May 16

More grading, more photos, and a poem!

1965

Bah Humbug

2023 Comment

?????

1973

See how fast it’s gone! Three weeks and I have been too busy (and happy) to write a word. Jim is gone to Buffalo for a few days to work with Paul. So now I wait for him…that’s love, I guess. I went out to dinner …Valle’s, but it was dinner…all by myself. (Well, me and Lewis Carroll) Cocktail, wine with dinner (stuffed lobster and shrimp) and B & B afterwards. Nice tip…passable meal, and a good time was had by all. Back to work tomorrow night.

2023 Comment

This was my very first time taking myself out for dinner, and I felt so grown-up, and so sophisticated! I took along a Spanish translation of Through the looking-glass”,  just to look super mysterious and interesting. Also because they had not invented cell phones or doom-scrolling yet.

1978

More rain, and still more rain! How is it possible to have so much rain in May? 

I am looking forward to seeing Kathleen and George Hanstein this Saturday. I could almost say “meeting” them, as I have seen them so seldom I hardly know them. The last time I saw them, I was nineteen and full of my own adultness. Oh, my, that was so very long ago. 

They have always seemed fascinating: my intellectual Quaker cousins from the artist colony in Delaware. They must be in their eighties now. Kathleen is my grandfather’s cousin, and he was in his early seventies when he died in 1964. I remember visiting their home in Arden when I was ten  - the antique furniture, the Adele Davis cookbook, a leaflet on breast self-examination. I know they traveled a lot; George was born in Germany. Her parents were killed when they walked across the railroad tracks in Wilmington. 

They have never met Jim, and are looking forward to it with an interest that is heart-warming. It’s like they care about me, yet I don’y know why. My own memories of myself at 10 are that I was a curious (even snoopy) self-absorbed child. Maybe I wasn’t so bad, or maybe they found my quirks endearing.

2010 Twitter

You know who invented grading? Satan.

2010 Facebook

Really really tired of grading. Too bad it's far from being done.

2013 Facebook

Finally found out what's less aggressive than our beagle Cunningham: Cunningham on Valium.

Cunningham embraces the utter deliciousness of napping.

2017 Facebook

Saw Baahubali 2 for the second time last night and downloaded the Mahabharata audiobook today. #retirementplans

2019

I’ve decided to make today a home day, since my back and shoulder are still sore from toting my laptop and gym gear all over campus two days ago.

• Volunteer task list for Rev. AB’s ordination

• weed patio, set up bird bath

• last set of Zotero entries

• press jacket fabric

• research reading 1 hour

• answer Sandy

Watched “English Babu, Desi Mem”. Eh. Not his best.

2021 Facebook

Cicada year poem

your bright crimson eyes

your delicate silver wings

your ancient love song

Welcome back. 

Yes, we are still here, for now.

H/t CBJ for the photo.

Apologies to my cicada-averse friends. I think they are awesome and fascinating. (The friends AND the cicadas.)

2023 Comment

The prospect of seeing them again when I am 89 might well keep me alive.

2023

I am staring at a stack of nearly 20 rectangles from my “learning Tunisian crochet” period earlier this year. So far I have basted them together in four different arrangements, trying to figure out WTF to do with them. We are not allowed to have open flames here at Riderwood.

2024

I “tinked” them and made a gigantic vest for myself. I have been stash-busting lately and it seems endless. I think this is about six weeks’ worth.