February/March, 2023
It’s hard to know where to begin after a hiatus, so I’ll just give the rundown:
Right now, in the Northern Hemisphere, we’re practically at the vernal equinox, which is never not life-affirming. Daylight Savings time… not so much, though my car clock is right for the first time since November, and I like that I’m typing this at 6:37 PM and it’s not yet dark.
A local flower grower once again has hoophouse tulips available at the local farmers market, another unmistakable sign of spring . I take extravagant (for me) advantage.
Seed inventory happened and I’m thinking much more critically about this year’s garden. Jim quietly, and without fanfare, cleared out the woefully-neglected basement to make room for me to start my seeds under lights. I’ve been doing this for the last 15 years, like I have some sort of operation down there, but I’m really not very good at it at all. My friend Connie’s seedlings are always these healthy, robust things. HOW DOES SHE DO IT? ( I’ve asked, she has no answers for me). Anyway, because I refuse to quit trying, peppers, tomatoes, herbs, and some flowers are under lights, with much more to come once it warms up for real. The last time I was outside for yardwork - a couple of weeks ago, now - I picked all the dead, twisted morning glory vines from the tomato and pepper cages, like a meditation.
The ol’ lizard brain has been working overtime thinking about climate change and winter and seasonal mysteries, which in 2023 in central Illinois include fewer birds, very little snow, and temperatures bouncing from below-zero F to 60 degrees F, sometimes in the span of a day or two. F, indeed.
However, #vulturbana 2023 got underway as scheduled on the last day of February (see photo above). They arrived silently and low, settled into our neighbor’s tree to watch the sunset, then left a couple of minutes later. It very much felt like a greeting; they’re still around, but have not returned to the tree since.
I take yoga classes, walk a lot, and recently added weightlifting to my repertoire. I take vitamins and read about adaptogens and, lately I read my friends’ memoirs, because we’re at that age, I guess. Though they certainly don’t need me to be, I’m so proud of Rose and Bruce and the work they’ve put into the world. Lives and communities were changed for the better through their efforts across decades - and perhaps, also, by their prose in 2022 and 2023.
Speaking of books, I renewed my library card a couple of weeks ago and checked out the Bono book. (Please, feel free to judge me!) I gently placed it in the book drop on its due date, having ignored all the parts about hobnobbing with the Davos crowd and the GAP shit, but having inhaled (heh) (IYKYK) the parts about growing up in Ireland in the 1960s and 1970s… and, it must be said, the parts where he hung out in the south of France with Michael Hutchence.
Pandemics and other disasters still threaten (haven’t they always? They have, they have), but I’m thinking about overseas travel. It’s daunting, for I am a 54 year-old under-traveled person with a demanding day job who’s just trying to follow her heart a little bit.
It's been a reflective last few weeks. I’ve wrestled with blame and vulnerability and how energy cannot be taken for granted and must be stewarded, a concept I arrived upon as I walk Urbana’s neighborhoods from east to west and back east again. Things just hit differently after 3 years of pandemic, political upheaval, and menopause (yep, I said it), and I welcome it. The scales continue to loosen and fall from my eyes, yet my capacity for mudita increases.
I’m energized by possibilities AND exhausted by realities.
Speaking of Seeing Clearly…
It took a furious hailstorm and more than two years, but new windows and doors were finally hung at 909. Let me be, er, clear: We did not do the actual work, perform the labor. We made choices and placed orders and did the money dance and moved our things out of the way and then put them all back and observed two major holidays in the process… and the work still ran very very long, because supply chain delays were a thing and there was more work, at least in the last few months of 2022, than the people we worked with knew what to do with.
But… my god! It’s so bright in the house now (our previous windows were almost 100 years old). It’s much quieter. Our windows did not freeze from the inside during December’s ultra-cold snap. It was a much-needed tightening up, but it was also an act of love and respect for this old house; I always imagine our house like the titular abode in The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton, just needing some TLC as the world changes around her. She - our house - looks so different now, with more to come. And, as always, with illumination comes… illumination, and for me that means both basking in the glow and uncovering of what small acts of love and respect we can give this structure that houses us well and continues to serve as both life raft and launch pad.
Passing thoughts
Considering the difference between attention and attunement
If you would have told me in 1993 years ago that in 2023 I’d be wolfing down a book by Rick Rubin about creativity, I’d have… well, I don’t know what I would have done. I probably would have raised my eyebrows and lit another Marlboro Red.
It’s time to get my eyes checked (again) (didn’t I just do this?) (records indicate it was a year ago)
My copy of the new Tamar Adler cookbook, The Everlasting Meal Cookbook: Leftovers A-Z, arrives today. I’m so excited. Of course, I can’t find my copy of The Everlasting Meal - which one of you did I lend it to?
I so completely understand this list--and the raised eyebrow/Marlboro Red drag/Rick Rubin moment
Ahhhhh, so good to see an update from Urbana in my inbox this morning. Let's catch up soon, much is afoot! ♥️