by Judy Handley | Jun 15, 2026 | 2026 Life Logs |
2026 Life Logs, Day 166: Pinning Down the Details and Day One in the Arctic
Date: Monday, June 15, 2026
Weather: Rain Overnight, Partly Sunny; High Temp 82, Low 59 degrees F
Location: At Home with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
What I did not do today was go on a field trip to Providence. It was a walking tour of the town and sounded like a wonderful opportunity, but I needed to spend the day trying to pin down the details of my sister’s move here. She is weathering her second bout of Covid and pneumonia okay so far, but this morning her sugar levels spiked, probably due to the meds she is on. I needed to make the final decision on when the Flying Angels would arrange the trip, and that was settled by the doctor. He can’t sign off on a flight for her until her sugar levels are in control and her lungs are completely clear. It took many calls throughout the day to finally get him to say that he thinks we can plan on June 29. But it was after 5:30 pm when I got that message, so tomorrow I will finalize with Flying Angels. Then there is the chore of choosing a doctor here, dealing with her health insurance, and many other details. That is how I spent my day and will spend my day tomorrow. Hopefully by tomorrow night most of the details will be pinned down.
I woke up to a text message from Heather announcing that she had arrived safely. Then later in the day she sent a photo of her in a tunnel dug through permafrost standing next to bison femur. Bison? I know but I didn’t know bison ever lived that far north. We can all envison polar bears (Nanuag) and grizzly bears (Aklaq), and caribou (Tuttu), moose, and wolves (Amaguq) in the Arctic, but I was surprised by bison. I had to educate myself a bit. What I learned is that prehistoric steppe bison lived in the Arctic as ‘recently’ as 30,00 to 9,000 years ago, and in Alaska and the Yukon as recently as 3,000 to 5,000 years ago. But that ‘recently’ was a long time ago. So I am going to forgive myself for not knowing.
by Judy Handley | Jun 14, 2026 | 2026 Life Logs |
2026 Life Logs, Day 165: Rise Up, Sing Out
Date: Sunday, June 14, 2026
Weather: Sunny and Hot; High Temp 82, Low 64 degrees F
Location: At Home with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
I spent part of my day opening up the house for summer. Old windows that are hard to open and fans that needed to be cleaned took more time than planned. But I did while watching soccer games and tried to make it fun. Then I had a visit from Xfinity late in the afternoon to figure out why the tv signal was off and on. A really great technician newly in this country from Japan fixed a number of issues that other technicians have just let go.
Then tonight I watched Rise Up, Sing Out, Jane Fonda and The First Amendment group’s counter to the spectacle on the White House lawn. Rise Up, Sing Out was the true opposite of what was happening in DC. It was just a plain stage at The City Hall in New York City. No electronic music, just singers and a piano. When Canadian-American singer and songwriter, Rufus Wainwright, sang Judy Garland’s ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’, it brought tears. And I hung tight to some of the quotes.
• “Our politics won’t save us. Our humanity will.”
• “No stars. We are all in this together.”
• “The people have the power if we make it so.”
• “We have to start thinking of ourselves as light bearers of the future we want; architects of a new America.”
• And finally, “Keep marching on.”
by Judy Handley | Jun 13, 2026 | 2026 Life Logs |
2026 Life Logs, Day 164: A Taste of Summer
Date: Saturday, June 13, 2026
Weather: Sunny and Hot; High Temp 86, Low 63 degrees F
Location: At Home with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
It is not yet officially summer, but it sure felt like it today. The first official day of summer is next Sunday, June 21, but we are close enough to call this summer.
I dealt with my flat tire early on this morning. Jed came over first thing to help me get the spare tire on (Thank you, Jed!), and then I drove the car to Sullivan Tire. As I suspected, I need a new tire and it had to be ordered. Hopefully, late on Monday afternoon that issue will be settled. Then I did some canvassing for 23-year-old Jack Richardson who is running to be a State Representative. This was my first foray into the door-to-door canvassing world here in Falmouth, and it went well. But I did learn that I need to take a hat, sunglasses, and water with me on hot days like today. Then I went to the Falmouth Green for our weekly standout for democracy. Because I got into an interesting conversation with a woman who was in the class I just finished yesterday, I didn’t get home until almost 2 pm. That gave me enough time to eat a late brunch, as there was no time for breakfast this morning, before I headed to Main Street to Arts Alive to hear the Falmouth High School jazz band play under the big tent on the library lawn. This was the first time they have played without the graduating seniors, so they invited some guest musicians. The jazz band director and Ollie’s saxophone teacher plus a seventh grader, joined the saxophone section and another older man filled in as the third trumpet player. And as they have been all this year, they were fantastic! There will be more eighth graders moving to the high school that will join next fall, eliminating the need for the extra adults. But every year a few middle school musicians perform with the high school. It was so much fun to hear them play this afternoon, Ollie on tenor saxophone and Jonah on trombone.
When I got home from Arts Alive, I spent the next hour and a half on the phone with Xfinity. When I got home, I turned on the television to see when the Morocco versus Brazil World Cup soccer game was on, and that is how I discovered I had no cable. Then I checked and saw that I had no internet. It took a bit to negotiate the online ‘live’ chat blockade before I got a real person on the phone. By that time the soccer game was underway, and it was almost over by the time I finished on the phone with the technician. I do have both cable and internet tonight, but there were issues with the cable that the technician could not resolve. He managed to get someone to come here tomorrow afternoon to check things out.
Tonight I went over to the Goldstones to give Heather a farewell hug. She leaves in the morning for two weeks in Alaska. Tomorrow, she flies to Minnesota and then on to Fairbanks, Alaska, and then has to drive 365 miles, on a dirt and gravel road, further north to the Toolik Field Station which will be her base for the next two weeks. From the field station to Prudhoe Bay and the Arctic Ocean it is another 133 miles, which on a dirt and gravel road takes another three hours. Unfortunately, she doesn’t get to go that far afield. But she will be taking day trips out from the station. This is an opportunity that comes from a grant that was applied for five years ago and finally came through this winter. I wish her safe travels and interesting adventures in the land of the Midnight Sun. The sun never sets there in June. In fact, the sun remains above the horizon for almost 70 days from late May to late July.
by Judy Handley | Jun 12, 2026 | 2026 Life Logs |
2026 Life Logs, Day 163: Go USA
Date: Friday, June 12, 2026
Weather: Partly Sunny and Hot; High Temp 81, Low 67 degrees F
Location: At Home with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
It could not have been a crazier day. Nothing went as planned, but in the end I finally have an invoice and paid the deposit for the food for next Wednesday’s Encore luncheon, all papers were signed to officially admit my sister Patsy to memory care at Bridges of Epoch in Mashpee, I attended the last These Truths class, and the US soccer team won their first game in the World Cup. Go, USA!
But, in all of my crazy running around today to get everything done, I hit a huge pothole going a little too fast and ended up tonight with a flat tire. My neighbor Billy got home just after dark when I was trying to loosen the lug nuts with no luck at all. He got them loosened, but it was time for the USA-Paraguay World Cup soccer match that we both wanted to watch, so we abandoned the flat tire to watch soccer. I will hopefully be able to finish the job in the morning and get the car to Sullivan Tire.
by Judy Handley | Jun 11, 2026 | 2026 Life Logs |
2026 Life Logs, Day 162: Working on Arrangements for My Sister’s Move
Date: Thursday, June 11, 2026
Weather: Sunny and Warm; High Temp 75, Low 64 degrees F
Location: At Home with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
This is going to be short and sweet. I basically spent my entire day trying to figure out details for moving my one month away from 93 years old sister from North Carolina to Cape Cod. And due to no fault of her own, she is not cooperating. Yesterday she was diagnosed with pneumonia and Covid for the second time in two months and tonight she managed to fall in her bedroom. She is okay, but all of these little blips, just two and a half weeks from moving day, are making me very nervous. So, I spent my day figuring up how to speed up the move if necessary and this require making double arrangements. Thankfully, Flying Angels are used to this kind of uncertainty and they are being very cooperative and fairly flexible. In addition, I contacted Restore of Habitat for Humanity in Mooresville, NC to arrange pick up of all of her furniture by the end of the month. I wrote an email to family members to see if anyone wants any of her things, telling them to get go the things out of her apartment on May 30, the day after to proposed date for the move. I bought furniture for her room here at Bridges this evening. It will be delivered next Tuesday, just in case we need to move her sooner than planned. And I talked multiple times to her Power of Attorney to figure out how to pay for all of this. There is way more, but you get the picture. There are many details to work out. And then this evening about 45 minutes after her private care companion left for the day, she had a fall. She is okay, but I don’t feel like she is safe where she is right now. That is why I am trying to be ready to move her at the first instant when Covid and pneumonia are under control. This is quite a project, but I am finally convinced that it is a necessary move for the well being of both of us. Managing her healthcare long distance is just no longer an option. And I feel confident that I have found the perfect place for her.
One other thing I did today was work on finalizing plans for Encore’s end-of-the-year reception next Wednesday. Finally, I feel like I have that under control as well. But I have more to do on that tomorrow.
And I did some house cleaning in preparation of a visit from two special sailing friends the beginning over Father’s Day weekend. It was a productive day.
