wednesday's words and wanderings and wonderings

Woodland Cemetery is Dayton's oldest and most historic cemetery. Many of the Who's Who of Dayton have their final resting place here. My yoga studio is just around the corner from Woodland and one day after class, I took a quiet, peaceful walk around the cemetery. The snow, the gray sky, the bare trees, the peace and quiet, the grave markers blanketed by the snow emphasized the reverence of the space and whenever my boots crunched on the ice, I felt as though I was disturbing the sacred rest. 

Whenever I go to Woodland, I always go to see the Wright Brothers gravesite. Orville and Wilbur are buried there along with their sister and their parents. The family plot is between the State of Ohio flag and Aviation History flag.

Another favorite grave marker is of Johnny Morehouse and his dog. Back in the 1800s, the Erie Canal ran through Dayton. The story is that 5-year old Johnny Morehouse was walking alongside the Canal, got too close, and fell in. His loyal dog jumped in but wasn't able to save Johnny's life. A local sculptor immortalized the pair depicting Johnny asleep with his dog protectively curled around him. People who visit his grave leave toys for both Johnny and the loyal dog.

We took off for Chicago to celebrate our grandson AJ's 2nd birthday. The big wind farm in Indiana goes for 20 miles and at the north end of the farm is where the time changes from Eastern Standard Time to Central Standard Time.

Birthday party time and a big Elmo Rice Krispie treat set the Sesame Street party theme.

All smiles with our two-year old little guy.

Q

Back home we woke up to hoarfrost on some branches and leaves. So pretty and delicate. As soon as the sun hit it, the hoarfrost melted.

After gray skies for a few days, this sunset was a welcome sight.

The grocery store is gearing up for Valentine's Day with strawberries and raspberries in heart-shaped containers. RIght now these fruits are not in season and even though they look pretty, their taste has little to be desired. Maybe a little Valentine's magic will make them sweeter for their recipients.

 

monday's mulling: bad bunny's super bowl performance

Last night over here in America we celebrated the culmination of American football by being glued to our televisions to watch the New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks play in the final game of the 2025-2025 season, Super Bowl LX (that's 60 if you don't recall your Roman numerals).

My husband loves the game of football. He has his favorite teams and can watch games all day long. Me, I don't care for football. The Super Bowl is a big draw for fans whose teams are playing and it also brings us non-football fans to the TV to watch the commercials (companies shell out huge sums of money to advertise during this game) and to watch the halftime show.

This year's halftime entertainment was provided by the Puerto Rican rapper and singer, Bad Bunny. Bad Bunny? Yeah, I hadn't heard of him until the announcement came out that he would be doing the Super Bowl halftime show. The drama really snowballed when people found out that the performance would be in Spanish, a first for the Super Bowl. 

My first impression of this Spanish-speaking rapper's performance...I liked it. He highlighted Puerto Rican life and even though his words were all Spanish, the choreography told the story - the love of community, the love of family, working to overcome devastating circumstances (the electricity going out with no power for days), and the call for Americans to recognize and respect one another.

Near the end of his performance, Bad Bunny spoke his first and only English words of the show:

"God Bless America."

He then proceeded to name every Latin American country, one by one, in Spanish: Mexico, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Venezuela, the Dominican republic, Cuba, and more. He continued through Central and South America, before ending with USA, Canada, and finally Puerto Rico again. As he named each country, dancers carrying flags from across the Americas walked behind him, a visual representation of the hemisphere united. The jumbotron behind them lit up with the words, "THE ONLY THING MORE POWERFUL THAN HATE IS LOVE."

This post is a little late because this morning I watched this halftime show a few more times before writing about it. It tells the American story. The REAL one. The messy, beautiful, multilingual, multicolored courageous one. At the very end of the performance Bad Bunny held a football that read, "Together we are America," and spiked it into the ground. Not with anger but with joy and it made hate look exactly as small as it is.

Check out this performance that celebrated Puerto Rico and its place in the American story.

 

it's that kind of sunday

Paradox - two opposing elements that coexist, revealing complexity or deeper insights. It challenges conventional thinking, causing people to think more critically, to see the bigger picture, to broaden horizons, to see both sides of the story. It helps us to grow, to adapt.

Right now it feels like the world is wobbling on its axis. Everyday we are bombarded with news that makes us wonder, "Can this get any worse?" and it continues day after day. Tune out the news and tune into your heart. Share a little kindness. It could become the best part of someone's day, especially when they're not expecting it. So today I encourage you to lead by example and show someone that most people are good, that kindness isn't dead, and that we're all in this life together.

it's birthday party time!

Today is the day for the family party to celebrate my little grandson AJ's 2nd birthday. Two years old and what a joy this little boy has brought to so many. 

For his 1st birthday, I made a zine to celebrate his first year. The tradition continues for his second year with a Sesame Street theme.

Dear AJ,

Woohoo!

You're TWO!

Happy, happy birthday,

I love you!

Love,

Didi 

 

the friday feed: perkatory

A big thank you to Catalyst, the creator of Oddball Observations and his Friday Funnies for inspiring this blogpost.

Perkatory...isn't this the truth? You smell the coffee brewing and can't wait for that first hot sip to start the day. 

Hot coffee and a c-c-c-cold winter morning. How cozy to be on the inside looking out at the new fallen snow.

Do you see that circle in the snow? There's a story to that. One afternoon my son called and asked if I would pick his dog up from doggy daycare. "Sure, no problem." It was 6:00-ish and he would pick his dog up from my house between 7 and 8:00 p.m. (19:00 and 20:00). 

"Would you mind making some scrambled eggs for Brutus for dinner?"

"I can do that."

It took a few minutes to make the eggs. They were hot, the dog was hungry, and the snow was cold. What to do: open the patio door, put the pan in the snow, the eggs cool in less than 30 seconds, and when they hit the bowl, B-Doggie snarfed them down in no time.

There are times when you need to use what's in front of you. It may not be the most conventional way but it sure gave a good solution.

ikigai

I love learning new words, words that come from different cultures, ones that may not have an English counterpart, words that encompass a bigger feeling, an action, or emotion in a way that English doesn't. 

Ikigai is one of those words. It's a reminder that joy and purpose can live in the same space. It's poetic and inspiring.

wednesday's words and wanderings and wonderings

It's been a quiet week. Winter Storm Fern has hovered over the Miami Valley with its bitter cold temperatures. Yesterday the mercury rose to 32° and after all those below zero days, 32° felt like spring was knocking at the door. Snow still covers the ground but it is slowly evaporating and melting. Maybe after the melt, we'll see some crocus pushing out from the dirt.

On January 30 the moon, with Jupiter to its lower right, sit up the night sky. It looked like a full moon but it wasn't. The full moon appeared on February 1. Todd was driving home from Findlay, Ohio. a couple hours north of here, after visiting a friend and his sweet mom who had been hospitalized. As we chatted, all at once an "Ohmygosh, you should see the moon rising!" It was a beauty and it wasn't dark yet. I went to the end of the street, stood in the middle of the cross road and got mooned! The full moon for February is the Snow Moon. It sure lived up to its name this year.

I've kept busy this week making some zines for my grandsons. AJ's birthday party is this weekend so he's getting two - one with the original party theme and one with the updated party theme. I also made one for Owen (3 1/2 years old) thanking him for choosing a loofah of many pastel colors as my Christmas gift. He and his mom went to the Dollar Store for his Christmas shopping spree and he chose all of the gifts for his recipients. In case you're wondering what a zine (pronounced "zeen) is, it's a small handmade book made by folding a single sheet of paper. They're fun to make and fun to receive. The art of writing thank you notes seems to have lost its importance. I grew up writing them and will continue to do so. One of my sons-in-law once commented that he really enjoys receiving my notes and letters. Letter writing is becoming a lost art.

The other day Todd was perusing the Kroger grocery ads and he pointed out that chuck roast was on sale for a good price. (Isn't it time to go to the grocery store...hint, hint?) A pot of beef stew sounded tasty so off to Kroger to find that chunk of chuck roast plus a few vegetable to put in it. I tried a new recipe, one where the meat was browned in a large pot on the stove top, add the vegetables for a few minutes to warm them up, and then put the pot in a low heat (325°) oven for two hours. Wow. It was delicious and will be my go-to beef stew recipe from now on. It made enough for a few leftover meals, too.

The big scuttlebut from yesterday was that the groundhog saw his shadow so six more weeks of winter. Actually Groundhog Day is the midpoint to spring so today marks the downslope to spring. 

The birds are busy at the feeders. Such a joy to watch them. Every so often a big flock of grackles comes and takes over the feeders. The other birds sit patiently waiting in the wings for the grackle feeding frenzy to end. Every so often, Todd will open the door and clap his hands to scare them off but they're back in 30 seconds.