Glass Half full

This is so far my favorite photo of the whole event. Silvio's face says it all for me. Here he is with his little sister, Valentina, still under six pounds, not quite a week old. Valentina's twin brother, Emilio, is still in the hospital neonatal care department trying to gain enough weight to join his sister at home. It will happen shortly.

I have not yet been able to go up and be the doting granny I'd love to be, but I dote from a thousand miles south. I crave all the photos my son and the twins' eldest brother send. Now the twins are almost nine days old! What a trip! Even from a distance. What I worried about most was my daughter-in-law who had such a tough time with the early birth, emergency surgery, etc. A million different scenarios crossed my mind.

But all is well, mom is producing enough milk for two! Dad is shuttling to the hospital on the twice daily milk run, wonderful maternal relatives are on board.

I am an activist and since I cannot be there I continually send things ( a huge ham, bathmats, orchid for the other grandma, a handmade easter dress (probably way too big) for Valentina, a top for the nursing mom, and a variety of framed photos. Tomorrow I will think of something else!

So the glass is very much half full.

The glass is half empty about where we are now in this country. Tonight, watching 60 Minutes, I was turned off by the pharmaceutical ads and the obvious political tilt. Hard to trust the media, let alone the commercial pounding we all get on T.V.

It pains me to say how much I distrust what is out there for such likes as me. I know there is another side to just about anything. I know that just about anything in the ads about drugs must probably be wrong and is only out there to make money for big pharma. I know that most Americans like me have only a slightly hazy idea about Affordable Health Care. What we do know is how such things affect us personally. (Yes, if Obamacare is overturned right now, you may be screwed if you have a serious disease or condition or require expensive drugs.) And none of us in either party can stand those relentless negative ads!

I do think about the basic philosophic differences between liberals and conservatives. We need to talk with each other. Do conservatives run scared and so have trouble being open to being supportive to an expanded safety net for the less fortunate? And do the liberals just not understand?

Silvio and Valentina and Emilio are going to have to figure this out.

And for now in this evening of soft breezes and bats and fireflies lighting up the night and my newest of eight grandchildren, my glass runneth over.