Happy Birthday to Me!

Recently I came across a birthday card Paul had given me in 2004. It began saying, “News Flash! You’re still in your 50s!”

Well, yes. I was 59 that year, but that hasn’t been the case for eight years now! But I am still blessed to be getting older. And this year with my slowly healing knees as a new  piece of my life, and my wonderful family as a continuing part.

BTW, this picture of Stephen was taken by dd Alice and posted on facebook where she said, “Note to self: do not leave cases of beer on the floor! Crafty toddler will push to gate & attempt an escape…”  Someone else suggested she send it to Great Lakes Brewery…..Stephen is indeed a crafty toddler, and one who makes me rejoice and hear the song in my heart every time he sees me and beams his sweet Stephen smile.

I’ve certainly been posting things less often on this blog. I think it is to do with my recovery and rehab which moves along slowly, more slowly than I realized it would……..I now do two hours of PT at the wellness center three days a week and when I come home my knees need ICE and I am truly tired…..I’m allowed to drive now, and Alice is coming over soon to take me to a nearby church parking lot to practice my reactions. I’m glad to be getting this independence back! And I see improvements all the time. But I do realize it will take longer than I imagined, even though I knew the full rehab is a year, and a bit longer for two knees.  The process  takes over a lot of my life!

Today one sil and bil called and when I answered the phone I hear two dear voices singing Happy Birthday to You! And I’ve talked with dd Em who is living in Budapest for six months with her family, but just now is in the western city of Pecs with colleagues on her research project. I told her again of her family connections to Pecs and she was interested, and was talking to me about being excited to show me changes in Hungary since my last visit in 2005. I’m pretty excited to see them too, and am looking forward to this two week visit in May.

Alice and her family and Andy and I are going out to dinner for my birthday to a new restaurant just opened by a friend of the family. It’s called Spice Kitchen and is in the Gordon Square area of Cleveland, a new “hot spot” for places to go. I’m really looking forward to it!

Reading for Recovery

Everyone has been telling me, over and over and over again, what a wonderful recovery I am having, and I think in many ways it is true. I am at a point where everyday there is some little improvement….I no longer need pain medication, which is a sort of miracle after 10 or 12 years of taking it every day for the arthritis pain….But the recovery feels slow in other ways and I need to cultivate that patience which has never ever been an outstanding virtue of mine!

I have no stamina, yet, and can  be suddenly overwhelmed with sleepiness! Still, I am taking this as a sign of recovery. And Tuesday it will be four weeks since surgery.

I am sorry for those who read my blog and have to hear about all this, but it is on my mind a lot lately!

Reading has always been a great pleasure in my life, and it is especially so now that I am rather more house bound, though I go out for therapy three days a week and Andy and I visit the grocery store every weekend! In a few weeks I will be driving again, God willing.  There are many places I hope to visit when I am not so tired.

But reading………Let’s talk about reading during recovery from major surgery.  I have a difficult time settling down even to mysteries which I normally enjoy greatly.  (And even netflix is difficult to watch. I become bored and tired a quarter of the way through things.) I can only hope this symptom will disappear as I get stronger.

What I find I can read with pleasure are books in the category of “old favorites”, which is to say, books I have been reading and rereading for 50 or 60 years………This may partly be the case because I know them so well that I can pick them up, read any short section, and be satisfied.

I can’t read non-fiction now, either. And I love biographies and various other sorts of non-fiction. But I just cannot seem to stick with it yet…

So I’ve been rereading a lot of D.E. Stevenson……..All the Miss Buncle books. Celia’s House, Listening Valley, Spring Magic, Music in the Hills…..

I also read Molly Clavering, Angela Thirkell, Elizabeth Goudge, and O. Douglas.  But principally, D.E. Stevenson……..

Her books do not fail me.  I know some people do not  think them especially great writing. They are gentle,  perhaps more domestic works (though not always) but the people in them seem real to me and I enjoy their company greatly, especially just now.

Some children’s books, especially Song of the Gargoyle by Zilpha Keatly Snyder have also been able to hold my attention these days too…..I have some gift books from dear friends who hope to amuse me during this time, but have not been able to make any headway in them as yet…….

Oh, yes, one new to me book which I read all the way through with enjoyment was Grace Lin’s Dumpling Days, a young adult novel about a Taiwanese American family’s visit to their relatives in Taiwan, This was delightful, the third book in a series about this family, especially the middle daughter.

Someday I will read the gift books………But meanwhile, I am counting as a great blessing that I have these wonderful “old favorites” to reread yet again.

There’s No Place Like Home……….There’s No Place Like Home…….

Late last Wednesday I returned home after my stay in the Edwin Shaw Rehab Hospital which was after my days in Summa Western Reserve Hospital for double knee replacement surgery.

Truly, there is no place like home, although the people in both hospitals were outstandingly kind, encouraging and took wonderful care of me and all their patients. Even the housekeeping people were very friendly and we got to know one another very well. But I’m finding that I am sleeping better here at home, which is no surprise!

 

It was a winter wonderland when I came home, with lovely snow decorating the branches of the trees and shrubs in my garden and back yard. But next day, already melted away. I have two pictures of the snow and a third of my feet in the delightful handknit socks sent to me from Norwegian blogger Britt-Arnhild Wigum Lindland whose sock give-away I won. I do think the socks helped my recovery, which is not at all over yet (full recovery takes a good year and it’s more than two months for recovery from double knee surgery.Her blog Britt-Arnhild’s House in the Woods is a delight every morning.

My heart is full of gratitude to everyone who prayed for me, and sent messages of encouragement and kind wishes. It certainly all helps. And my kids were heroes. I think I didn’t quite plan exactly right for the timing, didn’t give enough thought to the convergence of my surgery, Christmas holidays, and Alice and Andy’s huge room remodeling project for Andy. They had a lot to do! But they did and are doing it all.

Yesterday Andy drove me to the office of the surgeon where we were able to see x-rays of my new “bionic Nana” knees. I am so glad that I didn’t put this off any longer. The doctor said the knees were worse when he actually saw them than he had thought they would be from the initial x-ray. Not only were they bone on bone, but in the left knee bone was being worn away. They put an extra titanium screw in to reinforce the implant. The doctor told me that in about two weeks I’ll be feeling much better and my stamina will improve more.

I know there is a long way to go, and a lot of work, but I feel things are going better than I had dared hope, already.

I am looking back over 2011 on this last day, and looking forward to 2012, a year in which I hope to be able to do many things I haven’t done for far too long, things that involve being able to walk around on my own two legs. How lucky we are that things like this surgery are possible now!

Christmas was Last Saturday morning…….

Our Christmas celebration together was a joy! That was the morning party at my house. In the afternoon we celebrated Nathan’s seventh birthday at Alice and Mike’s with the larger family. The Hungarian Girl Scouts came to sing Christmas Carols for us toward the end. It’s always magical.

And this morning I get whisked away for my new knees. Andy says I will be “Bionic Nana”.  We had a lovely time together…..Three days from now Em and Ingmar, Sofia and Clara leave for many months in Hungary. We’ll miss them, but I’m hoping that by about May my knees are good enough to go visit them.

A Few More Photos on Thanksgiving Day

Thanksgiving Day 2011 is now just a lovely memory of a warm and happy gathering of family to share a delicious feast of a dinner to which everyone there had contributed something or things which were very very special.  And some wonderful little elves cleaned up everything and put it all away when my mind was occupied with something else .

May we all be here to gather together next year and share adventures. So much is happening next year!Next year I may be able to take the long walk after eating that everyone else did this year.

So here also  are some promised pictures of my mother’s china which we used this year (Spode – Romney), the table when mostly set, but before food was laid out, of Sofia and Clara considering the utterly fabulous retes (pronounced ray’tesh -meaning strudel) brought by Alice and Barney, the book in which my favorite picture of a father is found, and the picture itself of a knight in armor with his son seen over his shoulder . The last two are not of Thanksgiving of course, but I remember promising to post them on my blog. I like to keep my promises.

And may all of you had a holiday as delightful as mine, filled with great company, friendly laughter, and delicious food. I could hardly wish you more.

 

(The picture of my granddaughters was taken by their father who is taller than 6’6″.)

Our Beautiful CSA Winter Share for Thanksgiving………

My daughter Alice and I have a CSA share together. Beside the regular growing season share I also have a spring share and a winter share which we pick up just before Thanksgiving and just before Christmas, all beautiful organic produce grown just a few miles away from me, on a farm called Crown Point, begun by the Dominican Sisters of Peace in Akron, Ohio. The farm also grows food for the local food bank and gave well over 30,000 pounds each of the last two years. A lot of this is going to find it’s way to our Thanksgiving table. It was so super abundant and beautiful I just had to share this photo taken by my daughter Alice.

Wishing All a Joyful Thanksgiving!

This may be my last post for a while……Not sure how long. Most of you know that I’m going in for double knee replacement surgery on December 13th, and am already very busy doing PT to get ready, seeing lots of doctors, doing lots of tests, trying to get everything prepared or done ahead of time! This includes all the less than exciting things like car maintenance, carpentry, new gutters, PET/CT scans, etc., etc….

And getting ready for Thanksgiving which is a joy. My entire “nuclear” family plus a very special sister and brother in law will be here. Twelve is a good number for my table! Not sure how well we could fit in more.  Alice has been helping me so often! Furniture has been moved around, my mother’s china has been unpacked, all the many details have been worked on. Perhaps I will do one more post tomorrow, after the table is set.  We’ll see.

With so much going on, and my head in something of a whirl, it is good to take time to sit down quietly and think about Thanksgiving and all that I have for which to be Thankful. We used to have a tradition when my children were little and still all living under our roof, of each making a list of things we were grateful for. Then before the dinner, after the grace, each in turn would read aloud the list….There was a time when we had to limit the list to 3-5 things because they could get very long! This year we are planning to revive this tradition.

I remember how amused we were by some of the things our young children listed on their gratitude list. Alice began hers one year with “the wonderful green grass”. And there was a lot of repetition: family, friends, home, food, living in the United States of America with freedom of religion and speech and a high degree of safety….. So many people are struggling.

(Here I feel, so many people are rambling on, and I am one!)

So there will probably be a break in my blog for a good while, but I certainly hope to return “in the fullness of time”.

The pictures for this post are for my dear vegetarian son, Andy!

Do I Soar with Eagles or Fly with Turkeys?

Alice has been helping me with a lot of special projects lately, and I really enjoy this, especially because little Stephen comes along and is such a ray of sunshine with his happy ways that the whole day is immediately brighter…It is difficult to decide which picture of him is my favorite today!

I’m also posting a photo of the hutch cupboard with the flying turkey plates I inherited from my grandmother (called Nana, as I am). All the Thanksgiving dinners I remember from my childhood I remember eating from these plates and I am happy that my children and grandchildren  enjoy using them with me now, and hearing about long ago and far away when Nana was a little girl.

Also in this photo are two odd pilgrims I picked up a few years ago to use at this time of year, and some of my collection of squirrels and acorns. It began with a little boy in the 1950s who was a dental patient of my father’s and gave him his stuffed toy squirrel. It lived on a shelf of the Seth Thomas Clock on the desk in my father’s office, and I seem to have inherited it. Squirrels are a good symbol of  the “all is safely gathered in” theme of November.

And there is also a picture of a golden tree warming the far end of my back yard, against of lovely blue sky. I think we need to cherish this gold just now. A more monochromatic world approaches. It has its own beauty, but I think I love the golden days best.

Questions of Focus………..

Focus seems to be something I have very little of these past few weeks…..So busy, so much happening, so much flying by in the blink of an eye. I have wanted to blog……about  the Autumn this year which had one of the shortest times to enjoy red leaves in my memory and then a longer golden time which is still with us. The rainy days are so gloomy. The sunny ones filled with glory!

I have wanted to blog about books since we have been rearranging many things here – my daughter is helping me. I am sure I will write something about this, but not this evening. I have wanted to blog about china, about taking down the Hungarian Folk Art plates and putting up my grandmother’s Flying Turkey plates from the 30s or 40s, along with my rather odd collection of squirrels and acorns………I am sure I will in the next week or so. But these days have been so filled with many many doctor’s appointments and helping both Alice and Andy with their disabled cars. Every time I think, “Ah, tomorrow I’ll be home all day and can make some more progress!”, it turns out that very little of my time will be spent at home and when it is, I’m ready for a nap!

I give you, for your contemplation, a photo of my favorite Tupelo/Sour gum tree from the days of its brief glory this year, and a photo of the dining room table in my mother in law’s home in Hungary during the 1st World War. Cousins from Poland came there as refugees and stayed months. They came with their servants, too. And my mother in law and her three sisters and one brother really had a chance to make real connections to these far away relatives. One of the other things I’ve been doing is helping one of the descendants of these families with some genealogy. He remarked that the days are long gone when one has twenty children seated around a dining room table! Too True. But we do have family picnics and parties with more than this many children, so connections are still being made.

The girl on the lower left with her back somewhat to the camera is my someday-to-be mother-in-law whose childhood nickname was Didi.

At any rate, I’ve felt I hadn’t blogged in far too long and then had great difficulty settling down to one topic! That will happen soon, I hope, on a calmer day.

A Walk in the Woods

Today Alice and Andy are taking a walk in the woods at the Naturealm, an Akron Park near us…I used to walk there often with my children and with Paul, and after my operation in December and rehab, I am hoping to walk in the woods again.  All my life I have loved to walk in the woods. From my grandparent’s house on Story Road I could walk directly from their yard through a field full of wild flowers and grasses into the woods that led to part of  the Cleveland Metroparks Rocky River Reservation, though I don’t know if it was called that all those years ago in the late 40s and early 50s.  It was so beautiful, and I believe that if a person has this connection to nature as a child, it will never be lost. My grandchildren have it, though they don’t and probably won’t in their childhood, have the amazing freedom my generation did. Our parents didn’t really care where we were as long as we turned up at mealtimes and when it began to get dark! It was not that they were bad parents. All parents were that way in those days. There wasn’t this extreme sense of danger that exists today.  I think it is too much, but my kids go on long family walks together and this is a great blessing!

I have been missing this great blessing for too long. I probably should have had this surgery a few years ago, but I was dreading it very much. Now I’m trying to focus on what I should be able to do after rehab.  I don’t lack people who are willing to walk with me in beautiful places!

Actually, I live in a beautiful place and have a lot to look at in my own yard which is a little more than an acre and a half. But I don’t see the edges anymore because of arthritis. I am looking forward to a time when this will no longer be such an obstacle. Let it be!