Category Archives: Blog

My Animal Spirit Guide Crossed The Rainbow Bridge

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June 14, 2019 At the vet, saying farewell: we had a long talk and she never let go of my arm; she never stopped purring.  It was time. It was enough. More than enough. June 15, 2019 Today is still Caturday. I read through comment after comment on my posts. (on Facebook) Then I re-read them. Then again. I left everyone a heart though I wanted to leave words but I was overwhelmed. I am OK and then I am not, but that is the way we deal with loss, that back and forth and up and down. The people … Continue reading →

147. Mother-Daughter Journey … and Letting Go

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No! Really? I haven’t posted about my mother for months? Maybe that is because so much wackiness and unpleasantness has been rearing its head. So, let me do what I think I do best: weave. I like to take life’s seemingly unrelated threads and weave them together, somehow. My stories evolve. We are dealing with three threads: a sick, might I say, quite ill pet of fifteen+ years? a husband with a neurological issue who has recently come out of the hospital; a mother who is 101 years old.   Let’s get out the loom and see how it intertwines:  … Continue reading →

Learning From Crisis

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As you now know, Saturday was the culmination of a hard week. A strange week. A worrisome and sad week. It taught me a lot:       📌That there are EMS workers out there who are dispatched and come to your door as soon as they can to assess and help. The ones I met were immigrants or the children of immigrants and if I could I would adopt them; I was so grateful. Others work the night shift and move you from one hospital to another in the dead of the night. They may not be immigrants but … Continue reading →

How to Deal With Anxiety

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  Be creative. This is a compilation of photographs taken with the iPhone XSmax, edited on iPhone, many with the slow shutter app. I take most of my city photos from a car, passenger side. My photography group workshop this month was BLUR. The above photo originally looked like this:                                 Click box icon in video to see full screen. The slideshow was created via Keynote on the Mac.  

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Back on the Roller Coaster on Memorial Day Weekend

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This is supposed to be a great weekend. We bought plants—too many, as usual, and we were going to spend the day doing something outdoors, at least getting a tomato or two into a pot. Trying to forget this weird week… A friend of mine committed the ultimate act of pain the other day, she tried to take her life. Reached that tipping point of misery and the inability to cope. She is in the hospital. She survived. I hope she gets all the helps she needs. Then the microwave oven just stopped. Died, no warning. The parallel universe. Kitty … Continue reading →

Is Today the Day?

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  I know that many of you are following the saga of my little kitty, Caramel who has been ill since last December. Despite a nasty rare tumor and thyroid removal and many trips to the vet, we–including you, dear reader, have been on a rollercoaster. She initially was doing well after that big surgery, was eating, was social, and then after about 2 weeks something changed and I could tell something strange was happening. We are not doing any more biopsies or big procedures, she may be 16, 17 years old. She often cries and gags when eating. I … Continue reading →

The Cat Journey: Love and Pain

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    Last week I truly thought, was the end of my kitty; but, then they got her to eat, which is a big deal, and she was released from the vet on Friday. It is very difficult being in charge of a little thing who looks to you and depends on you. She would eat at the vet but I had the hardest time getting her to eat here; it was heartbreaking. She was running away and hiding, which is animal language for “leave me alone, I don’t feel well.” And how can one not feel well in dealing … Continue reading →

The Cat Journey Continues

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In a previous post I asked for CLARITY. We went to visit Caramel at the vet two days ago. I had been expecting the worst on-and-off for the last two weeks or so. There she was in her cage, attached to an IV, her eyes were leaky and formed crusts on her face, she was thin, and her puffety-fluffety face was deflated. But, I opened the cage and stuck my head in and the purr-fest began, we cleaned her face, did some heavy-petting and got her happy-motor running.   She rested her paw on my hand.         … Continue reading →

A Line of C’s in Many Fonts, Corny as It Seems

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I tend to write rants when things don’t go my way, I put it out there and move on when I get frustrated, when I am spent, when I am confused.  But my “growth-advisor-friend” helped me see things in another way and has shown me the importance of telling the Universe clearly I want. The Universe provides. Thank you to the Other Susan. Why are so many C’s coming to me?   Caramel       Remember I told you about the four cans of cat food that spontaneously, mysteriously fell to the floor in a neat line? C is … Continue reading →

On Yo-Yos and Rollercoasters

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    This is about my Caramel, the last kitty, the mama. I call her my spirit-guide. The kitty who brought her two litters to my door and to my neighbor’s door in 2004. I took her in in 2005 with two of her boys. My neighbor took one from the first litter and one from the same as mine. She hasn’t been well for months and every issue has been addressed with hopes of keeping her around as long as possible, in good health. She has been in and out of the emergency hospital and has been at our … Continue reading →

The Puzzler #6 The Wall Street Journal 5/9/19

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Evan has recently had three puzzles in syndicated news, so they may have been in YOUR local paper, keep an eye open for future puzzles. Today, the latest is in The Wall Street Journal, on-line on May 8 and in print on May 9. The link is here: https://blogs.wsj.com/puzzle/2019/05/08/ball-bearing-thursday-crossword-may-9/ And here is the puzzle:  

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The Topsy-Turvy Layer Cake of Life

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Even an orchid needs to vent   Life is a topsy-turvy cake. Here are the layers of the last few weeks.   You know my “vent” posts. Permit me to blow off some steam. And permit me to say that maybe we shouldn’t even bother, blowing off steam, that is, because eventually the steam dissipates and we forget about the issue or event (hopefully) and wonder what the big deal was. And then the vapor is absorbed into the air and we go on. But for some reason, I need to document and be able to look back and see … Continue reading →

The Kitty Tale

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I realized I never gave you closure on the sick kitty. To refresh your memory, in December there were subtle signs that something was wrong, the vet couldn’t find anything but I could hear something in Caramel’s throat. We ended up in an emergency animal hospital five days later on New Year’s Day. It appeared to be a bad cold. They did a fortune’s worth of testing. No diagnosis. Another five days went by and the cat was obviously ill. Finally a call from the vet at the emergency hospital indicating there was a huge cyst in Caramel’s throat and … Continue reading →

NYC Photo Journal: The New York Botanical Garden, The Bronx, NY: Orchid Show

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THE ORCHID SHOW: SINGAPORE   I visit the orchid show annually, each year the theme varies; this year was “Singapore.” It was a cool, wet day, probably a good day for a visit, mitigating the crowds. I felt that in the past the exhibits were more abundant, somehow fuller, not that this one wasn’t filled with beautiful orchids, but it was somehow different even though the set up was the same. At any rate, there was a lot to enjoy. What I learned: some orchids have faces. Look for them. Here’s what mattered: not all orchids steal a show. Photography … Continue reading →