Ten Little Celebrations – February 2024

I am always a little surprised at how easy it is to record something I celebrated every day…and how it is sometimes hard to pick the top 10 near the end of the month. The habit probably has helped me be more resilient to whatever is not going well….and appreciative of how fortunate I am.

A warm day to get the naked lady bulbs and iris rhizomes planted – Actually there were two Feburary days that were warm enough; I used one for planting in my yard and another for planting in my daughters.

Getting a full price offer on my Parents house – This was another double celebration since the offer and the closing happened in February.

Earl Grey tea – I seem to forget how much I like it…then celebrate rediscovering it.

Home again – After the many weeks away late in 2023, I find myself celebrating each and every time I arrive back home.

Out to lunch with my parents – I celebrated that they both were enthusiastic about going and that they ate well at the restaurant for lunch….and wanted their leftovers for dinner!

Snow suitable for patterns – Making patterns in the snow has been a treat this winter….celebrating my second attempt that benefited from my prior experience and the snow being wet (made the pattern I walked stand out more).

Pintails. I celebrated the picture of a pintail at Hagerman….one of my best so far this year.

Married life – Being married for over 51 years is something I often take for granted but, for some reason, I found myself celebrating more this month – that wasn’t even my annual anniversary. Having the long term relationship…a person that I know well, and that knows me well…is fundamental to the way I feel about just about everything else.

Port Aransas Whooping Crane Festival – Celebrating our first multi-day festival since COVID…more on our experiences in upcoming blog posts.

Parents’ house ready for new owner – Lots of coordination with my sisters…and physical work…celebrating that we got everything cleaned out before closing.

Ten Little Celebrations – January 2024

There are so many little celebrations every day. Here are my top 10 for January 2024.

51 years of being married. OK – perhaps this one is not ‘little.’ We marked the day by getting a special meal (picked up, eaten at home)…but the more significant part of the celebration was the savoring of being long marrieds…of always being supportive of each other, particularly when things are stressful.

Spider lily bulbs. I celebrated getting spider lily bulbs (and some iris rhizomes) planted before the very cold weather in mid-January.

A fragrant candle. I finally used up a very fragrant candle I had moved from Maryland (in the car since they are not permitted on moving trucks). When I entered my office each morning, I celebrated how it smelled from the candle I’d burned a few hours the previous evening!

Being home. Being away from home for 7 weeks and then leaving again for Texas 2.5 weeks later for a few days gave me several opportunities to celebrate coming and being home!

Braum’s Strawberry Poppyseed Chicken Salad. Yum. I had about given up on finding something at a fast food place that I liked…so I celebrated this discovery. The greens are fresh, the grilled chicken tender, the strawberries, blueberries, and pineapple make it special.

First Snow. I celebrated being home for snow…not on the road between Texas and home!

Patterns in the snow. I celebrated my first pattern walks in the snow…hope to try it again soon.

Old friends. I celebrated that two old friends (that I hadn’t talked to in years) contacted me just when I needed to talk to them…before I even realized how wonderful that would be.

2 years cancer free. Celebrating a 2-year mark of a 5-year monitoring regime for cancer after surgery…and all the checks are indicating no cancer.

Being indoors. When the temperature is single digits or below zero…it’s worth celebrating an indoor day in a warm house.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 28, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

What links litmus paper and lichens? – How did I not know that litmus dye was made from lichens? I remember using red cabbage to tint paper for an elementary school science project with my daughter. We tested everything in the house…discovered that even the fumes from toilet bowl cleaner turned the strips we made bright pink!

How donkeys changed the course of human history – The beast of burden. During Roman times the subspecies used was larger than modern donkeys…specifically bred for the expanding empire.

Jungle realm of the Snake Queens – A 5-part article about 2 Mayan queens: Lady K’abel and Lady Six Sky.

Marriage in Minoan Crete – A surprise – it was very common to marry one’s first cousin!

Kenya’s Rift Valley lakes are rising, putting thousands at risk – A study reveals that there have been increases in rainfall since 2010…an increase of only 0.4-2% of mean annual rainfall leads to the observed rising lakes/flooding.

EPA requirement keeps electric buses out of low-income schools – Low-income school districts often don’t own their school buses; they rely on contractors or subsidized lease deals. So --- they can’t meet the requirement to scrap the old diesel buses.

Ten-minute scan enables detection and cure of the commonest cause of high blood pressure – The hormone aldosterone causes 1 in 15 cases of high blood pressure. This new technology/treatment is a big improvement for the way those cases can be treated.

Dead Humpback Whale Washes Ashore at Assateague Island – This is the second one recently. I am familiar with the place this time…Assateague Island was a place my husband and enjoyed for birding when we lived in Maryland.

China’s population declines for the first time in six decades – Changing demographics in China.

Bees exposed to common weedkiller via wildflower nectar – Evidently the flowers can be contaminated even if they are not sprayed directly!

A 50th Anniversary

I posted about my parents’ 70th anniversary back in December; now I am celebrating my own 50th wedding anniversary with my husband. The anniversary prompts me to think about those 50 years of shared life from different perspectives.

Our external focus shifted through the years:

• For the first 10 years, we were completing our education – a PhD for him, a masters for me. I was working full time during those years…not thinking about computer science as a career for the first 5 years but gradually realizing that I liked the work too much to switch fields. From the beginning he seemed to have a clearer idea of what he wanted to do. We were the first in both our families to go beyond an undergraduate degree.

• We moved to the east coast for my husband’s work; it was a great career move for me too. We were both focused on our careers for about 5 years.

• Then we decided to have a child and took the precautions needed for a successful pregnancy in our mid-30s. We thought we were prepared when our daughter was born but quickly realized that there was a learning curve that was just beginning. Between the two of us we successfully juggled parenting and careers…until she went off to college 20 years later.

• There were 5 years of career focus with occasional bursts of activity to help my daughter move out of the dorm into an apartment, get to an internship, or move for graduate school. The internship and graduate school were more than halfway across the US!

• 10 years ago - I retired and my husband started a ramp down from his career that continued for several years.

We’ve lived in several states over the 50 years: Texas for 10, Virginia for 3, Maryland for 36.5, Missouri for .5 years. The two long haul moves (from Texas to Virginia and from Maryland to Missouri) were quite different. We had a lot more household items to move the second time, the technology of finding a new house/selling our old one had improved dramatically, and we were able to buy our current house rather than get a mortgage.

Our shared interests have evolved over the years.

• Photography. My husband was the one that enjoyed photography from the beginning….doing his own black/white and color developing (and printing too). I remember in our first house when one of the developing chemicals was not diluted enough when he poured it down the kitchen sink and it dissolved the disposal flaps! We have a lot of negatives and slides from those pre-digital years. The transition to digital happened about the time our daughter was old enough to start taking pictures. My interest in photography picked up a little when my daughter was born but ramped up dramatically once I retired.

• Travel. From the very beginning we’ve both enjoyed day trips and vacations to outdoor destinations: gardens, state parks, and national parks. In the beginning, we economized by car/tent camping and not eating out. By the time we moved to Virginia we could afford flying, staying in hotels, and eating out although the road trip still dominated our vacations. When my daughter was born, we shifted our accommodations to ones that had a small kitchen to accommodate her food requirements/preferences. Some of our travel was associated with either my career or my husband’s…so that part of the travel was paid for as part of our work. After she got older and as we travelled more on our own, we enjoyed short term house rentals. For a few years before the COVID-19 pandemic, my husband and I used birding festivals as a focus for our travels.

• Astronomy. My husband was interested in astronomy before I knew him. One of our early dates included a lunar eclipse at the local astronomy club’s observatory. In the early years of our marriage, we participated in grazing occultations (stars and the mountains of the moon); my role was to help him get the telescope set up as quickly as possible in the assigned location so he could take the measurements. Later I used the cast iron telescope mount to add weight in the back of my rear-wheel drive car – to give it more traction on snowy days in Virginia. His astronomy activity ebbed although he did replace his telescope; we (daughter included) observed the sunrise in 2000…our celebration of the new millennium. Once he retired, he became active the local astronomy club in Maryland and we both camped on the field for a star party at a dark sky site in Virginia several times; he liked the dark sky (and being able to call it a night whenever he got tired) and I enjoyed being outdoors, hiking during the day.

A lot has happened in 50 years and we’re both realizing how fortunate we are that the big decision we made all those years ago was a good one for both of us!