Lake Galena: Before the thunderstorms

Down to Bucks County's Lake Galena where we went for a paddleboat ride.

The day was hot and muggy so we ate at La Morena in Hatboro, PA. Met Benny and Nidia, the owners. The food was nothing short of spectacular.

I've always loved the look of vending machines. I ordered a delicious Guava soda made by the Mexican company Boing. The bottle was long and thin -- real glass, not plastic -- and so b'ful I almost brought it home. "For what?" I asked myself.

After I got home I went on my stationery bike for 20 minutes since I ate so much.

Can you hear the thunder rumbling? Grrrrrr. God is angry. But why should he be? It's not like we're fighting a useless war.... oh never mind... or polluting the ... oh never mind.

Auto Show & Cooking Show

Auto Show at the Upper Moreland PA Middle School. I try to make it once every 10 yrs.

The classic '66-67 Stingray

A well-designed cab is a piece of artwork

Sarah came to town to accompany me to my doctor appt at Einstein. Scott drove us and also sat in.

We added dried cranberries to our coleslaw. Our dinner guests -- Ada and Rich Fleisher -- loved it. Sarah sauteed haddock in cornmeal and special breadcrumbs and served it w/a cool-as-cucumber sauce. Our next-door neighbor McKayla, who just graduated 5th grade, came over to help us prepare the meal. She has an adventurous palette & had never eaten mushrooms cuz her mom is allergic to them. She had her first taste with us and is still alive.

Cmon over and have some!

Back to the Buddhists I go

Buddhist temple Mongkoltepmunee in Bensalem, PA

Enter, please

Glittering door in this classical Thai temple

Mr. S, who designed this classical Thai Buddhist temple, and Tang, a Thai-born Buddhist


Interior with Red carpet
White world of purity

Picnic grove. Buddhists like to eat

The iron gates of the monestery

After my experience w/the Buddhists, I went food shopping. Made a fresh flounder sandwich with sauteed onions on a kaiser roll. It was delicious except I was talking on the phone while eating since I had to catch up on my phone calls after I escaped to see the Buddhists.

I had a hankering to revisit old places today so slipped on my shoes and went. Everything is timing. First I drove out to Simon's old house. Unrecognizable. Under construction, major construction. Am wondering if the plumbing biz next door bought it. Tried to see if his trees were still in the backyard -- and the yellow iris he planted in memory of his mother -- but couldn't see a thing and didn't feel like trespassing.

Then I drove to The Atrium where I used to work as a therapist. Here's a photo. The bldg hasn't changed but our old offices are a financial company.



My old office was just beyond the bushes on the right. I had a huge room, the conference room. Used to run groups there. We had an intern by the name of Greg Perri. One time Greg came over and Henry Jacqueline was canvassing for office as a twp commissioner. I invited Henry in cuz I didn't like what he stood for but wanted to hear his spiel. I introduced boyish-looking Greg, correctly, as Dr Perri.

Couldn't remember what street the monestery was on. Was driving slowly & saw the iron gates. My heart soared. Would I be taken in?

Parked in the empty parking lot. They hold services for civilians on the weekends. Greg and I had gone once together. He said he never felt so out of place. The room was filled with chanting Asians and a handful of whites like us. I felt quite comfortable.

Lo and behold the Buddhists had built a bright new white temple. Aghast, I walked up to it in my shorts and red shirt, watch shining in the sun. Started snapping photos right away. Then I saw a man. Then two men.

He waved and I knew I was safe.

We stood and talked for half an hour. I was now under the influence, again, of the Buddhists. All life is suffering, he told me. The Buddha designed a way out of suffering. By meditating, you lose your ego which is all about attachment. Ah, I'd forgotten that word. Attachment. Things. Materialism. Nice things.

When I walked back to my car, I wondered if Tang thought I had a nice car. I am a materialist. I told him I was a poet. He said sometime in a past life I was also a poet. He had been some animals as well as persons. It was no accident we met, he said. There are no accidents.

The fact that you and I, Dear Reader, are together right now, when you could be watching a dumbass TV show or raiding the refrigerator like I'm gonna do, is no accident. According to Tang.

When I got home I took a nap. It was 4 o'clock. Slept well. When I woke and looked at my watch it was 4 o'clock. My watch had stopped.

Perhaps I was dead. But, no, I was dead the other day. Sometimes we die but we come back to life again. So far, so good.

Love, Ruthie

Mandy's Movie Nite

When I first met Mandy, a relative newcomer at ND, I thought, Hmmm, wouldn't it be great if she'd have a regular movie nite at her spacious Willow Grove home w/gardens out back including 3 splashing fountains.

Luckily for us, Mandy had the very same idea. We arrived in droves on Friday nite. We watched the hilariously obnoxious film The Hangover. Mike Tyson, the fabulous soft-spoken crazed prizefighter made a brilliant cameo performance. We got to see the inside of his Vegas home.

For me the hit of the party was the watermelon Tom brought. He got it at a ShopRite in NE Philly near where he lives.

So, after Scott and I went on a Pennypack nature walk this afternoon, we drove over to Harry Mitchell's Shop n Bag in Bethayres where I bought cut-up slices and chilled em till they were cold enuf to eat.

We do love our watermelon!

What? You've discovered there ain't no Mitchell's Shop n Bag? That's b/c I made up the name for my novel. That's where Mollie buys most of her groceries, putting em in a canvas bag, of course, to conserve on trees.

I based good ole Harry on the cashier David, who calls everyone ma'am (yuk!)but I'm not wearing my namebadge or tattoo no's from the Nazis, but in the book he knows Mollie by name. David did share w/me that he has a schizophrenic brother living in a group home in Germantown.

I wrote a bit about his brother, who I named Gene, and based him on a star athlete I played volleyball with who graduated from Abington High School and then lost everything when he was diagnosed. I gave Gene an illustrious career as a football star at Syracuse before his fall from schizophrenia.

This is among the worst diseases god ever invented. Well, the chick pea disease in the previous post isn't much fun either.

Last nite I was pretending to be dead. They say the dead visit you. I was trying to decide who to visit. After Simon died, my computer wouldn't work right. After my dad died, I had a week full of dreams about him. Usually when the dead visit you they're not particularly nice to you. They shake you up. When my electrologist Lorraine died she came under the door to say hello cuz my bedroom door was closed.

Rodica said to me, Why would she come under the door? She's a spirit and would come thru the door.

Always end with a pleasantry. When we got to the top of the hill, we saw bluebirds, real bluebirds, swirling around the fence, dipping and darting. They have a distinctive spurting motion. Then we saw a hawk high in the air and more bluebirds were attacking the hawk and sending him off beyond the clouds.

Quite a spectacle. Another couple came up the path. "We were just escorted off the meadow by some darting bluebirds," I said, "who was afraid we'd bother their chicks," I said, pointing to the bluebird house.

After talking awhile to the couple, I learned that we had indeed seen a bluebird or two, but the majority of birds we saw were Swallows, or a Kingbird.

I'm fairly sure the couple Scott and I saw were homo sapiens, but who knows? Hard to trust my eyes.

And, did you hear about dark matter? Dark energy? What we know of the cosmos is only four percent of the actual reality. 96 percent is still out there unseen and called dark matter.

During my next hangover, or, psychotic episode, I'll posit some theories about dark matter.

Fini: Third & final revision of my novel

This is my novel. Went on Facebook to see where my teacher had gone since she didn't answer my email. She's on vacation. Ya know how our darkest thoughts occur at nite? Here's what I imagined would be written on the back inside cover of the book jacket. "The author died at age 65 of kidney failure from taking lithium."

Sarah's friend, the jazz critic Stanley Crouch, told her kidney dialysis is a fate worse than death. I am fully aware of that and had told my kids I might choose not to have it. That fate has animated me now. I've written a number of really good poems and would like to gather them up and publish them.

Facing death really gives you something to live for!

Began making this bread at 9 a.m. Saturday and pulled it piping hot from the oven at Noon. When Sarah called and said, Mom, pick me up at Trenton, I'm late for the shower, I said, Sure, Sweetie, I'll leave in 5 minutes. I cut 2 thick slices for Sarah and spread on the butter, and was in Trenton 45 minutes later. We got to the shower in Abington exactly on time: 2 p.m.

The baby shower for Dan and Nicole and unborn baby Grace was lots of fun. I got to meet their new cat, a beautiful stray whom they adopted. Food was organized by Barb, Nicole's mom, who, as a native Philadelphian, knew where to buy the most scrumptious hoagies -- make mine the portabello mushroom one -- and iced pound cake from the famous Stock's Bakery on Lehigh Avenue, a cake so delicious you don't need ice cream with it.

Dan's guacamole dip was to die for, and in fact I almost did. I had a cumin allergy attack & am still itching around my eyes and nose. Scott was insanely worried about me. "Are you sure you're all right?" "I'm fine, Scott," I'd say. "I'm not gonna go into anaphylactic shock."

During my misery, I ran upstairs to read the Web about the cumin allergy.

At Dan's, I led my mom up the steep stairs so she could see the baby's room. Wish I'd brought my camera. It's one of the most beautiful rooms I've ever seen. Bright yellow, newly painted, with plenty of character from the shape of the room. One window gives onto a view of the huge backyard. On a dresser, Grace's library has already been set up. For sure, she'll be a great reader like her parents.

Her little clothes hang in the closet, and I'm certainly not gonna tell my readers that I looked in the drawers of the dresser and found her darling little 'rubber pants,' as we used to call them. Look! The term came up from the abyss.

"Jews," said my mother, "don't prepare like this."

Jews are superstitious, that's why. Not all, of course, I say, crossing myself three times.

Guests frolicked on the back lawn. They played bocci. We sat under a tent where little Jonas came up to me and showed me his 'fun bands,' thin colorful plastic bracelets that, when you removed them, assumed the shape of various objects like a dogbone, dollar sign (this is America), woman's figure, the sun.

Three babies were in attendance. They arrived in the arms of a parent from as far away as Jersey City; Montclair, NJ; and Delaware. Gifts overflowed the dining room. I handed Dan a US Savings Bond I bought at a bank. Dan said when he went to college, he cashed in his savings bonds which had trebled in value.

You know I'm nosy, right? At the bank where I bought the bonds, a woman and her husband stood in line. The woman had some grotesque disease where it looked like chick peas were growing all over her face and neck.

I asked the asst. bank manager, Ann, if she knew what the woman's condition was. She didn't. I spent a good deal of time in the middle of the nite thinking about the nerve it would take to walk out of the house with chick peas growing all over you. Any ideas what it might be? Possibly an Elephant's Man type of condition.

I kept a few books to look over when I gave Linda the New Directions' library of books. Inside The Angry Book was a photo of a couple and a delicious-looking glass of white wine

Surprised by daylillies in the backyard

California Clint is 80

Clint Eastwood is still handsome and sexy at 80. It gives us all hope!
Clint tours a huge vault filled with the costumes from all his movies
There are so many costumes he barely remembers them all.
Ny favorite are his fancy cowboy togs
He walks well for a man of 80 and his pants aren't hiked up too high

Watched the birthday tribute to Eastwood on Turner Classic Films, introduced by the dapper Robert Osbourne. As I type, I'm hearing the theme song right now. Biggest brain area, I'm told, is our Song Department. Thanks to Oliver Sacks, MD, for that bit of fascinating trivia.

I called Lori yesterday at the hospital in California where she checked in. I gave her hell for wanting to leave the planet. She's on new meds - Celexa, Risperdal, and Lamictal.

You understand, I said to her, they don't work unless you take them, don't you?

Yes, she said.

Her voice was animated when she first spoke to me. The nurse put her on the phone instead of the ignominy of the payphone. Then, as we talked business --- her mental health -- she began to waver.

What are you thinking? I asked her.

About going home, she said.

And what will you do there, I asked.

Nothing, she said.

Well, you've gotta have an ACTION PLAN when you leave the hospital. Dyou understand?

Yes, she said.

Dyou promise me you'll get an action plan before you leave?

Yes, she said.

After I hung up, I thought about how much I loved life. Here's a few things to love as I'm sitting here typing:

- The breeze that's coming in the kitchen window and the front door

- My typing hands that have been with me for 64 years and who began typing at 8 when my dad taught me to type

- The green leaves on the maple tree in the backyard, seeming to protect me from all harm

- My library books

- PA Representative Tom Murt's office which are still collecting goods for Iraqi citizens, they said, when I stopped in this morning. I have many things to donate.

- Best of all, the wonderful people I surround myself with. If we are what we eat, we become even greater b/c of the people we love and who love us.

Linda, Cornbead & Kidneys

Linda is the new librarian of New Directions. A prolific poet and reader, she recommended that Scott and I visit the Folger Library when we tour DC in June. She saw Othello there, a play about the ravages of jealousy.

Linda attends our monthly Writers' Group and presented 2 poems last week: Lady Autumn and Sister Agnes. A devout Christian, she believes that "God saves us through His Grace." She attends church and Bible studies. She is also working on a novel.



Baked this cornbread this morning and brought a couple pieces over to Neighbor Sue. Her kids loved it. Her dad recently died from kidney failure so I told her about my failing kidneys due to ingestion of lithium for 16.5 yrs. She said a man down the street is facing dialysis.

I asked a few questions like What's his energy level. Very poor. I'm fortunate cuz I haven't reached that point yet. I've got lots of energy but I do love my naps.

Doctors do not tell you about adhering to a restrictive diet to prolong kidney health and postpone dialysis. Mary Ann Moylan, nutritionist at the Willow Grove Giant, put me on a kidney-healthy diet which I adhere to cuz I do not want dialysis. It ruins your body. Average lifespan is 5 yrs.

Spoke to my friend Lillian who's been on dialysis for 8 yrs. She's doing well but gave me added reinforcement for staying on my diet.