The Faith of her Friends

This weekend I'm moving in to my first house! In the spirit of... all my favorite authors, I have been thinking about a name for it, and I've decided to call it "Salt Life Cottage." This is in honor of my East Coast roots and my love of the beach and ocean, but also a reference to my faith and the way I pray that it will protect, transform, and heal those whom I welcome into my new home. Several of my friends requested that I make an online housewarming registry, so I did. If you enjoyed following my journey this summer and would like to be a part of the next season, feel free to check out my "New House" registry . If people order off this list, these items will be shipped directly to my new house. Also, there's this tradition in the South called a "pounding"... An Old-Fashioned Pounding is specifically food related and helps the recipient to stock their pantry. Believed to originate in the 16th Century, and often accredited to the Quakers, it i

Today is the last day of my summer experiment. Tomorrow I move out of my downtown apartment and head back to my hometown of Winston-Salem.  The past three months have been a delight and a challenge. I have felt the thrill of independence and the panic of vulnerability. I have made some new friends who have become like family to me, I have explored the famous and hidden areas of this city, I have taken some really cool weekend trips, and I have felt homesick in a way I haven't felt since college. And I am still alive - so it was a success! So what now?  Well, I bought a house! Yes, that's right... I bet you didn't see that coming! Yesterday I signed a billion papers, and I am now officially a first-time homeowner. Actually, I bought a condo in Arlington Park, a neighborhood on the northeast side of Fort Wayne, just five minutes from Kevan and Katie's house. It's a little, one-level, two-bedroom place that has what I need and also has a lot of potential and "scop

 A really good healthy lifestyle tip for anyone is to drink water throughout the day. I definitely can feel the difference - when I drink more water (four or more cups daily) I think more clearly, move more easily, breathe more freely, and generally have more energy. When I don't, I get sluggish and tired and congested. So this water thing is important!  The tricky things is - and this is getting a bit personal - the more water I drink, the more often I have to use the bathroom. You've probably noticed this in your own practice: what goes in must go out... and water moves through you faster than some other things, especially when you consume it frequently. And because I'm getting older, my bladder is not as strong as it once was. So if I am alone for 3-5 hours during the day, I have to be really careful because I need someone around to help transfer me to the toilet when nature calls.  My short-term solution to that this summer was to just not drink much water. A half a cup

Last weekend was the Dragon Boat Festival, down here on the river. I am not sure if I mentioned it before, but my apartment is right on the Maumee River, which happens to be the largest watershed river into the Great Lakes (Lake Erie). There are three rivers that converge in downtown Fort Wayne - the St. Mary, the St. Joe, and the Maumee - and so, river life is a real thing in this town. At least, it was years ago, and it is becoming so again now.  Quick little history lesson: these rivers were used 150 years ago as a "short cut" for transporting French goods from Quebec to New Orleans and were also considered a "major highway" for getting around in this part of the country. With the age of cars and trains and such, lots of bridges were built to cross the meandering rivers, and the water became just part of the scenery, a convenient place to dump waste, and a nuisance to city planners who couldn't maintain a nice, even grid-like street pattern.  My friend Pam to

 I remember playing super Nintendo games as a kid, and every time my character lost points (or size or special powers), I learned some new thing that helped me get farther along the next time around, until eventually I was able to beat the level. It made me understand at a young age that learning and improving is a process that requires you to try, fail, gain knowledge, try again, fail again, gain more knowledge, and try again, each time being a better, stronger, wiser version of yourself. This summer experiment has been like that for me and my friends, as we've steadily learned more and more about what works, what doesn't work, and how to improve in our communication and care for each other.  My caregiving schedule worked for the most part, and I think it worked really well for my friends to be able to see it laid out week-by-week. However, it also really stressed me out to see gaps, especially for the upcoming shift, and have to figure out how to fill it. Group texts are anno

I've done pretty well this summer with balancing eating out, having leftovers, and getting groceries, so my food budget stays under control. Every once in a while, I have ordered dinner through UberEats , to have it delivered to my apartment. It's pretty cool, actually. It's the evenings when I am home alone for a while, so I put on a movie or TV show to watch while I eat... which is my "stress-free zone," since I don't have to talk and I'm not worried about trying to eat fast enough to keep up with others.  On UberEats website, you can write specific instructions for the person who is delivering, so I wrote: "Please knock and then open the door - resident cannot open it herself but is expecting you!" And people have handled that very well. The learning curve has been with the packaging of the food. At first, I was just happy for the person to come inside and set the bag on my table for me and leave. But then I spent 10-20 minutes just trying to

 My summer experiment will be complete in only two more weeks, so I've been reviewing the summer and realized I forgot to write about one very special adventure: the butterfly exhibit. There is a botanical gardens conservatory in downtown Fort Wayne, which I really appreciated when I lived here before, especially in February, when it was still so cold and dark and I longed for spring. But in May and June, the conservatory has a special butterfly exhibit, which I'll explain more in a minute.  One of my friends and caregivers this summer is Danielle, and one of the (many) things I love about our time together is that it usually involves her family. She has two daughters, an unofficially-adopted daughter, a husband, and a dog named Smudge. They have all visited my apartment and helped in their own unique ways... it's very cool. Anyway, Danielle and her three girls and I decided to spend a couple hours of a particularly hot day in June at the butterfly exhibit.  The conservato

On Friday, Westley was in town. Westley, as in " The-Princess-Bride -Dread-Pirate-Roberts-Masked-Man-in-Black-As-You-Wish," Cary Elwes . The Embassy Theater was having a special screening of the movie and then he was going to do a little storytelling Q&A time about the making of the movie.  I got tickets for me, Kevan, and Katie to go.  Kevan also informed me that often times, the out-of-town celebrities who come to perform at the Embassy stop in at Fortezza Coffee sometime that day, since it is a conveniently short walking distance from the theater. It has been a nearly-lifelong fantasy of mine to get to have a cup of tea with Westley and tell him how much my life has been impacted by The Princess Bride. That is truth, no exaggeration.  So Friday morning, I got a shower and asked my friends to help me with a cute outfit and up-do, then I packed up my computer and grabbed my wallet and headed down to Fortezza for the day. My friend Ruth went with me, and we chose to sit