2023 Life Logs, Day 284: Birthday Luncheon for Jane Woodin
Date: Tuesday, October 10, 2023
Weather: Mix of Sun and Clouds; High 63, Low 53 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

I’m still kicking myself for not getting a photo of our birthday luncheon for Jane Woodin today. The women iu my Dining-In group get together for lunch for each person’s birthday and today it was for Jane. We met at the Captain Kid in Woods Hole and sat out on the deck overlooking Eel Pond. When we arrived ,it was cloudy and we asked the staff to turn on the gas heater as it was a bit chilly. But when the sun came out, we had a beautiful view of the all the boats in the pond. Jane looked radiant as usual, and we all enjoyed our time together. It was a picture perfect setting, I just missed the opportunity. Sorry Jane, but happy birthday! We’ll have to have a repeat performance next year and get photo documentation.

I did a lot of Encore work before and after the luncheon, spending a lot of time on the phone talking to Board members to get background information from them for tomorrow’s Board meeting. Due to a phone call that took longer than expected, I was late to take Shadow over to Heather and Jed’s so Ollie could take him for a walk. Ollie and his friend Simon were going to walk together, but I was late and Simon had to go home just after I arrived. But Ollie did the walk, and I will continue to take Shadow over everyday for Ollie to walk with him until my back is better. Right now it is just too painful to do much walking.

2023 Life Logs, Day 283: Pumpkin Time
Date: Monday, October 9, 2023
Weather: Mostly Sunny and Windy; High 60, Low 50 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

There was no school today in observance of Indigenous Peoples Day. Jed, Ollie, and Jonah returned from the camping weekend, Sam and Jonah had soccer practice in the afternoon, so Heather, Jed, Ollie, and I decided to head to the pumpkin patch. We missed having Sam and Jonah with us, but we’ll return at some point so they can pick out their pumpkin. We all picked out our favorite pumpkins and sunflowers to take home and then stopped on the way home to buy chrysanthemums. I headed home to make lasagna for everyone for dinner at Heather and Jed’s. It was a celebration of autumn.

You’ll have to wait to hear more about the Blue Zones. It was a wonderfully busy day, and I am too tired to write about Blue Zones tonight. Stay tuned.

2023 Life Logs, Day 282: Transition to Cooler Weather
Date: Sunday, October 8, 2023
Weather: Partly Cloudy; High 62, Low 51 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

We’ve had some ups and downs with the weather this summer and fall, temperatures have been up and down, but today I felt like we have finally turned the corner to cooler fall weather. I hope I am wrong, but if my prediction is right, the 70 degree days might not return until spring. Mother Earth, please, please, prove me wrong. But what I do know is that for the next few days we will have highs in the 60’s and lows in the 50’s. Then next week, both our highs and lows will be in the 50’s. I think it might be time to pull out my fall jacket and maybe turn the heat on.

I spent part of yesterday watching the first three programs in a Netflix documentary called The Blue Zones. In the early 2000’s, Dan Buettner teamed up with National Geographic to write a book about the Blue Zones. These are places in the world where more people live longer, more centenarians, than anywhere else on earth. Why just these four or five locations? What do these people do that allows them to live longer, healthier lives? Last week at my Health and Wellness group meeting, someone suggested that we watch the documentary based on Buettner’s research. I did and I took notes while watching the first three episodes. I am going to share my abbreviated notes below. I hope you will read them and try to come up with a list of the four categories that Buettner came up with and shared in episode four., the four major things you can do to live a longer, healthier life. Write down your four categories and I will share his tomorrow night so we can compare notes.

Blue Zone—Okinawa, Japan (island)
1. Medicinal Foods (add herbs that keep you healthy)
2. Caloric Density Foods (lots of vegetables instead of meat)
3. Hara Hachi Bu (stop eating when you are 80 % full)
4. Moai (getting together with small group of friends daily)
5. Ikigai (sense of purpose)
6. Balance (do things to keep physical balance to prevent falling)

Blue Zone—Sardinia, Italy (island)
1. Steepness (don’t avoid steep climbs and steps)
2. Good Carbs
3. Control Stress
4. Care for Elders (outsized reverence for elderly family members and friends)

Blue Zone—Loma Linda, California (urban suburb with heavy concentration of Seventh Day Adventists)
1. Volunteer
2. Plant-based Diet
3. Faith-based Community
4. Right Tribe (surround yourself with the people who live a heathy lifestyle)

Blue Zone—Ikaria, Greece (island off coast of Turkey)
1. Herbal Teas (sage, rosemary, common mallow)
2. Raw Local Honey
3. Partnerships of Love
4. Ikarian Wine
5. Dancing and Laughing (Panegyris)

Blue Zone–Nicoya, Costa Rica (northern Costa Rico near border of Nicaragua)
1. Plan de Vida (reason for living)
2. By Hand (avoid mechanisms that do work for you)
3. Slow Down (make time for things that are really important to you)
4. The Three Sisters (corn, beans, squash)

2023 Life Logs, Day 281: Personal Day
Date: Saturday, October 7, 2023
Weather: Overcast with Light Rain; High 65, Low 53 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

I took the day off today. I’m calling it a personal day because I needed to get myself back on track. I haven’t been walking because it hurts, but I know if I don’t walk my back will never heal. I started slowly today, but I did take two walks with Shadow and walked a mile today. I’ll increase it a bit each day, but I know I have to do it. I also got back on my exercise bike and that felt good. And I did my stretches. I made a promise to myself to do these things every day, no matter how busy I am. The other thing I did was start watching a series of four programs about the Blue Zones. These are areas in the world where people live longer than anywhere else. I have read about the Blue Zones, but this series (not new) is really compelling. I’ll finish it tomorrow and share what I learned.

Jed left with Jonah and Ollie this morning to go to the fairgrounds for Mass Jam. This is a state-wide Boy Scout Jamboree (campout) and despite the rain, Jed reported tonight that they are doing fine. Heather took Sam to the driving school this morning as he had a two-hour appointment. He has his learner’s permit, but he has to book so many hours with the school and have more driving time with a parent. Since Jed and the other two boys were camping today and tonight, this was their opportunity. That’s about it with news from here today.

2023 Life Logs, Day 280: Trip to Cohasset
Date: Friday, October 6, 2023
Weather: Mostly Cloudy, Sprinkles Late; High 69, Low 62 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

This mostly cloudy day was brightened by a day trip to Cohasset to tour the home of Karen and Peter Baranowski’s daughter, Lyn. Karen invited a few women friends to come see the showcase home and have lunch. Cohasset is a lovely little town on the shore south of Boston. The first written record is from 1614 when Captain John Smith was exploring the coast of New England and described an encounter with four Native Americans in a canoe at “Quonahasit.” The name comes from the Native American people who lived there long before the Europeans came and one meaning of the word Quanahasit is “long rocky place.” The location of Lyn Baranowski’s home certainly bears that out. It sits majestically on a granite hillside overlooking an inlet of Cohasset Cove. The home is a spectacular example of a mid-twentieth century modern architecture in the vintage of Frank Lloyd Wright. There were nine of us visiting and as we moved from room to room and then outside, the words “breathtaking” and “spectacular” were uttered over and over. The furniture and artwork Lyn has chosen perfectly compliment the architecture of the home. My favorite painting was one that the original owners passed on to Lyn. It was on an interior wall with no windows, but was painted in such a way that it made you feel as if you were looking through the wall to the cove outside.

After touring the inside of the home, we went out to the screened in room that leads out to a patio with a little waterfall going into a pond with Koi and from there you look down to a pool that was carved out of the granite hillside. The home sits on almost three acres of land and overlooks an inlet of Cohasset Cove. Much of the home is glass, so no matter where you are inside, you feel like you are outside. Just as we started to eat lunch inside, the sun came out, so afterwards we went back outside to the pool area that has a pergola covered with wisteria on one side and granite steps leading uphill to the wooded side of the property on another. I felt like I had been air-dropped into a magical autumn fairy land as the foliage on the South Shore has started to turn. Lyn has left no stone unturned in restoring this home and the grounds. It really is spectacular. So, thank you to Lyn for letting us invade her home and to her mother and my good friend, Karen, for inviting us on this tour.

Lynne left this morning before my 9 am meeting. We had a lovely, laid-back week together in between spurts of productive activity. We got rid of a carload of things I no longer need from my basement and a huge bag of clothing from my closet. Thank you, Lynne, for encouraging me to “downsize” by getting rid of some stuff stored in the basement and the old clothes I haven’t worn for years. It felt great to purge and I need to do more of it. Lynne was headed back to Nyack to visit with family and then on to Michigan on Sunday.

2023 Life Logs, Day 278: Trip to Woods Hole and Closet Cleanout at Home
Date: Wednesday, October 4, 2023
Weather: Another Beautiful, Sunny Day; High 76, Low 59 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

Lynne’s visit was delayed and delayed, but when she finally got here, she hit the jackpot on beautiful weather. It has been sunny every day and the high temperature for the day has gone up and up. Today it was 76 degrees F. Wonderful.

I spent my morning on my computer. First, I had to deal with an unexpected computer issue that took much too long to resolve. Then I needed to get the agenda out for next week’s Encore Board meeting and that took much longer than I thought. It was almost noon before I even got dressed for the day! Lynne kept busy on her phone and then went out in the backyard to do a little clean-up of small fallen branches while I finally got dressed. Then we ate lunch and took off for Woods Hole. We took Shadow and made our first stop Stony Beach. Then we walked toward Eel Pond. When we got there, I turned around to go back and get the car to come pick-up Lynne and Shadow while they walked on through the village to get their steps in today.

Late this afternoon, Lynne went with me to the first meeting of a new Newcomers-Encore activity, a Health and Wellness group. This first meeting was spent deciding what topics we might cover at the next few meetings. It was a small group, but that is fine. Maybe when the weather is not so beautiful, more people will take the time to attend. And after the meeting, we headed home to start a closet clean-out. I keep clothes for years, so today was getting rid of some perfectly good clothes from the 1980’s and 90’s. I had not worn some of the things for years, so it was time to purge. We didn’t get through the whole closet, but we filled one garbage bag with clothes to give away. I call that a success.

After dinner, Kevin and Claire called to answer a question I had sent to them via text. They were driving as they left the East Coast today, eventually headed for California to visit with Kevin’s mom and other family that live there. There will be stops along the way to visit with friends and family and after the visit in California, they will head back to their boat in Mexico. It was great to talk to them. Last year when they visited me, Lynne was here, so it was great for all of us to be together on the phone tonight.

Lynne leaves on Friday morning, so tomorrow is our last day together. I’m not sure what we will do, but we do plan to go out to lunch up by the canal at Fisherman’s View. Our time together is going by way too fast.

2023 Life Logs, Day 277: Basement Redo and Sail on L’Escargot
Date: Tuesday, October 3, 2023
Weather: Another Beautiful, Sunny Day; High 68, Low 59 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

Lynne and I spent our morning rearranging the boxes of things stored in my basement and then taking the purged items to the Swap Shop. I have a very difficult time getting rid of things, but it felt incredibly good to let go of things that I longer need. Then after lunch, we headed to the West Falmouth Boat Club to get aboard L’Escargot with the Woodins and one of their sailing friends, Martha. There was no wind at my house when we left, but it was windy on the dock when Lynne, Jane, and I arrived in West Falmouth Harbor. Bruce and Martha had arrived earlier to take the dinghy out to the mooring and bring the boat to the dock to pick us up. There was a bit of drama as somehow in getting the dinghy tied to the mooring ball, the dinghy escaped and blew into the tall grass on a near shore. Bruce and Martha rowed a boat club dinghy out to make the rescue. And in spite of the escaped dinghy and the white caps outside the jetty that gave us a lumpy, bumpy ride at first, things settled down a bit and we had a great sail. Lynne has lived aboard a sailboat and sailed most of her adult life, but this was her first time on a sailboat since 2018. Despite the rowdy sail, we all managed to embrace the beautiful weather and really enjoy our time on the water. Thank you to Bruce and Jane for the invite!

We ran some errands on the way home. One of the errands was to stop by Heather and Jed’s to pick up Shadow’s frozen dog food and to drop off some empty plastic bins that I had borrowed from them during the move. Again, it felt so good to know that Lynne and I had emptied those bins. Heather was giving Ollie a haircut when we arrived, and we had a short but good visit. Then it was home for dinner and to watch two more episodes of Drops of God. This is an Apple TV series recommended by folks in my wine group as it is all about wine. There are eight episodes and we finished episode six tonight.

Tomorrow we have no plans other than to find ways to enjoy this beautiful weather outside and inside, to go through my closet and get rid of clothes that I have not worn for years.

2023 Life Logs, Day 276: A Beautiful, Relaxed Day with Lynne and Shadow
Date: Monday, October 2, 2023
Weather: Beautiful, Sunny Day; High 67, Low 51 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

Lynne, Shadow, and I enjoyed this beautiful day. In between walks, we worked in the basement to try and get rid of some of my things that are hard to part with, but no longer needed. It is good to have someone pushing me along on this project. We also did some work in my herb garden which made me super happy. We drove down to Falmouth Heights Beach for our afternoon walk. I have to stop and rest my back while Lynne and Shadow go ahead and then come back to pick me up, and that seems to be working for all of us. Shadow is loving his longer walks with Lynne and is enjoying cuddle time with her. And Lynne and I are just enjoying having a relaxed time together.

2023 Life Logs, Day 275: Lynne Arrived
Date: Sunday, October 1, 2023
Weather: Partly Sunny, N Wind; High 65, Low 54 degrees F
Location: At Home on Lakeview Avenue, Falmouth, MA

After many changes in plans and much anticipation, my friend Lynne finally arrived this afternoon!!! I am so happy to have her here and Shadow is over the moon. During most of the year, Lynne lives in New Zealand and pet sits. She loves taking ‘her’ dogs for long walks and today she took Shadow for one short walk and then a longer walk to go to Main Street downtown and back. He was one happy doggy after limping along with me and my knee and back issues this summer. I went part of the way on the longer walk but when my knee and back reached their limits, I sat on a park bench and waited for Lynne and Shadow to return. Lynne will be here until Friday morning. We have no specific plans other than a sail aboard L’Escargot with Bruce and Jane Woodin on Tuesday afternoon. We just want to spend a low-key week together, but who knows where our week will really lead us.