Seasons | Playing for Time

Sunny Saturday… page 156

05 Dec 2020 Leave a comment

Day 265 – 12/05/2020

Some morning in the next year… or the one after that… I’ll wake up and check the news and not cry. That’s going to be a good day. Second story I read today was about Kansas health officials walking away from their careers, not because of the 80-hour work weeks but because their families are being threatened with violence. The Reno County Health Director resigned in July after having local police watch his house while his wife and kids were home alone, saying the stress and worry simply weren’t worth it. And he isn’t the only one – in the past nine months 27 Kansas county health officials have left their posts, many because they’ve been physically threatened or politically scapegoated. To quote Nick Baldetti, Reno County, pictured in a red MAGA cap, “By the end of the day, you just felt like you were on an island by yourself,” he said. “Whatever decision I made, 50% of people were going to be upset because it was too ‘restrictive’ and the other 50% were going to be upset because it wasn’t restrictive enough.”

That’s the same ratio that says Joe Biden either did or did not win the presidency, despite the facts, including that the popular vote margin has now exceeded 7 million:

Oddly enough, the half of the country that wants to believe Donald Trump won is the same half that’s threatening not only health officials but medical doctors and other personnel for requiring measures against the virus, and simply for representing something they refuse to deal with. That’s so beyond the pale I can’t believe it’s happening in America’s cities and small communities. So I cry. Every day. I guess it helps… I eventually put on my big girl face and get on with it. But I no longer know, nor feel I can trust, about half the people in my life because of the visceral hatred I’ve seen in familiar faces, along with the lack of any willingness to address what’s happening to us as a nation, a people, a family of humans. The pandemic and political divide are breaking us.

But it’s Saturday, the sun’s shining, we just had The Breakfast, and Kim might get to play at SPL or Lyons today. Our little neighborhood is full of dog-walkers and a tiny house finch is perched outside my window. Time to adult-up and savor the weekend…

Image by Judy Smith

Loving everybunny… page 154

03 Dec 2020 Leave a comment

Day 263 – 12/03/2020

For so many reasons, Christmas has been a non-event in my life for the past 25 years or so (other than that first magical one with Kim in 2004 which we decided we could never top), but today is December 3rd and my immediate world needs some cheer, so holiday mode it is. It was fun to have a mini-blizzard to start things off – a few minutes of tiny snow flurries – and my space heater’s keeping my toes warm this morning. ❄️❄️❄️

When I walked over to the barbershop at 8am it was below freezing, but no wind so no biggie. Says we might get rain today, with low 50s and sunny through the weekend. Sounds just fine.

The Jayhawks have been playing every couple of nights and we have a televised game to look forward to again tonight – Washburn here at 7pm. We’re 2 – 1 so far and the team’s coming together the way it happens every year… essential players leave, FNGs come in and learn the ropes, you gradually get a whole new team and life goes on. Sometimes it all gels into a beautiful thing and it’s always worth hanging around to find out.

Still taking our distractions where we find them, even though in a world loosed from its moorings things like sports and TV require a certain amount of cognitive dissonance to enjoy. Even the parts based in reality are sometimes a bridge too far alongside knowledge of what the pandemic and sedition in government are doing to us.

Aiming for holiday happiness, though. Pollyanna’s no quitter.

Image by Judy Smith

Black Friday… page 150

27 Nov 2020 2 Comments

Day 257 – 11/27/2020

Can’t remember why it’s called Black Friday but I’ve never done one and this year would be an incredibly stupid time to start. Kim said Mass Street was quiet this morning so the stores didn’t open early for sales – maybe #lfk isn’t going to the dance this time around.

I’m seeing lots of Twitter comments about crying jags and teary breakdowns on The Day After. I have a feeling we stayed home and did it right, all brave and stiff-upper-lipped, and today the knowledge of everything we’ve lost is proving too heavy. Will there ever be a road back to what we knew and believed to be real?

This day feels ponderous to carry so I’ll have to break it up into livable chunks – sixteen unbroken hours of staying awake for it is unmanageable. Tried not to write about it, but I can’t go all day without breathing. Tried not to talk about it to Kim but he’s the only one here. Looking for a diversion in the bottom of the toy box that will take me outside myself and into the sunlight. Feels like it will be a long winter, with days and days of isolation and uncertainty, so I gotta figure it out, I can’t whine my way through another year of this. And by the time a vaccine gets final approval, a distribution system is in place, and we’ve all received our two shots with a month between, it will most likely take that long. Then we’ll have to keep wearing masks and social distancing until we achieve community transmission reduction. Long haul ahead, Mama, pull up your big-girl undies.

Image by Judy Smith

What day is it?… page 138

12 Nov 2020 2 Comments

Day 242 – 11/12/2020

Got a little spoiled when the weeks were zipping by like proverbial clockwork, then this one hit the brakes and turned it all to slow-mo. But history is being made every single day and that takes time. So yeah, it’s only Thursday when it feels like it should be next Monday.

It’s chilly to cold and winter’s setting in, week by week, and with virus numbers on fire across the country, Lawrence Sports Pavilion won’t be opening again any time soon. That means Kimmers will be cooped up for weeks on end in a place he knows like his own pores, with mostly frosty walks and trips upstairs to the workout room to break up the ennui. Yikes. Good thing he likes reading, research, selective TV, and cold morning walks. He trekked to the Boathouse again early this morning and caught a better shot of one of the rowing crews.

I should be so motivated – the walking not the rowing – but there are roadblocks at every turn…

And booking a class would result in exactly this all too often, minus the cigarette…

Not to get cliché-crazed, but all of life is hour-by-hour from cradle to grave and every day’s question is “What’s next?” We’ve been in suspense waiting to know the answer for this era… and soon enough, what’s next will be what’s right now.

Image by Judy Smith

Veterans’ Day 2020

11 Nov 2020 2 Comments

Kim was rollin’ ’round the river early this morning and brought back the receipts…

**Rowing crews, bundled up, down by the Boathouse**

**Old power station, still used but currently undergoing a cleanup and revitalization, in conjunction with work on the riverbed below the dam.**

**Yup, those are roads they’ve built out into the river.**

**Liquid sunshine on this Veterans’ Day morning**

Photo Credits: Kim Smith 11/11/2020

Image by Judy Smith

A Walk in the Woods…

26 Oct 2020 1 Comment

Watching the snow fall, seeing how it gradually covers the flaws and imperfections in the landscape, and thinking: We’re on the cusp of change, either a new embrace of democratic government and individual freedoms, or a sharp swerve into fascism, with no real middle ground available for the foreseeable. This election will come down hard on one side or the other and Americans will deal.

Question: What happens then with what’s been lost? What about all the connections that remain but the relationship part has drained out? What about friends who were friends before we knew we were idealogical foes? Likely most of those ties won’t survive the intense reckoning, in part because there’s no easy way to pick up the thread and go on. Where do we start? What do we talk about? We’ve all shown our colors now and there’ll be no going back to the naiveté of simply not rocking the boat. Life’s too short to be that afraid and disingenuous, and look where it got us.

Will I be big enough, someday when the world feels a little safer and saner, to throw off the slings & arrows, not against me but people I love, toss all the other ugliness onto the funeral pyre with it, light a match, and walk away? Toward more solid relationships, not back into my cave? Right now it feels like no, not right away, maybe not ever if we’re plunged full-bore into an aberrant form of government.

I honestly don’t know what’s going to happen. Will this election be fair and true, or has somebody laid the groundwork for sabotage again? PTSD from 2016 makes me overly cautious about even expressing hope. So far, I’ve managed to write myself through it, but that will no longer be a panacea if everything goes badly wrong.

This is all borrowed trouble from my active imagination, but it’s also a way to prepare myself for any eventuality. Considering the *what ifs* in any situation makes for a better Girl Scout.

I’ve watched a number of people walk out of my life over the past sixteen years… I’ve booted a few to the curb myself… I’ve put some on hold in 2020 until all this is over. Each time, it’s a stark reminder of how sharply divided we are in America, and it doesn’t happen without stirring up a deep sadness. Things will never be so incredibly ideal that we don’t need each other, and those relationships happened for reasons.

Since not everything is meant to last forever, I’ll be focusing on what does – it’s the rational thing to do. I’m hoping for a groundswell of healing energy from people who know that a hard heart will kill you and closed minds lead to blind alleys and dead ends. We can live without a lot of things, but hope isn’t one of them.

Image by Judy Smith

First snowfall… page 130

26 Oct 2020 Leave a comment

Day 225 – 10/26/2020

We woke up to a white coating on everything but streets and sidewalks, with light snow still falling… we’ve since watched big flakes come down in earnest a couple of times… and radar shows more on the way. Nothing’s been cold enough long enough for it to stick on, but it’s pretty for now and I love a snow-day. It’ll be even quieter all up in here than usual.

Seeing the vari-colored trees decorated with snow calls for this…

Only 8 days/years now…

**Me hanging on, hoping for a good landing.**

Image by Judy Smith

Going, going, gone… page 129

25 Oct 2020 2 Comments

Day 224 – 10/25/2020

Wow, mood all over the place this morning, my Diary muse. October is almost over and we’re down to single digits – 9 days until what we’re still calling Election Day even though at least 56 million people have already voted as of three days ago and the lines stay long most everywhere. Including today we have over 200 hours to fill before the polls close on the 3rd. I’ll probably start with moving to my other chair and watching whatever sports happen to be on. And more coffee.

The cook went for a walk early and then still wasn’t hungry by 10am so he tried to talk me into hot cereal. On a Sunday morning. No and no, he wasn’t passin’ that cheese by me unless it was in an omelet. I’m spoiled – why get over myself now? I neeeeed that ranch omelet or Sunday isn’t Sunday, and I mean, what else ya’ got? Forecast says hard freeze tonight and possible snow tomorrow, wha… ? Tues thru Thurs isn’t looking too inviting either, but the weekend bodes well if Mother Kansas doesn’t get all moody on us. I totally feel her and she’s entitled. Long hours to wait for the answer to the question: Is there any price under the sun that’s too high a cost for the pleasure of owning the libs?

Came across this pic from gentler, more tranquil, days… maybe five years ago, all things considered. When our world comes ’round right, these sweet times can return and we’ll gather in the courtyard at Cielito with friends again, laugh, enjoy great food, and toss back tequila shots. When I see Americans in long voting lines in every town and city every single day I begin to think that the world we knew is still out there… only better, once the chaos ends. It has to end.

Photo Credits: Kim Smith

Image by Judy Smith

Frozen… page 128

24 Oct 2020 2 Comments

Day 223 – 10/24/2020

Morning, Diary… it’s 6am and apparently time to be awake. Kim was up, I rolled over and saw the glow of the kitchen lights, and that was it. I’m looking out at the hushed cold darkness and wondering if our preservation efforts on behalf of the mums did any good. Oh well, ya’ try.

Can’t imagine why my brain wants MORE hours in the day for overthinking now, while we’re all still limping toward Jerusalem. But I do know why writing saves me…

I can sit here and get it all down, and then put a lot of it out for public consumption, but only by those who choose to wade through it. I’m not at all sure how well I would have done with the long isolation if I couldn’t vent to myself in some cohesive way, and the resulting feedback helps a lot.

Today’s forecast is Not Horrible… and there’s breakfast. Two outta three so far, I’m in.

Also, here’s where this whole mankind experiment went off the rails…

Image by Judy Smith

Marking time… page 127

23 Oct 2020 2 Comments

Day 222 – 10/23/2020

Dark rainy morning. Kim had stuff to do first thing, so I’m sitting in the quiet with my coffee, watching headlights bounce off shiny surfaces below me. No warm-up for a few days now, and Monday’s forecast says 31º and snow showers, with a low of 20º. Whoa, baby…

It was fun to get out yesterday in t-shirts and shorts and roam around in the 85º temps. We saw pretty leaves, ate lunch in the car with the windows down, watched an enormous muskrat nibble on greens next to a creek, drove around KC metro just because we could, found what we wanted, and happily crawled back into the cave four hours later. Not old, just tired…

Watched last night’s debate, so that’s done now. Counting down the interminable hours until we know and trying to keep my head busy. It’s chilly, wet, and windy, so this will be an indoor day, which means working twice as hard at holding steady. We have a freeze warning for tonight, so we might try to huddle the mums together and cover them. They’re so perfect we hate to give them up, especially when there are some warmer temps to follow.

Welp, Diary… I’m gonna be boring and tedious for eleven more days and then let’s both hope for a sea change all ’round. Then the next sea change will be when we know we can walk into any restaurant or other business in town, attend any event, gather with friends, without the restrictions imposed by a pandemic. That one will be a pretty big deal, too.

Wow, look at the time… 10am… this day is positively streaking by!

**And you thought you’d be getting something new…**

Image by Judy Smith

Falling… page 125

21 Oct 2020 Leave a comment

Day 220 – 10/21/2020

… the rain, the temps… here’s where it gets real, Diary, as the weather closes in and the balcony becomes off-limits – how sloooow can she gooooo? Chill and damp out there this morning, with showers in the forecast. BUT… tomorrow’s supposed to be in the 80s, so I barely have time to whine about this, I just know what comes after tomorrow and beyond…

A few stalwarts are on the courts again this morning, but Kimmers opted to stay in where it’s cozier, playing guitar, which doesn’t make me sad. I’m running comfort-food menus through my head and just got to the M’s. I think we have Velveeta Mac, which is always a guilty pleasure on a cold day. Since we usually think of the same food ideas, we’ll see how that pans out…

We did pick Mac & Cheese for lunch, which I’m pretty sure we just had last week but desperate times call for desperate measures. Kim put Italian sausage crumbles in his today, but I’m always reluctant to harsh the cheesy mellow with anything – it’s therapy. We got a brief hard rain when he would have been playing PickleBall, so he called that, too. It’s gray and drizzly, one of those days where I wander from one distraction to another like a dog who doesn’t know where to lie down. Most of it happens in my head, but still…

I’m tuning in to TV news coverage a little more as we get down to the wire – it’s hard to resist keeping tabs on shenanigans and polls. That practice failed us utterly last time, however, so I’m trying to stick with the highlights and take every last thing with a grain of salt. We’re mostly spazzing out over The Voice… they’re doing such a stellar job of production this season we forget there isn’t a live studio audience. Also The Amazing Race, which is new to Kim and an old friend to me from their earliest seasons, before I spaced it off. And maybe a debate tomorrow night, American entertainment at its nadir. We’ll watch… we ain’t scared.

Adding this so I’ll know in the future where things were right now, two weeks out:

Freaking Out About the Election? I’ve Got Some Advice for You.

Image by Judy Smith

Adapting… page 124

20 Oct 2020 1 Comment

Day 221 – 10/20/2020

Those PickleBallers… “Oh, you kids!” They updated the outdoor rules to read:

Play starts at 10am

Temp at least 45º

Wind low enough to keep the ball in play

Janice, who’s helping keep things organized and happening while she awaits knee surgery, is asking Parks & Rec to hang tarps on the north fence to block the chill breezes… nothing on that yet, but this is a dedicated bunch and they’ll figure it out. Kim’s over there now and I’m guessing a spa soak will be in order when he gets home – it’s still just 45º.

Yikes, sitting here typing and a migraine hits – rare occurrence now. Guess I’ll hit back with some more caffeine and hope it stops at *aura* level. They happen when I’ve been super-stressed, whether I’m aware of it or not, then suddenly the pressure’s off and BANG, migraine. I’d hate to think I’m getting just a little too happy… relaxed… optimistic… but I’m pretty sure the next two weeks will keep all those little blood vessels up there busy. Hoo-boy…

Kind of all over the place with the daily Thought Parade. My optimism is at a slightly lower ebb than yesterday, but not so’s my peace of mind would really notice. The eternity of *Almost There* will pass, but it will require a lifetime’s worth of grit to get there and this “one minute at a time” stuff is cruel and unusual punishment.

Okay. Today. It’s the only chunk of time I need to think about right now. The KIMN8R is home after a couple hours of play in the bracing fall air, he’s making red beans & rice with corn muffins for lunch, and the afternoon does indeed call for a warming soak. Even if life weren’t that great it would be magnificent.

Image by Judy Smith

That will bring us back to Do (oh-oh-oh)… page 123

19 Oct 2020 5 Comments

Day 220 – 10/19/2020

Yup, rollin’ on into another week. We finally started the fireplace last night – it’s been chilly for enough days that the building is absorbing some of the cold and the fire was soothing. Same this morning – high temp today of 46º, overcast and gray. But then… Mother Kansas takes over again and it’s the ol’ rollercoaster ride:

Over the past couple of weeks I’m sensing a sea change in the country… or I hope that’s what it is. I’m starting to allow a cautious optimism to permeate my thoughts and to maybe, possibly believe that truth and right will win out. It’s hard to get there, though, because for as long as I live – and I’m counting on another 30 years or so – the night of November 8, 2016 will never leave my consciousness. We knew that night what the nation was in for and all of it has come true, so never again will I blindly trust that things will work out for the best no matter what.

But… I’m starting to have hope with something under it and I do know what time it is.

Monday’s MickeyD day and my belly’s starting to tell me about it. So with Taco Tuesday and the big weekend breakfasts, that leaves just three lunches a week to get creative with and the routine, for two non-traditionalists, is comforting and fun. Also we’re lazy, yeah.

Something happy yesterday as I was bopping through my photo cache – a pic of John, taken I know not where nor when, but I love it. That smile turned my okay day stellar.

**John says: Taken April 26, 2013, inside a Lockheed Super Constellation on display at the National Air & Space Museum in Washington, D.C.**

I’m thinking this might be the weirdest of Halloweirds we’ve experienced, so I’m bracing for the worst while opening a large porthole to the best. Mere days to wait, we hope, as we test our capacity for suspense, stress, and terror. Suck it up, fellow believers, we’re going to make it.

Photo Credits: Kim Smith

Image by Judy Smith

Hope on a Sunday… page 122

18 Oct 2020 Leave a comment

Day 219 – 10/18/2020

The intrepid PickleBallers are in dire need of a safe place to play indoors, but SPL is open for limited fitness activities only. Our typical short fall is morphing into early winter for now and outdoor play is becoming no bueno. So Kim borrowed my headphones and went for a long walk while I was sleeping this morning, and now he’s playing electric guitar, I’m noodling as usual, and we’re both waiting for hunger to strike and then it’s omelet time. Our high temp today is expected to be 49º so the spa soak will be from HEA-vun!

Less rain this year so the leaves are not quite as vivid and they’re dropping fast. Fall is such a metaphor for what’s happening in the world, and a present reminder that hope carries us until spring… every time. Thinking of all that’s changed in eight months, that’s one thing that remains – hope – and I’m trying to wear it on my face these days. I started realizing a couple of years ago that I have little need for mirrors now – my hair’s a no-effort deal, I bother with zero makeup except on rare occasions, I’m well-acquainted with my face after all this time, so mirrors are slightly superfluous and I forget to look, which naturally follows when one is neither jarring nor arresting to look at.

But the thought that follows from that is this: how much have my countenance and underlying substance been altered by the hours, days, weeks, and months here in my ivory tower? When we finally see our “boys” again, will I catch an “Omigod, Mom!” glint in their eyes before they check themselves? Have I gradually and imperceptibly melted and re-compacted into a zombie-like being who absorbs the hits, one by one, and keeps slogging forward? Or is that just how it feels from inside my head?

Rita stopped by yesterday for some fun catching up – she looks amazing despite her stress and exhaustion, and she’s getting on the downhill slope of things. Spring holds out hope for ALL of us! Odd to be thinking in those terms, maybe, since summer barely ended, but in the words of a favorite author:

“The very least you can do in your life is figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance but live right in it, under its roof.” – Barbara Kingsolver

Live right in it… the hope. While the wind blows, the rain spatters, the snow falls and whips around us… live right in the hope. By spring we’ll know what sort of nation we are and what we personally will do with that. By spring maybe we’ll start getting a handle on the current pandemic before the next one hits. Maybe spring will bring some room for healing… repairing and rebuilding some of the vital relationships… putting things back together in this society we’ve made. I hope so.

Image by Judy Smith

Stay in line, America… page 119

14 Oct 2020 2 Comments

Day 216 – 10/14/2020

First day of advance voting here. We ordered mail-in ballots but decided we needed the rush of being there… and that was a great call. It’s a perfect fall morning, little breezy, little cool, sunshine everywhere along with the leaves. The line, distanced and masked, was out the door only about 50 feet when we got there, and the whole thing was a smooth operation – eight voting cubbies on two floors, everything sanitized and in order – and the woman who facilitated our voting process in light of the fact that we have mail-in ballots out there somewhere was amazing – she knows her stuff, and we have no qualms that our votes won’t be counted. When the paper ballots arrive we’ll shred them, and that will be that. And anyone silly enough to think you could get away with voting twice has never met the force of nature that is the County poll worker.

Neither of us has ever been so energized to cast our vote and we’ve been voting since Nixon. And now we wait. We were near this level of urgency in 2016, and we were marinated in the belief/hope that it wouldn’t go south. But it did… so the next three weeks… and hopefully not beyond, please, universe… will be a wonky bundle of angst tied with barbed wire.

We’re so incredibly privileged – we drove three blocks straight south, parked in the courthouse lot, stood in line, signed the required paperwork to keep tabs on our vote, took our time marking our ballots, returned to the car… and by the time we walked back through our door we’d been gone exactly 30 minutes… on a morning so beautiful it could make a grown man cry, on a day when we’re upright and breathing, with eyes and ears to take it all in. Everything about this morning has felt right… make it so, world.

**Beautiful inside too, and a memorable place to fulfill a sacred duty, right, and privilege.**

Image by Judy Smith

	Judy Smith on Is the year still new?
	ArJay on Is the year still new?
	Judy Smith on Month by month…
	Mark Zimmerman on Month by month…
	murphyvillefarms on And the rains came…
	Judy Smith on And the rains came…
	murphyvillefarms on And the rains came…
	Rita Wagner on Time… free but pric…
	ozantm on Time… free but pric…
	Judy Smith on Hello out there…

Playing for Time

Sunny Saturday… page 156

Loving everybunny… page 154

Black Friday… page 150

What day is it?… page 138

Veterans’ Day 2020

A Walk in the Woods…

First snowfall… page 130

Going, going, gone… page 129

Frozen… page 128

Marking time… page 127

Falling… page 125

Adapting… page 124

That will bring us back to Do (oh-oh-oh)… page 123

Hope on a Sunday… page 122

Stay in line, America… page 119

Judy Smith

Follow Blog via Email

ALL the stuff …

Playing for Time

Top Posts & Pages

These people know better but they read my blog anyway.

Join the conversation …

Categories

Were you looking for …

I choose favorites …

The Nitty-Gritty

COPYRIGHT

Winnowing the Chaff

Search My Site

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Follow Blog via Email

ALL the stuff …

Top Posts & Pages

These people know better but they read my blog anyway.

Join the conversation …

Categories

Were you looking for …

I choose favorites …

The Nitty-Gritty

COPYRIGHT

Winnowing the Chaff

Search My Site