Ending the weekend

Congratulations, Nick and Helene! This is Theo, son no. 2, one hour old! Wow!
He joins his older brother about 2 years old.
As usual, click on the image to enlarge it,
then back arrow to return to the blog

Dear family and friends,

Though I usually write first thing in the morning, this has been an unusual weekend, with, as you know, a summit meeting of the hamletworks.org team. We were supposed to meet in Chicago in early April, but my broken pelvis prevented that. So my three colleagues Nick, Hardin and Eric and our MIT collaborator, Pete, all came to Glen Head. Pete was here for only one overnight.

You know my pleasure in the kitchen, cooking interesting food, the easier the better. I realized, though, that I would have to simplify things greatly to get through long days. Altogether we had 6 meals: breakfasts were catch as catch can: cereal, fruit, yogurt, and, once, lox with cream cheese. Usually, I would have made French toast or pancakes or something special. Coffee of course. Merwin took care of that. Here are some of the lunch and supper meals we had, almost all of which I had prepared in advance: Gazpacho followed by baked fresh salmon; individualized pseudo pizzas, with fixing by choice; stuffed shells with pesto sauce (Toby's), along with stewed veggies; another lunch was a choice of avocado sandwiches and tuna sandwiches. We also had tomatoes, salads, cake, cookies, rugelach. The weather was hot, but we had our lovely new air-conditioners to keep us comfortable.

The main thing is that we re-bonded and made decisions that will see us through many months. Late yesterday afternoon, after a session, we took a break and went to an opening at the Nassau County Museum of Art. It was an interesting show--all based on the sea in art. I ran into only one friend, Naomi, who is a docent there, rather uneasy about her coming tours because the art was rather scattered—19th century and 20th century all mixed together. But for me as a civilian, with no duties to perform, it was pleasant if undemanding. I think we or most of us enjoyed the show and the wine and cheese. I was exhausted, though, by the time we finished there.

I got up early to take Nick, Hardin and Eric to Kennedy airport. Eric had taken Pete to LaGuardia the day before. It took only 1 hour to make the round trip, a far cry from the 2 or more hours it had taken Merwin to pick them up on Thursday.

This morning I had my second session with my physical therapist, Jack. He is very pleasant and careful. I have permission to do anything that does not hurt: so I can return to the stationery bike cautiously. Merwin has to get Dave to help him fix it; something is clanging inside of it.
Both before and after the p.t. visit, I napped. I am still very tired from the weekend, but I am pleased with my ability to get through it all, from a physical standpoint. Better and better every day. I know very well that carrying anything even a little heavy (like my ice pack that I am supposed to apply after my exercises) hurts, and the p.t. says not to do anything that hurts, but some activities are hard to avoid.

Tomorrow I hope to get back to normal, with the fatigue well past.

Love to all,
Bernice