recovery up date...

It was one week ago today that I last posted-- during a long day spent in the hospital with dad. Forgive me for not posting a proper update sooner, it has been a bit of a long week as well. (The beginnings of recovery are perhaps the least fun of all...) But he made it through surgery well, (as well as one could hope at least), and spent two nights at the hospital in a pleasant enough room up on the fourth floor that looked out on the beautiful Chicago skyline. He is home now... and again, doing as well as he can in his situation. I'll spare him and not post any photos (though I do have some GREAT ones...) of this particular phase.

Thanks ever so much for your thoughts, well wishes, good energy and prayers through all this!

We have been reading Harry Potter out loud- a great diversion and very helpful to the recovery process... :)

sitting and waiting...

Today is dads surgery. He has been starved, cleaned out, prepped and wheeled nervously off in a gown and silver cap... Mom and I are out in the waiting room with a host of others also sitting and waiting. We've been given a number and there's a big screen- like ones at the arrivals gate- so we can track in status. He's just moved from "Preop" to "In OR"... but the desklady has not yet come around to inform us that surgery has started, which she has been doing periodically to others. Oh... mom's off to "answer the phone." They are going to give here the start time. Fascinating. She's back, they just started at 8:41am. So... it goes. And we wait. (And what better to do than to blog about it?) Love you dad!

taken from dad's iphone. :)

Summertime texture

... went for a walk in Blackwell with mom and dad yesterday evening. So many shapes and colors and patterns to look at... and smell and taste, and feel...

Papa bear foraging for berries...

Fragrant paralandra flowers:
mama bear foraging for berries:
such loot!




I took this photo two winters ago on an equally dazzling walk in November two years ago (nice to know that winter never lasts forever!):


Such a mellow summer evening... And all for the small price of X# of mosquito bites/berry. Not too bad for mid-July. I'll be scratching for a good while though...

Last monday...

...we were in Baltimore- or leaving Baltimore...

This monday, we are in Chicago (ok really the western suburbs, but yesterday we were in Chicago for Ethiopian and a spectacular sunset on the Montrose pier):

On the one hand, I can't quite imagine that I am not going back to Baltimore- I'm enjoying what just feels like a vacation... On the other hand, all my stuff boxed up in the basement and photos of my empty house make it all unavoidably real. So this week I will try to find my energy (lost somewhere along the way), dig out my calendar and computer, and start to work out The Next... While continuing to enjoy what feels a bit like a vacation. What IS a vacation! Good tea, beautiful weather, no responsibilities...