She’s Back! (again)

 

It has been quite a long time since I wrote in this space. I needed a sabbatical. Needed to internalize personal loss and gain. Did I miss it? Not until recently when a few friends asked about it, said they missed it & encouraged me to return. One friend said it was more authentic in some ways than facebook postings. 

We have so far—family and friends—survived the pandemic and have begun to reach out again, maskless, vaccinated, boostered, ready to roll. My heart goes out to those who have gotten seriously ill and still feeling the effects or have lost someone. Of course, the horror of what is happening in Ukraine is a presence in my mind as I go about my daily life. Thankful that I have a daily life. This neighborhood where I live now has a large population of Russians and most probably Ukraines. I do not know them personally, but I pass them on walks in the park around which our homes and apartments are located. They look somber—even the ubiquitous grandmas pushing bundled-up-against-the-cold babies in their prams, the ones who previously have always looked contented, even smug—look worried now & deadly serious. 

I changed the blog profile photo to my new badass self (even with all the reflections in the mirrored sunglasses). Because, frankly, I feel that way: Badass.  (At least to myself. Who knows what others think?). Maybe it’s just that I’m eighty-one now, writing, knitting (socks mostly), still taking pictures, loving, looking toward my new book coming out this month, There Was Always Enough Time, a collection of poems. I will share these posts on facebook, also, so if you are reading this and would like to be a “fb friend” please do so. I’d like to connect again or meet you. Due to arrive this month, besides official Spring, is the 2nd Printing of my 2017 book, From Salt to Sage, A Memoir. I will try out new material on you, my readers, too. My partner’s book, The Evolution of Freud was released yesterday, already with great reviews. More on that later, too. 

I looked through my new material to find a poem or haibun to add to this note but what comes up consistently is a poem by Adam Zagajewski called “To Go To Lvov” and it fits what is going on in Ukraine & Russia. I do not have permission to post the whole poem here, but the first few lines will pull you in and you will be able to find it easily online in its entirety. 

“To go to Lvov. Which station/for Lvov, if not in a dream, at dawn, when dew/gleams on a suitcase, when express/trains and bullet trains are being born. To leave/in haste for Lvov, night or day, in September/or in March…”

Until we meet again…