Lockdown gratitudes

This is an unprecedented and weird time. Still, good things do happen.

1. The heat has arrived early in Tucson; it was over 100 degrees twice last week, and the upcoming week has more of the same. But the A/C in our little place works fine. We set the thermostat at 78 and we are fine. I'm grateful we've agreed on 78 rather than 84.

2. I go for an eight-mile e-bike ride every morning and another one most evenings in our retirement community. I ride with my friend Ellen. We maintain social distance while chatting about the news and whatever else comes up. I'm grateful for the constancy of a good friend.

3. Ellen and I started riding at 10 a.m. until a couple of weeks ago, then changed the start time to 9, then 8:30, then 8:15, then 8:00. We want to be back before it gets hot. I am not a morning person, but I am willing to become one for the next few months so we can take our morning ride.  I'm grateful for the motivation to get out in the cooler morning air.

4. We ride at about 6 in the evening and some days we witness the most magnificent Arizona sunsets. Really, the sky here stretches from horizon to horizon, with few trees or hills to interrupt. Sometimes I have to stop and just watch the sunset. I'm grateful for red and orange fire in the sky.

5. This week Larisa's vet agreed to give her a haircut. Larisa is a Siberian forest cat with a triple coat, and she was moping around, looking like a hedgehog and lying on the laundry room floor to keep cool. Since she got home from the vet, her body shorn and looking more like a rodent, she has spent a lot of time curled up on my lap. Adjusting to these changes in body temperature takes time, I guess. I'm grateful that the vet deemed Larisa's comfort an essential service.

6. My husband Art does the grocery shopping and he always brings me about five pounds of grapes. I take them off their stems and put them in baggies to freeze. They make a wonderful popsicle-like snack. I'm grateful for something I like almost as much as ice cream.

7. No one in my retirement community has gotten the virus, as far as I know - and I'm pretty sure I would, the way "news" travels - and I'd say about 80 percent of us are observing social distancing and about 50 percent of us are wearing masks. We wish the pools were open, and the restaurant, and the pickleball courts, and all the other facilities, but the management decided to keep us safe instead. I can live with that, and I'm grateful that it's fairly easy for me to be a good sport.

8. Last week Ellen and I got in her car and went to a drive-through place for a Sonoran hot dog, which we were both craving. She was in the front seat on the driver's side with her mask on, and I was in the back passenger seat with my mask on. We got our food and found a shady place to eat it, still sitting in the car. Then we went to a take-out place for two scoops of ice cream (she says $17.50 was way to much to pay and we should never go there again, and maybe we won't, but BOY was that ice cream good!). Ellen said she felt like my driver and I said I'd give her a big tip, and she laughed. Ellen is the only person I have been in a car with, except for Art, since this all started. Even when she and I ride our bikes on the Tucson Loop, we take two cars with our bikes on separate racks, and meet at the trailhead. I'm grateful to have a friend who shares my thoughts about keeping safe.

9. I had an MRI last week to look at my lower back. I'm grateful that the experience is much less harrowing than the ones I had nine years ago. The tube was twice as large, I got to choose the music that came through my headphones, the technician told me what was going on the whole time. And I'd worn my mask into the facility. Once I was lying down I just moved it up from my nose and mouth to cover my eyes so I didn't have to look. It was almost - not quite, but almost - a meditative experience! 

10. I don't have the virus, and neither does anyone else I know. I am grateful!

Lessons in sheltering

It's been over a month and both of us are still healthy in our little place in Tucson. Here's what I'm learning:

1. I'm content indoors most of the time, since I spend a lot of time reading and on the computer. I have to have Alexa set the timer for half an hour or I would remain in my recliner for hours. I've set up a daily plan alternating "in the recliner" and "not in the recliner" activities.

2. I mostly like not having places to go. Usually I'm out and about, with activities and meetings, driving for half an hour to gathering places. Since we began sheltering in place, we've only needed one of our two cars.

3. I haven't volunteered at a shelter in over six weeks. The combination of a locked-up border and the risk of gathering during the time of coronavirus has shut down the shelter. I thought I would miss it, but I don't.

4. The idea of contact tracing sounds interesting, so I've filled out an application to help with that - either paid or as a volunteer - for Pima County, where Tucson is located. I would help at the food bank, but my age makes me part of the vulnerable population. I would help make masks, but I lent my sewing machine to a friend nearly 20 years ago and have not missed it once. I remember a line from a sonnet by John Milton, "They also serve who only stand and wait." Mostly I'm sitting and waiting, but I am willing.

5. There is no way I can persuade people in my community to do social distancing if they're not doing it now. I can just keep them off my porch. I have heard people say, "Well, this whole thing of sheltering in place is overkill. There isn't any virus in our little community." I want to say, "That's because MOST OF US ARE DOING IT." It doesn't seem to be related to a person's politics. They just want to be able to use the pools, or the pickleball courts, or the golf course, and they don't think it should be such a big deal.

6. On Friday I rode 30 miles on my e-bike. The bike rides are exercise but they are also a relief from the current restrictions. I don't mind wearing a mask. I ride with my good friend Ellen. Neither of us have been around anyone else for the last six weeks, and we observe social distancing with each other.

7. It's nice to have distractions: cancellation and rebooking of our bike-and-barge trip in the Netherlands and Belgium from May 2020 to June 2021; planning for a May trip to Washington to begin the basement remodel of our Brier house, set to be done this summer but dependent on the limitations of the virus.

8. My right hip would be bothering me whether I were sheltering in place or not. But it, too, sometimes keeps my mind off the limitations of sheltering.

9. I'm surprised at how normal it feels already to wear a mask, to stay six feet apart from people I meet on the street, to run Clorox wipes over surfaces anyone else has touched.

10. I'm grateful we have the resources to get through this without hardship.

One day at a time. This too shall pass. And all the other things we say.

Sheltered

So, here we are, staying home in our 620-square-foot park model trailer in Tucson. Not returning to our place in Seattle for some undetermined number of weeks or months. Going nowhere except for acquiring food or medication. And riding bikes for exercise.

I have been in a couple of 12-step programs for over 20 years. I know I am powerless over the current situation, and that what we're going through now is truly one day at a time.

Very fortunately, I have a laptop. So I can

• Connect with friends and family
• Make purchases online
• Keep up with the news
• Work on the taxes when I get motivated enough

I have a six-inch stack of magazines to read. And half a dozen books.

I am getting reacquainted with my inner introvert.

I know that we are all in this together, and that we are all the same. I actually knew it four years ago, when I first started volunteering with refugees and asylum seekers. I suspect that many millions of people are learning it now, and I think that is a good thing.

I hope with all my heart that we learn from this global tragedy and that, once we're up and running again, we leave behind some of our useless or destructive ways and institute new practices for the good of all of us.

Viral thoughts

Three weeks ago I had planned a three-day trip to visit grandkids in Spokane. Looking at the news coming from China a week later, I canceled my airbnb and my Southwestern flight. Good thing, too. The grandkids and their family are working long, long days in the Grocery Outlet they own. I told the grandkids' mom I'd be glad to come and help in their store, but I was an "elderly".

It seems very weird to be an elderly in these times. I feel some gratitude that the whole world is shutting down for the sake of keeping us older people alive. Like we're all in this together. Finally. I hear some younger people are protesting. I might have felt the same way when I was their age.

I see signs of a crisis bringing out the best in us. Young people volunteering to run errands for older people. Churches going online for their services. Facebook connections revitalized as we check in on each other. Donations and grants from the large and small. 

I have a sister and two sons who are nurses in the Pacific Northwest. I know they signed up for this kind of crisis when they graduated from nursing school. They are the heroes right now. My sister told me this morning that she will flog me if I touch anything when I go for my walk. I believe her!

Other heroes? All the people who are still working but not from home. All the people working from home, surrounded by their out-of-school kids.

Today I offered a squirt of hand sanitizer to the Amazon delivery driver, and he thanked me.

I live in Tucson right now, and so far there are relatively few cases. Give it a few more days, I'm thinking. My husband has always been a quantity shopper, and right now I'm profoundly grateful for that. 

Our Washington house is about eight miles for the nursing home in Kirkland that's been in the news. I was there a couple of years ago visiting a friend. Five of our kids live in the area. So far they are all okay.

We have a European bike-and-barge trip paid for in May. Guess what? Right now that seems pretty unimportant. 

My calendar is almost completely empty and I am okay with that.

In a way, this time feels like when we were volunteering in a refugee camp. Everyone there was living with unknowns, trying to stay safe, trying to keep their children safe. So much uncertainty. So dependent on the generosity of others. 

So here we are, living with unknowns. Let us be community.

On aging with grace

I've said for years that I want to age with grace. Now I'm there - aging - and the grace part can be challenging.

I've gotten used to healthcare professionals saying, "Well, this issue of yours is part of getting older." Like cataracts, not-so-good night vision, and sometimes forgetting people's names. I've had these issues for several years now, and I've resolved what I can and more or less accepted what is here to stay.

Now I have knee, back and hip issues, and I am not there yet with being graceful about them.

I've bought shoes with excellent arch support, and custom orthotics for those shoes, and my feet no longer hurt when I walk. That's a good thing.

I've been seeing a physical therapist, Paul, for several months. At his suggestion, I now go down stairs one step at a time, with the bad-knee leg descending first and the other leg descending to the same step. Like a toddler when they're first maneuvering on stairs. It takes longer to get down the stairs now, but my knee doesn't hurt. That's a good thing, too. Every now and then I try my old way of descending stairs, and sure enough, my knee hurts.

In Tucson, where we live in the winter, I have only four stairs to negotiate. In Seattle, where we live the rest of the time, there are 14 stairs. I struggled with them last summer - especially when carrying a laundry basket up and down - so we're remodeling our daylight basement this summer, turning it into a studio apartment for us, while the upstairs is rented out.

My back and right hip is a different issue.  I've realized recently that when I am on my feet for more than a few hours, I'm in trouble. Like last Saturday, when I went antiquing for three hours in the afternoon and then worked a volunteer shift at the asylum seekers' shelter for four hours in the evening. My back and hip hurt for three days, sometimes waking me up at night.

I talked to Paul today. He says I can stretch my back and my hips, and I can strengthen my core (I have exercises I do every morning for those things). But he says I also need to pace myself and honor my body's requests for rest. If I go, go, go - as I have for many years - my body will be unhappy and it will tell me so.

Paul also said the body works best when it is mobile - sitting, then standing and moving around, then lying down, then sitting. Variety. He says antiquing and similar activities (like Costco outings), where you walk a few paces, stop, turn your body to look at labels, walk a few paces more) is the worst kind of exercise. Paul calls it "strolling". That's why you see everyone in the checkout line leaning on their carts to ease their backs. So, starting today, I'm using the timer on my phone to remind me when I need to get up after sitting for half an hour, and take ten minutes to do something else. This practice is  a change for me even though I've known about it for decades. I need to modify my daily lifestyle habits. And I will do that. Because now it's not just a good idea. It's a pain reliever.

It's likely to be several years before I need a knee or hip replacement, and I'm grateful those options are available. Paul said this morning, "Do you know what people did 100 years ago? They went to the rocking chair."

Not me, not yet.

Here's one of the items I bought when I went antiquing on Saturday. It's a reminder to me as I age with grace.

"Life is amazing. And then it's awful."

I've always appreciated this quote:

“Life is amazing. And then it's awful. And then it's amazing again. And in between the amazing and awful it's ordinary and mundane and routine. Breathe in the amazing, hold on through the awful, and relax and exhale during the ordinary. That's just living heartbreaking, soul-healing, amazing, awful, ordinary life. And it's breathtakingly beautiful.”

Right now I'm relaxing and exhaling through the ordinary. We're continuing with our winter routine, enjoying classes and friends and activities and volunteering. Too busy, but most of it is very good.

It's good for me to remember, from time to time, that ordinary is just fine in a good life.

Standing in the field again

Over four years ago I spent the weekend at a writing workshop on Vashon Island in the Puget Sound. Our last activity was a ten-minute write on the famous last line of Mary Oliver's poem, "The Summer Day": "What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Ten minutes, from our heads, through the pen, onto the page. Here's what I wrote:

I plan to say yes. To whatever comes along, especially if it's unexpected. I've said this often recently: I'm standing in an open field, forest all around me. I'm waiting, with my arm stretched up and out, for what it is I am supposed to be. Not do. Be.

I have at my feet all my gifts: intelligence, articulate expression in the spoken and written word, the ability to listen with sensitivity and care, a passion for creating understanding between and among. At this point I have no idea how that will turn out. Who will enter the clearing? Will they arrive arrive on two legs or four or none? Will they be visible or just a spirit or essence? I am sure I will recognize their arrival quite quickly, regardless of their form.

Most of my bucket list items have been crossed off. What's left, I think, are the intangibles; what I don't yet recognize should be on that list. So far, I am still saying yes, knowing I'm on a right path.

Who am I to know what it is I'm supposed to do? What will the yesses to come be about? "We are all in this together" has been my mantra for a while now. Who are we, and what is together? I have to keep saying yes. That's the only way I'll know."

Less than a year after this ten-minute write, I said yes to volunteering at a refugee camp in Greece. Five times.

Nighttime

New arrival

Women gathering

Volunteer schedule

Afghan hospitality

Hallway to the bathroom

Team dinner

Laundry at the team house

At work with sleeping puppy

Then the refugee camp was closed by the Greek government, and the subsequent community center close for lack of funds.


I said yes to volunteering at an asylum seekers' shelter in Tucson, where we live in the winter.

Tracking device

These days, most asylum seekers are required to wait in Mexico for their asylum interviews in the US. The numbers at the shelters in Tucson are low and are likely to close soon.

That's why I'm standing in the open field again, my gifts at my feet, waiting. What will be next?