Thursday, March 10, 2011

House projects are never truly done – this warning should be written in bold letters on mortgage papers – but nevertheless I am declaring victory on the relandscaping project.

About a year ago I got serious about facing up to some long-standing garden issues that I hadn’t put the the time, money, or guts towards addressing. Bing had kept the lawn fertilized, weeded, and reseeded. . .and I hadn’t. Whenever I pulled in or out of the driveway in daylight, I was reminded that the lawn had become a far cry from its previous putting green self. Besides, after serving on the board of the USC Center for Sustainable Cities for a number of years, I became increasingly guilty about even having a lawn which required weekly mowing-and-blowing and watering, yet still turned brown during the summer water rationing. The roots of the liquid ambar tree were destroying the front brick patio and were preventing anything from growing inside the front courtyard. The fruit trees and climbing Cecille Brunner rose hadn’t been pruned in 10 years. I didn’t spend the time on the vegetable gardening that I wanted because the weeding overwhelmed me. I hated watching the azaleas and camellias burn every summer and saw the handwriting on the wall that water here in the Southern California desert not only will become more rationed and more expensive, it just won’t even be available.

So I decided it was time for a major make-over: get rid of the lawn and liquid ambar tree, clean everything up, switch to drought-tolerant California natives, and convert the sprinklers to drip irrigation. On top of that, I charged my designer with avoiding cactus, keeping the blue-purple-pink-white color palette, leaving me room to do “edible landscaping,” and adjusting for the microclimate problem areas.

Six months after the demolition started, the new materials, plants, and irrigation now are installed, and the new look is settling in. The deciduous trees are ready to pop, following my wisteria’s lead. The new citrus trees are bursting with white blossoms, adding their fragrance to that of the new sages, osmanthus, and thymes. With bird seed I’m enticing the birds back; I’m especially glad the mourning doves have returned. I’m watching for the butterflies and bees next. My gardener said “I must have known something” about the liquid ambar, because he said the roots were sick and that tree could have come crashing down in the next storm, of which we have had plenty this past winter. My water bill is higher than a year ago, although I have cut my water usage almost in half. Just think what that bill would be otherwise. And starting next week, the city of Pasadena will have a ten-day water shut-down on external uses. All in all, I’m glad I took the gardening bull by its horns, and am able to experience springtime in the new eco-order.

I can tell I’m feeling much better because I am itching to plant my new vegetable beds this Saturday. I’m continuing contentedly without any further word from the doctors and in the meantime, as Bing used to say, will “go play in my garden.”

Monday, March 7, 2011

In the past 36 hours since Saturday evening about 6:30 p.m., I have slept almost 31 of those hours. And the way I feel right now, I’m due for more zzzz’s.

I rallied to conduct choir rehearsal yesterday morning, and immediately came home afterwards on a beeline back to bed. Even before my medical advisory committee had a chance to weigh in last night, I had decided I should stay put and take it easy today. After last night’s rain, this morning is gloriously spring-like, with a light brisk wind and puffy white clouds billowing across the bright blue sky. It will be a shame to close the shutters on such a beautiful day, but close them, I will.

I’m not sure what this overwhelming fatigue means. Maybe it’s a good thing – my body building back up after all the drugs. If I don’t answer the phone, you’ll know why.

“A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor’s book.” ~~Irish proverb

Thursday, March 3, 2011

By its very numbers, March 3^rd, or 3/3, is considered auspicious for significant undertakings; my maternal grandmother selected it as my parents’ wedding day.

Traditionally, March 3^rd also is celebrated in Japan as Girls’ Day. In ye olden times, the day’s activities were along the lines of visiting the temple, daintily playing a badminton-like game while clad in kimono, and eating various foods such as a clam soup and manju, sweet decorated mochi in pink and other pastels (really, you just aren’t going to get away from sticky rice). But perhaps the most important Girls’ Day custom is a “passive” one: to display sets of dolls known as ohina-sama (hina means small) which depict the members of the Imperial Household.

This tradition is said to date back to the Heian period (794 -1185), when parents came to believe that the dolls would absorb any illness or injury which came to their daughters and thereby would protect them from harm. As even the most basic doll sets are an expensive luxury, not much seems to be made of this holiday in Japan today, and they have been low priority among the Japanese American immigrant families.

I’m sure my male-dominated family would not have paid any attention to Girls’ Day but for a package that arrived from Japan not long after I was born. The package was from Utae Ono, a first cousin of my maternal grandmother, Shizu Kurose. What my mother has told me about Utae is that in her youth, she became a lady-in-waiting to the Empress of Japan. To become a handmaiden in the Imperial Household is as if a young girl joins a convent. She lived her entire life in the Kashiko-dokoro (“Place of Awe”), one of the buildings in the Imperial Palace considered sacred.

Utae and my grandmother stayed in touch after my grandmother came to the U.S., and my grandmother wrote to her saying that her first grandchild, a girl, had been born. The parcel which Utae sent was impressive. The rice paper which enclosed the gifts inside had calligraphy by the Imperial Household to say that it was sent from my relative to my family. My dad saved this calligraphy and I have it framed. My mother said there was a very fancy box of sugar candies, a beautifully decorated set of this badminton game, Japanese-style baby clothes hand-made from silk remnants belonging to the Empress, and an elaborate ohina-sama set of dolls for me.

Each Girls’ Day, my mother would bring out my doll set and tell me this story. I always was fascinated by the little figures and each year would stare and stare at them to take in their detail. Along the way, my mother gave me the game set and baby clothes to keep in my grandfather’s trunk I claimed in high school, and when I got married, she gave me the doll set to keep. The custom is to put the dolls away and only bring them out for the festival, with the accompanying superstition that leaving the dolls out past March 4th will result in late marriage for the daughter. Since I was already married, I was undaunted by the superstition and have chosen to display them in my living room bookcase year-round. Besides, I really don’t have a place to store them, and they are among the most interesting things I own.

If you could look at them closely, you’ll see the Emperor and Empress holding court from the top row. The Emperor holds a baton signifying his status and the Empress holds a fan. Behind them is a gold folding silk screen. One way you can tell my set is “deluxe” is because it has so many accessories considered option, such as the lampstands decorated with cherry blossoms and the two vases with peach branches in between the Imperial couple.

In the second row are three ladies-in-waiting who bear different sake containers. The two round tables between them are supposed to be for holding confections.

Five male court musicians occupy the third middle row. Left to right, they are holding a small taiko drum, a larger otsuzumi drum, a hand kotsuzumi drum, and a flute. The musician on the far right holding a fan is a singer. I’ve always liked this row because my maternal grandparents were accomplished musicians on Japanese instruments.

The fourth row has two ministers, both bearing bows and arrows. In between them are two diamond-shaped stands displaying red, white, and green diamond-shaped ricecakes.

The fifth bottom row has a mandarin orange tree on the left and a cherry tree on the right. In between the trees are three samurai, protectors of the Emperor and Empress. In some sets, they are depicted as drunken, but mine look pretty sober, appropriately enough.

I wish I knew more about Utae – one of those family history projects to tackle one of these days. As someone who is reminded every day while reading the International Waldenstrom’s Macroglobulemia Foundation talklist that I have an incurable fatal disease, I suppose I ought to ratchet the priority on such projects. In any event, I’m glad to know what little I do know about her, and to have what I have from her. Happy Girls’ Day, and happy anniversary, Mom and Dad.

(And yes, there is equal time for boys: May 5^th.)

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Thank you to the Good Samaritan who has been taking out and bringing in my trash cans before I’m home from work. I appreciate it.

This week I have been working late sitting in on the courses which meet in the evenings and have advising sessions with my students who work during the day and who are trying to complete a master’s program at night. It’s also that time of year when I review thesis drafts. With the inevitable few whose drafts are a mess or who have yet to even turn in a first draft, I must strike that fine balance of tough love to get them in gear while also talking them down off the ledge and keeping them motivated that they can still finish in a credible way and graduate this semester. Most of the faculty and senior staff I work with know what’s been going on with me, but the students don’t know, which is appropriate so I am listening to their problems and not them feeling that they should be asking me about mine.

It’s also that time of year to recruit high school students for the summer programs I oversee. I wasn’t able to work at any of the February recruiting events but at least I’m able to staff our big “Come to Campus Day” this Saturday morning. And the real “fun” right now is getting the budget approved and determining the teaching schedule for the next academic year.

These are the main “seasonal” crunches on top of the usual fray. But my real time crunch is a function of a whole new set of responsibilities that came my way this summer, right before I was diagnosed with WM. The university accreditation process has grown into demanding its own complex, data-driven machinery. We have to be able to document that we’re teaching what we say we’re teaching, that students are learning what we say they should be learning, and that we know how we’re going to improve both processes. I became the point person for the review of all undergraduate academic programs in the College of Letters, Arts & Sciences over a ten-year cycle, because – you’ll laugh – I’m considered the organized, efficient associate dean who can get cantankerous people to (usually) cooperate.

What’s made the work load truly laughable is that when one of us four academic associate deans left for another position a couple of months ago, the powers that be opted not to replace that position, and even more new work came my way. This and they cut my one administrative support position from full-time to half-time last June. I was asked what my raise is for taking on all this new work and what my new title is to reflect this increased scope of responsibility. Ha! See, I’m laughing.

That’s okay, because I figure the more that’s in my “decanal portfolio,” university-admin-speak for “what’s on my plate,” the better the job security. Associate deans are the top of the civil servant pile; although we all serve at will, usually new deans keep the worker bees like me in place because we’re the ones who deal with the nitty-gritty that they don’t want to know about. President Sample was famous for sending complaint letters addressed to him down the chain with his ¼-sheet slips of green paper attached on which he scrawled, “Please handle.” Those green slips would end up with staff like me. At least I tell myself that it better be worth the job security and the USC health insurance.

Since I hadn’t heard from my USC doctor for a few weeks, I was letting the “sleeping chemo dog” lie. No further treatment has been scheduled because she hasn’t paid attention to me, not because there was some determination that I didn’t need any further chemo. But then my “peeps” starting asking questions such as whether they could book me for appointments on Fridays again, whether they should get me refundable plane and hotel reservations for an upcoming conference – you know, questions that presume I know what my life is going to be like. I broke down and emailed her, and true to form, she thinks I need to continue with treatment, but is contacting the Dana-Farber doc as she promised to do to see what he thinks. So we’ll see and in the meantime, I’m going to catch up with as much as I can for as long as I can, be glad to let my veins recuperate, and hope my taste buds come back soon.