5/29/25

 Thursday, May 29, 2025

D+183/128

1916 US Marines invaded the Dominican Republic, staying until 1924

1954 Pope Pius XII issued a holy declaration canonizing former Pope Pius X as a saint 

In bed at 9, awake and up at 4:50.  54°, high of 64°, sunny on and off.   

Prednisone, day 379; 1 mg., day 21/21; Kevzara, day 3/14; CGM, day 12/15; Trulicity, day 7/7.  Last day on prednisone.  Other meds at 7 a.m.  Eye drops at 7 a.m. & 7:30 p.m., Triamcinolone 7:30 a.m.   

Old man chills.  The thermostat in the house is set at 72°, day and night.  I was cold most of the day yesterday.  I wore sweatpants, an undershirt, my heavy, blue plaid shirt, and my green fleece (?) outdoor vest in the house, all day, and slept with the plaid shirt on.  When Jimmy Aquavia was living up the road, he would have to dress warmly when he was with us for dinner and some visiting.  He was in his mid-80s and kept his apartment at Newcastle Place in the high 70s.  When I visited my Dad in Florida during the winter months, he too kept the temperature in his little cinderblock home in the mid to upper 70s. He was in his upper 70s and low 80s in those years.   Now it's my turn.

LTMW at a busy morning at the bird feeding station.  I replaced the oranges and immediately attracted an oriole.  The birds that are most attracted by the oranges, however, are not the orioles, but the catbirds,  the red-bellied woodpeckers, and the house finches.  I also brought in the hummingbird feeder to change the nectar, but I can't unscrew the bottle from the plastic gizmo through which the hummingbirds feed.  

I was pleased to see the lawn service guy spraying our lawns this morning.  I'm guessing he was spraying herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers.  The lawn was in very bad condition after this past winter, lots of dead patches as a result, I suppose, of Lilly's urine.  As much as I dislike the brown patches, I would gladly accept more of them to have Lilly back in our lives.

It's impossible to choose a favorite sight looking through my window, the one next to my recliner, that is.  I enjoy watching the neighbors walking or jogging by or riding their bicycles or pushing baby buggies or strollers or pulling children in wagons or trying to keep up with kids on scooters.  I enjoy seeing my neighbor Ghasson and his beloved bull mastiff Athena.  They each walk with a sort of measured, majestic gait, and Ghasson is very patient when Athena chooses to sit down on County Line Road or on Wakefield Court and to stare at what? nothing?  Some neighbors get impatient with their dogs when the dog's desire to sniff some fragrant 😜 grass or soil, tug on their leash, and remind the poor pup who's the boss, but not Ghasson.  He stands and waits until Athena has accomplished her mysterious purpose.  Concerning the birds at the feeding station, I try to make a point of not favoring one kind of bird over another, half-remembering C. S. Lewis' comment in his autobiography about "the pernicius tendency to compare and prefer" and Mary Oliver's line in When Death Comes, "I think of each life as a flower, as common as a field daisy, and as singular."  I admit, however, to getting especially excited when I see a very occasional eastern bluebird, or a flock of cedar waxwings, and even when the gray catbirds appear.  If we were visited by indigo buntings, I'd probably be breathless.  Having said all that, I must also admit that I do have a favorite sight LTMW, which is watching the finches and sparrows filling their beaks with cotton nesting materials from the big cotton ball stuffed on top of the niger tube.  I think that both males and females engage in nest building.  They stuff their little beaks so full of cotton that it looks like they would not be able to see through it to navigate back to and land on their nests, but nonetheless, like Elizabeth Warren, they persist.😜  I get a big kick out of watching their diligence, their sense of mission and purpose.

Such a creature of habit.  I drove Geri over to the Audi dealer on Brown Deer Road to pick up her car after it had been serviced.  On the way back, I drove along Upper River Road in River hills, admiring the mansions and the great estates, wondering who lived in these places and wishing, as I do every time I drive this route, that my sister Kitty were with me to see these places.  Every time I take a long drive on the country roads north and west of Milwauiee, admiring the farmhouses, barns, silos, sheds, and farm fields, I wish my Dad were with me to share the enjoyent.  Every time I drive through Milwaukee's old neighborhoods, admiring the homes and stores and old factory buildings, I wish Steve were with me to share the enjoyment.  Kitty and my Dad are gone, and Steve lives 100 miles away.  I am thankful that I still get great enjoyment from these drives and only wish I could share them.  Sometimes I wish I had a three-wheeled motorcycle or a motorcycle with a sidecar so I could easily pull off to the side of whatever wonderful road I am on and leisurely enjoy the view and perhaps take photos, without impeding traffic, but that's not in the cards.  A cycle is out too because of balance challenges, i.e., the lack of balance.  I'll focus on being thankful for my 4 wheel, sturdy Volvo.  On my earlier drive through River Hills, I drove past the lovely little cemetery on Range Line Road, exciting my taphophilia.

 

Fooling around with the gouache paints that have been boxed up unused for a couple of years, and, on the top piece, with a graphite pencil and blender stump/tortillon.

Thoughts on today's anniversaries.  The history of the United States and of the missions assigned to the United States Marine Corps should instill in us a bit of modesty, if not of shame, when we start casting aspersions on imperialism or aggression of other countries.  As noted historian and ethicist Donald J. Trump reminded Bill O'Reilly back in 2017: “There are a lot of killers. You think our country’s so innocent?”   Those who mistakenly believe that the U.S. is so innocent need to read Marine General Smedley D. Butler's 1935 book, War is a Racket.

Re Pius XII's declaring that Pius X was (is) a saint in heaven enjoying the Beatific Vision,  I am reminded of the 1906 encyclical Vehementer Nos promulgated by the Pope Sain Pius X, in which he said: 

The Scripture teaches us, and the tradition of the Fathers confirms the teaching, that the Church is the mystical body of Christ, ruled by the Pastors and Doctors (I Ephes. iv. II sqq.) - a society of men containing within its own fold chiefs who have full and perfect powers for ruling, teaching and judging (Matt. xxviii. 18-20; xvi. 18, 19; xviii. 17; Tit. ii. 15; 11. Cor. x. 6; xiii. 10. & c.) It follows that the Church is essentially an unequal society, that is, a society comprising two categories of per sons, the Pastors and the flock, those who occupy a rank in the different degrees of the hierarchy and the multitude of the faithful. So distinct are these categories that with the pastoral body only rests the necessary right and authority for promoting the end of the society and directing all its members towards that end; the one duty of the multitude is to allow themselves to be led, and, like a docile flock, to follow the Pastors. 

Maybe Donald Trump should try some variation on this theme in his arguments about the Unitary Executive Theory in the Supreme Court, but with the president as the One and Only insead of the Pope.  Personally, as one of "the multitude," I'm not so inclined " to allow [myself] to be led, like a docile flock."