30 April 2014: Wednesday ... Y spinning w/Maria ... BodyPump w/Amy (tough but good) ... Theresa, a sprite, birthed two 9-pound babies, now 7 and 3 ... Lubna and Urdu greeting ... Mary Jane's loving nature (20 years at Y in child care) ...

Lubnah (sic), who is Pakistani, just taught me "Kah say yoo", Urdu for "How are you?" at the Y (this was after I asked her, in French, "Comment vas-tu?" and she responded, "Good", unknowingly). I take yoga with her. (I sent the previous note through my iPhone by using the app that allows me to take notes and then send them via instant messaging or email, I chose the latter).

Headed out, on this rainy Wednesday evening, to visit the Delaware Music School for the first time and attend its scholarship concert with the Serafin Quartet and friends. It starts at 7:00 p.m. and I want to make sure I have plenty of time, which is currently 6:25 p.m. (have to run Dancer out first in this rain). 

25 February 2014: Tuesday ... two fitness classes today, a first (yoga with Christine and then BodyPump in the evening) ... vertuccirose@gmail.com IS BORN (Mom has email) ...

Felt a little out of sorts today but was revived by Christine's yoga class and then had the idea, which I should have had a long time ago, to get mom a gmail account and have her learn to receive and send basic email responses through the iPad. It's going to be a learning process but today it began and hopefully it will progress.

The account, which I pondered, is a mix of her maiden name and middle name as the first choice -- virginiarose  -- was not available, so I went to --- vertuccirose -- which was available. Hopefully, she'll get a charge out of it and enjoy using it. We shall see.

21 February 2014: Friday ... Doug to Home Depot for door stop & batteries, among other items ... doin' BodyPump at 10:15 ... photo of Norma with baby cousins in lap ...

Thanks to Doug I now have my gmail up and running again on my iPhone and was finally able to send this old photograph of Norma Clare with her daughter and Lindsay, the two girl cousins, on her lap at the home in Westminster Heath (off Moores Mill Road).

Let's try phrases that illustrate moments during the day, times that are revelatory, that open up a window to a new understanding or sense of human compassion all wedded to a sincere belief that love is the glue that holds all we humans together. I'll list and perhaps, later, connect:

1. She (Zariana -- Doh boh botch neeya - Ukrainian equivalent of the Russian - Dos vee danya) is demure, so frail and lovely in her youth as she waits in line for Body Pump at the Western Y this Friday morning. I recognized her (met her yesterday as I noticed and commented on her accent -- an annoying foible of mine) as Ukrainian with elementary English. I mention the peace treaty between the president, hated by many in her country, and the dissidents. She is doubtful and skeptical about peace and presses her hands to her heart and says that the divisions are so great and that the peace must come from the people and not a written document. I concur, wholeheartedly. Later, during the exercise time, I help her put up her platform as we both go to store ours at the same time.
   
   
   
   
2. The morning airing of Performance Today on Georgia Public Radio's Augusta station, WACG via by iPhone NPR app always enlightens. Today, Fred Child had the conductor of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, Bill Eddins, on for the hour to give his personal music choices. They included Bach, Beethoven, Ravel and a surprising choice that he compared to the young genius of Mozart and Mendelssohn. She was the younger sister of the great French teacher of composing, Nadia Boulanger, her name was Lili, and he played an extended operatic piece she composed at age 19 centering on the story of Faust. She died, tragically, of Crohn's Syndrome, at the precious age of 24 on the Ides of March 1918. What a loss to the world of music.
   
   
   
   Lili Boulanger
   
   

   3.  A third and concluding revelation on this day involved the final song of Schubert's Die Winterreise  of "Der Leiermann" and the recording of Hans Hotter, baritone, and pianist, Gerald Moore, and it concerns the playing length of notes and a 1/16th rest. The ultimate artistry of Moore, a favorite of my dad's and the greatest accompanist bar none of the 20th century, is seen as he pauses for that slight moment throughout the song, that 1/16th rest, and the singer, how he holds out the 1/4 notes to their full length. It is so easy to rush but you can't rush the organ grinder in the cold, playing his music and being ignored and unheard. You cannot ignore or hear the beauty of this song, a spiritual centerpiece for dad, especially when Richard Tauber sang it.
   
   

            
   Hans Hotter                                                        Gerald Moore

17 February 2014: Monday ... BodyPump ... a call from Joyce ... Skeesha visit ... talk with Ben's dad ... The Night Classical pianist Simone Dinnerstein and singer-songwriter Tift Merritt ... Ladysmith Black Mombazo amazing tribute album ... 70-year-old gravedigger in frozen soil

Getting set to go to my first practice with the small singing group, The Associates, directed by Margaret Love at the home of Joanne in the North Star neighborhood between Paper Mill and Limestone Roads (husband is Thom Remington, brother of Jeanne Hanson) at 206 Mercury Road, 4.4 miles or a 9 minute drive, according to Google maps. It should be fascinating. I'm taking my Beethoven Quartet book and my Schubert lieder book to show Margaret and Thom and the others.

Margaret Love playing the harp during
church service at UUSMC on 16 February 2014, Sunday. 

12 February 2014: Wednesday ... "make a list" encouraged mom and I did and got a lot done, felt rested in the morning ... BodyPump w/Carla in early pm (nice conversation) ... snowlit walk with Dancer as storm moves in on Pecksniff ... lots of texts ... connection

5 February 2014: Wednesday ... found the other iPad charger in the living room at the end of the couch (it'd been weeks lost) ... visits from Skeesha and Beth today from Delaware Hospice ... great BodyPump w/Carla (who scowled at the sound system to get it to work) ...

LOST AND FOUND: Sometimes they just show up because you run into them again. Such was the case with my iPhone and iPad charger, which I had two of and then managed to misplace one of them and consequently, had to charge each item separately. There is something greater in significance to finding something that you've given up on for lost. There is the immediate relief and joy at finding it, but why did you give up on it in the first place. Was there no search process that covered all the bases, thoroughly? Well, when I saw the charger on the arm of the sofa under the Ubeda painting in the living room, closest to the lamp, I thought: It's been there for weeks and I have not noticed it. What is the reason it stayed there for weeks, lost in my estimation? Did I not water the plant my father treasured, a gift from Sydney Steele, did I not vacuum or dust? Obviously not, for there it was, unperturbed, untouched for days upon days. Will I learn from this? Probably not, I haven't in the past, and at the present time, the same urgings and desires run through me that are purposeless and hurtful. Discipline is not for the squeamish.

MOM SAYS I'M NOT FEELING WELL: That is often the refrain from mom when I inform her that Skeesha Johnson is coming. Well, I pooh-pooh it because she gets well, quickly, and enjoys the attention and the conversation with her Delaware Hospice contingent as was the case today in spades. The delightful young mother and CNA, born in Jamaica (?) or at least has a Jamaican father, who died recently and she went to the island nation for his interment, does her work with joy and competence. Mom just adores her and Skeesha seems to like mom, too. It's a nice pairing.

Later, Beth Kincaid, RN, showed up and we worked to clear up the medicine needs. We are short of Xanax, Tamazepam, and Hydrocodone, all essential to the well-being of mom, especially the anti-anxiety drug Alprazolam, which she did without this evening because the drug order did not arrive as Beth estimated (it came the next day, first the hydrocodone and then, still waiting at 1:34 p.m., the Xanax and Tamazepam), but she is a careful and deliberative health care provider and has mom's best interests at heart.

GREAT BODYPUMP WITH CARLA: One of only two men in the class, Carla, our instructor, feisty and fit and enthusiastic, really put together a great workout. She had some difficulty with the sound system and seemed to rustle it into order by looking up at the speaker in the ceiling and scowling as she pressed the buttons to start the bouncy, hip-hop music. One of the participants, Diana, a young mother with two pre-teen daughters, remembered my name from the yoga class yesterday where our instructor, Christine, led us into a circle and played a naming game. It worked for her. I remembered that there was some slight confusion over her name as she was initially called Diane instead of Diana. Regardless, it was a delightful interchange. She is a EMT studying to be a nurse now that her children are both in class. I asked where she knew Kristen, who works at the front desk of "Y" and is also studying to be an RN at Del Tech, where she is going. She did not recognized the name but was impressed that she was set to graduate in May. Believe she has just started the program, perhaps.

23 January 2014: Thursday ... the chill continues ... to the Y twice today ... Flyers' losing streak reaches three ...

We got our medications, thankfully, dropped off, as usual, almost clandestinely and furtively on the front doorstep by FedEx and everything was there. Mom has her med for the coming week at least. Calls from Beth were most helpful.

Worked out at the Y this afternoon with weights and did a selection of available ones and had to modify my workout on the computer. Ended with the stair step machine and that kicks your butt. I made it to the top of Big Ben or 37 floors and was spent. It's hard work and of course, great cardio, if you can stand it.

Made it back to the "Y" for a primer by Jennifer Fawzi, a trained instructor in LesMills workouts (which I will take -- her class -- on Monday), in the early evening and it was quite helpful and instructive. Working out consistently has certainly been in her favor as she is fit, attractive and I would say, middle aged. She gave a thorough description of cycling and her own discipline of lifting weights during a workout with songs. The name eludes me at present, have brochures downstairs which I'm too lazy, or what the heck, it's called BODYPUMP and you use weights and lift in traditional poses but do extended reps. Should be interesting.

The walk tonight was another chill one and mom called me as I circumnavigated Mealey's Funeral Home about a need for morphine. Told her it would be about 30 minutes. I crossed the road, tentatively, as the cars come quickly and the snow is a dangerous deterrent, but I made it into Limestone Acres past the homes (probably moved by now) of the Snyders (Rocky and Jay) and the McCauley's (cannot recall his name, my age who always impressed me with doing his homework on the bus before he got home, oh Greg, and who I learned later in life was treated for a mental illness), and took the first street on the left, walked an extended block to Pickwick, turned left, crossed Limestone Road, again, with care back to 4546 for a total of 1.25 miles on the digifit app. A decent walk as I received the sole word -- "Congratulations" -- in a flat, officious tone from the iPhone female-voiced app.

So disappointing to watch the Flyers tonight play the Columbus Blue Jackets in Ohio. They went ahead 2-1 only to give up the next 4 goals and lose 5-2 to their former high-price signer goal, Sergei Bobrovsky, who is on an unbeaten streak as are the BJs this January. Not so with the Flyers.