300 Days of Sunshine

Happy Fall!  I am very much looking forward to a new season.  I love the crispness of fall.  It's the perfect time of year to let go and to reflect.  Ady has been really interested in seasons lately and certain traditions or themes that come with each one.  She was so thrilled when I told her it was fall, exclaiming, "Yay, we get to eat corn on the cob!"  We also made some pumpkin cookies with warm apple cider this week.   Still trying to determine the best wine pairing with pumpkin cookies... In addition to yummy fall flavors, here are a few tidbits about life lately: 1.  We're still taking the pandemic very seriously in New Mexico, with masks required at all times when leaving the house, and most businesses are still closed to indoor service.  As a health care worker, I'm so thankful for our state's leadership in their approach and scientific basis for decision-making.  I am also thankful to have so many beautiful outdoor spaces for safe, small gatherings, a

Finding inspiration at my favorite local coffeeshop drive-through At the beginning of the summer, when our nation and communities were struggling with a surge in COVID-19 cases as well as the aftermath of George Floyd's murder,  I thought to myself, "This must be rock bottom for our country.  This is the collapse of humanity as we know it.  Things couldn't possibly get any worse for our nation right now."  That was before fires destroyed homes and lives along the west coast.  Before more cases of police brutality and abuses of power emerged.  Before the new school year started, with some areas virtually and some in person but all equally stressful.  Before the pandemic pushed people to their limits of mental health, causing our numbers of patients in the ICU with critical illness resulting from substance use and mental illness to reach unprecedented highs.  And before feminist icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg succumbed to cancer.  I'm still processing her death and what i