Happy Holidays (Chapter 16)

This year has been an interesting one.

The global economic and US political (as well as other countries’) situation have sure frayed a lot of nerves and yet there is still optimism for a better 2021. Powerful feelings have led to tension. The amount of misinformation, disinformation, and outright lying on all sides make it harder and harder to recognize reality. All I can fall back on is core beliefs and values – which include empathy, acceptance, tolerance (except towards intolerance), trying to understand other views, and most of all love. These have certainly been challenged this year.

Dave’s leukemia was knocked down to barely detectable after which they said they had no more to offer. So we went Alternative and have been seeing a Naturopath. This has enabled his energy levels to increase and most other Chemo side effects to lessen and heal. He still has numbness in his feet (neuropathy) which interferes with balance and in his mouth which interferes with enjoyment of food. Plus the cancer battle did not exactly make him younger so the toll of aging is still there. Yet we are looking forward to hopefully being able to return to Alegria if Covid restrictions allow and health continues to improve.

Yesterday we walked to the bus (.7 miles), rode to PCC near Greenlake, walked around the lake with hoards of others (3.2 miles including to and from PCC), rode back downtown, walked another .7 miles home, plus miscellaneous (? in the store, etc.) for a total of over 5 miles – finishing up with climbing 4 flights of stairs (loaded with groceries to boot). Not bad! Dave’s phone said we walked closer to 5.6 miles but we are mystified as to how that could be. Actually it said 6.2 miles based on his height of 6ft but his stride is greatly shortened and slowed by my not being able to keep up to his normal pace. So we generally reduce its estimate by 90% which usually comes fairly close as far as we can tell – hence the 5.6 calculated miles according to the phone vs 5 miles estimated from Google Maps. Rather large discrepancy!

Dave spends most of his time on Facebook, given the Covid restrictions, while I spend mine on Quora, picture puzzles, and computer games like Boxed In (my favorite – a challenging logistical game) and card games (3 deck spider, Mrs. Mop, FreeCell), Mahjong and the like. We watch movies and Ted Talks – luckily having similar tastes. So I have been somewhat bored but managing better than many. Covid sure sucks!

Trinidad has been closed ever since about 2 hours before my delayed flight out last Spring so boat sales are pretty much dead in the water and Heidi sits there, pretty much abandoned.

All in all it has been a pretty tough year for a heck of a lot of people, and we feel truly blessed to have each other and our friends and family and our current state of health.

Cheers to all, Happy Holidays, stay well, keep in touch.
Robn and Dave.