Warm, Wonderful December

Our tree!

One hippeastrum has already bloomed and past. This means we’re getting deep into winter. All the paperwhites but one are done. But there’s lots more hippeastrum coming into bloom around the house.

We put up our Christmas tree this weekend. My husband has many years’ worth of ornaments from family. I have the ones I collected over time. We strung two long Tibetan prayer flags over it all, and turned on the lights. The dogs love the tree. I think they know that Santa is on the way. That’s my favorite part of Christmas day – giving our beautiful pups their presents. Their sweet little faces are filled with happiness. It’s awesome.

Started craving amaranth over the weekend, so I made a porridge with coconut. Then I wanted more, so I made some for lunch today. I was thinking as I was making the second batch that maybe my body was telling me something. Amaranth is packed with lots of good things, and one of them is iron.

Then the phone rings this morning. It’s my naturopath. She just received the paperwork from the hospital I was at last week, and my bloodwork shows that I’m still anemic. Amaranth craving. The body doesn’t lie.

I’ve recovered from last week’s drama. I was at the library over the weekend collecting exposes on medicine and the workings of the pharmaceutical industry. One good book I found is The Rise and Fall of Modern Medicine by James Le Fanu. Another one I borrowed is Medical Nemesis by Ivan Illich.

I’m avoiding the literature that is comprised mainly of rants: I’m looking for more than anecdotal evidence on these subjects. Activist and consumer rights attorney Ralph Nader has a lot of good thoughts on the corporate medicine machine, with plenty of found facts to back him up. I think I’ve found a new obsession.

It’s 53 degrees outside today, December 7. It’s going to rise into the 60s this week, and these temperatures look like they’re going to hold on for a while. I’ll take this every single day all winter. If I get really lucky now, I’ll find some seriously marked-down tulip bulbs and plant clusters of them in the front garden while the ground is still so insanely soft and warm. Tulips are amazing. Winter in New England can’t get better than this.

ཞི་བདེ
Peace on Earth