Super Bowl, Climate Change, and Poetry
The temperature went from zero to 46 in about 20 hours. Climate change—and a lot of people still don’t believe it’s real. I’ve experienced it a lot now. We went from zone six to zone seven – agricultural zones; what you can plant and what won’t make it where you live. We have different insects than we used to and several difference species of bird. Weeds are enormous and tenacious. Our falls last a lot longer and spring is a bit later. We have terrible droughts in summer and this winter, it rained at least four days every week. It gets hot than it ever did and colder. More and fiercer storms. I’m terrified we’ll get a hurricane that could destroy our house and perhaps us, since there’s no way to evacuate Cape Cod from the outer Cape owns.
For many years, I worried about an accident at Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant, one of he two worst-run in the country. We fought to shut it down and succeeded but we’re not rid of it yet. The company that is decommissioning it wants to dump all the nuclear waste into Cape Cod Bay. That’s our current battle. We all eat seafood and shellfish from the Bay and people swim in it and humpback whales spend months there. Endangered turtles spawn there. Dolphins live there.
I gave a poetry reading via ZOOM for Hyde Park Poetry Center. I believe it went well. Lots of good feedback. I’d have preferred to do it in person, but groups like ZOOM. They pay much less, don’t have to pay for travel and don’t have to take you out to supper or arrange to sell your books. I miss signing books and I miss the warmth you get from a live audience. Plus, you can see their reaction. On the good side, you do get an audience that lives out of the area.
I‘m still reading the 500-page CHILDREN OF ASH AND ELM, about the Vikings by an archeologist who specializes in their lives and history. But I’ll have to lay off it for a couple of weeks as I’ll judging poems for the WOMR poetry contest. But I can’t read them as yet. I had an eye appointment in Yarmouth and they put so much dilation in my eyes that almost five hours later my sight is still too blurry to do much of anything. I’m typing with my eyes shut. (Forgive the typos, please!) Can’t read, can’t work, can’t even watch TV.
We’ll watch the Super Bowl on Sunday, of course, but just with us. When we’ve tried it with groups of friends, most of them are not really into football and just want to party. It gets rowdy, noisy, and tiring very quickly. I like to watch the plays and try to strategize. For me, that’s more fun than jostling for a seat on the couch and eating junk food. But I do miss the Kitten Bowl and I wish they’d bring it back.
I tried physical therapy at Spaulding in Orleans. I had tried it back in 2014 for my knee and the physical therapist gave me exercises that destroyed the remaining cartilage in my right knee. The operation that had been planned for December had to done quickly, as I could no longer walk without a terrible limp and worse pain. I had also tried them for the back pain that was bothering me after the knee operation. Spaulding recommended ablation. The doctor somehow did it wrong and caused me excruciating pain. He retired the next week. I kept hearing from friends and acquaintances how much better Spaulding was now, so I tried it.
What this physical therapist did to me that afternoon put me in bed for two days. Finally, with the help of long massages from Woody and ice and a couple of exercises I remembered that did help, I am much, much better now. It’s not completely normal, but doesn’t impede me in any way. I’m not going back. I’ll try Seashore Point. They are a much smaller operation and don’t have all the machines Spaulding does, but as they are attached to assisted living, the therapists there are used to dealing with older people. They didn’t cause me problems when I was seeing them for my ankle. They actually helped. My ankle is almost normal now.