The day is impossibly beautiful and breezy. Dazzling.
Nekkid baby has returned to my strip of the sidewalk, on a tiny bicycle. Riding it like a scooter. One foot on a pedal, one accelerating heedlessly.
An hour ago, with his mommy, he had walked by wearing nothing but a pull-up diaper, holding a sippy cup, absorbed utterly by anything under his nekkid little feet. Leading with his lil' boy belly. Dappled in sunshine.
But now, on his bike, daddy along for the ride literally, he is dressed and helmeted and speeding. I hear no wailing; he must be good at not falling.
He fades down the road.
The passel o' boys across the street from me are outside playing some game, squealing with joy between yelling like angry badgers, all modulated by occasional, calm dad-voice.
It. Is. OSUM.
Oh man - another bloodcurdling scream! Kids at play so often sound so terrifying!!! It sounds exactly like my own neighborhood, circa 1978.
Between this, tweeting birds, and inviting breezes, I am hard put to finish part 2 of the month's reporting. Gah.
There is this very specific inflection to kids playing - an elastic up-and-down wave, nothing like so tidy as a sine - in which the sound of injustice resonates with purity. BUT WHYYYYY ... can't I go over here ... does he get to run to the next base ... am I not wiii-ii-iiiiiii-in-in-innniiiinnng?
The breeze in the maple outside the window, playing with the grass, scintillating in the treetops across the way. The beagle a couple houses away, Expressing Opinions.
It is ... beautiful.
***
Just a few miles away, filthy Confederate monuments I want to see for myself, updated for our age by people angry, and sad, and bereft for the several-millionth time in 400 years. The police chief here has been on the side of citizens. Just south of us, another chief stood with his people. It is not loaves and fishes The Beatitudes, and it IS optics and choices and amplification calculated - but it is good to see choices for those these polices forces are here to protect and serve.
One of my dearest friends, my best neighbor at work, a woman I love so much - I have heard the sirens, but she heard those and the sound of "no justice/no peace" and "I can't breathe" all this weekend. She is a living blessing.
The Daughters of the Confederacy could have done as others have - served history instead of themselves, as an institution. Why anyone would care to be institutionalized with a group of worshippers of the Lost Cause - people lionizing rebels, who broke away from and tried to destroy the United States - is beyond comprehension. Their existence is shameful, and their mission indefensible. They should relinquish their revolting relics to actual historians, donate their facilities, repent and make reparations. They are shameful. They burned - for a little while - this weekend. This is not looting, it is reprimand, and long past due.
Lee's tired horse, on an exalted platform of ridiculous loftiness - tail down and tired, while the old General still rides, ramrod straight and UNASHAMED, bronze and burnished, but shat on daily by local pigeons with more rectitude - is bedaubed with graffiti. Stuart's plinth, a little shorter, surrounded by a wrought iron bridge it could *not* have been easy to bring down - but brought down it has been, by living bodies who matter more than these rebels do.
Leave them desecrated, the echo of the desecration these insurgents brought to the United States, in dividing them. Remember them for the failures they were. Let the bronze and granite decay, the rot take them over. Leave them to rot, or take them away altogether.
Leave Kehinde Wiley's living horseman in their place - no traitor, but an AMERICAN man - pristine and strong and proud and standing for something. Let him tower over the others as they fall down.
***
It would take only minutes to see what has been done, and what has been undone, in my city. I will probably drive out - before the newly enacted curfew - to see what I need to know. To be a part of it.
To see the dazzling sun, perhaps, set ... on these newly-faced (hardly DEfaced - how do you "ruin" idolatrous monuments to traitors?) images.
To breathe the good air, and commit to using my privilege ... so that little nekkid kiddo can stay untouched a while longer.
Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Monday, June 1, 2020
Wednesday, December 11, 2019
Rumors of War
"I'm working on something, and you're going to love it, and it belongs in Richmond, Virginia."
Honestly, I'm not so sure about the point that Rumors of War actually "outflanks" discussion of removing monuments bought and paid for toward a racist political and social agenda. I hope that the idea of removing such so-called monuments (to insurrectionists who rebelled against the United States and lost) isn't just *over*. But I do appreciate the strategy, and not least because this is the most breathtaking kind of art.
Side note ... given how lazy/racist it is to use chocolate and coffee imagery in describing characters of color in fiction, how do we feel about the "silky, dark patina" comment from a white journalist? Hmm.
Honestly, I'm not so sure about the point that Rumors of War actually "outflanks" discussion of removing monuments bought and paid for toward a racist political and social agenda. I hope that the idea of removing such so-called monuments (to insurrectionists who rebelled against the United States and lost) isn't just *over*. But I do appreciate the strategy, and not least because this is the most breathtaking kind of art.
Side note ... given how lazy/racist it is to use chocolate and coffee imagery in describing characters of color in fiction, how do we feel about the "silky, dark patina" comment from a white journalist? Hmm.
Monday, September 30, 2019
White Gentrifier Guilt
Over the past couple of weeks, I have been tooling around Teh Intarwebs and the real world, getting a feel for real estate. Watching my mom, aged 80, continuing to grapple with the question of whether to leave the home she shared with my stepfather (answer: almost certainly not) has me thinking about what I'd like my own old age to look like, and it's possible it might not look best in the house I've got.
When I purchased my home in July, 2001, I never imagined being in it 18 years. It was meant to be starter equity, to be traded in when I found some haplessvictim man - really very nice, but nothing I meant to become permanently attached to.
Well, my equity is now old enough to vote, or to die in a foreign war (but not drink!), and I find myself wondering whether it might be best traded on at some point. The house is two steep storeys, AND has a full basement: and the laundry is located all the way down there. Being of a moronic and stubborn nature, this means I regularly huck hundred-pound loads of clothes up and down stairs in varying states of safe clearance. Oh, in my fantasies, some engineer appears magically and offers to build a motorized dumbwaiter in a convenient spot. But then, in my fantasies I also have a slate-floor screened porch, a brick car port with electricity, and the house is suddenly not located in a super-white neighborhood either.
Yeah, I am 51 years old, and have realized that MOST of my life has been lived in a White Flight bubble. The schools I went to were named for old white politicians, proponents of Massive Resistance (we could have been Edgar Allen Poe high, but ohhh no - must be a politician!). The suburbs I spent most of my time in were without diversity.
So I don't really want to live my entire life in the economic, cultural, and personal bubble that is White Fragility Comfort. If I do sell, I'd love to see my place go to people who don't look exactly like me. When I bought, I was still a little afraid to buy in neighborhoods with bars on the windows.
Now, I'm more afraid to buy in those neighborhoods because, inevitably, those of us who grew up like I did are seeing how nice the houses were, that our parents or grandparents left behind in heading for the suburbs ... and they're coming back, displacing historically Black neighborhoods, denuding beautiful homes of vintage architectural details (white shaker cabinets that do not reach the ceiling and theoretically high end finishes that clash with and poorly cover older homes' interiors - what I call "stick on" kitchens), falling for ugly and disrespectful flips. Gentrification is killing family businesses and families, pricing people out of places they have lived maybe for generations.
I don't want to be that person. The notation "yoga studios and coffee shops are popping up everywhere!" in a listing, translated, means "don't be scared, lil' white folks, you can come back to the city because we're papering over what it used to be as fast as we can destroy lives!" It also means ramping up economic inequality - and, cringe-ironically, sending those who'll no longer be able to stay to cheap apartments ... or maybe the midcentury ramp crappy flips we're leaving behind now that they're no longer fashionable.
In just a few weeks' looking at my own future and driving around trying to suss out the worst of the gentification, I haven't figured out how to puncture the white economic bubble I've spent an awful lot of my life in, versus avoiding landing like a lummox on an even more delicate neighborhood ecosystem without damage.
One thing I know: whatever comes, I'll have zero use for boo-teeks, coffee shops, or yoga studios, so at least I don't have to feed THAT aspect of economic flux.
But I don't really know if there is an answer. It's entirely possible the answer is, "Sit down and shut up" - and, the fact is, I'm entirely willing to take that answer. Eighteen years in, I let my eye rove, and what I find when I come literally home is, home is a really nice place. Maybe I ought to hope my own environs might diversify with time, and save money for that dumbwaiter, that porch, that car port. A person could do far worse.
For now, I'm educating myself, and it's already working. I'm getting a feel for what the real priorities would be, what it would take to take me away from the house where I have loved my Sweet Siddy La and Pen and Goss, where I endured my father's and my stepfather's and my best friend/sister's deaths. Where I felt Mr. X's hands across my back as he held me, the day dad died, the first time he ever visited here. It wouldn't be easy to strip my home and leave these walls, these bricks, these good bones.
Maybe at some point I'll figure out the balance. Maybe (it's remotely possible) Mr. X and I might even find a home together someday.
Eh, maybe I'll be hit by a bus tomorrow. It's unlikely. But in the meantime, I gotta live.
And my place isn't a bad one for doing that...
When I purchased my home in July, 2001, I never imagined being in it 18 years. It was meant to be starter equity, to be traded in when I found some hapless
Well, my equity is now old enough to vote, or to die in a foreign war (but not drink!), and I find myself wondering whether it might be best traded on at some point. The house is two steep storeys, AND has a full basement: and the laundry is located all the way down there. Being of a moronic and stubborn nature, this means I regularly huck hundred-pound loads of clothes up and down stairs in varying states of safe clearance. Oh, in my fantasies, some engineer appears magically and offers to build a motorized dumbwaiter in a convenient spot. But then, in my fantasies I also have a slate-floor screened porch, a brick car port with electricity, and the house is suddenly not located in a super-white neighborhood either.
Yeah, I am 51 years old, and have realized that MOST of my life has been lived in a White Flight bubble. The schools I went to were named for old white politicians, proponents of Massive Resistance (we could have been Edgar Allen Poe high, but ohhh no - must be a politician!). The suburbs I spent most of my time in were without diversity.
So I don't really want to live my entire life in the economic, cultural, and personal bubble that is White Fragility Comfort. If I do sell, I'd love to see my place go to people who don't look exactly like me. When I bought, I was still a little afraid to buy in neighborhoods with bars on the windows.
Now, I'm more afraid to buy in those neighborhoods because, inevitably, those of us who grew up like I did are seeing how nice the houses were, that our parents or grandparents left behind in heading for the suburbs ... and they're coming back, displacing historically Black neighborhoods, denuding beautiful homes of vintage architectural details (white shaker cabinets that do not reach the ceiling and theoretically high end finishes that clash with and poorly cover older homes' interiors - what I call "stick on" kitchens), falling for ugly and disrespectful flips. Gentrification is killing family businesses and families, pricing people out of places they have lived maybe for generations.
I don't want to be that person. The notation "yoga studios and coffee shops are popping up everywhere!" in a listing, translated, means "don't be scared, lil' white folks, you can come back to the city because we're papering over what it used to be as fast as we can destroy lives!" It also means ramping up economic inequality - and, cringe-ironically, sending those who'll no longer be able to stay to cheap apartments ... or maybe the midcentury ramp crappy flips we're leaving behind now that they're no longer fashionable.
In just a few weeks' looking at my own future and driving around trying to suss out the worst of the gentification, I haven't figured out how to puncture the white economic bubble I've spent an awful lot of my life in, versus avoiding landing like a lummox on an even more delicate neighborhood ecosystem without damage.
One thing I know: whatever comes, I'll have zero use for boo-teeks, coffee shops, or yoga studios, so at least I don't have to feed THAT aspect of economic flux.
But I don't really know if there is an answer. It's entirely possible the answer is, "Sit down and shut up" - and, the fact is, I'm entirely willing to take that answer. Eighteen years in, I let my eye rove, and what I find when I come literally home is, home is a really nice place. Maybe I ought to hope my own environs might diversify with time, and save money for that dumbwaiter, that porch, that car port. A person could do far worse.
For now, I'm educating myself, and it's already working. I'm getting a feel for what the real priorities would be, what it would take to take me away from the house where I have loved my Sweet Siddy La and Pen and Goss, where I endured my father's and my stepfather's and my best friend/sister's deaths. Where I felt Mr. X's hands across my back as he held me, the day dad died, the first time he ever visited here. It wouldn't be easy to strip my home and leave these walls, these bricks, these good bones.
Maybe at some point I'll figure out the balance. Maybe (it's remotely possible) Mr. X and I might even find a home together someday.
Eh, maybe I'll be hit by a bus tomorrow. It's unlikely. But in the meantime, I gotta live.
And my place isn't a bad one for doing that...
Wednesday, August 8, 2018
Collection
Something about changes in fashions (whether in apparel or not) always fascinates me, especially when particularly long-running trends are finally bucked. It's been liberating to watch delicate (or no) necklaces overtake ugly plastic "statement" pieces, and few miss the once-ubiquitous Stupid Platform Heels, I suspect. But now it's going to be a showdown ... When grey paint dates in a few seasons, we can take it. When subway tile comes back - and then goes back out again, we soldier on. But fella babies, ROOMS are making a comeback. It's exciting in the same way fear of death is exciting for some - whatever will the world come to, if they put walls into our houses? Hang on tight, y'all. Purpose-built rooms and privacy could be returning soon to a domicile near you.
HAPPY INTERNATIONAL CAT DAY! I think this Aussie moggie is my favorite.
HAPPY INTERNATIONAL CAT DAY! I think this Aussie moggie is my favorite.
 |
| From: The Atlantic |
Saturday, November 25, 2017
Squees and Thanks
Thanksgiving didn't turn out as planned, but oh I do love the quiet holidays that are just me, mom, and my stepfather. He has been ailing for seven years now, but the point has come where doctors are starting to recommend stopping recurring procedures, and the slowdown he is in now feels somewhat different from previous periods when he has felt low. So, though I'd invited them to my house, at about 1:30 on Thanksgiving day, when I was pulling the turkey breast out to tent it for its final phase, grabbed the broccoli and sweet potato dishes, and went to their house.
When your mom is in tears, the dishes you've twice-washed and spot-inspected lose all significance.
But our day, which is possibly the last quiet-holiday time the three of us will share, was lovely. He was up most of the time I was there, and dressed even. We had a few little laughs; his grace is at times the greatest blessing for others, in the face of his pain. I deeply love my stepfather. Another blessing, and one I did not see coming eleven or twelve years ago.
As much as those I love must endure, my own life is richly blessed and comfortable right now. I still miss Mr. X. But there is someone that remarkable in this world, for me to miss. That is inestimable.
At four years in, my "new" job is now entirely mine. I love the work I do, and I like and respect the people I get to work with. It was scary to leave public service, but I have learned that a form of service that is much more direct has great rewards, and what we do is honorable, sometimes fun, and gives to our community in ways that are new to me and mean so much. All this, and at four years there's a bump in vacation accrual, so woo!
Gossamer and Penelope are still the finest little monsters anyone could ask to live with. Goss is soft and gentle - and preternaturally forgiving of his great lummox of a human. Pum is soulful and warm, both magnificent and insouciant. They make me laugh every day, and then they warm my heart.
Writing ... I'm doing that. Not enough - but is it ever enough, in any writer's mind? What is happening with it is good. That counts.
Christmas: we are looking forward to my brother and BOTH nieces coming for a visit.
And homeownership ... ahhh, homeownership! Here may be the most immediate squee for today. In three days from now, I will have a new run of five kitchen cabinets. One wall has always been the home of every bit of storage in this 67-year-old house - and it's not too bad, actually; lowers, as well as uppers all the way to the ceiling, and I have eleven-foot ceilings, so storage is significant.
So 'long about my birthday (suffice it to say, this was over half a year ago), I went to the Habitat for Humanity Restore a couple or three times, and found a pair of midcentury cabinets which will coordinate nicely with the originals. Since, then, I have poked now and then at all of them - removing the old black hammered hinges from mine, spackling and repainting the uppers (white), throwing around a bad paint job (black) on the lowers, re-hinging all of the uppers including the "new" ones.
Today is the day to remove the lower doors and old hardware, give them a spackle and sanding, and tomorrow paint 'em black.
MONDAY ... comes the handyman. He will cut the crown molding and patch the circa-1950 hole in the wall that was all we had in the kitchen for a vent back then. Install the cabinets, AND the ventless range hood. And all the drawer and cabinet handles. He's even going to tidy up a spot of water damage (long since resolved) that predates my 16 year ownership. The tile I ordered isn't here yet, but we'll call this guy back. Or cross fingers it'll arrive today! :)
Oh my gosh. In three days, I will have new kitchen cabinets. I'll be able to put away my crock pot, cookie jar, lots of things. So exciting!
And on the first day of The Big Holiday Family Visit, I also will have a brand new chair. Mom and I recently went chair (s)hopping at a couple of stores, and on my own time I tried at least one more place, on a quest to find The Chair. The chair you come home to, that will welcome you and take care of you all evening after work. The chair that is kind of foxy, but also comfortable. And one we saw on the day she and I sallied forth was all that, but also had remarkably good BACK SUPPORT. It was the chair that stuck in my head through a few more chairs and another shopping trip. And it will be mine.
This is the kind of chair that makes a big difference in a home. It's the kind of chair that makes a big difference in most days, too. So, with this, and the major changes in the kitchen, some really big improvements for the holidays. After The Great Bookcase Project of the summer of 2017 (three. seven-foot. bookcases, y'all. Don't even tell me you're not jealous), and the final completion of the it-seemed-neverending basement job, this is going to make for one HECK of an organized domicile. And just in time to clutter it all up with Christmas decorations!
Hoping everyone had a splendid, blessed, and joyous Thanksgiving, and that the best is yet to come.
Are you ready ... ???
When your mom is in tears, the dishes you've twice-washed and spot-inspected lose all significance.
But our day, which is possibly the last quiet-holiday time the three of us will share, was lovely. He was up most of the time I was there, and dressed even. We had a few little laughs; his grace is at times the greatest blessing for others, in the face of his pain. I deeply love my stepfather. Another blessing, and one I did not see coming eleven or twelve years ago.
As much as those I love must endure, my own life is richly blessed and comfortable right now. I still miss Mr. X. But there is someone that remarkable in this world, for me to miss. That is inestimable.
At four years in, my "new" job is now entirely mine. I love the work I do, and I like and respect the people I get to work with. It was scary to leave public service, but I have learned that a form of service that is much more direct has great rewards, and what we do is honorable, sometimes fun, and gives to our community in ways that are new to me and mean so much. All this, and at four years there's a bump in vacation accrual, so woo!
Gossamer and Penelope are still the finest little monsters anyone could ask to live with. Goss is soft and gentle - and preternaturally forgiving of his great lummox of a human. Pum is soulful and warm, both magnificent and insouciant. They make me laugh every day, and then they warm my heart.
Writing ... I'm doing that. Not enough - but is it ever enough, in any writer's mind? What is happening with it is good. That counts.
Christmas: we are looking forward to my brother and BOTH nieces coming for a visit.
And homeownership ... ahhh, homeownership! Here may be the most immediate squee for today. In three days from now, I will have a new run of five kitchen cabinets. One wall has always been the home of every bit of storage in this 67-year-old house - and it's not too bad, actually; lowers, as well as uppers all the way to the ceiling, and I have eleven-foot ceilings, so storage is significant.
So 'long about my birthday (suffice it to say, this was over half a year ago), I went to the Habitat for Humanity Restore a couple or three times, and found a pair of midcentury cabinets which will coordinate nicely with the originals. Since, then, I have poked now and then at all of them - removing the old black hammered hinges from mine, spackling and repainting the uppers (white), throwing around a bad paint job (black) on the lowers, re-hinging all of the uppers including the "new" ones.
Today is the day to remove the lower doors and old hardware, give them a spackle and sanding, and tomorrow paint 'em black.
MONDAY ... comes the handyman. He will cut the crown molding and patch the circa-1950 hole in the wall that was all we had in the kitchen for a vent back then. Install the cabinets, AND the ventless range hood. And all the drawer and cabinet handles. He's even going to tidy up a spot of water damage (long since resolved) that predates my 16 year ownership. The tile I ordered isn't here yet, but we'll call this guy back. Or cross fingers it'll arrive today! :)
Oh my gosh. In three days, I will have new kitchen cabinets. I'll be able to put away my crock pot, cookie jar, lots of things. So exciting!
And on the first day of The Big Holiday Family Visit, I also will have a brand new chair. Mom and I recently went chair (s)hopping at a couple of stores, and on my own time I tried at least one more place, on a quest to find The Chair. The chair you come home to, that will welcome you and take care of you all evening after work. The chair that is kind of foxy, but also comfortable. And one we saw on the day she and I sallied forth was all that, but also had remarkably good BACK SUPPORT. It was the chair that stuck in my head through a few more chairs and another shopping trip. And it will be mine.
This is the kind of chair that makes a big difference in a home. It's the kind of chair that makes a big difference in most days, too. So, with this, and the major changes in the kitchen, some really big improvements for the holidays. After The Great Bookcase Project of the summer of 2017 (three. seven-foot. bookcases, y'all. Don't even tell me you're not jealous), and the final completion of the it-seemed-neverending basement job, this is going to make for one HECK of an organized domicile. And just in time to clutter it all up with Christmas decorations!
 |
| Still life with much clutter |
Hoping everyone had a splendid, blessed, and joyous Thanksgiving, and that the best is yet to come.
Are you ready ... ???
Friday, August 12, 2016
Collection
Stephen G. Parks and his partner on whether or not salt can expire. I love this post!
Feelin' flossy? Okay, much as I'd love to cite a classic Simpsons joke, I won't comment on the fact that the Brits are the ones finding that flossing is not efficacious. As for me, I do it less as a health concern than just because it makes me feel like my teeth are cleaner and out of very minor concern that what I clean out of there could cause bad breath.
Okay, y'all have me dead to rights. I can't pretend I am not obsessed with The Drumpf's hair. But so many people are! Anyway, how am I not going to share this headline: The Citrusy Mystery of Trump's Hair? The plot thickens (even as the hair thins). This writer, though, misses the fact as obvious as my sixth grade teacher's ever-changing locks. She left every Friday with faded color, and returned to class Mondays with bright red hair. It was just a temporary rinse, and regular maintenance was for the weekend. Okay, now who's going to monitor Donald's mood-hair-color schedule? (BTW, "chromatic symphony with his face" is brill.)
Also political wives, daughters, celebrities, athletes, any victim of anything which is covered by the media ... and, indeed, even the reporters, anchors, and commentators themselves, if they have the misfortune to be women ...
Speaking of women ... it is not only the problems we face, but the eloquence with which sometimes those are addressed, that makes it impossible for me to keep this blog from turning, at times, to the social and political struggles in the world. It is important *for* our world that, for instance, people should read the extraordinary and harrowing statement of the plaintiff (I refuse to call that woman a victim) in the Brock Turner case. It would be good, too, to click on the link above ... when the simple fact of a victim's gender can make murder "understandable".
Let's have a lighter note. Have you been following Janet Reid's blog as it goes to the dogs? It's also going to piglets, horses, and of course cats as she takes a month off babysitting her reiders to get in some good reading time. Her community's pet photos are a lovely way to while away an August day.
Y'all know I enjoy a good "oldest" artifact, and Cute Shoes knows I love jewelry - how about two for one? The oldest gold bead - inevitably, courtesy of The History Blog.
Also at The HB, on the road to hell with good intentions. The kids who tried to fix an ancient petroglyph ... It makes your heart just hurt, really.
And hearth rights - in a different way than I usually conceive of the phrase, as in the rights of a team to excavate and learn. The US Air Force and an archaeological team in Utah have brought to light a hearth dating back more than 12,000 years. And proof the area was once lush wetlands. And the oldest known human use of tobacco seeds. Huh!
Oh ... what do I usually mean by hearth rights? It's an ancient principle - basically, the concept of domicile and the precept of hospitality, manifest in the concrete. The hearth is the center of manmade fire, and it was a physical heart to humans' daily lives for millennia, throughout the world. Tending the hearth, the right to be warmed beside it, to enter its protective light out of the darkness, to be fed from the food cooked upon it - these were core to human experience throughout history, and hearth rights were not to be trifled with. The hearth gave us community, sustenance, security from the night. This is why hospitality, enshrined in so many cultures, is such a great gift.
But the archaeological right to explore is perhaps as important. It is the way we record how we once lived - and reflect that upon how we live now.
And finally, from The Washington Post - better passwords aren't nonsensical, they're LONGER. This also marks the first time I've ever failed to cringe at the phrase "all intensive purposes".
Feelin' flossy? Okay, much as I'd love to cite a classic Simpsons joke, I won't comment on the fact that the Brits are the ones finding that flossing is not efficacious. As for me, I do it less as a health concern than just because it makes me feel like my teeth are cleaner and out of very minor concern that what I clean out of there could cause bad breath.
(W)e’ve trapped ourselves behind glass. We’re so bewildered by real life that we’ve had to invent a hashtag for it, and IRL – in real life – is now a state that is removed from the way we actually spend our days.
Okay, y'all have me dead to rights. I can't pretend I am not obsessed with The Drumpf's hair. But so many people are! Anyway, how am I not going to share this headline: The Citrusy Mystery of Trump's Hair? The plot thickens (even as the hair thins). This writer, though, misses the fact as obvious as my sixth grade teacher's ever-changing locks. She left every Friday with faded color, and returned to class Mondays with bright red hair. It was just a temporary rinse, and regular maintenance was for the weekend. Okay, now who's going to monitor Donald's mood-hair-color schedule? (BTW, "chromatic symphony with his face" is brill.)
Americans have a situation of overdue justice, wherein a male candidate is finally drawing as much sarcastic, snickering attention for his appearance as so many female candidates have long endured.
Also political wives, daughters, celebrities, athletes, any victim of anything which is covered by the media ... and, indeed, even the reporters, anchors, and commentators themselves, if they have the misfortune to be women ...
Speaking of women ... it is not only the problems we face, but the eloquence with which sometimes those are addressed, that makes it impossible for me to keep this blog from turning, at times, to the social and political struggles in the world. It is important *for* our world that, for instance, people should read the extraordinary and harrowing statement of the plaintiff (I refuse to call that woman a victim) in the Brock Turner case. It would be good, too, to click on the link above ... when the simple fact of a victim's gender can make murder "understandable".
Let's have a lighter note. Have you been following Janet Reid's blog as it goes to the dogs? It's also going to piglets, horses, and of course cats as she takes a month off babysitting her reiders to get in some good reading time. Her community's pet photos are a lovely way to while away an August day.
Y'all know I enjoy a good "oldest" artifact, and Cute Shoes knows I love jewelry - how about two for one? The oldest gold bead - inevitably, courtesy of The History Blog.
Also at The HB, on the road to hell with good intentions. The kids who tried to fix an ancient petroglyph ... It makes your heart just hurt, really.
And hearth rights - in a different way than I usually conceive of the phrase, as in the rights of a team to excavate and learn. The US Air Force and an archaeological team in Utah have brought to light a hearth dating back more than 12,000 years. And proof the area was once lush wetlands. And the oldest known human use of tobacco seeds. Huh!
Oh ... what do I usually mean by hearth rights? It's an ancient principle - basically, the concept of domicile and the precept of hospitality, manifest in the concrete. The hearth is the center of manmade fire, and it was a physical heart to humans' daily lives for millennia, throughout the world. Tending the hearth, the right to be warmed beside it, to enter its protective light out of the darkness, to be fed from the food cooked upon it - these were core to human experience throughout history, and hearth rights were not to be trifled with. The hearth gave us community, sustenance, security from the night. This is why hospitality, enshrined in so many cultures, is such a great gift.
But the archaeological right to explore is perhaps as important. It is the way we record how we once lived - and reflect that upon how we live now.
And finally, from The Washington Post - better passwords aren't nonsensical, they're LONGER. This also marks the first time I've ever failed to cringe at the phrase "all intensive purposes".
Collection
Stephen G. Parks and his partner on whether or not salt can expire. I love this post!
Feelin' flossy? Okay, much as I'd love to cite a classic Simpsons joke, I won't comment on the fact that the Brits are the ones finding that flossing is not efficacious. As for me, I do it less as a health concern than just because it makes me feel like my teeth are cleaner and out of very minor concern that what I clean out of there could cause bad breath.
Okay, y'all have me dead to rights. I can't pretend I am not obsessed with The Drumpf's hair. But so many people are! Anyway, how am I not going to share this headline: The Citrusy Mystery of Trump's Hair? The plot thickens (even as the hair thins). This writer, though, misses the fact as obvious as my sixth grade teacher's ever-changing locks. She left every Friday with faded color, and returned to class Mondays with bright red hair. It was just a temporary rinse, and regular maintenance was for the weekend. Okay, now who's going to monitor Donald's mood-hair-color schedule? (BTW, "chromatic symphony with his face" is brill.)
Also political wives, daughters, celebrities, athletes, any victim of anything which is covered by the media ... and, indeed, even the reporters, anchors, and commentators themselves, if they have the misfortune to be women ...
Speaking of women ... it is not only the problems we face, but the eloquence with which sometimes those are addressed, that makes it impossible for me to keep this blog from turning, at times, to the social and political struggles in the world. It is important *for* our world that, for instance, people should read the extraordinary and harrowing statement of the plaintiff (I refuse to call that woman a victim) in the Brock Turner case. It would be good, too, to click on the link above ... when the simple fact of a victim's gender can make murder "understandable".
Let's have a lighter note. Have you been following Janet Reid's blog as it goes to the dogs? It's also going to piglets, horses, and of course cats as she takes a month off babysitting her reiders to get in some good reading time. Her community's pet photos are a lovely way to while away an August day.
Y'all know I enjoy a good "oldest" artifact, and Cute Shoes knows I love jewelry - how about two for one? The oldest gold bead - inevitably, courtesy of The History Blog.
Also at The HB, on the road to hell with good intentions. The kids who tried to fix an ancient petroglyph ... It makes your heart just hurt, really.
And hearth rights - in a different way than I usually conceive of the phrase, as in the rights of a team to excavate and learn. The US Air Force and an archaeological team in Utah have brought to light a hearth dating back more than 12,000 years. And proof the area was once lush wetlands. And the oldest known human use of tobacco seeds. Huh!
Oh ... what do I usually mean by hearth rights? It's an ancient principle - basically, the concept of domicile and the precept of hospitality, manifest in the concrete. The hearth is the center of manmade fire, and it was a physical heart to humans' daily lives for millennia, throughout the world. Tending the hearth, the right to be warmed beside it, to enter its protective light out of the darkness, to be fed from the food cooked upon it - these were core to human experience throughout history, and hearth rights were not to be trifled with. The hearth gave us community, sustenance, security from the night. This is why hospitality, enshrined in so many cultures, is such a great gift.
But the archaeological right to explore is perhaps as important. It is the way we record how we once lived - and reflect that upon how we live now.
And finally, from The Washington Post - better passwords aren't nonsensical, they're LONGER. This also marks the first time I've ever failed to cringe at the phrase "all intensive purposes".
Feelin' flossy? Okay, much as I'd love to cite a classic Simpsons joke, I won't comment on the fact that the Brits are the ones finding that flossing is not efficacious. As for me, I do it less as a health concern than just because it makes me feel like my teeth are cleaner and out of very minor concern that what I clean out of there could cause bad breath.
(W)e’ve trapped ourselves behind glass. We’re so bewildered by real life that we’ve had to invent a hashtag for it, and IRL – in real life – is now a state that is removed from the way we actually spend our days.
Okay, y'all have me dead to rights. I can't pretend I am not obsessed with The Drumpf's hair. But so many people are! Anyway, how am I not going to share this headline: The Citrusy Mystery of Trump's Hair? The plot thickens (even as the hair thins). This writer, though, misses the fact as obvious as my sixth grade teacher's ever-changing locks. She left every Friday with faded color, and returned to class Mondays with bright red hair. It was just a temporary rinse, and regular maintenance was for the weekend. Okay, now who's going to monitor Donald's mood-hair-color schedule? (BTW, "chromatic symphony with his face" is brill.)
Americans have a situation of overdue justice, wherein a male candidate is finally drawing as much sarcastic, snickering attention for his appearance as so many female candidates have long endured.
Also political wives, daughters, celebrities, athletes, any victim of anything which is covered by the media ... and, indeed, even the reporters, anchors, and commentators themselves, if they have the misfortune to be women ...
Speaking of women ... it is not only the problems we face, but the eloquence with which sometimes those are addressed, that makes it impossible for me to keep this blog from turning, at times, to the social and political struggles in the world. It is important *for* our world that, for instance, people should read the extraordinary and harrowing statement of the plaintiff (I refuse to call that woman a victim) in the Brock Turner case. It would be good, too, to click on the link above ... when the simple fact of a victim's gender can make murder "understandable".
Let's have a lighter note. Have you been following Janet Reid's blog as it goes to the dogs? It's also going to piglets, horses, and of course cats as she takes a month off babysitting her reiders to get in some good reading time. Her community's pet photos are a lovely way to while away an August day.
Y'all know I enjoy a good "oldest" artifact, and Cute Shoes knows I love jewelry - how about two for one? The oldest gold bead - inevitably, courtesy of The History Blog.
Also at The HB, on the road to hell with good intentions. The kids who tried to fix an ancient petroglyph ... It makes your heart just hurt, really.
And hearth rights - in a different way than I usually conceive of the phrase, as in the rights of a team to excavate and learn. The US Air Force and an archaeological team in Utah have brought to light a hearth dating back more than 12,000 years. And proof the area was once lush wetlands. And the oldest known human use of tobacco seeds. Huh!
Oh ... what do I usually mean by hearth rights? It's an ancient principle - basically, the concept of domicile and the precept of hospitality, manifest in the concrete. The hearth is the center of manmade fire, and it was a physical heart to humans' daily lives for millennia, throughout the world. Tending the hearth, the right to be warmed beside it, to enter its protective light out of the darkness, to be fed from the food cooked upon it - these were core to human experience throughout history, and hearth rights were not to be trifled with. The hearth gave us community, sustenance, security from the night. This is why hospitality, enshrined in so many cultures, is such a great gift.
But the archaeological right to explore is perhaps as important. It is the way we record how we once lived - and reflect that upon how we live now.
And finally, from The Washington Post - better passwords aren't nonsensical, they're LONGER. This also marks the first time I've ever failed to cringe at the phrase "all intensive purposes".
Sunday, July 24, 2016
Creative Not-writing
Most creative and/or artistic types express their limber right brains in ways other than being writers, painters, musicians, sculptors and so on.
I rock a bit of the Ageing Bohemian Authoress style in my wardrobe and home, and I also have this thing where I have to change things every now and then. There is a semi-regular seasonal rotation of my living room and bedroom furniture that just gives me a little pleasure looking at the same things in a different way.
Like my mom, I also have a collection of decorative items and wall art far exceeding space to exhibit it all at any one time. I haven't switched those things around much in the past year or two, but used to shift out a small portion of my dad's pewter collection for colorful dishes and Israeli enamel around the kitchen, or put out different knickknacks in the living room from one mood or season to another. Of course there are Christmas decorations, too.
Finding places to put things is a major recreational and practical habit for any homeowner; often, this comes with the question of "How do I store X, Y, and Z?" but some of us just have fun with what's actually out.
This week (I hope!), I'm having my basement foundation jackhammered to the footing and waterproofing updated in this beautiful 66-year-old home, which I moved into fifteen years ago this month. Step one in this job is MY contribution, which has been to move everything down there away from the walls.
Any homeowner can tell you, any project involving moving every single thing in one room in a house ends up feeling like a massive undertaking. As a pushing-50-year-old woman with multiple back injuries to my discredit, it's also one you have to be careful about. Gossamer has fallen in love with my back for smelling like off-brand Icy/Hot, because the wintergreen drives him mad, and I've certainly been keeping the naproxen sodium business going. Hooray for NSAIDs!
And for subterranean dreams.
Moving everything down there presents the opportunity not only to open up a new line of credit debt in the name of resale value I hope not to realize any time soon, and also to Get Some Things Done.
Washing the walls is job one, once the contractors clear out. Just taking a hose to the whole place. Whether I'll follow that with a paint job I'm not sure. in some ways, being able to see the flemish bonding that goes all the way down under the house proper charms me. And exposed brick is a thing.
I *am* rather tempted to paint the floors with something glossy enough to take a good sweeping.
The clothes lines will probably move, but I haven't decided where. Some things will have to develop as things are shifted back into place.
The major workbench will be dismantled and its true two-by-fours kept for some other wonderful purpose, its massive legs saved likewise. This will free up a massive amount of space down there, and some of the furniture in storage will be put to use AS storage, as well as cleaning up the look of the place.
I don't intend to finish it completely, but I may let paternal grandma's easy chair and maternal grandma's dresser and vanity/desk serve some decorative and practical purpose. I have my eye on the vanity/desk as a spot I could set up my sewing machine, which currently stays stuck behind a filing cabinet, but which could have a living/working function in a safe, cleaned-up full basement.
The extraordinarily well-built shelves at the bottom of the steps, I think may be little gussied up, but cleaned and called for duty to hold some of those miscellaneous decorative items not always in service themselves. If I do anything to prettify this spot, it will be simply to hang a shower curtain to keep things safe from the worst dust.
Mom and I have some of our best conversations, stimulating each other's decorator brains on projects like this. It distracts her for a time, too, from the difficulties of being a constant caregiver, and I hope is some relief from the tension.
If nothing else, spending fifteen or so minutes actually starting that job we agreed upon, of dismantling the largest workbench seems to have provided some frustration working-out. She bashed every board off the top (NO damage; mom and I both get physically sick watching the careless destruction inherent in most "demo days" on HGTV shows) before I could even say I still needed it to stack the shelves on as I deconstructed those!
Along the way with creative projects of any kind come the surprises. The incalculable cache' of Gossamer poops, hidden away when he's been in some kind of mood or other. The ASTONISHING weight of a tiny vanity made out of hard rock maple. The fact that the smaller workbench, laden with firewood and appliance boxes I have saved because I am *that* person ("keep the boxes in case you ever have to move!") ... was missing a leg, and just propped against the wall. For who knows how many decades! The exact size of cave cricket poo.
But in a week or so (I hope! I got the call Friday the county permits had not been completed ...), I will be able to indulge some of these fantasies.
Right after I scrub down the falls and remediate the dust. Shew!
So. What's up with you this summer?
I rock a bit of the Ageing Bohemian Authoress style in my wardrobe and home, and I also have this thing where I have to change things every now and then. There is a semi-regular seasonal rotation of my living room and bedroom furniture that just gives me a little pleasure looking at the same things in a different way.
Like my mom, I also have a collection of decorative items and wall art far exceeding space to exhibit it all at any one time. I haven't switched those things around much in the past year or two, but used to shift out a small portion of my dad's pewter collection for colorful dishes and Israeli enamel around the kitchen, or put out different knickknacks in the living room from one mood or season to another. Of course there are Christmas decorations, too.
Finding places to put things is a major recreational and practical habit for any homeowner; often, this comes with the question of "How do I store X, Y, and Z?" but some of us just have fun with what's actually out.
This week (I hope!), I'm having my basement foundation jackhammered to the footing and waterproofing updated in this beautiful 66-year-old home, which I moved into fifteen years ago this month. Step one in this job is MY contribution, which has been to move everything down there away from the walls.
Any homeowner can tell you, any project involving moving every single thing in one room in a house ends up feeling like a massive undertaking. As a pushing-50-year-old woman with multiple back injuries to my discredit, it's also one you have to be careful about. Gossamer has fallen in love with my back for smelling like off-brand Icy/Hot, because the wintergreen drives him mad, and I've certainly been keeping the naproxen sodium business going. Hooray for NSAIDs!
And for subterranean dreams.
Moving everything down there presents the opportunity not only to open up a new line of credit debt in the name of resale value I hope not to realize any time soon, and also to Get Some Things Done.
Washing the walls is job one, once the contractors clear out. Just taking a hose to the whole place. Whether I'll follow that with a paint job I'm not sure. in some ways, being able to see the flemish bonding that goes all the way down under the house proper charms me. And exposed brick is a thing.
I *am* rather tempted to paint the floors with something glossy enough to take a good sweeping.
The clothes lines will probably move, but I haven't decided where. Some things will have to develop as things are shifted back into place.
The major workbench will be dismantled and its true two-by-fours kept for some other wonderful purpose, its massive legs saved likewise. This will free up a massive amount of space down there, and some of the furniture in storage will be put to use AS storage, as well as cleaning up the look of the place.
I don't intend to finish it completely, but I may let paternal grandma's easy chair and maternal grandma's dresser and vanity/desk serve some decorative and practical purpose. I have my eye on the vanity/desk as a spot I could set up my sewing machine, which currently stays stuck behind a filing cabinet, but which could have a living/working function in a safe, cleaned-up full basement.
The extraordinarily well-built shelves at the bottom of the steps, I think may be little gussied up, but cleaned and called for duty to hold some of those miscellaneous decorative items not always in service themselves. If I do anything to prettify this spot, it will be simply to hang a shower curtain to keep things safe from the worst dust.
Mom and I have some of our best conversations, stimulating each other's decorator brains on projects like this. It distracts her for a time, too, from the difficulties of being a constant caregiver, and I hope is some relief from the tension.
If nothing else, spending fifteen or so minutes actually starting that job we agreed upon, of dismantling the largest workbench seems to have provided some frustration working-out. She bashed every board off the top (NO damage; mom and I both get physically sick watching the careless destruction inherent in most "demo days" on HGTV shows) before I could even say I still needed it to stack the shelves on as I deconstructed those!
Along the way with creative projects of any kind come the surprises. The incalculable cache' of Gossamer poops, hidden away when he's been in some kind of mood or other. The ASTONISHING weight of a tiny vanity made out of hard rock maple. The fact that the smaller workbench, laden with firewood and appliance boxes I have saved because I am *that* person ("keep the boxes in case you ever have to move!") ... was missing a leg, and just propped against the wall. For who knows how many decades! The exact size of cave cricket poo.
But in a week or so (I hope! I got the call Friday the county permits had not been completed ...), I will be able to indulge some of these fantasies.
Right after I scrub down the falls and remediate the dust. Shew!
So. What's up with you this summer?
Thursday, May 19, 2016
Waxing Moon
Watery, drab spring, and vertigo, and the necessity to make a living keep me inside doors so much. Tonight: a walk, under the moon.
Distinctive scents of home; whiff of honeysuckle along the 4-laner amid storefronts and garages. Moving away from mercury lights, toward the houses - strong spirea, clover, fresh cut grass, exhaust and asphalt.
The sounds; the way live music sounds warm, muffled, emanating from the bar and grill. Not looking in, just glad people are out, are together. Two horns, vying against one another up the road, their engines as angry as their drivers.
Full moon cool, distant, and remote. Sheen of its light on a peaked slate roof.
It is so damned lonesome here. When the walk is already over.
Distinctive scents of home; whiff of honeysuckle along the 4-laner amid storefronts and garages. Moving away from mercury lights, toward the houses - strong spirea, clover, fresh cut grass, exhaust and asphalt.
The sounds; the way live music sounds warm, muffled, emanating from the bar and grill. Not looking in, just glad people are out, are together. Two horns, vying against one another up the road, their engines as angry as their drivers.
Full moon cool, distant, and remote. Sheen of its light on a peaked slate roof.
It is so damned lonesome here. When the walk is already over.
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