TeamReedBlog.2020

It's been a while since I posted. No reason, really. It's been busy, but I've also been lazy. Not a ton to report as we're all still slogging through this pandemic as best as we can.  We've been careful, as you must be when you live in one of the most unvaccinated states in the country, and I think I've been so happy to be with friends and family when that occurred that I forgot to record some of the moments.  Despite the state of the world and my lack of chronicling Team Reed activities, I'm feeling grateful for so many things: Purely by happenstance, I put a new ornament on the tree - a stack of books I came home with from Christmas Book Club where, yes, I stole it under the rules of our gift swapping. It's between ornaments from Jeff's grandfather's house. Each a precious reminder of the best things in my life, and maybe yours: friends and family. I'm fortunate to have friends and family who don't always agree with me and don't hol...

When I moved away from my rural childhood home, some friends and family were worried that I was giving up a lot and getting very little in return. Down home, when there's a death or trouble in a family, the church ladies get together and make a big meal or series of meals for the survivors. Small towns will band together an have fundraisers for other issues, or just send the kids over to mow the yard, bale the hay or do whatever needs doing but can't be done due to said trouble. And family, of course, is always around and available to help you out. I'm not even IN trouble (not really) and I have all of the above and more thanks to wonderful friends who have become family. I've already mentioned the gifts and flowers, food and drink and treats that have come my way since my hip surgery - for which I'll be eternally grateful.  Last week, Jeff was contemplating bailing on an overnight work thing that had been scheduled for months.  But after three weeks of taking care ...

I've been envious of murals that have popped up all over Broad Ripple and other parts of Indianapolis for a while now. They always make me smile when I run across them, and I've been talking for years about doing something like it at our house. Before we covered our interior back porch wall with wine box panels, I'd considered a mural there, but never got the job done. The exterior west side of our garage has always seemed like a canvass in search of paint, too. But no longer. I am beyond happy with this splash of happy flowers that Nikki Lazar, one of Alison's dearest friends, just finished. The mountain scene in between the sunflowers reminds me of our California trip. You can't quite see the setting sun and the reflection of it and mountains in a lake at the bottom of the mural due to a canna lily that I planted last year (thanks, John Vielee) before we commissioned Nikki. It took her only a couple of days once she got started and had all of her supplies. We talk...

There will come a day when I will complain about the Captain again. But it should not be soon. Six days ago, he and I got up at 5:30 a.m. and headed down to Methodist Hospital where a few hours later, I had my left hip ripped out of my body and replaced with something better. I haven't had the guts to really examine what went in there; how, exactly, the original parts were removed; and what exactly went in in its place. All I know is the diagnosis of severe arthritis I got earlier in the year had gone from what I thought physical therapy could improve to rapidly worse and, as it turns out, bad enough that the consultation I went in for turned into surgery two weeks later. I'm not the surgery type. I mean, I don't like hospitals and I don't like the idea of having my parts messed with. It just seems like an invitation for additional activity. And my surgeon, in a very surgeon-like delivery said, "You'll have to do the other side, too."  As if he understood ...

Every parent fights the unending flow of precious art created by their progeny. At first, you save every scrap of paper with a scribble, every malformed piece of clay that for the life of you, you can't figure out what it's supposed to be. Every pasta bracelet and necklace. It'll bury you faster than a silo full of shelled field corn if you're not careful. I don't know how parents of multiples keep up with it. Wiley parents find ways to get rid of some of the materials that come home in reams from school without the little tykes finding out. Most of us get caught at least once. Once caught,  you're back in the thick of wading through construction paper and quizzes marked with stickers. But this weekend, my kid gave me some art that'll be on my wall for the rest of my life. I recently went to Newfields to take in the Van Gogh exhibit, so clearly I know good art when I see it, and the art that Ali gave me for my birthday is good art.  It's a mashup of our ...

 The Black-Eyed Susans have taken over my yard and every year I think I should take some serious measures to fight back, but I never do. They're just so happy, and they last so long. I love them. They are my signal that summer is fully entrenched and I should stop to soak it in. This is my current view: Oh, but wait: there's more! When Ali was little, this patch was full of ground cover and her plastic house where she first had tea parties (once I'd cleared out the spiders and debris from its dormant, winter time, and later climbed on and used as a perch.)  Thanks to my sister Deb for the metal flowers that will bloom even in the snow. The hydrangeas are new, and the middle one is shy, but they'll come along. The pots are newish, too: reclaimed and waiting for inspiration. The lilac tree outside my kitchen window is coming along, and was pretty this spring but I didn't get a great picture. Here's the current  view from my kitchen window and a cameo from the spri...

 I'm a big believer in the idea that people should suffer a little bit along the way to success so they know what it's like to have to live in a crappy apartment, to not be able to afford dinner out every night or to drive a beater car for a while. It builds character and can inspire a person to appreciate what it takes to provide a nice living space, a cool car and an ability to enjoy life a bit. That said, when we thought Alison's summer sublease might have come with a side of bed bugs, I was ready to put her up in a hotel until we could get her better accommodation for her 10-week-internship. She protested, said she thought the problem was take care of and stopped me six or times from dragging her mattress out to the dumpster. We instead spend the equivalent of a college student's semester budget for booze on a zippered pouch and bed-bug killing pillow cases, environmentally hazardous bug spray and electronic gadgets that claim to deter all kinds of creepy-crawlies. ...