Going Back to Ohio, Cincinnati Spring

Hall Family in Cincinnati

Going Back to Ohio

Just like Chrissie Hynde, this week I went back to Ohio (and my city was gone!) We went to visit my and Glenn’s family, and it was really nice to be together with family and old friends and neighbors, and check in my dad and mom. Also great to spend time wit nieces and nephews, who I don’t get to see often enough. Cincinnati—and our old neighborhoods—had changed a lot, and also felt both familiar and a little sad. Some parts had built up, and others had been left to decay.

Brother Mike, my mom and me, after flying in late together

And I forget how much I take the beauty of being on a coastline with mountains, oceans, rainforests, islands compared to the flat and somewhat tepid landscape of Ohio. Also, when we were flying over the state, the Ohio river looks like a sickly green snake—it had an odd color, probably because of agricultural runoff and recent flooding? Pollution problems are real. I am so sad Trump is rolling back so many environmental protections places like this really need.

This was the longest trip I’d taken on a plane since several years before the pandemic, and I was admittedly nervous with all the news about airports and the TSA, but everything went pretty smoothly at SeaTac (except my legs getting bruised—using their wheelchair help through the airport is a necessary evil because sometimes people don’t see you (or pretend not to see you) and wham you with their big luggage or hockey sticks or their legs.) The Delta 737-800’s luggage overhead compartment was duct-taped shut, and the seats were wildly uncomfortable (note for people who have not flown on one of these before). The people sitting by us were rude. I was like, flying, right?

Me with Glenn’s family – The Gaileys

Visiting with our families—and the friends that stopped by – made the stress of the flight all worth it, though. One thing that struck me is how the “kids”—my brothers’ and brother-in-laws kids—all had these amazing personalities, and were so different, and all of them so tall!  Just spending talking and catching up was great. We are dealing with some sad health realities which made the visit a necessity, but the blessing part—where you remember how much you really like and appreciate your family members, how much fun you had together, not having to be “on” all the time because everyone has known you forever.

Me, dad, mom, Chuck and Mike

I love Seattle and look forward to being back home, but I do regret how far apart I live from my far-flung family. (I never regret moving away from Ohio, but I do miss my loved ones there.) On the other hand, I’m getting a permanent new family resident out here in two weeks—my nephew Dustin! Expect pics soon.

Common Blue Jay (still pretty though!)

Cincinnati Spring

The other fun thing I did was hang out with my mom, who has an amazing bird collection because she feeds so many birds, and play with our Merlin app and try to take pictures of elusive birds. We saw rare-to-Cinci birds but also cardinals (which I miss)—and several deer and hawks. I also was able to acquire a rare old edition of Louisa May Alcott short stories for my mom—she’s a big Alcott fan but like Daphne du Maurier, didn’t know just how many short stories she had published during her life. (I also got a rare edition for myself,

I can’t lie.)

The weather except for the first day was wonderfully mild, with temps in the sixties and seventies, and rows of my mom’s daffodils and hyacinths were blooming, and we even saw a few cherry trees in bloom (nothing like Seattle, of course, but not nothing). April will be here soon, with its celebrations and tulip festivals and generally increasingly cheerful weather. With MS (and a fractured immune system), travel may always be a hardship—and I will need a few days to rest and recover—but this trip seemed like it was worth the effort.

Wishing you as good a spring as possible…

First Day of Spring, Hawks and Cherry Blossoms, April Rituals: Poetry Month and Birthdays

First Day of Spring, Hawks and Cherry Blossoms, and Feeling the Changes

This week was filled with medical appointments for Glenn and I—we’ve both been devilled by various (minor but annoying) health problems, because we’re too busy to have them right now, as is always the case. We’re finishing up our taxes and trying to navigate the proper paperwork for a flight these days with the TSA issues, etc.

Me in the shadow of a cherry tree

On the plus side, we got a break between appointments—and in the rain—long enough to spot a few cherry blossoms, hawks, and other signs of spring. It was nice to walk around a bit—even when it just hit 50°F, though the rest of the West is roasting hot—and get some fresh air. I think as a writer we feel the change in the seasons with our bodies and minds—for instance, I write more in spring, always have, and read (and watch movies) more in winter. We stretch and move more, we start opening windows and shaking the dust out of our metaphorical houses, we are friendlier (this is definitely true around Seattle—people are just nicer in the sunshine!)

Cat packed!

Going Back to Ohio

We’re getting ready to visit Ohio to see family. You can see Sylvia is anxious to join us! It’s a short trip but the longest distance I’ve travelled since Covid, believe it or not. I’m nervous because I usually get sick travelling to the Midwest—air quality? local allergens? I just generally don’t respond well to Ohio? But I am looking forward to spending important time with family, many of whom we don’t see often enough. I just wish that instead of airport hassles with the TSA and wheelchairs, I could just teleport.

Spring Rituals: What Makes You Happy?

Here in Seattle, though so far it’s been cold, I love to see the cherry blossoms and daffodils that are the first heralds of spring. Also, more birds popping up. I’m hoping I can make it back up to Skagit Valley some time in April though my schedule is packed with book clubs, the Poetry night at J. Bookwalter’s restarting with a feature with Kelli Russell Agodon and her delightful new book from Copper Canyon, Accidental Devotions, and more medical appointments that tend to come around in my birthday month for some reason. (Does this happen to you too?)

I really like celebrating National Poetry Month—it’s nice for the world (and myself) to put a little more attention on this mostly neglected art form. Do you look forward to cooking something in spring? I love the influx of fresh peas and asparagus, and I love the rituals of Palm Sunday and Easter, which always feels like a celebration of chocolate and pastels (even if you’re not particularly religious). The myths of rebirth are generally hopeful, aren’t they? April is also my birthday month—and though I am getting older, I am thankful that I am still here, even for the hard parts. I am trying to adjust to 1) surviving ’til I was 50 and 2) realizing I am, if you’ll forgive a pun, no longer a spring chicken. I am adjusting to the shift into elder mode—along with losing so many friends and family, which seems like a part of aging. I am actually physically in better shape and in less pain than I was ten years ago—food allergies sorted, out of my wheelchair thanks to my MS diagnosis and subsequent physical therapy focusing on balance, and better able to appreciate the smaller joys of life.

I hope you make something special to welcome the season—even something as simple as a salad or a new mocktail—and look up some new (to you) poetry.

Surprise Snow, Aimee Mann and Daffodils in Mt Vernon, and Social Media Musings

Snow on pink hyacinth, my garden

Surprise Snow, Wind, and Sun

This has been a week for Seattle weather—we had a pretty powerful windstorm, which was predicted, and the next day we woke up to an unexpected snowstorm—not at all predicted—that grounded planes, knocked out power, and made it very hard to get out of the house for most people. Snow here—especially in March – is not common. It was also Friday the 13th. (Insert Twilight Zone music here.)

Glenn and I with forsythia and cherry blossoms, La Conner

Aimee Mann and Daffodils

The next day we woke up to more unexpected snow. We packed the car for a day trip up to Mt Vernon to see an Aimee Mann concert (we had bought tickets months before, so we decided to take a chance and go.)

Just as we left, the sun came out. We decided to take some time to visit the earliest blooms—some of them still holding on to a little snow. We also saw Trumpeter swans, several pairs of bald eagles, and a few seals. It was still chilly—in the forties—but the sun was a like a promise of better things to come.

The sunshine and activity helped my MS symptoms feel better—after being stuck in the house for a while with illness and bad weather—and the concert itself—a celebration of her Lost in Space album—was super fun—someone even gave me a free VIP tote that included a signed album, a comic book by Aimee Mann, and some other swag. Kindness of strangers. Glenn bought me a t-shirt! The last time I had a concert t-shirt was…a while ago. It was a lot of fun. And Aimee Mann being 65 is such an inspiration—an indie musician still doing her thing,

Social Media Musings

I started an interesting conversation on Facebook about social media—its value to us as writers, in selling books, in maintaining connections to others, or not.

Facebook, Twitter, Blue Sky, Instagram, TikTok, Substack…Which feel useful to you instead of like distractions, or worse, something that makes you feel worse, that drains you? I am contemplating this as I am trying to decide where to stay, which to cut, where to spend energy. As you can probably tell, I’ve been blogging for a long time, and I don’t really want to stop now. This is where I feel most comfortable.

I was thinking about how I follow writers, artists and musicians—like I learned about the Aimee Mann concert from a post of hers on Instagram and the last piece of art I got I learned about from an artist’s Instagram post as well. I hear about books from my writer friends mostly on Facebook—but books from authors I don’t know—it’s harder to pin down where I hear about them. The next time I have a new book, I’m not even sure what social media network will be working, not run by a supervillain, or where writers and readers congregate. I do know that I keep in touch with friends and family on various platforms—even LinkedIn sometimes (yes, I do have an old profile there). It shouldn’t be hard to cancel one social media or another, but somehow, I just keep hanging in there, posting once in a while.

Time Changes and Winter Blues with Cherry Blossoms, Academic Women in Pop Culture: Vladmir

Early cherry blossoms

Time Changes and Winter Blues (with Cherry Blossoms and Hummingbirds)

Daylight Savings Time started with sideways rain and chillier than average temperatures here in Seattle. I spent the last few days sneezing and coughing, mostly in bed. I managed to write a couple of poems, send out the book a couple of times, and watch the Netflix series (based on the book) Vladmir. I always am interested in how pop culture portrays women of a certain age (i.e. my age) in academia, particularly English professors, for some reason. Vladmir focuses on a sexed-up married professor who develops feelings (ahem) for a younger colleague, and how that plays out. I posted on Facebook about one of the funnier lines, where the protagonist (never named) complains of having writer’s block for 15 years, saying “I’ve tried everything! The Artist’s Way, microdosing ketamine…” Skipping from the Julia Cameron classic creativity handbook straight to hard drugs? Well, that’s not how I have managed my writer’s block in the past, but to each their own. The series also ends on a cheerier note than the book (no spoilers on specifics), and the actor who plays Vladmir is not really my type (looks a little too much like J.D. Vance for me), but Rachel Weisz is pretty funny in the role. There is also a discussion of a classic of gothic romance (although it’s not really about romance, it’s about ghosts and power and murder and money…). Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier which the protagonist’s students complain is misogynist. I did Rebecca in my winery book club and everyone loved it, so maybe this is a misread of the youth. There is a repeated phrase in the show about the sexual harassment case being brought against the protagonist’s husband: “it was a different time,” and I wonder if that’s really true. I never ever wanted to sleep with any of my professors (in the early nineties and later in the early 2000’s), and though I saw some questionable behavior by male professors towards female students (which even when they are over 21, I think can be very damaging) I never thought, “Well, gee, let’s give that a pass.” I always thought it was gross. I was also very married as a grad student. Maybe that made a difference? Anyway, you can watch it for yourself and see what you think. (Another quibble is: the main character is mid-fifties, but the author is only 45. It’s a generational difference that I think made some things read…somewhat off?)

All this time in bed with bad weather also gave me some opportunities to birdwatch, though the lighting was not perfect, I got a few shots of a hummingbird on our hummingbird swing and an immature eagle circling the house (the same one I saw a month or so ago, I think).

Despite the misleading cherry blossoms at the top of the post, we’re supposed to have cold rain AND snow this week, so spring seems like a false hope at this point, a thing which will never arrive. Winter Blues are a real thing for me in November, February, and yes, March. I wish for some dry warm days to shake up my physical miseries (colds never seem to be made better by cold wet weather, I notice). I missed AWP and saw all the happy pics on Facebook and sighed to myself. I don’t go every year—I don’t have the means, as a non-academic, to do it, even if I wanted to. But the news has also been so miserable, the weather, the fact that we’re planning a trip home to visit a very sick family member…it’s hard to just snap back to my usual cheerful self. I wrote a few poems about how I felt about America. Will these poems change anything? Probably not, but sometimes you need to write them anyway. We’re also doing taxes, which will do little to cheer anyone up. Well, here’s something to make you laugh, at least—one of the best SNL commercial parodies I have ever seen. “Are you allergic to Otezla? You may be the key!”

What do you all do to cheer yourselves up this time of year, especially is winter is lingering to ruin your dreams of planting your garden or walking outside much? And what about you all that went to AWP—any new news you want to share with those of us who had to stay home?

Spring on the Way, Writing Through Hard Times

Early blooms of cherry, with nearly full moon

Spring on the Way

Well, like you, I woke up this morning to the news that Trump had, for some unknown reason (and without congressional approval) started a war with Iran. (Not than I’ve been a big fan of Iran’s hardline and repressive religious conservative government, but this move may put even worse people in charge, not to mention encourage more terrorism…I hope not.) Another reason to feel your country is out of control, in the hands of people too stupid to do their jobs? And didn’t Trump run on a “no foreign wars?” platform? And of course this rocks the stock market and boosts the price of gasoline. This is on top of skyrocketing inflation that Trump lied about not existing in his looong, meandering and completely false SOTU address.

But also, today, the sun was shining, some signs of spring, like these branches of cherry with the rising moon. Glenn and I went to the bookstore, walked on the water in Kirkland. I spent almost all day on Friday doing various tests for cancer in my thyroid, liver, testing my immune system problems, and it was tiring and discouraging, so I needed a whole day to recover before I could get out and about. One thing about chronic illness that people who are healthy may not know is the amount of time, energy and money is really takes. We had to prepay $500 for those tests, too, and we are not overflowing with money right now—which always makes me think about those who do NOT have good insurance. Are there always reasons for hope? Yes. Are there also days that feel like they drain all hope from you? Also yes.

Female Anna’s Hummingbird

Writing Through Hard Times

I have a few friends bringing out books soon, and they have told me how they struggle to continue to write, to even dare to post about their new books, or do readings, or any normal things.

I feel this pressure and anxiety as well—how do you write through the most stressful times I’ve ever experienced in my life? How relevant does poetry (or AWP, or a new book) feel in the face of women losing their rights to thier bodies, facing a new war, facing threats to our voting rights? Can women in particular be expected to just go about business as usual? How can we deal with personal crises on top of political stress?

February sunshine, me

I try to spend time noticing nature, spending time reading, trying to deal with each crisis as it comes and just do the best I can. Friends are also a huge support. And can poetry save a country, save women’s rights to vote or use birth control, help us heal our own bodies or those of our loved one? Writers are storytellers, and storytellers have an important roll to help people remember moments in lives, in history. If the American mythology seems to be teetering on the edge of insanity right now, how can we set that right? Can writing our own versions of mythology sound a note of hope, of justice, or reason? I hope so. I certainly don’t think it helps the world for artist to silence themselves in the face of so much uncertainty. Reading books about apocalypses helped me process the anxiety of the nuclear war threat of the eighties as a kid—perhaps something you’re writing right now will do the same for some other person? Speaking your truth—whatever that is—seems more important in a world where false information spreads like wildfire and hate tries to suppress everything kind, joyful, empowering. Is what you and I have to say about our daily lives, our work, our love lives, our disappointments and hopes important right now? I would argue, perhaps even more important than we know.