Wrap Up

Here are some of the things I've been fussing about this year:

January 

I went down the rabbit hole.
Will-o’-the-Wisps (a light that appears at night over marshy ground or a misleading or elusive goal or hope) are called Jack-o-Lanterns in Denmark. Weird huh? In Argentina, they’re known as Luz Mala. In Bengal = Aleya. Germany? Irrlicht.

Feeding my bean with interesting words (their origins and evolution) is ever so much more calming than following the news.

February

I learned that fishing is a gateway activity to prostitution. That Kimberly Gargoyle is the coked up love child of Dunaway’s Mommie Dearest and Nicholson as Jack Torrence in The Shining. The Alaskan Fiasco, Brainless Boobert and Madge Traiter Trash will never be anything more than dumpster brained half-twits. Oddly, beanie brains like Conspiracy Johnson, lil’ Marco Rubio, Running Man Hawley and Gym Jordan will never achieve their level of popularity. Why? They’re boring. They don’t give good soundbites.

March

I met with the folks at MGH’s Francis H. Burr Proton Therapy Center and began radiation treatments later that month. Joy. I had to be there every day for a short, precise zap to the thoracic section of my spine. The worst part of the whole thing? The commute. I’m hoping that when I see my neurologist on Tuesday, he’ll have good news about both the protoning AND the current chemo.  

April 

My beautiful angelic, most wonderful kitten had to move on to the next life. It was time for her to meet Bast. I held her on my arms in the car and then at the hospital while the gentle vets administered the go-to-sleep drugs. I know this sounds silly but I kept telling her she was going to be with The Amazing Bob where they could watch cowboy movies together again (seriously, they really did this).

May 

We adopted Cake. I was afraid that, perhaps, I’d not given myself enough time to mourn Coco. No. Mourning goes on—it doesn’t shut off like a light switch. Just as I love Ten but still miss TAB, I love Cake and still miss Coco terribly.

I also shared some unpopular food thoughts in May. Why? I’m helpful, that’s why! 

June 

In June there were pictures from here in Valhalla. 

July

There were more pics in early July when Hillel and his wife were in Prague where he was officiating a friends wedding.

July brought me the sixth anniversary of my beloved TAB’s death. SIX goddamn years! If he was still alive, he would be turning 81 on the tenth of this next month.

In the gardens of memory, the palaces of dreams, this is where we will meet.
~ Lewis Carroll, Alice Through the Looking Glass

And I caught COVID in July as well. Thanks to vaccines and boosters I survived. You may’ve noticed this—the still being alive shit. Of course, I may actually be writing this from my home in the afterlife. Where might that be? How the fuck should I know—I’m an agnostic, remember? I figure we’ll all find out when we get there.

August  

The month blew in with the realization that our new boy, Cake, has more refined social skills than me. I suppose that doesn’t take much. You already knew that was likely the case though, didn’t you?

Also, we adopted a hobbit, not a cat.

September

This month I realized that I’m awfully bad at being old. I probably should’ve taken a class before I hit 60 or something. 

October

 In October, I was looking to see What's Up?  In one of my usual Art Hunts, I found the Icehotel Winter in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden (about 100 miles north of the Arctic Circle in Swedish Lapland).

By the by, the flight from Boston to Lapland will take (with two stops), a minimum of 17.5 hours or as much as 40.5 hours. Jen suggested the first stop might be in Iceland with the second connection being through Stockholm. Taking a flight break in Stockholm would be cool—we’ve never been there before.

In November I had some VERY important questions about Adam and Eve and general pronouncements about random shit (like spinach—which belongs in everything—yes really, Star Wars AND Star Trek, Tom Waits and more).

Also in November, I caught Cake texting Jen during her workday. That boy’s sly and crafty, I'm tellin' you. 

December

This past year I had a lot of rambling, random brain walkabouts. Of course I did—between my ongoing SLOOOOOW recovery and rehabbing, COVID and the return of cold weather, December was no exception.

Fer instance: what do you have for lunch when you don’t know what you feel like having?

• Lobster and glitter goulash?
• Squash Tylenol smoothies?
• Garlic and hair stuffed cell phone pockets?

Then there were an assortment of dirtbags and good people (sadly, I couldn't include quite ALL of the good people).

So that was some of the year that was.

Happy New Year. I hope this next one is full of increasingly awesome health (for all of us), the comfort of friends and other random loved ones, travel to places other than MGH plus a few interesting dreams or more.