Trader Joe's Valentine to You

I enjoy Trader Joe's flowers so much I'd work there (in the floral department, part-time, if the store was down the block.)

Their bouquets are fresh and varied and reasonably priced. Plus their offerings are unique and creative.

In the fall our store sold small  in  yellow, orange and purple kolanchoes in tiny color-coordinated metal buckets. They were darling. I put one next to my kitchen sink because it took very little room, and it's still alive (but done with the blooming cycle.) Their larger succulents were reviewed in Southern Living as perfect hostess gifts. 

second blooming

In December they sold amaryllis bulbs covered in red wax. They looked a  flower version of edam cheese. No pot or watering required. I was curious to see if the bulbs would really flower. Wow, they did, four blossoms each for two cycles. 

You can see out my window to the snowy golf course, wind whipping, temperatures dipping into single digits. The flowers cheer my soul. 











I dropped by last night to see the latest, and picked up some Pussy Willow for a hint of spring. (They won't be budding here for three months.) And I love freesias anytime I can get them.  

They also had tulips and hyacinth rooted in water to take home and bloom--couldn't pass those up either. I chose a hyacinth.

The bulbs are from one of the largest bulb growers in the US, and labeled a Women Owned business. (The website has a searchable list of women owned businesses organized by type, fun to check out.)  There's an organization that certifies businesses at least 51% owned and managed by women! This one is a third generation family business. 

Two more reasons to love Trader Joe's flowers. 

Wow, the bouquet and hyacinth won't even be finished blooming by February 14th, but you can bet I'll drop by to see their Valentine for me!

Failing synapses -like trying to connect pieces from two different puzzles

When synapses fail, our brains are like pieces from different puzzles mixed together. The individual bits are difficult to connect. 

The stress of our last move numbed our brains before the first box was loaded into the truck. 

I got to the new condo and took one set of keys, and gave my husband the other. A couple of car loads later we couldn't find either set in pants or jacket pockets. Every flat surface was a jumble with no keys in sight. Going back over our steps didn't help-there were too many. Hours later we found one keychain on the porch in a box with a few hangers. The other one "appeared" in my purse, when I finally thought to search there. 

The next day Bill readied for a trip to the bank to deposit the checks from the closing. I'd put them some place "safe" that I  could get to easily. But surrounded by furniture in unfamiliar places and empty drawers I couldn't remember where the safe place was. Stomach drop. Heart palpitations. Hand wringing. Arrow prayer, "Where?" Then I thought, look in the check book. Bingo. Checks belong in a check book. 

Bull says our guardian angels are working overtime this decade. Next decade, they'll need to double the staff. 

We find life in general takes concentrated effort of both of us. Formerly my house-painter husband could change blades in his utility knife while juggling paint brushes and rollers.  But on a recent morning, he struggled unsuccessfully to get all of the parts to fit back together.  After fifteen frustrating minutes I turned to YouTube. Our problem-solving may have turned to mush, but we could imitate the man in the video. 

A little later, we had to change the vacuum bag and filter. What came out wouldn't fit back in. Back to YouTube. 


The photo for our Christmas card is another example. I'd wanted an updated photo since the last one taken four years ago. Our oldest grandson brought his camera and tripod to the mountain house we enjoyed for Thanksgiving. He put newly-learned skills to work to choose the by-the-creek setting with the right light and ambiance. 

We didn't think ahead to have color-coordinated clothes, although my middle grandchild purchased a new shirt for the event. The neutral blues and grey worked fine. Still, the great photo made Bill and I groan. If we'd had a plan, or looked in a mirror, he wouldn't have looked like a blow-up lawn decoration, and I wouldn't have resembled a two-toned orange popsicle. 

While some synapses create strong connections over longer periods of time, others can weaken.  Apparently some of our old synapses of mechanical and spatial events are not the stronger kind.   

I hope scientists somewhere are working on this problem. In the meantime, there are always clap-for-your-key devices and YouTube. 

It's the Berries

The landscape interest this time of year is in the berries. 

Because the bushes look like bare bent bones of a giant's finger the evergreens and berries catch my eye.

beauty berry blooms in the fall 

I used to love the red nandina, holly berries, and beauty berry in my yard.  I miss having them to cut and put in the house. The craving for winter beauty forces me to look more carefully. 

I found these lovelies in a well-planned garden recently. 
Although I dislike junipers I found this ground cover variety very attractive. 

The landscaper put the short spread-limbed tree, the spruce, the juniper and the bush with red berries together to contrast nicely. To my gardener's eye, it is as well composed as a painting.

Further along Rosewood Circle I found these blue-black berries. Plump and appealing, I don't know if the birds eat them or not. 

They weren't picked over, but I've seen birds patiently wait for just the right time and then

strip a holly tree in one day.

These ovaloid orange berries peek out from a white flower. The leaves are interesting too. Does anyone recognize this? 

I really must download a plant-recognition app. 

Even though my gardening is confined to indoor plants now, I enjoy the unusual and fruitful plants that I see around me. 

My brain made a connection (synapse) between the physical berries and a phrase I'd read "It's the berries."

I did a little digging and found that the phrase dates from an 1869 Punch cartoon. A young man is seeking a piece of Mistletoe. The seller tells him "It ain't a very big Piece, but there's lots o' Berries on it; An' it's the Berries as does it!" 

Apparently more berries made for increased likelihood of snagging a snog (1940's slang for kissing and cuddling.)

Enjoy the greenery we display this holiday season. Cut some Mistletoe - and be sure it's full of berries! 

Giant Pumpkin Guide to Colossal Joy

This fantastic display was in front of the historic Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.  I'd seen seeds in gardening catalogs for giant pumpkins, but never imagined them with appropriate awe. The cut stem was about eight inches in diameter. If hollowed out the pumpkin, I could have crawled inside. 

You can't get this result by overwatering an ordinary pumpkin. They're grown from special seeds, bred for size. Additionally, the plants need plentiful sun, fertilizer, water, and vigilance. 

They take careful tending. The vines should be a certain size before you  manually fertilize the female flowers. Roots have to be pruned to allow room for growth without damaging the vine. Then pinch off the tips to allow the nutrients to concentrate on the chosen fruit. 

During their peak growth time, huge pumpkins can grow two inches in circumference every night. A friend told me that if you listen, you can hear the actual sounds of growing. 

Perhaps if we nourished gratitude with intention and attention all year long,  our Thanksgiving joy would be as colossal as this pumpkin. I hope yours is!






                

Stick Together Like Mud

I ran into my girlfriends recently but we were all forty years younger.  

My hubby and I took advantage of a warm afternoon and visited a local beer garden. We enjoyed new brews, a tasty Turkish sandwich, and the sun on our backs. 

The tables were wooden picnic benches lined up end to end to seat crowds, like old school lunchroom tables. There was no crowd, only a small group of twenty-something women nearby.  It was too early for corporate types to be at happy hour. One woman showed off her new wedding ring and recounted it’s history. I knew it was fall break, and something about them made me think “teachers.” Another clue was that only one man was part of the group, which is typical of an elementary school. “The gym teacher” my husband said.  He may not have been the gym teacher, but the male-female ratio in elementary schools has barely changed in the last thirty years. 

When a group of three more approached they called out “Here’s the third grade.” So they were teachers. I couldn’t hear them clearly, but I didn’t hear any grumbling tones, from which I inferred their work together was collegial and satisfying. They were certainly enjoying themselves.

A good school environment can forge strong, respectful working relationships. And that fosters tight friendships. When you work and do life with a sympathetic, encouraging group, you are truly blessed. 

I went over and confirmed my prediction. We shared school names and grades taught.  I told them they reminded me of my own special group of teacher friends. 

Looking back from retirement I know that co-workers can impact each other as much as they impact their students. 

I just finished Where the Crawdads Sing, by Delia Owens. The main character lives  a hard-scrabble life in a marsh, deserted by every family member. She longs for companionship and remembers a distant happy event before she was abandoned. On a rare outing her mother and sisters took the father’s boat without permission and got stuck in mud. They’re mud-covered by the time the boat is freed. Yet they’ve laughed and enjoyed themselves. Their mother says it’s a lesson in life. They turned their trouble to fun. “That’s what sisters and girlfriends are all about. Sticking together even in the mud, ‘specially in the mud.”

My teacher friends and I stuck together through mud at school, and mud at home. I wish the same for the upcoming generation of teaching professionals.

Young teachers from McMeen Elementary School, this is my benediction to you.

In Praise of Limited Choices

Now that I live in a huge metropolis, I praise the fact that we had limited choices of good restaurants in our former rural community.

True, I wished for years that Mt. Airy, NC would get a Starbucks. After I moved it did. 

And I moaned when our favorite chefs moved on, and further restricted our possibilities for a dependably delicious dinner. 

At least in a small community, you know what you're going to get when you go to a particular restaurant.  At every new opening the locals endlessly review it on Facebook. 

My current zipcode 80247 has 26,000 people in 3 square miles. The Denver metropolitan area has 5,000  restaurants. There is no way to know the quality of every restaurant within even a one mile radius. And since our dining out time and budget are limited, we don't want to waste them on a dud. 

 I stood on one corner this week and took photos of four restaurants. 




The Italian restaurant was in the nicest building. 






The Turkish restaurant was humble, and hadn't caught my eye previously. But I liked the food we ate in Turkey and might try this one.





The Mexican restaurant always has funny signs, which is what prompted me to stop and look around. 

And the Thai restaurant in a three-business strip mall tried to create some ambience outside. Good for them! 





Just one intersection could shape our dining out until February. 

However, the sheer number of choices immobilizes us, so we tend to stick with the few restaurants we know and like. 

It's the same don't-take-a-chance principle vanilla ice cream eaters use. Who knows if you'll like glow in the dark ice cream (Britain),  raspberry-orchid (Turkey) or curry and carrot (Japan)?

Vanilla doesn't appeal to me, but that raspberry-orchid ice cream sounds interesting. Maybe my next dinner out will be at the Bosphorus, pictured above.

I'll let you know how it turns out. 

What's your worry score?

If I rated the level of anxious thoughts rattling around in my head on an average day, it would be a 1, minor annoyance, occasional twinge. ( I'm comparing them to the ten point pain scale.)  In the weeks after my husband's cancer diagnosis it skyrocketed to 7, difficult to concentrate, couldn't sleep. I would have called that level torment. 

Worry Score level 9 - panicked, frozen

Recent what-ifs sounded like this: 

1.   What if my alarm doesn’t go off? 

2.   If I don’t take a sleep-aid I’ll never get to sleep. (So I took one, and slept well until 3:15 then woke up every 30 minutes until the alarm DID go off.)

3.   6:30 a.m., ten minutes before the bus is due, I am waiting. Should I have checked the website a fifth time in case they have posted an updated list of which juror numbers must attend? 

4.   I am wearing white pants, I’d better take a plastic bag to sit on the bus bench. 

5.   I wonder: Will the bus be on time? At 6:40 a.m. I consider it might have been early and I missed it.  Or, perhaps I’m confused and I should be at the bus stop across the street going the other direction? So I holler across the street at the man waiting in that bus stop and double check which direction he is headed. My bus arrives at 6:43. But the driver is new. She might drive too slowly. 

6.   I have to transfer buses, and then walk to the courthouse. What if I am late? Will some official scold me? I prepare an answer in my head. And rehearse it. 

7.   I take a photo of the security line inside of the courthouse to prove I arrived at 7:50 a.m. in case said official does demand an explanation for my tardiness. 

8.   I get through security and join two or three hundred other people assembled for the session. Do I have to go to the restroom? What if I miss something important? I wait. 

9.   Will my phone battery last for the day? I put it on airplane mode. I don’t use it. 

10.  After a welcome and pep talk by a judge we watch a high-school type civics video about our duty. Then we are told to please remain in our seats until our numbers are called, but I can’t wait. I join twenty other women in line outside of the restroom. When I am two people away from the front of the line we hear the announcement from the auditorium to take our seats. The woman ahead of me expresses her panic which I share. “I can’t wait!” The official voice assures us she will recall any numbers who have not responded at the end of her list. 

11.  I dig through my bag for my jury summons. I clutch it because I don’t think I can remember those four digits in the right order. I repeat them to myself over and over, “5510, 5510, 5510” while she calls numbers. 

12.  What if I get on a long trial? I will have to cancel tutoring on Tuesday, Willow childcare on Wednesday, no music group on Thursday. I try to stop the catastrophizing.

13.  When called, my group of potential jurors is at least forty people. Is this a felony case, requiring a jury of twelve? That could go on all week! But we are dismissed.

14. I check my watch. I have an hour until my return bus. So I piddle around while I walk the eight blocks to the first bus stop. I’m unsure I read the schedule correctly. I take the first bus. I get off and walk to my transfer stop. I sit on the second bench. I check my phone (no longer in airplane mode) and I’m pretty sure I have misread the schedule. I could have caught the right bus if I had not been leisurely. 

15.  Now I will sit on the shady bench and hope no driver in the very close and fast traffic does not veer off the road and kill or maim me. I cannot decide which is worse. 

16.  When the bus comes I double check with the driver that he is going all of the way to my stop. Assured, I get on and finally quit worrying.  

Whew! Sixteen distinct points of worry. I think that makes me more than a worrywart, more than a fussbudget, probably a basket case. Maybe a level six. But I did not hyperventilate or cry at any time, so I should get by without meds. 

But only during the day. Still need them at night. 

Can anybody relate? Let me know so I can take solace in a sisterhood of angst.