I read about this awhile ago but only got desperate enough to try it yesterday. I wrapped my head in plastic wrap and smeared peanut butter all over my forehead. It wasn’t some headache cure or skin treatment, it was a ploy.
Wren screams when I try to trim her nails, because one time three years ago I cut one too close. She’ll quietly let the vet do it if I’m out of sight, but with Dr. Vincent gone it’s too expensive and too far to drive as often as she needs it. So I hung her up in her cozy front-pack, donned reading glasses, set a small lid of styptic powder nearby just in case (but I was ever so careful), and stood where she could reach my forehead with her tongue. There was just enough peanut butter on there to keep her distracted long enough for me to clip all her front nails with nary a peep out of her. And it made me laugh, so it was a win all around.
Another small success was a perfect loaf of sourdough, and though this is the usual outcome, it’s been awhile since I baked one. I’m grateful for small domestic successes.
I’m grateful the little bonsai rose is recovering from its grasshopper defoliation.
One day the froglets will grow big enough to eat this grasshopper, but for now there’s a curious equanimity in their encounter. May I bring the same attitude to neighbors who are so different from me.
The froglets are very good neighbors even though their neighborhood is getting crowded. I have to walk ever so carefully, even ten feet from the pond on the flagstone, to be sure I don’t step on one. They’re literally underfoot! They are tiny, and fragile, and not 100% coordinated yet, so their jumps can be feeble and a little wonky; and also, they don’t really understand about giant feet yet, that they need to get out of the way of shadows.
I keep intending to set some coins out around the edge of the pond for scale to show exactly how tiny they are. But for now I’ll just use a cat: the frog above is the same frog as the one below, on the pond edge, just to the left of the furry hip of Topaz.
You can see several stages of metamorphosis in this image, if you look closely at each tadpole and froglet.
(the next morning)
The best cheese sandwich of the weekend was warmed Brie, sliced homegrown cabbage and red onion, mayonnaise, and organic grape jelly on of course homemade sourdough.
It was a lovely weekend, with ample outside time and the barest hint of pre-fall in the air, a slight cessation of the brutal heat and a minute rise in humidity. Wildfires in this part of the state (the nation, the continent) are rapidly getting contained with a little help from the weather and a lot of effort by brave men and women who are good neighbors to all of us. Whether they left homes nearby me to fight these fires or left homes in another state, right now they are my neighbors. The littles and I enjoyed another stunning sunset with our good neighbors to the west, who came to say hello over the fence and lingered for awhile in companionable silence before going home for dinner.
Speaking of neighbors, many people aren’t aware of the shooting at the CDC a week ago last Friday; it wasn’t a mass casualty event so it didn’t generate sensational television coverage. “Only” one person was killed, a police officer. But it was a mass trauma event, for hundreds of CDC staff and their families, and thousands of people who work in public health. Our neighbors. A foremost epidemiologist, Katelynn Jetelina, discussed the attack and its ramifications for public health workers, the regime’s non-response, and how average Americans can demonstrate support for healthcare workers in this essential, and increasingly stressful and traumatizing, field of public service. It’s forty minutes of lucid and moving discussion. Many of my neighbors work in healthcare, a lot of them in our rural hospital system which is on the chopping block with upcoming cuts to Medicaid. Are any of your neighbors healthcare professionals? How can you show them some appreciation?
Speaking of good neighbors, I was grateful this morning to be invited onto a press call about the destruction of the Social Security Administration. My contribution followed former SSA chair Martin O’Malley’s chilling assessment of the regime’s efforts to demolish social security. You can watch the press conference here if you’d like to hear just how badly the regime has already damaged “the only agency in America that runs a 2.6 trillion dollar surplus,” and also hear a couple of regular folks talk about what social security means for them and their neighbors.
Can’t we all be good neighbors to each other? Planet Earth is our only neighborhood, for all of us, human and non-human alike.
This evening, I only counted a dozen tadpoles left in the water. I know there are more I didn’t see, but I saw just as many froglets in one square foot at the edge of the pond. I’m not fond of the algae, but the froglets are, so I’m not about to scoop it out. It’s an essential part of their neighborhood, which is all they have and all they know.
I’m grateful that there were plenty of windows of opportunity to visit the pond over the weekend. A massive wildfire northwest of here about eighty crow miles covers much of the state in smoke depending on which way the wind blows. When it blows from the south these days, we have good air; when it blows from the north, as it’s been doing the past several nights, the air quality shoots up over 110 and many of us have to stay inside. I’m grateful it’s not worse: friends from Chicago to Syracuse have been experiencing the worst air in the world on occasion over the past couple of weeks, due to even more massive wildfires in Canada. So when I get a window of clean air I make the most of it, and visit the pond.
Despite jaw and tooth pain as my mouth settles around new crowns and attendant complications, I’ve “gotta eat sometimes,” as the dentist kindly reminded me. So I’ve enjoyed eating homemade brown sugar-cinnamon poptarts for breakfast the past few days. Amy recommended the recipe and since that was always my favorite flavor poptart growing up I had to try it. Pretty good for a first effort, and not that hard to make. Not perfect, either, so I’ll have to make them again.
After breakfast, or sometimes before, I visit the pond, where fewer and fewer tadpoles swim and more and more froglets crowd the edges. They’re in the rushes, on the lily pads, among the flagstones, under the flagstones, out in the grasses. This evening I took a quick look and had to step very carefully to avoid stepping on some: little froglets everywhere! They’re so tiny they get a little tangled in the grass stems when they startle and try to hop to the pond for safety. Wren could catch and eat them easier than she does the grasshoppers, but she’s been very responsive to my admonishments to leave it.
Above, four froglets cluster at the edge, and a nearly-turned tadpole rests in the warm shallow just above the tiny snail on the brick. In the detail below you can see a fifth froglet’s leg peeking out below the brick, underwater.
At the slow north end, where algae has collected, I couldn’t count the gathered froglets, and kept getting closer, and closer.
I hadn’t thought about what the soles of a froglet’s feet look like and it kind of surprised me to see the little bumps. I think these are the toes beginning to develop, but that’s just an educated guess. After seeing how far they’ve ventured from the pond already and how fragile and vulnerable they are, I may need to use my next window to lay out some branches and build a few rock piles; I certainly won’t be mowing again this year.
After a weekend of adventures and work and smoke and play, Wren and I both rest.
I was grateful to get into the dentist today to check out increasing pain in my teeth since the crown a few weeks ago. All kinds of nightmare scenarios were going through my mind, but not with the pernicious insistence of pre-mindfulness days. The dentist was reassuring, diagnosed it as a “bite problem” and ground down both crowns to resolve it. They said my teeth were bruised. What? I was grateful to learn something new: teeth are held in place by ligaments, and ligaments can get inflamed for all sorts of reasons, including not quite perfect crowns. Fingers crossed that’s all it is. We’ll know more later.
I’m grateful for making it through to another glorious sunset. West, light smoke floated below the clouds. To the northwest the wildfire smoke seemed to float above the clouds, though really, I think, it was just closer.
I’m grateful for the simple, productive pleasure of knitting. I’ve just started the right front panel of the dream sweater. Allowing the flow of creative energy releases agitation and grounds me in this moment. Whether it’s with knitting needles or a camera, writing or in the kitchen cooking, focusing my attention on creating something or capturing a fleeting image calms thoughts and eclipses ego. Wren was grateful that I took her to the canyon this evening.
Despite experiencing joy anyway, I often feel wracked with guilt that I’m not making more noise about the corruption unraveling our democracy, not doing more to raise the alarm, not making enough people wake up. It’s because I can’t say it as well as others, and I don’t even want to know about it. But we all must know. If you get a little delight or insight or respite from reading this blog, or even if you don’t, you also need to be paying attention to the political machinations that are demolishing American life as we have known it all our lives. Please keep reading, now, the words of Mark Elias, who likens what’s happening in the US with the musical Cabaret: As a populace, we are sleeping amid our pleasures while the Nazis take over.
POLITICIZATION OF THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE: The DOJ is now a political arm of the GOP
I know I’ve written about this before, but it bears repeating: under Pam Bondi’s leadership, the Department of Justice is a political arm of the GOP, and the attorney general is Trump’s personal lawyer. Right now, we’re seeing that clearly with the Epstein Files saga. As the MAGA base calls for the release of the files, Bondi is protecting Trump — not representing the American people. This will only get worse. If you want to see where the DOJ’s loyalties lie, keep an eye on Bondi.
TARGETING OPPONENTS: Threatening those who oppose the administration
On Friday, as part of her latest conspiracy, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard promised to investigate and prosecute Obama administration officials for their disclosure of Russia’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 election. Then on Sunday, Trump followed up her warning with an AI-generated TikTok of President Obama getting arrested by the FBI. This is just another in a long series of threats to political opponents — and it should be taken seriously. With the DOJ acting as Trump’s political weapon, it will go after and prosecute those who defy and speak out against the administration. Don’t dismiss these threats.
UNCONSTITUTIONAL ACTS: Betraying and defying the Constitution
Under Trump, the Constitution has become nothing more than a suggestion. Administration officials have been defying court orders left and right, ignoring judges of both parties. Emil Bove, Trump’s former personal lawyer and his nominee to serve on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, told government lawyers they should say “fuck you” to court orders. And back in March, the administration defied Judge Boasberg’s orders to turn a plane of Venezuelan immigrants around. The administration isn’t following the normal rules. There are no guardrails. Pay attention to who they’re taking orders from — because it’s certainly not our justice system.
ELECTION MEDDLING: Interfering with the outcome and results of our elections
Trump and the Republican Party are gearing up for 2026. They know their policies are unpopular. They know the Epstein Files have them in hot water. So, what are they going to do? Gerrymander and suppress voters. In Texas, Trump pressured Gov. Greg Abbott to hold a special session and illegally gerrymander his state’s congressional map. And in Colorado, election officials received calls from a GOP operative asking to inspect election machines and gain access to voter rolls. The 2026 election isn’t going to be a normal one. Get registered now. Double-check your registration. Make a plan to vote. When democracy is on the line, it’s never too early.
“When we said women and people who loved them needed to vote like their lives depended on it in 2024, it wasn’t hyperbole. Despite the hole the Dobbs case, which reversed Roe v. Wade, tore in the heart of so many Americans and the women who have suffered and even died since then from the unavailability of basic medical care, not enough Americans understood how precarious the world had become for women….
Trump is waging war on women in ways both big and small, subtle and obvious. When federal employees are fired, women lose jobs that permit them to support their families. When Medicaid gets cut, single moms, who are just trying to get by, are burdened. DEI gave woman a path to higher paying jobs. Now it’s being closed down. He’s trying to make it harder for us to votewith his Executive Order on voting and the SAVE Act.
But above all, it’s been abortion, the right that both kept women safe and made it possible for them to set the course of their own lives and families. This is an administration that not only wants to end abortion, but has also set its sights on contraception. There is talk of resurrecting the Comstock Actwith the complicity of the Supreme Court. That would make it illegal to mail material that talks about family planning, let alone the drugs like mifepristone that are essential for medication abortion. That means women who need access to medical care to prevent serious infection or death due to medical complications in pregnancy may no longer be able to get it.
The party that claims to be pro-life isn’t. It’s not just the misbegotten refusal to provide abortion, which can be lifesaving in a pregnancy gone wrong. The culture war against women is in full-blown progress.
Since I’m borrowing the words of others… from Instagram
But now in Tennessee, they’re taking it a little bit further. Unmarried? Pregnant? Sorry, no healthcare for you. According to footage shown by the Tennessee Holler, an unmarried woman who was pregnant was denied medical care by a doctor who didn’t want to treat her. She didn’t want an abortion. She wanted to carry the baby to term. He denied her care because she wasn’t married. It offended his Christian beliefs. We’ve heard about Christian bakers not wanting to bake cakes for gay couples. This is the next logical step in the Supreme Court’s permissive politics towards Christianity. Except that this doctor seems to have forgotten that Mary was an unmarried, pregnant woman when Jesus was conceived.
Apparently, the Hippocratic oath no longer matters, at least not if your patient is an unmarried woman who’s pregnant. Women in Tennessee have sufferedinthepast for being denied an abortion while carrying a nonviable pregnancy, only to lose their fertility as a result. But this is next level. This is a doctor denying a patient care because he, HE, doesn’t approve of the way she is choosing to live her life.
We have the opportunity to end this now. There is an election coming in 2026. An election where we will have to fight to register, stay registered, vote, and ensure our votes get counted. But it’s our fight. It’s the fight for democracy. Unlike 2024, when Americans failed to vote in sufficient numbers to keep Trump out of office because they somehow didn’t understand the stakes, we have to make sure every single person who cares about our country—and thinks women shouldn’t slide into second-class citizenship where they can be denied basic, noncontroversial medical care—is on the front lines in this election. In 2024, too many people thought they could use their voice to protest, whatever the issue, by staying home or voting for a candidate other than the one committed to democracy. The results have been tragic, just six months into Donald Trump’s second administration. It’s dangerous to be a woman. It’s dangerous to be an immigrant. It’s dangerous to be a member of the LGBTQ community. It’s dangerous to be someone who has devoted your life to government service if your work involved investigating Donald Trump or promoting DEI. It’s now dangerous to fall outside of Trumpism’s rigid definition of what’s right…. That’s wrong for all of us.”
another borrow from Instagram
And that’s my rant for the week, with deep gratitude for the big, courageous voices on the national stage who are shining the bright light of reality, of truth, clearly on the haze of deception, propaganda, brainwashing, and large-scale swindling that defines the current regime. Time really is running out, and we’ve got to wake up and really drain the cesspool before we drown in it. We can do it! Here are links to some other people’s words, newsletters and articles, to help us wake up and be a proactive citizen.
I’ll be back in a day or two to help us relax and savor the quotidian delights in our private lives.
I’m grateful that today was significantly cooler and that what little wind there was came from the north, clearing the air considerably. Instead of Air Quality of 150-200 it’s fallen steadily through the day from 80 to 56 at bedtime.
I was able to spend a little time at the pond this morning, and run errands this afternoon with the car windows down. I was grateful for the kindness of Christina at the DMV, and the consideration of pharmacy staff, and the tiny blonde girl who said hi to me at the market. I said hi back and smiled, but she couldn’t see that because I was masked; with the forthright candor of her three or four years, she asked “Why do you have that?” I was happy to explain that my lungs don’t work so good so I’m wearing it because I don’t want to get sick. She nodded and continued chewing on the date in her hand.
I was grateful to sit by the pond for awhile this evening and watch tadpoles and frogs; and later, to sit on the deck while a small festival of dragonflies feasted on mosquitoes overhead and a few stray swallows swooped through, watching heavy clouds roll into the mountains, breathing easily. I’m grateful that the firefighters had an easier day too.
It takes so little to excite me. When I saw apricots glowing in the lowering sun against the grey storm sky I dashed outside. Then it just kept getting better. Fortunately, the smoke wasn’t bad here today and the fire didn’t expand too much. I was grateful that the air was clear enough to spend sunset outside.
It was time for supper but it was too nice to go inside. Refreshed by a cool breeze and a smattering of raindrops, undaunted by the mellow distant thunder and feeble cloud to cloud lightning, I went up on the deck to enjoy the kaleidoscope.
Hungry, I almost came in, but saw a rainbow beginning to the south. A few minutes later a hint of color appeared in front of Saddle Mountain. So I waited.
Minute by minute the rainbow grew, intensified, first at one end then the other. A hint of double appeared first in the east and then in the south, and then nearly met in the middle. It went on and on. I was breathing colors.
Even in the last light, a hint of rainbow remained. And then I turned around.
Remember those waffles I froze awhile ago? One toasted, with organic almond butter and grape jelly, made a terrific breakfast.
There’s a question that’s been bugging me for nearly a decade. How is it that half of America looks at Donald Trump and doesn’t find him morally repellent? He lies, cheats, steals, betrays, and behaves cruelly and corruptly, and more than 70 million Americans find him, at the very least, morally acceptable….
Over the past 30 years, people have tried to fill the hole in their soul by seeking to derive a sense of righteousness through their political identities. And when you do that, politics begins to permeate everything and turns into a holy war in which compromise begins to seem like betrayal.”
David Brooks, The Atlantic
One of the fennel stalks getting ready to flower.
This incisive philosophical exploration of why some people like Drumpf traces the moral collapse of Western Civilization back to The Enlightenment. I’ve been spending too much of my attention budget on this question, but it’s helpful to read others exploring the origins and ramifications of current conditions. I’ve also been spending too much energy on wishful thinking, wishes like this bit of a ‘Prayer for the Resistance’ in Rob Brezny’s newsletter: “May the rich and powerful bullies perpetrating cruel violence be plagued by the consequences of their own actions, as their attempts to undermine empathy and democracy backfire spectacularly….” and other eloquent ill-wishes.
An early variety of cabbage I planted is tiny but ready! The grasshoppers figured it out a day before I did.
Perhaps a complementary article is this reflection from Mark Nepo on the Grateful Living website, about wonder and “finding the wisdom that lives in your heart.” There are two kinds of people in this world… which two kinds are always shifting for me, but there sure do seem to be a lot of aspects of human nature where polar opposites exist. I know, the last thing any of us needs to be doing is polar opposing people. I can’t help that I think about it, though.
A lettuce harvest gets a refreshing rinse from the sprinkler.
In a Saturday morning workshop with dharma teacher Martin Aylward, one of the takeaways was “I’m here to love.” At the end I thanked him for the teachings which validate a lot of the choices I’ve made in recent years, and said, “But I get stuck on ‘here to love,’ because I feel such rage and hatred toward the people making hateful, racist, cruel policies in the US.” I could have seen his answer coming, I know the teachings. He replied, gently, so compassionately, “So that is where you start, right there in your own heart, bringing love to your anger, your hatred which poisons only you, your tendency to demonize others.” A weight shrugged off my shoulders, my hand came involuntarily to my heart, tears to my eyes.
A spatchcock chicken roasted with potato and onion chunks will feed me for weeks.
In other inner work, our Grateful Gathering discussed this video Tuesday evening, which touched all of us deeply. Even more compelling, Ted Leach shared with us the next day some links to give more context on the life of Dot Fisher-Smith, whose wisdom and gratefulness shine through in the video. Talk about a paragon of inner work! And about the power of genuine compassion.
This is the earliest I’ve seen apricots ripen. There aren’t many, and they’re mostly out of reach, but they’re the largest the tree has ever produced.
In grasshopper plague mitigation, I’ve just signed up for this free webinar and recording from PPAN, People and Pollinators Action Network, in hopes of learning once and for all what strategies will work to save my yarden.
And in tadpole development, I remain mesmerized whenever I get a chance to visit the pond. It’s not far away, but with the air quality the past couple of days I haven’t been down there. We’ve only seen a couple of frogs in the past few weeks, and I was glad to catch one on the edge of the rushes the day before the fires. And welcome a lily blossom.
Speaking of the fires, the South Rim fire closed the day at 2500 acres, the Sowbelly at 2240, and the Deer Creek fire near the Utah border which also started yesterday blew up to 7000 acres within 24 hours. This exponential growth is sadly the new normal for wildfires. The smoke wasn’t as thick today due to less wind, and I was grateful for that though I still found it helpful to mask the few times I stepped outside. Grateful living has given me peace beyond the obvious. Where once I may have bemoaned the smoke and worried about its effects or potential duration, now I am simply grateful that it’s not worse: that the closer strikes were spotted and extinguished quickly, that these fires haven’t killed anyone, that the smoke isn’t denser, that my house protects me from most of it, that I’m slowly but surely taming my unruly mind, that every now and then a sliver of true compassion replaces my anger, and so on.
“Living gratefully is not something we aspire to one day. It is what we do. When we practice, this doing shapes who we are, who we are becoming, and the life we lead, transforming our way of being.”
It was a great day to be living inside the kaleidoscope. Off in Washington the party of pride and prejudice sold out the American people to kiss the feet of the billionaire class. I was grateful to be immersed in my little garden, and the big sky, and meaningful connection with two sanghas and several friends.
Despite grasshopper predation, potato plants are tall and flowering.Cabbages have not fared quite as well and screen covers are on the way, if I can only hold off the greedy hordes until Monday.I was so hopeful that this one cabbage head, at least, would escape unscathed, but in just a couple of hours between today’s scheduled shakings, the bastards chewed into it.
“We’re excited to get this done. If Hakeem would stop talking, we’ll get the job done for the American people. It takes a lot longer to build a lie than to tell the truth, so he’s really spinning a long tale in there, but we’re excited. The people will feel the effect of this bill….. The sooner we can get to it, the sooner the Democrats will stop talking, we’ll get this bill done for the people and we’re really excited about it.”
Speaker Mike Johnson lying through his greedy teeth to CNN this morning during Jeffries’ last ditch effort to stop the big bad bill. You bet the American people will feel the effects of the bill. Despicable. Excited, cheering, their ruthless delusion knows no bounds. I tried to call Jeff Hurd again this morning and when I chose the option to leave a message I was disconnected.
I had to run to the bank this afternoon and spotted this bumper sticker, which raised ironic thoughts, reflections on the prevalence and persistence of delusion, a brief spin into conjecture about how this pronouncement will be perceived in a year or four years, raised some bile: May you have the day you voted for. And then back to practice: May all beings be healthy and happy, may all beings be safe, free from inner and outer harm, may all beings live a life of joyful ease. May all beings be healthy and happy…
Golden light after blessed rain, extra grateful for no lightning.
One can’t practice enough these days. Literally, I cannot practice enough to keep my gorge from rising, the bile from a constant burn in the back of my throat. But I keep practicing, because that’s what we do.
After meditation, and a zoom sangha with Upaya, we strolled up the driveway to savor the sky, the clean damp air; to ground in the clear truth of nature, ancient junipers, mutable weather, the fleeting grace of a doe, a tiny spotted fawn running through the field.
[No, the fawn’s not in either picture, but the doe is in the trees in the first one.]
You do what you can, what you must, with hope, without clinging to outcome. You accept the truth that this is how things are right now, and then you adapt, reset, recuperate, and start again the next day. But for this evening, just for these precious few hours, you relax into whatever nourishes you, whatever sustains and restores you, and savor it like there’s no tomorrow. You step into the kaleidoscope and ride.
I just missed catching this band of low clouds glowing white, the only light between the West Elks and the valleyboth in cloud shadow.Oh well. I stayed up on the deck to watch light climb Mendicant Ridge to the sky.This is all the fireworks I’ll need for the weekend.
