history

tributary:

tributary:

happy smallpox eradication day to all who celebrate, which is everyone!

“On December 9, 1979, the disease was confirmed to have been eradicated, with the World Health Assembly making the declaration official five months later.”

“On May 8, 1980, more than two years after the last known case, the World Health Assembly formally declared the world free of smallpox.”

celebrate twice!

And it just so happens that we started The BIrchBark House by Louise Erdrich last week for read aloud, which opens with a devastating smallpox outbreak and I stopped reading to tell all those young ears that yes, in fact, we did that. We eradicated smallpox.

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When my mom was here last, she offered me her hand mixer. That thing is older than I am, and that’s saying something. It’s also all chrome retro-future rocket shaped. Just looking at it made me taste seven minute frosting, which is what I usually got to lick off those beaters as a wee thing. She warned me that the beaters only sort of stay in, but I couldn’t resist it. I donated my hand mixer (which was a wedding gift, so I’ve had it a long time, but it was pedestrian plastic and purely utilitarian, although it had a ton of attachments, unlike what my mom offered me, but then again I only ever use the beaters) to goodwill without another thought.

Today I pulled it out and used it for the first time. It was gorgeous and cool and the banana bread I made with it is utterly delicious.

I know full well that life is not about things. But this particular thing? This mixer with all this history handed to me by my mom? Pretty cool right now.

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