by Judy Handley | Apr 18, 2025 | 2025 Sailing Logs |
2025 Life Logs, Day 108: Beyond the White House, Mingle and Mix, My Sister
Date: Friday, April 18, 2025
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 55, Low 49 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
It was another day of dealing with my sister’s hospitalization in North Carolina. I am finding out just how difficult this is to do long-distance. The good news is that the doctor has okayed her release from the hospital. The bad news is the physical therapist wants her to go to rehab and that is complicating matters. More on this tomorrow.
I attended my second ‘Beyond the White House’ class today. This week we focused on John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States, and son of John Adams, the second president. The truly fascinating thing about John Quincy is that he ran for a seat in the House of Representatives after his presidency and spent nearly three decades in the House truly making a difference.
Then last night I went to an Encore Mingle and Mix. These are small gatherings of people who all bring food and drink and then have two hours of conversation while eating and drinking. This one lasted way beyond the two hours, but that was fine with the hosts, and we all enjoyed the extended conversation. Thanks to Peter and Karen Baranowski for hosting this month.
by Judy Handley | Apr 17, 2025 | 2025 Sailing Logs |
2025 Life Logs, Day 107: Topsy Turvy
Date: Thursday, April 17, 2025
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 55, Low 37 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
By 8:45 am this morning, I had done my morning back exercises and had taken Shadow for his morning walk. I took a deep breath and thought that I had a whole day before me with the only pressing thing I needed to do was to finish reading a few pages of the book for my Friday morning “Beyond the White House” course. This week’s chapter focused on John Quincy Adams, son of the second US President, US Senator, US Secretary of State, sixth US President, and then member of the US House of Representatives from Massachusetts 1831 until his death in 1848. At 8:45 am, I was imaging sitting down with a cup of tea and reading for a bit. But that is not what happened. The day with nothing to do went topsy turvy. I spent my entire morning texting, emailing, and talking on the phone about my sister who was hospitalized yesterday. By the end of the day today, she was doing fine and might go home tomorrow. But because I am my sister’s legally appointed health care proxy and literally oversee her daily life from afar (she is in North Carolina), there was an entire morning of texts, emails, and phone calls required in dealing with things. I did get to do my required reading in the afternoon, but that relaxed day just didn’t happen.
My day did end with a bit of fun. Heather invited me to join the family for dinner at Liam Maguire’s Iris Pub on Main Street where we listened to Thursday night live jazz as we ate. Ollie’s saxophone private teacher and Jonah’s high school band director were playing with the group tonight. Both are fabulous musicians and role models. So at least my day ended on a high note.
by Judy Handley | Apr 16, 2025 | 2025 Sailing Logs |
2025 Life Logs, Day 106: Meeting, Meeting, Meeting, Event
Date: Wednesday, April 16, 2025
Weather: Partly Sunny; High Temp 50, Low 39 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
In addition to an all morning Encore general program meeting, a meeting with the events coordinator of a local restaurant to arrange for an Encore luncheon next fall, an Exploring Public Policy meetings with Falmouth School District administrators, and an evening event at Woodwell on the connection between climate change and your health … this afternoon and evening I had to deal with my sister being sent to the hospital. It appeared that she had pneumonia, but it is looking more like congestive heart failure issue. We just won’t know how serious until more testing is done tomorrow. Needless to say, it was a busy day. I am exhausted, so I am off to bed and hoping for a quiet day tomorrow.
by Judy Handley | Apr 15, 2025 | 2025 Sailing Logs |
2025 Life Logs, Day 105: 101 Years
Date: Tuesday, April 15, 2025
Weather: Rainy AM, Overcast PM; High Temp 51, Low 41 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
I decided to take the night off and not write a log at all, but then when I took Shadow out for his bedtime ‘walk’ the beautiful moon changed my mind. The pink moon of April was full on Saturday, but probably because of cloudy nights, I didn’t notice it until tonight. But it is still round and beautiful. That put me in a better state of mind, so I decided to come in and at least write to say I wasn’t going to write! When I wrote the date in the heading, I realized that on this date in 1924 my mom and dad got married–101 years ago—and it was a Tuesday. It totally blows my mind to think my parents were married that long ago. I also read that Adolf Hitler was found guilty of treason on April 15, 1924, and sentenced to five years in prison. Unfortunately, that didn’t stop him.
by Judy Handley | Apr 14, 2025 | 2025 Sailing Logs |
2025 Life Logs, Day 104: Bright Yellow on a Dark Day
Date: Monday, April 14, 2025
Weather: Sunny and Warmer; High Temp 57, Low 45 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
This was a Cape Cod blue sky day dotted with splashes of yellow forsythia, yellow daffodils, yellow primrose, and yellow sunshine.
But there was a darkness that dominated this beautiful day. I never dreamed I would see a dictator from El Salvador sitting beside the president of the United States of America in the Oval Office discussing how to expand the number of prisons in El Salvador to hold “homegrowns” from the US. We are now in a constitutional crisis. If the Supreme Court does not make the Trump regime follow the law and send Kilmar Abrego Garcia back to this country, we will be in totally uncharted territory. Today El Salvador’s president said it was preposterous to think he would send Garcia back to this country. Preposterous is the right word but not used in the right context. What our government is doing is what is preposterous
by Judy Handley | Apr 13, 2025 | 2025 Sailing Logs |
2025 Life Logs, Day 103: One Thought Leads to Another
Date: Sunday, April 13, 2025
Weather: Overcast, Rainy and Cold; High Temp 42, Low 40 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue with My Shadow, Falmouth, MA
Fo me, one thought leads to another. I spent two hours this afternoon attending an online Resistance Lab learning how to organize for resistance. I’ll share more about that in tomorrow’s log. Tonight, I celebrated the Passover seder with Goldstones. Passover is celebrated by the Jewish people each year, commemorating the anniversary of the exodus from Egyptian slavery. The seder is a dinner centered around the telling of the story of the exodus as told in the Bible. At some point today, I realized that today was also Palm Sunday, the Christian feast that falls on the Sunday before Easter celebrating Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem. On this day, Christians reflect on Jesus’ entry in Jerusalem as a king and the events leading up to his crucifixion. Unfortunately, thinking about this in these political times made me think that maybe declaring to be a king is not such a good idea. And that led me to thinking about next Saturday when there will be another national day of protest centered around the ‘No Kings” theme.
But before I get to my final thought, I just want to say that we had a wonderful dinner tonight. Jed’s smoked beef brisket was delicious, Heather added all of the details that make the seder so special, and we all enjoyed my contribution which was a decadent flourless chocolate cake with all the trimmings. It was a special family evening together.
And finally, all of the things that happened today led me right back to a post written by Robert Reich that I read this morning. It was entitled, “Sunday Thought—Fighting the Regime’s Cruelty.” Hopefully, you have already read it, but if not, I think it is a worthy Sunday thought that I share here:
Friends,
It’s been another grueling week.
Several of you have asked me how to live in a nation whose leader has embraced cruelty as public policy. How do we inhabit Trump’s America without becoming complicit in this cruelty?
Molly watched Trump sign the executive order initiating criminal investigations of Miles Taylor (who wrote an anonymous 2018 New York Times op-ed describing internal resistance to Trump in his first term) and Christopher Krebs (who played a major role in undercutting Trump’s false claims about 2020 election fraud).
Molly asks: Is this America?
No, Molly, it is not — at least not the America we have known and loved.
Others of you are thunderstruck by Trump’s cruelty toward refugees who fled violence and have been living in the United States legally but are now being forced to return to their home countries and face more violence.
And the Trump regime’s cruelty toward people here on temporary visas who are deported arbitrarily, without a hearing — some sent to a gruesome prison in El Salvador even after the regime has admitted error in sending them.
And children in poor countries who are in desperate need of vaccines but are now doing without them because Trump has ended USAID.
The cruelty toward vulnerable people in Gaza, in Ukraine, and in Yemen who are being bombed, wounded, or killed because the Trump regime is doing nothing to stop these bloodbaths or is contributing to them.
Cruelty toward tens of thousands of public servants who are suddenly and without warning fired — some just months away from retirement and a pension.
Revoking security protection for Biden’s son and daughter. And for General Mark Milley and Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Revoking security protection for other former members of his first administration despite warnings of ongoing threats from Iran because of actions they took on Trump’s behalf.
Firing more than a dozen prosecutors who worked for the special counsel Jack Smith on criminal investigations of Trump.
Revoking security clearances of 51 people who merely signed a letter suggesting that the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop could be Russian disinformation.
Targeting law firms that employ or have employed lawyers who worked on investigations into Trump or on causes Trump objects to.
Targeting universities that have allowed international students freedom of speech.
And on it goes, day after day — the Trump regime’s abject cruelty, viciousness, heartlessness, brutality.
How does a moral person live with this? How do we not become complicit?
The answer, I think, is to do whatever we can to protect those who are vulnerable to this cruelty. We speak out against Trump’s use of criminal investigations to punish public servants who helped expose his venality. We make our communities into sanctuaries that limit local law enforcement’s cooperation with federal immigration authorities. We urge our universities to protect free speech and expression of everyone, at whatever the cost.
To the extent we can, we fund groups that are helping poor families around the world get the medical assistance they need.
We call our senators and members of Congress to tell them to retrieve their constitutional authority over government spending.
We tell them to stop the brutality in Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, and everywhere else America is either encouraging it or failing to discourage it.
We tell them to stop Trump’s criminal investigations of opponents.
We protest. We organize. We mobilize. We do what we can to put good people into office and keep them there, and we help regain control of Congress in next year’s midterm elections.
In other words, we become organized activists against Trump’s organized cruelty. We try to make this country an America we can love again. Years from now, when our children and grandchildren ask what we did during Trump’s reign of terror, we can tell them that we worked tirelessly to curb his cruelty — and we did it with our compassion.
