That Time of Year

It is that time of year when the river's bounty is providing us with seafood for enjoying during the cold winter months. My kitchen smells like either smoked fish or or steamed crabs...both of these are not necessarily good smells when you have them on and off during the day. But it is nice to see the freezer beginning to get full once again.

I was steaming yellow beans all last week and will be processing the pesto from our bolting basil this next week.

Tomatoes we are eating as fast as they come off the vine. The plum tomatoes this year are mealy tasting and disappointing. The tangerine tomatoes are prolific but not all that delicious. The sweet little grape tomatoes are as good as in the store, but even sweeter. There are a few other varieties ripening and not ready to pick.

My hair is damp from steam and hanging in my eyes and my apron looks like I lost a food war. Too busy these days to write anymore.

Snowballs in H***

Interesting plant in the photo above, no? Go ahead, take a guess and identify this common (rare in my garden) flower.

Those rare, fringy, skinny plants are ta-daa...marigolds. They are marigolds on a diet. You may have never seen skinny marigolds .

When beginning my garden this year, actually re-beginning after the building of the deer fence, I read somewhere that planting marigolds around roses will help to keep insect pests away. It appears that insects do not like marigolds. Actually I am not a big fan of marigolds myself. I know, I know. We are supposed to like all of nature's bounty and marigolds have their place in this world. I would put them way in the back of the flower garden and in the shade. Their flower is nice, but they have no fragrance and they have no drama for me, common since my childhood.

Anyway, I am all about biological controls and selected the "snowball" marigolds to stand as sentries around the delicate rose bushes. I bought a packet of seeds, planted them in the seed tray and nurtured them way back in early April. Most of them germinated. They are like cockroaches in that they are hearty and healthy. I then planted them carefully and symmetrically in front of and around my roses. Weeks of work and they were beginning to make a nice little hedge. They loved the soil and the limited sun and began to grow like weeds. I had done the germinating and planting in two week periods and the first group was ready to bloom. Lovely snow white blossoms even though they grow mostly in the shade. (I somehow did not grasp the true shade of these 30 foot trees on the side of my yard until this summer when I began serious work on flower beds.)

The second group of marigolds was planted two weeks later in the sunnier bed. They took to that bed like weeds, again. Then one morning I went out and saw what you see above. What the? What on earth eats marigolds? It had ignored my cone flowers, my roses, my statice...not my sunflowers, but everything eats my sunflowers.

Thus began the detective work. Fortunately I am a dyslexic sleeper and sometimes wake up at 2:00 AM, 3:00 AM, 4:00 AM and sometimes I even sleep in and get up at 7:00 AM. Each morning I saw nothing in the vicinity of my marigolds. The only active animal was a little rabbit eating the clover in my lawn...the same one I chased around the yard last week. I would let him sit there and munch away as he did a real job on the clover.

I had sprayed the marigolds with hot pepper oil and cut with vinegar and water but, what will come as no surprise to the avid gardener, one morning I saw bunny enjoying his salad of marigold leaves and his dessert of marigold flowers following the clover appetizer. He was mowing through the plants like it was his last supper, as maybe it should be, because I think we are moving him to new fields tomorrow.

Navigating a Narrow Mind

When she first looked out the back window at the river that sunny summer morning the view seemed strange. There was too much space. Then she realized that it/they were gone. The bright orange-red barge and its smaller brother tug boat were not there on the opposite side of the river tied together like prisoners with lifetime sentences against the opposite shore.

They had sat idle for years like fat retired whales, never moving and only occasionally groaning wildly in the wind or when the owner started up one of the rusty motors to do something unfathomable for an hour or so, making ugly raucous noises where large metal pipes were clanged or moved to another side of the barge. Most recently, as the deck to the barge owner's new house was completed, the monstrosities were moved to the nearby dock no longer blocking the owner's wife's view of the river.

In Tabor's mind they were like the war flags. Her side of the river was filled with fancy motor and sailboats and weekend children's rafts and paddle boats. The other side was filled with working gear, small fishing boats, and lawn BBQs and, of course, the two rusting whales. Oddly she felt guilty at her happiness in 'winning' the mind war that had resulted in the ugly monsters being removed. This couldn't have been the owner's livelihood because they were never used. They had become very expensive pieces of deteriorating junk. Surely the owner with his dark mustache and beer belly was just as glad as she that they had found a new home.

Yesterday, sitting on their new partially completed deck, they had waved as she floated by in her canoe. She waved back. Maybe this war was only in her mind.

Born to Be Wild

"Road Trip" Just whisper those words and hubby has bags packed and the car out of the garage in seconds. Since his retirement he is so into filling his days with activity. I, on the other hand, even though I know I am going to die for sure some day, fill my days with sitting and reading and being perfectly happy. We are a good match as opposites. He gets me out of the house and I keep him from spending all our retirement money on gasoline.

We had been wanting for years to explore the Cranberry Glades of West Virginia. This is about a 6 hour drive from where we live. We reserved a reasonable room in Marlinton (there no longer are cheap rooms in this world) and packed our stuff and headed out on the highway (shades of Steppehwolf). Marlinton, West Virginia, does not appear to have a web page. When we reached a Visitors Center near Hot Springs in Virginia, no one there could tell us about the town or how to get there even though we had our heads close over Virginia road maps. These are people who live in the region! Finally we found it when we pulled out the WEST Virginia map. The town is just a wide spot on the road just below a major ski area. It appears to be barely surviving on the tourist industry. Our motel still uses metal keys for their doors. The 5 or so restaurants all have exactly the same menu. If you order spinach it will come from a can. If you order gravy it will be thick and white. Applesauce is served with everything. The waitresses, country girls, are friendly and actually can "talk your leg off." Chatty Kathy, from our motel restaurant, told us her life story over breakfast, which started 20 minutes late because she was late to work.

We took a walk down the main street after one evening's dinner at another restaurant and the exotic culture of this town was like a foreign country to me. There was a fire and brimstone tent meeting at one end of town with a heavy-set black preacher shoutin' and singin' for all to hear. He had quite a few devoted followers chiming in with 'Yes, Lord.' while they sat on metal folding chairs in the lawn under a large open tent. At the other end of town, only three blocks away, was a street fair with a reasonably good country band providing mountain music between the vendors selling cotton candy, hotdogs, popcorn and lemonade. A skinny and angular young man with a mouth full of buck teeth was standing in the middle of the street in front of the band and kept shouting "Yee Haw" to the music as he jerked along to the rhythm. For a minute I thought I was in a Dolly Parton movie. I am not making this up!

We were barely able to book our room in this area as the ski resort a few minutes away was holding lots of activities each weekend during the summer, most certainly to keep the economy moving. SnowShoe Mountain Ski Resort (their website gives a real flavor of the place) is a mass of diverse architecture covering the top of the Snowshoe Mountain. "Also known as Forever Wild, Snowshoe is a year-round adventure located in Pocahontas County." The only things 'wild' about this resort are the mountain bikers who keep the trails muddy and the jeep wranglers who up the ante even more with their off road contests. The architecture is described as 'Swiss village' and I describe it as interesting and little frightening for such a lovely mountain area. The footprint is huge. This particular coming weekend was a Jeep Jamboree and a major Chile Cookoff. We ate at the ski resort one night in search of healthier food and asked the host of the restaurant if he was planning on being busy the coming Saturday.

"We are going to get our butts kicked big time," he smiled. And then he went on to explain that this event was such a big deal even CNN was covering it. That explained the camera crew that was setting up just out side the restaurant when we entered. "Butts kicked big time"...I don't think I have ever heard a host say those words to me in a nice restaurant.

If you want my take on the beauty of this area which we saw on our daily hikes through the meadows, over the waterfalls, and between rocky caverns, along with a sad wildlife story...that, of course, gets posted on 'my other blog.'

Because You Asked

I received some lovely comments on my prior post as it touched a chord in some readers. The reason it touched a chord is that we are all on the same boat...some going first class and some going steerage and some hanging on the edge of the stern for dear life. And we all get to shift places on this boat, usually without being asked.

In answer to some questions about the creation of the post, it did not take me long to write it. It really did just flow from the heart. I have traveled a lot and have seen some of this in my travels. I did research by looking up traditional names starting with T from various countries via the Internet. I did research by perusing some world headlines to stimulate thought.

I have been on travel, a second road trip, this time to the enticing mountains of West Virginia on a hiking adventure which included viewing mountain meadows, rocky crags and waterfalls like that above. I will reminisce briefly on that trip once I get the photos all processed. I will also attempt to catch up on reading blogs. It seems that it is very easy to get far behind as my blog list keeps growing.

My World on Wednesday #1 --- Looking at the Moon

Tabor decides to eat the leftover pancakes and remaining strawberries with honey for breakfast.
(Tushar has only a dollar for food today so he is skipping breakfast.)
Tabor kisses her husband goodbye at the gate in the beautiful early morning.
(TalAyeh kisses the air that still smells of rose water from the funeral of her husband.)
Tabor polishes the oak end table that was purchased when her children were first born.
(Talia goes through the ashes of the fire and finds the brass drawer pull from her best end table.)
Tabor turns on her fancy computer to check her email correspondence from one and all.
(Tanya unfolds a yellowed and creased letter from the priest who had abused her so many years ago and then touches a corner to the flame.)
Tabor decides to walk in the flower garden before the day gets too warm.
(On an abandoned hillside in Berlin, Tabbert find his community garden destroyed by the land owner.)
Tabor washes the garden dirt from her hands in the lovely patterned sink of the powder room.
(Tu bin washes the blood from her hands at edge of the river reflected in the glow of an explosion.)
Tabor decides it is time for tea and reading her new bestselling book.
(Tierra pushes aside the layout for the morning edition and flees from her newspaper office as the soldiers break down the door.)
Tabor answers the phone and is overjoyed to find the call is from her laughing grandson.
(Tamira answers the phone and is overjoyed to find the call is from her father fighting in Iraq.)
Tabor decides not to cook dinner and persuades her husband to try that new restaurant in town.
(Tae-Hyun quietly closes the metal gate to his tiny restaurant and locks it tight as he puts out all the lights.)
Tabor slips between the fresh clean sheets and snuggles into her bed with pleasure at the ending day.
(Tawson shifts carefully in the hospital bed trying not to pull out the intravenous tubes or increase his pain.)

Tabor reviews her day and is thankful for its abundance.
(The nameless gray-haired woman in the homeless shelter reviews her day and is thankful for its abundance.)

Mums on Acid

Am I the only one who wonders about wildlife like this when the 4th of July comes around? The very first explosion sent two geese (this photo above is of ducks) high into the air and away from the river. We watched, for the very first time, from our boat, the small town fireworks. It was preceded by some very nice smaller fireworks shows on the lawns of several mansions at the mouth of the river. The boats were anchored in comfortabe space along the mouth before the entry to the bay and while the water carried the banter of celebratory boaters, the dusk and darkness provided a blanket of privacy. Since it was just hubby and I we could freely neck as the nightflowers exploded against the black sky. Other things I noticed in the glass half full side was that the weather was a breezy 72 degrees and the normally sweltering sun was hidden behind a high gray sky that threatened rain which never happened. This is the coolest 4th of July I have experienced in a long time. For a while the wakes of the boats prevented me from reading while waiting for the dark, but eventually the surface of the ocean calmed down.

The glass half empty side was that the almost full moon was hidden and could not light our way home at the end of the show. The glass half full was that all 99% of the boaters were intelligent and polite and actually followed the Rules of the Road and wending our slow way home watching the red and green bow lights on the motor and sailboats along the 5 miles up river was actually quite nice.

I know that it is impossible to take a photo of fireworks when sitting on a rocking boat, but the photos below were fun to process anyway. They look like mums on acid.

We almost didn't take this holiday challenge as our neighbors had said the boating was crazy on the 4th, but since we had been alone all day we needed to do something. We were pleasantly surprised and now feel perhaps we can take our grandchildren out on this holiday.

Sheesh, Is there no Zen here?

I am heading out to dinner at the 'summer' house of the head of a unit that I worked with in a prior life and for whom I had a miserable "TEAM" working experience. I am only going because my husband's project requires could use this fellow's input and support. I am going to see his summer cabin and praise its lovely location and praise his wife's marvelous cooking and watch his beautiful children play at the water's edge ( if they are there) and then come home, and hopefully, not throw up. I can rise above this.

Tomorrow Saturday is our Independence day in America. It really is an important day and unfortunately we sometimes convert it to BBQ and too much drinking and forget the real reason we have to celebrate. We had invited my son and his friends but my son never responded told my husband he would let us know and so the few other people we invited at the last minute had also made other plans. I hate empty holidays but looking at the glass as half full, this means I do not have to put on fresh sheets in the bedrooms and plan any meals! (My daughter and family are visiting friends for this day.)

I spent this morning chasing Mr. Rabbit in circles around the flower garden and then around the vegetable garden....REALLY!! My husband thought this was very funny. He has a very immature sense of humor. I also had to move the little box turtle from my sad sunflowers as he seemed to be lost in the sparse jungle of stems. Why oh why do I think I can fool Mother Nature?

(In case you need a break from my ranting: The recipe for parsley dressing is here for one of the salad dressings. The other I made up using balsamic vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, salt, garlic, parsley, red wine and olive oil..maybe some other things, but I sort of was working with the cooking muse and working on using up leftover stuff. All was whipped in the food processor.)

The transmission, clutch(?) something went out on my 10-year-0ld Mazda last night and after it was towed from my front yard this morning to the mechanics garage he said it would cost $500 just to go in and look at the problem!. This is after a tree fell on the deer fence last week which will cost $300 to repair. There is a glass half full here...it is cloudy with scum floating on top...but at least the car stalled in the yard instead of in the Virginia mountains where we were a few days ago and at least I have free towing with my insurance.

I hope all of you have a Happy 4th...even if you don't live in the beautiful if somewhat crazy U.S.A.

Sharing the Munchies

I found these hungry caterpillars munching on the parsley in the garden the other day and asked hubby about them. He said he had decided to leave them alone because they make butterflies eventually. What about the parsley, I asked. He said that we had way too much of it anyway.

I thought about this for a minute and realized that we had so much parsley because I was never harvesting it and using it. I had been focusing on other stuff from the garden. I have not been a big parsley user in my cooking in the past, and therefore, since we had so much success this year with the lovely green lace, I decided to search the Internet for some parsley recipes.

I harvested a bunch of leaves (two different types) and proceeded to wash and dry them allowing spiders and caterpillar poo to float away.

An hour later and with the kitchen smelling strongly of garlic and with spilled olive oil across the counter and with green stuff everywhere, I finished two recipes of parsley dressing. One pungent with Parmesan and garlic and one sweet with gentle spices and balsamic vinegar and red wine. Guess we will be eating a bunch of salad this week. All this green has got to be healthy, right?

Abundance

A number of years ago Oprah was promoting the use of a personal journal in which we recorded all the things in our life that made our lives rich and full. Clearly we all lived lives of abundance, but just needed to make that more concrete by recording it daily. I actually kept an 'abundance journal' for a short while, but like many New Year's resolutions it fell by the wayside years ago.

This house is for sale. It is actually a three-house compound on an island in the river near where I live. If you know someone who has a few million to spare, let them know about this abundant opportunity.

This sailboat belongs to one of my neighbors. It was brand new when purchased almost a year ago. To my knowledge, it has never been released from the dock and used except to sit on the back deck while at dock and watch the sunset on rare evenings! My husband would love to own a sailboat, but that is an abundance we will never have.

For the next few months I do not have to buy cut flowers from anyone else. My yard is providing me with so much abundant beauty.

Balance

In dealing with Mother Nature I have learned that it is all about balance. Having been both a wife and mother I think I understand about balance. The most important balance one must have is in expectations and in how one deals with the willingness to fail once in a while. Whether gardening or raising children or solving a marital issue it is pretty much dependant upon the biology of the moment.

I have always been partial to hybrid tea roses. These plants are very temperamental and cannot be grown organically unless in a hermetically sealed greenhouse. I, therefore, knowing the challenges, had reasonable expectations in the failure and success of the new roses I planted in this yard. Of the five, one looked so bad this second year that I dug it up and tossed it. I did not expect my Olympiad rose to grow so well and so easily. The flowers are perfect in shape, last for days and make excellent cut flowers in arrangements and the plant has thus far been resistant to both bugs and fungus!

I had planted cosmos from seed and they have been somewhat slow to start, but flowers are now beginning to form. This was a surprise as the cosmos I see that is growing with little encouragement in the road medians seems to be very robust. I anticipate my plants will be robust in re-seeding and I will have to watch them closely next year so that I keep them in their place.

My sunflowers, on the other hand, have been so very sad. Several were eaten by rabbits until I sprayed pepper spray on them and also deer repellent around them. But even so, they are struggling to grow in this wet non-California climate. While this photo above was taken days ago and the plants are now over two feet, I must admit that sunflowers are not going to be something I try again.

The vegetable garden has rewarded us with spring crops and now we are harvesting our first tomatoes, cucumbers and raspberries. I find the most wonderful pleasure in getting all kinds of herbs from my herb garden that sits just outside the front door. This was something I dreamed about when I was living in the apartment in the city. These garden tomatoes above (our first harvest for this year) are garnished with basil and fennel...they look almost like a Christmas decoration.

Reptile Weekend

My grandson came to visit last weekend (Father's Day) and it seemed that all of the reptiles in our yard wanted to make his visit complete by putting on a show of support. The two frogs in the photos immediately above landed on the patio door windows as night descended, two different species within a foot of each other. Their suction-cup appendages clung to the glass and they peered into our room watching us watch "Kung Fu Panda" on the big screen TV. Maybe we should have invited them inside.

The two box turtles each made an appearance on opposite sides of the house during the daytime. One acted very much like a turtle and was totally terrified of Xman, probably with good reason. He kept his head hidden and he ventured only tentatively after we had moved inside to our lunch. The other turtle (top photo) was also terrified, but this resulted in a rather speedy run across the grass into the safety of the woods...fastest turtle in the East. He was the most stunning in color as well. (Don't let that angelic photo of my grandson deceive you. He is very much a Huckleberry Finn when it comes to manipulating those who love him.)

Xman was recklessly brave as only a four-year-old can be around them and even more brave to let this lightning bug crawl up his arm. We captured two lightning bugs and put them in the insect hotel, but they seemed to not appreciate the confined safety of a plastic room and did not let their lights shine during the evening as he drifted off to sleep.

Technology Transfer with Honey

In one of my first jobs I worked with a public services agency and did most of my work on the computer. Since I had just come from the mom world, I had much to learn about software and hardware. In those days the end user was responsible for defrags, backups, etc. Our tech people were quite nerdy and also in their insecurity happy to make you feel stupid. I was regularly reminded of how inadequate I was and was asked questions about the system for which I had no answers. The attitude of our tech department was that they were dealing with lazy and stupid children who would never learn anything. Having been a teacher in a prior life, my whole philosophy was that there were no stupid questions. Their attitude was that all questions were stupid.

In this prior life I was responsible for a survey regarding a price change for services that my agency was considering. We worked with universities and colleges and also the public and were required by law to survey prior to raising our service fees. As a result, this meant I had to monitor many emails for several months and record the responses.

The first thing each morning I would open my over-filled email box and begin the responses. On one particular morning I opened an attachment from the Dean of a university to print it and immediately my email box was filled with responses from my huge address book from everyone...many of them address invalid responses. Within five minutes the headquarters computer security office in the city called me on the phone and said I had a virus and to shut down my computer immediately. I did. I also walked around the building and posted signs telling staff not to open any email from me that morning. It was the Melissa virus.

I was very intimidated by this whole mess and knew that the 'nerds' were going to have a field day with me. Because they worked late hours none of the crew got work before 10:00 AM. I had to sit and stew for the first part of the morning without any computer. When they arrived, they immediately wanted to know what games I had been playing on the computer, what Internet sites I had visited, etc. When I revealed that I had opened an attachment from the Dean of a prestigious university it took most of the wind out of their sails. I did get some pleasure from that.

When I changed jobs years later the next job also had a staff of IT that felt it was necessary to belittle the 'client' and to even go so far as to correct their English on the help tickets being posted, even though there was a database that recorded this insolence. I took a totally new approach to working with these folks. No longer was I going to be the deer in the headlights. I became the chatty and praise filled client. Everything they did was golden and my questions were always coated with awe at how they did what they did. I ignored their snide remarks. It worked! We became the best of friends and I became number one on their help list when a problem arose. They even began to share knowledge.

This all came back to me when twice this week I was in IE browsing various blogs and when I clicked on a link the 'about:Tabs' starts up and keeps opening new tabs ad nausea um until I am forced to turn off my PC...actually I have to UNPLUG my PC as I get no response from the keyboard or off button!

My PC is an oldie but a goodie, but I guess it is is now beginning to show its age. Staples is having a half-price sale on PC maintenance---which I hope means more than vacuuming the inside of the box. Maybe I should look into this. I wish I had some rude nerds in the neighborhood.

Fresh Start

When the day is ending it means you get a fresh start once again. It means that you can rest with the knowledge that you battled well and made it through and will have a fresh tomorrow to face the demons with more energy and new spirit. It means that somewhere, some spirit places a cool hand on your fevered brow and smiles gently at how brave you have been thus far. It means that morning light will bring clearer thoughts and renewed dreams. The morning light will clean the edges and you can sort the real from the false. You will see how far you have come on this journey and reward yourself with that thought. Sigh deeply and be thankful that your are loved by more than you know. (For everyone climbing that extra large mountain these days.)

That Look

Remember that look that your mother gave you when you had stepped out of line? Remember that look that said 'I am NOT going to wait until your father gets home, kiddo!' It is the look of the 'all-woman/all-mother.' It is the look of fearless strength and defense-to-the-death attitude that women keep deep in the essence of their being. It is the look that clearly sends the message, "Don't make me go there." Well, it looks as though my granddaughter is already beginning to master that look.


And, of course, as every good grandmother knows, the best toys do not come from 'Toys R Us' or any other toy store.

It's Just Another Day

After one of the more torrential thunderstorms had cleared a few weeks ago, we were rewarded with the view above from our dock. Actually, there were two rainbows both forming complete arcs across the end of the finger of the river. That more complete view was impossible to capture with my not-so-wide angled lens. Even capturing the colors of a rainbow, that mystical reflection of rays of light painting their way through the raindrop, is quite the challenge as this photo does not look as stunning as the real thing. It was sort of "you had to be there."

It never ceases to surprise me that rainbows create such a feeling of hope and euphoria in me. Maybe it is the electricity in the air that polarizes the brain cells; maybe it is the vastness of the arc that makes us appreciate that, tiny creatures that we are, we were saved from all the thunder and lightning; maybe it takes us back to the first time in our fresh youth when we saw our first rainbow. I don't know, but it sure does ring my chimes.

(This should probably be posted on 'my other blog' but I already have a line-up of pre-scheduled posts with some other photos waiting there! I am spending most of my time in the "room without walls" these days.)

Friko's Meme

Friko tagged me for a meme a few days ago. I don't usually play along, but I have just gotten back from a funeral and am not yet in good blogging rhythm so decided to take her challenge. I wrote these answers shooting straight from the hip in about three minutes total. Only #11 and #15 caused me to pause and come back to them after some thought. If you are up to it or in blog stasis and need an idea I challenge you to play along.

1. If one song were to describe your life, what song would that be?
"She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain When She Comes." (In other words, eventually I will get where I am supposed to be, I hope.)
2. Which item of clothing do you wear most?
"Underpants" (Cute lacy things ;-))
3. When did you get up today?
6:30 AM---I actually slept in!
4. Last thing you bought?
Rose fertilizer
5. What are you listening to:
The Pink Martini (I saw them last week live.)
6. If you were a God/Goddess, who would you be?
Diana--she was the tough one.
7. Favourite holiday spot?
Some place that I have not yet traveled to. (Although if I never get to travel again I will say Bali.)
8. What are you reading right now?
A Thousand Splendid Suns
9. Favourite Film?
Out of Africa
10.First thing you do in Spring?
Smell the earth.
11.Funniest thing you saw in your life?
Well, I have answered all of the questions and come back to this and thought and thought. Something funny 'seen' usually means slapstick humor or a pratfall and I don't find those so funny anymore. I guess I haven't had a good belly laugh in quite a while and things I remember don't seem so funny anymore. (Now when we start playing a game of Ballderdash I sometimes laugh so hard I can wet my pants.)
12. Who is your hero/heroine?
Right now it is President Obama, but there have been many others before.
13. Share some wisdom?
Don't forget to breathe deeply as you start your day.
14. If you were a tree, what tree would you be?
A banyan...a big fat banyan.
15. Fictitious character/s who made a lasting impression on you?
Had to think for a while because most of those who impress me are real people, but I guess I will say Kermit the Frog and secondly Charlie Brown.
16. Four words to describe you?
Picky, happy, creative and curious. (Also fiercely loyal, but that makes a complex five.)
17. Why do you blog?
Why not? What else can I do with my words that, so far, gives me some complimentary feedback?

Greener Grass

We are back from the Tampa/St.Petersburg area in Florida. The tourist season is slow and the tourist beaches were not crowded. The daily to weekly rental places were busy, but the rental houses and condos were all empty.

We spent a Friday morning in St. Petersburg and were surprised to see the contrast in activity from our nearby city. The streets were quiet and parking was easy to find. Downtown Tampa was not much busier. Clearly the recession is here.

While we were happy to see many relatives from my husband's family we also were reminded about the difference in culture of the area. One of hubby's nephews is 55 and drives a florist truck for a living (his fourth career move) and another is living in subsidized housing at the age of 58 and has been drug and alcohol free finally for a year. Their children (adults) also seem to have no interest in anything other than hanging out while drifting from job to job.

The wife of one of the nephews brags that she has been a bartender at the same hotel bar for over 30 years. Several of the youngest are also divorced or working on their third marriage. None of this means they are terrible people. It is just a culture that my husband and I are not a part of. I do not denigrate this blue-color culture but the transient nature of the work means that no one really develops a skill...except for making drinks. It seems that the warmth and easy living of Florida does not encourage motivation to better oneself beyond a string of retail jobs. It was also a little bit of a surprise that the more successful members of the family did not cross the state to pay their respects.

You cannot pick your relatives and we all come from the same ancestral tree and they were all very polite.

This photo below is the famous Sunshine Bridge that crosses Tampa Bay. Many years ago a barge hit one of the supports to this bridge and it was shut down for some time.


Below is a photo I took in the park across the street from the art museum in the city. It turned out pretty balanced in composition and it actually might make a nice poster...no?

Florida temperatures were in the 90's and the days were very humid and we spent much time searching for shade...even at the beach. It is good to get back to the 70 degree weather here and to try and catch up on blog reading.

Just Passing Through

I hate the fact that I am entering that time in life where the goodbyes are more often of a permanent nature. Everyone has had to bravely pass through this season in their life. I just hate that it is now my turn.

I sit quietly here blogging early in the morning. We stole my 2-year-old granddaughter for a visit on Sunday and she is now sleeping blissfully in the Pac-N-Play in our big closet...it is the quietest and darkest place on the main floor of this house. Thinking of her gentle breathing, I see life as a broad spectrum this morning. She has so much adventure ahead of her while others are moving on leaving her room.

My husband lost his sister-in-law last week. We were not close, but she had just visited our new home last year and I was so happy to see her in even better health and sharper spirits than she had been a few years before. Two of her five children had brought her on this trip. They had made careful plans renting an RV and planning for the needed oxygen tanks and other necessary baggage. She felt energized by this chance to get out on a travel adventure, we could tell.

We leave Wednesday for the memorial service in Florida, so blogging will be in stasis for a while, except for the pre-scheduled entries on 'my other blog'.

Stuff

Dictionary.com has over 15 definitions for the word 'stuff'. Clearly we are lazy and use this word a lot. Not as much a f***, but almost, being the vocabulary deprived nation that we are.

On my recent visit to Nassau this store at least admits that it sells stuff by the lettering over the door.

Above is someone's precious stuff that was thrown out onto the street when they could not pay rent two years ago.

I have lots of non-precious stuff that should be thrown out. What is non-precious stuff? This stuff is that object that is so rare that it has remained in that dusty box at the back of the closet for years. Non-precious stuff is that very useful gizmoo that you have never used that sits in the darkest part of the kitchen drawer. Stuff is that gift you bought that you never gave away which now sits on the top shelf of your closet just waiting to be noticed once again. Stuff is that brand new hand-held appliance that costs too much to repair and would break your heart to toss away and so it sits on the garage shelf waiting for 'someday.' Stuff is that pair of shoes worn to a wedding that will never again see the light of day. Stuff are those 1,000 fishing lures carefully organized in that Tupperware container in the garage. And, if you are like me, your stuff comes with stuff. I am thinking of the 4 pieces of two-foot square 2 inch thick pure white packing Styrofoam boards that sit awaiting creative genius so that they can be made into some grandchild's project. Unfortunately, I think I packed the creative genius in one of the (unlabeled) cardboard boxes in the closet.

I know that when I die my children will take most of my precious and non-precious stuff and give it away or just toss it into some landfill. I stopped buying folk art years ago because I knew I had too much non-precious stuff. While this thought of tossing bothers my husband because he is tied tightly to his stuff, I am really comfortable in knowing that I will return to dust someday and it is all just stuff!

Lately, I have been (once again) feathering my nest by adding stuff. We recently purchased some hose racks to hang our garden hoses. We just purchased two gold fish and a red waterlily for that fountain we bought last year. I also purchased several trellis stands for around the house to use on all the annual vines I am attempting to grow this year. Hubby bought a sprayer for the liquid fertilizer. We also had to buy two new cushions for the canoe and a long cushion for the patio lounge. I then purchased several new flower pots for the new deck as it was looking awfully bare.

In a fit of organization we finally got around to buying some pieces of peg board and some furring strips to use in the garage so that we could actually find stuff when we needed it.

We bought two new bird feeder hangers because we buried the others so carefully under brick that we cannot move them. (We try to move the feeders once a year because of salmonella issues.) We also bought another bird house to discourage the blue bird from moving into that silly little blue house without the ventilation and drainage. We failed in that attempt, of course, and we now have a brand new empty birdhouse.

We had received a gift of a hammock net from our kids after our long-ago trip to Belize and I finally purchased a hammock frame that we will put together someday soon(!). I had moved one of the deck tables to the patio area so I had to purchase a new small table for the deck to replace it.

The problem with all this purchasing of stuff was that I promised myself when I moved into this house, that I would start a simpler lifestyle. No more stuff! I told myself it was now time in my life to be more zen, to be more accepting of bare space. (I had lived, quite happily I will add, for almost a year on 60 pounds of household goods delivered to my apartment overseas when was younger. Therefore, I know I do not need much stuff.) Having currently failed this promise to myself --- miserably, totally, agonizingly--- I promise this fall I am going through our large basement storage room and begin the process of getting rid of stuff! We have lived here almost two years and not used some of the STUFF down there at all. Who knows, maybe we have someone else's stuff mixed in with our stuff!

Next I will start on the kitchen where I have at least three of every single thing from all of my prior moves, including an entire set of cobalt blue goblets (14) that I have been unable to give away. (Pay the shipping and they are yours!)

Last I will start on the closets. When there are only two of you living in a house, you take over the empty closets...all of them and fill them with more important stuff. The kind of stuff that has to stay in boxes which are never opened, so you forget what is there.

Stuff will take over your life. It will become the pack leader in compiling your list of how you want to spend your time. I have found maintaining stuff consumes too much of my day already. Stuff, begone, I say!

This was my son's bedroom when we lived in the rental house years ago.
He was trying to create a sound studio in one corner...there is way too much stuff here.