I have been home and mostly silent online after my “decompression lamenectomy” surgery at United Hospital in St Paul. This will allow me to walk more than 10 minutes without pain, which had become increasingly, very gradually, disabling for many years.
I am recovering on schedule and the 29 staples will be removed tomorrow.

The most stunning part of the whole thing was being held in such love by my family. Bob on guard all the time, Todd and Ann Marie arrived to make the hospital journey with me and stand by to wait with Bob to greet me back on the other side. Daughter Cully came the day I was discharged and was an angel at home– keeping track of meds, encouraging my walking and moving as prescribed, laundry, changing sheets, etc. thank you to all of them. And thank you too, to all my friends who sent cards and called –even a vivid lively bouquet from the library friends. Pilamaya for prayers from my “hunka” Lakota family. And thank you, of course, to my talented and intuitive surgeon, Margaret Wallenfreidman, and her team at the hospital.

Bob and I are sticking with our weight loss regime (me 33 pounds, Bob 20 pounds) and that, with the surgery for me means : hiking! dancing! gardening, more stamina, able to stand for lengths of time, more possibilities for more vigorous travel.

Bob and I say how fortunate we are… now there will be more time and energy and ability to further our work to help those less fortunate — and with Obamacare (Obama Cares!) the excellent medical help I received should be available to more people.

We are one big family, as the Lakota people taught me. We are all connected.
If you have time, you might listen to my favorite illustration of this… always lifts my heart. (this is for the scientists too!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGK84Poeynk  (copy and paste into your browser)

Two violent storms put one of our trees down — the edge of the woods, no worries, but our neighbor lost half of a huge Hackberry tree in their yard that fell on the street. I heard a chainsaw going and looked out in the dusk (longest day of the year) and saw another neighbor who has a tree service (Northern Arborists) and his son working in the dark with his truck lights on the scene. They cut enough to clear a lane in the street. Bryan and Jodi were at their lake house and Bob called them to give them the news. Turns out Jodi had a premonition — driving up to the lake on Friday she told Bryan, “I am really worried about that tree.” They will have to take the other half down too. We were guessing at least 200 years old.

Our tree, not so bad.

Saguaro National Park by Dave Procniack from the New Century Artist’s show at the library. Loved this one and Bob gave it to me for my birthday. Indeed, we are planning a southwest getaway next winter… six weeks in Las Vegas close to two of Bob’s children and their families; and for me, four hours to LA and Cully’s family. This winter was a big bummer for both of us. (Even though Bob insists he likes winter.) We can take George, have rented a house (Vacation Rental by Owner) and suddenly the long winter doesn’t seem so daunting. 

I have missed the southwest…We have seen this park thanks to Bob’s friend Michael in Tucson who asked us to visit a couple of years ago. We will stop in Santa Fe on the way to Las Vegas or back to visit friends and family — and even Las Vegas itself (bizzaro place that it is) is close to wilderness areas and more desert.

This is George, now holding down the fort after Rosie’s death. After she died we found out a bunch of new stuff about George. For example he does not bark. He is a quiet dog…apparently Rosie was doing all the barking. He will bark, but only if you are petting him, and stop. He will also give a little wuff if he wants to come in and you haven’t noticed him waiting at the door.

 
He just got his bi-annual grooming and we may have lost the equivalent of another dog in the fur left behind… one time when we picked him up the groomer said, “There is enough for a whole other dog back there.” He looks wonderful, although Bob says sometimes he comes back with “girly feet.” But we do not say that too loudly. George is a sensitive, gentle giant — most of his parts are unknown — but the DNA people said small parts of husky, cocker spaniel and Borzoi…he is 110 pounds and 10 years old. I got him at the shelter in Sauk County, Wisconsin. He had been a stray and looked like he had been out there for awhile, it was winter and his coat was enormous. The dog psychic we took our dogs to said George knows how lucky he is, that some dogs do not seem to know their fate, but George will always be grateful. She also said he is a bit of a “Romeo” — and this is true — he likes the ladies, and will look deeply into your eyes with his big brown ones.

 
He missed Rosie for awhile, was sort of down and subdued, but like the two of us he seems fine now. We are adjusted, except for the quiet — I told Bob, “It is almost like we don’t have a dog.”

Once again we are enjoying a number of St Paul Saints baseball games. (Thanks to Todd and Ann Marie Christmas gift) I enjoy watching baseball, but not nearly as much as Bob does. But I love the silly stuff and the people watching.. here are some choice photos.

Muddona — the mascot

The nerd

all kinds….

Family friendly…

The drag queens drag the field after the fifth inning….

Seigo Masabuchi, Japanese Karaoke singer

(never have been able to figure out that outfit.. some kind of half skirt affair???)

favorite player, Ole Sheldon, with his odd batter’s stance… played for years everywhere.

Now it seems he is here mostly for fun, I will have to look up that story again.

Only In Minnesota — Ole — that’s really his name.

Undoubtedly the oddest ones — notice the joking girls behind us — they got a giggle out of being in my self portrait.

There was a huge article about our continuing success (and some controversy) with Lake Elmo Public Library. Link is below.

I have resigned from the board in the wake of scheduling some spinal surgery (June 24) –I need to step back and let others take on the major tasks and decisions. The board is in the process of hiring a librarian which will help all the volunteer work loads immensely. I am so proud of what we have accomplished. I still take a shift running the circulation desk on Saturdays and will continue with my favorite things such as the free coffee service, helping patrons, flowers out in front, etc.(Bob continues his position on the “facilities” committee – he has fixed and built and remodeled and who knows what all, assisting the “chief architect,” Steve DeLapp (former architect with 3M and president of the library board).

It is nice not feeling so responsible and, unlike the nay sayer in the article, I believe the library is now well established and our levy, that we MUST spend for library services, is plenty to keep it going.

Through all this I have come to know, for me, the key to happy retirement and aging is to find something to do that feeds a passion (books in this case) and also to be of service to others, while resisting getting caught up doing things that are not my path.

http://www.startribune.com/local/east/208003341.html

Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost,
And for a breath of ecstacy
Give all you have been, or could be. –
~ Emily Dickenson

The bees at their favorite birdbath for water — we think they like the little grooves –less chance of drowning

The barn swallows are back in the garage — two eggs so far …. Bob didn’t want to keep them out which we could have done by keeping the door closed…. I guess I like them too, right there where we can see them but also right over the door into the house 🙄

Bob mowed the prairie since we were unable to get a permit to burn — Justin from Prairie Restorations said the DNR was busy with the fires up north… so we cut it short (bad idea) since it then left piles of hay (with nice prairie seeds in it, though) — but Bob, the farmer, worried it would smother the little plants growing up so he harvested and took it to the upper meadow.

Cully sent me this poem — so good.

A Dog Has Died

BY PABLO NERUDA
Translated by Alfred Yankauer

My dog has died.
I buried him in the garden
next to a rusted old machine.

Some day I’ll join him right there,
but now he’s gone with his shaggy coat,
his bad manners and his cold nose,
and I, the materialist, who never believed
in any promised heaven in the sky
for any human being,
I believe in a heaven I’ll never enter.
Yes, I believe in a heaven for all dogdom
where my dog waits for my arrival
waving his fan-like tail in friendship.

Ai, I’ll not speak of sadness here on earth,
of having lost a companion
who was never servile.
His friendship for me, like that of a porcupine
withholding its authority,
was the friendship of a star, aloof,
with no more intimacy than was called for,
with no exaggerations:
he never climbed all over my clothes
filling me full of his hair or his mange,
he never rubbed up against my knee
like other dogs obsessed with sex.

No, my dog used to gaze at me,
paying me the attention I need,
the attention required
to make a vain person like me understand
that, being a dog, he was wasting time,
but, with those eyes so much purer than mine,
he’d keep on gazing at me
with a look that reserved for me alone
all his sweet and shaggy life,
always near me, never troubling me,
and asking nothing.

Ai, how many times have I envied his tail
as we walked together on the shores of the sea
in the lonely winter of Isla Negra
where the wintering birds filled the sky
and my hairy dog was jumping about
full of the voltage of the sea’s movement:
my wandering dog, sniffing away
with his golden tail held high,
face to face with the ocean’s spray.

Joyful, joyful, joyful,
as only dogs know how to be happy
with only the autonomy
of their shameless spirit.

There are no good-byes for my dog who has died,
and we don’t now and never did lie to each other.

So now he’s gone and I buried him,
and that’s all there is to it.