handstories

another Tuesday

    Eighty-nine squares to go.  I paused on this one for a while.  Indigo, walnut and tea, I think.

    A couple of squares begun.  This one with one of Jude's stars, it had floated to the top of the basket.

    This strange thing happened yesterday in response to Jude's post about wrinkles.  Not quite sure what's happening.  It felt like birthing something, maybe myself, but looks like a rock garden, too.  Maybe my mind is a rock garden?  Now I'm remembering childhood stops at a rock garden and museum- an attraction the family would stop at on the way to visit cousins.

    The book of loved things continues, but at a slower pace.  Some pages take longer, like this one of a retired favorite mug.  It was the perfect mug- size, image, handle...sadly, the glaze has worn off on the inside making it unsafe to drink from.

    Just a bit of Rosee...

    "Every night after work, Stew and all the girls in the beauty shop and I went riding before bed time.  It got so hot that summer that the whole bunch of us took a blanket and went out and slept in the pines.  It was a lot of fun.  The summer of 36 came along..."

floating over the deep

    Last night, I went to bed thinking about art, process, and my place with it all right now.  Somehow this led to remembering days at summer camp at the Oregon Coast...

    Every year, on Friday, the whole camp would go over the dunes to the beach, working together to carry a long thick rope.  I couldn't tell you how long, or how many of us there were.  A hundred children?  Fifty feet?  We would march down the sand, parallel to sea.  Once we arrived at the designated spot, the counselors would spread themselves along the rope and carry it out into the ocean until they were waist deep, creating a barrier between us and danger.  When the signal came, we would all run in as hard and fast as we could!

    I remembered that feeling of jumping into the waves, and the occasional momentary drowning panicking feeling when overwhelmed by a surprise surge, and then being upright, breathing air again, excited it might all happen again, and the anticipation and elation of jumping just right, so that the swell carried you almost to shore...  It was a joyous kind of baptism.

    (You should know that it's hay fever season, and I'm in those first loopy days of meds...)

moon talk

    We've become good friends over the last couple of weeks, telling each other stories, making a new one together.

    Jude's big orange moon sings with the stars of Deb's thread.

    Collaborating with cloth.

"Moon Talk"

    She's in the shop.

just when you think you've got nothing...

    A new place to wander.  Summer's indigo scraps and a ThreadCrumb moon (about 13 x 13").

    There's been a lot of forehead furrowing by K. and I about Moon's future plans.  K. keeps telling me to not say anything, that it will push his heels deeper in, but I can't seem to help myself.  So, the other night, jokingly, I suggested a different idea.  When he didn't react, I stepped out onto the ice, slowly and carefully saying some of the reasons why I want this to happen for him.  He seemed to be listening, so, bravely (or foolishly), I kept going... 

    "I just want the world for you..."

    Finally, I stopped, held my breath and hope that I hadn't cemented the deal for his original plans, and turned to busy myself with making dinner.

    And then...

    "Mom, I love you, too." 

    I managed to keep the happy cry in in until he left the room.

    And, he's looking into and considering our idea.

a blur of Joy

    The wedding was in beautiful Whistler, BC.

    Everything sparkled.

    And twinkled.

    And glittered.

    Young and old danced and sang until midnight.

    Including Moon and me!  I hadn't danced in years and years...  It was a perfect party. 

    I loved every minute of it-  all of the details from tying ribbons around the bouquet to into her hair, cutting fleecy "snow" for the stumps we attendants sat on, convincing the bartender that even though they only ordered wine, "surely" there was a bottle of bubbly somewhere for the happy couple (there was!), talking with strangers (who felt like family), the ceremony, dinner, dancing, watching everyone be so very happy (the couple, Moon (who charmed all of the girls, from five to thirteen), everyone) ...All of it.  I couldn't stop smiling.

    Before falling to sleep, I wrote "Joy, pure joy!"

    We came home Sunday night, and I slept for eleven hours, and then yesterday, began really stitching again, all day long.

    I'm back, and feeling better than I have in months.

works-in-progress & a story that has nothing (or everything) to do with them

    The nitty-gritty things for the show were stressing me out (again), so I gave myself permission to not worry about them this week.  Instead, a few more story squares were worked on, and I'm calm again (for now).

    This morning I had planned to go to the grocery store at ten.  After the morning rush, before the lunch crowd, and knowing the library would be open by the time I headed home.  At nine I suddenly had the feeling that I should go Now.  Five minutes later, a few blocks from home, I came upon an accident involving a scooter and a car that had happened moments before.    

    The young man was stumbling and trying to move his bike out of the road.  Being the daughter/sister/aunt of fire fighter and EMT folks, I pulled over and got out to help.  While convincing him to sit down, he looked at me and said, "Were you my teacher?"  Looking him in the face, I recognized E. right away.  He was the sweetest boy, who struggled to get his poetic thoughts down on paper.  We had spent many hours working one-on-one together on his writing more than ten years ago. 

    The accident happened right in front of the house of the woman who hit him.  We settled him on the porch, moved his bike, she brought him a blanket, and us tea, while we waited for his dad to come.  His dad arrived, and the two of us got the bike into his pickup.  As they were leaving to get him checked out at the ER, I gave E. my phone number, asking him to let me know if he was ok, and then I headed to the store (at ten o'clock).

    He texted later saying he has a torn ligament in his knee, and also how scared he was when it happened, and how it helped to suddenly see a familiar face.  He is still a sweetheart.  

    Some of the "just the right" cloths and threads are from the makings of Jude, Tina, and Deb.

grateful for moments

    Late afternoon yesterday, I was so happy for this moment while stitching... A tiny mid-stitch moment when I could see where this piece might want to go.  It felt like falling in love.  

    It was a swell break from the overwhelmed breaths that seem to be filling the days.  There's just too much going on, inside and out.  And I've probably said this already, but I can't remember, because of all that's going on in my life and head.  Some of it is good and/or growth/life stuff, and the rest are things I don't know how to, or want to, but need to do-  updating my browser, business things, parenting things, etc... 

    But, then yesterday, this piece was turned a different direction, and there was finally a connection.

    And later, this sunset...

    It will be ok.

    (With additional gratefulness for Jude's moon & Deb's cloth and threads)

the games of childhood

    Finished "Playground" is hard to photo.  The many, many, many tiny stitches don't show up very well.

    But, sitting here holding it...blue marbles and purple hopscotch squares whisper memories of a blacktop full of monkey bars, swings and see-saws... games of Jacks and chalked Tic-Tac-Toe created with stolen pieces of chalk from the classroom.  

    Swinging from ring to ring felt like flying.  In those days, girls had to wear dresses, but in order to play on the equipment, you had to prove to the recess teacher that you were wearing shorts under your skirt.  On days that they were forgotten, a good friend could be convinced to share hers by sneaking behind the huge tree in the center of the playground to slip the shorts from one to the other.

    In winter, when the big long puddle that ran along under the second grade windows finally froze, we would line up a ways away, and take turns getting a running start towards it, hoping the momentum would allow us to slide the entire length.

    Bottlecaps was a favorite.  Gathered from home and the streets, twenty-five tops of beer and soda bottles were carried to school in pockets.  Two players would take turns removing one, two or three.  The goal was to force the other player into having to take the last cap.  I figured out that if it was the other person's turn when there were fifteen left, that I had won.  I used to be very good at survival tricks.

the shape of a memory

    The back of "Playground" so far.

   Looking for a big circle to trace for the next layer of stitching, I noticed this plate in the back of the cupboard.  It dished up a whole bunch of stories. (Ha.)  

    It belonged to Great Great Aunt Kate, a woman that was long gone before I came into the picture.  The only story I ever heard about her was from Grandma Rosee.  Rosee had no middle name and her Aunt Kate had no children.  Kate offered young Rosee a dollar to take Katherine as middle name.  She took the dollar, and the name.

    Fast forward a bunch of decades to sometime in my twenties...

    Mom handed the plate to me.  "You should have this.  It belonged to Rosee's aunt."  Flipping it over, there was a scrap of paper taped to the back, a note written by my mom,  "Katherine O'Neill- a feminist."  A pretty piece of family history took on a new meaning, a symbol of one of the big tug and pulls of my mother's and my relationship.

    My first memory on the topic happened when I was around twelve.

    One day Mom excitedly showed me a newspaper article about her recent charity work.  Under her photo she was identified as "Mrs. Dad's first name (Mom's first name) Last name..."  (i.e. Mrs. John (Sue) Smith)

    "Why is Dad's name in here?" I asked.

    She explained that was the proper way to refer to a married woman.

    "But you did all of the work, and he didn't do anything!"  I went on and on, yelling about him being the one who should be the in parentheses, if at all.

    She took the article back, frustrated that I had burst her bubble.  It was the first of many exasperated-on-both sides discussions between us regarding women's roles, with neither of us budging or understanding the other.

    I'd like to think Aunt Kate would be glad I have her plate.

first day

    Today there was a little knitting while waiting for my oatmeal and tea to cook, and then stitching on this piece I'm calling "Playground" for now.  Later there was more stitching, followed by the dismantling of a very large falling apart contraption that has been living in the basement for several years.  It took half an hour to separate the garbage from the recycling- made of cardboard boxes, toilet paper tubes, tin foil, legos, etc. and lots of duct tape... a long abandoned creation by Moon.  The goal is to take at least one thing out of this house a day.

    There was more stitching.  Lunch happened, along with laps in the Y pool and a little grocery shopping.

    Next came more stitching, rows and rows and rows of dots (Jude's invisible baste, and that's one of her moons, too.), which make me so happy.

    No school, no commitments, other than to myself.  It was a very good first not-back-to-school day.

    Time to make dinner, and then some more stitching to do, while the light holds.