It's New Year's Eve day, and for the past few weeks people on the radio, TV and Internet have been sharing lists to mark the closing of 2009. These lists have only dimly penetrated my consciousness, I think because I'm simply not in a holiday mood this year. I suppose there's always ebb and flow in life, but this year I did not feel the Christmas magic at all. And the imminent switch to 2010 later tonight doesn't feel like any kind of big deal either. I suppose it's my year to "bah humbug." It can happen to anyone, right?
What I did do over the Christmas holidays was cook. The husband and I took on responsibility for the extended family Christmas Eve dinner, so we were on-duty the weekend before, the Wednesday before, and the day of Christmas Eve. Here is what we cooked, and I must say the meal came off quite deliciously. Ocean scallops rubbed with sugar, cooked in butter, and drizzled with an orange-cardamom glace/reduction. Puree of potatoes and celery root. Leg of lamb marinated in garlic-rosemary-lemon-olive oil. Roasted root vegetables (carrot, parsnip, rutabaga, potato, onion) in butter and herbs. Onion pie with Jarlsberg, thyme and tomato. Green beans. A variety of fresh breads. For dessert we had a trifle made with ladyfingers, frozen raspberries cooked down in sugar and cornstarch, and home-made custard. There were various cookies and bars in attendance as well, and some warm spiced cider kicked off the pre-meal appetizers of olives, cheese, crackers and pickled herring. Even though I was a grinch in my own mind, I ate incredibly well for Christmas.
The real highlight of my holiday week was Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 26 and 27. All the Christmas festivities were wrapped up, and the husband and I finished 3 days of watching our neighbors' pets while they were out of town (their being out of town for the holidays meant that we also got to be in charge of shoveling out their properties during a 3-day winter storm!) We stayed in our pajamas for two whole days and settled into our basement TV room to watch the entire 5th season of LOST. It was the best Christmas present ever, I tell you. We were underground, literally, in the basement, and figuratively, not answering our phones or going outside. If you didn't hear from me at Christmas, that's the explanation.
Now it's New Year's and I feel a tiny twinge of obligation to go out and find a party to attend or observe in some way the closing of 2009 and the beginning of 2010 - a new year, a new decade. But we had no firm plans, and no real motivation to find a celebration until two hours ago when I got an email from a friend inviting us over tonight for some food, spirits, video games and mindlessness. Bingo. I will not give in completely to my grinch tendencies and will finish out this holiday season with at least a muffled bang.
Happy New Year!(?)
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
happy world AIDS day
When I started this blog back in April, I wrote a belated 'Happy Earth Day' post just after Earth Day. But today I'm writing a punctual 'Happy World AIDS Day' post. It's strange to put the word "happy" in front of a call to remember the struggle and loss of those affected by HIV/AIDS, isn't it? But didn't it get your attention?
I haven't thought seriously about HIV/AIDS since late 2006. That's when I returned from living in Ghana where I served in the Peace Corps working on HIV prevention education and providing support for People Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). Since then it's been a luxury to concentrate my energy solely on setting up my life back in this country - getting a job, buying a house, planning for the future, etc. But today is World AIDS Day, after all. It's a good opportunity to refocus my attention on the continuing global health crisis that is HIV/AIDS.
My contribution today will be to call your attention to current information about HIV/AIDS. Our president has issued a proclamation that contains up-to-date figures on the number of PLWHA and the recent progress made in decreasing the number of infections. Also from our government, www.aids.gov has not only basic information about HIV, but ideas for how you can stand in solidarity with PLWHA using the social media of your choice. I plan to attend an event later today at the university campus where I work, which will consist of an AIDS advocacy walk down a busy main street near campus followed by a conversation with several AIDS activists working on the local, national, and international level.
These are my first attempts to get back into the arena of AIDS prevention education and advocacy. They may be small steps, but they are something I can do to honor the memory of the PLWHA I knew in Ghana. Before I went to Africa, HIV was just a scary consequence of unprotected sex, something I had been educated to avoid at all costs. But for more than a year I worked on educating and supporting PLWHA in Sub-Saharan West Africa, where I was able to understand the disease on a whole new level.
I held the hands of dying AIDS patients in their hospital beds. I sat and kept HIV positive people company while they waited for test results. I visited AIDS orphans at their extended families' homes in remote villages. I attended the funerals of PLWA who finally succumbed. All of these brave people brought home to me the real consequences of this indiscriminate and life-altering disease. I thank them for allowing me into their lives during the short time I knew them, and for the rest of my life I will hold their faces and their stories tight in my memory.
I have the luxury of living in a country with a relatively low incidence of HIV infection, but the disease is here all the same. It would be a waste of all my learning to turn away from the effort to increase public awareness and understanding of HIV. I may not be an activist or a crusader, but if I am one person with access to a computer and the Internet, and electricity to power them, then I can contribute to public HIV/AIDS awareness in my own small way. It's the least I can do.
I haven't thought seriously about HIV/AIDS since late 2006. That's when I returned from living in Ghana where I served in the Peace Corps working on HIV prevention education and providing support for People Living With HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). Since then it's been a luxury to concentrate my energy solely on setting up my life back in this country - getting a job, buying a house, planning for the future, etc. But today is World AIDS Day, after all. It's a good opportunity to refocus my attention on the continuing global health crisis that is HIV/AIDS.
My contribution today will be to call your attention to current information about HIV/AIDS. Our president has issued a proclamation that contains up-to-date figures on the number of PLWHA and the recent progress made in decreasing the number of infections. Also from our government, www.aids.gov has not only basic information about HIV, but ideas for how you can stand in solidarity with PLWHA using the social media of your choice. I plan to attend an event later today at the university campus where I work, which will consist of an AIDS advocacy walk down a busy main street near campus followed by a conversation with several AIDS activists working on the local, national, and international level.
These are my first attempts to get back into the arena of AIDS prevention education and advocacy. They may be small steps, but they are something I can do to honor the memory of the PLWHA I knew in Ghana. Before I went to Africa, HIV was just a scary consequence of unprotected sex, something I had been educated to avoid at all costs. But for more than a year I worked on educating and supporting PLWHA in Sub-Saharan West Africa, where I was able to understand the disease on a whole new level.
I held the hands of dying AIDS patients in their hospital beds. I sat and kept HIV positive people company while they waited for test results. I visited AIDS orphans at their extended families' homes in remote villages. I attended the funerals of PLWA who finally succumbed. All of these brave people brought home to me the real consequences of this indiscriminate and life-altering disease. I thank them for allowing me into their lives during the short time I knew them, and for the rest of my life I will hold their faces and their stories tight in my memory.
I have the luxury of living in a country with a relatively low incidence of HIV infection, but the disease is here all the same. It would be a waste of all my learning to turn away from the effort to increase public awareness and understanding of HIV. I may not be an activist or a crusader, but if I am one person with access to a computer and the Internet, and electricity to power them, then I can contribute to public HIV/AIDS awareness in my own small way. It's the least I can do.
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