Merry Christmas 2023

 Greg and Dixie

2023 Holidays

 Merry Christmas, Happy New Year! 

May you have something to celebrate and someone to love in 2024.

“What is Christmas? It is tenderness for the past, courage for the present, hope for the future.” – Agnes M. Pahro

Dear Family and Friends, 

So once again, I sit down to write a summary of sorts, to give you a bit of an understanding of the Goode life here in the California Redwoods. I'm not sure where this year has come and gone so quickly from. Looking back there were long stretches where I can barely believe we lived it. Time seems to have rushed up and past me this year without many grand adventures. Again we have lost one of my sisters-in-law. Greg's brother Harv's wife Fran who has been both a generous hostess, and a delightful guest at our home. Her laughter and her temper were both as vibrant as she herself was, and I can't believe she is gone. It happened quite fast, while she was out on a walk in the Black Hills we at one time called Home. I also lost another one of the four cousins of my Mom's who was more like her brothers and my uncles. Roger Slack was always there, at least weekly and usually more often through my entire life from early childhood until I married and moved away, and even then I never doubted the connection. Again I have to say that I can't believe he is gone and I'm only sorry I didn't spend more time appreciating him while he was still around.

But of course there has been more to life than just death and loss. There have been many moments of snuggling granddaughters, and watching my grandson's delight in the simple beauties around us. The new house that Austin and Trisha moved into is a warm, homey place with a garden that they have really gotten to thrive. It's as perfect a place to raise their son and daughter as I could have wished for for them, lots of fruit trees and room for exploring and animals and even a neighbor girl for their daughter to have as a friend. 

We did go on a short trip to the Redding Water Park for my 60^th birthday. We drove through the Trinity River area and spend two days just roasting and soaking in Waterworks park in the 105* heat before coming back to our 60* and fog, coastal summer. We had a gnarly forest fire not long after that, triggered by a dry lightning storm, which put the family without power or running water for ten days, and the city on gas powered generators for over a month. It left much of our Smith River canyon and river area scorched. Its a strange patchwork of charred and green areas. Some survived untouched right next to areas where nothing is left. We really owe much to the hard work of fire crews from all over the world.

Greg had those knee replacement surgeries in 2021 and that allowed him to move better. I'm really proud of him because he determined that he wanted to be around to see those grandkids grow up, and he started walking, then biking and swimming and has since lost 100 pounds even. I think it was actually 16 months and 100.4 pounds on the same scale at the Dr. in Medford. 

Emerson has been walking and getting in shape again too. And he had a chance to drive to San Francisco to take his client to a 49ers game. It was a big, exciting victory for the 49ers but his client had an abscessed tooth that ended up making him quite sick, so then Emerson has spent many many days and nights with him in the hospital. His client is almost exactly the same age as my brother Lance, but his handicapping condition is a lot rarer than Down's Syndrome and more severe.

Daisy got a wonderful German Shepherd/malamute female for her 9^th birthday. Foxy was a graduate of obedience school at Pelican Bay State Prison, in an inmate run program called Prison Paws. Walking the dog has helped all of us get outdoors more and be healthier. Of course we also have a ton of fur everywhere in our homes and cars and lungs. The only sad thing is Foxy gets car sick. I mean almost instantly. She has been known to vomit three times in a 4 mile drive, so yeah, we walk her and she plays with neighbor dogs and a neighbor pair of pigs that keep coming here to visit. 

I haven't gotten a diagnosis yet. My Neurologist from San Francisco referred me to one closer to home who supposedly was really good at testing the types of muscle issues I have, but she ended up moving and the Dr. I actually saw was a specialist in eye issues in neurology. After he told me I just had abdominal cramps and should drink tonic water, I became so frustrated I gave up on seeing anyone for awhile. But I have still been feeling better since I started being prescribed gabapentin a few months before seeing that idiot it took a few months to help, and the first noticeable side effect was my hair falling out in hands full. But still, I have the muscle spasms and the pain, but I also find my mood, my endurance and ability to participate in life all have improved this year.

Greg and I also indulged in tickets to Three plays at the Ashland Oregon's Shakespeare Festival. Two (Rent and Romeo and Juliet) in the Angus Bowmer theater, and one (the Three Musketeers) in the Elizabethan Theater in Lithia Park. And we got a second set of tickets to Rent given to us by Greg's friend so we went four times to plays. We also went once to see our Niece from Arizona, Remi and her boyfriend, Gabe perform while they were on tour before moving to Nashville. Once we had to cancel tickets to Jurassic Quest Animatronic Dinosaurs, and once reschedule a play because the fire had the canyon Highway closed down for a lot of July and August. 

This month I have actually gotten back into writing my novels. It's been several years since I had the mental focus to write like that. Again I think it is the gabapentin helping, even without a diagnosis. I have been digging into research on Pompeii and Mount St. Helen's and actually enjoying the process again. There were too many family deaths about the same time I started to have the muscle spasms and severe startle reaction, so I can't say for sure whether my brain fog was from the sadness and depression or from actually being a side effect of whatever neurological thing I'm battling, but I just couldn't even read a novel, let alone focus enough to create one from thin air.

What haven't I mentioned? Trisha has been creating absolutely gorgeous beadwork earrings. I don't have pierced ears, but if you do and are curious about what she has for sale, just ask. I don't know where she finds the time and patience to be both an amazing gardener and do such artistry, on top of raising my 5 year old granddaughter and 7 year old grandson. Gavin is non verbal, and smart. He's observant and has an ability to communicate that goes beyond words. Trinity is an eager kindergartener who loves school and has a very firm opinion which she is happy to tell you all about. Each of my grandchildren are very strong personalities unlike each other but I'm so in love with the three of them. 

Much Love,

Dixie and Greg

“Christmas is a necessity. There has to be at least one day of the year to remind us that we’re here for something else besides ourselves.” – Eric Sevareid

Merry Christmas 2022

December 2022

Time once more to wish you a Merry Christmas 🎄🎁 

A Joy Filled 2023 New Year

And all the Happy Holidays you can fit into these dark winter days

My best reason to smile is these Grandkids 

Daisy, Gavin and Trinity 

So my dear friends, family and beloved people chosen to be blessed with my wordy newsletter, I have to say that 2022 wasn’t a boring year. I might not do it Justice here, but it was interesting.

Just remember, when the ancient Chinese told someone, “May you live in interesting times, they were not blessing them.”  However even in the darkest of times you can look for the light and try to be the light for others. OMG. I am sounding a bit like Dumbledore there. 

Then again, the Harry Potter books have invaded our world 🌎 

Completely dominating July through November. 

Emerson told Daisy that she couldn’t watch the movies until after she read the books. She was angry and declared to anyone who would listen, that her Dad was unreasonable, mean and WRONG. But then we had a long trip in July, and that meant lots of long hours in cars and airplanes and boring waiting in airports and motel rooms, so we read the first book, and by the time she watched the movie she was psyched and ready to declare all the same things we had said twenty years earlier about, “they changed that!” And “they left that out!” And “that scene was perfect.” And that was all it took. One book, then a movie followed by book 2 and the movie and I planned to stop after book 3, thinking she wasn’t ready for the darkness and deaths in the last 4 books. So we read a couple fan fiction novels that rewrote the first two books from Hermione’s viewpoint, but then she declared she wanted to read book 4, just as she began third grade. And by November she had read through all the books, plus the script for “The Cursed Child”and seen 8 movies and 3 Fantastic Beasts Movies and obviously understood them all because her conversation was non stop analysis of the stories and questioning “what if”  and “why” even though none of her friends knew what she was talking about. 

Greg’s sister Laura died unexpectedly this spring, and her boyfriend had her cremated. The ashes were sent to Greg’s last remaining sister, Wendy. In July we flew to Salt Lake, via LA, and spent a day in Lagoon, the amusement park/water park near Salt Lake, before renting a car and driving across Wyoming to Laramie. All the brothers came to Wendy’s house, and then the family went to a beautiful waterfall on private property in the forest of Wyoming. There they turned Laura’s ashes free and each said something kind in farewell to a sister who had had a difficult life. While we were there in Wyoming I also turned 59 and Greg’s sister made roast elk and antelope for my birthday dinner. 

Emerson and Daisy came with us to Wyoming and Greg’s brother, Matt brought his wife, Andrea and daughter, Remi and her boyfriend, Gabe. Wendy’s sons, Connor and Colton were both there, along with Connor’s girlfriend Stephanie and Colton’s wife, Brittney, but Harv’s wife, and our Austin’s family were not able to be there, so it wasn’t a complete family reunion, but it had some good times, and was overall a fun but emotional visit. 

The rest of the summer, we stayed closer to home. Daisy took swimming lessons, Gavin and Trinity had birthday parties. Greg and Emerson and Austin worked a lot and got in some outdoor time as well. 

The Remaining Goode Siblings

Austin and Trisha

Greg and his siblings, past and present

Emerson, Daisy and Trinity 

Family collage 

Austin and I at Gold Beach

School began and Daisy was in third grade, Gavin in first and Trinity in Preschool. Austin’s family learned that their landlord had decided to sell and they needed to be out by January, so they started looking for a house to buy. The requirements were important that they have space from their neighbors and room for the kids to safely play both indoors and out. They also needed space for their high school age niece to be able to move in with them because she had been living with Trisha’s grandma, but the grandma died and her house left the family. 

I’d say that they were successful in their house search. They got a sweet couple acres with two houses and fruit trees. I like that it is close to us, and has a farm house vibe that just says people have lived good lives here over the years. It seems right to me that Redwood school staff gave Greg a baby shower in 1993 for Austin and held it in the house across the street from Austin’s new home. 

My Brother on a Boat Ride in Tennessee 

Greg and I watching the sunset in the harbor

This year Daisy got into the Harry Potter stories

Reading all 7 books and the Cursed Child Script

Nothing is better than having grandkids 

I haven’t mentioned my health. It’s still unknown exactly what I have, but I have further referrals for new neurologist to try and find a diagnosis. Last year I had a lot of tests and next year looks like more of the same. Greg says when they do diagnose me, they will probably name it after me. Anyway, pain and muscle spasms aside, I’m doing well enough that I went to two weddings in the spring, a memorial service in Wyoming in the summer, and a three day weekend at a cabin in Gold Beach in the fall for my husband’s 60th birthday. 

That was nostalgic in a cabin we first stayed in 37 years ago, and the interior is so strangely familiar but it’s all been redone, walls were wood, now white, used to have a real fireplace but this is the second fake one, new minimalist art and furniture but we have been there as newlyweds and with a foster daughter, and the night we got our adopted son and then with friends and both sets of our parents and the night my Dad died and with our premie son and my mom and brother and with our young boys and then our teenagers and now with our grandkids. It always relaxes and refreshes us. It’s nice to return to a calm place and replenish the peaceful memories. 

So once again, I send you love and wish you all the best.

In a art piece by a man I’ve admired for years, Brian Andreas, he said, “there are things we do that may make no sense and they may make no money but they may be the real reason we are here: to love each other and to eat each other’s cooking and say it was good.” 

 I wish you a year filled with good food and people to share it with. 

All ways, Always I love you. 

Dixie

Lance's Birthday Report

Last night I was at home playing with my granddaughter who had somehow decided to become a little pink monster, inspite of being all smiles and wanting to be played with. Then I got a photo from my brother Brett.  Turns out he had been in Wyoming getting my Mom's old house remodeled enough to try to sell it, so Lance hadn't gotten mail from the post office box address I gave everyone until they got home, but on Halloween he sent the picture and said, "You should post this on your facebook wall, Lance got a stack of cards 8 inches high for his birthday."  Just look at hat smile. So thank you again to everyone who sent him one.  He specifically mentioned that he had gotten some from an after school program and a kindergarten class. He also had some from countries around the world including London, Slovakia and Canada they said.

2003 and Overwhelming Abundance

Christmas Card 2003, first time we were too buy to get all of us in one place in the right mood for a family picture.

The river in summer is warm but the ocean can be really cold

At Jedediah Smith National and State Park

The kite festival

fern canyon, parts of Jurassic Park 2 were filmed here

Austin

Emerson

Harris Beach by Brookings, OR

Our yard is perfect for boys and cats

2003

Merry Christmas!
     Once again I sit down to review the year and am blown away by the speed with which it has flown by.  Greg and I are constantly running jut to stay in the same place it seems.  In fact, we recently looked at each other and admitted that we've both been feeling depressed, not about things we don't have but because we're overwhelmed by having too much - too many activities we've said yes too, too many "cherished" object cluttering our home - too many "delightful" pets - too many dishes - usually dirty etc., but I do have a sign in my kitchen that says, "Praise God for Dirty Dishes - at least you have food."

In fact it has gotten bad enough that I probably have at least 15 pictures, magnets, buttons etc all saying, "Simplify your life" - yes, I'm living a contradiction, between my dreams and my life.
     So why is 2003 so overwhelming?  Probably because O didn't deal with it in 1999, or 2000 and so on.  Our method for instance, with dealing with coming home to a sink and counter full of dirty dishes is to load up in the van and go out to eat.
     Also, I'm subbing every day now and Greg is not just teaching but working on the Children's Community Choir which he started last year, then the boys want to say yes to everything, soccer, fiddle, trombone, choir, birthday parties, plays, overnights, 4-h, and on and on.  I'm still writing my books and going to writer's conferences - - oh my gosh - we'd jut about kill to sleep in one day!

     Are we sounding stupid?  Crazy?  I explain it by saying, "We put the fun in dysfunctional! ??"
     Anyway, enough moaning about the ditch we have dug ourselves into - we are slowly building a ladder to pull ourselves out of the hole and there is light overhead.
    I'm glad Thanksgiving comes right before I sit down to review the year because it's nice to remember all the good things we have to be Thankful for, and with us the things we complain about and the things we have to be thankful for are the same list.
     So in 2003 we didn't travel much, which is unusual for us.  We didn't go to Wyoming either for Christmas 2002 or this previous summer.  Consequently we've dug a little out of debt, and refinancing the house helped more.  Then Greg went to Marysville in the heat of summer for 2 weeks worth 0f classes that gave him enough credits to move across the pay scale.  But the gains were off set by the fact that our boys haven't seen cousins and grandparents or most Aunts and Uncles since 18 months ago.  We are still in debt, but this Christmas we're going to Wyoming because we also feel we can't afford to miss any more family time right now.

Fortunately Aunt April and Uncle Vince Live about a 5 hour drive away, so the boys get some more contact there although never enough.  We also have our "DayCare Family" even though they haven't been in a day care for six years now.  "Grandma" and a few very special friends are still as close as real relatives.
     Again I see the blessing and the problem sides - - we have OK jobs, Ok insurance, great friends, an Ok house (although pack ratted to the max) a great neighborhood, a great yard (although under maintained)  all of this is either wonderful security, or a rut we're half wanting to - half afraid of moving out of.
    Goodness!  I sound so gloomy this year and what it really is, is exhaustion.  And even though this is a Christmas letter - our family had, is having, a very hard time letting go of summer this year.  Instead of being thankful for the days we had swimming in Jade Green rivers and walking in ancient redwood forests and running our greyhounds or going to kite festivals at the beach - we're whining because we can't do it NOW.

Nov. 29, 2003

     The previous pages were written while I was trying to look interested at a teacher training.  Now it is the 8th day of our amazing 9 days off (all of Thanksgiving week and 2 weekends) - and the 4th day in the cabin at Gold Beach.  Suddenly (I owner Why?)  There is nothing the slightest bit gloomy or depressed about my attitude.

     I have been sitting by the fire, listing to the sea gulls and the waves, talking to Greg, Vince and April and Stuffing myself on pies and poppy seed rolls.  Painting rocks, hangout in the hot tub and snuggling my boys. Here life is simple - the house is empty so the people and outdoors are important.

Austin in 4th grade until this June with Mrs Haggard

Emerson with 3rd grade teacher Mrs. Peep

Speaking of my boys, Austin and Emerson started to school in a fourth and fifth grade class - but a week into the year the school shuffled class placements and lost a teacher and since then they have been together in a 4/5 combo with 30 5th graders and 5 4th graders.  They had heard rumors about how nasty their teacher is but by now they both love her.  I think it took less than a day.  She says they get along well and she loves having both of them - and it has changed how they interact at home, more respect, yet also more competition.
     So I hope 2003 has been kind to you and I look forward to the cards and letter which flood our mailbox for the next month before leaving it a desert with only the thorny bills appearing there.

    For 2004 we are hoping to shovel some of the clutter from the house - reviser Disneyland (the boys have almost no memory of the 1999 trip) and hopefully have more of what we've had so much of already - family time - good health - good friends and more.
    Sure we're greedy.  Life for the most part has been yummy enough to keep us wanting more.  Love you!


Dixie, Greg, Austin and Emerson