Renee Rocks

A recent hiatus from writing my blog happened unintentionally. I created this outlet for my thoughts and memories on January 1st, 2018, almost seven …

Hiatus – Of Travel, Trees and Aging

A recent hiatus from writing my blog happened unintentionally. I created this outlet for my thoughts and memories on January 1st, 2018, almost seven months after Michael died. Since then, I’ve published 542 different posts, with another 127 unfinished drafts in a queue. That’s about 6.7 pieces per month, on average. In my head, I’m writing daily, often jotting down a thought or idea so I don’t forget where I’d like to follow it. I’m also a champion at creating nifty titles. Yet, somehow, after February 2nd of this year, I just stopped. I had some organized paragraphs spread out under four different topics, but I couldn’t finish any of them. I haven’t exactly figured out why. I realize that the over-arching political situation in this country has been wearing me out for ages, every day revealing a new piece of crazy news that I can’t wrap my head around. I’m not alone in this, I know. In addition, I’m acutely aware of what feels like the rapid acceleration of time passing. I never was one of those people who got freaked out by “big” birthdays. I blew past 30, 40, 50 and 60 without blinking an eye. Seventy felt different as close family and friends who populated the landscape of my life started dying more frequently than before. And with my 75th birthday looming this month, I’ve definitely become more engaged in having experiences rather than writing about them.

But today I got a little mental kickstart, probably as May is looming with its emotion-laden days, starting with what would’ve been my 50th wedding anniversary on the 1st. Of course, I remind myself that when that day arrived in 1976, Michael and I had already been living together for four years and had been friends for five. So actually, fifty-five years of my life have been wrapped up with “us,” this “us”which is still an essential part of me, despite his being dead almost nine years. The undercurrent of our bond remains a mysterious connection that I’ll never be fully able to explain. But it’s undeniably real for me and has been sustaining as I’ve proceeded forward. I love his constant presence in my deepest core. Now that’s simply a given.

This year began with multiple trips scheduled for me. I’ve traveled more since Michael died than I ever did before, but he was still working before he got sick, which made leaving town less flexible. In any event, I’m moving around a lot more, grateful that I’m physically able to keep going. My daughter gifted me a getaway weekend with her at a spa in Wisconsin in January, to a place I’d had the pleasure of visiting a few times before. Then in February, I joined my son and his family in New Orleans. I’d been there before, but never during Mardi Gras, which was a wholly different and truly entertaining experience.

The good news about these interludes is multi-faceted. First, there is the great pleasure I get from knowing that my kids and their families include me in their lives in a way that feels like I’m still a person with whom they can enjoy themselves. So far, there’s no caregiving required from them in regard to my capabilities, either physical or mental. The twenty-five years I spent as my mother’s primary person after my dad died, were fraught with challenging responsibilities that seriously frayed our relationship. I want to avoid that erosion in my own family for as long as possible, maybe even longer. My kids say they’re happy to step up for me as the situation may someday demand. And I believe them. But I still don’t want to burden them with my needs, all their best intentions aside. I don’t think I’ll ever get comfortable with that prospect – my scars from that part of my life are still too fresh. Secondly, changes of scenery are definitely good for keeping your mind fresh. Going to different places seems to create new neural pathways for me, while simultaneously stimulating access into my memory bank. I’d been to both the Wisconsin spa and New Orleans several times with Michael. I really enjoyed the almost holographic images which popped into my mind from those times, stimulated by the still familiar places we’d shared together. A true travel bonus.

But in between these good times, I was struggling with what felt like an onslaught of deaths in my immediate universe. During the months preceding these two little trips, I was involved with three different women friends who’d suffered the deaths of their partners. As a widow with practice at grief, I was doing my best to be a supportive sounding board for them. And I was managing that pretty well without much of a personal PTSD response, as I confronted my own traumatic experience one more time. Instead, what really rocked me were two other random losses. One person was an old friend from high school, Stuart, with whom I’d reconnected via Facebook some years ago. We’d exchange messages and memories frequently. The last time we’d communicated was in October of last year when we were chatting about a hot dog business started by mutual friends out in Boulder, Colorado. Just a nice social exchange. But in January, I received what I thought was a fake message from some stranger informing me that Stuart was dead. What??? Impossible. After all, I’d just talked with him. I didn’t have any personal relationships with his family or other friends who might confirm things, so I poked around on my own and discovered that indeed, Stuart had died only two weeks after our last conversation. I didn’t get informed until two months later, after posting a birthday greeting on his Facebook page. That stranger had actually done me a favor by letting me know he’d died. The peculiar truth about social media is that unless an individual has given someone else the authority to remove their Facebook or Instagram accounts, their pages exist in perpetuity. I gave myself the macabre assignment of counting the number of deceased people I knew, for whom birthday reminders are still sent out annually on those platforms. To date, my list has 33 names. So weird.

And then there was the disappearance of my friend Peg. Peg used to be the best friend of Michael’s older sister Betsy, for almost 40 years. We periodically socialized with them, Michael and I never quite understanding how Peg tolerated the often rude and selfish behavior Betsy displayed toward her. Eventually Peg walked away from that relationship while continuing to build one with us. Over the course of the next 15 years, she became one of our most valued friends.

Two and a half years ago, Peg wrote me to share that she had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. She requested no phone calls from me, which I assumed meant that she wasn’t emotionally prepared to confront all the ramifications of her diagnosis. So for months, our communication was limited to brief texts. I had no information about her prognosis. I’d never met her adult children and had no relationships with any of her other friends. It was a bleak time. Then last year, I got an unexpected birthday greeting from her. I decided to follow up with a phone call and to my delight, she sounded like herself and was interested in getting together. Peg lives in Denver. As my son and his family were now living in Colorado, an opportunity for a visit arose last June, when I was staying out there for a month to help welcome a new grandchild. My son and I drove to see her for a day. The visit was rough. In person, I could see both the physical toll of her disease, coupled with the very obvious mental decline that had transpired in a scant year. At the time, she was very angry with her children who she said were trying to take control of her life. I’m sure that was true, as it was clear that independent living was getting to be a dangerous situation for her. But she couldn’t see that issue clearly, only as a power trip against her. Our time together was emotional and unnerving. After that day, we texted sporadically. Life moved along. And then at the beginning of the year, I realized Peg had disappeared. No more notes, no more texts.

I have tracked down contact information for Peg’s two kids and written both of them. I don’t know if they’ll reply or if they’ll simply delete my messages. I don’t know if Peg is alive and in a facility or if she’s dead. A vanishing. It’s a terrible feeling to have someone disappear. I know that these kinds of things happen to people all the time. Stuart’s death and this situation with Peg are new for me, quite unlike living through the hard times of watching loved ones eventually succumb to an illness. I know how to do that kind of loss – but these are a different kind of sobering, the transient and ephemeral nature of life, right up in your face. When I’ve had to hold my dogs when they are euthanized, I’ve had a similar sensation of thinking that the line between life and death is just a brief flash. Over, just like that. And then and then…

In March, I was spring cleaning in the yard when I noticed a split in the trunk of my 37 year old redbud tree. We’ve rough winds and powerful storms with lightning, and many tornadoes near where I live. I planted that redbud tree when my son was three. The buds for this year were formed on its branches. But the split got worse. When I called a tree service company to come and have a look at it, they recommended immediate removal. Otherwise the next big wind could topple it and plunge at least half of it into my house. Everything happened so fast.

Losing a tree, especially one you’ve planted, is deeply disturbing. With the environment and climate change in the forefront of my mind anyway, having a tree go is like a death. Is that dramatic? Maybe for some people. But I spend a lot of time appreciating and admiring trees which provide so much for humans and animals alike. While living in our home, I’ve planted six trees on our lot. The redbud is the first of them to go. Michael and I were both forest walkers and tree lovers. After he died, I was preparing a pamphlet for his celebration of life. In his famous red notebook where he wrote his thoughts about his illness, his life and his impending death, I found this poem by Maya Angelou. It was clear that it resonated with him so I placed it on the bifold of his program.

And then and then…I parted with my 23 year old car and reluctantly got a much newer one. And then I was back in the traveling mode, on another extended trip, this time to Colorado to visit with my grandchildren. Somehow or other, as people die and disappear, I’m still running around through airports and flight delays. I know I’m aging and slower than I used to be, but so far I’m keeping up with it all and trying to squeeze the best possible experiences out of this time I continue to have.

While on these trips to Colorado, I usually pick up the viruses that the day care kids bring home to share. So far they haven’t killed me. I wonder how long I can keep going along at my current pace. Trying to stay strong is certainly a life goal although I realize that anything can happen once you hit your mid-seventies. During this particular journey, one of my oldest friends who’s lived abroad for decades had a birthday. I sent him my usual greeting but received no reply. I have no way of knowing whether he’s okay or not. Then I received an email from a swimming friend informing me that one of our fellow water lovers had died. I missed her funeral. At the very end of my trip, while at the airport, I got a call from still another friend, telling me that a lovely woman we’d known since college had died quickly from a massive stroke. And to top off all this news, my daughter called to let me know that a huge maple tree right across the street from me had come crashing down, taking out a relatively young tree on my parkway. The front of my home, shaded by amazing trees since we moved in here in 1978, was now totally exposed. My shade garden is now a sunny one.

These first months of the year have felt like a lot. I miss my trees. I’m sad about the shrinking of my social fabric, although I’ve known for a long time that this part of life is for those of us still living, a time for thinking about age, diminishing and loss. I still remember my mom frequently asking, “why am I still here?” I had no answer for her back then and I have none for myself as I continue on my road. Life’s mysteries.

Currently, a couple I’ve known for many years have had to lay down their over two decades long struggle with cancer. Treatments have finally been …

Hospice Redux

Currently, a couple I’ve known for many years have had to lay down their over two decades long struggle with cancer. Treatments have finally been exhausted for the husband who valiantly marched through so many challenging years. Together, this family, which includes the patient’s beloved wife, two sons and their partners, along with their trusted medical team, made the decision to enter hospice. Their current journey has evoked many memories for me, many profoundly painful. These are some of my recollections which I periodically revisit and release.

The other day I received a telephone call from Carol, the hospice nurse who was assigned to Michael’s case in May, 2017. Michael wasn’t in hospice for very long, just about eleven days. During that brief time, I developed a fairly intimate relationship with Carol, who entered our lives at that impossible moment when a family has resigned itself to the fact that the death of their loved one is imminent. That she still calls me to chat is one of the unexpected positive byproducts of that fraught experience. Carol’s call brought back lots of memories to me. Michael’s last days weren’t my first experience with hospice. Back in 1989, after only a three month wrangle with bladder cancer metastatic to bone, my dad entered hospice for his last few weeks of life. At the time I was thirty eight years old, reeling from the fact that both my parents had been diagnosed with cancers within five weeks of each other. My mom, always the less healthy one, survived this cancer, her second one, and lived for another twenty-five years. My dad couldn’t tolerate his treatment and after only one round of chemotherapy, and despite the fact that the cancer hadn’t spread, opted out of life, asked that his funeral arrangements be made and went home to die.

I don’t think anyone in our family had realistic ideas about the practical aspects of hospice. The departure from active participation in trying to stay alive meant that life would go forward in my parents’ home without any further doctors’ appointments or visits to the hospital. A nurse would visit every few days to take vital signs, answer questions and provide medication we could administer for comfort care. The nurse was a liaison between the formal medical setting and our family. The professionals were still out there but we were in charge. Despite knowing that the daily decisions about meds, food and everything else would be the family’s responsibility, the actuality of adapting to that total caregiver role was really overwhelming for my mom. For me and my younger sister too, the siblings who lived nearby. I had a job, two young kids and a husband, who in the midst of my parents’ issues, was recovering from a siege with a herniated disk and ultimately, a back surgery.

The first few weeks of dad’s hospice time were relatively uneventful and my mom was able to manage their situation with support from me and my sister. But then dad’s pain medication made him groggy in addition to suppressing his appetite. The weakness that set in as he detached from nourishment eventually changed his status from mobile to bedridden. Next came a commode which ultimately would be followed by diapers and a catheter. A fall which required me to tear out of work in order to help my mom get my dad off the floor, was the catalyst for moving a hospital bed with guardrails into the spare bedroom. All these changes. The brief nurse visits could hardly prepare us for the devolution of dad from husband and father into a fragile, helpless person, soon to be wholly unmoored from the life that came before.

Volunteers came to visit, to be helpful. For the most part these well-meaning people were not a great match for anyone in our family. No screening was involved to determine whether they shared values and beliefs similar to ours. As a result, we experienced friction and alienation at a challenging time. An aide whose job was to provide bed bathing and general hygiene service, shaved my dad’s mustache off before we had a chance to tell her that he’d had one for the majority of his adult life. What an alienating moment for us, although his body grew that hair back before he died. Ultimately we opted out of visits from the hospice staff, choosing instead to only be alienated from each other. I write that with irony. Each of us family members brought our own ideas and emotions to helping care for dad. Despite our common background, we didn’t always agree on the way things should go. Our individual paces for adjustment were highlighted in a time like no other in our past experiences as a family. I can still recall making the leap from the normal boundaries between daughter and father to suddenly changing his diaper as if he was an infant. I remember thinking that the shock of a sudden death did not make the same demands on a person as having a loved one in hospice care does. Some people will never know the psychological permutations we had to make during those weeks. At one point my mom wanted to take my dad to the hospital. Reminding her that would violate his wishes changed her mind but the truth is, his hospice enrollment had removed that option anyway. She was simply too overwhelmed to remember that. When I became a parent I crossed from one type of adulthood into another – when I cared for my father’s body, while advising my mother, I went further into grownup life than what my parenthood had required of me. My siblings had their own version of these startling changes, bringing their personal spins to each challenge. We made it through everything, up to and including dad’s death. But hospice wasn’t simple nor was it really peaceful until the very end of dad’s life.

When Michael’s turn for hospice arrived twenty eight years later, I was obviously marginally more prepared than I’d been during my caregiver time with my dad. My mom’s physical and emotional limitations required me to do a level of caregiving with dad which I desperately wanted to spare my own children. For the most part I was able to manage that, mainly because I’d had considerable practice at maintaining the parent/child boundaries that had crumbled in my family of origin when I was only a teenager. I didn’t spend a lot of time bemoaning my early responsibilities. I just didn’t want my kids to repeat my experience in their lives.

Michael had been in remission for over a year when he suddenly began exhibiting confusing behavior. After a month of negative CT scans we finally were able to get a brain MRI which showed widespread cancer throughout his brain tissue. We were stunned and thrust into instantaneous powerful grief. At the same time, all the conversations about end of life issues and all the decisions that we made, were suddenly tossed to the winds. Michael refused to wear his DNR bracelet when he was admitted to the hospital. He wondered if there might be some unexplored treatment that might buy him more time. Despite our previous years of coping with his deadly orphan cancer for four and a half years, accepting the idea that his effort to live over felt unacceptable to him. With only a few weeks’ life expectancy, according to his dire prognosis, his drive for life was so powerful that he chose to undergo whole brain radiation, along with Keytruda infusions. Despite my feelings about the brutality of this regimen, I felt that honoring my partner’s wishes was the only choice I had. We spent almost 5 weeks in the hospital, from February to early March, 2017, before finally being able to go home. After all the debilitating treatments, Michael was never fully himself again, alternating between short periods of lucidity, confusion and forgetfulness. Amazingly, he regained some physical strength during April but the cancer rollback from the radiation was brief, with a steep decline on all fronts beginning in May. As days passed, life grew more challenging as both his cognitive and physical skills declined. All these changes spooled out between visits from home health care personnel, still drawing blood, taking vitals and encouraging physical therapy. Always a very tall and muscular person, Michael became more and more difficult for me to manage. My own body was bending under the weight of his when he insisted on trying to maintain his physical independence. Making the decision to enter him into hospice was particularly hard as he still maintained a deep desire to survive, coupled with an inability to retain understanding about the severity of his situation. But then he fell, twice. Getting him up was impossible for me, and even with the help of my strong children, we almost failed. Watching the person you love best disappearing in front of you is deeply eroding. After spending decades as partners in planning, having to make that hospice choice was incredibly painful for me. But finally I did it.

May 17th, 2017 – It’s not every day that you sign your husband up for hospice. No more doctor’s appointments. No ER. No more bloodwork. No more home health visits. Just watching and waiting for death to come.

When Carol the hospice nurse came to introduce herself and drop off supplies and medication, she talked with Michael and me together, and then to me alone. She’d quickly assessed our situation, giving me helpful guidance about deciding when and how to proceed with medication which might keep Michael calm and relaxed. The first days of that time were still hugely difficult. Trying to keep Michael safe and comfortable was a 24 hour job until the time came when he was no longer mobile. He continued to attempt behaviors his body and mind were not capable of performing. I was frightened a lot of the time. My kids came to stay with me round the clock for the last days of Michael’s life. I was able to keep them from having to parent their dad, but rather to love and grieve him as his children which was so important to me. By the time he died, I was beyond mental fatigue and utterly physically drained. We all felt that Michael never made peace with dying so those beautiful moments we’ve all seen dramatized in movies weren’t part of our hospice experience. Michael died on May 28th, only 11 days after he was admitted to hospice. On the day Michael died, Carol wasn’t the hospice nurse on call, but she showed up anyway, informed by her coworker that Michael had passed. Although I have no military experience, I imagine that the bonds forged under fire must be similar to what happened with Carol and me during this end of life process. Her popping up in my life throughout these last eight years is, I guess, a testimony to that connection. I haven’t sat back to relive those days in awhile. After getting these thoughts out I’m again going to set them aside. Those vivid memories are never leaving me.

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We Saw It – A Murder, Plain and Simple

Video and photographic evidence of Alex Pretti’s murder have been widely shared by countless individuals and news outlets.

The representatives of the federal government, who have readily lied all day long about the violent thugs who are fanned out in this country, are trying to tell people that this man was at the Minneapolis protest to kill ICE agents and police.

He was an intensive care nurse at a VA hospital. He was attacked while trying to help people who were hurled to the ground.

I can barely find the words to express my grief and rage about what’s happening in my country. Innocent citizens being slaughtered in the streets under the pretense that their murderers have come to their citizens to make them safe from dangerous, violent criminals. Lies. More and more lies.

WE SAW IT. This government is trying to make people deny reality. While they sanction murder.

The historian who sifts through the daily madness of current life in the U.S. is Heather Cox Richardson, a Harvard-educated professor currently employed by Boston College. She published a column on the platform Substack called: Letters From An American. She includes verifiable references as backup for her reporting. She can address today’s horror better than I can. I’m too flooded with emotions to do it.

Here is her column from January 24th, 2026 – Saturday evening:

January 24, 2026 (Saturday)

“This morning, on a street in Minneapolis, at least seven federal agents tackled and then shot and killed Alex Jeffrey Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse for the local VA hospital.

Video from the scene shows Pretti directing traffic on a street out of an area with agents around, then trying to help another person get up after she had been pushed to the ground by the agents. The agents then surround Pretti and shoot pepper spray into his face, then pull him to the ground from behind and hit him as he appears to be trying to keep his head off the ground. An agent appears to take a gun out of Pretti’s waistband during the struggle, then turns and leaves with it. A shot then stops Pretti’s movements, appearing to kill him, before nine more shots ring out, apparently as agents continued to fire into his body.

It looked like an execution.

After he was dead, the agents walked away, apparently making no effort to preserve the crime scene, which people on the street later tried to secure by walling it off with trash bins.

As journalist Philip Bump noted, administration officials didn’t even pretend to wait for more information before jumping straight to “the opponent of the state deserved it.”

Mitch Smith of the New York Times reported that federal agents have blocked state investigators from the scene. Drew Evans of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, a statewide investigations team that specializes in police shootings, told reporters his agency had obtained a search warrant—a rare step—but the federal government still refused them access.

Tonight, in a lawsuit against Homeland Security secretary Kristi Noem and other administration officials, Minnesota attorney general Keith Ellison asked a judge for a temporary restraining order to prevent DHS agents from destroying evidence related to the shooting. The suit noted the “astonishing” departure from normal investigations, seemingly trying not to preserve evidence but to destroy it. A judge, who was appointed to the bench by Trump, immediately granted the restraining order, barring the administration from “destroying or altering evidence” concerning the killing.

Ernesto Londoño of the New York Times reported that federal officials also “have refused to disclose the identities of federal agents involved in Saturday’s shooting, as well as the names of federal agents who have shot people in recent days.”

Minnesota police have refused to obey the federal officers, though. Local law enforcement has been talking to witnesses and finding videos of the shooting. Minneapolis police chief Brian O’Hara said at a press conference: “Our demand today is for those federal agencies that are operating in our city to do so with the same discipline, humanity, and integrity that effective law enforcement in this country demands. We urge everyone to remain peaceful.”

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has said that it, rather than the FBI, will investigate the shooting. But, as Alex Witt of MS NOW noted, DHS had already issued a statement about the shooting, which falsely asserted that Pretti had “approached US Border Patrol officers with a 9 mm semi-automatic handgun” and that he “violently resisted” as “officers attempted to disarm” him. The statement continued that “an agent fired defensive shots” and added that Pretti “also had 2 magazines and no ID—this looks like a situation where an individual wanted to do maximum damage and massacre law enforcement.”

“So,” Witt noted, “they’re gonna be investigating that which they’ve already issued a summary about…. It would seem that it’s a closed book?”

After repeatedly being exposed as liars over previous accusations against those they have shot, the Department of Homeland Security has so little credibility that Witt is not the only journalist calling out the federal agents for lying. Devon Lum of the New York Times wrote: “Videos on social media that were verified by The New York Times contradict the Department of Homeland Security’s account of the fatal shooting of a man by federal agents in Minneapolis on Saturday morning.

“The Department of Homeland Security said the episode began after a man approached Border Patrol agents with a handgun and they tried to disarm him. But footage from the scene shows the man was holding a phone in his hand, not a gun, when federal agents took him to the ground and shot him.”

But lying to the American people is the only option for the administration when we can, once again, all see what happened with our own eyes. Pretti did have a permit for a concealed handgun and appeared to have carried the gun with him, although witnesses say he never reached for it. Tonight Noem doubled down on the lie, saying again: “This looks like a situation where an individual arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage on individuals and to kill law enforcement.”

When the Democratic Party’s social media account posted: “ICE agents shot and killed another person in Minneapolis this morning. Get ICE out of Minnesota NOW,” White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller replied: “A would-be assassin tried to murder federal law enforcement and the official Democrat account sides with the terrorists.” The Democrats’ social media account responded: “You’re a f*cking liar with blood on your hands.”

Miller continued to bang that drum. When Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) said that “ICE must leave Minneapolis” and that “Congress should not fund this version of ICE—this is seeking confirmation, chaos, and dystopia,” Miller responded: “An assassin tried to murder federal agents and this is your response.” When Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar similarly decried the killing, Miller responded: “A domestic terrorist tried to assassinate federal law enforcement and this is your response? You and the state’s entire Democrat leadership team have been flaming the flames of insurrection for the singular purpose of stopping the deportation of illegals who invaded the country.”

Miller is a white nationalist, who has recommended others read a dystopian novel in which people of color “invade” Europe and destroy “Western civilization.” Those who support immigration are, in the book’s telling, enemies who are abetting an “invasion”—a word Miller relies on—that is destroying the culture of white countries. They are working for the “enemy.”

In the wake of Pretti’s shooting, Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote to Minnesota governor Tim Walz to suggest he could “bring back law and order to Minnesota” if he handed over the state’s voter rolls to the Department of Justice. As Jacob Knutson of Democracy Docket noted, she explicitly tied the administration’s violence in the state to its determination to get its hands on voters’ personal data before the 2026 election. Minnesota has voted for the Democratic candidate running against Trump in the past three presidential elections, but he insists that he really has won the state each time.

As G. Elliott Morris of Strength in Numbers wrote: Republicans could stop this at any time they wanted to.

“All it would take to end the murder of American citizens by an untrained government goon squad is 16 Republicans in Congress voting with Dem[ocrat]s to defund ICE (or 23 to impeach and remove Trump—3 in House & 20 in Senate). That’s it. 23 Americans can vote for the public and end all of this.”

Morris also pointed out that in December, Trump’s approval rating was negative in 40 states, including 10 he won in 2024. That covers 30 seats currently held by Republicans. Pretti’s shooting will likely erode Trump’s support further. Tonight, even right-wing podcaster Tim Pool reacted to Pretti’s killing by noting that it looked as if the agent had disarmed Pretti before the other agents shot him. “I don’t see Trump winning this one,” Pool commented.

The funding bill for DHS is effectively dead in the Senate, as Democrats have said they will not support any more funding for DHS. Tonight, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) told reporters: “Senate Democrats will not provide the votes to proceed to the appropriations bill if the DHS funding bill is included.” But the July law the Republicans call the One Big Beautiful Bill Act poured nearly $191 billion into DHS through September 30, 2029, with almost $75 billion going to ICE and $67 billion going to Customs and Border Protection (FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, got just $2.9 billion).

“Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital. Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately, he will not be with us to see his impact.

Representative Seth Moulton (D-MA) had more to say: “What we just saw this morning on the streets of Minneapolis is another outright murder by federal officials. And let me just be clear, those federal ICE officers are absolute cowards. I am a Marine veteran standing here telling you to your face they are unprofessional, pathetic cowards. Because if a Marine, an 18 year old Marine, did that in Iraq in the middle of a war zone, he would be court martialed because it is murder. And you pathetic little cowards who have to wear face masks because you’re so damn scared, couldn’t even effectively wrestle a guy [to] the ground, so you needed to shoot him? This is why ICE needs to be prosecuted. Yeah, I voted to defund it, but ICE, you need to be prosecuted, and Director [Todd] Lyons, who’s running ICE right now, I hope you’re hearing this from this Marine to you. You guys are criminal thugs. You need to be held accountable to law if you think you can enforce it, and you need to be prosecuted right now.”

Just hours after the killing of Alex Pretti, agents pinned U.S. citizen Matthew James Allen to the street while he screamed: “I have done nothing at all. My name is Matthew James…Allen. I’m a United States citizen…. You’re gonna kill me! Is that what you want? You want to kill me? You want to kill me on the street? You’re going to have to f*cking kill me! I have done nothing wrong.” Nearby, his sobbing wife screamed: “Stop please! Stop!! Please!! We were just running away from the gas. That’s all we were doing.”

“We all know the poem,” Blue Missouri executive director Jess Piper wrote, “and there is no shade of white that will save you from this murderous regime.”

Tonight, Susan and Michael Pretti, the parents of Alex Jeffrey Pretti, issued a statement:

“We are heartbroken but also very angry,” they said.

“I do not throw around the ‘hero’ term lightly. However, his last thought and act was to protect a woman. The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He had his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down, all while being pepper sprayed.

“Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man.”

This must end. Abolish ICE. Impeach Trump. Stand up against this dystopian federal autocratic government. Stop the murders and the lies.

That’s all I can manage for tonight.

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3149 Days

Time seems to just barrel forward at this juncture in my life. I can barely remember a moment when I was anxiously awaiting an event which seemed like it might never come. Those frustrations were the emotions of my young self, never to return. Instead I’m trying to adapt to this speedy pace, to not just be going along for its often breakneck ride. I’d like some control. I want to live my days mindfully, to exercise intention, banishing drifting and being lazy to only those moments when I’m really tired. Good intentions for a new year, right?

For me, this latest new year arrived without much fanfare, other than changing a digit from 5 to 6. I’ve always thought New Year’s Eve was an overrated holiday, except for the fireworks from around the world, conveniently displayed by news outlets in order of time zone. And I’m not big on resolutions which historically, back when I made them, proved less than successful for me. Except for one life commitment. Some decades ago, I made and stuck with one of the hardest decisions I ever attempted, smoking that last cigarette before turning the calendar to a new year, quitting cold turkey, and never going back to that habit again. I’d been smoking a long time and in addition to being addicted, I really enjoyed it. I used to think there would never be a time when I wouldn’t crave a cigarette, especially during moments of stress. But I was wrong. I made it through all the years of Michael’s cancer, up to and including his death, without ever lighting one. I’m so grateful for the often-elusive discipline I found for that task.

With all my other personal challenges, though, I’ve recognized that the bad habits in myself I most wanted to adjust since I was young, are still with me. For the most part, I manage them more successfully now than back then, but those issues with which I struggle are as integral to my essence as they once were. My two main ones are food and money. Will I ever have a perfect diet or be a great financial wizard ? All the evidence suggests not. But I forgive myself for those imperfections which evidently are my price for being human. The good news is that my problems don’t appear to have a negative effect on anyone but me, at least so far, as I haven’t heard any complaints to the contrary.

But back to time. Sometimes the days seem to simply melt into each other. The relentless news cycle is a huge factor in how I spend my time, especially during this past year which has been so especially fraught, for me and many likeminded people, as a result of the current presidency. So many long-held norms and institutions, trashed in such a short time, have left the most recognizable guardrails of democracy in tatters. I find the autocratic trend terrifying. And it’s not like I haven’t spent portions of my past life disappointed, angry and protesting the wrongs in my country – it was far from perfect for me starting way back in my teens when women’s rights, civil rights and the Vietnam War were huge issues for me.

But truly, this time is like no other. Has there ever been a more unqualified government in my lifetime? No. The only requirement to serve this administration is to have blind loyalty and obeisance to the president. And if you don’t toe that minimal line, you can expect retribution. I can’t think of any other time since colonial days, when there was an actual king, when things were this bad. This past week, to top off the madness of invading Venezuela to capture its leader and then its oil, having to watch the rules on children’s vaccinations be tossed aside by a cabinet secretary who has no medical license, and to hear the president and his sycophants blithely discussing the next countries they plan to take over, I watched over and over, the videos of the murder of a young American woman by a masked immigration agent, dead for the crime of temporarily blocking a street. That travesty of justice was instantly backed up by outright lies and character assassination of that woman by this corrupt inhuman administration, whose supposed intent of deporting dangerous illegal immigrants, has devolved into a moments like this. Maybe even more astonishing to me, is recognizing that there are people who have watched that same footage, who see that shooting as justifiable, an act of self-defense. How is that possible? I am haunted by all of it.

The barrage of assaults on democracy in this country during the past year has been overwhelming to me. Educational institutions threatened with sanctions if they support teaching classes that are too “woke.” Removing historical reports at museums and national monuments which are now deemed incorrect by the ideologues redefining history and truth. Willfully ignoring civil rights and the Constitution every day. Where will it end? And at my age is this what I should be focused on, 24 hours a day? Yes, no one is forcing me to pay attention. I could look away to protect my mental health. But I’m not great at ignoring reality. The ways in which I’d like to spend my time seem so trivial and meaningless in the face of this wanton destruction. I’m really struggling to find balance.

My 75th birthday is a few months away. I still remember when I read the article excerpted below, back in 2014.

DR. EZEKIEL EMANUEL:

“Well, first of all, let’s clarify, I expect to be alive at 75, and I’m not going to kill myself. I don’t believe in legalized euthanasia or assisted suicide, but I am going to stop medical treatments.

And I look at 75, when I look at all the data on physical disability, dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, loss of creativity, slowing down of the mind and the body, and 75 seems like that, albeit somewhat arbitrary, moment where you get the maximum chance you’re still going to be vital and alive and vigorous.”

That article, (which, by the way, really didn’t mean that the author wanted to die at age 75), had a profound impact on me. At the time I first read it, I was 63 and my husband Michael was 65. Michael, who’d been diagnosed with a rare, incurable cancer in 2012, had already been through a minor and a major surgery, 30 radiation treatments and 18 rounds of a powerful chemotherapy cocktail. Only a few months after his last infusion, his cancer had popped up again on three bones. We were waiting to see if he might be eligible for a clinical trial, as he’d already exhausted all the protocols for his particular disease.

I read Emanuel’s stark predictions of life from age 75 forward. For the majority of people, the body was likely to begin deteriorating in multiple ways, weakening at the very least. Treatments like chemotherapy and radiation are debilitating, even for the young and healthy. Would the suffering and indignities that were almost inevitable consequences of such therapies worth it to prolong life, often for only a short term? What about the quality of life remaining? Big questions. Back in 2014, Michael was still in his 60’s. So every effort to prolong his life seemed worth it to him and for our whole family. And indeed we did get some excellent time during the next two and a half years. But the hard times were definitely pretty grueling. His cancer was briefly quelled, only to return. Each attempt to induce remission took a greater toll in his body. I was with Michael at every moment, as he went through that time before late May, 2017, when ultimately he died at age 67. I came away from that cumulative experience with what have been unchanging ideas about how I want to live the rest of my life. Seventy-five is fast approaching. That Emanuel article stayed with me. So my most essential idea is that I don’t see myself pursuing the same punishing therapies which Michael chose, right up to his death. They took too much away from him, leaving him too exhausted to do almost anything. But the second most essential idea about how I want to go forward, is to always recognize the value in each healthy day I have, when I have no physical issues interfering with my ability to, as the saying goes, lead my best life. I always think about what each good day meant to Michael, and for months they were few and far between. I honor his memory by being conscious of my good fortune and try to proceed accordingly. But I need a reset, a fix to get back on track to making the most out of my days.

Sometimes I feel that my small life concerns are so trivial compared to what’s going on in the big world. I can protest. I can call my representatives. I can make my donations to the organizations which are benefiting the greater good, at least as I see it. I try being a supportive friend, especially to those people in crisis during these harsh times, those who are grieving, those who are coping with family illnesses or emotional strife. And I’m good about getting exercise, making sure I read books, and usually keeping current with the chores of daily life. But I have lots of projects that I’ve set aside while in my loop of pursuing news for too many hours in my day. This has to change. So rather than making resolutions which I might abandon, I’m going with good intentions instead. For example, during the past year, I’ve stopped taking classes which have been part of my goal of lifelong learning. I can fix that by signing up again this month.

I’ve started baking after not doing much of it for a long time. I still periodically cook old favorite meals for my family, but I want my grandchildren to have memories of me bringing them special homemade treats. My mom left all that nurturing behind when my dad died. I missed that, as did my kids.

And I have some digging to do into my past history, before my research skills diminish. For a very long time, I’ve wanted to explore the early years of my life, from my infancy through age seven in Sioux City, Iowa. I’d like to fill in the blank spaces before my parents relocated our family back to Chicago, where they’d lived all their lives and where I was born. I feel urgency about that as my parents and two older siblings are dead.

These are not earth-shattering or momentous goals. But they are meaningful for me and very concrete, certainly better choices than anxiously following the latest political events over which I exercise virtually no control.

When spring arrives, I can turn my energy toward continuing to develop my pollinators’ garden, ridding my yard of useless grass, except for a small patch for my dog, who likes to roll around in it. The garden is solid work for me, in addition to creating an environment that benefits threatened species.

So these are my intentions for 2026. The politics are a still a dark space until the midterms come, which I hope will bring some relief from the autocratic nightmare playing out right now. But that is an open question and a scary one from which I’m seeking some relief.

I miss Michael, who provided me with the space to lay down my mental load for at least a short time. I can hardly comprehend that he’s been gone for 3149 days. What a mindboggling number that feels like for me. Our relationship began as a special friendship during which we spent countless hours talking, late into the nights, about everything. And without a doubt, I talked much more than he did, as my thoughts and ideas have been tripping over each other for escape from my brain for as long as I can remember. But eventually, with Michael listening, I could get done with them. And I could relax. I’ve found other ways to slow down my brain during these years that he’s been gone, but this last one has been even harder than the early ones of adjusting to his absence. And I’d so appreciate his perspective and the broad knowledge he’d developed as a U.S. history teacher during his career. Forty five years was a long time to have such a wonder. But now, in this part of my life, the best intentions will have to do.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve said aloud, to oh so many different people, and of course, to myself, that life can change in a second. That …

Close Calls and Lucky Reflexes