13 October 2025

The grey morning of 8 October, my birthday and day 5 of a frustrating case of laryngitis, did not begin auspiciously.  I woke from some sad dream morbidly wondering who would, when the time came, take on the task of spreading my ashes around the flower beds of my home, joining those of my father, mother, sister, and husband among the daffodils.  Then I knocked over my bedside water glass and had to scramble to clean up the spill that immediately seeped under the glass topping the dresser stacked with books, partially read New Yorkers, and a daunting array of supplements.

First order of business:  hydrate (the better to prep for an IV insertion) and get to a medical appointment.  But traffic was stalled just before the General Sullivan Bridge, the only way across Little Bay to my Portsmouth destination.  An earlier accident was the cause, I later learned, one I happily was NOT involved in, despite the symmetrical allure of ending my earthly voyage on the very day it began.

I nevertheless made it to my long-scheduled CT scan at Mass General Brigham’s Pease facility in good time to “enjoy” my barium sulfate smoothie and the tender ministrations of Megan and Christine, who guided me into the high-tech donut hole with minimal discomfort.  Welcome to septuagenarian birthday celebrations.

The MGB facility on the former SAC base is nicely landscaped and quite handsome, however, and though rueful about the clinical start to my birthday, I was grateful for the health care out-of-reach for many of my fellow citizens, a situation that on day 8 of the Federal shutdown is only likely to get worse.

Trying to avoid mental doomscrolling about the State of the Nation, I rewarded myself with a breakfast bialy at Kittery’s Beach Pea bakery, where I also picked up my birthday cake, and then drove on to New Castle, stopping first at the Riverside Cemetery, established in 1868 and affording all its residents some pretty enviable views.

The overcast skies proved appropriate for the spooky season.  Later walking the beach at Great Island Common, I felt no urge to immerse myself in the between-the-rocks plunging place that had so delighted me throughout the sunny summer:  fall has indeed arrived.  Instead, I admired the finesse of the three Moran tugs guiding a freighter into the mouth of the Piscataqua, and snapped a few photos of the sea grasses attired for autumn.

En route home, I stopped at Emery Farms for some decorative pumpkins, admired the foliage on Hayes Road, and planted the next 10 daffodil bulbs of this fall’s campaign; there will be 100 newcomers flanking the garden steps come April.

Then it was off to the guaranteed physical and spiritual uplift of Ruth Abelmann’s yoga class, followed by my usual Wednesday night pasta dinner at home, this time completed with a slice of Beach Pea chocolate/raspberry cake, and finally the latest dropped episode of Slow Horses.

I take it as a birthday treat that this episode 3, “Tall Tales,” was my favorite of all 5 seasons so far:  Jackson Lamb, deliciously profane, witty, and squalid as played by Gary Oldman, so cleverly spins a spy tale of STASI interrogation that he both distracts the Dogs keeping the Slough House team in lock down and prompts his “joes” to perform the coordinated assault that frees them.  I’ve watched that delightful scene three times now, and may yet watch it again—despite the uncomfortably recognizable “destabilization strategy” at the heart of Season 5, “London Rules,” based on Mick Herron’s 2018 novel of the same name.  How do you create widespread chaos and division in five easy steps?

1. Compromise an agent (seduce one of the good guys into inadvertently helping the bad guys)
2. Attack the village (evoke terror with random violence that harms civilians)
3. Disrupt transport (keep people from traveling freely)
4. Seize the media (create a viral media distraction, diverting the public and news outlets from a larger, more sinister plot—aka “flood the zone”)
5. Assassinate a populist leader (a politically motivated assassination maximizes chaos and further destabilizes the government)

Yikes.  Sounds all too familiar.  No wonder I’ve inadvertently memorized the “Strange Game” lyrics Mick Jagger so memorably recorded for this series.  Life in these Un-tied States has indeed become a strange game.

But the next day, following up a tip from Ruth about a dahlia display in Newmarket, I discovered a compensatory counterbalance to the gloom of dispiriting news and a lingering virus.  Estate gardener Spencer Scott maintains a spectacular garden of 250 dahlia varieties in a waste space adjacent to a Newmarket parking lot on Bay Road.

That night would bring our first frost of the season, so he was on site to offer bouquets of the bounty that would not last the night, and to answer any questions.  Spencer’s love of his garden was evident as he detailed how he cares for his plants, harvesting seaweed and grinding it with a mower to enrich the soil, feeding and watering each plant directly to its root system, experiencing two hours of such care “as no more than 5 minutes,” and turning bleak to beauty.

Flower power:  it cast a spell, a tonic reminder of goodness in the world, and a most welcome start to my 73^rd year.