I'll Fly Away

Sunday we had a speaker between the two services at St. George's. She's my good friend Elizabeth Keith, PhD, a sociologist, a college professor, a healer, a Cherokee, and she spoke on how to respond to the dying as friend, family, or medical professional. Set off an interesting series of questions and anecdotes.  Some of the dying speak in side references, she said, such as getting on a train or ship, crossing a river or the ocean.  Some see deceased relatives or even Jesus in the room with them.  A little boy spoke of how he was going to on an elevator with Jesus in such explicit terms her mother became frightened of taking an elevator.  The instructions to witnesses are: reassure.  For example one man was sure he was going to catch a train, but fretted that he didn’t have his ticket.  Elizabeth reassured him by saying his ticket would be at the window at the station.  Another woman knew she had a new dress to wear but was frantic about having no shoes.  Elizabeth actually went to a store and bought a fancy pair which she showed to the dying woman, who then passed on content.  Some people want their family around them, but others seek solitude and they take an opportunity when no one is around to quietly sneak out of life.  It was a very interesting session.

On my way home, I was listening, as I often do Sunday mornings, to a country radio station that plays old-time country hymns and I was singing along to one ("I'll fly away, O glory, I'll fly away. When I die hallelujah bye and bye, I'll fly away").  You might find this odd for a high-church Episcopalian, but I find this old music comforting.  I saw a big bird circling in the sky down Minnetonka Avenue - and then when it turned and the sun hit its back, I saw the tail was white – it was a bald eagle.  I've seen him before, but a just that moment it was . . . interesting.  An omen?  I don’t know, but it wasn’t a scary one.  But it gave me to think, truly.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

A Late Entry

I completely forgot about my blog until I read a post on Facebook from an old friend.  It was quite long  and ended up being about a book of poetry he'd put up on Amazon.  After reading it, I thought it would make an excellent blog post to promote his book.  Then suddenly it sunk in that it was Friday morning and I hadn't written my blog post.

I had planned Thursday to be a day to catch up.  I wanted to go to my knit and crochet group in the morning and I was going to bake a birthday cake for my husband (his birthday is today) and I was going to finally finish the synopsis I've been working on.

But then....

People have all different ways of dealing with stress.  For my son it's a trip to Disneyland.  It's not a bad plan.  You get exercise and an escape from the everyday world with no negative side effects. We have season passes and go there a lot.  The plan was we were going to go on Tuesday to see all the holiday  lights and decorations, but when we were finally ready to go, it would have put us in the heart of bad traffic and taken 2 hours to get there.

He had a meeting in Pasadena yesterday and he decided we could go after the meeting.  While he talked with his clients, I did work on the synopsis and actually just need to type in the changes.  But then it was off to Fantasy Land, Adventure Land, Tomorrow Land, etc.

 Even after all these years of living out here I am a dunce about the freeways.  Luckily he isn't.  I'm always reading the freeway signs and thinking "oh, so this is where Whittier is."  The only way I could orient myself was when I had had a view of downtown L.A. in the far distance.  It was just tiny tall buildings sticking up on the horizon.

And then we were there.  The holiday music was playing.  The creepy purple lights in the trees in California Adventure had been swapped out for tiny white lights and other trees had jars filled with strings of colorful lights.  The giant Christmas tree was up in Disneyland and the façade of It's a Small World was done up in colorful lights.

I have to admit that by 10 pm I was dragging.  But then I'd left my house at 9:30 am.  I nursed a cup of coffee on the patio of the Jolly Holiday coffee place and he went off to go on rides.  The patio was empty except for me and a Chevy Chase look a like, or maybe it was really him. 

I was surprised when I looked at my watch and realized it was almost 2 am when I got home.  The get away had worked and I'd forgotten about everything including my blog until now.  So there it is.

First Snow of the Year

Even though the weather people had warned of us snow, I hadn't really expected we'd get so much. It's been snowing steady since 9 this morning and is finally letting up. It's early in the season for this much snow and we aren't as prepared as we'd like...and we're leaving for a long road trip tomorrow. Snow just never seems to come at the right time. Or at least for me. I like snow on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, once everyone is where they need/want to be for the holidays, and on days where we don't have to go anywhere...and have no plans to leave the following day.

It's supposed to clear up by tomorrow morning, and I hope it does, because I'd have for my husband to be disappointed by having to delay the trip. It's a special birthday trip for him and he's been looking forward to spending a long weekend with his family. 

I'm Home

Although I posted here at Killer Hobbies during the last two weeks, I was actually traveling, from visiting my grandkids for Halloween, to passing through my old hometown of Pittsburgh, to attending the Baron Mutual Funds shareholders' meeting in NYC, which we often do.   All were fun. 

As usual at the shareholders' meeting, I attend because of the fun entertainment there.  This year, it was all about comedians.  The main entertainer was Billy Crystal, and I really enjoyed his program.  At lunchtime, there are generally three entertainers, and attendees can pick a theme and then see who's there.  This year the categories included Comedy Legend, who was Mel Brooks; Male Comedians, who included some Saturday Night Live male comedians: Seth Meyers, Michael Che, Keenan Thompson and Darrell Hammond; and Female Comedians, which was the one we saw--and it was great!  It included an interview of some female SNL comediennes who answered questions about SNL and their respective careers, and of course they managed to be funny as interviewees: Kate McKinnon, Amy Poehler and Tina Fey.

 

So now I'm home and letting people know about my latest and last Harlequin Nocturne Visionary Wolf.  And preparing for Thanksgiving and the rest of the holiday season.

Fortunately for me, but not for a lot of other people in the LA area, we're not close to the horrible fires, although I do see smoke on the horizon sometimes.   Stay safe, everyone!