Home Again After Aphasia on the Road
Being Home Again (After Aphasia on the Road)
Coming home feels different this time.
I was away for weeks. Now I’m home again.
Twelve states.
New places every day.
New people. New decisions. New goals.
Now I’m home.
And everything is quieter.
With aphasia, home matters.
At home, I know where things are.
I don’t have to search for every word in a new place.
I don’t have to figure everything out all the time.
It’s familiar.
Slower.
Easier.
When you’re traveling with aphasia, even small things take effort:
ordering food, understanding directions, keeping up with conversations.
People talk fast.
Places are loud.
Choices come quickly.
I managed it.
Sometimes well.
Sometimes slowly.
Sometimes with help.
But I was always working at it.
At home, I don’t have to work as hard.
I can pause.
I can think.
I can find my words more easily.
That matters more than I realized.
But something else is true too
I’m home again. After traveling for a month, I’ve been resting and moving back into my habits in Connecticut.
I loved traveling.
And now I adore being at home.
Resting.
Gardening.
Walking.
Looking at my Facebook writing.
Preparing for Aphasia Awareness Month in June.
Life is suddenly quiet again.
I’ve even spent a little more time watching TV.
And now, after ten days at home, it is time to write a new blog — the first one in five weeks.
Home is easier. But I am stronger.
That’s the difference.
Before the trip, home was my safe place.
Now it still is — but it’s not the only place I can be.
I went out into the world.
I figured things out.
I asked for help.
I kept moving forward.
And now I’ve come back.
What’s new?
I am home — the same but different.
I have new ideas for blogs.
There are so many things to talk about.
Aphasia Awareness
June is Aphasia Awareness Month, and we are planning an aphasia program on the Connecticut shoreline.
Three of us will speak at the library in Madison, Connecticut:
an SLP and two of us with aphasia.
We are looking for people with aphasia, caregivers, and anyone who wants to learn more about aphasia.
I’m excited about this.
I have a feeling it will be very interesting.
Gardening in May
It is time to garden again.
I work outside for about a half hour almost every day:
moving leaves, mowing the lawn, going to plant sales, and buying a few plants.
Half of them will probably die by 2027.
I try to keep them alive, but honestly I don’t know that much about gardening — not like some of my friends.
Mulching is hard work every year.
But I’m good with herbs:
basil, mint, lemon balm.
My bleeding heart died this year though.
I’ll have to get another one.
Cooking — trying a new approach
As usual, I’m cooking every day.
But now I’m trying a new experiment.
I look at the food in my kitchen and talk to my AI Teacher:
“What can I make that is easy, quick, and takes less time?”
For years I used The New York Times Cookbook (NYT) app.
Fantastic recipes — but often complicated.
There are many ingredients and lots of steps.
I can read the ingredients, but following all the directions can be difficult with aphasia.
Cooking usually took me over an hour.
This week I asked AI Teacher what I could make with eggplant and a few other ingredients.
I made a simple Eggplant Parmesan.
It was really good.
Yesterday I made split pea soup with red lentils.
Easy and yummy — but orange, not red.
Now I’m already thinking about making it again next week. AI suggested a way to turn the food red instead of orange.
That is what I like about this process:
ideas, experimenting, changing things, trying again. I have never done that with my wonderful NYT.
And one more thing matters.
This first draft took about 45 minutes.
Before AI Teacher, this same draft might have taken four days.
That means a lot to me.
👉 Home is easier. But I changed