Author of Madam, Have You Ever Really Been Happy? An Intimate Journey through Africa and Asia

Category: Colorado

THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN’

In late June when I was in Colorado, I planned to write a blog telling how wonderful it was to be rid of THE MASK for the first time in over a year. And to walk down the street and smile and make small talk. To mingle. And to see how interesting humans were when they unveiled their lower face and you didn’t have to depend on the eyes, alone, for communication. Those sparkling, sober, sad, questioning, sometimes disapproving eyes.

And then I stepped off the plane in Denver into a wall of 104 degree heat. There went the brain. There went the will. There went the energy. For the first four days friends and family were treated to Meg, the Zombie. I felt as if I were swimming upstream in a river of molten lava. Have faith and be patient, they all said. You’re a mile high and it’s hot (no kidding). You have to acclimatize.

“Who me? I’m used to 18,000 ft. in the Himalayas. What’s a paltry 7,000 ft. You’ve got to be kidding.”

But they weren’t. They would simply have to be satisfied with monosyllables and wan smiles until, miraculously, I was reborn. And the irony of it is that the temperature plummeted to 62 on the day I left and I flew into 95 and climbing temperatures in Seattle. And into the next week we were treated to 100 before returning to normal. A little taste of global warming. If only “forewarned is forearmed” were true.

Here are some photos of my visit to my friend Bonnie Phipps and her husband, Bill Moninger, in Boulder. She is not only an autoharpist par excellence but also the designer of this exquisite garden.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

Doug and Martha

I enjoyed a lively visit in Arvada with my granddaughter and great grandchildren en route Manitou Springs, where my daughter, Martha, and her partner, Doug Hammond, live. They bought a charming Victorian house on a hill (the whole town is hills!) with a view of Pikes Peak, and are surrounded by woods and greenery and lots of steep walkways. Because of the heat the hiking was curtailed, but there’s always the future. We did take a stroll in the famous Valley of the Gods, as prelude to future walks in the valley and hills of the Rockies. And, BTW, the restaurants are superb in the area. Especially in the cool breezes if evening.

My photographs are greatly limited because of my heated “vegetative” state. The fellowship was wonderful, but I would have preferred having it in the Arctic!

Martha has been creating a terraced garden that the local deer are also enjoying.

 

And here is a short slide show to let you know that Whidbey Island is still blooming and weathering the summer heat.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

I would like to end with a poem that flowed out of me during the darkest days of the pandemic. Humorous with a touch of pathos. I had totally forgotten it, but I think it says what many of us felt as we attempted to circumnavigate the new reality of the past year. Lots of lives were upended but lots of soul-searching also took place. True. It was not all bad. But for many it was the end.

Senior Pandemic Blues

The children are worried. “She seems so disorganized…even more
Than usual,” they say
Then there’s the book, oh, no, it’s no longer relevant. Was it ever
Relevant? Yes, it’s hilarious. I know I’ll finish it after I tweak
The cast of characters.
Don’t talk about dinner, I can’t think about dinner, please
I’ll take a walk in the woods if it would only stop raining. You know I hate
The rain and I need to see that play being streamed from New York.
I miss the theater so much but I don’t mention it. I’d be accused
Of complaining. Nothing is settled. The new phone, so complicated, the camera, health insurance,
It all takes so much time. I will die “on hold’ with Verizon. Let them pay
For my funeral.
NO I’m not depressed. The cedars are beautiful, their feathery leaves dripping
With water, the ferns in their crispness, resisting the 40° weather and
Lifting their fronds to meld with the fog
The interminable fog….
No, I am not complaining.

The computer calls. The New York Times. The Washington Post
I must read them all and oh, the TV and
YouTube have so much I can enjoy…don’t you want me to enjoy
During this dreadful time? Winter is coming, some call these the
Dark days. I used to be free, but my life is now curtailed; I can’t travel, I am beholden
To a mask for my peregrinations. Is this not a cause for worry?
Does my mind ever stop, for meditative bliss is at my
Fingertips. Dinner. Don’t speak to me about dinner, again.
I am lucky. I am not unemployed. I am not homeless. But I am
Not happy, not fulfilled any more. I miss friends, groups, crowds,
Parties. What gives life meaning? Do I still have a reason to exist? I am a hermit.
I can sit all day and sort memorabilia and
I can go mad. Now why don’t I play my violin or finish my book?
Let’s sit on the beach and watch the sun go down;
The beach is deserted. The beach is peaceful. Only lapping water.
The world turns, chaos continues, the sun goes down.
No, I am not complaining.

NEW YEAR’S GREETINGS

I hope you are all taking some time to groove on the holidays, enjoy your family, and make plans for what I hope is a healthier, more thoughtful, compassionate, and peaceful year ahead.

I seldom put personal information or political opinions in my blog, but I’ve received so many wonderful year end reports from friends, who press me for basic information, that I’m sending them and you the sketchiest of news. This is a first for me. I’m not known for brevity.

My youngest son, Robert, is off to Shenzhen, China, on business, leaving his wife, Gwen, in Orlando, Florida, to hold down the fort for their golf entertainment enterprise, Glowgear. My daughter, Martha, has returned to her home in Denver, Colorado, after three months of teaching Essential Somatics in the U. K., Ireland, and Australia, to be on hand when her daughter, Cally, gives birth to a second son in January (what does that make me…a great grandmother, again? Can’t be!). I shall be joining the Denver wing of the family for Christmas while Cary and Tom are staying in Langley, with the school farm program and Tom’s house building at the Upper Langley affordable cohousing community going swimmingly. Grandson Adam and his girlfriend, Allie, are in New Jersey tearing up cyber space with various innovations. Grandson Thomas, a prolific writer of fantasy fiction, will greet me in Denver before he makes his way to Portland, Oregon, to embrace a new job and that soothing winter rain. Cary and I miss going to Nepal, but the holiday season brings a lot of wonderful connections with stateside family, friends, concerts and theater that we don’t find trekking in the Himalayas.

And to all of you…a wonderful Christmas and jolly holidays. And try not to behave yourselves….

(Stay tuned for more reports of my trip to Mongolia last summer!)

View of Puget Sound from Cascade Avenue in Langley, WA on a sunny December day.

NOW IS THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT….

What a play Shakespeare could write about the craziness that has enveloped our country in the past few months. So many of my friends from around the world are writing passionate letters, worried about their future and that of the United States. Join the crowd. Pick up the paper, watch the satirists, do the research, and make your beliefs known by your actions.

I returned from a delightful week in Denver, CO, to witness a spirited march on January 21st here in Langley, where over 1,000 people spoke their minds in a city that only has about 1,000 citizens. The crowd went all the way up the hill at First Street!

Seattle (on the Other Side) was around 175,000 and my grandson, Thomas Bixler, and my niece, Rebecca Magill, told me of the astronomical numbers crowding the streets of Washington, DC. Ditto for seventy countries around the globe. You’ve all seen the pictures and read the stories.  Here are two of Rebecca, her daughter, Amaya, and husband, Paul Benzaquin.

In an attempt to find serenity I enjoyed two hikes while in Colorado. One at Sawmill Pond in Boulder with Bonnie Phipps and her husband, Bill Moninger, and the other with my daughter, Martha, great grandson Theo, and grandson-in-law Zack. My, that’s a mouthful!

Sawhill Ponds Hike slideshow

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Hike in the Denver Rockies slideshow:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

I always like to leave you with a good taste in your mouth and here’s a poster I saw at the South Whidbey Commons this week. It proves that the Asians are not the only ones to enjoy and depend on the soothing and social repercussions of coffee!

© 2023 Meg Noble Peterson