The Blog: Spellbound by our own imperfect lives...

Honoring a Life That Changed Mine by Lonnie Ellis Last summer, at the Rock Bend Folk Festival, I met a man named Dana Melius. Dana works for the St. Peter Herald and we ran into each other a time or two after that and then because Facebook friends. Once, each of us had bought the same book twice accidentally, so we traded. I had two copies of  Humans of New York: Stories  and he had two copies of  Dreams Of My Mothers: A Story Of Love Transcendent.  So, we swapped but he tucked two dollars into his book because he thought he was getting a better deal.   A couple months later, Dana's young wife died unexpectedly from complications of cancer surgery. It was tragic and her death touched me as I read the poignant posts written by Dana and his children mourning the loss of their wife and mother.  Then one day, another post crossed my Facebook path. A post written by a man who had an experience with the Melius family years before. It was a stunning ...

I have much for which to be grateful. Way too much to be condensed into a list but I will try. Don't think I'm going all Pollyanna because I'm working on a list of complaints, too. 1. I am grateful for a feeling of safety. There are so many horrible things happening around the world, and so much evil talk about the horrible things, that a person could be terrified every day. I limit my exposure to it by not watching the news and by reading very little about it, but I am aware of it. I am so thankful that I live in a small town where I don't have to worry about being shot at or accosted. 2. I am grateful for access to such good food. Not only do have more than enough to eat but we can buy fresh, organic food that's grown locally. How sweet is that? 3. I am grateful for my family: my mom who came to visit for Thanksgiving, my nephew who traveled to New York City for a spectacular honor, my grandchildren who live close and who are kind and funny people, my kids w...

I went through some old files of  Christmas pictures  this morning and put a few of them in a Picassa album. It made me nostalgic. Our little ones are growing up so fast. Ella is so grown-up...she likes to sit at the table with the adults instead of playing with the kids. Sigh. It makes me feel old. I lost my job this week when Lone Star closed suddenly due to a major meltdown in the kitchen staff. Not sure what that means but I can guess. I feel sad for Tom and Mary and for the people who depended on their wages to live. Not so with me...it was fun money. Regis got me one of the DNA tests from Ancestory.com. I did it yesterday and sent it in. It will be interesting to see what it reveals although cynical me says they could say anything and how would I know. These are the darkest days of the year. I am not fond of all the darkness and I crave light. I have lights on the tree, an electric candlabra, lights in jars, candles, lights everywhere. I sit in front of a s...

This is me a few years ago. I wore this outfit as I walked to the bank and people on Minnesota Avenue actually rolled down the car windows and waved. I think they thought I was part of the community holiday celebration. A little kid in a store tugged on the hem of my red shawl and asked if I was Mrs. Santa. Yup, I said, I am. I wish I still had those white mittens. They were so soft and beautiful but eventually they got dirty and I washed them. That was the end of both the softness and the fluffiness. Sad.

After the blur that was fall, I have taken a sabbatical from the outside world. Since Friday, except for going out to eat to celebrate Vickie's new job, I have not left the house. I do manage to get dressed and make meals, but I have checked out of the euphoria that happens outside the front door. I have decorated the Christmas tree, started some craft projects, and gone through the mess of papers that collected during the months of whirling dervishism. I started thinking about holiday cards. I have been knitting. I have been writing. I have been productive, just not outside of these four walls. I have spent some time mentally organizing for Christmas. I have a tentative menu, a tentative grocery list, and plan to be more reasonable that I was at Thanksgiving. Life can be so scary sometimes (I can't watch the news and I delete most things reality based on the social media.) so it's good to concentrate on the things over which have a modicum of control. Off to the...

We have now had more mass shootings in 2015 than the year has days. More than one per day where innocent people were killed by American terrorists. Last year, after the massacre at Sandy Hook, we did nothing. Small children in an elementary school and their teachers were slaughtered by assault rifles and we did nothing but talk about arming teachers and maybe planting ex-military personnel in schools. Both are really bad ideas. It makes me so sad that people are continuing to be killed by assault rifles and men in masks. We are told to be afraid of refugees, but these are not refugees, these are mostly white men with some sort of vengeance complex, or at least the ability to buy guns that will kill multiple people in seconds. And we think this is a 2nd amendment right? Where is my right to be whole at the end of the day? What I don't get is that people I know, intelligent people, don't read the research or understand the statistics. More people are killed in the US becaus...

I told Regis I was going to write a letter to myself about my obsessive Thanksgiving planning and cooking. I'm sure he felt like rolling his eyes, but what he said was that it wouldn't help. It comes on me so gradually that I don't notice until all of a sudden, I am reaching for the brownie recipe at 8 o'clock the morning of Thanksgiving because someone mentioned chocolate. Christmas is always much less stressful. I get it out of my system, I remember how tired I was, and Christmas is a much less traditional meal. My goal is to prevent the obsessive, bug-eyed Teresa from coming out.