the war is over

To all the medical eyes who have been watching these past three years, the Patient is considered a recovery statistic. Therefore, I am laying down the arms of the Tonsil War and taking up everyday life again. Welcome to this new site where, God willing, normalcy (!) will prevail. I have been holding off writing anything, anywhere until I could unilaterally declare that this family has moved out of the war status and back to a place where the threat of dire disease does not pervade our thoughts. No more "How's he doing?" Let me just say that he's doing fine and with a few thousand calories more per day he'll be doing even better. I hope to write about things more interesting than illness.

The trip to La Jolla (remember that?) was great fun. Spent time with friends, went to the campus for various events; cocktail party Thursday night, beach gathering Friday that was sort of a bust since only a handful of people showed up. Friday night my hostess had a dinner party for classmates and one of our teachers. There we were, these old broads sitting around the table laughing at our teen-age antics. Terrific evening. Saturday morning chapel service (always moving and lovely) followed by an al fresco luncheon. Spent some time with the woman who had been headmistress during my years there. She's 98 1/2 years young. Remembers everyone's name. Saturday night big blow-out Hollywood-style over-the-top party to celebrate the 100th birthday of the school. Flew home Sunday. Good weekend. A dozen of us are meeting again in Dallas in October. I guess we don't get enough of this re-hash stuff.

My classmate Sandy, with whom I stayed, lives in Mission Hills, a lovely old section of San Diego that boasts, among other things, lots of canyons. She shares her house with this adorable creature.

His name is Divot and he talks. I'm not kidding. Yes, he barks, but he also chatters. He also smiles. Very amusing.

Sandy bought an old house, completely gutted it and restored it to its original Craftsman-style glory. It perches right on the edge of a canyon that is covered in eucalyptus trees, masses of wild nasturtiums, some sort of vining wild rose and various other shrubs. Her neighbor transformed a rather ratty garden into something Monet would envy. The flowers spill over her fence and trail down the canyon. We sat out on the deck on Friday morning gazing at all this lush loveliness.

When I visit San Diego I am always amazed by the variety of plants ~ trees, flowers, shrubs ~ that grow there. The climate supports everything, unlike the hot valley where those delicate blooms would fry in an instant. But when I got home I discovered that summer had shown up while I was gone and the back looked quite beautiful.

It's still too cold to swim but perfect weather for gardening. In fact, we had quite a nice rainstorm, complete with thunder and lightening on Wednesday evening. Very refreshing. Rafa finished installing our new low volume sprinkler system. Next will be some up-lighting for the Japanese maple and birch trees. Then I think the House and Garden chores for the season will be done.

My sister is still in the rehab facility in CT. She may be home by July. Andrew is thriving in Shanghai. He found the government shut-down on June 4th to be quite amazing. Em is about finished with her freshman year. Alex will soon be busy getting her ready to head off to Thacher in August. Spouse and I were planning to fly up to Bozeman tomorrow but Cait reported this morning that it was 30º and snowing. Since Mr. C's thermostat was fried by radiation and he is always cold we have decided to wait until somewhat warmer weather.

During the last two weeks also saw my doc ~ A+. I visited my new car; I should get it in about a month. I've read a couple of books ~ John Banville's "The Book of Evidence" and C.J. Samson's "Dissolution." Recommend both. I have also watched several movies, including "Starting out in the Evening" (Frank Langella) which I loved, "Changeling" (Angelina Jolie and her lips; boring), "Flash of Genius" (Greg Kinnear) and yesterday "Doubt." A tour de force on everyone's part. Meryl Streep and Philip Seymore Hoffman are so good, so compelling. A shocking end. See it.