If you were born in 1959, what are the odds of pulling a penny with the year of your birth from a $25 box of rolled pennies at the bank? In the wee hours of this morning, I came up with a completely unscientific answer: One out of 2,500. I stayed up late sorting pennies, … read more 1959 odds
Author: Lisa
Jagged edges
As I stepped out onto the broken deck, I felt a shifting, an instability, as though the whole house was moving under my feet. Vertigo… the house weaving as though to spin and suck me down into the earth. Though I wasn’t there when the oak fell, the impact hits me whenever I enter the house. We … read more Jagged edges
Braced to walk
Braces – ugh. The word evokes jagged bits of metal and leather straps. Polio victims and adolescent teeth. And orthotics – ugly shoes with two-inch soles. Tom went to get fitted for a brace today. His ankle and tibia muscles are weak from the stroke, which makes it hard for him to walk correctly, so his physical therapists … read more Braced to walk
Counting my pennies
The day was a struggle. Couldn’t find things, couldn’t do art, my brain was not working, my feelings were painful and confused. I broke out a new brick of pennies, and sorted four rolls into years. I was still crying at the end of those 200 pennies, but I felt a little bit better. So I … read more Counting my pennies
Taken to the cleaners
Just about fainted when I opened the bill from the cleaners: The total was $4,178.50. This is for cleaning all of the textiles that were covered with debris when the tree fell on our house. The tree punched five holes in the roof, including several on the main floor and a big one in our bedroom … read more Taken to the cleaners
Kandinsky on materialism
Feeling deprived of spirit and art, I started the morning by re-reading Wassily Kandinsky’s “Concerning the Spiritual in Art.” That got my day going right. One of the quotes I highlighted: Our minds, which are even now only just awakening after years of materialism, are infected with the despair of unbelief, of lack of purpose and … read more Kandinsky on materialism
Rainy day spirits
It’s just crumpled plastic wrap. It’s sitting there in the trash can in big wads. I took a quick snapshot of the plastic wrap to illustrate my post about unwrapping. But the light in the office is good – subdued, cloudy, coming through the windows and skylights in filtered soft grey because the rain is pouring … read more Rainy day spirits
Unwrapped
Once I got a mud wrap at a spa. Two people slathered a slippery brown mud mixed with herbs all over my body, and then wrapped me in cellophane. After that, they swaddled me in a cotton sheet. I figured that was for pure aesthetics rather than any therapeutic reason, because who could relax when … read more Unwrapped
Lofty ideas
My new office is uplifting. Today I was up lifting boxes of files. And down carrying empty boxes. I’ve claimed the loft in our rental house for my office – and what an office it is. A skylight illuminates the room and frames blue sky with the highest tips of leafy branches. To my right, a … read more Lofty ideas
Whatever makes you happy
I got a free therapy session, courtesy of a fellow caregiver. He wrote, My counselor asked me last night, “what makes you unhappy?” I was struck by that. I struggled to find something that made me unhappy. I started to blame (my ill spouse) for not taking care of herself, to justify my unhappiness. But … read more Whatever makes you happy