HOM and i are back at a favorite place at a favorite time of the year!
thankful that we are able to visit again.
HOM and i are back at a favorite place at a favorite time of the year!
thankful that we are able to visit again.
we accidentally chance upon the town christmas parade when we visit for lunch. not to mention three separate craft fairs. with a thrift store and a thrift store that calls itself an antique mall (cue <eyeroll>). and just a 50-minute drive away. a distinct improvement on the christmas fair, if you ask me.
peeing the baby
changing it
talking to the baby
distracting the baby
walking it
looking at the tomatoes
trying out the swing
repeat from top
A swimming in puree.
A swimming in chicken fibers.
A swimming in avocado.
A swimming in yogurt.
HOM and i think to ourselves: feeding an infant sure was different back in the day.
the sermon today is about the first christmas all those years ago back when the political situation was oppressive national morale was low and cultural identity was fractured and the child was born who brought a new and different hope.
what do we look forward to at advent today? the speaker asks. good reminder that, i think. time to recall that it's not all black-friday-cyber-monday deals seasonal carols and all that dreamin' of a white christmas stuff. there's also that little (and deep) matter of the fountain that washed away my sins.
i can look forward to the second coming, i think. although that is rather too abstract. what i look towards at christmas is really easter. because of that fountain.
family. friends. (really good food.)
undeserved blessings.
welcome mercies.
it's been a busy year. my cup overflows with gladness.
we excitedly pack for the big trip to visit J1 J2 Yi Ji and A! on the other side of the world! after waiting a whole half year for it! there is something deliciously delightful and gloriously gladsome about putting out the clothes the gifts the toiletries and the emotional support books and stuffing them into the suitcases.
except we forget to put in the cold weather gear as well and have to sheepishly repack.
on the one hand there are bucket lists stars in the eyes and loftily aspirational plans. like the camino de santiago or the green fields of ireland or the west lakes.
on the other hand there is a quick drive across the causeway for a couple days away from the madding crowd. add in the rain and clouds we are having and it feels like a colder season too, only without the layers. just as good for the soul.
i have started reading the english bible aloud! the 87-year-old woman reports. i look up the words i don't understand and i check their pronunciation. but i skipped the so-and-so begetting so-and-so bits. i am amazed not least because english is her second language.
i made this for you, my 80-year-old patient says. i figured out how to crochet it from youtube videos.
the 93-year-old gentleman hobbles his bent frame into the room. how have you been? i ask. oh he is busy supervising the help at home, his daughter says as he gives me his impishly toothy grin.
when i am your age, i tell them, i want to be like you. on high heels.
A has arrived safely and is thriving. HOM's trips have been taken and he is home. his mom's house move is done with, as are the utilities the furniture purchases the TV set-up the roster and much more. O has had her home trip and we have learnt to do housework again. my key tasks are over, namely the three exams. as is my formal life of being employed. the various bodily challenges continue unabated.
the year is exhilaratingly thrillingly and finally winding down. bring it on, thanksgiving!
O brings these pretty ladies home.
pressing question: do we remove the plastic casing or do we leave it on?
flawed and ineffective
bluster and bluff
untruths and prevarications
sound bites and corporate-speak. particularly corporate speak
glad it wasn't mine to choose. one merely looks on in helpless horrified wonderment.
*2024 US elections
the hotel room has a dinky personal assistant that you activate by calling xiaodu, xiaodu!
she is enthusiastic indefatigable and only mildly gets on my nerves with her unsolicited music which irritates after a few seconds. but she is a mine of random information like the weather the news and today-in-communist-history and she is of course perfect for adjusting the temperature and turning the lights on and off.
HOM and i are in discussion to adopt for ourselves a little xiaodu.
pampered individual with picky palate reflecting on the ideal hotel breakfast buffet spread:
we attend J2's exit seminar as her PhD journey nears its end.
i don't pay too much attention to the details because i am busy being impressed by the slides and her style and my thoughts. my baby, i think. that little urchin who shared her fishballs with me. that girl who became a teenager at eight. her own woman today, generous able and strong.
that cup is full to overflowing. may your deeds be shown to your servants, your splendor to their children.
the trains are out today so i take the bus to work.
one word to describe it all.
sardine.
to clarify, these are my reflections on the translated kindaichi books:
you know it's been a long day when...
...you look at the dog pooping on the concrete floor in the dark and think to yourself what a strange place to poop at and the little boy stands up from his squatting posture.
today i do a load of laundry in the machines. because O is home on her vacation and we are dangerously low on undies. here are some life reflections:
it's been a good series of really pleasant reads by east asian writers translated in to english. starting with private detective kindaichi and discovering the hyunam-dong bookshop and then the kamogawa detectives. not to mention the hen who is trying to fly, which i am halfway through.
what i like so much, i think, is the light touch with the language. the sentences are not heavy and convoluted even when the ideas are. indeed, as with the most artful asian discourse, there is much that is imagined within an essay that is pitched at middle school reading level.
and also the innate restraint and courtesy of the current selections. very much more persuasion* than bridgertons!
*still my all-time favorite novel
when we have exhausted our store of endurance - when our strength has failed ere the day is half done - when we reach the end of our hoarded resources...
slowly emerging from the recent distress* and today i gingerly test my memories and find they are less painful. the toothache is less sharply tender.
*relating to HOM's trip
the shunamite woman rebukes me with her generosity of spirit and purse even as i am supremely unimpressed by her husband who, when his son is taken desperately ill, only has this to say, take him to his mother.
how is it that a (seemingly) discerning gracious and contented person is shackled with a clod like that?
how does a woman become/remain discerning gracious and contented living with a clod like this?
what pain she must endure to be so much and to live with so little.
the main preoccupations of our friends these days appear to be:
friends that grow old with you are like wine, i think. some really good ones deepen and widen with maturity and you take them out to savor a sip or three every year or so.
i have lunch with Su who is like an excellent shiraz. bold and strong and rich and generous. we share imperfections and failures and fears and stories of hope and grace together.
i have lunch with Te who is a chardonnay. light and gentle and fruity and delicate. i see my younger idealism in her clear eyes and daring dreams.
today i have tea with Sh who is a pinot noir. complex and unique and hardworking and lovely. how serendipitous, i think, the friendship that has grown out of our long ago encounters and endured expatriation repatriation and the years in between!
how fortunate i am to have a well curated cellar.
the supermarket cashier asks if i am a senior citizen.
i am torn between greed for a 3% discount and vanity.
vanity wins. i am a few months short, i mumble.
i wait well, i think. give me a good book and a shady spot with a nice cuppa and i'm set till you are done. except when my wait for a cellphone battery transplant means an agonizing hour of purgatory.
because the book is in the 'phone. and the money is in the 'phone. as is the map of this strange neighborhood. even the time is by the 'phone.
i feel lost and wish to throw a tantrum. how unfair it is, i think to myself. to come to the end of a long day to be so hungry and so far from the day's rest. all because my 'phone is giving up its lithium ghost.
i surreptitiously glance at strangers' wrists to figure up when my hour is up. and what do you know? lots of folks have stopped wearing wristwatches! and of those who do, most are wearing smartwatches with anonymous faces. wear analog, people! perform a public service!
in any case my cellphone is rejuvenated with new energy and i am back to my streamlined efficiency.
today's news has a congratulatory account of a 70-year-old man who goes to medical school at 65 after he retires from his sales job and is graduating tomorrow.
so. lifelong learning. grit. inspiring. commendableness par excellence.
but. also ghastly and borderline horrifying. one sincerely hopes people do not start to think that five years of school makes a physician.
i have a really long day at work the other day. my colleagues are new and require hand-holding. patients come later than their scheduled time and take more than their allotted.
as well as out-of-the-blue 'phone calls from relatives.
my dad had a fall this morning, she says. he was drenched in his own sweat. what should i do? he refuses to see anyone. will you speak to him? i do, over the 'phone. to my immense gratitude, we have sufficient history between us for him to decide to listen.
my mum's skin is breaking out again, her daughter tells me, at her wits' end. we work out a plan to bring her in for a check in the next days.
to be a pilgrim, victoria sweet says, is to know the starting point and the ending and to have adventures in between. to go and peaceably (and even delightedly) meet the people and events that come my way unannounced.
my aim for this year, most belatedly, is to be more pilgrim-like.
but also long-winded especially with the weather and sky and river and valley and stuff.