May Memories, Part II (my garden)

On the way back from Maryland, I stopped to pick up some native plant starts for my garden, as I was itching to pull out the dead stuff and plant some green and some color.

Walk around the yard with me:

The yard guys pruned the rose plants to create these dramatic, top-heavy sprays.

I went orange-and-white for the planters around the patio with prelude white begonias and aloha kona hot orange calibrachoa. 

This is a fairly inconspicuous spot along the fence, but it's right next to the swing, so I'm hoping to fill it up with purple and greens. This is a combination of plants from Chapon Nursery and Terry from Facebook Marketplace.

The midnight salvia I bought from Lowe's last year--and last year's groundhog chomped to the ground--came back! The roots were still good, and this year's groundhog is uninterested. The white euphorbia ("hip hop") is new for contrast.

I pulled almost everything out of this bed last year (and the rest this year) in order to plant it with a kind of lily at the back and purple-blue Mexican something-or-other in the middle that I'm hoping will be colorful later in the summer.

Not much grows in the shady corner under the tricolor beech tree, so I picked up a flat of "wizard mix" coleus. I had enough to plant there and under the ornamental pear tree (no marigolds this year). For the stretch on the side that had been utterly overgrown with grasses--I spent so much time digging them out that I can't believe I didn't think to leave down the cardboard and just put the new dirt, plants, and mulch over top--I put "mango tango" anise hyssop and what might be fern leaf yarrow (I can't find all the tags). Out front I went purple and white with begonias, morning glories, and something else. Of course, the healthiest plant in the pot is a wild lettuce, no doubt growing from a seed dropped by a bird!

While gardening I listened to Kristin Hannah's The Nightingale (slow start and a little formulaic but ultimately worth the read) and our local NPR radio station, 90.5 FM WESA. I donated my banged up Turquoise Torpedo to them and finally got the letter advising me they had received <$200 for it. 😅

Finally, in the fenced-in plot in the back, I've given up on having the time to grow berries or vegetables--I mean, the deer could easily jump the fence, so what's the point--so I'm slowly cultivating what I hope will become a pollinating garden with natives plants.

Click here for Part I and Part II.

May Memories, Part I

I have taken so many more pictures than I have shared to Facebook over the last month, so I thought I would put some of them together here in a post written after eating a delicious spring-like lunch (salad and Triskets with brie; the secret is Green Goddess dressing). It feels so good to sit at the dining room table--while Dear Husband eats lunch and watches soccer in the next room--with my wet braid hanging between my shoulder braids, refreshed from a shower after three hours of trimming bushes and pulling weeds and raking up the long grass left by the mower, fueled only by NPR radio on my phone, since I skipped breakfast. That's okay: more room for a piece of the heaping strawberry pie DH baked this morning. It's my turn to have the kitchen for the afternoon: I will watch Persuasion on Netflix Legally Blonde on YouTube while I make banana bread with the over-ripe bunch I brought home from the office.

The first weekend I attended two films at the Jewish Film Festival on the Carnegie Mellon Campus. Validity is a Pittsburgh-produced film starring my colleague's sister as a scientist struggling with whether to use unethically sourced data about hypothermia collected on concentration camp prisoners. It's based on an actual person and controversy, and I don't know why the film's promotional material didn't name Robert Pozos's work at the University of Minnesota (perhaps he asked them not to?).

Meanwhile, Dear Husband was playing and conducting a choral service at church with the Schubert Mass in C (WordSung).

That afternoon I hung out at the main Carnegie Library before watching Disposable Humanity, a documentary about the Aktion T4, when healthcare providers helped the Nazi government sterilize and kill disabled Germans. Theirs are the only Holocaust victim names that by law have to be redacted, as if it is still so shameful to have been diagnosed with a disabling condition that it would be embarrassing for yourself or your family to have it known.

The second weekend I drove to National Harbor, MD, for the Society for General Internal Medicine conference. I didn't actually stay at the expensive hotel, having snagged a bedroom in an AirBnB across the street and through the fence. It was awkward if I had to run back in the middle of the day for some reason, but parking was free, and I could afford it without a roommate.

I attended a variety of panels--on reproductive health for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, treating osteoporosis, culturally competent nutrition, and fibromyalgia--and helped present a workshop on taking care of adults with Down Syndrome.

I brought a bunch of "I <3 medical history" ribbons to leave at check in and was gratified to find someone wearing one. (Even though you can't see either of ours in the picture!)

I had resolved not to play trivia again after winning two years in a row and then joined an unlikely table at the back of exhibitors from Team Health. Team Stealth ended up coming in 2nd place! 

After the conference I attended the wedding of my residency cohortmate. The next morning, I met a colleague for breakfast in Old Town Alexandria to discuss our respective books and then enjoy the art studios at The Torpedo Factory. After Mother's Day lunch with My Awesome Parents, it was an easy drive back to Pittsburgh listening to Anthony Doerr's All The Light We Cannot See. (It was okay.)

I'll leave you with a panoramic view of Pittsburgh from the back deck of one of the residents, who lives on the South Side and hosted journal club. There was a break in the rain just long enough for us to go out and marvel at the city spread out before us.

Click here for Part II.

Another One Ties the Knot

What a joy it was to celebrate a residency colleague's wedding at President Lincoln's Cottage! Built on a hill overlooking the Capitol in 1842 for a Washington DC banker, the federal government purchased the property in 1851 as a Soldiers Home, and other presidents have stayed there as well. The Lincolns used it as their summer home during his presidency, Lincoln developed the Emancipation Proclamation there, and he visited it the day before he was shot by John Wilkes Booth. It served as the Public Affairs Office for the Armed Forces Retirement in the 1990s, and there is a military cemetery across the street. After a big renovation that involved removing 20 coats of paint from the walls, down to beautiful hard word, it was opened to the public in 2008. Now part of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, President Lincoln's Cottage bills itself as "the home for brave ideas."

The day was overcast and wet, but by the time the breeze had shaken the last of the raindrops from the trees, the clouds lightened and the sky turned blue in time for the brief ceremony, which was officiated by a veteran in residence on the grounds. Both the dog and the baby were well behaved. 

Instead was a beautiful vanilla cake with strawberries by Heidelberg Pastry Shoppe--and a really good chocolate cake with chocolate icing for the groom's niece whose birthday was yesterday from Wegman's, where the bride and groom ate sushi on their second date. However, some guests filled up at the cookie table, a Pittsburgh tradition in which friends and family bake cookies for guests to take home as their favor. When they finally came out of the oven, the pizzas from Timber Pizza were very popular.

I asked the groom's aunt to take a photo of me with the statue of Lincoln and his horse out front, in the food tent. Then we had a lovely conversation about physical therapy and Charlotte, NC. Inside the classical guitar player who had entertained us before the ceremony played, and in the gazebo on the side was a cover band. It was so pleasant just to sit and soak up the atmosphere, the music, the company. There's just one more of the four of us to get hitched...

Happy 100th Birthday, Gram!

My paternal grandmother was named for her father, and my younger brother has their name as his middle name. (My middle name is my maternal grandmother's.) She was born on the same day, month, and year as the late Queen Elizabeth II. They led very different lives. Gram grew up poor in rural Texas. Her mother died when she was 11 of complications of an abortion, after her doctor told her not to get pregnant again but her husband didn't care. She wanted two things when she grew up: nice clothes and to travel. She got them both--visiting 27 countries on four continents!--as well as a long career as a night psych nurse. She joined WAVES (Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service), went on a blind date, and met the man of her dreams. They married and had four children, five grandchildren, and four great grandchildren. 

I was the first grandchild. Gram has been the longest reader of this blog, which I started to document my travels. Friends and family recently gathered from around the country to celebrate her 100th birthday.

Some of her favorite things 

- cheese and crackers and a glass of wine in the evening

- strawberries with Nutella

- tissues in her pockets and candy in her drawers

- researching family genealogy

-  reading