This is how my night will culminate: trail mix, (maybe a bowl of cereal), Sleepytime tea, a little Dame Judi Dench on the TV, and my favorite red robe. Apparently I've dressed in this robe almost every (cold) night for the last thirteen or so years, at least that's what Martin claims. He seems to be ambivalent toward it, but I LOVE it.
It does not become me in any way. I found my enormous Land's End robe--red as holly berries--at an outlet center in Maine (I think--I can't remember now). It was far too big for me, especially at that time, but I didn't care. It was incredibly soft, not sensuously so like bird's feathers or spring leaves, but like a huge slipper--for my body. It has enormous pockets that are continuously filled with tiny choking hazards swiped off the floor or earrings removed at night or wads of kleenexes.
There is nothing attractive about this robe--it's 100 % polyester, bulky and voluminous; it completely hides any figure I might boast and the tie about the middle makes a big, unflattering knot. And yet it has been just the thing for three pregnancies and daughters who loved to nurse constantly and for as long as possible. It's as good as a blanket as I pad around our old, chilly house in sheepskin slippers where morning temperatures upstairs in our room waver in the 50's and 60's. I love this huge, ugly, comfortable piece of red perfection.
What's an ugly comfort you love? Give thanks for it tonight, as I shall when I wrap Good Old Red around me once again.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
What's intimidating me today:
Baking Merry's cheesecake.
I have baked a cheesecake before, and goodness knows it's not too hard. But it's just a tad bit fiddly, and I don't 'do' fiddly. That's why I am not a good engineer. Measurements? Meaningless details!
Merry's belated birthday party is this weekend and she wants a Cheese Party: all her guests will sample cheeses and write down what they think of each one. If she pushes for this on her tenth birthday, what will she ask for in another ten? Caviar tasting party? Truffles from around the Continent?
My parents are eating cheese, too, but they may very well be locked this very moment in their tiny beach shack in Oregon listening to winds gust over sixty miles an hour and waves crash not far from their thin walls. But my mother, who sounded absolutely drunk on life yesterday when I spoke with her, and my father, who is more reserved generally but also sounded very happy, assured me that they had bought emergency matches and candles and would be quite snug with their Scrabble game, cheese, Dave's Killer Bread, and a bottle of the best wine I have ever, ever tasted: Angelico, a red so smooth that you feel like a baby again. One can't help being a little envious of the hurricane lovebirds in their empty nest. They've managed to feather it quite nicely.
Baking Merry's cheesecake.
I have baked a cheesecake before, and goodness knows it's not too hard. But it's just a tad bit fiddly, and I don't 'do' fiddly. That's why I am not a good engineer. Measurements? Meaningless details!
Merry's belated birthday party is this weekend and she wants a Cheese Party: all her guests will sample cheeses and write down what they think of each one. If she pushes for this on her tenth birthday, what will she ask for in another ten? Caviar tasting party? Truffles from around the Continent?
My parents are eating cheese, too, but they may very well be locked this very moment in their tiny beach shack in Oregon listening to winds gust over sixty miles an hour and waves crash not far from their thin walls. But my mother, who sounded absolutely drunk on life yesterday when I spoke with her, and my father, who is more reserved generally but also sounded very happy, assured me that they had bought emergency matches and candles and would be quite snug with their Scrabble game, cheese, Dave's Killer Bread, and a bottle of the best wine I have ever, ever tasted: Angelico, a red so smooth that you feel like a baby again. One can't help being a little envious of the hurricane lovebirds in their empty nest. They've managed to feather it quite nicely.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Garden Plans
Martin was very busy over the weekend with a major project. He toiled over it until two in the morning on Saturday evening and spent at least five or six hours bent over it in deep concentration on Sunday.
The final project is now taking up half our dining room table, along with our computers, unfinished puzzles and hot cups of Sleepytime tea.
You'll never guess. It's a to-scale, detailed, topographic rendering of our garden plans, in. . ..LEGOS. Yes. You heard me correctly. The paths, the pots, even the compost bins and our white cat (we don't own it; it just likes our garden)--all carefully built out of legos. My favorite part is the woman sitting at a table under an arbor draped with grapevine. She did not try to design the garden, on paper or with legos. Her one attempt at building a pot was met with veiled derision. So she isn't patient enough to find just the right blocks--so she doesn't have an engineering bone in her body and her pots look like something from out of space--so what? She's happy in the shade.
The woman is me, of course, and she looks so content out there in lone splendor with her book, plastic ponytail, and pot of tri-colored flowers.
In contrast, there are three men, and I think they must all be Martin--one is watering the garden with a huge hose, one is raking over green matter in the compost bin, and one is jauntily starting up the main path with a broom in his hand (due to a cornocopia of legos from different sets, the broom used to be a spear. A barbarian gentleman with a shield and impressive facial hair used to lounge breezily on a garden bench as well until he was plucked and discarded).
There's even a little wheelbarrow and a woman in a zen position in front of a planter. That can't be me.
My little charge, Ethan, poured over the Lego garden today, and his little hands kept fluttering toward it. "No, we don't want to touch it," I'd say. "Uncle Martin made that."
Ethan couldn't wrap his mind around it. "You mean he made it when he was a little boy?"
"No, he made it this weekend." Of course, the impressive crop of legos are from Martin's childhood, and I am glad to report that he is just as delighted by them now as he was when he was ten.
We tromped outside in the garden in our snow boots and made comparisons between the lego garden and the actual garden. We agreed that though the height adjustments of our sloping garden had been tricky to achieve in the Lego replica, the actual toil output in our actual garden come spring thaw will be harder. . .a whole lot harder. But what's more fun than shoveling tons of clay?
I wish I had downloaded the photos, but they're still on the camera. . .maybe tomorrow. I know you'll wait with bated breath.
The final project is now taking up half our dining room table, along with our computers, unfinished puzzles and hot cups of Sleepytime tea.
You'll never guess. It's a to-scale, detailed, topographic rendering of our garden plans, in. . ..LEGOS. Yes. You heard me correctly. The paths, the pots, even the compost bins and our white cat (we don't own it; it just likes our garden)--all carefully built out of legos. My favorite part is the woman sitting at a table under an arbor draped with grapevine. She did not try to design the garden, on paper or with legos. Her one attempt at building a pot was met with veiled derision. So she isn't patient enough to find just the right blocks--so she doesn't have an engineering bone in her body and her pots look like something from out of space--so what? She's happy in the shade.
The woman is me, of course, and she looks so content out there in lone splendor with her book, plastic ponytail, and pot of tri-colored flowers.
In contrast, there are three men, and I think they must all be Martin--one is watering the garden with a huge hose, one is raking over green matter in the compost bin, and one is jauntily starting up the main path with a broom in his hand (due to a cornocopia of legos from different sets, the broom used to be a spear. A barbarian gentleman with a shield and impressive facial hair used to lounge breezily on a garden bench as well until he was plucked and discarded).
There's even a little wheelbarrow and a woman in a zen position in front of a planter. That can't be me.
My little charge, Ethan, poured over the Lego garden today, and his little hands kept fluttering toward it. "No, we don't want to touch it," I'd say. "Uncle Martin made that."
Ethan couldn't wrap his mind around it. "You mean he made it when he was a little boy?"
"No, he made it this weekend." Of course, the impressive crop of legos are from Martin's childhood, and I am glad to report that he is just as delighted by them now as he was when he was ten.
We tromped outside in the garden in our snow boots and made comparisons between the lego garden and the actual garden. We agreed that though the height adjustments of our sloping garden had been tricky to achieve in the Lego replica, the actual toil output in our actual garden come spring thaw will be harder. . .a whole lot harder. But what's more fun than shoveling tons of clay?
I wish I had downloaded the photos, but they're still on the camera. . .maybe tomorrow. I know you'll wait with bated breath.
Monday, January 16, 2012
She will just ramble on. . . .
It's a very quiet MLK day here at Wazoo, though I just heard Merry cackle. Yes, cackle is the right word. It's supposed to be quiet time--Bea just looked outside and said, "It's very dark. It must be time to go to bed." The sky is a heavy white, a reflection of the snowy ground, though it's warming for evening rain.
Merry has saved her weekend homework until now and should be bent studiously over her tablet and book but Catherine is upstairs, too, and concentration is unlikely. Catherine is such a part of our family now that I no longer adjust my thought to fill four cups with water or ask four girls to scatter to tasks. I no longer "set an extra place" for Catherine but it is as if I have a fourth "sometimes" daughter.
It's been a short three or four months since Nancy died, but oddly it seems like much longer. In a way, death is like a boulder in a river; the river continues rushing on but there's new texture to it, an awareness of the way the rock has changed the course of the water. And, at least in this life, it's immovable. It will always be there and though everyone sees it, it is not often talked of. The first week I spent with Catherine after her mother passed away, I noticed that I did not speak of Nancy. At the end of the week, I felt convicted of the wrongness of this. Now I speak of Nancy freely with Catherine--when I see something that reminds me of her mother, I say so. When I remember something her mother loved, I tell Catherine. She must have many stories of her mother, and with these stories she will build a secret room of riches for herself. She'll need it--we all need secret rooms.
Catherine speaks easily and matter-of-factly about her mother, in the healthy, natural way that children have, or should have. It is only we adults, tied up so tightly by our own fears, who must adjust and choose to be natural instead of awkward.
I often think that we will someday realize that time is a flexible, boneless thing that wraps us now but will later be thrown from our shoulders like an old coat. It seems like such a rigid thing now--it pins us, storms at us, makes us dizzy and sad--but someday we'll find it to be a friendly, dynamic thing, with which we can play and relate and even laugh at. At least this is what I trust to be true, and it seems so much more obvious now that my friend has died, my children are growing quickly, and winter is here again, though the lilacs are already tightly budded. What if they were to bloom this afternoon and the air around them warmed until the grass went green and their corner of the garden was full of spring? Something like this happens in Oscar Wilde's "The Selfish Giant." The North Wind and Frost punish the giant for being selfish, but one day the giant smells spring blowing in the window. When he looks outside, "He saw a most wonderful sight. Through a little hole in the wall the children had crept in, and they were sitting in the branches of the trees. In every tree that he could see there was a little child. And the trees were so glad to have the children back again that they had covered themselves with blossoms, and were waving their arms gently above the children's heads." You can read the whole story, which begins with promise but ends by being unfortunately didactic, HERE.
(Please don't try to stick your children in icy trees to see if sudden thaw will occur.)
Merry has saved her weekend homework until now and should be bent studiously over her tablet and book but Catherine is upstairs, too, and concentration is unlikely. Catherine is such a part of our family now that I no longer adjust my thought to fill four cups with water or ask four girls to scatter to tasks. I no longer "set an extra place" for Catherine but it is as if I have a fourth "sometimes" daughter.
It's been a short three or four months since Nancy died, but oddly it seems like much longer. In a way, death is like a boulder in a river; the river continues rushing on but there's new texture to it, an awareness of the way the rock has changed the course of the water. And, at least in this life, it's immovable. It will always be there and though everyone sees it, it is not often talked of. The first week I spent with Catherine after her mother passed away, I noticed that I did not speak of Nancy. At the end of the week, I felt convicted of the wrongness of this. Now I speak of Nancy freely with Catherine--when I see something that reminds me of her mother, I say so. When I remember something her mother loved, I tell Catherine. She must have many stories of her mother, and with these stories she will build a secret room of riches for herself. She'll need it--we all need secret rooms.
Catherine speaks easily and matter-of-factly about her mother, in the healthy, natural way that children have, or should have. It is only we adults, tied up so tightly by our own fears, who must adjust and choose to be natural instead of awkward.
I often think that we will someday realize that time is a flexible, boneless thing that wraps us now but will later be thrown from our shoulders like an old coat. It seems like such a rigid thing now--it pins us, storms at us, makes us dizzy and sad--but someday we'll find it to be a friendly, dynamic thing, with which we can play and relate and even laugh at. At least this is what I trust to be true, and it seems so much more obvious now that my friend has died, my children are growing quickly, and winter is here again, though the lilacs are already tightly budded. What if they were to bloom this afternoon and the air around them warmed until the grass went green and their corner of the garden was full of spring? Something like this happens in Oscar Wilde's "The Selfish Giant." The North Wind and Frost punish the giant for being selfish, but one day the giant smells spring blowing in the window. When he looks outside, "He saw a most wonderful sight. Through a little hole in the wall the children had crept in, and they were sitting in the branches of the trees. In every tree that he could see there was a little child. And the trees were so glad to have the children back again that they had covered themselves with blossoms, and were waving their arms gently above the children's heads." You can read the whole story, which begins with promise but ends by being unfortunately didactic, HERE.
(Please don't try to stick your children in icy trees to see if sudden thaw will occur.)
Friday, January 13, 2012
Now it feels like winter--snow flurries in furious gusts, eddies at window panes. Bea is snoring softly next to me. We are both bundled, she and I, her head thrown back into her pillow, mouth open, cheeks pink. The windchimes are making a glorious racket and the ill-fitted storm windows in the sunroom bang in the wind. It's hard to ever really wake up on a day like today, when the the sun is only a reality for others. (I'd like to be in Australia by the sea this afternoon). Sally and Kevin came for lunch this afternoon and we all sat and stared at one another. Conversation was not bright and the best I could contribute was lines of "I'll Be There," by the Jackson 5, which was to be one of the most inane songs of all time. Cloying and saccharine, it sticks to the roof of my mouth, and Bea loves the Jackson 5 beyond all others.
"Jackson 5!" she demands on a daily basis, and for TV, "Tom and Jerry!" and for lunch, "Mac-e-bo-bos!" She and I share a rather bland diet there but it's punctuated by good books and frenzied rides on her tricycle, which she can maneuver around corners with astonishing speed and accuracy.
I'm thinking of all the household tasks I now have time for: finally tackling a closet I've been dreading for years (literally); paring things down, getting rid of say, half our stuff. I have the time but none of the will, because, let's face it, it's so very dull. If Jesus were to come back and I was cleaning out a closet, (I told Kevin and Sally today), I'd feel absolutely gipped.
How in the world do you spell that word? Gypped. That's just worse. Oh, I've no idea.
The sledding hill beckons children perhaps this afternoon but not me. It's a windchill of perhaps 1 degree and though I had high hopes of becoming Pioneer Mary and taking walks in every sort of weather, I am hiding from my better self today and baking cupcakes, one batch of which was a miserable failure (despite two sticks of butter, they taste like cornbread) and the other which succeeded so well I don't want anyone to eat them.
Jipped. That can't be right. I've been literate for a while now and my spelling just gets worse. Why?
Happy Friday, and may Happy Hour rise up to meet thee.
PS. Just ran the spell check and lo and behold, Gypped is correct. What a silly looking word that is. I wonder if it's embarrassed.
"Jackson 5!" she demands on a daily basis, and for TV, "Tom and Jerry!" and for lunch, "Mac-e-bo-bos!" She and I share a rather bland diet there but it's punctuated by good books and frenzied rides on her tricycle, which she can maneuver around corners with astonishing speed and accuracy.
I'm thinking of all the household tasks I now have time for: finally tackling a closet I've been dreading for years (literally); paring things down, getting rid of say, half our stuff. I have the time but none of the will, because, let's face it, it's so very dull. If Jesus were to come back and I was cleaning out a closet, (I told Kevin and Sally today), I'd feel absolutely gipped.
How in the world do you spell that word? Gypped. That's just worse. Oh, I've no idea.
The sledding hill beckons children perhaps this afternoon but not me. It's a windchill of perhaps 1 degree and though I had high hopes of becoming Pioneer Mary and taking walks in every sort of weather, I am hiding from my better self today and baking cupcakes, one batch of which was a miserable failure (despite two sticks of butter, they taste like cornbread) and the other which succeeded so well I don't want anyone to eat them.
Jipped. That can't be right. I've been literate for a while now and my spelling just gets worse. Why?
Happy Friday, and may Happy Hour rise up to meet thee.
PS. Just ran the spell check and lo and behold, Gypped is correct. What a silly looking word that is. I wonder if it's embarrassed.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
I've been thinking about writing a lot. I've been writing only a little. I've been thinking about starting work on a novel; I haven't typed a single word. Last night I told Martin, "Why do it when there are plenty of people who have already done it well? And most of them I haven't even read yet!" I've also been meaning to start a writing group with students since I'm not teaching this semester. I ran into a student in the University hallway--straight from home, I was in my "plain clothes" of course--stained shirt, house sweater, comfy cordoroys, my hair hanging about my face--and Bea, though she was dressed, had left her coat at home and was in socks with no shoes (she did have a blister on her toe, by the way). I chatted with the student for a bit and then the writing group came up. "Yes," I said, "I will organize it. I plan to get serious again in. . .um. Four days."
The days are passing quickly with no signs of seriousness from me yet, though at least I've started blogging again.
It was certainly encouraging to find a review online of my short story, "Patron Saint of Trees," by Nichole Reber at her site, "The Review Review." You can read my very first review HERE.
Next week I will gather in my energy and be serious again. That gives me--let's see--about four days more. Perfect.
The days are passing quickly with no signs of seriousness from me yet, though at least I've started blogging again.
It was certainly encouraging to find a review online of my short story, "Patron Saint of Trees," by Nichole Reber at her site, "The Review Review." You can read my very first review HERE.
Next week I will gather in my energy and be serious again. That gives me--let's see--about four days more. Perfect.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Truth is Overrated, Especially When You're Six
Tonight we gathered around our kitchen table and bowed our heads over steaming bowls of homemade chicken soup. This introductory sentence might make you feel as if this was a peaceful occasion. Much of the afternoon had been relatively calm--the girls were happy, they'd decorated some cookies and rolled some biscuit dough into pinwheels I slid into a hot oven. But the chaos that strikes shortly before dinnertime had indeed knocked us all upside the heads like clockwork and by the time I sat down at the table, all I could do was tip my head back in utter exhaustion.
Elspeth wanted to pray.
She told us they always pray in school before snack. "Really?" I said.
"Yeah," she said, folding her hands together. "Mrs. E. [her kindergarten teacher] makes us."
"I don't think so," I insisted. "That's actually illegal."
"Well. . ." she hedged. Maybe you should know that Elspeth is currently telling tales about everything under the sun. . .she drops a lie as easily as sneezing or shrugging her shoulders--lies to help herself out, lies too when there's absolutely no reason to lie. "Okay," she admitted, "Ben and I pray sometimes before snack." (I can't imagine this happening since she usually sinks her teeth into anything in front of her without so much as a "Thanks, Bozo," but who knows?)
Nevertheless, we bowed our heads and Elspeth began: "Thank you, God, that I had a good day today. Thank you for my sisters, Merry and Beatrix. Thank you for this food and I am so grateful to Mommy for being patient with me and also because she adopted me. . ."
I tried not to laugh behind my folded hands because most of it was such a nice prayer, but Merry spoke right up. "You're not adopted, Elspeth!"
"Yes, I am," Elspeth said, looking up. "Mrs. E. told me I was."
That Mrs. E. Apparently I'm going to have to write a letter into the school. According to Elspeth, she is the source of all kinds of craziness. But this is the same girl who, in preschool, tried to convince me that her teachers were making them climb through roof panels onto the roof. She also spun such skillful tales of utter hooliganism perpetrated by a poor boy named Thomas that I actually believed her for a while until another mother pooh-pooohed me.
I can only hope Elspeth can manage to stay out of jail in later life. Hope springs eternal since she recently asked me, "Mommy, can I be an artist when I grow up?"
"Absolutely," I said.
"And a teacher?"
"Yes, you can choose what you want to be. You can be an artist and a teacher." (Hopefully not a convict).
She looked as if I'd handed her the keys to her freedom. "Really? You mean they'll LET ME?"
Ah, my girl Elspeth. The killer of all my parent pride, the source of much joy and delight. You'd better be a mighty fine artist, my dear, to warrant your wild childhood.
Elspeth wanted to pray.
She told us they always pray in school before snack. "Really?" I said.
"Yeah," she said, folding her hands together. "Mrs. E. [her kindergarten teacher] makes us."
"I don't think so," I insisted. "That's actually illegal."
"Well. . ." she hedged. Maybe you should know that Elspeth is currently telling tales about everything under the sun. . .she drops a lie as easily as sneezing or shrugging her shoulders--lies to help herself out, lies too when there's absolutely no reason to lie. "Okay," she admitted, "Ben and I pray sometimes before snack." (I can't imagine this happening since she usually sinks her teeth into anything in front of her without so much as a "Thanks, Bozo," but who knows?)
Nevertheless, we bowed our heads and Elspeth began: "Thank you, God, that I had a good day today. Thank you for my sisters, Merry and Beatrix. Thank you for this food and I am so grateful to Mommy for being patient with me and also because she adopted me. . ."
I tried not to laugh behind my folded hands because most of it was such a nice prayer, but Merry spoke right up. "You're not adopted, Elspeth!"
"Yes, I am," Elspeth said, looking up. "Mrs. E. told me I was."
That Mrs. E. Apparently I'm going to have to write a letter into the school. According to Elspeth, she is the source of all kinds of craziness. But this is the same girl who, in preschool, tried to convince me that her teachers were making them climb through roof panels onto the roof. She also spun such skillful tales of utter hooliganism perpetrated by a poor boy named Thomas that I actually believed her for a while until another mother pooh-pooohed me.
I can only hope Elspeth can manage to stay out of jail in later life. Hope springs eternal since she recently asked me, "Mommy, can I be an artist when I grow up?"
"Absolutely," I said.
"And a teacher?"
"Yes, you can choose what you want to be. You can be an artist and a teacher." (Hopefully not a convict).
She looked as if I'd handed her the keys to her freedom. "Really? You mean they'll LET ME?"
Ah, my girl Elspeth. The killer of all my parent pride, the source of much joy and delight. You'd better be a mighty fine artist, my dear, to warrant your wild childhood.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Tonight I ate a half a chicken, stuffed under the skin with herb butter, that made me feel like a new person. Or maybe it was the bottle of wine that we finished with my sister and my brother-in-law, or maybe it was the mocha creme or the walk through the woods to the candlelit restaurant near the Puget Sound. . .or maybe it was all factors rolled into one delicious experience that made me feel that life was full to bursting with possibilities, all at my fingertips. If the Italian owner hadn't told us we weren't allowed to dance on the tabletops, I might have.
Here in Washington it is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas, though there won't be any snow for us. Tomorrow we'll take the ferry into Seattle to see the lights and ride the carousel with my brother.
We were talking tonight about the temptation to dream up a new life for yourself, and that dreaming is okay as long as it doesn't make you discontent with your life now. And I'm deeply grateful for all this life is to me now: my close community, family, and employments, our big old house and out-of-control garden. But sometimes I imagine what I want life to be someday: a tiny, tidy house, a garden just big enough for a vegetable patch, flowers, and a patio with a tiny table and herb pots, long mornings to write followed by a long, rambling walk down a quiet path by. . .where am I when I imagine this? By the sea? Back on Orcas Island? In East Africa? I have no idea.
Life is so often what we could not have dreamed, what has been given to us and fallen to us by a series of blind turns, what we have bungled into. What is intentional, of course, is how we stumble along our paths, with joy or with suspicion. How many undiscovered rooms still wait for me to open doors? I wonder. . .
Meanwhile, I find my thoughts returning to next semester. I won't be teaching and I'll finally have the time to work on a book. But I can't settle on a project. I want to compile a book of poetry, a novel, a children's book, and a memoir, but I have to choose one and stick with it. And stick with it I must, even through the long February days when I stare into the grey sky and find the same things over and over again--mostly bright birds with wild feathers askance, mostly red birds. Maybe I will have to swear off birds this winter.
Today is my Elspeth's birthday. She had a wonderful coming. Martin and I sang Christmas carols through my labor transition and then I rocked back and forth on a giant exercise ball and laughed with the midwife, Martin, and my mom, pausing to work through contractions until they intensified to such a pitch that I knew she was coming. I began pacing up and down the room and then I held onto Martin's neck and pushed her into the air and the midwife caught her like a football. That night I held her until morning, and I remember feeling completely content and happy. Her little head, soft with reddish hair, nestled under my chin. She slept so well and soon I took her home and placed her in a shaft of winter sunlight, where Merry knelt down and read to her from a tiny book. She felt like a natural, seamless addition to our family. Today I picked her up in my arms and smoothed a blond tendril away from her face, and though she is full of the moments of her own life and can't remember her genesis, she squeezed me back, and her arms were strong, and I love her for being full of exactly who she is.
It's late and I feel as though I am writing terribly, but I wanted to post an update even though I am as luxuriously full as a stuffed Christmas goose and as stupid. I hope tonight finds you all with something pleasant to drink, something lovely to read, and someone comforting to say goodnight to. Goodnight!
Here in Washington it is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas, though there won't be any snow for us. Tomorrow we'll take the ferry into Seattle to see the lights and ride the carousel with my brother.
We were talking tonight about the temptation to dream up a new life for yourself, and that dreaming is okay as long as it doesn't make you discontent with your life now. And I'm deeply grateful for all this life is to me now: my close community, family, and employments, our big old house and out-of-control garden. But sometimes I imagine what I want life to be someday: a tiny, tidy house, a garden just big enough for a vegetable patch, flowers, and a patio with a tiny table and herb pots, long mornings to write followed by a long, rambling walk down a quiet path by. . .where am I when I imagine this? By the sea? Back on Orcas Island? In East Africa? I have no idea.
Life is so often what we could not have dreamed, what has been given to us and fallen to us by a series of blind turns, what we have bungled into. What is intentional, of course, is how we stumble along our paths, with joy or with suspicion. How many undiscovered rooms still wait for me to open doors? I wonder. . .
Meanwhile, I find my thoughts returning to next semester. I won't be teaching and I'll finally have the time to work on a book. But I can't settle on a project. I want to compile a book of poetry, a novel, a children's book, and a memoir, but I have to choose one and stick with it. And stick with it I must, even through the long February days when I stare into the grey sky and find the same things over and over again--mostly bright birds with wild feathers askance, mostly red birds. Maybe I will have to swear off birds this winter.
Today is my Elspeth's birthday. She had a wonderful coming. Martin and I sang Christmas carols through my labor transition and then I rocked back and forth on a giant exercise ball and laughed with the midwife, Martin, and my mom, pausing to work through contractions until they intensified to such a pitch that I knew she was coming. I began pacing up and down the room and then I held onto Martin's neck and pushed her into the air and the midwife caught her like a football. That night I held her until morning, and I remember feeling completely content and happy. Her little head, soft with reddish hair, nestled under my chin. She slept so well and soon I took her home and placed her in a shaft of winter sunlight, where Merry knelt down and read to her from a tiny book. She felt like a natural, seamless addition to our family. Today I picked her up in my arms and smoothed a blond tendril away from her face, and though she is full of the moments of her own life and can't remember her genesis, she squeezed me back, and her arms were strong, and I love her for being full of exactly who she is.
It's late and I feel as though I am writing terribly, but I wanted to post an update even though I am as luxuriously full as a stuffed Christmas goose and as stupid. I hope tonight finds you all with something pleasant to drink, something lovely to read, and someone comforting to say goodnight to. Goodnight!
Thursday, December 15, 2011
High Heels!
Brilliant musician Greg Scheer writes:
I didn't write a poem about high heels, but I included high heels in a new song. I hope there's a prize or something, because I just ate up a half of a day on this absurd little venture: http://musicblog.gregscheer.com/2011/12/15/baby-youre-not-wearing-pants-again/
Listen to his song now before you hear it on Top Ten on your favorite radio station.
PLUS. . .Heather Long McDaniel submitted this beaute about a callous aunt from Pennsylvania:
There once was an aunt from PA
Who gave neices sharp heels for play
The aunt did not know
Of the pain in the toes
She doomed me to suffer that day
Don't be intimidated. Submit your art/poems/etc. about high heels and win Wazoo's fabulous (virtual) prize!
I didn't write a poem about high heels, but I included high heels in a new song. I hope there's a prize or something, because I just ate up a half of a day on this absurd little venture: http://musicblog.gregscheer.com/2011/12/15/baby-youre-not-wearing-pants-again/
Listen to his song now before you hear it on Top Ten on your favorite radio station.
PLUS. . .Heather Long McDaniel submitted this beaute about a callous aunt from Pennsylvania:
There once was an aunt from PA
Who gave neices sharp heels for play
The aunt did not know
Of the pain in the toes
She doomed me to suffer that day
Don't be intimidated. Submit your art/poems/etc. about high heels and win Wazoo's fabulous (virtual) prize!
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Advent Poem 2
Today I look for you in birch bark
and find your eye seared black into its trunk.
Perhaps you are the bird that bellied to my daughter’s window
and opened white wings edged with blue.
From the spindle of a black walnut
you watched me with marble eyes,
ticking your face left and right like a mechanical toy.
But when you flew you were like snow falling.
Later I heard you, clawing at the window, scratching
at the frame. I wondered what you wanted.
If you call me with warble from the top of the birch,
will I hear you? Inside there’s a roar of heat,
the calling of my children’s voices, the smells of dinner.
Your feathers fluff against the cold. If I fed you,
would I know your secrets? Every thistle
bears stars, the soil smells of God.
and find your eye seared black into its trunk.
Perhaps you are the bird that bellied to my daughter’s window
and opened white wings edged with blue.
From the spindle of a black walnut
you watched me with marble eyes,
ticking your face left and right like a mechanical toy.
But when you flew you were like snow falling.
Later I heard you, clawing at the window, scratching
at the frame. I wondered what you wanted.
If you call me with warble from the top of the birch,
will I hear you? Inside there’s a roar of heat,
the calling of my children’s voices, the smells of dinner.
Your feathers fluff against the cold. If I fed you,
would I know your secrets? Every thistle
bears stars, the soil smells of God.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Call for Poems
While this is not really in the spirit of the Christmas season, and while I should be grading final projects, I've noticed lately that there's quite a bit of traffic to Wazoo generated by people hunting for. . ."poems about high heels." You faithful visitors may remember a poem I wrote about Merry's high heels last April, which was National Poetry Month.
High heels and I are not on intimate terms right now, nor do I know any women (or men) who wear them. But I'd love to post some fun, silly, or serious poems about high heels! You can leave them here in the comments section, with lines separated by back slashes ( / ) and I will publish them in their correct form. High heels in December? And why not? I've got a red pair the color of holly berries. They languish in the basement next to old seed packets. The girls try them on once and a while and trip and clomp around the laundry room. The girls LOVE them. Why? What is so inherently attractive about high heels?
So write me.
P.S. Weirdest search by a Wazoo visitor? "Bald flight attendants."
High heels and I are not on intimate terms right now, nor do I know any women (or men) who wear them. But I'd love to post some fun, silly, or serious poems about high heels! You can leave them here in the comments section, with lines separated by back slashes ( / ) and I will publish them in their correct form. High heels in December? And why not? I've got a red pair the color of holly berries. They languish in the basement next to old seed packets. The girls try them on once and a while and trip and clomp around the laundry room. The girls LOVE them. Why? What is so inherently attractive about high heels?
So write me.
P.S. Weirdest search by a Wazoo visitor? "Bald flight attendants."
Monday, December 12, 2011
advent
Now is the time of waiting,
the hours of music in the womb,
of fields swept up, covered in sheets
of snow. Gathering, sheaf and boil
is done, now jars gleam with dilly beans
and gemmed berries. Lone cats paw
through the garden. I think of you
and gather seeds, each one a womb.
In the spring after the last frost
I will scatter them over freshly turned
soil, scented richly as coffee. But for now
They lie ponderous in my palm
and I am full of their weight.
Holy winter, heavy with waiting,
grow in me a green thing
strong as grapevine.
the hours of music in the womb,
of fields swept up, covered in sheets
of snow. Gathering, sheaf and boil
is done, now jars gleam with dilly beans
and gemmed berries. Lone cats paw
through the garden. I think of you
and gather seeds, each one a womb.
In the spring after the last frost
I will scatter them over freshly turned
soil, scented richly as coffee. But for now
They lie ponderous in my palm
and I am full of their weight.
Holy winter, heavy with waiting,
grow in me a green thing
strong as grapevine.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
My story, "Name Finding," has been published at Literary Mama. Please read it (and leave a comment if you'd like) by clicking HERE. I hope you enjoy the site--it's not just for mamas, of course.
And. . .to read about my first experience hunting, check out my column for this week by clicking on the geranium at right. (Did I mention I never write my own headlines?) Also, while you may be the reader that takes the total reads to fourteen, the column is mostly read in print in this county and in the next. But online reads are important, too, so leave a message if you'd like! Finally, big thanks to Tonya for putting up with me as a novice hunter.
And. . .to read about my first experience hunting, check out my column for this week by clicking on the geranium at right. (Did I mention I never write my own headlines?) Also, while you may be the reader that takes the total reads to fourteen, the column is mostly read in print in this county and in the next. But online reads are important, too, so leave a message if you'd like! Finally, big thanks to Tonya for putting up with me as a novice hunter.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
from Marial Thon in the Southern Sudan airport
Dear All,
I'm waiting in a jumble of people in the Juba Intl Airport, sweating from every pore as people crowd into one another, many human scents wafting from our places of origin. The airport is not air-conditioned. There is one big room for all of the flights, domestic and international.
While I am writing the desk staff comes and check-in is done efficiently. I step around people to the immigration counter where they stamp my passport and then I fill in their register to give them a record of my visit. I go to security. I am given a quick pat down ignoring the lumps in my pocket and then through a metal detector that does not work.
My computer bag goes through the X-ray and the man tells me to take out the computer battery, which I do though he never looks at it except briefly when I hold it up.
I then pass into the one room departure lounge with very worn but fairly comfortable overstuffed leather chairs and sofas with crammed in everywhere suplemented by a few plastic chairs.
But before I sit down I have to pee. The door to the men's room lies directly in line with those coming into the room from security but there is not a door that will close. So those coming in get to see me standing at the urinal doing my thing. No washing hands here.
There is a sink but the entire top of the faucet-the part with the handle to twist, lies at the bottom of the basin, broken free from its threaded bounds.
But I'm on my way back to Nairobi and home-just waiting for the plane to land.
It's the five month birthday of Southern Sudan today-a new airport is being built built just down the way and I rejoice in their growing time.
Love,
Mere/Dad
Today, from Nairobi:
Enjoyed your blog on time. I built my workshop completely around proverbs and stories. So to begin to help folk understand that proverbs reveal something about the culture from which the people who created it came, I gave them two proverbs to consider. One was “A log can be in a river for a long time and never become a crocodile.” And the other was “Time is money.” I asked what they thought it meant, where they thought it was created and what it might show about the people who created it. The discussion of the last one brought out the huge differences that you referred to in the blog. It is not only chronos and kairos but time as repeated cycles vs a line. There is not sense of time as a commodity but, in facing modernity——[both have to be understood].
My correct Dinka name is Marial Thon (Thon pronounced with a silent “H” but aspirating the “T” sound but not the “O” sound as in “ton” but rather in “tone”). It means a “bull with black and white color & strong bull at the same time.”
Look forward to seeing you soon.
Love,
Dad
I'm waiting in a jumble of people in the Juba Intl Airport, sweating from every pore as people crowd into one another, many human scents wafting from our places of origin. The airport is not air-conditioned. There is one big room for all of the flights, domestic and international.
While I am writing the desk staff comes and check-in is done efficiently. I step around people to the immigration counter where they stamp my passport and then I fill in their register to give them a record of my visit. I go to security. I am given a quick pat down ignoring the lumps in my pocket and then through a metal detector that does not work.
My computer bag goes through the X-ray and the man tells me to take out the computer battery, which I do though he never looks at it except briefly when I hold it up.
I then pass into the one room departure lounge with very worn but fairly comfortable overstuffed leather chairs and sofas with crammed in everywhere suplemented by a few plastic chairs.
But before I sit down I have to pee. The door to the men's room lies directly in line with those coming into the room from security but there is not a door that will close. So those coming in get to see me standing at the urinal doing my thing. No washing hands here.
There is a sink but the entire top of the faucet-the part with the handle to twist, lies at the bottom of the basin, broken free from its threaded bounds.
But I'm on my way back to Nairobi and home-just waiting for the plane to land.
It's the five month birthday of Southern Sudan today-a new airport is being built built just down the way and I rejoice in their growing time.
Love,
Mere/Dad
Today, from Nairobi:
Enjoyed your blog on time. I built my workshop completely around proverbs and stories. So to begin to help folk understand that proverbs reveal something about the culture from which the people who created it came, I gave them two proverbs to consider. One was “A log can be in a river for a long time and never become a crocodile.” And the other was “Time is money.” I asked what they thought it meant, where they thought it was created and what it might show about the people who created it. The discussion of the last one brought out the huge differences that you referred to in the blog. It is not only chronos and kairos but time as repeated cycles vs a line. There is not sense of time as a commodity but, in facing modernity——[both have to be understood].
My correct Dinka name is Marial Thon (Thon pronounced with a silent “H” but aspirating the “T” sound but not the “O” sound as in “ton” but rather in “tone”). It means a “bull with black and white color & strong bull at the same time.”
Look forward to seeing you soon.
Love,
Dad
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