2021 Life Logs, Day 273: Happy Birthday, Heather
Date: Thursday, September 30, 2021
Weather: Sunny and Cool; High Temp 62, Low Temp 46 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

Happy B-day to my Busy, Beautiful, Brilliant first Born! At the end of a very busy day for all of us, I went over to Heather and Jed’s for a birthday dinner and celebration for Heather. It was almost 7:30 pm when I got there and only Sam was at home. Jed arrived shortly with Jonah, coming from Jonah’s soccer practice at Cape Cod Academy which is about 45 minutes away. Then Heather arrived with Ollie. They had been to a violin lesson after school, then went directly to soccer practice, and from there to a 6:30 to 7:30 pm first elementary school band ‘practice’ where Ollie had his first lesson on his saxophone. And I had been on a Newcomers field trip to the Cape Cod Museum of Art today. Whew! It really was a busy day for all. So, instead of a fancy dinner, the boys decided that the perfect birthday dinner was take-out from Moto pizza which included fancy donuts from a new place in Mashpee Commons instead of a cake. It was a fun alternative to the usual fancy birthday dinners we have. After dinner Heather opened her presents. She loved the blown glass conch shell the boys picked out for her at the Sandwich Glass Factory this summer. There were many other gifts to open and then Sam challenged his mom to computer karaoke contest. Heather definitely got the highest score. Happy Birthday, Heather,

The Cape Cod Museum of Art is in Dennis here on the Cape. I had never been there, so I was excited to join the Newcomers field trip on this excursion. T
he trip was planned by friend Jane Woodin and it was a wonderful day. The museum is small but the sculpture garden surrounding the building and the exhibits inside were so engaging. We started by watching a film about the history of the museum which was fascinating. We then had a guided tour of the exhibits. If you live on Cape Cod and have not been there for the “cARTography” exhibition, I recommend you put it on your weekend schedule. It ends on this Sunday, October 3, and I am so glad I got to see it. It is a mix of historic maps of Cape Cod dating back as far as the 1600’s. These maps portray the traditional viewpoints represented by European mapping. The accompanying exhibits, however, add the perspectives of history that have been left out of traditional education. Artist and National Seashore cartographer Mark Adams depicts the landscape the native people of this area encountered through “Geologic, Native, and Historical Time.” A map on the gallery floor shows the landform and sea levels of about 11,000 years ago. This is paired with a display called “Our Story: 400 Years of Wampanoag History.” The Wampanoag have lived in southeastern Massachusetts for more than 12,000 years. They are the tribe that first encountered by the Pilgrims who sailed here on the Mayflower. The Wampanoag side of the story is told in this exhibit through short video clips that you can watch at your own pace. The entire display is captivating and very moving. If you haven’t seen it, make time in the next three days to get there. It is well worth it.

2021 Life Logs, Day 272: Walking, Walking
Date: Wednesday, September 29, 2021
Weather: Mostly Sunny, Cooler with N Winds; High Temp 64, Low Temp 49 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

It was a beautiful day for walking, and I certainly took advantage of that. This morning I walked with a woman that I met back in 2017 when I first started going to classes at the Anytime Fitness gym. I continued to see her in classes for the next year and a half. Then the classes ended, Covid arrived, and I haven’t seen her since . . . until a couple of weeks ago at the Farmer’s Market. I saw Kate there and we agreed to get together to become better acquainted. Our first foray was today. We walked in the cranberry bogs for an hour and a half. We have a lot in common and enjoy each other’s company, so we are planning to walk again next week. I didn’t take Shadow with me today, but I will next week. He has had a bit of an upset tummy for the past two days, so I chose to leave him at home.

By the time I got home, had lunch, and then took Shadow for his walk, it was almost time to go pick up Ollie after school. It was a day when Heather and Jed both had commitments, so I volunteered to pick him up. We stayed an extra hour so he could play with friends on the playground. By the time I got him home, it was time to go pick up Sam from soccer practice. Jed left to pick him up but then called to say the traffic was crazy and he was not going to get back in time to go with Heather to a ‘Meet the Teacher’ appointment at Ollie’s school. I was backing out of the driveway to head home when he called and volunteered to go get Sam. Since all three boys are in new schools this year, Heather and Jed both want to go to the introductory meetings with teachers. Two working parents with three active kids need all the help they can get. Heather and Jed are both active in community activities as well as having full-time jobs and all three boys have school, soccer, music lessons, and Scouts. It is a lot and since I certainly have more free time than they do, I love helping out when I can.

BTW, when I took Shadow for his walk it was evident that he was much better, so we had a nice long walk. I cannot pinpoint what happened to cause his tummy upset, but thankfully he is better now.

2021 Life Logs, Day 271: Back to The Voyage of Windbird
Date: Tuesday, September 28, 2021
Weather: Cloudy with PM Thunderstorms; High Temp 73, Low Temp 55 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

In June, as summer activities kicked into gear, I put away my book writing project. The Voyage of Windbird book project spent the summer in a bag. This morning, I unzipped the bag and extracted the unedited ‘almost’ completed first sixteen chapters. It took all morning to get back into the project, but at least I assessed what had been done and formulated a plan. My first task is to go back and edit what I have already written. A friend has read and made editing suggestions on paper. I will start by reviewing those suggested changes and making them official on the electronic copy of each chapter. Then I need to complete chapter 16 and write chapters 17 and 18. That will complete year one of the voyage, Volume 1. I am hoping to get that done before Christmas. I can then start the new year by writing about the middle years of the voyage, Volume 11. The last year of the Voyage of Windbird and beyond and will become Volume III. That takes me into 2023. I think this project is going to take as many years to complete as it did to actually circumnavigate the globe. I’ll just keep chipping away.

This was an early release day for all grades in the Falmouth School District. I picked up Jonah and Ollie and headed home to check in with Sam. The weather and homework interfered with our plans, but I did get to take Jonah and Ollie to the Morse Pond soccer field to practice goal shots. Jonah has just been designated the person on his Steel United team to kick penalty goals, so he wanted to practice before going to official whole team practice later in the afternoon. Then the weather interfered. Sam’s high school soccer game and Jonah’s official soccer practice were both cancelled due to thunderstorms that brought torrents of rain. By the time I got home, the rain had subsided enough for me to take Shadow on a walk and then come inside and catch up on emails that needed to be written.

Tomorrow is supposed to be rain-free. I hope to go for a long walk on the bogs with a friend in the morning and spend the afternoon catching up on some household chores. Thursday I go on a Newcomers field trip to the Cape Cod Museum of Art. Time flies when you’re having fun.

2021 Life Logs, Day 270: Visit with the Aunties; Canning Tomatoes Again
Date: Monday, September 27, 2021
Weather: Sunny; High Temp 73, Low Temp 66 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

Karen Baranowski and I drove to Scituate this morning to visit with her ‘aunties’ who are my next door neighbors for part of each year. Her Aunt Doris turns 103 next Monday. The aunties are not living next door to me this summer as Doris had a stroke in July and had to be moved back to her home in Scituate. Her sister Shirley, whose home is next door to me and who is my landlord, is staying with Doris. I made applesauce from apples from Shirley’s apple tree and wanted to take that to her. It is an old tree and the apples are not beautiful, but they make great applesauce. I also made broccoli potato soup and chicken salad for lunch. Karen added zucchini bread. Doris could not come downstairs to have lunch with us, but her son and daughter-in-law from Alabama joined us. I enjoyed meeting them and spending time with Shirley.

Once home, I walked and played ball with Shadow and then launched into cooking the last batch of tomato sauce for this summer. It is in the canner jiggling away as I write this. The applesauce was so good that I plan to salvage as many apples as possible tomorrow morning and make another batch of sauce. Then at noon I pick up the boys from school as it is an early release day. Plans are up in the air as the forecast calls for rain. If it is not raining, Sam wants to cut the grass next door at Shirley’s and Jonah wants to practice goal kicks at the school across the road from their neighborhood. It will take a bit of juggling to do both, but we’ll figure it out.

2021 Life Logs, Day 269: Soccer, Laundry, Cooking
Date: Sunday, September 26, 2021
Weather: Rain and Early AM, Clearing Late AM; High Temp 74, Low Temp 67 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

We had heavy rain overnight, but it was only raining lightly by early morning. The first word was that Jonah’s soccer game was cancelled, but a bit later Heather sent another text saying it was back on but in a different location. It was a good game but ended with a dramatic touch. Jonah was racing down the field with the ball far ahead of all the other players when the referee blew the whistle. Jonah’s arms flew out asking why. All he wanted to do was to get that ball in the goal. There might have been a foul, but I think it was just the signal for the end of the game. Disappointing for Jonah, but his team did win.

After attending Jonah’s late morning soccer game, the rest of my day was spent doing laundry and cooking. Not an exciting day, but it was productive. And tonight, I talked to Lynne Kirwin in New Zealand to catch up on what is happening in her life there. It was great to catch up. But now it is late and I am off in the morning to visit with the ‘aunties’ who are currently living in Doris’ home in Scituate. I am going to end here and get to bed.

2021 Life Logs, Day 268: Soccer, Wampanoag Celebration, Kid Sitting
Date: Saturday, September 25, 2021
Weather: Mostly Cloudy with Some Rain; High Temp 71, Low Temp 62 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

I need to start with a correction to last night’s log. In the first paragraph I announced that Jonah’s PCR test came back positive and I meant to say negative. He does NOT have Covid.

Ollie played in his first soccer game of the fall season this morning. He missed the first game last Saturday as he was camping with his Scout troop, but he made up for it today by playing a great game.
He switched back and forth between being goalie and center forward and gave his best effort in both positions. His team won and he scored the last goal of the game. He was a happy kiddo.

After the soccer game, we went to Heather and Jed’s to regroup. Heather and Jed were going to meet friends at my house and go kayaking for the afternoon while Sam, Jonah, Ollie, and I were going to Highfield Hall for a Wampanoag Celebration and then come home for an afternoon of play. The threat of rain was constant, but up to this point in the day we had just had a few sprinkles here and there. So, on we went. We grabbed a lunch for Jonah as he was not anxious to try any of the Native American food being served at the celebration, but Sam loved the venison stew served over roasted potatoes and Ollie loved the Quahog chowder. I ate a little of both and found both to be delicious. Jonah and Ollie made ring and stick toys that all three boys enjoyed. Then Jonah and Ollie decided they each wanted to make a Quahog shell pendant necklace. Quahog is the Native American name for a hard-shelled clam. The boys had to sand the edges of the shell they chose by wetting it with water and rubbing it on a rock. No sandpaper. Then they had to drill a hole in the shell with a stick and string drill. Jonah commented that he was sure glad we have electric drills these days. The process took a while, but both boys were proud of the necklaces.

All too soon it was time to get home as Jonah and Sam both had friends coming over for an afternoon playdate. We left Highfield just in time as it started to rain as we got in the car to leave. It rained off and on for the remainder of the afternoon, but just enough at one time to barely keep things outdoors a bit wet. Heather reported that they didn’t have rain on their kayak adventure or maybe they were having so much fun they didn’t notice. They had a wonderful time and while paddling in a hidden cove, they discovered a Great Blue Heron hide out. There were about a half dozen herons and some of them were roosting in a tree. Not a sight you see just every day.

2021 Life Logs, Day 267: Good News, Good News, Good News
Date: Friday, September 24, 2021
Weather: Mostly Cloudy, Some Sun, Some Rain; High Temp 76, Low Temp 62 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

Good news all around. Jonah’s PCR test came back positive, so he does not have Covid. The rapid test was just a false positive. Sam’s blood test results came back showing he does not have Lyme disease. And I heard from Justin this morning and he was so excited that they now have reliable electricity. Yay! Yay! And Yay! Heather invited me over for dinner for an end of a tough week collective exhale. Ahhhhhhhhh. And this is only the second week of school. It is inevitable that there are going to be more Covid exposures, so I guess we just have to get used to yet another new norm.

The news about electricity at Finca Maravilla was another piece of wonderful news. Even before Hurricane Maria in September of 2017, Justin and Jo didn’t have totally reliable electricity. But since Maria, it has been a constant uphill battle. First, they had no electricity at all for months. Then when the electricity was restored to the homes in their area, they still did not have full service. Eventually it was determined that there was a problem between the road and their home. Finally, in the last two weeks, that problem has been found and there is now enough light to read by at night and to run two major appliances at one time. As Justin said, “Welcome back to the ‘first’ world.”

2021 Life Logs, Day 266: Covid Frustrations
Date: Thursday, September 23, 2021
Weather: Mostly Cloudy; High Temp 77, Low Temp 70 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

I waited all day to hear the results of Sam’s blood test that will determine whether or not he has Lyme disease. But when I got the call from Heather, it was not about Sam’s blood test. It was about the Covid positive result from Jonah’s Covid rapid test. The home rapid test says he has Covid, but that led to a PCR test. We will not know the result of that until tomorrow sometime. In the meantime, we are all waiting and hoping that the rapid test gave a false positive. Heather and Jed are scrambling to figure out how to deal with this. Since Jonah was exposed at school on Monday, Ollie has moved out of their shared bedroom to sleep downstairs. They thought about moving Ollie, who is too young to be vaccinated, outside to sleep in a tent tonight. But after going and back and forth, they are just going to continue their current protocols, masking in the house, eating outside, and distancing as much as possible, until they get the conclusive report tomorrow. They also had to decide whether to send Ollie and Sam to school tomorrow. School policy allows that but neither boy feels right about going to school and possibly infecting more people. All three boys are scared, but especially Jonah. And as Heather said, what parent is not going to hug their crying child who just got a positive Covid test. Oh, the frustrations of this pandemic for parents (and grandparents). Jonah has been vaccinated, so if he does have Covid, we can only hope it will be a mild case and that no one else in the family will get it.

On a happier note, I met Jane Woodin for lunch in the outside courtyard at the Senior Center and then we went to the beach for the afternoon. There was not a lot of sunshine and it was windy, but it was warm and beautiful. Very relaxing. And again, no gardening. Maybe tomorrow.

2021 Life Logs, Day 265: It’s Officially Fall
Date: Wednesday, September 22, 2021
Weather: Mix of Sun and Clouds; High Temp 76, Low Temp 68 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

Tweet from the National Weather Service: “It’s officially Fall!!! The Fall/Autumnal Equinox was today at 3:20pm EDT. This marks the time when the day-to-night line, called the terminator, is perfectly vertical from pole to pole and the sun is directly over the equator.” There you have it. Now we just have to wait for Winter Solstice for the days to begin getting longer once again.

My celebration of the equinox began with a walk in the woods with my friend Olga and Shadow. Then mid-afternoon, I tuned into a Woodwell Climate Research Center webinar entitled “Internalizing risk: What 1.5 degrees C (and beyond) looks like.” I found each of the four panel members engaging and the moderator was fabulous. (Disclosure—The moderator was my daughter Heather, and I am definitely not biased.) Seriously, I learned so much. Alison Smart from Probable Futures shared their world map that depicts temperature rises that are predicted if the average world temperature rises 1.5 degrees C or more. The hope is that planners can use this tool to make informed decisions. A woman named Wendy Cromwell from Wellington Management talked about how her company is partnering with Woodwell to learn more about climate change and are then using this information to help the financial world to make sustainable investments. Helen Adams, head of Science Engagement for COP26 (Conference of the Parties), helped us look forward to the next major UN climate change conference. The meeting in November of this year will be the 26th meeting of this group of nations, thus called COP26. The final member of the panel was Christopher Schwalm, Risk Program Director at Woodwell. The next webinar takes place in two weeks on October 6 and is entitled, “Tipping Points: Is There a Point of No Return?” If you are interested, you can go to Woodwellclimate.org to learn more.

Staying in the learning mode, tonight I tuned into another Zoom sponsored by libraries across the state in collaboration with the Library of Congress and the National Book Festival 2021. This included a recorded video of an interview with Isabel Wilkerson discussing her book, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. The following conversation was facilitated by civil rights advocate Byron Rushing and Professor Roopika Risam. I was so glad I participated in this. I am not quite finished reading the book, but I am hoping to find a local group that would like to get together to have our own conversation about this book.

In between all of this, I did a little bit of gardening. Little bit by little bit, I’ll get it done. But I am taking tomorrow off and going to the beach!

2021 Life Logs, Day 264: Scattered
Date: Tuesday, September 21, 2021
Weather: Another Beautiful Day; High Temp 75, Low Temp 66 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA

Today was supposed to be all about gardening, and gardening did get done, but the day ended up a bit scattered. Not that scattered is bad, but the amount of gardening that needed to be done is still on the ‘to do’ list. A member of my book club named Lori, along with her husband John, came over as planned at 10:30 am. We spent almost two hours picking each other’s brain to get at our best tips for gardening. I think Lori has always grown perennials in her yard, but John started vegetable gardening in retirement and is full of enthusiasm. I saw the beginnings of John’s raised beds in April at one of our book club meetings, but now I want to return to see the end result of this summer’s bounty. It is great to find people who have the same interest in gardening that I do, and I look forward to more sharing.

After Lori and John left, I ate lunch and then Shadow and I went outside where I worked on cleaning up the raised beds while Shadow watched. I had hoped to get all three beds cleaned out and ready for fall planting. I did send a text to Heather offering to take Jonah to soccer practice if needed. The message that I got back was not that they needed me to take Jonah to soccer practice, but rather that he would probably not be going because they had been contacted to tell them that he had been exposed to someone with Covid today at school. So now they are dealing with trying to get to the cause of Sam’s ankle problem and figuring out how to deal with Jonah’s exposure. Plus yesterday at recess and split his ‘. Then he hit his lip on his bike handlebars today and resplit it. It is so swollen he can’t eat. Ugh. Nothing I can do about that, however, or about Sam’s ankle, but it did bring up the fact that none of us had purchased any Covid rapid tests. And as I read in the New York Times yesterday, there are very few rapid tests available for purchase in the whole country. I dropped gardening and started a hunt for rapid tests which took the rest of the afternoon. But I was successful in finding 6 test kits. There were none available in Falmouth or Hyannis, at least not that I could find, but I did find the 6 in Mashpee. When I got home, I talked to my sister in North Carolina and found that two people in her assisted living facility have Covid and she is in lockdown. Plus, my nephew’s wife found out today that she has Covid and other family members have been exposed. All have been vaccinated, but the Delta variant doesn’t seem to care. I am so disappointed that we are back to this point again.

When I got home from my Covid rapid test search, I took Shadow for his long walk of the day, fixed dinner, and watched a Woods Hole Oceanographic (WHOI) webinar on the ocean twilight zone and the role it plays in climate change. It was a great conversation. Something the President of WHOI, Peter de Menocal said really stuck with me. “Science isn’t completed until it is communicated.” And tonight the panel did a great job of communicating the importance of the ocean in each of our lives. It was pointed out that this is UN Climate Week, and we got to see some of the light show being projected on the UN building each night this week. A deep-sea luminescent creature from the twilight zone called a siphonophore is a crucial agent of carbon removal from the atmosphere. Its beautiful dance is what is being projected. Really beautiful.

Last, but not least, I labeled each of the jars of marinara sauce that are now ready to be delivered to Heather and Jed’s. Like I said, it was a scattered day from new gardening friends to tomatoes to Covid issues to siphonophores.