Call Me a Dreamer

It's been a little more than seven years since I last posted here. That's a long time. Long enough for a trip to fairy, or at least for a very short trip to fairy.

A lot has changed, a lot has stayed the same.

TRIGGER WARNING: This story has multiple mentions of trauma, including medical issues, some described relatively graphically, and death. Also, some less graphic mentions of prolonged stress, grief, and depression. The difficult stuff is hidden behind the cut.

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While I'm talking about low-sodium foods, I want to mention the restaurant we ate at last night, in honor of my husband on Father's Day. Golden House Healthy Chinese Food is a wonderful, amazing place to eat. We had planned to eat elsewhere, but found when we arrived that they were not currently offering a dine-in opportunity, and now that we are all vaccinated, we wanted to eat out for the first time as a family since Covid hit. A few internet searches later, we were on the road to Golden House, not knowing what to expect. It was busy when we first arrived, but not yet full, and we were seated immediately by a cheerful, welcoming woman whom we later learned is Ming, the owner of the restaurant. We went a bit overboard in terms of our order, getting appetizers and lots of variety, because we were feeling so celebratory. The staff were wonderful, and the food arrived very quickly. Everything that should be served hot was piping hot. Ming made sure that our son with Down Syndrome knew that the soup being placed in front of him was hot. The vegetables were fresh and crisp, just a bit nouvelle, but not overly so. Just right, so that the food would not only taste good at that meal, but the leftovers will still have a bit of crispness.

I should mention the menu. It's really impressive in terms of the wide variety of healthy food options available. Everything is low-sodium, you can select gluten free, vegetarian, and vegan meals from the menu, but they also serve carnivores, so even the most steadfast meat-eater will find a wide selection to choose from.
Here, let me share a photo or two that I took of our vegetarian meal at Golden House:







You can request white or brown rice. They will do substitutions. You can ask for extra veggies on every dish. I'm sure I'm forgetting about half of the selections! They offer a selection of teas, bobas (aka boba tea), sodas, wines, and beers. I ordered a coconut boba, which was delicious, and frosty cold. I chose this, but I was forgetting that icy drinks can trigger my asthma. When I asked for a glass of room temperature water, it was delivered quickly and without fuss, no explanation needed.

So, all this stuff happened. There was more stuff. Maybe I'll tell you in a future post. Maybe I'll spare you the other difficult details and just jump to the good stuff. There has been good stuff. Most especially, my immediate family has been spared any deaths from covid. My daughter got it. It was scary, as she was ill enough to spend several days in the ICU, but she recovered and, despite a number of other health issues, seems not to be plagued by the lingering effects that have effected others.

My family has also been very lucky in that I was able to switch to working from home with very little difficulty when the covid restrictions started, so my family's income has not been negatively impacted. Given the choice, I would prefer to keep working from home, so I hope my employer won't make me choose between staying home and staying employed. So, right now, I'm employed full-time, working from home, and working on finding ways to make my life even better. That's not a bad place to be.