The Brenda Photo Challenge ~ Light

I've sorted through my photos and have nothing new to post.  So thought I would revisit some glances at light from the past year: sunlight from the beginning of the day to the end of it.

Remembering Mary..

I held a dandelion in my hand the other day and an image of  Mary W. filled my memory.  It happened a long time ago.  That is as I, a mere human, reckon time.  I was a young person and an inexperienced nurse.  As I calculate the decades that would have made me about 20 years old.  I was working the night shift in a small private hospital that was rumored to have  beeen operated by "the mob" (more about that aspect of the tale another time).  I worked with one nursing assistant and cared for 30 patients.  The nights were slow most of the time. The seriously ill went to the likes of the Mass General or the Peter Bent Brigham. The absence of a critical care or E.R. rush  gave me an opportunity to spend time with my patients when needed.  I could be someone to talk to or someone to hold their hands as they waited for pain to subside.  On one particular winter night, the hand I held was a small frail part of a dying woman named Mary.  She had been in the hospital for many weeks.  Those were the days when patients could linger and are now long gone.  Mary was yet another patient for whom the doctors ordered placebos ~ she received saline 3 out of 4 injections.  Two hours prior to sitting with her I had dutifully delivered the saline injection. So many were treated with placebos in those years  

It was perhaps 1 A.M. when we sat in the dark together.   Mary and I could  hear a trolley clatter by on the track outside.   A few late night, rowdy college students piled out of the  transport and  slogged through the snow on their way back to the near by dorms.  They chatter away filling the night with youthful laughter.  I listened to their voices and wondered at a life that was so free.  I felt Mary's hand flutter.  She was impossibly thin.  The translucent skin with its blue veins covered delicate nearly weightless finger bones.   She tapped her finger impatiently...little rain drops on my palm.  "The medicine isn't working.  I hurt awful".  My heart sank.  I knew it wouldn't work, couldn't work.   She had a soft Irish accent (that sound, an intonation, a lilt, I came to love as a year turned into decades of living in Boston and other parts of New England).  "Will you let the Doctor know this medicine isn't helping me Dearie?"  I reassured her I would tell the morning nurse (again) and that I had documented the lack of relief.  The morning nurse and Mary's doctor  thought Mary was malingering.  She had endless diarrhea and was so thin that she could have blown away in a stiff wind.  Her condition had been written off to 'drug seeking' and living a hard life.  Mary was in her 40's, single and lived unmarried with a man.  He visited her often and  wept at her bed side from missing her.  Their relationship met with sharp disapproval from the staff.  When did the medical and nursing staff  stop seeing her?  Stop seeing her plight?  I was too young and inexperienced and not yet the 'bossy nurse' who learned over time to speak up and demand someone do their job for their patient.  Sadly, Mary was one of the women who helped me learn to do just that.  It was too little and  too late for her. My heart aches just a bit now as I remember her.  That night as we shared a moment, her room filled once again with the acrid odor of loose stool.  She winced and began to apologize for the 'mess'.  As I worked to clean her up I realized that the feces was pouring out of her vagina.  The sick odor was cancer.  It is, as I well know now, unmistakable.  Mary lasted several more weeks.  Our moments of chatting were brief.  She told me about her girlhood in Ireland and working in factories north of Boston.  She spoke through a haze of morphine.   The last week of her life, her man never left her side.  I'll never know why they never married.  I simply remember that thin delicate hand of hers laying in his huge hard working bear-paw of a hand.

Rest in peace Mary W.

A Personal Conspiracy Theory

Excess work, Spring and Lethargy have conspired to keep me away from my Blog.  The Terrible Threes even managed to hatch a plot to keep me alienated from my camera ~ for many weeks.  The  score in the game of life: The Threes v WR:  5 weeks to 1 day.  But what a glorious day it was.  Reclaiming my free time started yesterday and the sun was out (always a good sign - if one is given to looking for signs).  The battle has been engaged and I'm feeling 'feisty'.

Puget Sound is exploding with color.  I've been lulled into observing the slow dance of Spring and Winter.  It has been a seductive tango: a late frost a warm day, warm rain and cold rain...enough to bring out bulbs and leafs.  Gardeners are slowly creeping out of hibernation.  Migrating birds home from warmer climes.

A vacation is looming on the horizon.  A trip to see Alaska and it's glaciers.  The anticipation of a mental escape is building.  Good to be back.

A perfect day

Life is such a joy when a few relaxing moments are spent with friends. My friends are such a joy.  We represent the Right, the Left and Middle and still find common ground.  There is a lesson in that!!! We spent the day in the Proctor District window shopping, haunting thrift shops for a bargain and having a sandwich in a local and I might add delightful restaurant, Rosewood Cafe.  Delicious food had by all.  The place has a friendly and warm atmosphere ... reminds me of my favorite places in Boston.  But Rosewood has its own unique Tacoma feel. Metro Market, as always, had a wonderful display of fresh flowers outside ~ not to mention it's fabulous presentation of food inside!

EXCUSE ME... A Correction!!!

Daylight Savings is on MARCH 14th!!!  Spring begins on the 20th.  More LIGHT ~ it's all good!!!!!

14 Days 'til Spring

We can do it... wait for Spring... but almost all of us would like to see her pretty face now!  Let us begin the rituals of  preparation: clean out the house, air the rooms, get the dogs groomed, plan a summer trip, think about feeling the warmth of sun on human skin...ah Spring!  In the mean time, we wait...

Brenda's Photo Challenge! Anything wooden ~ waiting for Spring!

Today caught me off guard and I am posting just a bit late.   Took these photos on Fox Island (Puget Sound) at the community center there.  Almost every object seemed to long for the activities of Spring and Summer!  Spring is now just 15 days away...but for some there will have to be a few more snow, sleet or rain storms before the GAMES begin!!!  It can not get here fast enough for me!

 Waiting for camp fire stories to be told...

Waiting for Grandparents and young mothers doting on the family youngster...

Waiting for someone to find the patio furniture and BBQ!

Waiting for Dad or Handy man to apply a fresh coat of paint

Wishing all a good week end and good health!

Go Away Sally Ann...No One Likes You

“Why do you stay in prison

When the door is so wide open?

Move outside the tangle of fear thinking

Live in silence

Jalal ad-Din Rumi, Persian Port and Mystic 1207-1273

I named her a couple of years ago.  She was back for another unbidden, unwelcome visit.  She is a relentless hitch-hiker and has the annoying habit of arriving whenever it is convenient for her  .It is always in winter. Fundamentally she is a loner yet she insists on silently hanging around people.  She is the uninvited over-night guest that never seems to know that she has over-stayed her visit.  I can no longer remember when I first gave her a ride - except I know it was some long ago frozen New England winter. Now she just sits quietly, some would say, dolefully in the same spot, collecting dust and sadness. .  Sally Anne has horrible food preferences, all sugary junk food and gobs of not so healthy carbohydrates.  We’ve had to come to an agreement on the food thing…whole grains only and NOTHING with white sugar in it.  As I alone do the shopping, the rules are not difficult to follow ~ she is no longer allowed in the grocery store.  Most days she sits on the couch with a pile of unread books next to her and she always rides in the car no matter how short the errand.  I hate commuting with her.  Her presence conjures up all the “would’a, could’a, should’a” scenarios that time cannot erase.    The saving grace is that I know come Spring , the real Spring ~ not the one I simply yearn for, she will disappear.   Sally Ann hates sun light.  I’ve often accused her of being a Vampire.  She does not smile or bark a hostile word back.  She has no sense of humor.  I’ve come to believe she moves to South America in April.  I know her well enough now to know that she is not bilingual.  The Spanish lessons have been collecting dust along with all the other books near her nest of books on the couch..She does not need to know another language.  She lets the host do all the talking.  She simply sits and does a weird imitation of one of those distorted fun house mirrors.

"People with SAD suffer from a lack of sunlight – they are literally ‘in the dark."  ~ Dr. Raymond Crowel, Psy.D.

Certain bright lights create a hostile environment for her ~ even Costco knows this and sells anti-Sally Anne” Verilux” lights  The sun really does the trick but good artificial lights helps…almost makes it seems as though she is not there.  So does exercise.  She hates sweat and shrinks back just a tad to avoid contact the clear stuff.  But all in all, nothing works as well as sunlight.  Bright warm sun light is the only message she will really notice.  ‘Go away Sally Ann’ it silently screams.  Come April she will do just that! 

Brenda's Photo Challenge! The Color RED!

Red: the color of life.   To be organic is to be messy.  No other color expresses that notion as well as RED!  It is the color of passion, war, love, birth, hate, and blood.  It is vibrant and pulses.  It can bring us to tears or romantic sighs.  It represents summer and autumn. 

Red is the color of life…at it’s beginning and it’s end.

Container Gardening in a different key!

Enough said....

recycling at it's best!!!

Living musically?

“In the end we shall have had enough of cynicism and skepticism and humbug and we shall want to live more musically”   ~ Vincent vanGogh

“...living musically” ~ Isn’t that a fascinating thought?   Perhaps that is the way we should proceed with each moment…chose a musical score  and move as though no matter what occurs in day to day life it were all part of an elaborate dance.  Rather than being trapped in memory, listen to the composers, find your rhythm, timing and engage dynamically as if it were the magic of a symphony that propelled you through time.  Perhaps the nation would turn off Fox News or MSNBC or whatever talking head is espousing their particular version of the truth.  Maybe then we could engage more fully in life…in step to music, creative impulse, rather than hate, ideology, or some pressing need to be upset over the ‘news’ of the day.  What if we were looking for dance partners rather than converts? 

My rationale mind is struggling with the notion.  “How would we get anything done if we are all dancing” the little list maker frets.  Living musically does not mean living idly (I reassure myself).  Perhaps the phrase suggests we would live in concert with ourselves ~ with others.  There seems to be a simple honesty implied in the quote…something to ponder.

Hand Blown Glass for the Garden!

Posted this picture on my photo blog (http://romancingthenorthwest.blogspot.com/) but wanted to share it on this blog as well.  Thought the this artist's hand blown glass was/is creative and graceful as well as whimsical.  It would make a delightful surprise in a shade garden ~ as this garden group demonstrated.  So interesting to be able to create a multi-purpose garden of a different sort ~ part landscape, part canvas.

Of course, after thriving most of this winter in record breaking warm weather, the folks of the Northwest are now dealing with heavy fog and chilly nights.  Dang!  I was feeling so certain that Spring was just around the corner.  Of course, I usually have Spring Fever from January to May so I can not be trusted as a barometer of serious weather related events, especially at this time of the year!

Seattle Garden Show 2010 -2

Last night I drove home in thick fog.  That is always a draining commute when one cannot see beyond a few feet in front the car and the folks driving behind you have a perverse need to tailgate.  Reviewing and editing the photos from the week end excursion recycled the peaceful moments of wandering through the gardening examples at the Seattle show.  What a pleasant escape!

Seattle Garden Show 2010

Spring comes to some in the form of the annual Garden show.  After a record warm and mild winter, there is now daily talk of the hard frosts that are about to descend on us.  But we can face it...we've all been to the Garden Show!  The perfect escape into an imaginary May and June and it works for me!!!!

 the  traditional cold frame in stylish colors~

Simple elegance ~

Brought to you by TODAY OUTSIDE!!!

"Spring is sooner recognized by plants than by men."

 ~Chinese Proverb

Almost There ...

"It's spring fever.  That is what the name of it is.  And when you've got it, you want - oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!"                                              ~Mark Twain

Brenda's Photo Challenge! ~ The Best of 2009

In order to tell the photo tale of 'the best of 2009' I had to bring forward a photo from 2008.  This past year has  been one interesting journey.  A journey filled with sorrow, mysteries and joy.  A quick glance over my shoulder reminds me that I left freezing winters and deep snow.  I learned that I could not only tolerate the isolation of the deep woods but thrive there no matter how cold the day was and that at 60 I could stack cords of wood, clean chimney's, rake many feet of snow off the roof of the house and other odd jobs that are required when one lives by oneself in the woods of New England.

I spent part of 2009 in the Central Valley of California. It was stunningly hot and dry.  I had to work hard to find the beauty in the heat of that arid place but grew to love the sights and sounds of the agricultural center of that State.  Spring was a particular delight, though short lived, she turns the normally brown hill sides into a patch work of floral color.

Now I live in Puget Sound and love the sounds and sights of this wonderful place: fog horns, the splatter of heavy winter rain, the scream of eagles hunting for their breakfast. 

Life is amazing!

Getting out of my own way.....

"For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin - real life.  But there was always some obstacle in the way.  Something to be got through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid.  Then life would begin.  At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life." 
                                                       ~Fr. Alfred D'Souza

Choosing to see the mystery or the obstacle~ every now then I have to remind myself not to be so heavy, cynical and overly serious: attempting to keep my eyes wide open in order to avoid becoming my own personal obstacle course.  All this attempting to  witness the magic of it all and stay in the NOW ~  is a piece of hard work!!