Almost Paradisical

Face Lifts Do's and Don'ts

2012-02-10T13:29:00.000-08:00

Last night we saw a newish movie with a come back actress from the old days. The amount of work she had done on her face since I saw her last was shocking. She looked grotesque and deformed. No remnants of character or emotions crossed her once expressive face. At one time she made us howl with laughter by the contortions her face would go through.

There was only a stiff, gaudily painted mask where a face should have been. It didn't make her look younger, it made her look like a strange alien. Plastic.

Our eyes are the window to our soul. There is nothing more fitting or beautiful to me than loving eyes looking out from a real face.

Wisdom wrinkles, laughter crinkles, love twinkles ~ the face lift that brings a smile to everyone.

Love In The Room

2012-02-03T21:10:00.000-08:00

The waiting room is full of people coming and going for check-ups and x-rays. Most of them don't look like they feel well. My friend is there to see her M.D after her first round of chemo and radiation is finished. She is weak and fragile. The palms of her hands and bottoms of her feet are burned and peeling from the inside out. She smiles from the sunshine as we come through the door.

I have lots of time to people watch. One older couple in the corner sit and visit comfortably with each other. Smiles and tender touch hint at comfortable intimacy. He looks at her like she is the only woman in the world. This makes her beautiful.

Wanting to catch them before they go in to the inner sanctum, I go over and sit beside her. She moves her walker for me.

I ask if they are married.
"Sixty five years."
Do you have children?
"Five, but one died at 16 from a brain tumor, but it's OK, I know where he is."
How did you meet?
"I sang in the church choir in high school with his brother. When he came home on leave from the service, we met and married six months later."

I took her hand. With tears slipping down my cheeks, I told them they were a beautiful couple with a wondrous glow of love between them.

That morning had been a difficult one. Could have been the moon, my lunar cycle, circumstances, vitamin D deficiency, someone hacking an online account, whatever.......

But in that room of worry and sickness, despair and turmoil ~ a whisper surround sounded me ~ Love matters most. Then it echoed softly again ~ love matters most.

As they tottered in to see their doctor, the wife waved at me and pointed with a glowing smile to the pretty nurse beside her.

"This is one of my daughters."

It does a body good to agree with that whisper. Love matters most.

Take it to the Garage

2012-01-25T18:11:00.000-08:00

Life sails along without a hitch for a few seconds a week, a few days a year. The rest of the time things get messy, muddy.

Loverby and I stopped today and took a breather. Our marriage and our life needed a tune-up. It is painful and uncomfortable to put it up on the hydraulic lift and look underneath. Every thing's exposed. The wear, rust and deterioration are obvious.

Loose bolts have to be tightened. Sputtering mufflers need replaced. Tires get worn out and lose their grip. Fluids lose their viscosity. Parts need lubed. Chips in the windshield need stopped before they turn into cracks. Wipers need replaced to clean properly.

If feels overwhelming to take our marriage and life, individually and as a couple, into the garage and deal with it, but it is the only way to have the quality of life that is worth living. It is the only way to have enough leftovers to give away to a hurting hungry world.

Our garage is the marriage bed with the door locked and the lights turned down low. The garage isn't the place for movie set sex.

It is the place for tears, affection, safe conversation, confession, dreams, and naked truth. Needs are expressed, wants and desires are spoken of out loud, failures are forgiven, prayers sent, disappointment heard. Hopes are risked, requests asked for, depression admitted, fears quieted. Feathers smoothed. Tears wiped.

When we take the time to go to the garage, we realize how much we miss playing, teasing, flirting, smiling, and especially.....laughing. Mostly, we remind ourselves to relax and not take everything so seriously. We remember again that beauty saves the world, not worry.

We remember that it takes only a little bit of creative thinking and planning to bring a romantic moment to fruition.

When the lift sets us down on the floor, our thankfulness leaves us purring.

P.S. Our mechanic doesn't charge a thing. He has a mysterious way of sending notifications for when it is time for a tune-up. They don't come with a stamp....

Timely

2012-01-22T16:11:00.000-08:00

Loverby and I went over to visit a friend who is on the downhill side of radiation and chemo. Ten more sessions. It was a slushy morning yesterday. I was starting to get cabin fever from being cooped up in the aftermath of a lovely snow storm. The melt hasn't been so lovely. When you're miserable, they say visit someone more miserable. We came to the wrong house. She wasn't. Miserable, that is.

Her old and worn Lutheran hymnal was lying open on the footstool by the couch where she spends most of her days. Alongside it was a box of well used recipes. Some were clipped from vintage magazines, others were hand written. A few were e-mail copies.

I thought of Elizabeth Elliot saying....the new choruses are fine, but it is the old hymns which best get us through the dark night.

We sat side by side on her couch and sang every old hymn we could recall. Acapella. They weren't perfectly pitched, and some ended on a different key than we started with. We kept a brisk tempo. A few brought tears. Two braced us with new courage. The writers, some from the 1700's had been in the smack dab middle of some sort of major troubles. We closed that old book feeling like we had just imbibed ..........comfort, straight, from comforters who knew precisely what they were talking about.

When we started going through the recipes, each one reminded us of someone, a gathering, or a time. Loverby sat by tasting and smelling every dish without gaining a pound. He stopped short of drooling.

I left with sensory loaded gifts, momentos tangible and intangible. Thanks my friend.

Uncaged

2012-01-19T13:02:00.000-08:00

I greatly

admire the brave

souls

who try the

latches on their

cage,

lift it,

and fly

to freedom.

They show

me how to

soar.

January Bleau

2012-01-17T16:28:00.000-08:00

It seems like everyone

around me is feeling

winter's varied shades

and hues of blue.

Navy blue pulls down

night. Steel leaves you

cold. Silver mist winter

kills. Aqua marine likes

to dunk and drown.

Saffires, ceruleans, indigos,

Prussians, and cobalts

don't practice birth control

during the doldrums. The

way they multiply and

intermarry scares me.

There is a blue neither

bleak nor wearisome.

The color of God's glory

is periwinkle.

Drench me.

Please Pass the Poetry

2012-01-17T15:11:00.000-08:00

Send it to the right

with your left hand

where my right hand

will pick it up so our

shoulders don't get

jumbled while I

transfer it to my left hand

and heap my plate

before I pass it

to the right with

my left where they

grab it with their right

heaping their plate

from the left hand

before they pass it

on to the right

until it has gone

all around the table

and we sit back

full bellied. Wait a spell,

let it settle before

you ask for seconds.

Aibileen Says

2012-01-15T16:47:00.000-08:00

You is:

Smart

Kind

Important

Brave

Talented

Loved

Beautiful

I took liberties and added a few other things she might have said to Mae Mobley and you and me. From The Help by Katherine Stockett. We all need an Aibileen in our lives. Often. To remind us of the truth. Amen.

Tears in My Cornbread

2011-12-18T14:31:00.000-08:00

Dad was cruel to animals. He was consistently and constantly critical. He never praised anyone because we never measured up. He wasn't a faithful husband. He turned his back on his creator. His hard fist punched in soft faces. Guns were pointed. Animals and humans felt his hands or ropes choking their necks. Horses starved in order to teach them a lesson. Anger ran a cold current, surprising us each time. There are ways to prepare for hurricanes and earthquakes, but not rage.

But none of these things happened to me. I was only an unwilling witness, sometimes screaming hysterically, most times silently watching the anger sucking us all under. A little girl can feel guilty for being relieved to have such anger bypass her.

Late last night I couldn't sleep. The kitchen is where I found cold cornbread leftovers. Crumbling a piece in a bowl with sugar and warm milk, I slowly spooned it into my hungry heart through my lips. Tears started to leak, along with milk dribbling from my contorted mouth. Crying and eating aren't compatible.

I never did like soggy old cornbread mush, but dad did. He shared it willingly, without knowing that being with him was the only part I relished.

He was more than that first paragraph. Much more. Last night proves the good memories never go away.

I miss my daddy.

Cork and Apron Dining

2011-12-17T12:04:00.000-08:00

Last night we dined at Anthony's on the Edmonds waterfront for Loverby's company Christmas Dinner. I had packed two simple gift bags for the other two wives. A candle, a little paper chain wreath, a box of Anna's ginger cookies.

Before we left, I kept having this niggling thought bubble bumping and prodding me. It came fully texted. "Give Christine one of those aprons you made today." Weird.......OK. At the last minute I wrapped one in tissue paper and dropped it in her bag, then had to mark it so I remembered which one was hers.

We had a wonderful view of the docks lined with boats all decked out for the holidays. The lights reflected and bounced merrily off the water. A sailboat with a tall mast lit up is a breath catching sight.

Our waitress was elegant. Experienced. Composed. She left us to discuss ordering a bottle of wine. My table companions remembered the story of my first embarrassing wine experience/fiasco when I was young. For a joke, the boss pointed to me when she brought the wine to the table. I almost had a stroke. She looked puzzled as everyone howled. I told her the short version of my infamous wine cork licking.

She compelled me to look her in the eye. She said she could heal me, redeem that wounded moment. With panache she took the dreaded white towel off her arm and laid it on the table, showed me how the cork was correctly moist, poured me a tiny bit and taught me the proper swirl (flat on the table) to release the bouquet. She said wine should be accessible and friendly. (I mused how opera used to be the same to the common people.) She then showed me the clear edge of the puddle against the white towel as she tipped the wine in the bowl of the glass. That is what the white towel is for! If it has a brickish/brackish edge, it is 'off'.

This was all done, not in a whisper. My lesson was for the whole room. More than our table was mesmerized with her poise. She signed the cork for me. Kit. I'm keeping it. Maybe framing it.

She told us her most embarrassing dining story. Her husband took her to a high end French restaurant in Canada for her birthday. The waiter asked her if she wanted to savour the champagne? She said yes. He then took a sword off the wall and laid it and the champagne ceremoniously on a table he pulled over for the occasion. By this time, she realized he had asked her if she wanted to saber the champagne. The restaurant was full, all heads turned as she severed the head off that bottle. Thankfully, it was the real deal. In spite of her hyperventilating performance, they didn't drink any glass particles. :)

During our lingering meal, Christine, the youngest wife and mother at the table, mentioned how for five years she has begged her husband to get her an apron for a Christmas present. He put his head in his hands, moaning at his failure at fulfilling this impossible task. Bev and I both love aprons and started holding hands in excitement under the table and slapping each other's knees. I knew she was thinking of making Christine an apron as soon as possible. I knew what was in the bag. Shivers went up my spine as I felt this supernatural love flow toward this young woman. I was so glad I hadn't dismissed that strange thought bubble by pushing it away.

I asked Christine to unwrap a certain package. She wiped tears of happiness away as she realized what it was. I told her the back story. It was one of those perfect moments. Divine. Thanks Maestro. I love how you orchestrate and make music of our lives. I love how you love us.

Our waitress happened by as Christine was holding her apron up. She said, "Looks like two miracles happened this night." We all agreed.

Recap 2011

2011-12-13T20:08:00.000-08:00

Because we don't live a Christmas Letter life, I can't write one. The pictures would be a little troubling also. Sorry. We can't laugh about it all yet, but maybe someday.

Here is a recap, though. Our year started with Brita getting rear ended, totaling her car and breaking her ribs. Christmas was not fun for her, nor were the many weeks after. Tess was sick four different times, each lasting for about seven weeks. Tests. Tests. And more tests with no answers. Craig was hit by an oncoming car turning in front of him as he was riding his motorcycle. He was in pain most of the summer and fall. Shoulder, ribs, neck, knees, and arm. The internal bruises have been slow to heal. He experienced depression for the first time in his life. I experienced him not being able or capable to bear the load he usually does. I concluded that I take his emotional and physical strength for granted. This, I purpose to rectify. I still have the piece of shattered glass from his windshield. It is in the shape of a heart. I'm grateful he wasn't taken from us that day.

We added two kitties to the estrogen laden air in our home. If I don't get them fixed soon, I'm afraid we will have two batches of kitties birthed in our closet. The kitties made us smile and laugh with their playfulness. They alone had the fortitude to lay curled up next to Tess for hours at a time bringing warmth and comfort. Brita cared for her sister in intimate and generous ways that most siblings never experience. She nursed and bathed and cleaned up after her. She found perfectly tempting food for Tess's wilted palate. Her tenacity was a welcomed character quality as it translated into a year's worth of never giving up. Love is an action verb to Brita. We all were the recipients of it many times over this year. Somehow she carried all of us at different times. She is a woman of substance. Beloved. Complex. Mysterious. Beautiful inside and out.

Tess was the most uncomplaining patient in history. I watched her be disappointed and lose heart each time she got sick, but I also saw her catch the tail of hope and rise with it. I witnessed her training her thoughts to comply, obey, and be disciplined instead of rule over her. This I admire in one so young. Her thought processes are those of a mature woman. An old soul. I don't fear for her future. She taught me how to live this year. She has an ethereal loveliness that comes from experiencing great trouble. It's in her eyes. Forever.

We had some fun vacations and getaways this fall. Restorative days. At this moment in time our family is intact. Our love is thriving. We have our home and garden, heat and a full freezer, hot water and soft beds. Life is good. Life is sweet. And the bright spots and light places and good memories twist together with the hard parts making strong rope.

Loverby's mom always proclaimed after a bad harvest, "Well, maybe next year will be better."

I don't think it was a bad harvest after all is said and done, but I do hope next year will be better. :)

How a Paintshirt Becomes One

2011-12-09T21:33:00.000-08:00

A needle

threaded by help of

new readers

lays easy in my hand

sliding stitches full of color

in and out. Today I

will only think

about sewing (I think),

so an unstained shirt

is worn. In between

stitches, I see glue is

needed right now

to keep loose ends

together. Before its

stickiness has time to

dry, I wonder if another

layer of paint should be

put on that board waiting

in the corner. Oh, and those

strips need chalked along

the edges. Content,

I wipe my hands before

getting back to my needle.

Another paint shirt is born

hand printed with colors

lifted from life. Don't

suggest an apron, I

was only going to sew.

Tongue Tied Lashing

2011-12-08T18:00:00.000-08:00

No warrior's armor guarded
or protected her from his plunging
organ angrily piercing violation
into her soul. She had left her
breastplate and shield and sword
at home. After all, this strange family
estrangement wasn't war was it?

Anger now spent, these days his
tongue lies silent, unaroused, and
flacid. Her friends said she deserved
it, even asked for it. He still says
it was needed discipline for someone
with mental issues and authority
problems. On bad days, I want
their tongues cut out for saying this.

My tongue is no longer tied
because I faced my accuser
eye to eye last night.
Suddenly, I felt like Dorothy
pulling the curtain back
exposing a harmless, scared
little wizard who only wants to
get back home as much as me!

Next, I felt like Meg in
The Wind In The Door,
saving Mr. Jenkins from his fate
by Naming him. Part of her
task is to distinguish the
real Mr. Jenkins from his two evil
Echthroi doubles. In order
to do this she must look past
her personal grief and grudge,
finding the goodness in Mr.
Jenkins, and let herself love him.
(Again).

All is well. Generously compensated,
I wait, wishing my own Mr. J/Wizard
well. Recompense happens.

Tom Hanks and I Say Thanks - 2011

2011-11-23T19:12:00.001-08:00

Salty Grace

2011-11-21T11:16:00.000-08:00

Wired for sound
he finds it is easy
to publicly sprinkle
benevolent grace
like rare finishing
salt over every plate
but mine. My tears turn
into twin waterfalls,
divinity's way of
providing a salty cure
for the incongruence
trying to flatten me.

Hamon's Head

2011-11-19T16:33:00.000-08:00

Hamon
came to dinner twice
heady with plans
of power. No

disastrous premonition

warned him that it was
his head
instead
that would hang on

the waiting gallows
he had built for
another. How long

did it take for his
smirk to drop at the
corners? Did his eyes
reflect rage
when dispatched plans

thwarted
planned destruction,
turning the table on
his legacy

of hatred,

slander,

gossip,

greed,

and lies?

This land might

blossom now with

grace. Flourish with

love. Stretch

its borders with

kindness.

Harvest
has a chance
of

happening
now.

Cultural Surprises

2011-11-10T21:44:00.000-08:00

I found a unique thing today in the equivalent of a Japanese dollar store. When I saw the vast variety of a never before seen item on the shelf, it piqued my interest. Shellacked. Bamboo. Plastic. Disposable. Fancy. Simple. They all had tops to fit the style.

If the back of the package hadn't explained their usage, it would have been a lifelong mystery.

Use only for intended purpose
Never let children use alone and keep away from reach of children
Avoid picking too deep and giving too much stimulus or impact to an ear
Should you feel any discomfort during use, please consult a doctor.

I could not believe what I saw in tiny English. Un earpick. There were two in each package. Isn't un singular? Somehow it tickled my funny bone - I couldn't stop laughing. Very bad of me. When I could breathe and see again, I picked out two packages of two. Great stocking stuffers for $2.00....

They look like miniature back scratchers - only instead of a tiny claw it has a tiny spoonish end. Just google it, won't you? A picture IS worth a thousand words. :)

Who needs to keep buying and wasting those trees and cotton in Q-tips anyways? I'm going green. Finally.

Just think how it would take care of itchy ear syndrome? Or worse. Happy ear picking thoughts aren't coming as quickly as I thought they would. I think Jane's gorillas would be fascinated by this tool. They would probably eat the treasure they mined....even consider it a delicacy.

I'd better stop now, it will only go downhill from here. As @katdish says, "I crack myself up".

Ode to Twitter Bird

2011-11-08T13:09:00.000-08:00

Two years ago my world expanded

exponentially. Because of Twitter,

and you. Twitter seemed scary back

then-a different world speaking a

new language. The learning curve

at middle age gets fierce, but you

all were patient. My eyes opened

to new conversations and new ways

of thinking. The cravings and

tenderest desires of my heart found

a path, easy to follow on my

timeline page day after day.

My curiosity was aroused, satisfied,

and whetted again, only to be

satiated once more. My favorite

thing, the thing that has stimulated

me more than anything else has

been observing the

creative creative pursuits of

people from all over the world.

Being exposed to artist in all

mediums, writers, and poets

has lit my fire too. I'm compelled

to try what others are brave

enough to try. It gives me

courage to face my own

blank piece of white space.

Following behind the @ were

names of strangers who now have

become friends. Someday, I wish

we all could sit around a big table

together. I could finally hug you,

feed you, see your eyes sparkle

or tears run. We aren't strangers

any more. Thanks for not following

your mama's advice. I want you

to know that your words, links,

shares, mentions, RT's and @replies

have held me up when life became

to heavy to bear alone. This is my thanks.

This is what community looks like from

my point of view.

Our Moth Eaten World

2011-11-05T13:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday on Facebook, Jeff Keuss posted this.

- From the C.S. Lewis's The Silver Chair chapter 12 - Puddlegum says:
  
  "One word, Ma'am," he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. "One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder. I'm a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things - trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a playworld which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play-world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say."
  Our world's wintery, moth eaten darkness can smother us with hopelessness and despair. Hearing Puddlegum's declaration prompted a flood of tears, an infusion of fresh courage, and new resolve. It also prompted a thought.
  
  I don't know for sure exactly what's true, but I can believe something is true. The truth is......I want to believe in an after life in a place where there aren't any moth's or rust to destroy Narnia's beauty, its eternal spring.
  
  I want to believe that someday Aslan will breathe new life into me, making me fully alive forever. I like to think that I, like Steve Jobs will also will be saying with my last earthly breath, "Wow. Wow. Wow."
  
  PS. Jeff has a new book out called Your Neighbor's Hymnal. Music lovers
  and those who practice thinking outside the box will love it.

Making Pretty

2011-11-02T14:04:00.000-07:00

Collecting vintage ephemera, books, fabric, and lace has a problematic side. Finding space for it all and keeping it organized is a tremendous ordeal. When I go junking, possibility pieces attach themselves to me like steel shavings to a magnet. I keep the pile down by sharing the bounty and limiting how often I go foraging. The present messy disaster is a necessary part of the artistical inspiration later.

I have aprons, slips, hankies, hooked pieces, and quilts from the turn of the century. They were well used, washed often, and mended. Repeat. Linen and batiste fabrics become as fragile as onion skin ~ I am able to save only the lace.

Several plain white workaday aprons have tatted lace sewn laboriously not only around the hem, but also along the tie ends.

Even the plainest of the used hankies have a touch of delicate hand work in a corner.

This silk pocket for storing delicacies has french knots arranged in a design on the inside.

We go to artist retreats to find the serenity, space, and teachers who give us inspiration and license to create. I love these places and dream of going myself. I want to support them and encourage their vision, but it isn't the only way. It isn't only somewhere else that making pretty happens. It's right here with our own needles, box of crayons, or ball of yarn. Moments grabbed whenever it is now, in the muddle of every day, using what we have handy.

I want to be a brilliant entrepreneur, have the hottest Etsy space. I'm envious of the artists and bloggers featured in high quality creative living magazines like Somerset's, Kinfolk, and Uppercase. I want to print copious amounts of business cards and have people begging me for one. I long to hang a shingle which will make me real. When I get published, then I will be an author. It would be amazing for someone to not only want what I make, but pay to own it.

The truth is I don't sign up for an Etsy account, nor do I take the risk of submitting an article. I haven't gone to the printer's with print ready graphics for a card. I haven't cut out that shingle. Why? Maybe because I'm terrified of both success and failure. Maybe I'm content, not wanting the bother?

Motivated and rewarded extrinsically is one option, but in the cultural flurry outside, I don't want to miss the slow, warm glow growing inside of me.

It could simply be putting a sweater on a candle, making a paper box for it to nestle in, then giving it away.

These pieces of intricate work made by an unknown woman's hand, cause me to pause. I want her results. It feels like she was the lucky one, making pretty for pretty's sake alone. She used the resources at hand to satisfy her creative urges, bringing texture to her workaday life and pleasure to the ones who received these gifts.

My favorite pieces are ones like this apron. Thankfully, it was tenderly mended instead of discarded.

It seems like they made pretty for themselves ~ intrinsic motivation and reward. Often, the very tools they used are works of fine art in themselves, made with precious material like bone or exotic wood. It must have been a pleasure to use them.

The lady who labored over these tiny stitches might have lived and died in obscurity, yet her artful life was the best kind, the everyday kind. The most useful kind. She did what she could with what she had to let beauty surround her, then drip on her family and friends.

This is a tribute to my artistical girlfriends. You have hospitable homes, hearts, and art. You have quietly gifted those of us who walk through your door. You are the bravest of the brave girls who make pretty, finding great peace and satisfaction in doing so. You give me courage. You know who you are. Thank you.

Ironing the Wrinkles Out

2011-11-01T21:08:00.000-07:00

Advertising couldn't convince mom we needed a toy ironing board and iron that wouldn't work. We couldn't afford to waste money on an Easy Bake Oven. We used her real tools of the trade. I'm thankful for this.

Mom had a huge pile of unending ironing. It was before permanent press and wrinkles don't go away when clothes are hung on a line. When she got the courage to face that mound, I loved watching her sprinkle each piece by flicking water with her hand, then rolling them up to keep the moisture in until she was ready to iron it. If the budget allowed her the luxury, a can of spray starch was sparingly used.

The best part was when the last piece was hung up in the door frame and she put the ironing board down to its lowest notch just right for my height. Dad's white hankies were mine to finish. If there was spray starch left for me to crisp them it was heaven. It was serious work. Important work. Loving work. It seemed necessary and I was chosen and entrusted with it. I found great pleasure in it.

I don't remember any catastrophes. I do remember hours of playing house with the real stuff of life.

When I want to take it down a notch and let my mind have a complete rest, I plug in the iron and pull out the ironing board. It feels like recess, not a chore. I find a pile of clean vintage napkins, aprons, or hankies, a hot iron, and a $1.89 bottle of spray starch. The spray starch still feels like an extravagance....

The wrinkles in my head are smoothed with each finished piece. My brain becomes more orderly as the stack of folded pieces gets higher. It's like my mind becomes a kaleidoscope of new visions and colorful thoughts. When I do this peaceful activity, it feels like I have the freedom, authority, and permission to rename things ~ like I could be chosen next time to give paint and crayons their colorful names.

What a Ghost Town Says

2011-10-27T20:13:00.000-07:00

Crumbling walls, gaping frames, and empty door frames are the only remains of the Lower Bankshead Lamphouse near Banff, Alberta. The ghost town has a crunchy coal pathway winding through what once was a thriving coal mining operation. A couple of coal cars sit frozen on a piece of track. Glimpses of foundation walls poke through prairie grass. History leaves her ugliest secrets silently buried here, but proudly flaunts the good that happened.

Upper Bankshead was the village where the miner's families lived. Only the steps to the community church remain. The weathered sign says that these isolated families of several different ethnic and religious backgrounds sat and worshipped together in this place. Peacefully.

The lamp house is where I spent most of my time. It haunted me. The plaque read:

I wish every community of any kind had a lamp house.

Sometimes a person's light goes out, but there is no one to go searching for the missing owner of the lamp. No one knows. No one cares. The empty spot on the shelf goes unnoticed. Lord, forgive us.

Young Folks Do

2011-10-24T10:38:00.000-07:00

One folds paper into flowers

One sets a table eclectic

One prepares simple food ~

tomato soup

hot crusty rolls

salad wedges

roast with rustic veggies

while peach crumble

finishes the meal

passed hand to hand

around the table

touching hearts

knitting us together

warming the night

with music

and light

Fruitiness

2011-10-22T17:34:00.000-07:00

"He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard - things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely."

~ Eugene Peterson's The Message

Sucker or Succor?

2011-10-21T09:24:00.000-07:00

Packaging, advertising, and the right color at the right time lures me. I easily believe and buy if these conditions intersect with impulse. This little plastic gizmo was $9.99. I know better, yet placed it willingly on the check out counter. It was bright green.

The other day I had a cooking disaster with the simple syrup for pear tarts. Recovered from the trauma, I started over the next day. The pears from our tree needed used immediately.

The tart gadget promised picture perfect miniature pies all the same size and uniform shape.

After the pears were peeled and sliced, spices and syrup added ~ I rolled out the pie crust. Opening the gadget I made two boring tarts that didn't look anything like the glossy picture. It took more time than usual and brought zero pleasure, so I stopped and went back to the way my sisters and I, my mom, her mom, and her mom's mom have been making them since forever ago.

It was satisfying to roll out uneven rounds of crust, put some filling in, fold them over and do the familiar pinch around the edge. The result was pleasing. Rustic. Natural. Honest.

Tarts are pockets of love. They are able to deliver succor to the recipient who is given a batch.

The plastic didn't deliver anything. Turns out it was just a trickster making a sucker out of me. Why do we so easily believe the glossy is true?

I'd be glad to send a gadget your way, postage on me. Just ask. :)

Artistical Disaster

2011-10-16T17:11:00.000-07:00

The pear tart called for some simple syrup. I forgot about it being on the burner until the smoke filled the house. It was close to bursting into flame when I grabbed the pan and ran outside to lay it on the rock patio. It looked like a puffy chef's hat, a smoking black one. It was fail/fail because it seemed like my favorite pan might have been wrecked. Brita came outside to see the damage. Her curiosity changed my perspective and the experience.

Hunkered down beside the mess, she poked and prodded. With a knife, she slit the top to explore what was inside. I bent over to watch tiny little beacon flames flicker out and turn into prisms. Burnt sugar looks like a lava flow, or black spun glass, but it is as ethereal and fragile as soap suds.

It made me think of the beauty that artists like Andy Goldsworthy notice and capture. Their curiosity is a gift ~ framed, displayed, or bound in a book for us to exclaim over.

Most days, I wake up and beg to see ~ really see. Today I forgot, but my daughter saw for me. Noticers refine worship with simple curiosity. Thanks my love.

This is the progression. Burnt Sugar Study. Beauty for ashes.

Blue Hospitality

2011-09-12T09:39:00.000-07:00

Prairie sky

spills periwinkle

vast and wide.

This favored

color poured

from on high
becomes a

generously spread

welcome laid

for pilgrims
migrating
toward
homecoming.

The prompt is "Gathering Blue". Come over to 3 from here and there and join the fun with Claire, Kelly, and Sarah. Offer yours.

Loverby and I just returned from a circuitous loop to North Dakota and back. "This Land is Your Land" played a loop in our heads the entire time. Harvest across the prairie is glorious. There was something in the air. It looked like hope - waving, piled, stacked, transported, waiting, and stored up.

Camping

2011-08-29T14:15:00.000-07:00

He helps me
into water
washing my skin
and hair tender
before
leading me to lay
down clean ~
heaven above,
earth beneath,
water beside us ~

loving me back
from exhaustion.

Like a stuck

casement window,

handle gears rusted~

wanting to stay shut~

he cranks me

wide open,

letting fresh love

blow through.

The stars peek inside

open screens, then

shoot across the sky

in applause.

Watching the flame

lick and caress the wood

till its colors

come out glowing

pink, purple, red,

blue, apricot, and yellow

makes me

want to stay

burning also ~

to fear not

the dark.

The colors of bruises

are also the colors of

rainbows.

Sharing a Bed

2011-08-12T10:49:00.000-07:00

Rumpled blankets
bury books and fold up
kittens tangled around the dog
who gives wet licks
to wake us up for
breakfast.

Here's a must for middle age ~
get again not one, but two kittens.
Their paws are softer, whiskers
ticklier, fur silkier, and purr louder
than my earlier memories recall.

At play, they make me smile
at the tumbling chase and laugh
at their clumsiness. My eyes
water in wonder as tiny
padded paws pat my cheek.
Close isn't quite close enough
at times for a kitten, but
I have no way to unzip
my skin for them
to get all
the way
in.

Unlikely Pair

2011-08-06T18:32:00.000-07:00

Dick Staub doesn't do celebrity coming or going. Neither does Nigel Goodwin. What they do is dream up ways to gather artistic creative thinkers. They encourage, include, endorse, and foster. Kindling is a way to start fires and keep them burning.

They both have lion sized hearts. Untamable hair. Voices that roar over valleys and bounce off the highest hills. Hugs that mend aching, fatherless hearts.

Nigel wears funky street dancer shoes just in case the mood should strike him to tear up the pavement. His signature style is butterfly colored socks and jackets unmatched to anything else he wears. He is unabashedly bold about being seen in public this way. He tries to keep Dick stocked up on colorful socks, to no avail. Barefoot is better. It must be an island thing?

Kay Redfield Jameson in Exuberance tells of the musical that Jim Dale wrote about P.T. Barnum's extraordinary life. It reminds me of Nigel.

Barnum is portrayed as keeping at bay his own and the world's ennui by spinning off energy and joy. "Through a night as dark as space / And cold as the sea / Someone's got to make it bright / Shoot a rocket, shine a light." Someone, in short, has to build a fire. Exuberance, Barnum knew, is complicated. Exuberance is contagious.

In the musical he also sings ~

"The colors of my life

Are bountiful and bold

The dazzle of a flame

The glory of a rainbow

I put them all to shame.

no quiet browns and grays

I'll take my days instead

And fill them til they overflow

With rose and cherry reds.

And should this sunlit world

Grow dark one day

The colors of my life

Will lead a shining light

To show the way."

She also quotes C.S. Lewis. It reminds me of Dick's untiring work to see his vision come into being and bear fruit.

"Good things as well as bad are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to get wet you must get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them.....They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you: if you are not, you will remain dry."

Might I explain Kindlingsfest 2011 this way? I've been both warmed and wetted three years in a row. I don't have to have a studio, an audience, or a patron to be creative. I don't need permission, degrees, pedigrees, or papers. I don't need to have a maid, or months of solitude. I only need a way of thinking and being. A way of living each day noticing beauty. I need to choose it amidst the interruptions and disruptions of real life. I want to use color, words, my voice, my gifts, and our home in ways that dance and sing and cast prisms for me and others to swim in.

May these men (and their forbearing, steadfast wives and families) receive more grace, much mercy, and heaped to overflowing blessing upon blessing. Someday we will stand with all heaven and applaud as they receive the eternal, "Well done boys, well done."

The Kindlings has a wide assortment of links and doors to look behind. You'll discover the dots connecting with International Arts Movement, Taproot Theater, Jeff Keuss's new book, Your Neighbor's Hymnal, Image Journal, and more. The recorded interviews and podcasts are a gold mine of interesting dialogue. The archives are deep and wide. Take a deep breath and dive.

Chickadee Feathers

2011-07-17T18:18:00.000-07:00

The flies have been pests in the garden and yard this year. I put out a few fly traps and some fly paper strips around the yard. It is a gruesome solution, but I was desperate.

I took down the gooey sticky paper strips though. Never to be used in my yard or life again. Never. I didn't know. Now I do.

As I was watering, I looked over to see a young chickadee crucified to one of them. Its wings were stuck fast, spread wide. It took awhile to loosen the little fellow. I brought him in the house and used warm water and soap to clean as much of the stickiness off as possible. His heart was thumping too hard for its size. I separated each feather and blew gently to dry them off. Many were missing, still stuck to the death trap not intended for a baby bird.

I set him gently in a sheltered spot. He immediately tried to fly. It was an unsuccessful attempt. My hurting heart couldn't follow him where he hid under some brush. I couldn't save him from the troubles he was in. I hope he lived, but have strong doubts that he could heal properly.

Grieving, all that day I kept thinking about "not one sparrow falls to the ground without your father knowing and noticing."

There was a time about ten years ago when I truly believed that he cared about sparrows more than he did about me. It is because I had always misunderstood the verse.

I thought he kept the sparrow from falling. Why then, couldn't he keep us from danger and sickness. Why didn't he help us when we were in dire straights? Why was he silent most the time. Why didn't he act?

Now I live and think and trust differently. These things I know:

He sees.

He notices.

He cares.

He's always there.

I'm never alone.

He waits to bind up my wounds gently, with profound care.

He feels my heart pounding too hard.

He calms my wild eyes.

He washes the stickiness off.

He binds the broken parts.

Puts me in a safe place.

He hopes that I fly again.

He does.

He loves me this I know.

Every single hair of my head is counted.

Even the ones that are falling out by the bushel, making it easier to number them I'm sure.

Seeded

2011-06-14T23:34:00.000-07:00

Tess is ill. Again. Worse than any other time. The progression is scary. I went to Idaho to bring her home a week and a half ago. She lays limp on her back day after day. We have a neurology appointment on the 22nd. It can't come soon enough. None of us are able to talk much about what's been going on. Advertising publicly seems indelicate. But we do need prayer sent our way. So I speak out. We also don't want to wear people out with the continuing saga. It is time to find answers and not quit until we do.

Meanwhile I'm learning to trust. More. I'm glad I know the one I pray to. I'm glad he goes to the father on our behalf. He cares for Tess more than anyone. I'm learning to notice things to be thankful for, on purpose, over and over again.

Gardening in the rain is possible. I am. I bury seeds and watch them rise up from the darkness. Reaching for light. It's a thin light, but it draws life. Nothing says hope like a small seed. Seeds need rain. Me too. Wash me. Wash all of me. Rain on me. Cry for me. Be our gardener. The gardener of our souls. Shield us. Shelter us. Plant our roots deep during this time. Twine us together, close.

Lucky

2011-05-25T12:29:00.000-07:00

An angry artist painted

jaded predictions into a young

pastor’s portrait. Each sitting brushed
telling layers onto the covered canvas

keeping its secret week to week.

Unveiled, the easel revealed

in detail how twenty years

would finish the man.

Fifty years in his chosen

vocation hasn’t erased the warning

framed and stretched. Waiting, closeted,

it's an amulet, an antidote, a ready

remedy if Botox unexpectedly

tries to inject his soul
with apathy.

His smile spilled a papa’s

patriarchal blessing over our

waiting heads. Laugh lines cracked

open around his eyes bestowing love and

benediction. We face our future now
with goodness and mercy following
us, leavings left by a warrior
poet whose life proves
the portrait wrong.

Lucky him, lucky you, lucky me.

Coming down from the mountain has been difficult. The Image Seminar at Whitefish with Eugene and Jan Peterson was truly epic. He didn't merely write The Message, they live The Message. Greg read a piece called Born, Again and Again. It describes the entire experience perfectly. If I told the backstory for this poem, you would need to take your shoes off. Be content to ponder it with me, for I mustn't speak of the sacred just yet.

Early Phone Call

2011-05-11T11:22:00.000-07:00

When the phone rings at six in the morning, it usually isn't someone wanting to have a friendly chat. A week ago Wednesday, the phone woke me. I picked it up and saw Loverby's number. Instead of saying, "Hello" I said, "Did your motorcycle run out of gas again?" "No, it's worse than that. Someone turned in front of me - I'm in the hospital. Will you come and pick me up?"

His shaking voice told me to hurry. My one comfort was that he was able to call and the news wasn't from a nurse or an officer.

On the way home, I stopped at the scene of the accident trying to find his new prescription glasses. Shattered glass was mingled with broken reflectors and a headlamp. I didn't find his glasses, but in the rubble, sparkling to be noticed, was a heart shaped piece of windshield.

I'm a grateful wife, thankful for the miracle, grateful that the sacred was not torn from my hand.

Look to the Edge

2011-05-10T10:12:00.000-07:00

I was watching a fascinating link that came across my Twitter feed today. It was a behind the scenes look at the making of the Documentary Rising from the Ashes. Anything about Rwanda catches my interest. Each layer of this unfolding story echoes with redemption.

The Director, T.C. Johnstone finished with, "...there was a moment that kind of told the story for me - in the dailies - here’s this peloton, this group of 19 riders, they’re screamin’ down the road, they pass this guy and he’s on an old bike, and I don’t think he even had shoes on, and the team comes by and this guy just starts barreling down and he comes in and they open up the peloton and in the edge of the frame - after I watched it two or three times - they let him in, and he gets there for just like, maybe like 20 seconds he can hang with these guys, then he pulls out and the peloton continues. But we didn’t shoot that! That’s the story.”

Help me see that story, please help me not miss it - the one on the edge of the frame.

A Strong Song

2011-05-08T16:05:00.000-07:00

I used to hold

shells to my ear,

hoping to hear

ocean music.

Now, I go

into the open

pink spirals

twisting a trail

for the mystic

in me.

I follow

this invitation

to its middle

where new tears drip

ointment, tending

old wounds.

This place

welcomes me,

the-being-still-me,

making it easy

to choose

the good part.

Wooed and won,

I’m content to stay

cradled this way,

living inside a song.

Click here to watch Kathy Hastings conch spiral series. I saw them as I wrote.

~To my beloved rabbi, who pointed the way~

Easter Morning Breakfast

2011-04-25T19:56:00.000-07:00

A bunch of us foodies gathered to make breakfast early Sunday morning. We didn't cater to vegans, vegetarians, or anyone on a no carb diet. For the gluten or lactose intolerant, I hope they took their pills.

It was straighforward-farmboy-comfort-food. Heavy. Buttery. Food that stays and sticks in ways unapproved of by the health/weight conscious ~ biscuits, sausage gravy, potato casserole, bacon, scrambled eggs, strawberries, blood oranges, orange juice, and milk. We felt no guilt. There was no force feeding this sort of warm fun down anyone's throat.

Loverby had the dutch ovens stacked high between layers of briquets. A circle of us hovered around them to keep warm. The biscuit steam curled up to catch and mingle with the bacon's perfume.

If we all had gone out to plow eighty acres, milk the cows, hoe the garden, feed the stock, or hand scrub nine loads of laundry, it would have been good fuel for the work ahead.

Instead, singing and hugging each other was the most strenuous thing we did afterwards. We wanted to take 'carb' induced naps, but the good news we were hearing kept us awake.

He's alive! For me, it's true. I happen to believe the grave is empty.
I often wish I could have been that Mary, the one who first saw him. I imagine grabbing his ankles in the dust, not wanting to ever let go. I imagine his look of fondness, unembarrassed by my too intimate, too passionate, public display of affection.

The building where we gather doesn't have a kitchen. Boldness and desperation made me ask a favor on behalf of the camp kitchen set up outside. Weather favors are risky. Asking for good weather when it is supposed to rain is crazy. I'm crazy. I asked, plead, begged, and persuaded.

As the line formed to eat, we were scrambling to make do with plastic forks for the bacon and strawberries. Christine hurried to the front of the line and put down two pairs of tongs. "I washed these last night and planned to bring them today, but don't know why." She had planned to bring them, even before I planned to forget to bring them!

Because she listened to the prompt, I felt overwhelmed with love from the one who held back the rain, and the one who stretched food for seventy to one hundred and thirty or so.

As the last canopy was taken down and stowed, it started to sprinkle.

Love like this gets my attention. And eternal gratitude.

There's no lover like the one who strategically and deftly makes plans to pleasure his beloved.

(Thanks to Loverby, Paul/Kimmie, Tracy, Frank/Trisha, Brita, Renee, and Dave.)

Momentos

2011-04-18T14:51:00.000-07:00

The rabbi tears flatbread apart,
generously offering me half-
over and above his full,
full plate.

Crumbs fall wasted
between
our silverware.

I fight the urge
to sweep them
into my pocket.
Hoarding can't preserve
this moment's scarcity.

Instead,
I take and eat - in
remembrance for
later - when deep
yearns for deeper.

Communion.

Going Ahead Anyways

2011-03-29T16:02:00.000-07:00

A long time aquaintance of mine is in the middle of a project worthy of a mention. It isn't merely the dreams that she is seeing come to completion, but the timing of it all. Her blog is an intriguing follow.

Jeri and her husband Kurt are expats living in Abu Dhabi. He is retiring from BP. They bought a piece of property on the shores of the Mediterranean in Kas, Turkey a while back. They dreamed of refurbishing and repurposing this derelict estate into a home to invite hungry, weary pilgrims to "come and rest a while and learn the unforced rhythm of grace".

Many of us have been following the progress of the structure as laborers - craftsmen all - breath three dimensional life into the one dimensional blueprints Jeri drew up. They saw what she dreamed...

The astonishing thing is the time in which it has been happening. Earthquakes in Haiti, Chile, and Japan. Political turmoil in surrounding countries. Dictators falling. Oil spills. Floods. Famine. Sex trafficking ramped up. The economic meltdown keeping pace with the possible fallout of another Chernobyl.

It is hard to fight the instinct to dig into a dark bunker, hunker down and live off the stash we've cached. Some desperately pray for escape by rapture - taking us to the heaven we hope is true.

I got a lump in my throat when I saw the latest pictures this week. It took me awhile to process why it filled me with jubilation. I wanted to stand and applaud this family who isn't caving into despair, but fighting valiantly with all their energy to create beauty on a tiny bit of dangerous earth. A place that is hospitable - inviting the creative encouragers from all over the world to receive refreshing. Laura said the other day that she wanted to be a beauty activist. I loved those words. It fits in with this story of this home.

A home with no agenda. No programs. No stipulations. No drawn lines of separation across creeds or gender. No price tag. No strings attached. No gimmick. Ugly isn't invited.

It will be a home with lights on. A home with food shared around a common table with stimulating conversation. A home with chairs catching the breeze on a veranda looking towards the sea. A home lined with good books, lovely music. A home with a welcome mat always out.

Jeri and Kurt redefine and reframe the word retire into inspire. [Deep curtsy]

"Can You Hear the Flowers Sing?

2011-03-28T09:35:00.000-07:00

I'm linking this today as I don't have any words of my own to offer. Hopefully, someone needs it. It isn't as hard to read as it seems. :) Cheers.

http://www.sengifted.org/articles_adults/Lovecky_CanYouHearTheFlowersSing.shtml

Manliness

2011-03-26T10:40:00.000-07:00

When you observe a man who has a wife that glows - you see a lover who has studied his wife well.

When you observe a man who has grateful children - you see a father who has truly loved.

This man is kind in public or in private. In his home and outside his home.

This man uses his strength to protect instead of hurt.

This man cares accurately for his wife and children's heart, their wounds, their joy. He breathes air into their dreams.

This man is generous secretly.

This man has a wife who responds to physical intimacy and affection with matching hunger.

This man's words are congruent with the way he lives.

This man believes the best about people.

This man is comfortable with who he is, giving him the wherewithal to be a good friend.

This man is mine.

Once more, I'm grateful beyond words for the gift of living with a man who shows me the face of God, over and over again.

(Yes, whenever I come home from a trip I appreciate my life with greater clarity.)

There's a Hole

2011-03-15T11:30:00.000-07:00

We own a coffee maker that I am willing to exchange for a $17.00 Mr. Coffee soon, and very soon. It has a thermos carafe which needs pre-heated with hot water if the coffee is to be hot. For the three years we have owned it, I did not know the plate it rests on is heated. I assumed it was the thermos holding the heat in, but not doing a very good job. (I like coffee and I like it hot.)

Yesterday, Loverby told me the plate was heated. I was incredulous. I didn't believe him. When I put my hand on it - sure enough - it was. I apologized for contradicting him. He smiled so big that I 'fell into his dimples'.

I had to adjust my beliefs ~ to truth. Every time this happens, I could jump with excitement.

The reason is this: what else might I have been wrong about for years and years? It opens doors, windows, and holes in the galaxy when I can change my mind and adjust to the truth. I'm clicking the iLike button on it. :)

Enough

2011-03-14T13:01:00.000-07:00

The final scenes

in "Chocolat" roll through

frame by frame

enticing me with

desire for the same happy

ending, but we are different

names in a different script.

My story doesn't

play out the same, or

end with a chance

to offer a glass of

soda to the man

who needed to

destroy.

This story doesn't end

with a soft look

across a dish of ice cream ~

unspoken, but

grateful ackowledgement

of grace received and

mercy given.

But He asks me, "Am I enough?"

"Yes. You are. Enough.

Always enough," I spirit groan,

conceding.

If He isn't enough, any scene

I could imagine to assuage this

grief wouldn't be enough,

either.

Beauty's Promise

2011-03-10T20:04:00.000-08:00

Sunshine

drops behind

bits of blue
fragments
splitting

rain's grey
wide

open with apricot
mixtures of pink and gold.

One last touche

pierces prisms

straight through

leftover rain drops

whose colors

wink flirtatiously
at the tip of each

pine needle.

I imagine

John O'Donohue's

Conamara

on the western

shores of Ireland

luring artists with

pinkish gold light

turning off and on

each day ~

just

like

this.

He makes me
long to be there

instead of here ~
until I see the rainbow
canopy covering
my neighborhood ~

here
not
there.

Ireland and the Pacific Northwest have much in common. Rain, ocean, green, and nicknames with Emerald in them. The green can become almost heavy, overwhelming, and claustrophobic at times. It is just too much with the unrelenting rain. But, when I'm gone from here, I miss the moisture and the greenery.

Ireland's green is a bit different because they are missing our forested acres of evergreens. Their fields are broken up with rock walls. It is a surreal green all the same, the sort that almost hurts your eyes. The rain softens the neon of it ~ as does the golden pink light.

Once in a while, we get that same light. It feels magical. It can't be captured, only experienced. Tonight was such a night. Anyone and anything is lovely in such complimentary light. Pausing to be drenched with it is the only response.

I have finished savoring John O'Donohue's Beauty and Anam Cara. There were parts that made me think he endorsed Marxists and Druids. [Smiling] It seemed like he believed that we are our own source, like a car putting gas in itself. But on the whole, I loved his whispy, mystical, Celtic way. I think he is bringing much pleasure to all of heaven. He didn't speak 'the lingo' which made me think creatively.

He also made me want to sell everything and move to the West Coast of Ireland! I think we'll stay here and perhaps learn Gaelic instead?

The Biting Edge

2011-03-04T19:40:00.000-08:00

Mindless

bites chewed slow

between numb buds

taste no pleasure yet

intense desire begs

between whispers

and hiccoughs

to name the

craving

It only

crackles like

a bad connection

leaving me to wonder

if I'm looking out the bars

of a padded pastel crib or

behind stark prison iron

waiting for the key

to unlock lost

parts of

me.

Artist at Play

2011-03-02T08:52:00.000-08:00

Last summer was the first time seeing Kathy Hastings' encaustic photos. I posted about them, but had neglected to get up close. How could I have missed reaching out and touching them? We have been taught not to touch, but Kathy invited me to feel and see the layers and in between.

She has a few heavy lines on her life's personal timeline. One marks before and after David died.

The other is before and after beeswax. The after, that came after both ~ changed everything.

Beeswax resting hard. Beeswax melted warm.

Below is a box of old mounted photos from the early days, before she started adding the encaustic process.

They are nice, these orphaned and ignored first children, but Kathy's work has gone far beyond merely nice.

These textures and layers, seeing through them, under them, beyond each one to what lies on top ~ takes them from being nice, to alive.

It was uncanny how warm the beeswax felt to my fingers. Perhaps it's the organic nature of the material ~ a living creature manufactured it. Silk, and Mexican sun-baked Saltillo tiles, give the same kinesthetic pleasure. My nose and camera lens got up close to the edge, where the action is.

Kathy is a scuba diver and world traveler. She had/has a conch shell obsession. The symbolism, colors, and never ending variety of brokenness meet where her "insatiable curtiousity" (as Kipling would say), lives. This toppling tower of conch shell photos printed on deckle edged water color paper captivated me. She has a series of her favorites as finished encaustics.

A photo is printed, cropped to size and mounted onto a prepared panel.

Melted beeswax is applied.

Torched smooth, melted on.

Another layer of beeswax.

In between each layer, more texture and color is added.

Everywhere I looked were collages of tools, and streaks of color. Odd bits of things were stacked and piled together ~ waiting to be picked. Noticed. Used.

A stack of her Crossings series boxed and labeled, ready to be shipped. A church had ordered them in time to enjoy during Lent.

Kathy has an astonishing array of musical instruments. The collection covers the map.

Her jewelry collection also covers the map.

She mostly loves paddling around in her kayak, meeting the big boys in the Seattle harbor at their own waterline. The rusty hulls of mammoth working ships give her fodder for her photos.

She allowed me inside the drawers and colors of her home. Kathy has a hospitable heart. So does her art.

Kathy Hastings' maker's mark. It left an impression. Deep.

Check out her website to see her new series ~ Waterlines. She says, ...."I'm literally (shooting from) where the water line touches the hull of the boat. The hull is hard. The water yielding. The surfaces touch, hard and yielding. The boat displaces the water. The water cradles the boat. If I'm the boat, who/what is cradling me? God's love, the love of God through others. I'm fascinated with the play of fluid next to the hard, the boundaries of the surfaces, the ship being held by the water."

When I first saw them I immediately thought of the chorus of Held, by Natalie Grant:

This is what it means to be held

How it feels, when the sacred is torn from your life

And you survive

This is what it is to be loved and to know

That the promise was, that when everything fell

We'd be held

Another new series is the Frio Suite, capturing the unique shades of green found winding along the Texas hill country near Laity Lodge.

Old Wound

2011-03-01T13:41:00.000-08:00

Blood colored tears

(call it amber if you want

to stay cushioned from seeing

pain's trail)

drip down

sticky with memories

along

her rough barked skin

where season by season

she

valiantly

tries to cover the

wounded place

where the

pound

pounding

happened

Snowflakes

2011-02-28T17:17:00.000-08:00

Snowflakes fall

covering

a black table

People walk past

fast

missing

the cluster

of crystals

shooting wonder

into my veins

better than

a caffeine hit in

the latte I came for

frozen ornaments

of falling grace

heap up

in front of me

absorbing the bruised

blackness with

white light

they land silent

delicate

frozen still

on my shoulders

others

cling to my hair

kiss my face

whisper in my

lashes

see

and

love

what

see

He likes it too

that

Time for Tom Waits

2011-02-22T17:17:00.000-08:00

Every year at this time, this seasonal between time, I spin Tom Waits' song around and around in my head. You Can Never Hold Back Spring is reassuring me again.

I was messing around trying to refine my skills at hand lettering today. Using thick, cold pressed, high quality water color paper, good ink, and a fine nibbed dip pen, I spent the afternoon making swirls. Trying to make them graceful and uniform was the point. It was practicing with a purpose for a project page.

More than halfway through, the nib let loose a few blobs. I tried to blot them - unsuccessfully - away. Then my hand accidently rubbed across a still wet letter. Discouraged, I proceeded to finish what I had set out to do. I had wanted to make something pretty, but the results were already disappointing.

As I filled in delicate spots with water color, it overflowed the outlines. Wait, messy wasn't supposed to happen this thoroughly!

Life is messy. I smudged up the rest of the letters to match. Now they are all uniformly messy. Mud always happens, in the spring that always happens.

We were longing for it, weren't we? Get out your muck boots, friends. Hip waders for some of you. Wade through it. Get to the other side. There is another perspective. It looks pretty - from a distance.

Slip Details

2011-02-21T22:48:00.000-08:00

Eight rows tucked close

decorating an invisible

basic undergarment -

a slip - artfully trimmed.

Hand embroidered eyelet

by the yard around the bottom

part which drug hard in

the mud and dirt?

A skirt held up timely

gave a tantalizing glimpse

of shapely ankles - dangerous

to behold - feminine unmentionables.

A bustle in back gave her rump

a large lump.

Deformed by tight corsets

her waist measured

slightly bigger than a

How could she breath

or dance or run?

Hence vile smelling salts.

Recently, I found this slip from the turn of the century at a thrift store for $2.50. It should be in a museum, but seemed unwanted. An orphan, waiting to be adopted. I obliged - gladly. The details always take my breath away. Every time. They made their usable things beautiful and used their beautiful things until they wore completely out. Then they altered them. Repurposed them. iLike that.

Lacy Bones

2011-02-20T22:36:00.000-08:00

Lacy leavings left behind

skeleton of winter

soon erased by

spring

Healing Pages

2011-02-14T22:54:00.000-08:00

Lately, art journaling has been taking me by surprise, taking my breath away. iLove words. iLove art. Coupled, they send me. Once the page is prepped with layers and textures, feelings and thoughts seem to glue themselves down as if they find themselves, lost no more. Mod Podge is truly Soul Glue like they say. This might be too raw and nekkid. Dim the lights and grace me?

Doing It

2011-02-14T00:06:00.000-08:00

I'm rereading Eugene Peterson's Practice Resurrection, a title he borrowed from Wendell Berry's Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front.

"....the subject is 'growing up.' In dealing with something so critical and personal, so full of consequences for all of us, here is a surprise. This...places us in a cosmos in which God starts everything. Everything. There is not a single verb commanding us to do something, not so much as a hint or suggestion that we are to do anything at all. No requirements, no laws, no chores, no assignments, no lessons. We are born into a cosmos in which all the requirements and conditions for growing up are not only in place but in action."

I couldn't go to sleep tonight, so grabbed the camera to find the bulbs popping up in our yard. Daffodils, crocuses, and specimen tulips are all practicing resurrection - in the midst of a dark, cold, wet winter's night.

They just do it. So also will I.

Tessa Past and Present

2011-01-31T18:32:00.000-08:00

Many people have asked what is Tessa's story. We didn't really know she had one until recently when the patterns started repeating and the symptoms got more intense.

This last time we all believe her safety was in other hands, supernatural ones. She was not functioning normally. Her drive from the Boise airport to her place was a miracle. The first 5 days she was gravely ill. It was terrifying to watch a limp, lethargic daughter laying there for days.

This is a brief medical history as we remember it:

Chief Complaint: Progressively increasing intensity of debilitating symptoms associated with flying as demonstrated by the following history. (related from most current to present) These symptoms have not appeared during a flight. They usually start the day after a flight and linger.

January, 2011

Flight: Boise to Seattle

Utilized pressure equalization with no ear pain.

Post flight day 2: fatigue, eye pressure, minimal nausea

Day 3: Space Needle Trip (650 ft in 43 seconds, 10 MPH). Symptoms following were extreme fatigue, slow gait, no appetite, lightheadedness, blurry vision, pressure in eyes, inability to focus, disorientation, gait disturbance by that evening. She asked if her eyes were bleeding? Eyes kept rolling around in a strange way.

Day 4: Woke up gagging, diarrhea, vomiting (dry heaves), felt disoriented. Flight scheduled that night to return to Boise.

Flight: Seattle to Boise 1/19/11

Inability to focus to find car/follow signs to exit. Eye pain, Heart pain, and difficulty breathing. Extremely blurry vision, felt like she was in a tunnel. By the time she made it to the home of relatives, her skin was white and she was disoriented, pupils dilated, shaking uncontrollably.

1/20/11: Following day: extremely lethargic, slowed speech, difficulty responding to questions. Aware of her surroundings but inability to respond. Emotional lability, crying hysterically. (This is contrary to her natural character).

Progressively non responsive. Inability to eat or drink.

Admitted to ER.

Treatment: monitored her vitals, IV for hydration, anti-inflammatory meds and benedryl. Migraine RX recommended which we did not fill.

- Hide quoted text -

Treatment administered:

Tylenol PM : 2 capsules on 1/20

Gaba 4 times/day, Adrenal support: 2 capsules 2x/day.

Vit. C: 1000mg. TID

Calcium/Magnesium

Hydrated with water as able.

Response: different pattern of healing this time: This time her mind is clearing but bodily symptoms are slower. 1/23/11: Still slow and sluggish motor coordination, decreased ability to coordinate vision, disconnect from her body. Update today, January 31. She went to work for 4 hours. Able to drive. She is connecting and coordinating

better. Her tongue feels tight and clumsy when she tries to talk. Since she started to talk again, it has gotten more noticeable. Her left eye has continued to be scratchy, irritated, bruised, achy with pressure behind it.

Fall, 2008 Seattle to Hawaii

Nausea, blurred vision, eye pressure, lightheadedness, disorientation, slow motor movement and speech. Slow recovery upon return to home but kept working.

Summer, 2007 Seattle to Mississippi

No notable symptoms following this flight.

Summer, 2007 Seattle to Austria (3 month stay)

Day 2 post flight: sick, lightheadedness, disorientation, blurred vision, inability to visually or mentally focus, body/brain disconnect, fatigue, needed to lie still and stay in quiet environment.

Saw a german MD but translation issues were difficult. Given antibiotics thinking it was an inner ear infection. Required 3 weeks to get back to normal.

Flight home from Austria:

Similar symptoms occurred as described above. Saw primary MD who suggested anti depressants. Saw a psychologist for 6 weeks who determined it was not a mental health issue. Anti depressants meds were declined.

Went to see a vision specialist: negative results

Short MRI performed: Negative relults

ENT: Negative. “He felt is was due to an over active imagination, too much salt? and panic attacks.

2006, Seattle to Israel (2 week trip)

Symptoms following: extreme fatigue, nausea and vomiting, inability to participate in tour requiring bedrest. Lightheadedness, slowed movement and speech. Eye pain and blurred vision, confusion. Tried Dramamine: seemed to accentuate her symptoms.

2005 Seattle to Austria (3 month stay)

No significant symptoms noted other than fatigue.

2004 Seattle to Israel

Symptoms: Sick the 2^nd day after arrival with lightheadedness, disorientation, lethargy and fatigue.

2003, age 14 Seattle to North Dakota

Symptoms: sick following flight with fatigue, ear pain and inability to depressurize ears.

Other PMH: fractured clavicle at age 12

She isn't motion sick. She doesn't have vertigo. We have followed trails for possible altitude sickness/decompression sickness, or aerotoxic syndrome. Both were negative.

Tomorrow she has an appointment with an opthamologist - not to see if she needs new glasses.......

I'm staying with her this week until she is completely stable or we know something more. Keep us in your thoughts and prayers, please. :)

Linked

2011-01-11T10:48:00.000-08:00

Family and friends ~

an eternal chain

linked ~

forged together

history

memories

time

heartache

play

children

marriage

tragedy

laughter

and tears.

Rusty spots need

oiled with affection,

resurfaced with gladness,

sanded with gratefulness.

This strength

weighs heavy ~

a heaping pile

of glory

able to tug

upstream

against

the

current.

Home Country

2011-01-09T20:25:00.000-08:00

The clerk at St Vincent de Paul's asked a birdlike old man to help me carry out the second hand end tables I found for Tessa's first apartment. He wheezed heavily. His pink nose and cheeks became scarlet from the effort and weight of his burden. I felt terrible they had him help me. I was perfectly capable of making two trips to the car.

He fussed about getting them to fit, then closed the door with a flourish. Taking his gloves off he peered up at me with a twinkle in his eyes. With much brevity, he asked me if I was a sugar gal or a sugarless gal. Laughing, I told him my mama always taught me never to take candy from strangers. He cackled as he unzipped his ancient fanny pack. It was stuffed with varied brands of single wrapped butterscotch candy. Possibly collected from gratuity bowls by cash registers?

He gallantly offered me three from the sugar gal side. The moment required a grave bow but I gave him a warm hug - one that lifted him clean off the ground. He wheezed rapturously.

Too bad it was so cold out. Our bundled condition kept me from seeing his feet. I'm sure they were hairy - a misplaced hobbit sent to cross my path - freshening my weary day.

After fifty it is permissible to take candy from strangers. Do.

Winter

2011-01-04T11:00:00.000-08:00

The last month has been different. I've was holed up in the craft room creating - most of December. There are times when deliberate isolation and solitude are needed. Creating gets my feathers smooth again, lubes the gears, and fills me up. Quickens and quiets me.

We spent Christmas with my family of origin in Southern Idaho for the first time in years. It was a good day, simple and uneventful. Everyone left for home on a good note. All of us siblings were together.

Craig and Brita drove home to Washington without me. I stayed to help Tessa get settled into her new life and apartment. It is a miniature home in a brick fourplex. We had fun furnishing it with essentials.

I washed and changed sheets downstairs. It is ready for company again. Mom has a never ending round of overnight guests. I moved upstairs with her . We are snuggling in her king sized bed in the master bedroom.

Yes, I'm fifty and love sleeping with my mom. She smells like warm toast and has the silkiest skin. We wake up and hold hands while watching the sunrise over the canyon walls. Mist from the warm water ponds puff up into the cold air, making each morning a new mystery.

I fly back home Saturday where I will pick up my real life. It has been strange being offline for so long. I feel rested and full. Mom has nurtured and nourished me and my family. I am thankful.

I have my yearly bronchitis attack going on. She heats towels in the warmer at night to put on my chest and back smothered in Vicks. She heats the tea kettle for a dunk under the steam tent we make in the sink. I don't think any of us lose our need to be mothered and fathered. Lord, be with the orphaned ones.

I've been holding history in my hands this week - old journals, old music, pictures, letters, tools, recipes, records, and stories. I am storing every detail in my mind.

"We have this moment to hold in our hands......."

I have missed you all! The Twitterers, The Facebookers, The Google Readers, The Bloggers, The Beloved Friends and encouragers. I hope 2011 will be full of love, kindness, generousity, adventure, risk, comfort, making memories, new friends, and art of every kind and medium. Let the music play and let color dance all around us.

Smooch.

Legalism Defined

2010-12-17T14:27:00.000-08:00

Maggie and I took a walk around the airport trail this morning. Around our public spaces, people are concerned about doing the right thing when their dog poops. Carrying a bag to pick it up is essential to good citizenship.

Beside the trail this morning was a small black poop bag with a knot tied in the top. The owner had followed the letter of the law but completely missed the point. In his case it would have been better to creatively disobey the rules. Using a stick to sweep the offensive mess into the bushes to decompose within a short time would have been better than the plastic bag left on the trail. It will still be there in a hundred years if nobody picks it up. But he followed the rules and thinks he did good.

Legalism always stinks and doesn't seem to ever go away. It trades packaging, that's all. Don't be fooled - it really is what you think it is. Shipoopi......

Bundled

2010-12-09T08:43:00.000-08:00

No visions of sugar plums danced in his tiny head resting on remnants of hay stubble left over from night feeding. No
candles welcomed in the windows ~ for stables don't have any. His mother most likely wrapped him with her head covering, leaving her all exposed. Sweat drenched. Unprepared, what did she use for after birth bleeding? Diapers for him? Did he latch on quickly and have a swollen milk blister on his upper lip afterwards? Where did Joseph find nourishment for her? Did he borrow the animal's drinking water to clean up the mess? Did she tear? Without women to care for her, Joseph had to take the culturally unfamiliar role of midwife and doula for a wife with whom he hadn't been physically intimate with yet. His rough carpenter hands baby catching? The crown of thorns was waiting in the wings instead of a Nutcracker. Maybe the tree was growing even then to be hewn into a cross as he cooed. The blacksmith who hammered the spikes into shape might have been a baby at the same time. A weaver's young apprentice honed his skill making robes without seams. One this baby would someday wear ~ making men cast lots to own it ~ when they assumed he wouldn't need it anymore. He was laid in a stone manger swaddled with cloth at birth. He was laid on a borrowed limestone burial shelf after his death, wrapped in cloth once again, ministered to by women winding their love around him. Women who watched their love left in a heap, for he didn't stay a baby, nor did he stay dead. Instead he stayed God, wrapping us up ~ folding us into ~ a bundle of love, forever and ever. Amen.

(Please don't judge this sketch harshly. I've been picking up a pencil for the first time in thirty five years. I never had lessons and wish I could express what I see in my head better. Until then, I will practice the uncomfortable, rough way. I have such a heart for Joseph. He is probably the most overlooked hero scripture mentions. I imagine his hands, so rough and tender. To me, his faith was the greatest of any. I imagined the pageantry of our present day Christmas and the lack thereof on that morning.)

This is for a prompt from L.L. Barkat: "This holiday season, we invite you to take the big things of Christmas - family, grief, Christ, celebration, laughter - and share them with us through something small." Join us by sharing your link here.

What Divine Romance Looks Like

2010-12-08T12:11:00.000-08:00

Dead Drunk Garden

2010-12-07T17:06:00.000-08:00

Broken garden beds

covered with lifeless husks

lay brown down.

Their skeletal remains

used to be color spots,

pigmented petals

wooing friends

gathering nectar.

How do roots endure

soggy cold waiting?

They huddle together

thankful they aren't

homeless or alone.

Wrapping

their feet around each other

in the dark

they swallow great drunken

gulps of the rain maker's

honey mead

waiting to burst out

laughing again

when the sun's love

tickles them

awake.

Sucking on Succor

2010-12-01T20:06:00.000-08:00

Succor means: to aid, assist, help, offer comfort, encouragement.

This last week, I was in the sludge of discouragement. I took the week off from the world wide web and connected with comfortable behaviors and uncomfortable ones. I didn't have the inclination or energy for too much eyeball to eyeball or skin to skin engagement. For introverts it can be exhausting at such times.

Many hours were spent reading. This activity included a dog curled up on the blanket corner at my feet and a hot mug of tea. It was restorative and inspirational reading. Contemplative. Nourishing. Quiet.

I dug out some dormant art supplies which haven't been used in years. Sitting down facing a blank white page paralyzed me for a while. I finally gave myself permission to be a kid and simply put color on the white paper. It didn't turn out very good. The next one not much better. The third? Pretty much the same. Each was whimsical and colorful, though. They will stay private or be gracefully laid in the garbage. The thing was - I needed to be creative in new ways. Make myself uncomfortable. The finished products weren't good, but they bushwhacked the brush, clearing some plugged trails. The exercise wasn't wasted or futile. Some times creative juices need some sort of laxative to start the flow again........creative constipation happens. Taking action is imperative for me to get unplugged. The momentum carries over into other areas.

Because I was so discouraged, I thought - maybe I'm not the only one. I determined to send personal, hand written encouragement to everyone on my address list who loves words and writes. To give what I needed most. Writers need to know that words do matter in our world. It is a lonely, solitary call. Most the time, the lack of feedback is crushing. We don't know if the void has ears, or if there is a soulish connection being made. As I put that batch of envelopes in the mail, I felt presumptuous and foolish. I have people on my mailing list who surely don't want or need my simple offering? They are VIP's! I heard a mocking cackle of derision gurgling up through the slimy pit below me.

One of the most profound books I've read is The Gift by Lewis Hyde. A gift has to move. In a circle. It has to be passed on. Today I was at the end of the receiving line and got all the abundant excess somehow. Could it be because I offered the little I had to another? I don't know. Truly I don't.

This day has been so full of gifts being rained down on me. A blizzard of emotional goodness swirling me in loving eddies of affection and encouragement. I feel like I'm sucking on a succor cube of sweetness.

It came on a day that I thought I was going down gasping one last time - like Stevie Smith said, "Not waving but drowning."

Be strong and of good courage my friend. You are beloved. You are not alone.

Brides

2010-11-27T18:39:00.000-08:00

Two girlfriends are recently engaged to be married. Both are suddenly being loved by real men who are mature, grounded, and generous. Neither one has experienced anything similar in previous relationships.

This thing they are experiencing doesn't resemble the Hollywood model of lust, infatuation, or obsession.

For both of them it is a mature, long friendship that time and circumstances turned into romance, then wrapped in intimacy. Heart, mind, body, and soul. It was lagniappe on both accounts. Unexpected.

Both are older gals. They have known trouble and despair. Each in her own way has felt hopeless of ever knowing a future including a loving companion.

If you could see their faces. They shine. The room brightens when they walked in. They both look ten years younger. These women were pursued by men who took the initiative in wooing. The grooms wait impatiently to make them beloved brides. The wedding plans are unfolding with delight and joy.

It will be special to be a guest at their weddings.

Wait a minute! We are The Bride. Shouldn't our faces shine, too?

Slashing at Windmills

2010-11-20T15:38:00.000-08:00

These replace

the old style. We needn't

slash at them Don Quixote.

Graceful field growing

a crop of windmills

harvesting wind instead of

wheat. Man can't live on

bread alone.

Dreams of Steel

2010-11-20T15:22:00.000-08:00

Grounded beside iron feet

I look up and through

crazy house of mirrors.

The tunnel repeats support

again and again

waiting for its reason

for being.

The trestle bridges valley

and river anchoring

bluff to bluff where

brave men taunted death

straddling

someone else's blueprint dreams.

This train I wait for

comes speeding,

rumbling along

trust's thin, taut

high wire.

No Clue

2010-11-19T13:16:00.000-08:00

A few months ago we were able to go see the opening of a movie. It was happenstance. Through the blog world of poetry, I had become facebook friends and twitter friends with a young poet in Bellingham. Little did I know he was shooting a film. When he announced the showing close by, we went.

As we were finding a place to sit, we saw the brother and sister in law of a long time friend. We made small talk until I spied the young poet. I recognized him because of his gravatar. I went over to meet him and his parents. I told them they must be proud - to which they agreed - and asked if he would come over to my little group.

I introduced the poet / movie maker to our friend's family, thinking they would be honored. They were so anxious about finding a seat they couldn't be bothered. They missed the best part of the entire evening. It would have enhanced the movie without 3-D glasses. And it was a free opportunity. The saddest thing? They don't have a clue what they missed.

Anxiety robs. Worry wastes moments. Both put blinders on my noticer. I don't have a clue how many wonders I've missed, myself.

Lord, let me see and be anxious for nothing ~ simultaneously.

Clothespins

2010-11-18T10:48:00.000-08:00

The line strung between posts

doesn't sag dangerously close

to the ground anymore.

The heavy wet wrinkled washing

wrung out by the wringer doesn't

flap or snap. Clothespins put crimps

in sheet corners and made companions

of shoulder seams and Levi legs. Rules

were followed for correct

ways of hanging and attaching.

Jessie (Jesus) Viviana Victoria

Cota de Jose brought her

pins inside with every basket of

crunchy ritual. Noel didn't know

the rules or follow laundry protocol

when she ate the crotches, the all

important part, out of grandma's

underwear. How do you punish

a donkey who only leaves elastic

hanging lonely on the line with

a wooden clothespin? Hot

steam melts wrinkles flat

and sends donkeys to the

farthest back forty.

This is my grandmother's clothespin bag. I think a couple of the clothespins might have been her mother's. The Pacific Northwest is too quirky rain wise for hanging clothes. Unfortunately.

I played under her flapping sheets for hours using dropped magnolia pods for people.

Man in Black

2010-11-17T12:29:00.000-08:00

Harnesses and hames hang

with dusty reins

tangled in single trees.

The surrey sings

a red fringe on top song.

Horseshoes fit hooves

as big as dinner plates

for working horses

drafting with pride.

Yoked together

beasts obey bit

attached to reins

held gentle.

Knowing hands feel

current passing through

leather ~ master and team ~

at one.

Double trees, cutters, and sleighs

collect our storied past.

The springy buckboard

dream made from scratch

takes his lady easy

on Sunday drives slow.

Runners, wheels, and antique

saddle frames restored

preserve history.

Bells and rings attach

when it's time

to play dress up.

Prancing, they put on a

show for us and

the man in black.

I love the prowess of reinsmen. Garfield and Uncle Cliff have given us many hours of pleasure. The sleigh rides and hay rides on the wagon are epic memories. Thank you.

Making Rope

2010-11-14T23:31:00.000-08:00

Three strands twist until

they twine about each other

shortening their length by half

and multplying their strength in

triplicate. But even unbreakable

unity has tangled knot capabilities.

Pulling rope strands apart is difficult

for they have permanently indented

each other. A ring finger minus its ring

doesn't lie. It waits for oneness to return

A welcome weight.

This is a tribute to Loverby. Seeing a woman through all the hormonal stages of her life must be a challenge for a man. After menopause, what will I have for an excuse? His patience and kindness towards me when I'm most difficult ~ sometimes fails in a weak moment ~ but he decides to agape me again the next moment. This grace never fails to keep me completely devoted.

Love never fails. It is the true......a cord of three strands is not easily broken.

Craig's dad let me have an old rope maker we found in the barn last summer. Craig helped me try to make rope tonight. The rope turned into poetry. Poema means workmanship. The in-progress-whenever-it-is-now-kind. Continually. Ongoing. The Ropemaker's. His.

We All Get One

2010-11-10T11:36:00.000-08:00

One acre given at birth
One acre for everyone

One acre plants flowers and trees
One acre collects garbage

One acre births art
One acre breeds violence

One acre provides nourishment
One acre poisons the ground

One acre attracts butterflies
One acre draws flies

One acre gives life
One acre aborts thinking

One acre gives succor
One acre pillages

One acre craves more
One acre refuses growth

One acre learns new ways
One acre parrots old news

One acre values wisdom
One acre seeks fame

One acre celebrates freedom
One acre crimps ideas

One acre dreams awake in light
One acre hides in nightmares dark

This is my stab at a catalogue poem. I found it very difficult. LL Barkat offered a Random Acts of Poetry prompt over at High Calling. Check it out. Join in.

The thoughts that created this came from Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird where she talks about all of us receiving the equivalent of an emotional acre when we're born. What do we do with it?

Redemption. The desert may bloom as paradise. Direction may be changed. We may make U-turns, make changes, and start again. We get to choose how we live on our one emotional acre. Often we are the recipient of someone else's largesse. It makes us want to turn our wasteland into garden.

Upon Waking

2010-11-09T09:19:00.000-08:00

Last night I ran out of gas on the way to a wedding. A rodent of a man offered me three pepsis and one 7up. He said it would be a good substitute for gas. As he spun away I heard an evil laugh. This gave me red flags.

I knew before I started the motor I had to wake up - to wake Loverby up - to ask him his opinion. He said, "Don't start the car!"

He recommended me going back to sleep to siphon it all out.

He couldn't do it for me. I hated that. He always rescues me.

Loverby went back to sleep mumbling, "It might have worked if it had been coke."

Learning Prepositions

2010-11-05T10:02:00.000-07:00

aboard, about, above, across, after, against, along, amid, among, anti, around, as, at, before, behind, below, beneath, beside, besides, between, beyond, but, by, concerning, considering, despite, down, during, except, excepting, excluding, following, for, from, in, inside, into, like, minus, near, of, off, on, onto, opposite, outside, over, per, plus, regarding, round, save, since, than, through, to, toward, towards, under, underneath, unlike, until, up, upon, versus, via, with, within, without

How did other children learn their prepositions without the benefit of Mrs. Orr's legendary arms?

She was a few years from retiring when I was in fourth grade. It was obvious the shine had worn off teaching. She seemed tired the entire year, except when we learned prepositions.

Frozen in the 1920's, her jersey dresses looked like costumes off the set of Cannery Row. Belted with short sleeves. Classy, but outdated.

She became animated during this rote memory work. We were embarrassed, but had to stand and repeat them together, while doing the hand motion for that word.

Her arms had an indecent enthusiasm for the task. They escaped the confines of their sleeves upon any hint of a prepositional list.

As she wrote the list on the chalkboard - and while she energetically did the hand motions - the underneath, fleshy part of her arms flew about. They flapped like worn out, leathery elephant ears trying to fly. No amount of hydration or lotion could have brought them back to life.

It formed an unforgettable trauma bond.

My worst fear has come about. I'm glad I don't have to write on a chalkboard. I'm also grateful for long sleeves, and try diligently to stay hydrated. And moisturized. Perhaps it's not too late to find a preventative exercise?

Weight and gravity, can they be defied? It's too late. It is. But maybe I can use them to fly.

Big Katy

2010-11-04T13:14:00.000-07:00

We huddled in a circle in the corner of the brick school building. Six or seven of us almost pubescent girls. Talk turned quickly - every lunch hour - towards curious questions. We pooled our limited knowledge about the mysteries of sex. Fifth grade changed my world as I knew it.

I was a farm girl. Cats, dogs, horses, cows, pigs, and chickens mated, birthed and nursed whether we watched or not. The process had a natural rhythm. Our few questions were answered without fuss by the adults. By observation, I intuited that we women only had intercourse when we were in heat, or menstruating. This usually would result in a baby, of course.

When I offered this matter-of-fact tidbit, four of my friends fell silent. The next day the conversation heated up when they assured me it wasn't true.

When I demanded proof for how they knew it was so, I received more than I wanted to know.

One girl took us across the street to her house. There she uncovered her father's nakedness and produced piles of girlie magazines hidden in the closet. I didn't understand what I was seeing. I felt sick.

After much pleading, two other girls confessed shamefacedly to incestuous acts with an older brother. I didn't understand what I was hearing. I felt more sick.

Big Katy didn't say anything. Ever. She was older by a couple of years. The teachers had held her back. She smelled different than us. Unfamiliar. Ripe from someone taking their pleasure with her. And womanly with menstrual flow. It was a smell that made me instinctively scared for her, and scared for my future.

After we had our fill of talk, she would play with me. Before the bell rang, she'd grab both my childish hands in her adult ones. I ran in circles around her as fast as possible. Centrifugal force made me fly spinning into the air while she leaned back, twirling madly. She was strong and much taller than I. It was fun to fly, and it was fun to watch her throw her head back and laugh as I became airborne. I never saw her smile at any other time. We would return to class purified and winded.

Big Katy didn't get past seventh grade. I still didn't understand what was happening when I caught a glimpse of her bulging belly. She didn't even have a boyfriend.

This is for Big Katy who had a few moments in a school yard......to laugh with innocence. Thank you for playing with me when your heart had to have been so heavy with hurt.

My Space

2010-11-03T20:14:00.000-07:00

The cranky lady next to me on the plane jumped out of her seat to frantically keep anyone else's luggage from harming her Ferrari (?) laptop. She didn't want to put her second piece under her feet, but it was a good thing for two others to put their only piece under their feet. Everyone within a four row radius knew her opinion about my space.

I was angry at her for being so self centered. Later I softened when she told me of the places she'd been, the businesses she had started and been successful at. She needed to be a spitfire to accomplish what she had. When I found out she was eighty, it was hard to believe. She looked 60. Begrudgingly, I came to admire her as we parted. Still, I thought she was completely out of line and selfish.

A few days later I felt the grinding ugliness of my space. The beach was sparsely populated. Brita and I had a sweet little spot under the sun filtered fronds of three palm trees. A group of senior citizen's with visors and clothes screaming Tourist tottered over and plopped their chairs right between us and the water. Inconceivable! The whole beach beckoned..... and they picked that spot? Ruining my view? My afternoon? My vacation? My life?

It was unbelievably rude and inconsiderate of them. They didn't notice my scowl. They were oblivious of my offended huffing and puffing as we laboriously moved our pile of stuff to another place.

They wrecked my space. It was mine. I was there first. Acquiring two year old emotions came easily.

As lady dragon smoke continued to puff out my ears and nose, the frail older man who picked their spot came up to our chairs. Extending his hand he apologized. "We come from the East coast where the beaches are packed like Honolulu. I didn't realize we were sitting between you and the water. I'm sorry."

His timing churned my stomach. Brita had just been reminding me that they probably had been oblivious and weren't purposely being annoying or mean. She gently helped me remember times I had probably been unaware myself.

What could I do but blush and welcome him to the human race while taking his warm, wrinkled hand in mine? It was hard to make eye contact. His knobby knees had become fascinating.

David Rupert at Red Letter Believers does a monthly roundup of featured posts at High Calling. Check out the other featured posts Around the Network.

Rocked by Love

2010-11-02T23:10:00.000-07:00

On the beach I noticed this foot sized heart shaped rock. Tip your head or screen sideways and you'll see what I noticed. It is still laying in the sand on an island in the South Pacific. As I was downloading the album, editing and rotating pictures, I saw the embossed heart and the indented heart side by side.

Please tell me you see them. Love rocks!

I found these the next day. Everywhere I walked.....

Reading Red Earth

2010-11-02T10:33:00.000-07:00

She sprawls

unashamed

letting us watch

sweat trickle hot

between her breasts

under her arms

unshaven tufts

wait to catch

evening's coming

cool

strong shoulders

shrug pack aside

letting heavy

lay still

resting awhile

taking her ease

she swings in

rhythm with

island time

Prairie Well

2010-10-24T17:54:00.000-07:00

Anticipation vibrated

against his arm.

Heaving the iron

handle high

he raised,

lowered, and

raised it once again.

Sucking deep

the full spout

spilled faith

wet

like water.

Crushed

2010-10-19T21:46:00.000-07:00

Seeing the wine harvest brought in and crushed, has been on my bucket list since forever. I will be down in Oregon, having a peek at the process. In order to have the privilege, I have offered to clean toilets, pick stems, or do dishes for the family and friends loving Sineann Wine into being.

I go, hungry to sense and absorb the aspects of this process. Lord, help me see.

Thanks Peter and Nancy. See you.

Residents

2010-10-19T09:53:00.000-07:00

Their names are screwed tight

to the Resident's Directory

hanging visible by the door

opening one way ~ no escape.

He dresses up proper to read the news

one more time. Changing chairs makes

the old news new.

Elsie ran away to be a bride before

his father could interrupt love.

A work tent by the rail road's

newly laid track ~ her nuptial bed.

Jesus loves me is the only song

she remembers. She sings it heartfelt,

over and over, now that she isn't a child.

We come to see our mother who doesn't

know we came. When her limp hands wake

to clasp back tender, our smiles tremble.

Wedding bands worn thin

don't lie.

Sophie's Seeds

2010-10-17T21:30:00.000-07:00

Sophie moved her large bulk slow. Even so, the homestead work was accomplished with thoroughness. In between relentless chores, she planted flowers along the rock wall which she had hauled and stacked one stone at a time. Stones were plentiful and unwanted in the fields. She reframed them.

She is famous in the family for this: Doctor suggested she only have one piece of toast in the morning, instead of two. A keen mind in an aged body outsmarted him. With gumption, she told the family she would follow orders, but she would be sure to cut it thick. She pronounced it tick.

When we go back to the prairie, poking about the old places jog memories. Asking a question about some unfamiliar object becomes a story starter.

This tin can sieve with lid is for holding minnows. It was dropped in water to keep the fishing bait alive.

When I was younger, I lusted for the object left along the prairie trail. Now, I hunger only for the stories to pair with the digital proof. Often, the story is as wispy and fragile as the rotting curtains.

The ungainly rug loom held a place of honor in the small living room. Sitting by the hot stove under dim light, they toiled all winter turning straw into gold or rags into rugs.

The rusty story starts to loosen as you turn the handle. Flimsy questions echo up the stairs.

Her carpet was printed on linoleum. A good faux, easy to clean. The flowers are still bright.

Her bottom knew the frozen wooden seat of the outhouse ~ intimately. Paul would dig a tunnel from the house in winter. His aim was good as the tunnel always ended at the door of the outhouse. It was a two seater. There's a delicate question I have never asked about!

This old jar of hollyhock seeds whispered how a homemaker, in spite of lean times and a hard life, knew how to save color for her soul from one season to another. I'm learning what she knew. It was and still is, an essential.

No matter how severe the drought, or how meager the crop ~ one common saying frequently heard among those homesteaders after harvest was, "Oh well, maybe next year." A shrug of the shoulders flipped the burden of failure away while their hands found the next needful thing to do. They couldn't waste any energy for they needed to survive winter's sour winds.

Each spring, they picked up the handle of that dream one more time, and with calloused hands dug a place to plant seeds.

Reflecting Love

2010-10-17T09:07:00.000-07:00

Wilfred wooed Thelma for five years before he married her. Letters diverted from a disapproving mother didn't cool his determination. His constancy continues now from the place where she lives full time and he lives day times. Her thick brown hair is still lush, but grey. A stroke ten years ago changed the direction of what they had envisioned for their golden years. They have gone far past plans A or B.

Their view is one we can only partially empathize with as we look inside, and they look out with acceptance.

Fifty nine years of deciding to honor their vows is an epic story. The prairie yields many similar stories. The staying power of love thrives here. We have seen it up close ourselves. Too close. Perhaps roots grow extra deep in this lonely sod?

Thelma was a stunning young woman on the outside. Being in her presence for even a short while reveals a woman who is stunning on the inside, too. I was the one who felt visited. And blessed in her presence. All heaven will welcome one such as she. She stays because we need her light and love.

Hobo's Leavings

2010-10-16T20:08:00.000-07:00

They felt the need to leave their names carved in the woodshed's planks. The McHenry Loop was a dead end. A tricky little turn around. If they wanted to keep going west, they would have had to walk across the prairie to the main line.

Some wrote their names like a brand, with flourish. A couple drew a profile, perhaps unable to write. Indian Dave, GA Slim, Red, Omaha Kid, Hank the tie tramp, and Rock Island Whity left permanent proof that they had passed through. No amount of paint layers will obliterate their ~ I was here. 1904. 1917......

It is art, hidden mostly in tall prairie grass. What was graffiti then, becomes a creative record of a hobo's wandering now. If only we could follow their trail of carvings left behind across the wide expanse of America's railways.

Gordy's Mitzi

2010-10-16T12:01:00.000-07:00

Dad has a pup curled up still

in the corner

with a belly full of batteries.

He quivers no cow herding dreams

and only breathes when you turn him on.

When the milk barn telephone went off

he would never torment that cow

by swinging madly on her tail.

He doesn't smile for cookies, shed,

or make a mess.

This pup's has no ears to anticipate

the whistle coming from his master,

no eyes to watch intently

for the beloved hand

sweeping towards the calf

needing separated from the herd.

Never will he run flat out, belly

to the ground, tongue dripping joy.

He won't ever beg for food,

or beg for more of the work

he was born and bred for.

This pup won't die with

sides heaving,

trying to please his master

whose hand he can't lick.

Airplane Window View

2010-10-15T14:56:00.000-07:00

Underneath wing shadows

were paisley fields

with river tails, trailing

like curling thread.

It pieced and stitched

together

odd shapes of all sizes into

a crazy quilt.

History says paisley

was once a design

woven for mourning.

Easy to believe

as paisley

and tear drops

lay the same

lament upon the land.

No till is the accepted way of planting now. It was disturbing to see such progress up close as we visited family in North Dakota. The fields were being harvested. Sixty bushels an acre instead of the meager eighteen of thirty years ago. Afterwards, they spray to kill weeds. With poison. Round-up ready or poison coated seeds are then drilled into the clean, weed free fields. More toxins are sprayed on throughout the growing season. It is dead dirt, not to be mistaken for loamy soil, alive with living things.

I felt sad for the young farmers trying to survive and feed their families. They sit high and removed on the ways of monoculture's big tractors, insulated from the dying moans of the soil.

I feel sad for us, that we eat bread, made with dead wheat, poisoned from the beginning and several times after. It is altered, bleached and separated from its center of life.

We willingly eat bread made from poisoned wheat without a kernel!

When our bodies react as if violated, we are told we're intolerant of gluten and believe it.

Bulbs Buried

2010-10-08T12:28:00.000-07:00

This is my second fall of planting bulbs. Daffodil. Tulip. Paper Whites. Hyacinth. Crocus.

Memories of last spring gave me momentum to be extravagant.

It seems futile. My back aches, my hair gets frazzled, and dirt finds its way in under the gloves. I'm soiled and sweaty this morning. Instant gratification won't reward me any time soon. The bulbs and I wait.

Two hundred pockets of hope were buried in the dirt this morning.

When they burst out next spring, so will I.

Buried treasure. Buried pleasure. Buried dreams. The deep darkness grows it, knows it well.

Launch #1

2010-10-06T20:40:00.000-07:00

Tessa left home with her car packed yesterday. She snuggled with me in bed before we had coffee. As we hugged good by I couldn't quit sniffing her neck and cheeks and hair. Her scent is her own. I have already misplaced it. This makes me feel blind. Crippled. Numb.

I made her two aprons. One, a girl apron in pink floral and polka dots. The other a plain, John Deere print with tractor pockets - farm girl wanna be apron. She is an amazing cook, infusing her creations with sensuous passion. I think she stays pure and virginal physically because she can release and transform her desire into the food she shares. We have been blessed by many meals where the only sound at the table was a soft moan of satiated hunger.

Tucked into the aprons was a love note. Her middle name is Rose. Another gift to the world is her music. I will miss the piano throbbing the windows silly. The girl has soul. You can't learn it or buy it. You can only be born with it. It has nothing to do with perfection or performance.

On the back are taped tickets. Unlimited tickets to return home or ask for help if she needs to.

This was a love letter printed with crayon on first grade tablet paper.

It seems like yesterday when she was practicing cursive on it.

Tessa Punkin' Noodle Rosebud ~

Don't forget whose you are.

Be the bride.

Look loved instead of trying to look good.

Present yourself as a gift.

You are.

See others in that pink light also.

Give.

Save.

Pray.

Live simple and real.

Live fully alive and engaged.

Work and love from fullness and rest.

Be instead of do.

Don't look back.

Move forward within the tension of waiting.

Shine.

Twinkle.

Offer.

Laugh.

Play.

Smile on your world.

You are needed.

Collander

2010-10-04T00:40:00.000-07:00

Grind my bulk with wooden
handle going round in
circles until holes
ooze messy
pulp

bruised flesh broken away
from seed and skin
makes tasty
jam for
toast

Outside the Frame

2010-10-03T17:24:00.000-07:00

I want to know what is outside the perimeters of what the camera lens is panning, or framing. If it looks catastrophic, I want to know the rest of the story. Is there help? Is there also a flower bursting through the blood stained ghetto street?

Then, the happy pictures and posts of everyone else's wonderful lives, happy families, and idyllic vacations ~ you know, the Christmas Letter version of successful living? The kind that make me feel like a loser? Our vacations seem like a disaster? Our real lives extremely, painfully dull, and real?

Let this comfort you. Please.

Look at two pictures from the album I posted on Facebook from our last camping trip of the season, this weekend.

Idyllic. Pristine. Premium spot by the quintessential babbling brook. Luci Shaw's Breath for Bones, a journal, and falling leaves surround my peaceful interlude with nature. This is how what I show you looks:

Here is what you can't see, can't know. We got rained out the first night. The ocean was socked in, so we came inland the next morning. I cried with disappointment. We set up our soggy tent in what seemed like a perfect spot. By the time it dried out, we were regretting our choice. Our neighbor had his radio on full volume. Loverby asked him politely to turn it down. It canceled out the lovely quietness for the rest of the evening because he refused common courtesy.

The next morning, he fell out of his motor home cursing the dogs tangled with his legs. Two young boys with a live, beeping geiger counter started scouring the empty space next to us. This was all before seven o'clock in the morning. We forgot a flashlight, the dutch oven lid handle, the briquette tongs, and hot pads.

Loverby got cranky at a new rip in the tent. I got cranky at a slow leak in the air mattress. We both became cranky at the non-stop traffic on the way home.

There is a "however" ~ We did make glorious coffee. The brook did babble all night only a few steps from our tent door. The aromatic steam from the dutch oven meals probably made the neighbors drool. We did stay warm and dry. We did snuggle like a puzzle all night. And oh, the stars.........

Next time you see a disaster framed, know that somewhere there are beautiful hands taking a swipe at the ugly. There's more beyond the frame.

Next time you see someone's marvelous vacation pictures, realize they aren't showing you the blisters, disagreements, leaks in the tent, or breakdowns. There's more beyond the frame.

And that steep granite mountain I'm nose to nose with right now? Thankfully, there's more beyond the frame. I can't see it, that's all.

Biblio

2010-09-29T23:08:00.000-07:00

I am

alive words

carried through

time

protected from harm

undiluted

poem to feel a

parable to understand

a metaphor to see

paradox to puzzle

wisdom to know

prophesy to fulfill

truth to live

bright and sharp

I am

open book

full pages

words

written on

hearts

I am

We just saw "Book of Eli". It prompted this.

Bloody Berries

2010-09-25T19:25:00.000-07:00

Falling into the berry patch hurts. Dumping the full basket is discouraging. Spider webs trapped me. Barbed thorns hooked tender flesh. Hair chunks getting yanked out by a bramble branch made me cry behind askew sunglasses.

Is that blood oozing or berry stains?

Another two quarts of berries in the freezer is all I have for my trouble today.

Why do I do it?

It is never about the berries.

It's about the sensual satisfaction of gathering summer and putting it by. For later.