2020 Odds and Ends

The leaves are down, the days are short, and the winter wind is shaking the house. It must be time to reflect on the year. Ah, 2020... a year that will go down in infamy in every history book. As I write this, a COVID tsunami dwarfing all previous surges is sweeping through our heartland, and hundreds of thousands of families are facing a holiday season bereft of loved ones claimed by the pandemic. At least it's been improved here towards the end by the ouster of America's mad boy-king (who still refuses to concede) and by the promise of a vaccine. 

As for me, it's actually been an excellent 10.5 months, for which I am undeserving and incredibly grateful. My immediate circle has been spared by the pandemic, and the High Country is a wonderful, beautiful place to live, regardless of the public health situation. Here's a quick rundown of my year:

• We are in the process of adopting Eliza! Due to DSS restrictions, I can't post any pictures, but once the adoption goes through, there will surely be a post (or ten) on her. Literally as I was finishing this post, Mindy brought her into the library to see me and she reached out her whole body out towards me and said "dada" for the very first time. She melts our hearts every day!
• Mindy and I had a fun and relaxing 5-year anniversary trip to Chimney Rock last month, where we explored the trails and waterfalls of the Southern Appalachians, stayed at a nice bed and breakfast, and Mindy went gem mining for the first time.
• The Community Care Clinic has undergone several staff transitions but is now secure and thriving and continues to serve as the safety net clinic for the High Country's uninsured population.
• I made lots of strides in my ultrasound abilities, and started teaching the Family Medicine residents basic ultrasound in July.
• As you might imagine, my work has been busy... but there's nothing like a pandemic to provide job security to a hospitalist!
• I've learned a great deal about the subconscious, and about myself in the process; more to come on that in future posts.
• I kayaked nine times, and successfully rolled my kayak for the first time.
• Though I didn't have the chance to compete in any triathlons, I needed a rebuilding year. 
• I started getting a lot stronger over the last few months after getting serious about working out, seeing a personal trainer a few times, taking creatine, and consistently doing circuit workouts every 3 days. 
• I learned to identify more types of mushrooms, and Mindy and I found several edible mushrooms in the wild: field mushrooms, lion's mane, and chicken of the woods. Lion's mane was particularly tasty with eggs and onions.

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  Lion's mane in the cast-iron skillet
  

  
  
  
  
• I fermented several kinds of peppers and other vegetables into various sauces, pickles, and pastes. Here's just one day's work out of several:

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  Pepper mash, turmeric paste, ginger paste, and pickled ginger
  





• The garden did fairly well, and my gardening skills greatly improved. Mindy and I finally enjoyed several batches of home-grown asparagus in May after three previous growing seasons established the asparagus patch. We had a fun variety of squashes, and lots of tomatoes, jalapeno and aji dulce chili peppers, collard greens, kale, parsley, cilantro, basil, cucumbers, beans, and sunflowers. The carrots, beets, lettuce, and spinach were a disappointment, and the okra, celery, and marigolds didn't sprout. I also learned that cantaloupes, eggplant, and most varieties of chili peppers don't do well here-- it just doesn't get quite warm enough. 

The garden in July

I'm content with my life, especially the strides Mindy and I have made over the last couple years. And though I'll keep gardening, mushrooming, fermenting, kayaking, triathloning, reading, blogging, and ultrasounding, I'm always looking for the next thing. For years, I've been wanting to get back into music, but just haven't had the margin. One day I also hope to get back into rock climbing, jiu-jitsu, and grilling. I'm also planning to build a jungle gym in the back yard. Maybe 2021 will be the year for some of those things. If 2020 is any indication, it will also be generously sprinkled with surprises.

I hope everyone reading this has also had a generous silver lining to an otherwise dark year. The next few weeks will be busy, so I'll see you all in December! Stay well, everyone.

The Tao of Joe

Moderates. It's easy to overlook them, to miss the passion and the genius because of the label. But as we all impatiently await a Biden rescue on the burning deck of the Trump administration, anxious and crazed in one way or another, it would behoove us to understand the psychological underpinnings of our president-elect. Fortunately, we have a lot of data to go on. Joe Biden's biographer Evan Osnos put it this way: Joe Biden's passion for fairness is the through-line guiding his career over the last 50 years. And it is precisely his lack of dogmatism-- his moderation-- that has given him the flexibility to navigate the treacherous waters of Washington and advance, in an imperfect but consensus-oriented way, countless fair and just movements over the course of his career. 

Though Biden has doggedly pursued fairness over the course of his life, his biography also showcases how unfair life can be, in the midst of good luck: His fortuitous election to the Senate at the age of 29, followed weeks later by the unbelievable tragedy of losing his wife and infant daughter in a car accident. His ill-fated presidential candidacy in 1988, redeemed 20 years later by his selection to be the vice-president to the most transformative president in a generation. The tragic loss of his son Beau in 2015, when everything else in his life had been building to a comfortable retirement. And of course, his faltering candidacy in early 2020, turned around in dramatic fashion in South Carolina and on Super Tuesday. 

But the juxtaposition that trumps all the others has been the pandemic whose horror helped catapult Biden to the presidency. COVID-19 and the other crises of 2020 revealed to millions of Americans our deep need for a president who can provide stability, competence, decency, unity, and empathy. How fortunate that Joe Biden has each of these qualities, all core competencies as a result of the vicissitudes of life he has weathered. Joe Biden, scars and all, is a man perfectly fitted for the hour. 

The qualities of wise and unwise leaders are two of the chief themes running through a (well-timed) book I've been meditating on the last few months, the Tao Te Ching. Leaders are either in accord with or in opposition to the Tao, the basic principle of the universe. There's so much wisdom I'd like to share from this book (and I'm sure I will be in other posts), but Chapter 59 especially jumps off the page as the epitome of Joe Biden:

For governing a country well

There is nothing better than moderation.

The mark of a moderate man 

is freedom from his own ideas. 

Tolerant like the sky,

all pervading like sunlight,

firm like a mountain,

supple like a tree in the wind,

he has no destination in view

and makes use of anything

life happens to bring his way.

Nothing is impossible for him.

Because he has let go, 

he can care for the people's welfare

as a mother cares for her child.

I hope those words will prove more true than we can imagine-- that Biden will transform the impossible into the accomplished. The stakes are high, the obstacles many, and I often doubt how much can be achieved. But if anyone can slice through the fetters of dogmatism and arrive at something like justice in our time, it's Joe. And on the other side, I have a vision of what it might be like-- perfectly encapsulated by the last few lines of Chapter 17 of the Tao Te Ching. Here's the chapter in its entirety:

When the Master governs, the people

are hardly aware that he exists. 

Next best is a leader who is loved.

Next, one who is feared.

The worst is one who is despised.

If you don’t trust the people,

you make them untrustworthy.

The Master doesn’t talk, he acts. 

When his work is done, 

the people say “Amazing:

we did it, all by ourselves!”