Family, Holidays, Judaism

Grandkids

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Yule and the Moon of New Beginnings

Sunday gratefuls: Ruth. Gabe. Hannukah. Presents all round. Positive affirmations. Yule. Winter Solstice. Alan. Joanne. Hummingbird. Mechanical puzzles. Challah. French toast. Donuts. Shadow away. Gabe admitted to Hamline. Joe. His smile. Applications for school. Shadow Mountain Home. Nathan and the Dog run.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Puzzles

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:  Yirah.    Radical amazement, awe.

“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.”
― Albert Einstein

Becoming a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Blue and white Hannukah gift bags assembled on the table when Ruth and Gabe came inside after their drive up the hill from Denver; Gabe got the menorah and a box of Hannukah candles from the Judaica closet, brought them down to the breakfast table where Ruth busied herself lighting each candles base to seat them in the menorah.

 

The best thank you. As soon we’d finishing opening our presents, Gabe had a puzzle in his hands, already determined. Later on, Ruth, too. These aren’t garden variety puzzles. They come from Kubiya games, ranked in level of difficulty, 1-5. After Gabe finished last year’s puzzles pretty fast, this time I got all 5 level.

He asked me if his struggle was making me happy. I said yes. He laughed.

A season pass to A-Basin, Ruth’s big Hannukah present, had a few smaller ones added to it. A wall-size chromatic color chart, a jigsaw puzzle, vintage, of the human skeleton, and a Silence, Please coffee mug from the Bodleian Library. Gabe got a mug, too.

We’ve been doing Hannukah together since Kate and I moved here eleven years ago yesterday. Some of those early years Jen, Jon, Ruth, Gabe, Kate. Apres divorce no Jen. After Kate died no Kate. After Jon died no Jon. Now the three of us carry on, adding memories and time together.

Gabe got admitted to, and wants to attend, Hamline College in St. Paul. Hamline sits on Snelling Avenue which, further south, runs past St. Paul Central High School, Joe’s alma mater.

My old buddy, Howard Vogel, taught Constitutional Law at Hamline’s law school for many years. Jon graduated from Augsburg College not too faraway in Minneapolis. I lived in St. Paul for several years and Kate and I bought our first house together on Edgcumbe Road. A lot of family history in St. Paul.

Both Ruth and Gabe have finished their semesters. Gabe wants out of high school. So bad. High school sucked, he said echoing more than one senior with only one semester, or as he put it, the final eighth to go.

Ruth completed her first year of pre-med, maintaining her 3.9 gpa and earning the opportunity to become a T.A. in her Chemistry class next semester. She holds down two jobs and carries a full class load.

The grandkids are doing ok.

Dogs, Friends, GeekWorld, Politics, Shadow Mountain

Internet Refugees

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Samain (last day) and the Moon of New Beginnings

Shabbat gratefuls: Arjean and Tara. Eleanor and Kingsley. Generator. High Winds. The Grid. C.O.R.E. Lenovo. Ana. Natalie. Making the NYT. New computer. Getting it setup. Winter Solstice. Reading the news, books, magazines. Poetry. Morning darkness. Exercise. Shadow in boarding school. Joe in the U.S. Shabbat.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Starlink

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:  Yirah.    Radical amazement, awe.  “The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.”
― Albert Einstein

Becoming a metaPhysician

One brief shining: The days have begun to march toward the end of another year, another orbit completed in our circular, cyclical, non-linear path around Great Sol, yet before we get there: Winter Solstice, Yule, Christmas Eve, Christmas, Kwanza, New Year’s Eve how wonderful, these are my days of awe brilliant with legend, filled with memories, wedded to us by centuries, millennia of human longing.

 

Friday: Internet refugees. With my generator chugging along and my Starlink antenna aimed toward the northern sky, I had both power and the internet. Tara and Arjean had neither thanks to an Xcel intentional shutdown. Both of them had work they needed to do, homework as it is these days, yet could not.

Tara asked if she and Arjean could come and work here. I’m delighted you want to. Come when you need, stay as long as you like. In addition to electricity and internet, I also have a large fenced in back yard. Eleanor and Kingsley needed a place to romp.

The generator, with very brief interruptions, ran from Wednesday around 1 pm to Friday around noon. Made me feel good to be able to share what it made possible.

Due to family Ana had to wait until yesterday to clean the house. For a while, I had three adults and two dogs here. Shadow Mountain home buzzed with energy.

To complete the day Natalie came over to pick up Shadow’s heartworm meds and we chatted about Shadow. She will come to Natalie and let her put on the leash. “Though,” Natalie says, “she still looks like she’s going to die.” She crosses the threshold coming in from outside, yet Natalie says she’s reluctant to go back out. Well, geez.

I’ve recovered my exercise rhythm and had completed my workout before everybody showed up.

A good Friday.

 

Just a moment:  For reasons I don’t fully understand, I’ve begun to feel optimistic about our political future. 11 months to the day in this abysmal simulacrum of governance the cracks in DJT’s obsessive, unfocused, unintentional approach (which have always been there) have begun to widen enough to include Republicans, even some of his MAGA cult members.

Yes, he has three more years and one month (no, I don’t believe he can get around the 22nd amendment) and can still do more damage, but my gut tells me the political zeitgeist has begun to turn against him. We will see.

 

Shadow Mountain, Sport

Power

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Samain and the Moon of New Beginnings

Friday gratefuls: Generator. High Winds. Mountain living. Fresh Snow. Hanukkah. Damaged Dog house. Waiting on Nathan. Shadow and her heartworm meds. Natalie. Dr. Josy. Tara. Eleanor and Kingsley.  The Hummingbird. Alan and Joanne. Marilyn and Irv. C.O.R.E. Our electricity co-op. 80433 still 98% dark. Mother Nature can have a heavy hand. All our Wild Neighbors confronted with loss of body heat.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Automatic Transfer Switches

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Becoming a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Maybe an hour or two yesterday evening of connection to the grid, then with a flicker and a thrum, the sound of the generator was once again heard on the Mountain, back to its already over a day of constant on, giving me water, internet, light, warmth, a feeling of security as I switched on my oxygen concentrator last night and went to bed.

 

Hard to value a generator. The whole home sort that Kate and I bought ran between nine and ten thousand dollars when we bought it well over 15 years ago. A lot more now, I’m sure. I said in the post yesterday that Kate’s heat intolerance made the decision. A big chunk of it, yes. The clincher though was water.

Ever since we moved to Andover in 1994, we’ve lived on properties with their own water and septic. Septic works on gravity and hydraulics which power outages don’t affect. Water however relies on an electric pump. Hand washing. Cooking. Showering. Irrigating in the case of Andover. Not to mention staying hydrated. We plunked down our money.

The proof of its value comes over the years. When it comes on with the easy grace of the automatic transfer, a sigh of relief. The longer it runs, the more grateful I am to have it. Beats lighting with candles, heating with a fireplace meant for aesthetics, and cooking by opening cans or roasting something over the fire. May sound romantic, and if voluntary, sure. But all day, all night for two plus days? Not so much.

 

Sports: OK. I’ll admit it. I like football. Watched the first half of the Seahawks v Rams last night. Wish I didn’t go to bed at 7:30, but I do. Got crazy near the end and the Seahawks won in over time. I’m allowing myself more football watching even though it includes advertisements which I loathe and pays ridiculous amounts of money to men, enough to make them ignore concussions and later life altering injuries. If I watch, I’m complicit.

Still. The intricacy and the elegance. The struggle. The crash of behemoth linemen, the beautiful running of a back squeezing through the line. A pass arcing just over the arms of a defender then to be caught one-handed. The occasional play that breaks loose: a runback of a kick for a touchdown, a back headed for a first down who breaks a tackle and rumbles on for thirty, forty, fifty yard. Poetry.

Memories, Minnesota, Mountains, Shadow Mountain, Weather +Climate

Blowin’ In the Wind

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Samain and the waning crescent of Shadow’s Moon

Thursday gratefuls: High winds. Mini-splits out. Generator on. Kylie, pain doc today. Shadow on her leash. Making progress at boarding school. Rachel, my Alabama gal palliative care social worker. Her Cat and her Christmas Tree. Trash containers stayed stable until pickup. 80433, my zip code, 98% effected by power outage.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Generator

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Becoming a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Winds have howled like lonely Wolves since yesterday morning, rattling windows, threatening to up turn trash containers and share our leftover stuff with our neighbors, predicted to last now until tomorrow, Friday, morning; the Wind wants to come inside, find a crack, a slightly open window, an unsecured door, a real force of nature.

On one sweaty Andover, Minnesota afternoon Kate and I sat at our long kitchen table, talking about how good the air-conditioning felt. Kate got serious. We need a generator. I knew what she meant. If the heat went out in a frigid Minnesota winter, Kate could cope. If the air-conditioning failed us because of our common summer Thunderstorms, she could not. A hot-blooded Norwegian gal, my Kate.

We gritted our financial teeth and bought a Kohl whole-house generator. These generators connect to gas lines and have automatic transfer switches that sense a power outage. The transfer switch turns on the generator and switches its output to the house’s electrical panel. Happy Kate. Happy me.

We got satisfaction out of being “on generator.” Its two cylinder engine’s thrum proof that we had made a wise decision. When we moved, I decided we’d take the generator along. Not easy, it had to be strapped to a pallet and lifted into the moving van by four very strong guys.

It got off-loaded to the garage and there it sat for over a year as I learned how to deal with a paucity of trades people in the mountains. Finally found Altitude Electric who agreed to install it. The generator sits today on the western side of the house, beside all the electrical panels and the transfer switch. Yes, up here all of the electrical panels live on the outside of the house. Surprised the hell outta me.

Yesterday around one p.m. I read on Next Door Shadow Mountain that one guy’s weather station had recorded a Wind gust of 116 mph. I found it  hard to believe until I looked this morning at reports of wind speeds across the Front Range. Several in the 100, 102 range. So. Could be.

Around that time my lights flickered, my zoom call with Paul crashed and we had to switch to our phones to finish our conversation. Not long after I got off the phone, I heard that thrum again.

Hey, Kate. We’re on generator.

Politics

Richardsonism

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Samain and the Shadow Moon

Wednesday gratefuls: Shirley Waste. Mark, the mailman. Gifts assemble! For Hanukkah. Ruth and Gabe. Winter, wherefore art thou Winter? Climate changes. Stronger Hurricanes. Sea Level Rise. Ocean temperature rise. Coral bleaching. Polar and Glacial Ice melting. And so much more. The Great Work. Mother Earth and her strength. Humanity and its fragility.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Long Nights

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Seared the thick pork loin chops on high in a large cast iron skillet, put the skillet in the oven while I gathered sauerkraut, cherry Tomatoes, a plate, some aluminum foil to cover the two chops, letting them rest, continue cooking a bit, juices gathering. Ah.

 

 

 

I subscribe to Nate Silver’s Silver Bulletin. He included this image in his commentary above the reposting of his tweet:

Silver leans left, even acknowledges his affection for the world Richardsonism wants as suggested in the chatgpt image he produced above. And, yet.

He’s also the consummate political realist, steeped in the world of polls, analytics, and hard-nosed how do you really win strategy. So. While he may admire Richardsonism as a political ideal, he sees it as a naive approach electoral politics.

Silver admits that Richardson did not set out to create what he considers the third of three major divisions in the Democratic Party. But he thinks she has. Here in his  own words are the three factions:

“First, there’s the Capital-L Left: populist, deservedly feeling recharged by the success of Zohran Mamdani and a backlash to the increasingly politically assertive billionaire class.

Next, there’s what you might think of as the Abundance Libs: technocratic, more willing to find common ground with Republicans, and more sympathetic to market-based solutions.

The third faction Richardsonism or a term I’ll treat as synonymous with it: #Resistance Libs. They’re older, with extremely high educational attainment, predominantly female, and very highly politically engaged. This is the audience for a cluster of political activism encompassing things such as the No Kings protests and some highly popular anti-Trump Substacks along with certain prominent podcasts and much of Bluesky.”  Silver Bulletin, Dec. 16, 2025

Though I love Richardson’s substacks and usually agree with her analysis, you’ll find me firmly in the Capital L-Left Camp. That is, when forced to choose, as electoral politics forces us to do, I’m an economic justice guy tinged with more than a little retail political realism.

That happens to be Silver’s main point about Richardsonism and the Tea Party. The politics of purity collides with realpolitik. It does so by using its pure ideas, its dreams as a basis for choosing policies, candidates, and strategy. In other words it gets out over its skis by privileging ideas over the actual sentiments of the electorate. Result: Trump in office.

Final note: Though Silver and I both want a Richardsonian America, we recognize true political change as incremental. Yes, in spite of Trump’s appearance to the contrary. Take the Affordable Care act as a for instance. It got as close to universal health care as the realpolitik would allow. Yet it is now firmly lodged in the craw of even the most diehard MAGA congressman and only awaits a shift in the political winds to go deeper and more broadly towards its goal.

As Unitarian minister Theodore Parker said: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

 

 

 

Cancer, Far Right, Health, Politics, White Supremacy, Writing

Reading Right

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Samain and the Shadow Moon

Tuesday gratefuls: Paul and Christopher. Findlay and Sarah. Kate and Clare. High Winds. Shadow away. Arrival Day yesterday. Joe. Working out again. Cancer. Dr. Bupathi. Kristie. Dr. Carter. Jenna and Alise. Andouille. Kielbasa. Shrimp. Pork. Sheetpan recipes. New York Times. Ground News. Washington Post. LA Times. Vox. ProPublica. Ezra Klein. No despair.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Protein

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Oh, these cancer days and cancer nights, long have they stayed, often indolent no worries, ordinary sleep, ordinary waking, once in a while, at least every three months, a bit fraught, will the numbers be good or bad, sometimes, like as of late, ordinary sleep, but some edgy days with moving numbers, m.r.i.s, pet scans, radiation.

 

Health: Got my new PSA numbers over the weekend. A big jump. Uh-oh. Couldn’t ask the question until Monday a.m. Sent a note and Hannah said she’d make sure Dr. Bupathi had seen those results. Thanks, Hannah.

Not long after, again from Hannah, “The team thinks this could be the result of inflammation after radiation. Recheck in six weeks.” That’s also the time frame for my next pet scan. So, ok. Part of the process.

What matters here is whether I have transitioned from hormone treatment sensitive cancer to hormone resistant which requires the next step in protocols, new drugs, stronger ones. If my psa goes down, that is below 0.3, I continue on androgen deprivation therapy-hormone treatment-as I have since 2019.

This has my attention. Not worried yet not placid. Things not definitive. Six weeks of this. I appreciated Hannah understanding my concern, following it down. There are no small roles in this personal life and death drama.

 

Just a moment: A continuing commitment. I will read and comment on the news, especially news originating from non-traditional sources like the conservative Bulwark, the liberal Vox and Propublica, Groundnews, the Atlantic, and the Guardian. For my own original reporting I will continue to take you inside texts like Yasem Hazony’s Conservativism Redefined and the Violent Take It By Force, Matthew Taylor on the New Apostolic Reformation.

This week I’ve purchased two that will occupy much of my time for a while. Abundance by Ezra Klein, a progressive political agenda for our time, and Furious Minds by Princeton scholar of the New Right, Laura K. Field, which analyzes the Making of the MAGA New Right.

This is a project I began a while ago when reading Patrick Deneen’s, Why Liberalism Failed, followed by a book on the John Birch Society, another on Christian Nationalism, and yet  another on thinkers who have impacted the New Right.  Renaud Camus, for example, the French political philosopher who developed Replacement Theory. That was 2023. Well before the return of red tie guy.

Replacement theory shows up in the recent Trumpian National Security Strategy as that document’s warning to Europe about “civilizational erasure.” It also shows up among America white nationalists associated with MAGA.

I’m beginning to trust my sense of what drives the new far right, now I want to understand how its rise will effect our future.

Aging, Ancient Brothers, Fourth Phase

Living the Good Life

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Samain and the Shadow Moon

Monday gratefuls: Broncos v Packers. Whadda game. Happy Camper. Holiday gifts for Ana, housecleaner, and Mark, mailman. Later, Shirley Septic workers. The Ancient Brothers on gifts, gift giving, what do we really want for the holidays. Hawai’i. Hanukkah. The shamash. Nathan. Subway.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Hanukkah

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Took a Washington Post quiz and found myself in the meaningful life bucket for living a good life; the other two, a happy life and a psychologically rich life, also seemed ok, but meaningful did capture my life overall, its summary sentence: “I’ve made a difference!”

 

I mention this Washington Post quiz because Ode’s theme for the Ancient Brothers included the question, what do you really want for the holidays? He specifically pointed us away from things like world peace and toward our own lives, right now.

As you might imagine, the first thought for me was: no more cancer. That’s not gonna happen, I know. Press deeper. Taking that quiz, I realized I had my answer. I want my life to continue to be meaningful. Not productive. Not successful. Not achievement oriented, but meaningful.

What’s meaningful for me at 78, slowed down by fatigue and cancer, will not be, is not the same as me at 40, or 50, even 70. Now meaningful living lies in nurturing relationships of long standing. Nurturing and backstopping family. Developing in the moment kind and loving connections with everyone I meet. Continuing to write Ancientrails. Continuing to deepen my Jewish journey, my pagan journey, my life journey.

Realizing this is what I wanted, really wanted, not only for the holidays, but throughout the year gave me a gathered calm; my life has had this trajectory for a long time, my task now is to live it in my fourth phase, life with a terminal disease.

It means sticking with Shadow, making the necessary adaptations to have her as a permanent part of my life. It means planting Artemis, harvesting food for my table. It means going to mussar, bagel table, CBE men’s group. It means keeping up to date on our changing country, our changing world and commenting on those changes.

Live until l die. A meaningful life.

 

Just a moment: Living my meaningful life has, I realized, important implications for how I live in this fraught time, a time when the actions and struggles that have long made my life meaningful find hostile pushback. Trump and his ilk do not have the power to ruin my life. Only I have that power.

What can I do in this worst of times? Live as full, as rich, as collaborative a life as I can. Which is what I’ve been doing.

How about you?  Happy life? Meaningful life? Psychologically rich? The good life beckons. Yes, even now.

Cancer, Dogs, Far Right, Fourth Phase, Health, Politics, US History, White Supremacy, World History

Link Arms Against This Sea of Troubles

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Samain and the Shadow Moon

Sunday gratefuls: Rising PSA. Shadow, seen. Natalie and Dr. Josy. Winter is coming. (next week) Hanukah. Ruth and Gabe. Joe. Seoah. Murdoch. What I want. Death. Other life punctuation points. Hawai’i. Nathan and the Dog run. Venezuela. Latin America. Central America. North America. The Gulf of Mexico.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Joe

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Shadow cast her presence toward me, casually, too absorbed in other nearby dogs and her trazadone pall to greet her Dad when others of her kind, so many of them, were nearby, crossing behind Natalie’s FJ Cruiser with its DOGS4LIFE license plate, in the Flying J parking lot human companions holding leashes, some pulling toward Shadow to say hi, I’m here, too.

 

Dog journal: First I’d seen Shadow since a week ago Friday. She greeted me, but with little enthusiasm. A little bit of my heart broke. My hope for an enthusiastic smile, a jump, kisses set aside. I noticed, in a bit, that she moved a little slowly, that spark in her personality tamped down.

I’d forgotten the trazadone/gabapentin she was on while the prozac reaches therapeutic levels. Didn’t like it, but I understood the rationale. Reduce her reactivity and help her learn new behaviors. Like letting a leash on. Like easily crossing thresholds. Temporary. Similar to chemical constraints for humans in an agitated state. Shadow exists in an agitated state most of the time.

Natalie said Shadow acted the same at her place as she does at mine, vis a vis thresholds. Made me feel good. Not me. Some psychic gremlin gripping Ms. Shadow when faced with crossing from the outside to the inside.

Natalie, an empathetic and kind person, said she’d come pick up Shadow if I had appointments, keep her for the day and return her. How blessed am I. So many loving folks in my orbit.

We parted after about twenty minutes, Shadow with Natalie.

Good-bye.

 

Health: Yes. My labs showed my PSA jumped, in spite of the radiation, from 0.3 to 2.7. At first I saw the 2.7 and thought, yes! Only later wondering, opening the lab report again. Oh. Not 0.27.

Probably means new drugs. New side effects. Still many options between me and ordinary chemotherapy. Erleada is technically chemotherapy, says so on the pill container, but its side effects have been slight.

There again, blessed. A cancer with many treatments, slow progression. And, for me so far, no symptoms. Happy Holiseason to me!

 

Just a moment: Make Western civilization white again. A sad dream, a dream of the desperate, of the frightened and deluded.

Even the Asian civilizations with which I have some familiarity exhibit strong evidence of liberal ideals. Look at the young women of Korea on a virtual Lysistratan sex strike, wanting their autonomy. Or, young women and men in China. Many of the women rejecting traditional Chinese female roles, many men disillusioned by them and the job market, pushing back against their heritage of centralized control. Taiwan, too.

And here’s the paradox, the irony. Those of us strong with the force of liberal/enlightenment/renaissance ideas of no kings, individualism, small d democracy, individual freedoms and rights as human beings are the ones that recognize most the need to link arms against this tide of civilizational troubles and by opposing end them.

Yes, the liberal journey is not toward a fractious libertarianism, but toward a democratic socialism where the commonweal balances as best as possible with liberty and freedom for all. Not an easy project as our imperfect America has shown since its birth, but an inevitable one pushed forward by the creative tension between individuals and the collective. That’s what I see, what I have lived for.

 

Art and Culture, Cinema and Television, Commentary on the news, Dogs, Far Right, New Apostolic Reformation, Politics, White Supremacy

Our Ruby Slippers

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Samain and the Shadow Moon (radiation complete)

Shabbat gratefuls: The peace of Shabbat. Seeing Shadow at noon today. Dr. Bupathi. Ending radiation. Fatigue. MVP. Those who care. Knowing what I want. Lame duck red tie guy. MAGA cracking. Intellectuals. The thought is the father of the act, often quoted by Curt Ellis. The act leads to a changed lev (heart-mind), mussar. Rabbi Rami Shapiro.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Seeing Shadow at Flying J

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Netzach   “Endurance and Tenacity: Netzach represents the inner strength and fortitude required to pursue a goal or a passion over a long period, especially when faced with obstacles.”

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Like a first date, what will she think of me, what will we do, yet not, another punctuation in my ten month relationship with Shadow-my wu wei mistress in boarding school-I’ll see her today for the first time in a week in the main parking lot of Flying J Ranch, down Shadow Mountain Drive. I’m a little nervous, should I take bones? Treats? Toys?

 

Dog journal: Natalie will take Shadow to Flying J; I’ll drive down five minutes to see them. I wonder what she’ll do? Will she greet me like one of those camouflaged returnees from deployment? Tentative at first, then all waggy and kissy. Or, will she leap into my arms? Or, will she shy away, give in to her embedded flee first instinct? No idea.

Will be very interested to get Natalie’s take on Shadow after her first week at school. Along with the prozac and the dog run, this is a full on press to keep Shadow and me together, each with its own purpose. Prozac to tamp down her reactivity from whatever trauma she experienced in Trinidad. The dog run plus heated dog house to assure she can stay outside even if the training and prozac aren’t enough. With the dog house she can survive cold nights and I can sleep.

A long journey, far from over, I hope. Netzach

 

Just a moment:  The paragraph below from Thomas Friedman’s Dec. 11 column* sets out an interesting hypothesis. Trumpism does not care about foreign or domestic policy in the usual sense. Rather he and his intense cult feel as if a civilizational rug has been or is rapidly being pulled out from beneath them, leaving them in a world they no longer recognize, that may have no room for them. No room of their own to invoke Virginia Woolf. No home. I’m empathetic with the psychic disjunction this must create. Like how I’ve felt during Trump the Ascendant.

I have a new understanding of Trump’s project and that of his followers.  Even more the project of his followers than himself. Consider these: J.D. Vance, The Heritage Foundation, The New Apostolic Reformation, the Christian Nationalists lead ironically by orthodox Jew, Yasem Hazony, and the displaced white working class. The project summed up? Make Western Civilization white again.

In his National Security Strategy Trump declares our old allies in Europe and NATO as seeding their own destruction through allowing uncontrolled immigration. They face, as this document puts it, civilizational erasure. Read, control by non-whites from Turkey and Africa. That’s their fate, he says, unless they stop suppressing the speech and political action of their far-right citizens. Dog whistle for right-wing white nationalists.

When understood this way, the global movement toward authoritarianism, toward right wing populism, toward homogenous national identities, wants to stiff arm the advance of Renaissance and Enlightenment and liberal (small l) ideas, and return the globe to pre-European colonial times.

They will not succeed. Perhaps in the short term, perhaps in certain places, but even the most revanchist of MAGA, of Orban’s Hungary, of Putin’s Russia, already think of themselves as individuals, individuals who have choice and agency in how they live their lives. That’s what powers their actions inside these wanna be totalitarian states. The very essence of liberal political thought.

We will find our way out of this Oz created by weak and insecure wizards. All we need to do is clack together our ruby slippers. Our red shoes.

*”Humans have an enduring, structural need for home, not only as a physical shelter, but as a psychological anchor and moral compass, too. That is why Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz” (my favorite movie) got it exactly right: “There’s no place like home.” And when people lose that sense of home — whether by war, rapid economic change, cultural change, demographic change, climate change or technological change — they tend to lose their center of gravity. They may feel as though they are being hurtled around in a tornado, grabbing desperately for anything stable enough to hold onto — and that can include any leader who seems strong enough to reattach them to that place called home, however fraudulent that leader is or unrealistic the prospect.” Trump isn’t interested in fighting a new cold war; he wants a new civilizational war. NYT, Dec. 11, 2025. Thomas Friedman 

Health, Politics

Relief All Round

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Samain and the Shadow Moon

Friday gratefuls: Done with Radiation. Ablation. Injection. Bracing. No procedures or diagnostics on the immediate horizon. Shadow at boarding school. Support over the last six weeks. NYT editorials on the military. Grief. Again. Still. The price we pay for love. Faraway and nearby friends and family. Shadow Mountain home.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: Finishing radiation

Life Kavannah: Wu Wei    Shadow, my Wu Wei mistress

Week Kavannah:   Malchut   Wonder.   A feeling of surprise mixed with admiration caused by something beautiful or unexpected.

Being a metaPhysician

One brief shining: Alise and Jenna seemed genuinely sad to see me leave their radioactive workplace; made me feel good about the relationship we established over the ten sessions spread out over three weeks; easy really, I smiled, said thank you and remembered their names, asked questions, and showed up early.

 

A palpable sense of relief. This long, medical march which began with a P.E.T. scan in May, saw three MRI’s, a CT scan, a new radiation oncologist, lots of needles and appointments all over the south metro has come, mostly, to an end. I have a follow up with Bupathi today and Kylie (pain doc) next week, but that’s it for now.

Even the process of getting resolution to back pain, head drop, and an outlier large metastases brings its own stress, its own Thank God that’s over. Not to mention the brace, the injection, the ablation, and radiation themselves. Organizing, scheduling, securing drivers when necessary, or just driving myself. A lot.

And, of course, the varying results. Brace, a C-. Ablation, an A+. Injection, C. Radiation, hard to know at this point, but given previous experience, most likely an A. Which means that the head drop and the labrum tear will require more work.

But not right now. I’m taking a rest, enjoying the surcease of pain from the ablation, and, I hope, the preservation of my hormone sensitive status thanks to the radiation.

I get to celebrate Hanukah, the Winter Solstice, Yule, and New Years without further efforts to keep myself mobile and alive. Yay!

This is the plastic mesh that they put on my bare chest for each radiation session, oriented by small black tattoos, and clamped tight with magnets. It served as the primary positioning tool for the extreme precision required by this extraordinary therapy. My chin rested in the smaller, cupped portion of the mesh.

 

Just a moment: Vultures of all sorts have begun to circle the front lawn of the Whitehouse, awaiting the bloated political corpse of red tie guy’s presidency. According to a New York Times political correspondent, Trump has achieved a rare status for a second term President. He’s a lame duck a year plus before the mid-terms. After the mid-terms normally marks this transition as the President’s party loses power in Congress and his own party begins to look beyond him a candidate for the next Presidential election.

You can read about it here:  Trump’s Coalition Cracking. What this means for the immediate future and the next three, long years is far from clear.