Harbor Pilots

Hello, Cadre. Welcome to harbor pilots on Caregiver day. Harbor pilots, metaphorically, are people in your life who surround you as a caregiver with the care that you need. They help you navigate waters that you're not used to, or they come alongside waters and harbors that you are used to, and they get you safely to the dock. My name is Kathy Joy. My Cadre handle is speak wonder. I love words. I love poetry. I write words in poetry. And JC gave me an inspiration on his live this morning. I welcome the advent of the season of scarves.

I'm a scarf lady, and when I was working full time and showing up at the office daily, my colleagues would check in on my scarf adornment. This is one of my favorites. And of course, I've got my Cadre cap on. Isn't fall wonderful? It's apples and crisp air and the scent of burning leaves and pumpkin spice lattes and maple on vanilla ice cream. That sounds good. It's also apple cider donuts. We have these in northwestern Pennsylvania, where I reside, and they're the donut version of apple cider. What can I say?

They're dipped in sugar and they're divine. My favorite is the donut holes that are dipped in sugar. So this begs the question, who invented donuts? And I went on Snopes because that's supposed to be a pretty reliable source because there's a lot of myths and legends surrounding different topics. And I suppose anything could be said about the invention of the doughnut pastry. This is what I found, speaks my language as a nautical nod to a captain of a ship. So I'm reading off my computer here. Captain Hanson Crockett.

Gregory is often credited with being the first individual to put a hole in the center of the donut. How did he do it, and why? Various stories have evolved, and this one's my favorite. Gregory. Captain Gregory was eating a donut. And in those days, they were like, often you'll see a doughnut, a whole pastry all round, no hole in the middle. Sometimes you'll see those cream donuts. Cream filled donuts are like that, and fruit filled donuts are like that. But many donuts, perhaps most, have a hole in the middle.

So Captain Gregory was eating a donut hole made by his mother, Elizabeth Gregory. She had her own bakery, and he was aboard his ship on a dark night. It was a dark and stormy night. A dark night in 1847, and it was a stormy night because a storm suddenly struck and Captain Gregory needed to use both of his hands. Now, when the sea is calm. You can, you know, round the wheel nicely with one hand while eating a pastry in the other, no problem. But when the waves start to come, you have to do something about that pastry.

And you know what he did? So that he could have both hands on the wheel, the captain abruptly decided, in order to steer the boat safely, that he would. Let me see here. I just want to read it the way they wrote it. But he would click here to continue. He would make it more convenient by storing it on his wheel. So he literally took the donut, which was a whole pastry, and stuck it on the wheel, thus having a hole. And he had his Eureka moment. This is pretty handy. So then he tasked his mom misses Gregory, with the idea of making pastries with holes in them.

The donut. So that's how the donut was invented. And now we all want to go and get donuts, don't we? Pretty cool. This morning, JC inspired me on his live, which comes eastern time at 830. And he speaks to caregiver day. He was speaking to us. I invite you to go back to the replay if you weren't able to see it live. He talks on caregiver day about being a caregiver. And he. He was sitting in his mom's minivan explaining how plans got pivoted and rearranged. And he said, it's the caregiving ballet.

And that has been stuck in my noggin. The caregiving ballet. It is a dance, and sometimes you have to pivot, and sometimes somebody changes the choreography on you and you have to follow suit. And so he talked about the caregiving free movement dance party, which I love. Jaycee acknowledges pain and heartache and disappointment, and he puts a spin on it in such a way that is very life giving, such as the free movement dance party. Always changing, always shifting. And I believe I caught it right, that JC is in that live this morning, suggesting that we make the plan, but be willing to pivot, be willing to adapt, be flexible enough to dance the other way and still make it a dance party.

And, you know. Huh? I've got a poem brewing about that. Thank you, JC, for the inspiration. I wanted to tell you also that I bought this last Sunday. Isn't that marvelous? This is repurposed Barnwood. This is Barnwood that has been gathered from falling down barns, unused barns on the landscape of northwestern Pennsylvania in the countryside. And a beautiful way to repurpose Barnwood. Yes. So I was at a flea market, and this fella, his name is Bengt B eta b e n g T. He actually signed the back of his artwork.

B e n g T. Turns out Bengt is a caregiver. He is a caregiver to his parents, who still live at home. Mom and dad are in the farmhouse. Farm production is long gone, but they still live in the homestead. And so Bengt goes into the barn, which is his man cave, and he takes repurposed barn boards, and he makes boats. Love the sunset on this one. Just everything about this is precious to me. And what a neat discovery. He said. This is his therapy. This is how he copes, because he does get frustrated, and he does have to change gears and switch up.

And he has siblings supporting him as well. We had just a really cool conversation about caregiving, all because he's selling these boats. And then he told me why. When you see a creative or an artist next time, ask them about their art. Sure. But ask them why they do it. It's really interesting why some people are motivated to do things. And for Bengt, he said it's his farm heritage and his love of old barns and his love of boats and also his need to find a coping mechanism. And he produces wonderful art.

So I have decided I'm identifying myself in the caregiving realm as an RWC, and I looked it up online just to see what. Who else uses that acronym? RWC means Russian World cup, and it's also the name of a plumber locally. But I'm adopting RWC as r road, w warrior, and c caregiver. Road warrior. Caregiver, RWC. I was being hard on myself a few days ago in a conversation with a good friend who cares about me. She's one of my harbor pilots who kind of steers me back to where I need to be. And I was telling her, I'm not really a caregiver.

I'm like a poser. She said, what on earth do you mean? I said, okay, mom. My mom June, is in a nursing home, so she has caregivers 24/7 she's in a skilled nursing facility because of her physical needs, and it's the place where she's safe. She is loved and beloved, and they call her juniebug. So, you know, someone is pretty special when there's a nickname. So, anyway, I said to my friend Jane, you know, all I do is get in my car and travel to mom, and I'm emotionally her support, and we write out cards together because mom's vision is very low these days, and she's not able to write her own cards, and that is her ministry is writing greeting cards to her friends and loved ones, so I write them.

Emotional caregiver mom and I have conversations. She loves my writing and my poetry, so I read things to her, and we say prayers together if I'm visiting in the evening. You know, we say prayers together before I leave. And she says, watch out for dear honey, drive carefully. Call me when you get home. So I said to Jane, I'm not really a caregiver. In the full sentence, she said, there are all kinds of caregivers. You're a road warrior. It takes you an hour and 20 minutes from your driveway to the driveway of the nursing home where your mom lives.

I said, yeah. She said, that's not for nothing. That is budgeting your day in such a way that you can do your other things that you do, do your creative work, be with your grandkids, you know, conduct your bible study that you do weekly, and be on Cadre. She said, you have to budget all around that in order to go see mom, and you're a road warrior. And that just blessed my heart. So I decided that my code name for me as a caregiver is RWC road warrior caregiver. My question for you today, please, is, oh, here's Alaska has just joined.

Hi. Can you put in the comments, please? What is your favorite road trip snack? This one's mine. These are pretzel splits, and you see at the top, it says extra salt. Extra salt. Yummy. So these are very crunch worthy and salt infused, if you will. And they. I think because of the crunch and the texture, they keep me awake. I don't know about you, but when I take the same road, um, you know, a couple times a week, and it's an hour and a half trip one way. Sometimes I get what they call highway hypnosis, where, you know, basically your eyes glaze over because you know the way, and your brain becomes numb, and that's very dangerous state to be in because you get sleepy, and then you could have an accident or cause an accident with another motorist.

So I try to do things to prevent that. My daughter swears by this theory that if you take off one shoe, either your driving shoe, just take off one shoe, especially now that it's colder outside, that keeps you awake. I haven't done that. I haven't tried that theory or tested it. Chewing gum is another good snack to have to keep you awake. Rolling down the window, even when it's freezing out for a while, just to get you reinved, energized, pulling over taking a stretch break or a nap, whatever is appropriate.

What is your favorite snack? So I mentioned these pretzel splits. I welcome any and all ideas that are healthy. I try to eat healthy when I can. I try to be prepared and have food prepped like for instance, grapes. I stick those in the freezer and it's like having a popsicle. So sometimes I'll pull out a little container of frozen grapes. Take those with me. Frozen blueberries or room temperature? Either one. Cut up carrots. That's another good snack. Do you have any ideas for snackage? Alaska, do you have any ideas?

I see you joined. What do you take on a road trip? What are your kids like? What is it that they enjoy having? What is your go to snack when you're a road warrior? If you could put that in the comments, I would welcome that. And thank you for joining me on this live. It's almost quarter after eleven. I try to keep to 15 minutes, although I'm assured from my quadrosphere mates that I can have longer if I need it. That is pretty much what I wanted to cover today. Donuts, ballet and car snacks. Thank you for being with me on today's Cadre.

And if you liked it, tell your friends about the replay and I'll see you next week. From Lake Erie, Pennsylvania, all things harbor pilots on caregiver day. Blessings. Be well. Make sure you give a hug today. Hugs are life giving. Bye for now.