and I meet most every Thursday morning for coffee. She shared her life stories and how she survived World War 2 as a young Jewish girl in Poland after losing her entire family. (A story I still need to write for her).
Dot lived across the street. Her son was married to a friend I hadn’t seen since high school. A reminder we are circle back around one another in life. Dot made wedding cakes and my husband and son regularly benefited from her cast offs. I rescued a baby owl once who’d found its way down her chimney. We differed in how we interpreted God, but always respected the other.
Johnny and Drudy were the cute couple holding hands and walking their dog. More often than not, their evening walk timed perfectly with mine and so we’d stroll around together. Johnny loved his annual trip to Boston in the winter to represent his company at the annual fish market. Drudy never failed to ask about my son. They had two accomplished, good men as sons themselves.
Euel died yesterday morning. It was expected and his beloved great niece, Michelle, has been with him through it all. He and his late wife, Marie, weren’t able to have children, but they spoiled all their family. The strongest memory of Euel will be that he truly lived a life of kindness and respect for all. He LIVED it. He didn’t go around pontificating.
My childhood was spent around aging relatives and so that may be why I gravitate to the elders around me. They can often have a way of being that enriches my life in small and large ways.
Let Me Crawl If I Can’t Walk
It finally happened, my friend, and ninety-four year old neighbor, fell… and hasn’t walked again.
It didn’t have to be that way. His loving family was startled by how much he complained about his leg hurting. He never complains. It was a deep bruise and would need time to heal.
The family and the doctor, however, immediately flipped him from being someone in his home who had a housekeeper, physical therapist twice and week and a nurse check-in once a week ,to being a man told “not to try and get up because you’ll fall again.” He has literally been pushed down in his chair.
Overnight his bed was switched to a hospital, his walker was switched to a wheelchair and 24/7 caretakers added to the day.
He looked at me early in this process and said, “I guess they just want me to sit here, get old, rot and die.”
His 24/7 caretakers and I know he could have walked again. Not now. It’s been too many weeks and now morphine has been added “so he’s never in pain.”
My family has had the conversations about medical power of attorney, end of life procedures, wills, etc. Now we have had the conversation about the “just before” stage when my husband and I can and want to push ourselves as much as we can to keep moving and functioning.
I told them, let me crawl if I can’t walk.
Will She Arrive This Day?
Each morning
same time
same place
same ritual
waiting to hear
that whisper that says
“Yes. We will write together again”
Each Day
I must touch/
the bark of a tree/
or the blade of grass/
or stare into the folds of a flower/
each day/
to reignite/
the mystery/
of life.
Whoa-man!
I never imagined that reading, writing and watching romance would have such a powerful affect on my appreciation of WOMAN in the world.
We need this balance of the female more than ever. In fact, I believe the world is in the mess it is because we have not honored the Female the way way we honor the Male.
We need both. Balance.
Separate AND equal energies for creating a world wwhere we treat everyone and everything with kindness and respect.
So be it.
Inspiring Senior Fitness: Euel’s Story and Daily Squats
So Euel told me one day this week on one of our daily walks that he’s been falling, a lot. He fell in the back yard and couldn’t pull himself up because he wasn’t near anything. He said it took almost an hour but he crawled to him back door and was able to grab the door handle and get up.
I already sit on the floor at home rather than in a chair to stay nimble, but I’ve now added daily squats to the routine.
Of course I already know all these things, but being with someone everyday who is adversely impacted because he can’t do certain things has encouraged me to do more…and do it more consistently.
Be sure and check out my writer’s website for poems, short fiction and links to my new novel “Under The Autumn Moon”:
Valuable Life Lessons from a 94-Year-Old Neighbor
Last spring, my 94 year old nextdoor neighbor, Euel, voluntarily turned in his car keys. “I’m concerned I’ll hurt someone or myself and I don’t want to risk that.”
Euel has been a widower about six years, but remained active driving to Denny’s each morning to see the “regulars” at breakfast, bowling with his long-time team and chairing the local Coca Cola Club meetings.
All that stopped when he quit driving.
It took a couple of weeks of his car not being parked in front of his house for me to realize something had changed. He told me he had made arrangements with a grand niece (the only relative in the state) to take him grocery shopping, the doctors and other errands. She was only coming by once a week though.
I take multiple short walks daily and so started knocking on his door once a day asking, “Do you want to take a walk?”
he was unsteady at first I decided it was the cane his doctor told him to use. Not sure who’s idea it was to put people on a cane for balance when the cane actually causes one to lean over.
So I went to REI and bought Euel trekking poles. He immediately stood straight and had much better balance. We walk not once, but twice a day now. He always says “yes” when I knock on the door.
He knows more about current events than most anyone you’ll meet, but we agreed we have to limit those talks because we are both horrified at what our country has become. So he tells stories and I listen to clues about what he wished he’d done to be better prepared to be ninety-four.
His first lesson: Keep Up With Technology. Euel has not. He has an old computer and basically can only look at existing files. he’s not updated the program and so can’t view most of what he searches.
He has a flip phone and struggles to see who’s calling and how to return the call.
He can’t order Uber or Lyft or Door Dash.
In short, he is radically dependent upon others for everything. He knows that not such a good thing.
Other neighbors have noticed I take walks with Euel and their reactions have been interesting:
-One said, “You’re making us look bad, Betheny.”
-Another said, “I don’t really know what to do around old people.”
-A third has started taking him to the market with her each week and asks him to walk on the days when I’m out of town.
I remember Euel’s Lesson #1 : Keep Up With Technology each time I want to be lazy and have my husband or son do something on the computer for me because I can’t figure it out.
Ugh, but good for my future.
BethenyReid 