“Home” is too extreme a word to use for this temporary abode, but it has served its purpose, preparing us for our future home in so many ways.

One of the ways has been E learning about food principles and preparation, something her background never provided.  She has pretty much taught herself to bake wonderful breads of all kinds, such as these sage buttermilk biscuits from scratch, which she served with an herbed mushroom gravy.  Her country southern-style breakfasts are far superior to anything you can find around here.  It’s one of the skills she’ll be able to expand upon in our new home.

I think one of the biggest lessons of being detained here for me has been learning to make the most of the limited resources we have, and taking even less for granted.  Finding myself to be a very low-income older person in an extremely unfriendly conservative state has been not only a wakeup call, but it’s been useful practice and preparation for what’s sure to be even more challenging in our new home.  I’m normally pretty resourceful when it comes to stretching and repurposing things, but attitudes and assumptions from my previous life have been more stubborn and resistant to change.  This midwest interlude has really put me through a reprogramming process.

For E, after a lifetime of grueling work starting at a young age, and extreme personal loss with no support, it’s been a challenge to learn how to rest, relax, and catch up on pastimes that seemed like luxuries before.  She’s just discovering all the basics we take for granted, like reading, movies, music, cooking, clothing, you name it.  She’s finding it’s okay to not be at everyone else’s beck and call, and to finally get enough sleep.

It’s taken a while to distance herself from the financial damage caused by others in her past, and to restore credit and savings toward qualifying for a home loan, especially with our decreasing income.  If we hadn’t met and pooled our resources, neither of us would probably have made it going forward in this merciless political state of affairs.  The delay here has allowed us to recover and take care of essential business.

That’s just a fraction of the metamorphosis we’ve undergone here in our prairie halfway house.  There have been adjustments and adaptations too numerous to name.  At times we’ve felt frustrated and powerless against the forces stacked against us.  We never get complacent, knowing the next setback could come at any time.  It keeps us on edge, but also prepared with contingency plans.  If only all the streamlining extended to our figures as well!  But the forced idleness, and feeling like caged animals surrounded by predators, have taken their toll on our physiques.  Right this moment I’m further constrained by an extreme backache, providing another excuse to avoid the Infernal Device (elliptical)!  One more reason we look forward to our own yard, minus the gun-toting psychobillies.

Happy Ostara, or Spring Equinox.  Here it’s pouring, possibly hailing, chilly, with occasional thunder.  I remember first days of spring in the east with snowstorms, so I suppose this is more springlike.  I know all the wildlife that emerged prematurely due to unseasonably warm weather only a week or two ago, has retreated back into its frigid dormancy, if it hasn’t died.  Longtime residents remark upon the unusual climate changes of the last few years.

Meanwhile, in our future state, it’s in the 70s, and lots of flowers are blooming, according to my reliable embedded sources.  No doubt summer is right around the corner!  Pretty soon they’ll be able to winter over tropical plants.  The growing season for veggies will be longer, but some perennials that need to freeze over winter to do well next season will be flat out of luck.

Here at The Almanac, our vast fields of windowsill herbs are wistfully gazing out past the bleak landscape toward the south, imagining their liberation.  We humans are more cautiously optimistic, knowing in some ways we’ll be jumping out of the frying pan into the fire.  (Hopefully not literally, as is wont to happen down there these days!)  Our timing could be better, as conditions for people like us, already bad there, will be much worse now under The Dictator.  I hear it’s one of the top worst places for poor seniors to survive.

But we’re resourceful and determined to make the best of a challenging political minefield.  We’ll just make like the poor wildlife, and hunker down for the duration.  With trump skulking about, nowhere is really safe for the majority of Americans or immigrants.  Hopefully it won’t come down to a forced migration to a more conducive climate.  Although Canada may be warmer, at this rate!

Here are some more herbs, being wistful:

(The nasty snuck in there, posing as an herb.)

Well, mysterious sounds and aromas are emanating from The Almanac Kitchen, featuring herbs who bravely sacrificed their lives for the common good, so I must go pay homage.

In anticipation of Spring, here is some indoor vegetation…

lettuces and oregano–

white sage and chives–

Stir-fry of cabbage, carrots, red and green peppers, celery, hot chiles, almonds, peanuts, etc., with thai rice noodles (OK, so they used to be growing)–

I’m sure there are lots of interesting things coming up outside, if I didn’t have to run the gauntlet of medieval peasants with torches and pitchforks to get to my own yard.

Here are more local lifeforms emerging, thanks to the usual local groups:

Hepatica, White Trout Lily, Sugar Maple blossoms, and Harbinger-of-Spring–

Fox Squirrel, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Deer, and Fox–

Lastly, here is a lovely English bluebell woodland, just because…

Late last night we were treated to the latest methhead melodrama downstairs, when an ambulance, firetruck, and three police cars pulled up to our building, and practically had to carry the 20-something mother away.  It was pretty clear from the turnout and symptoms that drugs must have been involved.  I get the impression this is not unusual in our neck of the woods.

It’s particularly sad that two little kids depend on this mom, whom we know to be mentally unstable and sometimes even deranged.  And her gun-toting redneck guy friends aren’t much better, enabling her behavior.  They’re all back today, smoking like smokestacks, as if nothing happened.

Needless to say, we didn’t get much sleep, worrying about the situation right below our feet.  We’re just trying to mind our own business, live a quiet, secure life, and get out of here safely.  We’re at the mercy of whatever these careless grownup juvies cook up next.

It’s sad and scary that these are the kind of rural poor whites who vote for a trump, if they vote at all, and these are the same folks who will be hit the hardest under his regime.  It’s surreal to be living in the midst of this mindless, heedless culture, and to realize a vast growing segment of our population lives like this, and determines our future through their ignorance.  The rest of the world is baffled and alarmed by the direction this country is taking.  It’s a dangerous, volatile place to be in history.

We know our new home will have its own challenges, but the privacy alone, and being able to live our lives, without constantly being confronted and threatened by irrational hordes in our own home, will be a welcome relief.

One can fantasize, at any rate.

This being St. Patrick’s Day and erev, I think it only fitting that we get this party started right, with Breakfast of Champions (whatever that is for you).  Can you guess what I’m having?

I woke up to big fluffy snow coming down.  My lettuces and herbs are cozily observing.

The Skullies are getting ready to celebrate this auspicious poser occasion.  Even they are Irish once or twice a year.

WP tells me this is post #666.  That has to be lucky, right?

I’m going to attempt a pseudo-Irish Shabbat meal involving cabbage, potatoes, carrots, and some kind of meat.  Wish me luck.  The Spirits shall inspire me, I’m sure.

While we’ve been here, several “friends” have come and gone, showing their true colors and disqualifying themselves as genuine friends.  So when one turns out to be a keeper, it means all the more to us, as it’s so hard to come by around here.

After our monthly Equitas board meeting, we and Rex adjourned to a local BBQ restaurant for his early birthday, and then hung out at his cozy WWI-era house.  I always get my plant and kitty fix over there.

Here are sunset scenes over Dayton.

Here are some of Rex’s plants, outdoors and in his plant sunroom.

Here are some random decorative corners.

Last but not least, the famous kitties.  They look lazy, but I always fix that.

I was looking up a synonym for “trivia” and found this:

***

trump·er·y
ˈtrəmp(ə)rē/
archaic

noun: trumpery; plural noun: trumperies
1.
attractive articles of little value or use.
practices or beliefs that are superficially or visually appealing but have little real value or worth.

adjective: trumpery
1.
showy but worthless.
“trumpery jewelry”
delusive or shallow.
“that trumpery hope which lets us dupe ourselves”

***

How fitting and apt!  I was going to say, I seem to alternate between rants and trivia, just to stay balanced, but “trump and trumpery” fits the bill just as well!  This would be one of my “trumpery” posts (or maybe they all are).  Superficial and of little value, other than keeping one amused, and out of the asylum, which has to count for something. Ephemeral hope.  At least the nature photos are visually appealing.

Speaking of which, here are some lettuces and herbs, gazing out at the lame excuse for snow in these parts.  It’s just cold and whitish, like the people here!  Still, my plants haven’t given up the ghost yet.  Kind of like us.

From our animals dept., here are some local amphibians, reptiles, and others spotted recently by a local herping group.  Red-spotted Newts breeding, Fairy Shrimp congregating, a Northern Slimy Salamander, a Jefferson Salamander, an Eastern Fence Lizard, and an Eastern Earth Snake.

Let’s hope they haven’t all frozen in this cold spell.  I’m almost freezing, indoors. It must mean spring is right around the corner.

Traumatic, trump, same difference.  The symptoms are unsurprisingly alike, and the treatment and cure will definitely not be covered under the farce that is trumpcare (or trumpcrap, more accurately).  This should really be recognized as a legitimate disorder.  Increasing numbers of us are experiencing the serious effects in our everyday lives.

The symptoms include: depression, anxiety, insecurity, fear, loss of hope or motivation to live, anger, denial, trigger-sensitivity, and an extreme allergy to more bad news.  It may adversely affect the physical and mental health of vulnerable people who, not coincidentally, won’t be able to afford healthcare and other essential services any more.

In our own personal experience, we wake up from troubled sleep, apprehensive and fearful of what new disaster has become a part of our new bleak reality.  We’re afraid to even watch much news.  It’s hard to feel motivated to do anything, knowing our already uncertain future could explode in our faces.  I feel it in the slipping of my newly acquired good habits.  They just seem to take too much mental energy that I don’t have.  We’re experiencing new mysterious aches and discomfort that can’t be explained.  There’s this dark cloud of anxiety and tension in the air.

I know we’re not alone in this.  Many people we know have described similar fears and anxiety.  We feel helpless and powerless, watching our whole democracy get undermined and sabotaged by our own so-called leaders.  Everything we worked hard for and counted on for basic survival and human rights is falling out from under us.  The minimal ethics and justice we could rely upon, as imperfect as they were, are no longer assured.  It’s all we can do to just keep going forward and find someplace to lay low and ride out the storm.

I feel sad to think the latter years of our lives may be lived in a world reverting back to irrational, primitive superstition and cruelty.  We dared to think we were making progress–ha!  I realize that for some communities, this development comes as no surprise; it’s been pretty much their reality for centuries.  They could never take anything for granted or relax their guard for a minute.  Welcome to their everyday world.  For some of us it’s a rude awakening, realizing how such ignorant savages could still prevail and take us back to the dark ages in one election cycle.

But life must go on if you’re still alive.  Now is not the time to give up and be apathetic.  All the great battles for justice and civil rights were fought under extremely adverse, discouraging conditions and setbacks, but it only made the movements more stubborn and determined.  Not all of us may be up to the risks involved, but sometimes just staying alive, and acting as though there is a future, is the biggest thing you can pull off.  We’re going to proceed under that assumption.

Here are some wildflowers, courtesy of our local wildflower group, adapting to changing conditions and still forging ahead.  Sharp-lobed Hepatica, Blue Cohosh, Mayapple, and Dwarf Larkspur.

In the spirit of Victory and Revelry, there will be no talk of [insert evil villain here] today.  I shake my Purim gragger at you, Evil Villain.  Your time is coming.  Now on to more cheery spirits, if you know what I mean.

Graggers  to drown out the name of Haman, as opposed to “groggers”, see “Purim 101” and “spirits”:

Here is Purim 101, in a nutshell:

Here are the Skullies, getting into the spirit of things—nobody specified which spirit.

Don’t worry, I’m the designated supervisor.  Ahahaha….

Here are some yummy homemade soft pretzels E made yesterday (her first try).  And some “coffee” to start this fest right.

Just humoring ourselves until the “exodus”  (oops, wrong holiday).  Actually we hope it will be, appropriately enough, closer to Independence Day.  Going out with fireworks.

For now, the Purim V-for-Victory/Virtual Bar is open for the duration.

Animals won’t be the only species forced to change their migration habits due to climate change.  Humans will probably be joining them, due to political climate change as well.  It might be a good idea for all vulnerable individuals to have a Plan B and current valid passports at all times.  I wonder if California and Canada will have to enforce stricter residence qualifications and immigration restrictions.  Because I know I’m not the only one thinking along these lines lately.

My people were forced by persecution to migrate into the Diaspora for millennia.  I’m only alive at all because some of my ancestors read the writing on the wall, and immigrated to America while they still could.  Most weren’t so lucky.  My immigrant predecessors endured and survived the Depression, WWII, McCarthyism, and extreme antisemitism, and here we are full circle.  They must be rolling in their graves to see how fascist this country is turning.

The original native Americans, like animals, were hunted down savagely, and forced into what amounted to concentration camps.  Their few survivors still suffer today, far from their native habitats.  Other Americans didn’t even have the option to come here willingly, but were forced into slavery and exile by the very ancestors of today’s racists.  They never had hope of the American dream, let alone the freedom to achieve it.  Their descendants are increasingly unsafe and disadvantaged in their own home.

These greedy racist bastards will leave no stone unturned making America white supremacist again. Do a quick background check on Bannon and any of them, and you’ll find they make no secret of their extreme white racist agendas.  They feed upon the ignorance and superstition of average white trash, who play right into their propaganda and lies.  Even when these followers themselves become casualties of the alt-right agenda, which they will, they won’t see it coming, because facts are suspect.

The barrage of endlessly worse news coming at us like shrapnel is becoming too much to absorb, which is also part of the agenda–to overwhelm and desensitize us to the facts, until we tune it out and normalize the abnormal.  They get away with increasingly outrageous crimes, while their deluded supporters tell us to get over it.  When conditions for most Americans inevitably deteriorate, it can always be disingenuously blamed on President Obama.

So if it seems like I’m falling into that insidious apathy to insulate myself from the twisted freakshow that is trumpworld, believe me I’m all too aware of it every waking (and even sleeping) hour.  It’s just that I know realistically, in our situation, we’re mostly powerless against such a destructive force.  I want to be part of the resistance, but I also know our limitations and vulnerabilities.  At this late stage in our lives, we’d just like to find a peaceful place to live and be left alone. Like a smart animal in a conflagration, you don’t hang around philosophizing, you scram to safety, and live to fight another day.