Good Omens & Scaryness

Archie would like everyone to know that his ear is fixed. It appears that when dogs are teething, one ear may become a bit droopy and when they are done teething, they return to their original position. That is weird. What could cause the ears to be tied to the teething process? There are so many interesting wonderments out there. Also, I found this nest. It was hanging off our ornamental plum tree. It was just hanging by a (literal) thread. I think it was the home of hummingbirds as it's very small and there were hummingbirds flitting about that tree all the time. I'm going to set it in the Christmas tree. My mom used to have one in our tree when I was a kid and supposedly it brought good luck. I'm a proponent of good luck. I eat black eyed peas on New Years Day, put heads up pennies in my shoe, and am constantly on the look out for good omens. Some examples of good omens from the past are; having a hummingbird or butterfly bathe in the water spray from the hose as I water the garden, or seeing a double rainbow that is unbroken. There are also wishes everywhere. Such as, you can make a wish when you take that first bite from a piece of pie, the pointy bite at the front. I'm not sure where I learned that one but it sounds good to me. You can wish on gray horses if you lick your thumb and then stamp your hand. It's endless. I also like black cats and feel good about the number thirteen. The only thing that I would ever see as bad luck is walking under a ladder so I never do that. Speaking of black cats, we carved a pumpkin today. We have two more to do before Wednesday. I find the bright orange insides to be just beautiful, in a gross, slimy way. And the seeds...what's up with that? I always cut out the recipes for roasting them, and they always look so yummy in the pictures, but when I make them they kind of taste like salty, shredded bits of kindling. Jay carved his first all-on-his-own jack-o-lantern. It looks quite traditional and has mean eyebrows and fangs. I've decided that I'd like a nice, small electric saw to carve mine with. I see all these very cool, creatively done pumpkins on the Internet and in magazines as I'm in the check-out line but I can never get past the triangle eyes, triangle nose, and toothy grin. I've decided I must just need more tools.

Here are my picks for good, scary movies....The Devil's Rejects (Rob Zombie film). Of course, Halloween one. Silence of the Lambs. The Shining. Those are all fairly old. Ghost Story. I love scary movies but I can see from my list that I need to peruse the local Blockbuster soon. Now, take this guy. He's one scary ass m.f. (Did I just write that?) That's why I cut off his head. Hehehe. Okay, true confession, tonight when I went outside to take the picture of the pumpkin, I was totally scared standing on my own front porch. I heard spooky noises (coming from decorations I put up) and everything was all dark and there were two frightening ghouls (that I stuffed this afternoon) sitting in lawn chairs. But it was STILL scary! Can't wait till Halloween.

I looked for a scary quote and this was one of the scariest I could find....
"It's clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it."
--George Bush

Green Eggs and Chairs

So, say that you want to make an egg salad sandwich. You put three eggs into a sauce pan, fill it with water and set it on the stove. Turn it to high and let it come to a boil. Turn the heat down, set the timer for 20 minutes. We're fine up to this point. Then, say you go out to the garage where you're building a little workshop because you want to be able to work on painting furniture in the dead of winter so the garage needs to be tightened up. Holy schmoly, you forget about those darn eggs! Well, here's what happens...while you're in the garage, the water totally disappears. Then the eggs explode. Yes. Explode. Across the whole flipping kitchen. I had egg shell five feet from the stove. Egg shrapnel, if you will. Thank god there was no one standing in the kitchen. Of course, had there been someone there, they might have just taken the sauce pan of eggs off the stove and this all could have been avoided. Unfortunately, I cleaned it all up before I thought of taking pictures for my blog.

I've been a little remiss in my blog upkeep. One week! Without a blog! I will do my best to not let that happen again. I think it was the garage obsession that threw me off track. With my furniture painting going strong, I realized that with the coming cold weather, I'd have no where to work. I've been painting out doors and the garage was so filled to the brim with STUFF. Not wanting to give up the creative endeavors of late, I had to make some changes. So, I rented a small storage unit to put boxes in so I could set up a small workshop in the garage. Now, after four days of packing the car up, taking stuff to storage, spending hours going through boxes of pictures and cards and paper minutiae, sorting, re-boxing, throwing away, finessing the work bench where I want it, moving the scroll saw, I have a nice little work area. Many of the boxes were full of stuff from my dad and mom so I spent hours pouring over old pictures and letters and bouncing from elated to depressed and back to ecstatic. I was able to get rid of a lot that I hadn't been able to when I packed those boxes three years ago when my dad died so it was a good, purging-yet-keeping-the-meaningful-crap kind of experience. Just not one I'd planned on six days ago.
I am including a couple pictures of my chair, which started out as a bulky trash item in front of someones house and is now a piece of art (to me). I have a quote on it, of course, along the back (Earth's Crammed With Heaven by Elizabeth Barrett Browning), and there is a star hanging off the back rest. It's sturdy and comfy and I have no idea what I'm going to do with it now. I think I recently wrote about having too much stuff and now I'm in the process of making MORE stuff to have too much of. Next I plan on making a small end table and then, since I have a couple child size chairs, I thought I'd do a "time-out" chair (idea courtesy of Ms. K. Lasley, thanks!). Not that I have any small children around the house, aside from my wonderful/stubborn nine year old son, but I certainly could use a time-out chair myself on occasion. In the picture of the chair it's difficult, if not impossible, to see that all the blue is outlined in plum, along with the bottoms of the back rungs/pillars/whatevers. I have, and have had for years, this desire to paint furniture (where does something like that come from?) and I had the very best time sitting in the sun, painting, picking out colors, screwing up, and spilling paint on the driveway. I get immense joy out of the whole of it and it remains still another thing I can do and not get paid for. Wait, wait, I was not going to go there. I still have seven months of opus so I don't get to stress until then.

My mom is still my sweet girl. She's eating a lot of pudding and drinking her cranberry juice. Ahh-h-h, the real reason for my opus. Spending time with my mama. I took Jay up there with me on Sunday and she just held on to his hand. She's got quite the grip. Next time I go up I'm going to take a picture of the your-guess-is-as-good-as-mine lunches. I did taste a bit the other day and it's not too bad. I believe it's possible to puree anything. Not that I'd want to, just that it's possible.

"Keep on sowing your seeds, for you never know which will grow -
perhaps it all will."
Ecclesiastes, 11:6

Stuff Galore

I have too much stuff. Things I just don't know where to put, or what to do with, or if I should just chuck them all. Like my "Best of Show" ribbon. Do people keep these? And where? Do I need to build a glass case? Put it in a scrapbook? What's up?! It was certainly a thrill walking into the County Fair exhibition building and seeing the damn thing on my artwork, but what now? Am I allowed to throw it away? If I do, does it get recycled or tossed in the trash? If I'm not going to keep it, do I even deserve the chance to enter again? And I have these three statuettes that were my dad's. He ordered them because they were in Parade magazine and made by Lenox. He had no interest in ivory two-inch-tall figurines in the shapes of an elephant, a swan, and a dolphin. But I imagine he saw them and thought that Lenox was a good brand so, what the heck. Now, I have them. I don't want them but I'm unsure of what step to take next. I think they might break if I put them in a grocery bag and drop them off at Goodwill. They ARE Lenox, after all. I can't imagine anyone I know wanting them. They WERE my dad's. Keep them, give them away, or dump them? I don't know what to do. And then there's this cool pen that my son got at a birthday party. It has a tiny car in a little cage on the top that I can take out and, by pushing a button on the side of the pen, it will race around the kitchen floor. Jay doesn't want it, I certainly don't need it, but it's so fun. And if I get rid of it, can I throw it away? There's nothing wrong with it, it's not broken. Auuggghhh. This type of thought takes up way too much of my time.
We went camping again last weekend. Chilly, yet beautiful. I'm now a total pop-up tent trailer advocate. Camp food, beautiful view, crackling fire, wilderness AND no sleeping on the ground. The night was really cold, I have to admit, and campy time will soon be over for the year but with a warm sleeping bag it is much more fun than I ever thought it would be. Here's a recipe to make your own tasty breakfast burritos!! Scramble one dozen eggs with one cup shredded cheddar/jack cheese mix. Add a dash of salt, pepper and cumin. Fry up a little bacon. Put egg/cheese mixture on a large flour tortilla, add a slice or two of bacon, then salsa or sour cream if you'd like, roll it up tucking one side in so it doesn't all fall out *learned this from experience* and YUM. Good protein, some carbs, and no plate necessary!
At night, I can sit in that trailer, out of the wind, making hot tea on the mini stove (or shaking up a fine martini) and curl up on a mattress in utter coziness. And I did invest in one of those new fangled dish washers....the Archie Clean-Deluxe.
Regarding the previous blog where I bemoan the horribleness of my hand painted beer bottles, here is the evidence. Not to worry, I have already been working on new techniques. I found that using spray paint was not the way to go, aside from the base coat. So, I'm currently experimenting with better ways to do this.
Plus, I'm really not a great painter so my intricate designs (of circles and stripes, just to name a few of the more complex ones) look messy and not AT ALL art like. And, strangely enough, the paint is actual liquid and it runs down the side of the bottles in places I don't want it to. Although I have found that, most of the time, painting is a very satisfying and calming experience. Sometimes.

I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.
--Albert Einstein

Here I am

This is the cover of my book. My book. Silly. My book comes out in a month or so. People, if they desire, can read my poems. In a book. Weird. Okay, I don't want to talk about it. Okay, I'll talk about it. On one hand, I want everyone in the whole world to read my book. And then, I don't want anyone to read it. The "not wanting anyone to read it" is temporary. It's a strange feeling of "now everyone will know who I really am." Aaccckkkk! Oh well, at the same time, I relish that thought. I think, in my early years, :), I was different people with different people. What I've aspired to, in the last ten years, is to be JUST MYSELF with everyone. Authentic living, so to speak. Everybody basically gets the same me. No more being one way with some people and another way with other people. Geez, I hate it when I talk about me. (I have realized, however, that in a blog, that's just what happens...I talk about me occasionally)

Moving on. I went to Vegas last weekend. I LOVE Vegas. Sit me at a Roulette table for 6 hours with fifty bucks and I'm a happy gal. It's a very weird, glitzy, surreal place and I love it. Took my boy, and we met Suzy and her two girls. Three kids, two moms, swimming, nice digs (thank you brother John), and a nanny on Saturday night. We took the kids to see Stomp and made breakfast burritos in the morning to be frugal. Great vacation. And I was happy to get home.

My mom is wonderful. She gets coke floats everyday. She does not have to eat her spinach if she makes a face after one bite. She has these "mom" mannerisms that have resurfaced after the cease in meds. That seroquel has its place but can sure flatten a person out. She still inspires me every day to be alive. She smiles and gives these little laughs. Here's a funny story about her. She came into my bedroom once when I was about eleven. She was not a kidding/jokester type mom. She stood in my doorway and said, "You know those round toothpaste drops that you always leave in the sink? I was reading in Reader's Digest that you can pop them off the porcelain and use them as mints." I just sat there, quite unsure how to react. Really?!, I thought. She just smiled and walked back down the hall, and I thought, "wow, she's kidding. My mom made a joke." I had a totally new and impressive view of my mom after that day.

And finally, on the creativity front; my chair is going well, the drawer is shaping up nicely, I'm writing a poem here and there, and the hats are being knitted. I do have to say, however, that the bottles being painted to bottle the ESB beer that we're brewing came out horrid. (Pictures of all of this will appear shortly). I've only done three so far but they look absolutely stupid. I was looking at them today and thinking -- wow, yuck, bad job. So, I'll just have to start over on THAT project. But I did get a perverse thrill out of knowing that sometimes creativity is just f**ked up.

Funny quote of the day....
"When I die, I want to die like my grandfather--who died peacefully in
his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car."
--Author Unknown

Well,

I am doing creative things today and don't have time to write about it. I'm hand painting bottles to bottle the ESB beer that we're brewing. I'm working on a chair. I'm doing a hat with really weird yarn. I worked on a poem.

The life cycle of a dead tree

It began by dying, the green
of its life draining quietly
from the roots and tips of limbs.
The birds still came but the leaves
stopped renewing in the spring.

It looked harder and tougher
when dead
than when alive but it wasn’t.
Inside the trunk, decay was busy
working.
Budworms gnawed
within and woodpeckers
worked from without
to destroy the bones
of it all, until one day

it fell, whooshing
through the air past the blue
of sky and the soft petals
of clouds. It fell hard,
groaning into the damp
debris left of leaves and stems
and beetle bodies.

The people hidden within
their winter houses, glancing
from their windows, noticed only
the absence of the limb
the lone blue heron sat on
in the summer, the reach of brown
jutting into the moonlight
at night.

In Spring
when children fly from the house
like small birds
the tree became the ship,
the castle, and the dragon to slay
while the discarded branch
became the sword.

In a hundred years, its dust
will feed the clover.

Remember?

Remember about a month ago when I went berry pickin and got a big 'ol Tupperware full of blackberries? Man, that was a fun day. It was still summer, I was with friends and kids and getting scratched to bits by brambles. Well, tonight I made a blackberry pie from the berries I picked that day. And, although it looks to be a whole pie in the picture, I just finished having myself a big slice with a huge glass of milk. Ummmm. Those berries are so sweet and luscious. I am not always the successful pie maker. In fact, more often than not, the inside is thin and the crust is slightly underdone. But this one is yummy! I believe I will be having another piece for breakfast.

Remember when I grew those eggplant? They were getting big and then that damn frost came? But I still got four, you nasty old frost. Hehehe. And now...fried eggplant! They were sooo good. Small and tender and, of course, anything is just scrumptious when fried. The garden is history. I still need to blanch some tomatoes this week and I think I can make one more batch of zucchini bread but that's about it. I am so building a greenhouse next year.

Remember when I said I was going to be creative for four hours a day. Not. I'm getting in about two. But I'm trying to be okay with two for awhile. Wait until I show you the chair I'm working on! But I was shooting for four and I just can't do it right now.

I have a some mom stuff. My mom is now under hospice care. They've taken her off all meds and the focus is comfort. They are all so wonderful. She gets to stay at the memory unit where she's been for three years, in a nice room with people who love and care for her. Today I went up for lunch and she had a huge bowl of "your-guess-is-as-good-as-mine" and she ate most of it. She had vanilla pudding for dessert. I took this picture of her today. I LOVE feeding her. I have an insane love for it. I get to just sit, for an hour, and feed her and talk nonsense and mush and comb her hair with my fingers and help her eat. I like all the residents and the caregivers and it feels so good to just be there. The dining room holds about 5 or 6 tables with 2-4 people at each table. She smiles on occasion, (Tangent story here - on the hospice application I had to check all these things, nine of them, that she still could or could not do and the only one I could check "yes" to was - can she still smile? I loved being able to check that one) says a few words and holds my hand tight. This is the cool/weird part...once they take the meds away, she's become more lucid. Feeds herself a little, says more words. Shoots me looks and facial expressions that I remember from years ago. It's nice to have her doing more "mom" behaviors for a little while. And she doesn't have to swallow a dozen pills every day now. Hospice helps with baths and care and medical issues. They are good, caring people who have an amazing attitude about the dying process. My mom has a stellar view of the peaks and when she's lying down in her bed she is usually looking out the window. I asked her the other day if dad comes to see her much and her eyes got all big and she said, very loud and clear, "Oh yes."

This is how I see my life right now metaphorically:
Remember those cakes, the 9" x 13" rectangular ones that, after baking you could poke holes in with a straw. It was from a commercial for Jello brand pudding. Then, you'd make the pudding and pour it on the cake and pudding would seep into those holes. I feel like my life is the cake, and grief is the pudding, and it just kind of seeps in and touches most of the cake. But, even with the grief, my life is still cake.

Look on the bright side.
-Anna Divine
(my mom, who said this an unnerving
amount of times when I was a child,
but meant it, and lived it, and passed it on)