Yours, Gullible

 

(There'a something about this template color that makes me think of Pepto Bismol.)

Mid-Month Miscellany

 MONEY LAUNDERING

 Yes, I did.

 And here are the contents of the back pocket, all laid out to dry.

Rather reminds me of the time I washed my husband's wallet...   No pictures of that occasion.   Not exactly a Kodak moment.

 COOKIE MONSTER

When I began as a substitute mail carrier, I wondered about dogs on the route.   Dogs and mail carriers are supposed to be natural born enemies, you see. 

 But all the dogs on the route would come running with wagging tails and excited eyes when they saw the familiar maroon Honda.  I soon discovered the secret.

Small Milkbones. 

And Ivy knew they were in the car somewhere.  She didn't rest until the few I had were gone.

Then she crawled in back and went to sleep along with fellow housedog Bella.

 GOOD MORNING

Sun.  Streaming into my kitchen.  Sun, for the first time since mid-November.

Welcome back.

ARE THE ROADS SLIPPERY?

Whatever gave you that idea?

Hmmmmm....?

MORE THAN FAIR RETURN ON MY INVESTMENT

Monday, Valentine's Day, I invested $7 in two bags of Hershey's foil wrapped chocolate hearts.  Everywhere I went that day, I handed out chocolates and wished all the recipients a happy Valentine's Day.  I gave them to friends, sporting goods store clerks, sandwich makers at Subway, the kids across the road from me.

For that investment, the smiles I received in return were priceless.

Valentine's Day Postprandials, Part Two

 (Continued from Part One)

 Death wish?  Me?  Impossible.  I couldn't have a death wish; I'm having too much fun to want to end it all.

Yet, right at the top of my shopping list was one item of incontrovertible evidence.  As I drove down L Street toward Spenard, I thought about all this and what it meant.  I remembered my last shopping trip to Anchorage, some six weeks ago.

I'd needed a new pair of indoor shoes, something easy-on, easy-off, with no laces.  I pushed my shopping cart  past the shoe department at Fred Meyer's and saw a bunch of sale signs, along with bright gold coupons for additional savings.

And there they were, the perfect indoor shoes, marked down for sale, plus an additional discount with the coupon.

 Cool, snazzy, and unusual.  No laces, no Velcro straps.  Slip on, slip off.   And, if I happened to forget and wore them outdoors, the soles were waterproof.

 There was just one peculiarity about these shoes. 

These are the new rage.  They're called "fitness shoes" or "wellness shoes."  They're also known as rocker-style shoes "because the negative heel (lower than the toe) and curved bottom results in a gait that, the companies claim, improves posture and creates a natural instability that forces your buttocks and thighs to work harder."

"Natural instability." On sale or not, I don't need rocker style shoes to give me "natural instability."     Whatever athletic abilities I once possessed have long since been left on playing fields of many kinds.
 

That might have something to do with why my tour guide in Tibet almost fainted when I climbed up this rock wall .....







...to photograph these flowers:

The shoes also are supposed to increase calorie burn, and since my get-ready-to-hibernate-for-the-winter metabolism has resulted in regaining half of the weight I lost last summer, I'm all for increased calorie burn.

Once at home, I slipped them on.  Ahhhh. I've never put on a pair of Dr. Scholl's shoes yet that didn't feel wonderful.  I survived five hours of walking around, up and down stairs, in and out of the garage.  I didn't fall once.

Nothing to it, I thought.

Then I started a shopping list for my next visit to Anchorage, the one I was reading now, the one with the evidence pointing towards a death wish.

I reached the store I needed and walked inside.

"May I help you?"  asked a nice young man as soon as I entered.

I told him what I was after.

"For yourself?" he said.

"Yes.  I need another concussion," I replied.  He laughed and led me to the right area of the store.  That's where I chose these:

The clerk and I walked up to the cash register with my selection, where I handed over my credit card and and a handful of those foil-wrapped Valentine's Day chocolates.  They brought a smile, a very soft, tender, slightly abashed smile.

Then I stopped a lady with two children and gave her some candies.  Another lady with three kids got a handful, also.  "Here," I said.  "If I don't give these away, I'll eat them.  Happy Valentine's Day."  Well, does one really need an excuse to give heart-shaped candy to strangers on Valentine's Day?

Then some to another clerk.  Everybody in the store was smiling as I walked out the door into the sunshine.

Death wish?  I don't think so.  Just some more adventure and memories of a childhood spent ice skating on the pond behind our home in Woodland Park.

That's me pulling the sled with my two little sisters on it.  My younger brother is in the fur hat in front of me.  Don't know who the other kid is.  That's funny....the big bank on the top right doesn't seem to be as tall as I remember.  Must be an optical illusion.

(to be continued)

Valentine's Day Postprandials, Part One

 Armed with a pocketful of red and silver foil-wrapped chocolates, I set out for Anchorage with a minimal shopping list and plans to visit with friends whom I haven't seen in many months.

I say "I set out" because three miles from home I realized I didn't have the China and Tibet photos I wanted to show them.  I considered skipping the photos for this visit, but then an idiot light on the dashboard lit up and dinged for attention.  I'd known before I'd left my driveway that the truck was low on gas, but I'd though I could make it to the nearest gas station 55 miles away.

First sunlight since November in my yard

The idiot light and bell said otherwise, I realized after computing the distance remaining, the approximate three gallons left in the tank, and the 17 mpg the truck gets.  So, I turned around and headed back, where I got the photos and a few gallons of gas out of the bulk tank in my yard.

As I waited for the gas to pour into the tank, the sun rose high enough to clear a notch in the mountains and sunlight hit my property for the first time since mid-November.  We're gaining more than five and a half minutes of daylight every day now, rushing towards the summer solstice when we'll have more than 19 hours of official daylight, a number that doesn't include the twilight hours in between sunset and sunrise.

I called my neighbor, the one with four kids and a husband working in a remote village, and got her shopping list for Costco.  It included six loaves of bread.  When you live a hundred miles from the closest large grocery store, there's no such thing as going to the grocery for a loaf of bread, a jug of wine and thou beside me...  No, wait.  That's something else.  "For a loaf of bread and a jug of milk."  Instead, you stock up because your next grocery trip might be a month away.

The day was utterly beautiful, if a bit chilly at one degree above zero with a brisk northwesterly wind.   Seventy miles from home, the Dall sheep were grazing alongside the highway, as is usual.

Dall Sheep

 One of the first things I saw in Anchorage was this raven couple.  Aw, how sweet, I thought.  He's taken her out to lunch in the Sam's parking lot.  They must be waiting for the next table.

A raven couple, crouched behind a curb for partial shelter from the wind.

Scraps, that is.  Table scraps to be ready.

A very special chair.

Then it was time to visit the first friend.  We had a grand talk, chatting about Tibet, mutual friends, and reminiscing about a long-departed treasured friend.  And then, because it was Valentine's Day after all, I sat in a very special chair that once belonged to that treasured friend, as well as his father before him. I left a handful of candies with my very much alive friend for he and his wife and the others in the office

Now it was time to begin checking things off my very short shopping list.

I looked at the first item on that list. That's when I realized what it meant. 

I have a death wish.


(to be continued)

Castles in the Air

As is my custom when Valentine’s Day nears, I withdraw an envelope from its place of safe-keeping. The Valentine inside was given to me more than fifty years ago.

I picture him, that erudite and elegant dark-eyed man, standing in a Hallmark card shop, selecting this particular card with me in mind. The message inside, “If you will not be my Valentine, I shall be sorely vexed,” could have been composed by him. His intellect and wit were such that no one who knew him would have thought the almost archaic language was out of character.

I loved that man, loved him utterly beyond reason. And yet, somewhat more than a year after he placed this Valentine in my hand, I spoke words of goodbye that sent him away, and he was indeed “sorely vexed.” My reasons for those hasty and ill-considered words of self-preservation, reasons based on knowing that his public image, political aspirations, and other relationships did not include a young woman less than half his age, seem as valid today as they were then, yet do nothing to diminish the self-inflicted heartache that has been my companion for a half century.

We each wed others, though my wedding would not be for several years past another decade. He continued to cement his already legendary status in his chosen profession. I went in a different direction, one that took me to a simpler life closer to the natural world, far away from high-heeled shoes and fancy dresses.

Shortly after I married, he became a widower, then died a few years later. Because we had been in sporadic but distant contact, I am certain he knew my feelings for him had endured, and that affords me some comfort. Then, after thirty years of marriage, I too was widowed.

Late at night, in that time of quiescence before sleep draws a fleecy blanket over conscious thought, I lie in bed and build castles in the air. I contemplate what never was and never would have been. I imagine that he is alive and I show him the woman I have become, comfortable with the diverse parts of her life having finally come together to form a confident whole. I hand him the cherished Valentine and watch his gentle smile.

I add ornamental turrets and fantastical towers to my nighttime castle: I tell him that perhaps if he had played his cards a bit differently that awful night, with the simple act of putting his arms around me, he could have had me all to himself for the quarter-century left in his life. He smiles, steps closer, and enfolds me in his arms.

For a few moments, moments sweet as Valentine’s Day candies, I sense he is regretting not having done that very thing.

Then, with the self-deprecating balm that eases pain and helps me laugh at myself, I say, “Do you realize what a bullet you dodged?”

We laugh and hold each other closer as memories overcome, and I fall asleep in his embrace once again.