My heart’s desire….

“There is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful, than that of a continual conversation with God; those only can comprehend it who practice and experience it.”

~~Brother Lawrence

Wednesday, August 5th, 2020

I was up at 4:00 a.m. to shower for the second time with Hibiclens, and to make sure my overnight bag had everything in it. Flannel plaid nightgown, flannel plaid robe, washable slippers, underwear, toothbrush, socks, a couple of somethings to read. I left my four rings at home, and Lloyd had to help me get one of them off since my hands are getting arthritic and one of them only slid off with cold water, slippery soap, Lloyd’s back and forth coaxing, and me squinching my eyes and gritting my teeth. On my left hand I wear my wedding ring (Lloyd, 2019) and my mother’s wedding ring from 1940. On my right hand I wear my wedding ring (Michael, 1981) and my maternal grandmother’s wedding ring from 1919. They’re all plain gold bands of different widths.

Lloyd and I drove the ten minutes from our Airbnb house on Arctic Fox Drive, which my friend Ginny now calls The Foxy House, to the Charlton Building at the Mayo Clinic, where he dropped me off in the dark and I went in to be admitted. He was not allowed to wait with me, so I encouraged him to go home so he could rest, pace, do whatever he needed to there, rather than be cooped up in a one-room family waiting room for hours. The hospital texted him updates regularly.

I arrived at 5:35 a.m. and my surgery, the first of the day (and the only nephrectomy that day) was scheduled for 8:00 a.m. You leave your dignity and privacy at the door when you sign up for this. They did all the things they normally do for a surgery patient — made me undress and put on an awkward three-armed paper gown that took me two tries to get right, a turquoise hair covering which I put on with my bangs out, because some cuteness had to be allowed, non-slip socks, a wristband with my info on it, and I sat in a recliner in a small room and answered questions from a very kind nurse named Steve. He was envious that I was from beautiful Duluth and said he liked to hike and ride there as much as possible. We talked about ebikes and he asked questions about mine. I tried not to let my eyes well up with tears when I had to stand up in front of Steve and let him stick a large triangular padded bandage sort of thing above my bare butt and across my lower back so I wouldn’t get bedsores during my hospital stay. Oh yah, I am so nonchalant about random men being eye to eye with my behind… “Noh beeg deel” as they say here in Minnesota in their most exaggerated Minnesota accents. Are you not familiar with a Minnesota accent? It’s real. I’ve been told I have one now that I’ve lived here for almost forty years. Click here to see a short clip of what a lot of us hear almost every day.

Another nurse came to transport me on a gurney to the pre-surgical area. They covered me with warm blankets and got me settled in with Katie, my new nurse. By this time I was feeling a little anxiety and noticed my breathing was a little shallower, so I tried to remember to take deep, calming breaths as I answered for the hundredth time my name, birthdate, why I was there, who my emergency contacts were, if I was allergic to anything.

Soon Dr. Dilger, my anesthesiologist came in, and he was older and kind. He suggested I have a spinal anesthetic as well as a general, because with a spinal I have some pain relief after the surgery, and they give me less general anesthesia, which is a good thing. A “surgical fellow” came in and put my surgeon’s initials – MP – on the left side of my belly with a black Sharpie. He asked if I had any questions and since I’d taken a pill a few minutes earlier for pre-surgery sedation, I couldn’t think of any more things to inquire about.

It wasn’t very long before another nurse told me she was taking me to the Operating Room, and as she wheeled me down a corridor to some elevators, up to another floor, then down another long, sterile corridor, I could see what looked like the multiple doors, one right after the other, to very futuristic space ships on my left, and she turned me feet-first into the door to OR80.

I had a knee replacement in 2012 and I remember the overhead lights and the general look and feel of an OR, but this one was more intense seeming. I would give lots of reasons except by this time I was slightly sedated and could hear a rapid beepbeepbeep and I asked, “Is that my heart rate?” to which a young man in scrubs replied, “Yes it is, we’re going to give you something for anxiety,” and I realized my body was going into an ohmygoshI’mgoingtodonatemyleftkidney reaction that was beyond my control. So maybe it was the adrenaline and/or cortisol that made me think the ORs at The Mayo Clinic looked more ORish than I’d expected, more hardcore, but that is the best I can do right now, my friends.

I was moved sideways from the gurney onto a stainless steel operating table that was so narrow I thought, “I’m definitely going to fall off of this while they’re taking out my kidney,” but in hindsight I’m pretty sure I didn’t, because yesterday I Googled “nephrectomy surgical positions” and was so very, very sorry I did. My old and multiparous body was strapped down like that and laid out like that?  The words Oh.My.Gosh. just don’t cut it.

I do not remember one thing about the two-three hours I was in the recovery room. I know I was given Propofol before my general anesthesia, and that drug causes a lack of memory for any events before and right after it’s administered. It has worked well — those hours aren’t just fuzzy in my mind — they are blank. The surgery took an hour and forty-five minutes.

I was wheeled into my hospital room in the Transplant Center around 12:45 p.m., and Lloyd was there. Sharon came later after Chris was admitted, and she took this picture of us both. I like the photo filter she used, as it makes Old Lady Skin look more like Middle Aged Lady Skin.

Chris’s donor in Colorado probably went into surgery early in the morning, and after his nephrectomy, his kidney was cooled, put on ice, and flown from Colorado to Minneapolis. Then a courier picked it up at the main terminal and drove it an hour south to Mayo in Rochester, and Chris’s transplant team started getting him ready for his surgery in the late afternoon.

Today a kidney is transplanted into the lower abdomen, and the remaining two diseased kidneys are left in the body. Years ago they cut into the lower back, and it was a much more dangerous surgery and harder to recover from. Here’s a graphic and you can see where the new kidney has been put in, just in front of the hip bone.

I was so thankful to have my surgery behind me, and kept praying for Chris’s amazing, healthy donor in Colorado, and my recipient in Madison, Wisconsin.

I wasn’t hungry at all, had complete feeling in my right foot and leg, and only a tingly sensation in my left foot and leg, as I waited for my spinal to wear off. It was good to visit with Lloyd and Sharon, and text with people faraway I love.

I could understand why I had the special pad on my lower back now, because I couldn’t have turned on my side had I wanted to. My belly was alarmingly swollen, but I guess they poke three holes for various laparoscopic instruments, and a 4-5 inch vertical incision was made just below my navel where the surgeon reached in to bring out Justine, and they fill you up with gas while they operate, to give them room to look around and work in. Even though they try to suck the gas out before they close you up, apparently some stays in. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. My belly? It’s just gas.

I’ll share more about how Chris and I are doing in the next few days’ installments, but this is the first picture I received of him after his new kidney had been transplanted. He looked younger than ever, and was resting peacefully.

The journey for a transplant patient is much longer and more grueling than for someone like me who just donated a kidney.

There are weeks of testing and anti-rejection drug tweaking, and feeling wonderful and terrible and being totally at other peoples’ mercy just to get through a day.

My nurses on the 10th floor of Rochester Methodist Hospital were fantastic — so knowledgeable, attentive and compassionate. My favorites were Katie and Emily.

The first time I got up to walk on Wednesday evening, I sat on the side of the bed while my nurse Thomas went to retrieve the walking podium patients use to take their first spins around the hospital floor. As a firmly cherished rule of life, I do not throw up or get nauseous much, so was dismayed and shocked to feel a hot wave of sickness sweep over me, and someone grabbed something just in time for me to be sick for about three minutes. Gahhh. Literally. Thomas told me it happens to every single nephrectomy patient. I wonder why that is. It made me feel weak and shaky, but grateful when the nausea passed and I could go back to bed.

And while a Foley catheter is not usually anyone’s idea of a good time, I give it five stars for enabling a person to have a good night’s sleep, with no urge to pee or having to make hunched-over post-surgery trips to the bathroom, and I didn’t mind being catheterized one bit.

Apparently COVID means no flowers or even fruit bouquets, so my dear friend Su had this sent to me that first day. A candy bouquet! I shared some of it with the nurses and thought it was unique and fun. Thank you Su!

I’ll share more about the following days in the hospital very soon. I’ll tell you what little I know about Justine, settling into her new human in Madison. And I’ll tell how I’m caring for Verna (my remaining right kidney) and coaxing her along to start upping her game for me now that Justine has left the building. Forever.

So really, I should not have included auf Wiedersehen in my blog title as I did above (from a song in The Sound of Music), because in German it means “until we see each other again.” I will never see Justine again. I do have a picture of her, which I will share with everyone here when I feel you’ve all steeled yourself adequately.

Okay, Verna is telling me to end this post and rest awhile for now.

Until next time,

Tuesday, August 4th, 2020

Tuesday was slated to be a full day of tests for me — chest X-ray, EKG, more bloodwork, and meetings with lots of Mayo people. I met with my transplant coordinator Kay, who will follow me (her words) for the rest of my life, checking in, arranging appointments to monitor my health and kidney function over the coming years. I met with a social worker, probably checking to make sure they still think I’m stable enough to donate an organ. I signed a release giving my email address to my recipient in Madison, and whether or not he/she decides to write to me is yet to be seen. I would love to know more about the person who receives my kidney.

The most noteworthy appointment was with a transplant nephrologist (not the surgeon), who decided at the eleventh hour that I needed a chest CT scan and a mammogram, even though I had both of those tests a little over a year ago.

I won’t go into thousands of words of details because it would be boring to most, so I’ll just go into hundreds of words of details. In the early 2000s I was diagnosed with an autoimmune-system disease called Sarcoidosis. Weird and icky symptoms took a year of doctoring before someone finally said this is what I had. When I came down to Mayo to be screened for kidney donation last year, this same transplant nephrologist saw the residue in my lung x-rays of what my doctors in Duluth had always said was Sarcoidosis, and he had a different idea. He ran additional tests that revealed a surprise — antibodies in my blood showing I’ve had Coccidioidomycosis, a fungal infection that can be quite deadly, also known as Valley Fever. It’s contracted by breathing in fungal spores from disturbed soil (as in what would be found at building sites) under windy conditions, specifically in the Southwestern part of the United States. And the symptoms are almost identical to Sarcoidosis, which I now know I never had.

Years ago my family doctor in Minnesota never thought of Valley Fever because he didn’t know I was born and raised in Southern California, and that I’ve gone back to visit numerous times. So sometime around 2000-2002, I went to visit friends and family in SoCal, inhaled some spores in the wind, and returned home and was truly ill for six months, some days so bad I didn’t get out of bed except to go potty.

Thankfully I recovered, but the reason it’s relevant now is that the transplant team wanted to make sure what they saw in my chest x-rays is the old, calcified residue of fungal infection in my lymph nodes, not something active that would affect my recipient, who would then have to take an anti-fungal med for a year. I sat for over thirty minutes in the nephrologist’s office while he made two long phone calls with infectious disease specialists, giving them my info, and it sounded by Tuesday afternoon that whether or not I’d be allowed to donate was questionable. I couldn’t help but wonder why this uncertainty was saved until the day before a scheduled transplant and donation, with entire families uprooted and settled into their rentals, barrages of tests behind them, a donor and recipient ready for surgery in Colorado and Wisconsin as well. I was told not to worry too much, that the chances Chris’s transplant would be scrapped were slim, but that my chest CT scan would be read by a specialist that night and I would be called around 9:00 p.m. with results and final decisions.

I texted a few close friends and asked them to pray, because the thought of my son-in-law Chris being told things weren’t working out broke my heart. I’m so thankful for friends who pray and care. I have to admit, I sort of panicked inside instead of immediately praying and placing my trust in the Lord. I would like to get to the place where when something dire happens I go to the Lord in confidence right away, but I am not a very mature believer at times. I’m still learning.

I was finally called that night and informed that my CT scan looked unchanged from last year’s, indicating that I probably don’t have an active Coccidioidomycosis infection, and I should arrive at the hospital at 5:30 for admission on Wednesday morning as planned. I was so relieved.

I showered with a special pre-surgical scrub called Hibiclens Tuesday night and went to bed early, setting my alarm for 4:00 a.m. I was to take a second shower on Wednesday morning, scrubbing with Hibiclens again.

I realize how monotonous these accounts are, so feel free to yawn and click away.

I’ll share about the day of the surgery next time. Thank you for reading, and especially for your prayers!

Monday, August 3, 2020

Monday we were up early so we could get ready in a leisurely manner for all my appointments at the Mayo Clinic. Lloyd likes a hot cup of black coffee in the morning, and his favorites are Caribou Daybreak, and Gevalia House Blend. It was Gevalia for him, and I like Stok Cold Brew coffee every morning. It’s so smooth and doesn’t taste burnt and bitter. I drink it cold with organic half and half.

After we got dressed we drove the ten minutes to the Mayo Campus, which is quite impressive. So many tall buildings with peoples’ names on them — the Gonda Building, the Mayo Building, the Charlton and the Eisenberg Buildings, and more.  And the main ones  all connect underground. There are two hospitals here and numerous clinics and schools, and the best and the brightest minds come to practice medicine here. World leaders and U.S. presidents have been treated at Mayo for decades, my dear Michael had a shoulder replacement surgery here, Lloyd had a cardiac ablation here, because if you can get the care you need at Mayo, you do it. So I think my son-in-law Chris feels pretty good about the team that’s going to open him up and put a younger man’s kidney in him Wednesday afternoon. And I feel the same — if I have to have my body cut open and a vital organ removed, it might as well be here.

Mayo is a well-oiled machine, but in their efficiency and brilliance they haven’t lost their hearts — the staff are so kind and respectful and helpful. You feel like you are really being served here.

Everyone is screened at the door, temperature taken, questions about COVID symptoms and exposure asked, then given a sticker to wear to show you’ve been allowed in. No mask, no entry, also. We’re talking lots and lots of people at Mayo, huge lobbies in huge buildings, floor after floor of specialized departments.

Chris and I both had to have the dreaded COVID-19 test first thing on Monday. I was escorted into a small room where I sat and tilted my head back, and the fully gowned, masked, visored nurse told me the test would be uncomfortable, might “tickle the back of my throat,” and would only last five seconds. I didn’t have to sit on my hands like some do. The super long filament swab she inserted into my nostril, up into my sinuses and all the way to the back of my throat was thin, flexible and it curved easily as she swished it around to gather any potential microbes. I have given birth to three children without a drop of pain medication so I know I can tolerate some discomfort. It was bearable, but I did hear a groan rising in my throat as she seemingly swabbed my cerebellum while she was at it. I was so happy when it was over.

Next was a blood draw by a phlebotomist who filled eight tubes with my maroon colored blood. I left a urine sample, and then had an appointment with Dr. Mikel Prieto, the surgeon who will be removing Justine (my left kidney), placing her in a specialized cooling wrap to drop her temperature for transport, putting her on ice, and sending her on her way to Madison, Wisconsin. He explained that he has done over 1000 donor nephrectomies, and that in fifty-five years Mayo has never lost a donor.

When I told him I was still a little surprised that out of all the people who came forward to be screened as a kidney donor for Chris, I, an overweight 62 year-old woman rose to the top of the list over younger and more chipper and fit people. He said the screening process is so rigorous at Mayo, no one is allowed to give a kidney unless they have really good ones. That made me feel kind of nice, since there isn’t much on my body that would fall under the “really good” category. I don’t have “really good” knees, or “really good” eyes, or ears or hair or what have you. I guess I could say my teeth are fairly decent. But the rest of me wouldn’t make an objective bystander look my way and suddenly say to themselves, “If I ever experience severe kidney failure, I want that woman’s kidney.”

One by one, my test results at Mayo appeared in my online Patient Portal — almost before I could walk out of the buildings and get to the car. If you’ve ever had to wait a few days to get a test result, hoping your doctor’s office would call, try the Mayo Clinic. You’ll know your creatinine levels and HDL and LDLs and enzymes count within just a few minutes.  I had so many blood tests and urine tests I’ve never even heard of before.

After Monday’s tests were completed for me, Lloyd and I grocery shopped at a place I’d heard of but never been — HyVee. It was a very nice store, and we bought salad fixings, chicken breasts, oats and pecans so I can make Muesli, Rainier cherries, which are better than Bing in my opinion, and our favorite ice cream, Haagen-Dazs Peanut Butter and Chocolate. Lloyd had never eaten that ice cream before meeting me, and now he’s hooked. We buy a little pint once a month or so, sit together on the couch, and he eats the ice cream and gives me bites of the peanut butter chunks (my favorite part) when he digs them out. We drove home, put our groceries away, and enjoyed some down time working on a stupid, idiotic, ugly, ridiculous jigsaw puzzle for a while.

On Monday evening, Lloyd and I met Chris, Sharon and their children at Soldiers Field Memorial Park in Rochester, for some delicious Thai takeout food. We sat at picnic tables in perfect summer evening weather and had things like Pad Thai and Chicken Green Curry with Vegetables and Potstickers and Shrimp Fried Thai Rice. It was so nice to share laughter and to know that in a few days, Chris would have a new, healthy kidney. He has been on the brink of complete kidney failure for so long, we have prayed and friends have prayed for so long, it felt so wonderful to think about the wait and the wondering was over.

Lloyd and I waved goodbye to everyone, no hugs exchanged which makes me sad, and returned to our Airbnb. We watched some Netflix British Crack, then went to bed tired, knowing that my next day of appointments began early. We would have to be at Mayo by 7:20 a.m.

Chris’s and my COVID test results showed up on our Patient Portals in the afternoon — both of us are negative, thanks be to God. We can proceed, and when each door opens, we step through.

More soon,

I thought I would try to keep a journal of my journey toward donor nephrectomy (kidney donation) for a few reasons. First, maybe someone else might be getting ready to donate a kidney someday, and would possibly Google it and find a friendly place here where they could learn what they might expect. Second, I want to document for myself the ways God worked in my life and in the lives of those I love, because there may come a time when details fade and I’ll want to look back and feel in awe again. Thirdly, this is a way I can keep interested friends and family informed about what happens each day, rather than sending long and interruptive texts to a goodly number of people. Thank you for reading…

Sunday, August 2, 2020

Lloyd and I woke up early and were both so glad to see the hot, humid air that had blanketed our area for weeks had blown out. The central air has been on non-stop for longer than I ever remember. Lloyd opened the bedroom window to test the morning air, and the cooler, drier air rolled in. I ran around the house opening windows everywhere, and the fresh air was delicious. So delicious, in fact, we decided to take our time getting packed up for our trip to The Mayo Clinic, and go for a long bike ride instead.

Lloyd had ridden my new Rad Power e-bike enough times to like it a lot. He ordered his own, and we have had such a fun time going on Old People Bike Rides along the Lakewalk, down by the Aerial Bridge, and sometimes toward Brighton Beach right on Lake Superior.

We got dressed and headed out before breakfast. As we rode along the lakeshore, the waves whipped up by the wind sounded exactly like the ocean. The birds were singing in the overhanging trees and I kept calling out to Lloyd who was riding ahead of me, “Isn’t this beautiful? Doesn’t this air feel heavenly?” I don’t think he heard me, but I know he was thinking the same things.

It sprinkled the tiniest bit just as we rounded the climbing curve near home (which means, miraculously, that we don’t have any trouble pedaling up a steep hill anymore because we have e-bikes now!), and after we stored our bikes we thought Muesli for breakfast sounded good. Have you ever had Muesli? I make it at least once a week and it’s so good. Plain, tart yogurt, dry rolled oats, shredded coconut, a little honey, raw pecans, cinnamon… Lloyd likes his heated, with raisins and a drizzle of maple syrup. I like mine cold.

Lloyd and I take turns asking the blessing before our meals. I’m a wordy Protestant, he’s a concise Catholic, so we’ve both learned to appreciate and enter in to the other’s way of praying. If it’s my turn to pray, I usually just begin to tell the Lord what I’m thankful for that day — so much! A good night’s sleep, another day of breath, a break in the weather, beloved children and grandchildren, mercy and forgiveness, and His provision of the good food in front of us. Then we always say the beautiful prayer Lloyd grew up with:

Bless us, Oh Lord,
and these thy gifts
which we are about to receive
from thy bounty,
through Christ, Our Lord.
Amen.

And after I memorized that prayer I thought, yes! These oats, these pecans, they are gifts. From His bounty. Through Jesus, our Savior. Think of that. Prayers I used to think were rather rote have become rich and meaningful to me these past couple of years.

It was Lloyd’s turn to pray, and he also had some things to thank God for, but I was particularly touched when he said, “Thank you for another day, Lord, and thank you for our marriage.” At this late stage of our lives (Lloyd is in his seventies and I am in my sixties, both of us are widowed after many years of marriage), it means something to me that my husband considers our relationship a gift to thank God for.

We filled the back of my Subaru Outback with our suitcases, overnight bag for the hospital, laundry basket full of things like books, laptop, Bose mini speaker, hair dryer, sanitizing wipes and house slippers, and a cooler full of favorite things and enough to get us by until we could grocery shop in Rochester.

Our four hour drive south was blessedly uneventful. We listened to quiet classical music on MPR and stopped at a Kwik Trip in Hinckley to go potty and stretch our legs. We also stopped at Union Cemetery in St. Paul to place flowers in the vase on the columbarium niche where Lloyd’s wife’s ashes are. Neither of us can believe it’s been almost six years since RoseMarie and Michael died.

We were happy to find that our place in a residential Rochester neighborhood is clean and spacious and has everything we’ll need for the next several days.

We are staying in a modern split level home we rented through Airbnb, and it’s cheaper than most hotel rooms, yet we get a kitchen, laundry facilities, a deck to have our coffee on, a connected garage, and two bathrooms. And a comfy bed. And puzzles.

After we punched in the code on the door, carried all our stuff in and unpacked, we enjoyed a couple of episodes from the latest British detective series on Netflix. We ordered burgers and sweet potato fries from a place our Airbnb owner recommended, and had a quiet dinner together.

We went to bed fairly early since I was scheduled for several medical appointments at Mayo Monday morning.

So why is this post called Verna and Justine? Because I decided to name my kidneys ever since I’ve learned so much about them, how much they’ve done for me for over sixty years, how well they’ve served me. They are highly specialized in what they do (they remove wastes and extra fluid, help control blood pressure, make red blood cells, help keep bones healthy because they make a form of Vitamin D, filter 200 quarts of blood per day to make one to two quarts of urine, and more). I’m going to call my right kidney Verna (she’s staying) and my left kidney Justine (she’s leaving on Wednesday). There’s a reason for each name, and whoever can figure out why I picked each one, wins a big prize.

It was so lovely to sleep with windows open, a chill breeze billowing the curtains out in the bedroom. I woke in the middle of the night feeling cold, but I pulled the covers close up over my neck and chin, and refused to get up to close the window. It was a welcome discomfort after all the tropical heat we’ve had in Minnesota this summer.

A kidney donation could be something that brings some understandable anxiousness, but so far I’ve felt peace. The thought of my son-in-law receiving a new kidney from a caring, younger, healthy, tall man in Colorado this week is what I honestly care about most. We don’t know anything else about him, but I ask the Lord to bless that man in the Rockies, and to bless my son-in-law Chris as he prepares for all that’s ahead. I ask our heavenly Father to bless my daughter Sharon as well, and their four children, because the whole family goes through a transplant, really. I ask God to bring them joy and health and hope and love and faith and patience and laughter and I could go on and on and on as most of you already know….

Justine’s farewell journey has begun. Verna’s hardest job ever is just around the corner.

More tomorrow,

My city in northeastern Minnesota used to be known as The Air-Conditioned City because of the powerful cooling effect frigid Lake Superior has on the land and air around it. When I moved here from SoCal in 1981, the average summer temperature was 74º, but that can’t possibly be true anymore. The last few summers have been hot and humid, and this summer seems to take the cake for me. Being a humidiphobe means I look at what the dewpoint and temperature is supposed to be each day and into the coming week, and if the numbers are high, the dread creeps in. I become a hermit and don’t like to leave my house, which has air conditioning, which makes me functional. I’m very grateful for central air.

I have some friends who own ebikes, one for each member of their family, and they invited me to try one out. I did, and then spent about six weeks considering whether or not I should make a substantial purchase like that. I finally bought one online, and have been riding it in the mornings and evenings on the Lakewalk. It looks almost like a regular bicycle, but has a chargeable electric battery that provides “pedal assist” to help old people or unfit people or plump people or people with knee replacements (in other words, me) ride wherever they want without limitations. Duluth is a hilly city, and I would normally not try to ride up our steep streets heading away from the Lake, but now when I reach an incline that’s beyond my ability to pedal on my own, I turn the silent little throttle on my right handlebar and it gives me a smooth boost that gets me where I want to go. I can go over 50 miles on one charge, although I have yet to ride that far.

Here’s what my bike looks like:

See the battery under the seat? It’s a powerful thing. If you’d like to know more about the company, it’s highly rated, has great customer service and their bikes aren’t the most expensive on the market…click here.

Sometimes I ride east on the Lakewalk, and a few miles from my house Lloyd spotted a bald eagles’ nest in a tall tree skirting some woods. I wish the picture I took was better than this, but I’ll share it anyway, because it’s awesome to see even if it’s blurry. I circled the triangular nest. If you look to the left of the nest on a bare tree, you can see one of the bald eagle parents perched. Lloyd and I have gotten as close as possible and taken binoculars, and the branches the birds used are almost as big around as my wrist.

We’ve seen the baby eagles sitting on the side of the nest, flapping their wings as they prepare to fledge. It takes my breath away.

One morning when Lloyd and I walked as close as we could get to the nest, I took this picture with my iPhone:

He watched us as we passed beneath, turning his head and following us with his piercing gaze. Eagles can see fish in the water from hundreds of feet in the air, so I’m sure he caught an eyeful of us. Maybe he could see the red blotches on my skin and the whiskers in Lloyd’s beard. Sharon has seen these eagles on her morning walks, and when it’s early enough, one of the parents flies out over the Lake, probably looking for a hefty salmon to bring back for his family’s breakfast.

If you’ve been a blog friend for long you know that each summer I host a Bible study in my home. We’ve done studies by Beth Moore, Priscilla Shirer, Margaret Feinberg, Mary Kassian, Lisa Harper, Corrie ten Boom. This year we are studying The Sermon on the Mount by Jen Wilkin and it’s beautiful and challenging. I crave the words of Jesus during this time when loud voices and violence have added to the division in our country. A group of us has been meeting for 15-16 years now, and this year we could not gather in the same way we always have. I’m so glad each woman said yes when I suggested meeting by Zoom. Every Tuesday morning we gather in a Zoom meeting room online, and thirteen of us get to see each others’ faces as we discuss what we’ve studied during the week. Then, instead of watching a video in my living room, I email the week’s video to everyone and we watch it at home.

Here’s a photo of my beloved Bible study friends on my computer:

I am so blessed this year to be able to do this study with the childhood friend I’ve known the longest — Tauni. Tauni and I grew up in West Covina, California, just over the fence from each other. She still lives in SoCal (San Diego), but because of Zoom, she could take part. She has fit right in, and has been such a blessing to our group. From left to right, top row: Fiona, me, Sue D., Connie. Second row: Sue R., Tauni, Laurel, Dawn. Third row: Lana, Kay, Sharla, Kristi, and Deb is there underneath. I learn so much from these lovely women.

About two weeks ago my dishwasher stopped working. After talking with a repairman, I decided to buy a new one since mine is old enough that I didn’t want to plunk a few hundred dollars into it. I decided on my first Bosch (with a third rack – yay!) but apparently they are back ordered so we’ve been doing dishes by hand, which is what I did for years and don’t mind at all. Except that I tend to do it only when the sink gets full, so I’m slouchy about it. A few days later my washing machine stopped working, just like that. After talking with the repairman I decided not to replace the computer components of it, since it too is older and has been used almost daily for eight years. So I bought a new washing machine, my first LG. Lloyd and I humped it up many stairs into the house and he set it up for me. That was a relief. Then, my iMac desktop decided one afternoon to give me the Black Screen of Death, after having been fine for seven years. The AppleCare tech on the phone led me through a series of things to try, but the hard drive seemed to have disappeared — not a good sign when one has reams of important foster care paperwork stored on that hard drive. The nearest Apple store is three hours away, so I drove to Minnetonka to have it repaired, and the hard drive was shot. What?!?! I did have an external hard drive that had successfully backed up on June 26th, so when I got home WITH MY NEW COMPUTER I was able to migrate all my documents over. Except, my old Microsoft version wasn’t compatible with my new computer, so I had to go online and buy the latest Microsoft suite so I can read and access all my Word docs. Yes. And then my printer decided to not work anymore at all, and I had to order a new one. Mine was a good workhorse and I got my money’s worth out of it, but still. And then my iPhone began to die just a few days ago. It’s old, so it’s not a terrible surprise, but the timing of all of this was a little daunting. Almost laughable. I realize these are all first-world problems and I’m not complaining, just sharing.  🙂

Lloyd and I finished watching the series Endeavour and are now into Shetland. It makes me want to drop everything and head to the Shetland Islands, or at least to the north of the Scottish mainland. I’ll bet it’s not 92º and steamy as a sauna in Scotland. I’ll bet my dishwasher, washing machine, computer, printer and phone wouldn’t have broken if I were in Scotland.

I hope you’re doing whatever it takes to keep yourself and your family healthy these days. And I pray that Jesus will be your joy and comfort and help.

C.S. Lewis on Joy…

In speaking of this desire for our own far-off country, which we find in ourselves even now, I feel a certain shyness. I am almost committing an indecency. I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence: the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves: the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both. We cannot tell it because it is a desire for something that has never actually appeared in our experience. We cannot hide it because our experience is constantly suggesting it, and we betray ourselves like lovers at the mention of a name.

Our commonest expedient is to call it beauty and behave as if that had settled the matter. Wordsworth’s expedient was to identify it with certain moments in his own past. But all this is a cheat. If Wordsworth had gone back to those moments in the past, he would not have found the thing itself, but only the reminder of it; what he remembered would turn out to be itself a remembering. The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.

Apparently, then, our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be re-united with something in the universe from which we now feel cut off, to be on the inside of some door which we have always seen from the outside, is no mere neurotic fancy, but the truest index of our real situation.

And to be at last summoned inside would be both glory and honour beyond all our merits and also the healing of that old ache…

The whole man is to drink joy from the fountain of joy.

 ~ C. S. Lewis

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A few mornings ago I was driving home from seeing the baby geese and ducks at the cemetery. It was perfect weather — a deep blue sky with a few billowy clouds, a low dewpoint, and the temperature was about 52 degrees. There was enough of a breeze to need a sweater. I noticed that some of Northern Minnesota’s wildflowers are blooming. As I saw the purple and pink lupine, yellow buttercups and orange hawkweed on the sides of the roads, a memory wafted into my mind and I was instantly transported and filled with a longing ache for Michael that brought tears to my eyes.

Our wedding anniversary was June 28th, and for as many years as I can remember, we tried to go away for a weekend together to celebrate. When my mom was still alive, she would have Sharon, Carolyn and Sara stay at her house so Michael and I could have our time alone, and the girls always loved being with Grandma Sooter. She catered to them like nobody else, and it was a joy to know they would have such a good time while Michael and I headed north.

We usually drove up the North Shore of Lake Superior on Friday afternoon, and stayed in a cabin either in Grand Marais or Lutsen, and a couple of times on the Gunflint Trail close to the Canadian border. We returned on Sunday afternoon, anxious to see the girls but happy to have celebrated another year of God’s faithfulness to us.

June is when the spikey lupine begins to bloom on roadsides and in sweeping meadows almost everywhere you look. The delicate buttercups and invasive but pretty hawkweed flowers always mingle with the lupine, so a drive up the already spectacular shore of Lake Superior is made more breathtaking by the acres of color, waving in the wind.

Seeing the June wildflowers blooming this week brought our anniversary trips back to me, and stirred something in me that is more than just missing Michael. Yes, the flowers helped me remember that he and I loved going down the Alpine Slide in Lutsen, racing each other and laughing, to see who could reach the bottom of the mountain first. How he and I sat in front of the huge fire in the lodge and read together, shoulders touching. How we hiked to the top of Carlton Peak, ate top sirloin steak at The Birch Terrace Supper Club in Grand Marais, canoed on Flour Lake while he fished and I read a book on Ireland, sat by the largest freshwater lake in the world and talked about the kids, the Lord, our future.

I loved him so much. And after five years, I still miss him. After remarrying eight months ago and feeling so grateful for Lloyd, my heart still catches when I think of Michael. Maybe it’s because we had so many years together. I can’t explain it, but I am not going to apologize for it either. For those who grieve a spouse and love someone new at the same time, I understand.

The lupines and the other wildflowers arrayed in their fine clothing called out to me as I drove this week, and even though I couldn’t hear their flower voices with my limited human ears, I caught the faint strain of their message deep inside me.

C.S. Lewis wrote of experiencing “the echo of a tune we have not heard, the scent of a flower we have not found, and receiving news from a country we have never yet visited.” The swaths of textured, living color were more than just reminders of times Michael and I had together. They seemed to bring me news of a country I have never yet visited, a land to which Michael has gone, a place (and a Person) I pine for every day.

I had some trouble with my sleep last night. Some nights I go to bed at 10:00 and don’t wake until 5:30 or 6:00 and when I do I always think, “Thank you Lord! Wow.” Other nights I fall asleep and wake at 2:00 or 3:00 a.m., and can’t get back to sleep. I’ve tried Melatonin spray, which is helpful, but I don’t want to do that all the time.

I woke at 3:16 a.m. and couldn’t get back to sleep, so I got up and watched an hour long program that always records on my DVR. It was about Paul McCusker and his journey from Baptist to Jesus People freak, to non-denominational, to Episcopalian, to Catholic. Paul is a prolific writer who is responsible for most of Focus on the Family’s Adventures in Odyssey and their Radio Theatre, programs my family loved for years. I ate a handful of Planter’s peanuts while I watched, and had some water. Then I went back to bed and fell asleep around 4:30 a.m.

I vividly dreamed that I was walking down the middle of a slightly hilly, but very straight residential street in a neighborhood I didn’t recognize. It was dusk, and everything had a silvery glow to it. The houses were mostly nice ramblers, set back off the street a bit, and each smallish yard had mature, beautiful, leafed-out trees in it. It was a very shady neighborhood. There were some lights on in the houses (of an odd, pinkish cast), but I didn’t see one person in any window or on the street, no traffic. Just me, walking in the middle.

As I walked, I noticed without alarm that water began to rise around me, and it didn’t spread to the houses. It was only the street that slowly became water-covered. The water was silvery from the early evening light. I don’t remember seeing stars or the moon, but there was enough light for me to look down into the water as it rose around me and lifted me off my feet, and see it was very clear, and I saw my body treading water. My legs and feet paddled slowly beneath me. I didn’t feel afraid, but I knew something was going on, and I kept treading water almost effortlessly.

In minutes the water that covered the street was roiling but not cresting. There were big surging swells that lifted me up and lowered me down, and the current was slow, and carried me down the grade of the street. I turned and looked at one side of the street, watching houses as I drifted past them. I never swam (I’m a good swimmer) but just remained upright with my head out of this rising river, treading water and being slowly carried downstream. I noticed the pinkish light coming from the windows of a house or two, and the silver light on the leaves of the trees. The water was deep and powerful. I raised my arm out of the water toward the houses and tried to speak something to them. It seemed important that I say something as I was being carried past.

As sometimes happens in dreams, I had difficulty speaking. I tried very hard to get some words out, but who would have heard anyway? I was the only person I could see. Finally, with great effort I was able to say with real intention to each house, “Jesus!” I would raise my arm to each house as a pastor or priest does when he’s giving a blessing to his congregation at the end of a service, only my arm was stretched out exaggeratedly, and I called once loudly to each home, “Jesus!”

I had no idea what was happening, where everyone was, what neighborhood I found myself in, why only the street had become a rising river, and why I was being taken in this flood of water, but I wasn’t afraid. Perplexed, maybe, but I didn’t feel fear. And I knew I had to reach out to each house and pronounce the very best I could offer, which was Jesus.

I wonder what this dream means, aside from the obvious. Does anyone have a thought?

Hello friends. I have been sheltering at home now since March 19th, when Lloyd and I returned from our trip to California. I go the grocery store when necessary and always wear gloves. I wear a mask if the place I’m going seems to have enough people to make keeping a distance difficult. Once a week my sweet foster resident and I go for a drive, order takeout food, maybe drive through Dairy Queen for a cone, or Culver’s for her favorite, a dish of chocolate frozen custard.

I have been knitting a dark red scarf, very imperfectly, knit 2, purl 2, knit 2, purl 2, and the yarn is very forgiving. I also signed up for the German class through The Great Courses, and as soon as I get my workbook in the mail I’ll begin the thirty online classes. I know a bit of German, having lived there in the late 1970s for almost two years. I baked a boule loaf of bread in a lidded Dutch oven last week, a recipe my oldest daughter tried, and it was delicious. I think I’ll make it again, maybe when I decide to put on a big pot of soup. It was 29 degrees this morning, and today’s highs are in the 40s. In mid-May. So soup still seems like a good choice. And I bought the first jigsaw puzzle of my life not long ago, and Lloyd and I completed the 1000-piece The Last Supper and I actually didn’t hate it.

Lloyd and I have still been watching the series called Endeavour and so far like it a lot. We’re on the third season and there are seven, so we try to watch one in the evenings whenever we’re together. It’s on Prime Video for those of you who are Amazon Prime members.

I had a very long to-do list today and it feels good to have crossed almost every task off my list. I’m sitting in my dining room looking out on sapphire colored Lake Superior, watching chickadees swoop in to choose black seeds from the suction cup feeder on the window, and have just brewed myself a cup of tea. Aaaaand…I’m munching on a couple of See’s candies, lovingly wrapped and dropped off on my front deck by my friend Su. She and I grew up in SoCal (as I’ve mentioned on this blog about 467 times) and See’s was a part of our growing up years. Now you can buy See’s online, but back then we stepped into the white-tiled See’s store at the Eastland Shopping Center in West Covina, and oohed and aahed (silently of course) over the plentiful selection while the older women in white frilly aprons waited with smiles for our decisions. (Always a Bourdeaux for me.) Have you ever had See’s Candies? What were your favorites? My mother loved the rectangular, chocolate-covered molasses strips that were always grouped in fours and placed in the lower right hand corner of the box.

Anyway, I’m going to show you some pictures today of things I have in my house that are red. Some of these pictures have appeared on the blog before, but some are new. The older I get, the more I love dark, jewel-toned colors. I’m always intensely drawn to dark blues, reds (not fire-engine red!) and greens. I like purple if it’s a warmer purple, with brownish tones, like eggplant I suppose.

The bricks on this fireplace in my dining room were lime green when I bought the house almost exactly eight years ago. Michael was still here then. We moved to this house because he was getting sicker, and we needed to downsize and to have fewer stairs. I love my home, but I still have a stab of pain when I think that this was the place Michael knew would be his last dwelling on this earth.

My daughter Carolyn painted the bricks a deep red for me, and she helped me decide on the flowing arrangement of blue, red and black transferware plates I hung above the mantel.

I’ve had a thing for toile for years. I’ve had toile wallpaper in the last three homes I’ve lived in, and I think a bit of toile adds interest in a room, unless you’re decorating with an urban, industrial look, and then you can probably omit the toile. I put this little dark red and cream footstool in front of a Glen plaid chair in my bedroom.

And I love red in nature. Aren’t these leaves gorgeous? This was taken last fall in the cemetery where Michael is buried.

I swear by flannel sheets in the winter and fall, and the silkiest sheets in the spring and summer. These are one of two sets of flannel sheets I use. Buffalo plaid has certainly become a trend, which I usually try to avoid, but these sheets make me sigh when I sleep in them, so I will keep them until they’re threadbare.

I no longer wear red much, since my (porcine) coloring isn’t really compatible (although in COVID-19 times, come on, who cares, right?) This picture of me was taken by my dear friend Bob King, sometime around 1985-6. I was 28 or 29 years old.

My current bedroom has too much wallspace for wallpaper, so I opted for red and cream toile in my small office. And velvet turquoise/aqua curtains. I never know what color these are. Light teal? Dark robin’s egg blue?

This adorable little red and gold bird print was a gift from my daughter Sara. I hung it under a plate and a resin moose head. His name is Mendelssohn.

Anyone who’s acquainted with me knows how important cardinals are in my life. If you don’t know the story, you can click here to read the version I wrote for children.

The beautiful watercolor work by Cheng-Khee Chee was a gift from my dear friend Su. It’s on a shelf in my bedroom and I cherish it. And those two little ones on either side? They’re both seniors in high school right now. How interesting that they’re both wearing red.

There was a time I craved dark red so much, I painted my kitchen walls with it. And I used creamy white and lots of dark blue as accents. This is the kitchen from our former house.

These sheets were a Christmas gift from my daughter Sharon, and when my buffalo plaid sheets are in the wash, these cardinal softies go on.

Aren’t these little salt and pepper shakers sweet? Another thoughtful gift from a dear friend.

These are the warmest slippers I’ve had, and I wear them most of the day. They’re wool, made in Austria, and somehow that makes them more special to me, since I love The Sound of Music. That’s how my logic works sometimes, unfortunately. 1. Need new slippers. 2. Search online for new slippers with arch supports and a bit of red. 3. Find wool slippers with arch supports and a bit of red, made in Austria. 4. Think, “Oh, these were made where Julie Andrews (and Maria Von Trapp for that matter) twirled and sang on the hills of the Alps near Salzburg so when I wear them I will be closer to that beauty that touches my heart and makes me yearn so deeply. 5. Put wool slippers in online cart. 6. Type in credit card information. 7. Click “complete purchase.”

When Sharon took some family pictures of us in the last months of Michael’s life, we liked this one a lot. We had it enlarged and it hangs in my bedroom. When I took it to be framed, I chose a textured gray and a dark red mat to go around the black and white photo. The black frame also has some dark red in it — can you see? Mildred the Schnauzer photobombed, of course.

I’ve had this textured pillow for a long time and it has gone from room to room. For now, its home is on another plaid chair in my bedroom. I prop my Bible and devotional reading on this pillow in the morning, set them on my lap, and spend some time with Jesus.

Below is the most lovely quilt ever, from a friend of the heart I’ve yet to meet. Helen in Switzerland sent me this after Michael died, and it is prominently displayed in my living room, reminding me of her generous love and exquisite creativity.

This handpainted red birdhouse was given to me by some of my grandchildren. It’s called The Birdhouse of Prayer, and came with a red pen and some scraps of paper. Over the years when I’ve been overwhelmed regarding my loved ones’ challenges, I’ve written their names and needs on a piece of paper and just dropped it in through the openings, sending it off to the Lord to handle.

And I still love these bird prints, matted in dark red, or burgundy. These hang in the living room above a plaid chair I don’t love. I had it made years ago and when it was delivered I had an “uh-oh” moment when I realized it was not what I had envisioned it would be. It’s comfortable and I like sitting in it, but the plaid isn’t my favorite. Even though I love plaid. I’ll keep it until I need to downsize again, and be grateful for a nice place to sit.

This painted rock was a gift from a friend at Community Bible Study. An older woman named Hope gave it to a little girl named Adah, and Adah decided to give it to me when she was done with it.  That’s a baby bird with its mouth open at the top.

This red is a bit too bright and orangey, except that it’s part of a tartan plaid, and that makes it totally okay in my book. Most things Scottish are welcome and appreciated in this house. I have another one with some blue in it, and I drape it on the arm of my couch, a present from my dear friend Sue. R.

Red, red, red, and blue. One of our Thanksgiving tables, with a plaid throw, placemats, red chargers and other accents.

Is that enough red for now? I agree.

How are you doing during this time at home? Have you taken up anything new? Read any good books? I’d like to know! Thank you for stopping in.

God’s peace,