Catching Up....

Right after I posted my last blog about my life in Moses Lake, a couple of special friends died suddenly, within two weeks of each other.

The first one was my former boss at the Peninsula Daily News. Rex Wilson moved to Mexico to join his wife, Olga, in their family business and was suddenly diagnosed with lung cancer and just as suddenly left us all behind three months before his birthday.

The second was a fellow I met while traveling about eight years ago, William Good from Florida, and who became, along with his wife Sandi, delightful additions to my life online as well as when they came to Washington State to visit family. Bill was traveling in Spain with Sandi when he had a heart attack in mid-February, less than two weeks after my boss.

I tried to talk to my husband about the grief I was feeling, but he did not really understand the joy that having any exchange with these fellows gave me - their laughter, their quick wit, their expansive natures causing the lights in my world to shine a little brighter. In some ways it felt like my Dad had died again because there were aspects of each of these fellows that must have reminded me of him.

Then, getting over those sad days, my son-in-law announced his Multiple Myeloma was causing numbers to rise and he was going to have treatments again. So I retreated once more and found myself self-diagnosing anxiety and took on the objective of becoming a healer with art therapy.

"Celtic Knot Flower" is a design from another CZT that
I incorporated into a 12 -inch by 12-inch acrylic work.

This art therapy is called Zentangle™and though it is not advertised as a therapy per se, it is well understood that meditation is helpful and this process of drawing certain patterns was clearly helping me.

Something from my journal that has color and light in it.

I signed up for and was accepted to the 33rd session of training for Certified Zentangle Teachers (CZT) in Providence, Rhode Island for the end of March and beginning of April, 2019. For four blissful days I did nothing but eat, drink and draw with lots of laughter and fun. I concluded my trip with a fresh lobster dinner to celebrate achieving this certification, feeling pretty sure it might be awhile before the next trip and lobster!

Me with my seminar roommate, Norma G.
from Brazil. We had a good connection
and helped each other along.

Home again, I find I am not quite ready to begin teaching The Zentangle Method because I feel I still have so much to learn myself. But I have incorporated it into my existing art activity and have some fun plans for doing more in the future.

This is a small frame purchased at a yard
sale; making the Zentangle appear to be
more worthy... 

This is a Zendala, using tangles from Zentangle, Inc.

The other shoe dropped when we heard that a relative was
diagnosed with cancer, so I made her a blanket with pink
symbols for healing but it had special meaning for me as
it had patterns I have used in tangling.

Life in Moses Lake ~ February 2019

One of our first sunsets from our front porch.

"Amigo" is a Pug-Chihuahua cross that
we got in January.

As we complete our second month in Moses Lake, we both still agree it was a good move. There were (and are) challenges to be solved with the house, the grounds, but overall that part of our new life is progressing nicely.

A totally impulsive move was to add to the 'farm' animals by getting the closest thing to a sheepdog that we will ever see. Little "Amigo" (friend in Spanish) sticks close to Wayne's heels when outside and is under my feet almost all the time when inside.

Purriwinkle has one safe spot from Amigo...

Purriwinkle, our cat, thinks we purchased Amigo as her own wind-up toy, and Amigo thinks we provided him with a cat purely for the fun of it. They take turns chasing each other around the living room until one or the other falls down panting.

Peaches was a little annoyed at this small intrusion into her life, but as time as gone on, she has taken the high road to be the dog-nanny and teach Amigo what is what.

Peaches and Amigo on a walk.

Putting the finishing touches on a quilt to be
donated to a worthy cause.

It was a challenge for me at first to find like-minded artists as they are not 'front and center' like in Sequim, but now that I have my weekly art group (on Wednesdays) and a connection for instruction on Mondays, I am feeling less isolated from my creative 'flock.'

And I've found a quilting group that adds to my developing skills in that realm as well. It is a group connected to the Mose Lake Senior Center that makes quilts for donations to various organizations.

Wayne has made his connections to the Grant County Fair (They will find out just how lucky they are to have him in August!) and to local gardeners and a Master Gardening group.

His children, for the most part, have been involving us in their activities and we had the great joy to watch two of the grandkids in their Christmas pagents in December.

Zentangle is the art of drawing one line at a
time to create these little bits of art. It's both
a meditation and a creative process I find easy
and fun. I think I will like teaching others.

When we arrived we knew we would have to replace some appliances, but the stove turned out to be a major headache earlier than anticipated, so we replaced it right away. As I spend time in the kitchen I can see that some modifications will make it much easier to work in for the long run, so we are planning to make a few changes in the spring when cooking and eating outside is an option.

We have plans to go back over to the North Olympic Peninsula for the weekend of the 15-16th of February to go to the Blues Chaser square dance with old friends. If the weather is nice enough and forecasted to stay that way, we may take the RV. We haven't been anywhere in it this winter and I think Wayne is getting itchy feet.

At the end of February I head off to Sew-Expo in Puyallup for a couple of days to connect with my pals from last year's event, and at the end of March I have made a commitment to get trained as a teacher of Zentangle (CZT) so I can offer classes here in Moses Lake. That will mean a week in Rhode Island, leaving Wayne to manage the household on his own.

Feels like an Agatha Christie mystery...

Not exactly the "statues" I had in mind, but in a way
they stand in for that element.

If you ever read "Ten Little Indians" or seen the Agatha Christie Mystery "And Then There Were None..." you may have some idea of how I am feeling today hearing that yet another long-term Multiple Myeloma (MM) has announced his acceptance that no more treatments will be done.

Since I started this blog in 2009 to rant, rave and rail against a disease I knew nothing about at that time, I have watched all those wonderful folks fall like the statues in the mystery. Fortunately the person who inspired my blog writing is still with us and he is managing the consequences of the disease pretty well as we mark the tenth year since his diagnosis.

But Mike Gormley and his wife, Lorna, are the latest victims of MM, a far more murderous element than anything Christie could create. Reading that news late last night, I guess I should not have been surprised to have had dreams about most of the others who have already departed. It was a strange party to attend, not unlike the one on Shelter Island where everyone (unknowingly) has a death sentence awaiting them. We gathered around the table and I had a chance to speak to each one, asking how they were doing, commenting on how long the silence has been, etc.

My favorite was Lonnie Nesseler, a motorcycle rider, pianist, scientist and creative personality, who stepped up and said, "It's a new adventure. You can't really describe it to those who haven't arrived yet." Lonnie had been adventuresome in his treatments, and willing to educate readers as well as his medical team along the journey. But I had a toast with Bob Kirkpatrick, who pointed out that I was now a lot closer to where he used to live, which would suggest that we are not really so distant from the Other Side as we tend to believe.

So let us raise our glasses to them all, let them hear their names called out once more in appreciation for what and who they were to each of us, gone but not forgotten.

Peter Boyle (actor), Sam Walton (WalMart founder), John Ricco (author), Andre (photographer) 2009, Hamada (statesman) 2010, Paula (Multiple Myloma Buddy maker) and Sean Tiernan (photographer) 2012, Lonnie Nesseler (educator) 2010, Robert "Bob" Kirkpatrick (inventor) 2015, and others known to me but not listed here for privacy reasons.

Each one was special to someone, each one served a purpose. I guess the reason for posting this is to honor Mike as he prepares to conclude his business here and to support Lorna as she has little choice as a primary caregiver to go along for the ride.

My dearest wish is that we are able to solve this mystery of MM; to find out what causes the bone marrow cells to start running haywire, to be able to give those with this diagnosis something to hope for, if not a cure at least some way to live with it after treatment.

The setting sun shadows Mt. Rainier in Washington State.

And I end by quoting Ken Kesey, "Loved. You can't use it in the past tense. Death does not stop that love at all."