December 7th

Today, I step out of the December routines. First of all, the weather: it's sunny, with an expected afternoon  high of 51F (10.5C). This is remarkable! We need to take advantage of the break in winter drearies. I'll get back to that in a sec. Secondly, I'd booked a body pounding, muscle and joint kneading that promises to put new life into me for at least... a few hours! I love a good massage for many reasons and wish I could afford one on a regular basis, but the occasional one is good too -- it really does wonders for your stiffening movements. So, today I have my special plunge into a serious therapeutic kneading session.

But first, the animals.

(That's Pancake, our most feral cat. S/he is not allowed inside. The other cats see to that, and frankly -- so do we. Not spayed, not vaccinated and very skittish.)

And breakfast.

And a look at the tree, which gets a few minutes of sunshine from a distant window.

And now for our escape into the beauty of the day. Out come the bikes! We do a morning ride (because of my noon appointment), which is at once very delightful, but also still on the cool side. We're only at 40F (4C). But it's sunny and thus exceptionally thrilling!

And now the massage, which is the real deal -- a kneading by a guy who knows his stuff well. None of the soft music and froufrou details that spas tend to emphasize. This is all about making the body work better.

It so happens that the masseuse works in a room across the street from my grocery store. The store that has the reputation of ripping your budget to shreds, but nonetheless I have loyally loved it since the day it opened back in 1996, shopping there regularly, until March, 2020. I stopped going there then and reluctantly switched to online ordering and home delivery. I swore I would never go down that path, but Covid was real and so I gave up in-person buying.

I'd not entered the store since that last day in mid March, nearly four years ago. I dont know why. It's as if I felt robbed out of grocery selection by Covid. But, the store is moving to another location next week and here I am, just across the street today, and it seems that for all those years of shopping here, I ought to walk through the aisles one more time, no?

I do that. I dont buy anything. I just look and I remember. The pre-Covid years. The holiday shopping that would fill the cart. The careful sale searching, to make peace with the prices. Realizing that every dollar I spent here took away a dollar from the girls' college fund. And still, food matters. Forget the nicer clothes, the newer TV. But pay attention to the food. I sorted and touched produce -- to get that very best asparagus or box of strawberries. I read every cheese label and learned about cheeses I'd not heard of. I fussed about a fish selection. All those years of loving it, relieving me of the big supermarket grocery aisles that are so boxy and anomic, presenting me with produce selection that was mostly good. Fish that were mostly sustainably sourced. This stuff mattered to me and so I kept going back, in between trips to those big box stores for the staples. I learned to read labels here. I learned to care where food came from. Sure, call it a corporate chain -- but back in the day, I was grateful that we had it to teach me how to shop. This and the farmers market -- also not cheap, because guess what: small scale farming and organic growing are not cheap. Ask my CSA farmers. If we don't support them, who will?

I drive from there to a coffee shop, which is a little antithetical to a massage, but still, I love that second dose of caffeine! From there, straight to the kids' school. It's not an easy pickup. The girl has worries (because a friend said something dumb, but it triggered a worry), the boy is weighed down by the enormity of life and blurts out something that, too, triggers an unfortunate reaction. Typical stuff that comes up at the end of a long day.

(No photo of the boy yet -- he's slumping in the back seat)

We work through all of it. Nothing like food and farmhouse calm to align the stars once again!

In the evening, it's back to leftovers for supper. Along with a real high point: the eighth and last episode of the series we'd been watching -- Lessons in Chemistry. This time the movie is as good as the book. I mean, it's just a story, people, but it's a good one to tune into 8 nights in a row.

So yes, an unusual day, but oh, with such stellar moments and resolutions! And the warm weather continues into tomorrow. How awesome is that!

Happy Hanukkah to all my friends and readers who celebrate this special day.

with love...