Cooking the NYTimes and Other Assorted Retirement Activities

This is a post about gratitude.  Unconditional, unmeasured, unfettered gratitude. I am grateful I continue to have agency over my own life--and all that entails. I am grateful for the gift of a loving and good humored Spousal Unit ™  with whom I share my Ground Hog's Day life.  In the midst of the maelstrom, he continues to be one of the nicest people I know. I am grateful for every last dab of family, who frequently poke their heads up like the Meercats in Meercat Manor to check in with their fellow members of the bloodlines.  In that vein, I am grateful for friends who do the same. I am more grateful than words can express for my grandchildren.  Not that I don't hold deep gratitude for my children, their parents, without whom I would not know the unbearable joy of being a grandmother,  However, the love I continue to harbor in my heart and secure in my soul for my children may have been multiplied, then surpassed by the love I have for my grandchildren....

  Words have power . Their meaning crystallizes perceptions that shape our beliefs, drive our behavior, and ultimately, create our world. Their  power  arises from our emotional responses when we read, speak, or hear them. --found on The Google Upon reading this, you may be saying, "Thank you, Captain Obvious.  OF COURSE words have power.  Have you been living under a rock the past four years?" Sometimes I wish.   Like so many, my frustrations and anxieties lie not solely in awaiting election results.  My biggest wonder from the election of Donald J. Trump--how did we as a country get to this place and what was my role in this descendancy--has been on its own personal journey.  For the main, I'm admitting to having lost significant faith in my fellow man and my country, absolutely in the Republican party.  Hope has been a commodity in short supply.  During the run up to the election, I listened religiously to podcasts from Pod Save Ameri...

  Yesterday, for the first time, I served as an election judge.  It was a humbling experience, such an easy way to serve your community, and I highly recommend it. Arriving at 6 am, an hour before the polls opened in Minnesota, my fellow judges and I were sworn in:     I, __________,  solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will perform the duties of election judge according to law and the best of my ability and will diligently endeavor to prevent fraud, deceit and abuse in conducting this election. I will perform my duties in a fair and impartial manner and not attempt to create an advantage for my party or for any candidate. That truly set the tone for the day. Here's what I saw: Some of the election judges were veterans, one having served over twenty years.  Others, like me, were newbies.  We had two student volunteers whose enthusiasm for this democratic process was palpable.  Everyone took their oath very seriously.  They were kind and welcomi...