Desert Magnolia

     The first blooms of spring are here, and my heart is soooo damned happy to see them! The first daffodils of the year popped open this week. Green hyacinth foliage is looking strong and ready to produce the first truly fragrant blossoms of the season. Tulip leaves are strong...with buds sure to follow in short order.     I go a little nuts in the Spring. I blame the fact that I am a Spring baby, but it could be other stuff too. It could be emerging from dark, cold, windy months feels really good. It could be I feel a connection to the earthiness of emerging green and buds and happy birdsong and a feeling of imminent life...         In any case, we are at the time of year when I look at my heavy sweaters and boots and give them notice - y'all aren't gonna be in my weekly rotation much longer so let's have fun over the next couple of weeks while Winter really releases its grip on us and Spring pops in with warmer, sunnier days and a sense o...

I have the body of a sprinter, but always ran long distance. My wind would stabilize, my muscles would synchronize, my mind would clear...at about mile 2.5 and just improve after that. For decades I ran. My high school P. E. teacher, Ms. Vidano, instilled the love of the run, and it remains to this day, long past when I should endeavor to tread the roads for miles and miles. The run sustained me after my (very early life) divorce. The run helped reconnect with a childhood friend, who had ventured far for college but returned for work, and who found me enjoying a post-work cigarette and glass of wine on my balcony one night and said, 'Oh, no, this isn't right. Put that fucking thing out. I'll be here in the morning. We're going shopping, and we're going running.' Loved that. He was right, and he was awesome, and he got me back out of a trench and into my running love zone. Then I met my now love, my man of many years, father of my children, partner in ...

So I got a Kindle, and I read a LOT. It's convenient, easy for my aging eyes to read, and thanks to my friend Lisa, I am part of a fun book 'club' that sends daily deals and provides fun reading ideas. I am in a club... and it's been great so far. I can now carry oodles of options (I have about 25 books loaded right now) so no matter what mood I might find myself in, I can indulge. Full disclosure, I am a totally sucker for FREE books, so my collection may not be up to the 100 books everyone should read before they die expectation, but there you have it. Amazon gets me...and FREE is good. I have been known to pay for a book if a friend recommends it, but I like a bargain too. In other news, the world is still in the shit soup.  We are facing the consequences of a hasty reopening after COVID lockdown, consequences that may include yet another lockdown since we've allowed what is being called a surge to happen...with daily increases in the virus exceeding any prior...

I'm a voracious reader, have been since I was a child. I was born into a TV free household, where management insisted 'The Man' was behind TV, and that our thoughts and reactions and habits were subject to undue influence if we watched.  At the time I resented that we were the only people IN THE ENTIRE WORLD without a TV, but now I respect and understand the wisdom behind that decision. Our bookshelves were loaded with everything from art history to social commentary to mysteries to science fiction to gardening references. I read everything, all of it, in spite of my young age. I have reread some of the early tomes, and realize I missed much of the intent of the authors due to my lack of maturity at the time, but since I've reread them, I got it later. Anyway, I love to read. I also love to write, mostly because I love to read - they're connected in my mind.  A few years back I got a library card, and am a frequent flyer at our neighborhood branch. I take my ba...

I recently discovered that the most terrifying possible letter from a doctor contains those words. Until that point, I was smug. I was full of my own pursuit of health, of my certainty that the hard work I've done for decades in terms of eating well, stress management, exercise would render me bulletproof. It didn't. So when I read those dreaded words, my heart stopped. My blood pressure rose. My stomach felt like a giant hand had squeezed it hard and had no intention of letting go anytime soon. I catastrophized. Within a day of processing the message in my imagination I had battled and lost to breast cancer. My children were motherless, their need for maternal support and love no longer within reach on this plane of existence. My husband was without his wife. In one scenario I concocted late at night, he had remarried, and seemed much happier than I had ever made him. In this scenario our beloved felines were emotionally bereft without their pet human to spoil...

Son had borrowed it. Turns out he's not great about bringing things back - he's used to being on his own and coming and going and not having to think about things like a mug being someone else's. And a favorite at that. His departure left an energy vacuum that is slowly being filled with daily life. We are planting the succulents leftover from the botanical themed wedding. We are doing laundry, replacing light bulbs (an unprecedented number of them bit the dust over the wedding weekend, for some reason), returning borrowed coolers and fans and sundry other items necessary to stage an event the magnitude of ours. As the days go by I feel some clarity returning, some base energy filling the vast abyss following the wedding. I wasn't sure how to prepare for that, and still don't know how. I guess you experience it, then recover, as we are doing. We are enjoying pictures that are now circulating, taken during the festivities. Daughter and New Husband are ba...

In 5 days my baby girl will be getting married. In 2 days she, her fiance and their besties will be arriving. In 1 day I will need to have baked 6 quiches of different flavors for the brunch on Sunday. In 3 days I will have baked enough brownies to satisfy the sweet cravings of an army   a rehearsal dinner crowd. In 3 days I will have made enough lemon bars to do the same. In 15 minutes my next patient, then my last patient of the day, arrive. Just 2 hours ago my Mom came into clinic for a tuneup treatment and left 'feeling like she was walking on a cloud'. In 2 days I will, upon closing my clinic day, get my Mother of the Bride Mani/Pedi on my way home. In 3 days our little family and the groom's little family will enjoy cocktails and appetizers on our patio followed by dinner at a lovely, lovely restaurant in the valley to celebrate Father of the Groom's 60th birthday. In 4 days we will be loading a host of vehicles with the necessities to throw th...

My fatherinlaw recently passed away after a long battle with COPD.  He leaves behind three children, only one of whom spoke with him at the time of his death. That child, as it turns out, is my husband. My husband is a middle child - literally and in every possible figurative sense of the word. He has spent his entire life making peace (or attempting to craft lasting detante's in a family full of angst, stubbornness and general dysfunction, like most).  Upon his father's passing he was once again placed in this most tenuous of positions - that between forces, this time forces fueled by grief. These forces were comprised of his mother, the ex wife, and the widow, aka the Step Mom. Grief, as it turns out, brings out the very worst, the very best, and the absolutely weirdest shit imaginable in people. In the last month, memories long buried have percolated from the dark depths into the light of day. The hurts, the petty jealousies, the passions, the memories of disappointm...

 As I settle into my second year of practice, I am becoming more comfortable with the medicine overall, and am feeling continually blessed to be in a place where I can participate in journeys to better health and well being. Each day brings challenges, opportunities to test my abilities as a practitioner, and conversations about life, love, health, wellness and managing obstacles along the way. I am continually impressed by how patients cope, how they overcome their unique health issues, and how the medicine seems to support their efforts to improve. Some days the intensity of multiple patients with intense back stories or clearly nuanced and complex lives and circumstances leaves me exhausted, emotionally.  Therapeutic distance is a beautiful ideal that we're encouraged to employ; the reality is sometimes, often when I 'm physically taxed at the end of a long day or week, applying that ideal of distance becomes a challenge.  When the energy that fuels my barriers is...

When I graduated from Oriental Medical school I had some preconceptions about what my life would be like as a practitioner. I envisioned a hectic but rewarding practice, the daily rigors of balancing the art of medicine with the business of business, and a sense of constant growth and development as both a physician and a human. Those preconceptions were spot on, but with a stutterstep in between graduating and practice that was comprised of endless board exams study/completion, continual self-doubt during the board gauntlet (was I really cut out for this? could I really get through all of the silly exams without doing permanent brain damage? would I ever be able to pay back the ginormous loans I'd amassed during school? etc.), then, finally, licensing. After which realities present that require contemplation and action (or nonaction if you prefer.)  Where to practice? How to make a living while a practice grows? To accept insurance? Deciding to practice with former school col...

To say my life is full of blessings would be a gross understatement. I am incredibly blessed in countless ways. My marriage is working. After 30 years of give and take, raising a family, riding the roller coaster that is life in the modern world, we're solid. We still love each other, and are closer than I ever recall our being. Our communication has strengthened, our shared goals have morphed into simpler but infinitely essential tenets - often with our kiddos at the center. My health is good.  I still need to work on my stress levels, which continue to ebb and flow as I navigate this new profession I've launched.  My kids are great. My son continues to redefine himself after 10 years of East Coast schooling/working for NYU in the Middle East. He's fine. He's contemplating any number of futures. We'll see what he comes up with next.  My daughter, well, she's amazing, and is navigating the rigors of being an analyst at the world's largest brokerage of...

Among the 4,912,000 details that a new practitioner makes, whether or not to take insurance ranks among the highest. Pros?  More patients. Cons? Unbelievable administrative burdens. Credentialing. (Kind of like having your wisdom teeth removed, sans anesthesia, and giving birth - at the same time.)  Both clinics in which I practice accept insurance, everyone whose business opinion matters recommends accepting insurance (and jumping through the hoops required to do so), and my practical self says just bite the bullet and do it. Bullet bitten.  Process underway. I've been told it can be days, or in fact weeks, before any news comes from insurance companies about whether they're considering you, their panel is currently closed, or they want to negotiate with you. I am in that space right now, and have been told by my colleagues/mentors that now is the time to take a deep breath because once the credentialing is complete, things get a little nutso, what with tr...

Life has taken on a new rhythm now that I'm practicing. There are clinic days, there are private practice days, and there is the weekend. At least, sometimes there is the weekend.  Sometimes the weekend is for practice. Sometimes it's not. Sometimes one weekend day is a clinic day. I'm learning to adapt to a changing schedule. What I'd really like, though...is to have a full week, followed by an empty weekend. I can work really hard all week knowing I have a couple of days to catch up on life, domestics, rest, etc. This may be my many years in corporate life projecting on my new career. I'm not sure if that's it, but my preference would be to have a slightly more normal schedule. Honestly, when you first start practice, you accept patients mostly on their terms, because, mostly, you're just delighted to have patients to treat at all. But after awhile you realize that setting some time boundaries is good for everyone. And preserves a sense of order dur...

"Mom, there's something special about him. He's kind, he's romantic, he's so smart. I think I'm falling for him," she said. He is all of these things and more, and over time my sweet baby girl and her love have explored life together, have move in, have tackled daily logistics and worked together to help develop each other as individuals. He comes from a lovely family from the East coast, a family with which we have grown close over the last few years. They're funny, they're intense, they're Italian, they're foodies, they're very family oriented. And, because of yesterday's events, they will be joined with ours as our offspring unite in marriage. Our baby girl is engaged. And we couldn't be happier. The look on her face as we Facetimed last night was incredible. She was overwhelmed. She was joyous. She was filled with joy and hope and love. And her new fiancee was grinning like a loon, happy that the elaborate schem...

So you know that feeling when you know things are about to go nuts and you are doing your best to prepare in every possible way you can to avoid unnecessary whiplash? I'm there. Again. (It's happened several times in recent years, but this time is more huge since I am now licensed and about to practice...) Anyway, I am shopping for malpractice insurance, talking with fellow practitioners (who have all been amazing and supportive and incredibly helpful, sharing their own stories), realizing I have very defined dreams simply because when something happens that doesn't sync up with said dreams, I get twitchy. But I'm told this is part of the process. Twitchy is a state of being at the moment, but so is hopeful and excited and honored..to be about to practice a 5000 year old, unbelievably cool medicine, in the modern world. I think I may need to practice what I preach. Time to meditate, center, be mindful...and enjoy this ramp up to professional life (again in a to...

I can't seem to relax without feeling guilty. What is wrong with me? I have just successfully completed an enormous endeavor, and the future looks bright. I am in an in between place now - where I am done, but I am not credentialed yet, which should happen soon. There is no real reason for me to go nuts planning, as I have a couple of ideas in the works that should be a good beginning. Maybe it's because when hubby leaves the house each morning, he says "Whatcha got goin on today? Gonna check on that (name the topic, usually something to do with money) sometime?" Maybe I feel defensive about not yet working (ie earning money). Maybe I have forgotten how to relax over the last five years of insane schedules, nonstop studying, etc. I need to figure this out. Otherwise, this time, this gift of in between? I will squander. And that just seems silly to me. Hugs, Stevie

I am beyond the gauntlet. I have, after five years of study and focus, completed my education and examination process for Oriental Medicine. Within a few weeks my license will arrive, and I will be set to practice this ancient, beautiful medicine. As I write this I am light, I am hopeful, I am absolutely stoked about the future. If there is anything I have learned from the process of becoming a physician, it is ...stick with it. Every single day, even if the volume of knowledge to be consumed/assimilated seems so daunting it induces catatonia at times. Just persist. And show up each and every day ready for what lies ahead. That is all. It may be time for a nap now. Huge hugs, Stevie

As I write this, I have successfully completed five out of the six exams required for licensure in Oriental Medicine. Soon I will be taking the final exam. Finally. I am terrified. I am exhilarated. I am resolute. And after that one is behind me? Shit gets real. Fast. But I like real, and fast doesn't scare me. Though, at this point, after months and months of intense study/review/exam/study/review/exam....which is a totally different pace, a totally different way of living, moving fast may take a little adjusting on my part. Just sayin'. Huge hugs, Stevie

We have had a small pond in our backyard for the last five or so years. It provides a nice water element and requisite fountain sound that adds ambiance to relaxing summer evenings. It adds a colorful element to our raised bed garden, with gorgeous goldfish (big ones) swimming lazily beneath the lily pads. Life has been lovely for the pond, its inhabitants, and us, for years. Until the predators decided that the pond was their own private buffet, and, one Fall, right before we put a mesh cover over the top of the pond to protect it for the winter, they struck. The next morning we were outside, and noticed that the fountain had been tipped over, and that there were lily pads tossed out on the patio. And the fish food had been gnawed on, then also thrown across the flagstones.  The worst part, though, is the fish were gone. All of them. We were astonished, perplexed, saddened by the seemingly random barbarism. Turns out, we have several predators in our neighborhood, inclu...

I like coffee. I am not an addict, really, but I like it. I like one cup of good coffee in the morning.  By good I mean nice beans, darkly roasted but not charred. I grind them fresh, then pour boiling water over them and let them infuse the water with flavor. It's simple, really. One of those daily rituals that you look forward to upon waking. I add a spoon or so of raw sugar, then enjoy the warm, dark liquid. I don't consider myself a snob, but I may have strong preferences. I don't like light coffees, or even medium coffees. I like French Roast or Italian Roast.  Costo carries a vendor we like, so hubby picks me up a two pound bag every couple of months and life is good. It's a New Mexico roaster, so we feel good about the choice - it's always nice to support local. The other day I was at Sprouts picking up a few things, and I noticed they had a sale on their coffee beans. I investigated, remembered that our stock was getting low, and decided to try an Org...