After five years in Los Angeles, our then-pregnant daughter and
her husband decided to move to Pittsburgh, PA, where he had accepted an
attending position.
Coincidentally and nearly simultaneously my husband began
consulting on a local foods / economic development project in, you guessed it,
Pittsburgh.
So we committed to moving to Pittsburgh at the end of 2018 after
41 years in Madison, Wisconsin. With the vagaries of the real estate market,
the requirements of pension plans, and the necessary insurance requirements, it
ended up being early 2019.
When I agreed to the move, I had never actually been to
Pittsburgh. Until I started looking at maps, I didn’t even realize that Pittsburgh
is nearly in Ohio it’s so far west in PA. (No, geography has never been my
strong suit.) Everyone I spoke with
about the move knew someone from PGH, lived there once upon a time, or visited
regularly. And everyone loved Pittsburgh.
So at two weeks of age our granddaughter, LA (pronounced L.A.)
flew cross country with her parents to PGH. We arrived the next day by car from
Wisconsin to meet LA for the first time. It was, as any grandparent will tell
you, love at first sight.
To everyone’s relief, I also loved Pittsburgh. The folks in PGH
are some of the kindest, most thoughtful, and genuine people you will ever
meet.
After two weeks with LA, and her parents of course, we headed home
to start the process of selling/buying houses, retiring from my paid
employment, and figuring out all the things that went along with this.
My dedicated husband, while working one week per month in PGH,
spent every spare minute looking first for a neighborhood and then for a house
in a city he barely knew outside of professional meetings and hotels.
It worked though, and we found a perfectly charming and slightly quirky
house on a virtually dead end street with a fabulous yard/garden and lovely
neighbors. But we still had to sell our
house in Wisconsin, in the winter.
My New Year’s 2018 resolution was to get rid of everything we
owned, or at least a reasonable portion of it. Before the actual decision to
move, I was already sorting and winnowing our possessions. We had been at our
current location for 13 years so despite having winnowed before that move, we
still had a lot of stuff. Once the decision to move was made, the purging went
into high gear.
Anyone who has ever sold a home knows what a treat it is to make
it look like no one lives in your house while you are, in fact, living, eating, sleeping in it.
Thankfully we did not have small children, just a cat who loved to ride over to
the lake in the car when there were showings. And the house did sell for our
asking price on New Year’s Day 2019.
But the buyer was leaving the country for a month so could we
close in 6 weeks? Change paperwork, extend retirement date, redo
pension/insurance docs.
Then 3 weeks out from closing my husband was diagnosed with
cancer. Surgery was required. Not knowing what follow up would be needed or for
how long, we decided he would have the surgery done in Pittsburgh.
It is definitely good to have doctors in the family. Our
son-in-law’s brother is a specialist for this very type of cancer. He contacted
a local (WI) friend who saw my husband immediately, and who then called another
colleague in PGH who turned out to be the go-to guy in the US for this type of
surgery. Three weeks after the move, surgery got all the cancer. No chemo, no
radiation needed.
And then I had a heart attack: Just 65, no family history, few if any risk
factors. Being a woman the heart attack did not present like one. It just felt
like I was coming down with the worst virus ever. Thankfully my son-in-law
insisted that I go the ER not urgent care, or home to just take it easy.
It turned out to be a tiny little baby heart attack that left no
damage, but it did alert us to what turned out to be a 90% blockage in
one artery. Along with my titanium hip and surgical steel elbow, I now have a
shiny new heart stent and six months of cardio rehab.
Through all of this I have worked very hard to stay connected to
my art. Sewing machines and art supplies were packed away for months. Some days
it was hard to even remember that I was an artist.
It’s only been in recent weeks that I have really been able to
focus again on my work. And that’s what this blog will be about: making art
over the age of 50 with all of its attendant advantages and disadvantages. A
way to stay focused, connected, and accountable for showing up and doing the
work.
Here goes nothing and everything!
