Tea helps

Life happens. Tea helps.

Slumber

Sometimes my slumbering self is jolted awake.  Not that strange, slow awakening where the cobwebs of sleep loosen and drift off but a door in my mind flung wide. 

“Whaaaa?!”

A distant siren wails.

Dogs howl, coyotes yip and gibber. 

There is a shriek of laughter. 

It seems to be just outside my window. 

Farewells are called.

A distant voice answers. 

A door slams.  

A car starts.

I turn my pillow over.

The coolness comforts. 

And down the slope of sleep I slide. 

three strikes

 

I needed a little rug for my entryway. I pulled assorted friendly colors to create a giant ball. The plan was to crochet five strands at once and make a lovely, variegated, chunky rug. 

 

It was hard on my hands to work with that bulk but it created such a wonderfully thick and cushy feeling underfoot.

But alas, when I placed my first quarter done on the floor I found the door would not open over it. Drat? Too thick!
 

 

I pulled from two balls this time and started in again. But this time, the pattern was my undoing. Basket weave is inherently bulky. And thick. Too thick. Drat again!

I tried again, with two strands and single crochet. But by now my door was wary. It caught the rug here and there. It fretted and fussed. "Three strikes, you're out," I declared to my yarn stash. 

I made tote bags instead.

dust

Sun shining through the living room window doesn't mince words. 

It looks you right in the eye and says what must be said. 

"Dust!"

very daily

In January, Wuhan seemed very far away.
By February, a distant virus wasn't seeming so distant. Little dots begin to appear on maps around the world.
By March, the changes came day upon day and hour by hour.
What had been usual and everyday was suddenly a danger.
By April, our life has become 'daily.'
Very daily.

wireless

Way,
way,
way up on the roof across the street is a tall, spindly legged man.
It is an exceptionally steep roof.
A ladder is balancing between the lower, 'take your life in your hands level' to the much higher 'I sure hope you have a will level.'
He has no visible means of support;
No safety equipment at all, unless you count his giant boots.
He does have his cell phone though.
And, he is wandering around, over peak and valley while staring at his phone.
He's holding it up in front of him as though looking for cell phone reception.
He is taking his wireless connection to a new and terrifying level.

summoned

In the distance, I can hear my washing machine coming in for a landing.
A pause, and then seven urgent chimes sound.
I am summoned.
For some reason, this morning I remember my mother washing clothes in a wringer washer; a great white rub-a-dubber with the wringer set at a misleadingly jaunty angle.
There was always a tub or two of rinse water sloshing murkily nearby, a nose tingling of soap scent, and a motor chugging in steady rhythm, lefffft, rrrright, lefffft, rrright, like the sound giant windshield wipers would make.
Now I just twirl a dial, press a button and get on with my life.

release me

"Please release me, let me go, I don't love you anymore..."

I've been de-junking my closets. Isn't that the perfect theme song?

infused with hope

”What should we throw out today?” I ask my husband happily.

We've been striking a blow for serenity.

We've been simplifying our foyer.

Now those two statements might not seem remotely linked but they truly are.

Our entry way (foyer) has been making a very bad first impression on visitors to our home for an entire decade.

It has been dark and dingy and dusty. 

Dust always settles where indecision or apathy reign. 

This time it was likely a bit of both. First, indecision which left unchallenged gave way to apathy.

All that changed this spring when I made a decision. The wall paper had to go.

In fact, I made the decision in the very split second that I reached out and twitched a strip of paper off the wall. And then another.

Every time I descended the stairs for the next week or two, (or three) I twitched off another piece and then another.

I am married to a man who can catch a ball, even one thrown a bit on the wide side by me, and run with it. 

And make a spectacular touch down.

I should have taken 'before' pictures.

I'll take 'after' pictures though.

My husband has accrued so many brownie points that he could bank them for years to come.

He is a very hard working and particular man and I treasure his hard work for what it truly is, a large and lavish bouquet.

Our entry feels so different now.

So open and infused with hope.

no time at all

My favourite home reno show on TV is Fixer Upper. JoJo and Chip make it all seem so appealing and worthwhile to smash your house to bits with a hammer. It's not just the grand reveal at the end that's inspiring either, but all the decisions made along the way.
It has made me glance about my own living room with a jaundiced eye.
Our fireplace mantel has always struck me as a 'Before' sort of mantel, not an 'After.'
Not really a focal point.
Not really a reflection of our interests and passions.
Over the decade we've been in this house, we've cast about ideas for the fireplace.
We've pondered built-ins and built-ons and built-arounds.
We've considered paint and rock and weathered wood.
This spring, very suddenly, it seemed like the time was right.
Perhaps it was because I found at long last, a completely black fireplace screen. Or perhaps, it was because some projects just need to hang on the vine and sweeten in the sun.
Once a project is ripe and ready, the path seems to clear before your eyes.
Paint seemed called for.
And a more substantial presence.
After that, one thing led to another.
My husbands carved ducks seemed to be exactly the right thing to add to such an important spot.
A quilt will be next.
It is taking shape slowly on the vine right now but it'll ripen up just fine in no time at all.

routinely

A part of me craves routine and a part of me rebels at the mere thought of it.
The routine I crave is really the small rituals of daily life that add meaning.
I remember my in-laws when I think of this.
They always set the table a certain way.
A slow, methodically wondrous way.
They were seniors by the time I knew them.
Perhaps the slow and steady wisdom of age was partly responsible.
I loved it though.
The woven basket with slices of brown bread AND fruit bread.
The pale blue, milk glass sugar bowl, its rim worn thin by the passage of time and spoon handles.
I imagine my life is made up of similarly small ritual and routine but I just don't notice it because I'm part of the story.
It makes me think of something I read once.
A girl was complaining, "We don't have any Christmas traditions. We just do everything the same way every year."
While there is a certain comfort and even wisdom in routine and ritual, there is an equal joy and even benefit to flying by the seat of your pants, to spontaneity.
It's the balance of the two that is so individual.
Have you ever noticed that you only truly feel at home.....at home?
It doesn't mean that home couldn't be more serenely ordered, or more joyously filled with creative comforts because there is always room for change.
Change is good.
Routine is wonderful but change is good.

tooth clencher

A dinosaur with clenched teeth bars the way.
Really.
Out on the street in front of our house.

Our neighbor's work truck, topped with ladders is casting the most amazing shadow.
It fills the street.
A giant tooth clencher.
Probably a T-rex, or maybe a fearsome dragon.
The shadow just beyond is equally amazing in its appropriateness for the moment.
It looks just like the tower of a castle.
Like a turret.
Castle and dragon.
I'm pretty sure there is a princess or two and probably a knight out there.
Out in the shadow.
Does the dragon sense it?

P.S.
The angle of the setting sun made the dragon grow and grow until it crossed the street AND the sidewalk.
Then someone came and parked on the turret.

word of the day

The average house was once pretty little.
There was no place to hide back then.
Togetherness was the word of the day.
Then Rumpus Rooms came into existence.
Rumpus is a great word.
It says noise, loud and clear.
Play brought indoors.
It was a first step on a slippery slope.
Rec Rooms came next. Funny, I always thought of them as Wreck Rooms.
Same idea as rumpus, but a little more structured. The kids weren't just bouncing off the furniture anymore, they were playing table tennis on the coffee table.
Back then fathers had Dens.
Hibernation was more than implied.
It was often quite literal.
The shift to Family Rooms really spoke to a cultural shift.
So did the advent of Great Rooms.
And the idea of Open Concept.

Kind of makes me think of the expression, Children should be seen and not heard.
Of course when I was a child, we were neither seen or heard. We shot out the door first thing in the morning and rambled and roamed til dusk, only reappearing briefly to wolf down our macaroni and cheese.
By the time I had children of my own, there had been that subtle shift in culture. Children were kept a little closer, under the wing.
And it is even more so now.

Still, I wouldn't want to say we've got it right. Nor would I want to say that then was better.
Time swirls along.
Things change.
We still have families though.
And homes.
And all those words from the past can have a place.
Noise, play, space, openness, change.

shiffies

"Shiffies," my baby granddaughter shouts, over the din of departure. "Shiffies food," she adds, by way of clarifying.
Children younger than two are sort of like foreign films. They need subtitles.
At least some of the time.
My little granddaughter may say shiffie, but she means fishie.
Being lifted up to gaze down into the deep, dark water barrel at the fish is something she loves to do.
And feeding them is even better.
A little handful of food tossed on the water's surface and up they zoom like torpedoes.
Up to the surface with eyes bulging in greed, mouths open.
Gunk, smack. Gunk, splash.
Its sort of like the Orca show at the aquarium but in miniature.
Nature on stage.
And the front row is still the best place to be.

down by the sea

I love standing where the ocean washes ashore. I especially love standing there when boats plow past and leave a rising swell in their wake. A swell that races up the shallows and crashes around my feet.
Water pushing water.
Today I watched a leaf crossing the street. If fluttered across, just like a butterfly.
And in the wake of passing cars, dry leaves race across the pavement.
Wind pushing wind.
I never really thought of it before, this sameness of wind and water, but the words we use to describe wind are watery words. There are currents of air, the Jet Stream.....
And the words we use to describe water could describe the wind just as well;
Torrents, billows, mighty, rushing.
Even the sounds are similar.
Our home backs onto a busy street. The constant sound of cars and the wind they create sounds to me like waves rushing over a pebbled beach. Back and forth, back and forth. Even more so on a rainy day.
Makes me feel like I live beside a rocky shore.
Down by the sea.

i hope

Under the leaves in my garden,
under the cool tangle of green,
down in the shadow,
hidden from all eyes,
a little rabbit has made a summer hide away.
One tiny rabbit.
A baby bunny all alone.
Where in the world did it come from?
How did it end up in my yard right in town.
My back yard is against a very busy street.
Dogs live in the yards on either side of us.
We've never had rabbits before.
But we have a bunny now.
When I water the front yard, it shoots from one hiding spot to another as the cold spray sweeps ever closer.
I can see that it is growing.
It could have rested on the palm of my hand the first time I saw it.
Now it is stretching out, sleek and sassy.
And well fed.
I can see the missing blossoms on the pumpkin vines.
Perhaps our little bunny will turn into an adventurous rabbit and seek its fortune in fields afar come fall.
I hope and so do my pumpkin plants.

lots of pretty

 

What is so fine as a garden in June? The spring color is long gone but we are enjoying the first flush of summer. Lots of pretty, frilly pink things have arrived for the party.

top drawer

I read somewhere once that you can tell a lot about a woman by the state of her top dresser drawer.
They didn't really elaborate.
Just hinted darkly.
Well, if there are Dresser Police, I suppose I may as well step out of the shadows and confess.
There's plenty of evidence to convict me.

My top dresser drawer has always been my lingerie drawer.
Sort of.
The trouble is, lots of things fit that category.
And they aren't the sorts of things you fold either.
You just pull open the drawer and wedge them in.
Kind of like a junk drawer in a kitchen, but in the bedroom instead.
(I'm pleased to report that I don't have a kitchen junk drawer and feel quite virtuous about it.)
Sadly, the virtue is not universally applied in each room of my house.
And that is why I fail the top dresser drawer test.
If there is one.
Lingerie, random socks, the odd scarf, important paper, piece of jewelry, a rock??, loose change, mitten, and the list goes on.
I have improved.
Well.
Maybe.
My top dresser really does have only lingerie in it these days.
Because now I have a sock drawer.
It is similar to a lingerie drawer.
Sinisterly similar.
Mine has a pair of mini-gloves rolled in a ball just like a pair of socks that I pluck from the drawer optimistically but misguidedly on dimly lit mornings.
And a piece of jewelry, the odd scarf, an important paper........

make it happen

I'm going to tell you a story that could be considered a confession. Confession is good right?
If you are an organized and efficient soul this story will make you shake your head and thank your lucky stars that you are you and not me.
If instead, you find yourself in this story then we are two peas in a pod, kindred spirits stumbling along the rocky road of life together.
And if we are, please keep an eye out for my jewelry, I'm not sure where I put it.

"For crying out loud," I exclaimed feelingly.
I was staring down at my missing bracelet and it was staring reproachfully back.
I had been looking for it off and on as the afternoon wore thin right along with my patience.
I had tried to remember the last time I'd worn it.
I'm not sure how this would have helped me but it seems to be the first unanswerable question I plague myself with when something is missing.
There were several forces that had conspired against me. I say this as a sort of self defense, a smoke screen as most self defense is.
Firstly, my elderly mother lives with me and a combination of eccentricities cause her to wander at will, moving things, and removing things. This contributes to my own feelings of memory loss. I am certain I placed something just THERE and now it has wafted off, never to be seen again until I happen upon it in her sock drawer. Caring for someone with dementia is destined to make you feel at times like the blind leading the blind.
The second force arrayed against me is my own lack of organizational aptitude. If 'Keep like with like' is rule one, then 'Keep it all in one place,' must surely be a wise variation of the same.
Why then did I find myself searching with growing angst for my bracelet.

I thought I would write a funny story about my missing bracelet, how I gazed solemnly into drawers and cupboards and pitchers on the mantel. How I eventually found it in my jewelry box of all places, the last place I thought to look.
But I had one of those moments of startling clarity.
Why was the jewelry box the last place I thought to look?
And why was the bracelet there then, just as it should have been?

The bracelet was in my jewelry box because I had tried at some point in the past, to change.
To change the default settings of my life.
Many of them were put in place in childhood and reinforced by example.
Some have made me very unhappy.
Change isn't easy and one of the reasons is the ease with which we hand over the reigns of our life.
We are aware that we are unhappy, that there is a problem, but we fail to see our role in it. We fail to see that it lies within our power to change ourselves.

I am not going to let life happen to me. I am going to grab life by the lapels and make IT happen.
P.S. Just don't grab your lapels while wearing gardening gloves. Don't ask.

almost there

Here is my new table runner having its picture taken surrounded by a joyful group of Petal Ware.
Years ago, I found these plates in a box at a garage sale. I seemed to notice them everywhere for a brief time after and then twenty years have roared by with nary a sighting. I love the colors of Petal Ware. Just as Fiesta Ware say 'party,' Petal Ware says, 'spring.' I love that. I love the pastel colors and the fluted edge. I have enough plates to set my table-for-eight in assorted colors, and salad plates all in blue, and a few small bowls and even a few cups and saucers.
I think it would be lovely to paint a home in Petal Ware colors. Actually, my hall is that color of green and my china cabinet is almost that blue and my kitchen is that yellow.
I'm almost there.