Anger and quiet

I let my emotions get the better of me this evening.

A long day, starting with an overslept, rushed morning, ended with me (Miss Public Transit) sitting behind the wheel in the evening rush hour.

Couldn't do it.

I detoured to a less traveled route, probably taking the same time to get home as I would have sitting, but at least I was moving. Got honked at by an idiot, made every red light and basically wondered why I was being such a slave to hurry. Don't know. Just was. And didn't f---ing feel like sitting in traffic or being honked at by idiots.

Finally home. Let the girls out, sat down in front of the fire with a glass of wine, scratched the dogs and took a few deep breaths.

We went for our walk. No owl tonight. Just the quiet of the evening, black tree silhouettes against the grey night sky and the sound of a train in the far distance.

The rush of air deep into my lungs.

I felt better, and we strolled home.

A short Sunday

A short Sunday is what you get when you sleep until 11:30 a.m.

Part of my short Sunday included grocery shopping at my tiny neighborhood Giant Eagle, which, if I don't exactly love, I favor, because it is familiar and has only two self-checkout lines. The rest have people at the cash registers

I know the cashiers and the baggers by face, if not by name, meaning I know which ones I prefer and which ones to avoid. Today I learned the face of a new bagger to avoid; he tossed items in my bags willy nilly, with me repacking almost as soon as he plopped a bag in my cart. But most of the people there are nice, they seem all to have worked there for a long time, although I haven't seen the Sikh cashier checking anyone out lately.

In September 2008, my friends Carol, Virginia, Ellen and I took a girlfriends trip to Paris. One of the nicest experiences of the trip was buying our dinner the first night at a street market near the apartment we had rented in St. Germain des Pres. We bought a whole roasted chicken, some fabulous roasted potatoes, green beans and a baguette.

It was so much fun choosing our food and having it packed right in front of us.

I'll always remember from having lived in France when I was a kid seeing moms head home in the evenings with string bags full of provisions for the evening meal and the ever-present baguette. My mom once took us to Les Halles, now demolished, and, because I was little, I remember being awed by things like skinned pig heads in the meat cases. As a grownup, I am certain I would have appreciated the atmosphere more. In Pittsburgh, the Strip District comes close, but for my money, Cleveland's West Side Market is the place to shop on Saturday mornings.

Happy Birthday

This has to go into the books as an unremarkable birthday, except that I slept too late. There might be a bit of symmetry there if I could remember my mother ever telling me that I arrived in this world early, late or just about on time. Perhaps a remarkable aspect of me is that I can be all three. I am never perpetually late, early or just about on time.

I prefer to mix things up; it's the Aquarian in me.

Back to the birthday. It could not even be called remarkable in that it was defined by 2 and 3 feet high drifts of snow outside, because, after, all it is February in a northern climate even though such heavy falls are less common now then when I was younger.

What could be remarkable is that, except for shoveling snow, I take the dreary weather of my birth month with much more equanimity now that I am older, or as singer-songwriter-actor Loudon Wainwright III (63) told Terri Gross in an interview on "Fresh Air" this afternoon, "closer to the end."

I'm not a particular fan of LWJ, but I enjoyed the interview because Terri Gross asks good questions; for example wondering what it was like for him to revisit songs he had written as a young and very different man, singing with a much younger voice. I don't recall the answer; I just was struck by the empathy the question evoked in me, because I feel like such a completely different person from young Katy. The journey hasn't always been easy, but it has been interesting. I've learned a lot that has helped me to be, I hope, a better person.

There are 50 minutes left in my birthday. Snow is falling and time is passing, softening all hard edges.

Reflections of a day

What do you call the moments of the day, remembered in a jumble, deep into evening when the daylight has long since passed?

This morning brought dry, bitter cold and the palest of January light.

In the park, the dogs and I had barely come down the steps and moved down the path when a crashing sound stopped us, at least two of us with ears up. We turned and on the slope above us, two deer, galloping full speed, flashed by, followed by a small, golden streak, barking.

I expected shortly to hear horns honking, as they were headed toward traffic, but as we continued on, the only sound was a whistle for a dog, and the next sigh the golden streak, in the form of a running boxer, rushing back past us into the park.

We were left with the hollow sound of a woodpecker drilling on a tree trunk and icy water rippling over stones in the creek. We finished our walk uneventfully, the memory of the chase immediately replaced in the dogs' minds by the next fascinating smell.

I went to the hospital in the early afternoon to visit Carl, who now has a very talkative roommate. On his cell phone. With the nurses. About things you just would rather not hear about, as they are unpleasant daily realities in the hospital. I won't say thanks for sharing.

After work, I drove back to visit again. Heading in to Oakland on the Boulevard of the Allies, I saw the moon, low and huge in the evening sky, veiled by cloud drift. At the hospital, I headed to the top floor of the garage, hoping to get a picture, but the skyline obscured it. By the time I left, the risen moon had lost its near-to-the-horizon majesty.

Now, at midnight, it lights the dark, turning the snow in the backyard to a pale silver gray, reflecting what's left of the day.

The painting is by artist Edward Bannister, a black American who was born in Boston and died in 1901.

Remember me

When I leave this planet, there will be no tombstone, no mausoleum, no endowed chair, no charity to remind the living of my time here.

The best I hope for is to have been (and selfish younger me would never have imagined this) kind, generous, patient, civil and possessed of a real good sense of humor (got it!). And that those qualities made life better for others around me. Because I think the best we have to offer others is the best that's in us, not for the reward of heaven, or reincarnation, or at the lowest level, avoiding hell, but because we can in the here and now.

There's a scene in "Schindler's List" in which Ralph Fiennes' character, the odious concentration camp commander, is being talked out of not shooting a young boy, an inmate , because he has the power not to. He seems to buy the argument, then kills the boy anyway. That's the seduction of power and it's addiction. That killing may have given the commander a fix, but it only left him wanting more of the same hideous drug.

The better addiction is finding the place that lets you set aside your own immediate needs and face the world not as one against many, but as part of a group of souls made of the same stuff as you. So when you are in a hurry, easier to smile and say excuse me. Or to let another go ahead. Doesn't mean you let yourself be taken advantage of, just that in the daily bustle, you see the larger picture of your journey.

This all seems very nicey-nicey from Miss Prickly here.

(Brief pause here for viewing of Andrea Martin on YouTube. No, I am not linking. Open a new browser window and find it. Hmm hmm hmm. Back? OK, good!)

One reason I am thinking about this is how often older people unload about their aches, pains, ills, etc., in response to a simple "How are you?"

Another is: I've been told a few too many times lately how tired I look. By strangers. Why? Such a comment serves no purpose, except to make me want to run to the restroom and see how dark the bags are under my eyes. Thanks!

It's like a stranger telling you to "Smile!" Why? So stranger can feel good?

Of course strangers don't know my husband is in the hospital and that I am worried and stretching myself with visits and trying to figure out his care. Still. Butt out!

I resolve never to tell another that he or she looks tired, and never to complain to another about my aches and pains.

When someone says "How are you?" the proper response is "I'm good! Thanks!"

Snowflakes on snowflakes

Since Dec. 28, snow has fallen.

Traffic slows, newscasts get frantic and life goes on.

The dogs love the snow; the salt they hate. I take them out in the evening after the plows have been by and in no time, one paw after another is daintily lifted up and held, awaiting a soothing rub to dispatch the stinging salt. I have decided to call these moments of need "poor paws."

Needless to say, our walks are short. Yet life retains its rhythm. I say hello to neighbors, even on those brief walks, who are shoveling snow or taking their own dogs out for a break. The owl hoots at night and I wonder if he is lonesome. The flakes continue to fall, silently and beautifully, and enthralling against the dark sky. The clocks tick, the alarm waits, and the days grow longer, if only by seconds.

And my husband is another day closer to coming home.

Chaos and second chances

A month.

Carl has be hospitalized for a month with a head injury and as the month has proceeded, two things have happened. I have had dreams of counting, or trying to count, specific things. Like cards. And other dreams of a world in disorder and disarray. It doesn't seem that these dreams fit with the theory that our nightime fantasies are simply the brain's way of file checking. Mine clearly reflect the relative disorder and uncertainty that now govern my life and Carl's.

Fortunately, today there seems to be progress. He was sitting up and his eyes were open and he squeezed my hand. Still, there seems to be something in his eyes that is wild and fearful. He cannot speak because of a trachea tube, yet his lips move, trying to make words that I cannot read. He can nod in what I think is understanding of my words. And his hands, restrained, sometimes move to scratch an itch, but sometimes to aim at tubes in need of pulling out. I think I would be wild and fearful, too, if I was at that edge of consciousness.

I hope what comes out of this is a way for us to be better together. Better than we have been for some time. I have missed him, a surprise to me because I have for a long time felt being alone would be best for me. Now, I am not so sure.

Chaos, it seems, has turned everything about us upside down and inside out. A second chance is more than many have a shot at. Can we make the best of it? More than ever, I hope so.

A good omen, I suppose for tomorrow, is this: After a day of gray and snow, the sky is in a deep winter-night slate blue; silver clouds, like puffs of velvet, skim across. The chill has turned inside air into drops of moisture on the windows by the front door, making my fingers damp as I press to look out at the midnight sky.

The wind is blowing, but not harshly. And the greyhounds are snoring at the bottom of the bed.

Here's to tomorrow and a better day.