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Posts Tagged ‘Art’

Everyday Dust

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , on October 25, 2021| Leave a Comment »

“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life” Pablo Picasso

Today is Picasso’s birthday, he was born in Spain on October 25, 1881. My relationship to art is unfortunately subjective – if it moves me in any way, if it reminds me of the mountains or the sea, if I could just fall in love with the colors. But Picasso is a different breed of artist. Although I can understand his modernist vision, I wouldn’t want to hang his paintings on my walls…. even if I could afford them! His deconstructed asymmetrical portraits would haunt my dreams.

This weekend the Bride found an artist she loves at Artclectic, an annual art exhibit at the Grands school. Jaime Barks hails from Chattanooga and infuses her gorgeous paintings with the colors of nature. I wasn’t planning on attending, Bob and I had a mini-Oktoberfest planned with some dear neighbors in their carport. They cooked the bratwurst and kraut, we all brought a dish along with our folding chairs.

But I managed to sneak away from a simmering pot of German-style potato soup to immerse my masked-and-vaccinated self in the swirl of mixed media and sculpture at the school’s gym.

Last year Artclectic was cancelled due to Covid. They may have had an online auction, but nothing beats meeting the artists – “In Real Time and Real Life” plus mingling with friends and neighbors! Our everyday lives are expanding; children must get to religious school or soccer practice, dogs must go to the vet, parents are back at work, and social events are continuing outside and inside. The Grands should be vaccinated next month… it’s like post-Covid life has begun.

After four years of the clown presidency, coupled with our current pandemic, our mundane day to day way of life has been stirring up a lot of metaphorical dust.

And with it all, the artist/writer who carried me through lockdowns and other losses is Nashville native, Margaret Renkl. She sees the world the way my better self would want to see it. She can break our natural world into words that will inspire her reader. And she did just that this morning in the NYTimes, “The First Thing We Do, Let’s Kill All the Leaf Blowers.”

“They come in a deafening, surging swarm, blasting from lawn to lawn and filling the air with the stench of gasoline and death. I would call them mechanical locusts, descending upon every patch of gold in the neighborhood the way the grasshoppers of old would arrive, in numbers so great they darkened the sky, to lay bare a cornfield in minutes. But that comparison is unfair to locusts…. Grasshoppers belong here. Gasoline-powered leaf blowers are invaders, the most maddening of all the maddening, environment-destroying tools of the American lawn-care industry.“

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/25/opinion/leaf-blowers-california-emissions.html

Leaf blowers are maddening! They can destroy a meditative dog walk in a minute. We live directly across the street from an apartment building, every single day there is a team of leaf blowers that surround the whole block. I hated the sound of them in Rumson on expansive suburban lawns, but here in the city, it’s not just the jet-like decibel level of noise. It’s the swirling daily dust and debris with an occasional leaf thrown in that is almost disabling. Conversation stops, we look away to protect our eyes, but sitting in our garden, mask-less, cannot protect our lungs.

“That dust can contain pollen, mold, animal feces, heavy metals and chemicals from herbicides and pesticides,” notes Sara Peach of Yale Climate Connections. All this adds up to increased risk of lung cancer, asthma, cardiovascular disease, premature birth and other life-threatening conditions.“

Bob has always been a huge proponent of “natural” lawn care. We would never spray chemicals on our lawn, we’d watch the grass turn yellow in August like it was meant to do, and Bob never believed in blowing the leaves into a pile. We’d occasionally rake the Fall bounty into piles for the proverbial ‘child romping in leaves’ picture. But he always felt like leaving the leaves alone was best, and maybe cleaning up the corners in the Spring. Turns out, Bob was right after all! But don’t tell him I said that.

Tell him I found a beautiful painting of the mountains, and I’m making another soup.

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The Woodcarver

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , on May 28, 2021| 6 Comments »

When Clay Hudson Favell, aka Great Grandpa Hudson, married my Mother-in-Law Ada 40 years ago, we were all at the wedding! And for once, Hudson wasn’t the officiant. Long before anybody could become certified to marry people via the internet, he was the go-to officiant for half of our friends and family. Our tiny Bride was the flower girl at Ada and Hudson’s parking lot wedding, who would grow up to marry her Groom in an apple orchard with Hudson under the chuppah; blessing the new couple with his grand daughter Violet spreading flowers at their feet.

How did a lapsed Southern Baptist pastor, a widower who had built hospitals in Ghana during his missionary days and fought in the South Pacific during WWII, end up marrying a divorced Brooklyn Jewish marriage and family counselor in NJ?

Easy! He was smitten from the moment he saw her. Hudson was the moon to Ada’s sun. He was kind, steadfast, thoughtful, and he adored her. We called him the Poughkeepsie Gypsy since he would drive from NY every week just to see her. Ada told me he doesn’t get flustered, and he keeps his promises. He always loved it when their children and grandchildren would descend on their home for Jewish holidays or just for a swim in the pool.

When Hudson lost his first born daughter, Louanna, in a car accident, Ada was there to help. And later when Ada lost her second born son, Richard, they joined that horrific club together – the one where parents have lost a child. By that time they had created a counseling business of their own, one where pastoral counseling and family therapy could blend seamlessly.

As Hudson began to retire his therapy practice, he started carving totem poles. This is how his son Charles described it –

“Hudson was an incredibly talented artist. His specialty was woodworking. He made one of a kind pieces of wood art on his lathe. Ranging from wooden tables and table legs to toys, including figurines of people that would be incorporated in family therapy sessions. Hudson was immensely talented with a chisel as well, creating countless works of art by hand. After a trip to Alaska with Ada, inspired by the totem poles he saw and learned about, Hudson taught himself how to carve story poles. He created numerous story poles that artistically described the stories of his life, and life with Ada.” 

https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/fort-smith-ar/hudson-favell-10209776

Ada and Hudson surrounded themselves with his totem poles, and soon he was getting commissions. Every Christmas we’d wonder what type of creative carving he would deliver. A mobile of a seagull one year, a bagel cutting block another. I’m not even sure how many oatmeal ladles I have that were hand-carved. Of course our cardinal totem pole, with Jewish and Irish symbols, is our favorite.

He was the only grandfather my children have ever known. I like to think he taught them the art of patience, he brought a southern sensibility to his northern family. A friend on Facebook said he was “…a quiet force of nature and wisdom.” The Rocker describes his grandfather like this:

“hudson was an archetype of post-war tough, a navy veteran with an impeccable work ethic, a gravelly southern drawl and minimalism of words. the quiet contemplative yin to my grandma’s firecracker yang. but he also subverted a lot of the expectations of the archetype. he was deeply emotionally intelligent, a professional therapist; he was an artist and a master woodcarver, his home was covered in gigantic totem poles (wink wink) that he carved by hand from wood he cut himself, and art he made or collected through the years he spent traveling the world with ada.”

And the Bride had this to say about Hudson:

“When I remember my grandparents, I still see them in their house in Dover, my grandma squealing with delight at our arrival, squeezing us tightly. And behind her, quietly rocking in his chair in front of the wood stove, my grandfather sits. Adding newspaper and wood to the fire, slowly, consistently, a big smile on his face to see us. The yin to her yang. The quiet, kind, consistent rock to her insatiable joy.“

Grandpa Hudson officiating at our Cville wedding 2010 with his son Charles

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Momala Kamala

Posted in an expository essay, Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 14, 2020| Leave a Comment »

I stood up clapping and yelling in my empty office after Kamala Harris spoke to an empty auditorium in Delaware on Wednesday. It was her first time appearing with Joe Biden as his running mate, and I was on pins and needles waiting for them. When she said the case against Mr T was “…open and shut,” I swooned. When she called our Toddler-in-Chief a whiner, I Tweeted; then I followed her husband – possibly the first ever Second Gentleman – on every social media platform!

When Kamala said, “I’ve had a lot of titles over my career and certainly vice president will be great, but ‘Momala’ will always be the one that means the most,” I got it.  I’m pretty sure only Italians and Jewish people use Momala as a token of endearment. She married Doug Emhoff, an entertainment lawyer, in 2014 and her two step-children started calling her Momala. Great Grandma Ada, who btw I’ve called Momala for years, called me up to tell me Emhoff was from Brooklyn; and then I read that Kamala broke a glass at their wedding to honor his tradition.

Wait, I misspoke. I wasn’t entirely alone watching Kamala on CNN. Ms Bean had been napping peacefully on her bed, only slightly medicated because of those pesky afternoon  thunderstorms, when my cheering started. I guess I must have been jumping around too much because she joined in with ferocity, barking and climbing up on me. She hasn’t seen me that excited in almost six months, or maybe even four years.

The Flapper was a realist when it came to politicians. Except for the great FDR, I remember her saying, “They’re all crooks.” But my foster parents were dyed-in-the-wool Democrats. I remember them getting dressed up to vote at night after Daddy Jim came home from work. And try as I might, they’d never say who they voted for, although it was pretty clear to me that they voted a straight line Democratic ticket.

After all, the Democrats were for the “working man,” the great “middle class.” I was also told the Irish vote blue, so there ya go. And once Kennedy, the first Irish Catholic president was elected and later assassinated when I was just 15 years old, my tribal loyalties were sealed in stone. McGovern was my first presidential vote, and I’m still proud of it to this day.

Many Dems I know felt discouraged after voting for Hillary in 2016 and watching the electoral college – a holdover from the southern slave states – trample our desire for a woman president. Discouraged and depressed. But this time there is something in the air. Systemic racism has crawled out of the shadows, and sitting on a fence for this election is simply unacceptable. Thanks to this administration, the American people will be asked to make a choice:

Continue running our government into the ground, chipping away at affordable healthcare during a global pandemic, and ignoring the economic plight of our people? Should we vote for a man who has single-handedly destroyed our trust in institutions like the Post Office and makes a mockery of the Justice Department? Or shall we vote for a return to truth and dignity with a Biden/Harris ticket?

She broke a piece of crystal under her heel at her wedding, and she will be the one to shatter the glass ceiling. Painting of Wonder Woman by Ashley Longshore.

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Corona Crafts

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 13, 2020| 2 Comments »

Either you are crafty, or you’re not. It’s like being pregnant, it’s impossible to be only slightly pregnant. Some people see a balled up Cadbury cream egg wrapper and think. “That’s just the bit of sparkle I need for my found art project;” and some people just pick it up and throw it away.

With a bit more time on my hands these last few months, I’ve turned to Pinterest for corona life hacks and inspiration. I discovered how to make fabric masks. I’ve found great recipes, and charming party ideas which I may use in the future, but it was finding an exquisite type of Japanese embroidery that really piqued my interest. I wanted to mend my favorite pair of corduroy pants – and so I started a whole new board:

Corona Crafts – so far I have 23 pins!

Granted, I never would have called myself “Crafty” in the past. I never bedazzled anything, not even a pair of sneakers. I never did scrapbooking, nope never understood that one. Sure I’d put my pictures in books – remember when we’d get to hold a picture? –  but I felt they were self-explanatory. Looking back over those books, I wish I’d have written down a date here and there.

Wait – I take it back. I did make a scrapbook once for the Bride when she went off to college, full of old pictures. I wanted her to remember where she came from, maybe because of my early life as a gypsy. Always trying to fit into two families. There were glamorous photos of Great Grandma Ada as a young bride, and pictures of us floating on a pond in Windsor, MA when the Bride was a baby.

In Middle School, my daughter started making Fimo clay beads. I actually bought a small toaster oven for her to use as a kiln. Since I use a toaster to make toast, buying a toaster oven was an investment in her artistic nature. She has actually passed that particular craft on to the Love Bug, they recently made some lovely Fimo beads for me to incorporate into necklaces.

Granted, I AM a stringer; although my love of stringing pearls into eternity necklaces has been usurped by mask-making. I never considered making jewelry to be a “craft.” For that matter, I didn’t consider my quilting or knitting back in the day to be lumped into that craft category either. I’m not sure why. Were they hobbies? Today, a young Icelandic knitter buys vintage sweaters and knits mouths and tongues onto them. I guess I’d call her an artist. https://www.thejakartapost.com/life/2020/05/12/icelandic-designer-makes-scary-masks-to-encourage-distancing.html

Maybe I’m just a Maker! After all, if a man has a wood shop in his garage, he’s called a woodworker. Why does being “crafty” have such a bad rap? Well, searching at dictionary.com gave me a clue: CRAFTY

adjective,craft·i·er, craft·i·est.

  1. skillful in underhand or evil schemes; cunning; deceitful; sly.
  2. Obsolete. skillful; ingenious; dexterous.

 

Is it because it implies a woman of a certain age with time to kill, idle hands and all? The Flapper never had time to be crafty; she worked full time and cooked and cared for us, and every Sunday she did her hair and nails, never setting foot in a beauty parlor! She was however a gifted artist, as is Kay and the Bride.

As we all slow down and bake sourdough bread, or make masks, I like to think we are all feeling a bit more creative, when we’re not bored/in/the/house/crying/in/our/wine. And if you don’t feel like making something, that’s OK too… but just in case. Here’s how to make beads out of newspaper – remember newspaper?  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/11/at-home/how-to-make-newspaper-beads.html

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Freedom

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , on June 16, 2020| 4 Comments »

Yesterday was a day for the record books. In a 6 to 3 ruling, the SCOTUS ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, passed when I was a junior in high school, also covers gay and transgender rights. Now, along with the rest of us, the LGBTQ community cannot be discriminated against in the workplace. ANY workplace. HALLELUJAH!

It was a glimmer of light in a desolate spring. Americans have been staying at home, making and wearing masks to protect the must vulnerable among us, giving up our freedom to assemble, to go to restaurants and beauty parlors, and hug our loved ones.

We have witnessed the murder of unarmed, African Americans by a police force operating with impunity for decades. Risking infection from a novel virus, we have marched and protested, demanding change. Americans of all colors and all religious beliefs have said enough is enough. Black people have not had the freedom to drive or walk… without the underlying fear of being attacked.

So now that Title VII is the law of the land, what do evangelical Christians think? Elizabeth Dias writes in the New York Times:

“No question it is going to make it harder to defend our religious freedom, as far as an organization being able to hire people of like mind,” said Franklin Graham, who leads Samaritan’s Purse, a large evangelical relief group.

“I find this to be a very sad day,” he said. “I don’t know how this is going to protect us.”

They want to be able to hire people of, “like mind.” Their “religious freedom” is at stake! I wonder, was this what Norman Rockwell meant when he painted the Four Freedoms? Tucking your child in at night, free of fear? Or was it the profiles of white faces deep in prayer?

Because Black parents today must have “the Talk” with their children about the police. Because White parents today must explain systemic racism to their children. Parents today are buying bullet-proof backpacks in anticipation of schools re-opening in the fall. Because a small number of Americans cannot see fit to give up their “freedom” to own assault rifles. Because some even marched into a statehouse, guns strapped to their backs, because these same “Freedom Loving” people didn’t like wearing masks!

Their freedom was at stake because of a cloth covering their nose and mouth.

Yesterday, the light did shine through a very big crack in our society. Bigger than the Liberty Bell. Maybe the intersection of gun violence and racism will finally be addressed by legislators saying NO to the NRA. Maybe the majority of Americans will be able to stop living in fear, and will practice their religion where it belongs – in a church, mosque, temple or their home.

Today is not a sad day. In fact, today is Great Grandma Ada’s 96th birthday and we will celebrate her as best we can, through the glass in the vestibule.

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Geography Lessons

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on February 3, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Anyone else love Samantha Bee? I caught a bit of her show Full Frontal one night, when she called the movie “Joker” just another story about an angry white guy. Granted I didn’t see the movie, like I didn’t watch the Super Bowl. But I was mildly comforted this morning to read that Joaquin Phoenix, who won the Best Actor award for his performance as Joker last night in Britain, said

“I think that we send a very clear message to people of colour that you’re not welcome here.” 

To me, this is everything. Because Brexit is all about not welcoming “The Other.” Mr T is all about building his wall and keeping The Others out of our country. And even though I heard that JLo and Shakira put on an excellent half-time show, the NFL is all about the money – getting people in their seats and tuning in to watch a game that white-washes the Black Lives Matter movement… at the expense of its players’ mental and physical health.

To be honest, I did catch a bit of The Puppy Bowl.

But it was a dispiriting start to the weekend for many Nashvillians when Sen Lamar Alexander cast his vote against calling witnesses in the Impeachment Trial of Donald J Trump. We really cannot call this a “trial” without witnesses or documents. Even Monica Lewinsky testified (via tape) in Clinton’s trial. Even UVA’s esteemed professor of all things political, Larry Sabato, asked on Twitter if this Senate meeting should be called a sham or a farce instead of a trial. I replied, “It’s a coverup!”

The Senate has said facts are not welcome there. First hand accounts would be useless to their deliberation. If the Donald tells them to blackball a vote why then, they must. I wondered about the etiology of the word “blackball” as soon as it came out of my mind and into my fingers:

The word blackball appears in 1770, referring to a negative vote. Voting through the process of a voter placing either a white ball, or positive vote, into a ballot box or a black ball, or negative vote, into a ballot box, means that voters will remain anonymous and are not forced to give any reason for a negative vote. In some clubs a single black ball means a candidate will be denied membership in the organization, in other clubs there must be two black balls to justify excluding a potential member.  https://grammarist.com/idiom/blackball/

The Hill actually IS a private club of mostly old, white men who are not happy with women and people of colour (as the Brits say) challenging their asses in the seats. Did you know that Mr T watched the Super Bowl with the paying members of his club at Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach? We taxpayers paid to fly him down there for the weekend so he could hob nob with people who forked over nearly half a million dollars just to join his historic resort.

Is it funny that he Tweeted a congratulatory note to the Kansas City Chiefs from the “Great State of Kansas?” We have an untethered, narcissistic, idiotic, despot at the helm, who now thinks he can bribe anybody he wants cause hey, it’s in the best interests of the country. And HE is synonymous with the country. Don’t try to find that Tweet, cause somebody changed it to Missouri.

When Mr Alexander voted against calling witnesses I knew the gig was up. We will just have to beat him in November. And who is the next best hope for Iowa and the Democratic party? We cannot afford to play by the rules, we need someone who can stand up, toe to toe with Mr T and call him out on his lies. You can’t beat a bully by turning your other cheek, it doesn’t work that way. We need a fighter, and I’m afraid that Biden’s fighting days are behind him. We don’t need another angry, old white guy.

Tonight I’m heading to my favorite bookstore to hear Rick Wilson speak about Mr T; Wilson is the author of “Running Against the Devil.” About Trump’s little geographical error on Twitter, Wilson said: “This was a silly, innocent mistake” would be more viable if this wasn’t the thousandth iteration of his blistering ignorance.”

https://www.parnassusbooks.net/event/author-event-rick-wilson-author-running-against-devil

This is an art installation of all the people who were killed by guns in 2018 in Nashville. Who will have the guts to take this on?

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Say Anything

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, science, tagged , , , , , , , on December 9, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Reality is a fluid thing when your president attacks the press and sends his personal counsel on errands to create or approve a conspiracy. It leaves us walking along in a fog of Christmas cheer mixed with New Year dread – what’s next?

A soliloquy that screams of Lady Macbeth in the bathroom? “We have a situation where we’re looking very strongly at sinks and showers. And other elements of bathrooms….” said the leader of the free world, which just made me scratch my head. Is this the rambling of a demented mind? Move along, nothing to see here!

As we were entering the Vanderbilt auditorium last week, I noticed a small group of young men handing out flyers. Walking down Madison Avenue in NYC I’d usually just keep moving, wave them off saying, “No thanks,” but our small group of friends stopped to engage with the students on this chilly Nashville night. They were clean cut and sincere, they just wanted us to “know something:’ their flyer read:

“Why is Vanderbilt giving Steven Pinker a platform to speak?”   

Pinker, a Harvard Cognitive Psychologist, had a relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Hmmm Epstein, Epstein now where had I heard that name? It took a few beats before the sleazy sex trafficker came to mind.

I mean I’ve been so impressed and astonished by the impeachment hearings I’d almost forgotten the poor guy, left alone in his cell by 2 sleeping guards. But like Prince Andrew, Pinker was being sullied by association with Epstein: by flying on his private jet the “Lolita Express;” by collaborating with Alan Dershowitz to manipulate the language of Epstein’s defense on child sex trafficking that resulted with a very generous plea deal; and by being photographed with him at a party after his conviction.

Why thank you students! I was on pins and needles during the Chancellor’s Lecture, waiting for a protest to erupt or Pinker to meltdown, but nothing happened. Absolutely nothing! Southern students have manners or tremendous restraint. So i went home and Googled the guy.

I didn’t know that Epstein courted scientists, that he had donated 6.5 Million to Harvard, helping to found the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics?! Did you know Epstein was a devout transhumanist who wanted to seed the world with his sperm and freeze his head and his penis when he died? Honestly, I was wondering if this news was legit. All I’d read about was his crazy relationship with the Victoria’s Secret’s CEO, Leslie Wexner.

But Epstein was throwing tons of parties with money, booze and girls for scientists on his island and in New Mexico. He was reviving eugenics.

“On multiple occasions starting in the early 2000s, Mr. Epstein told scientists and businessmen about his ambitions to use his New Mexico ranch as a base where women would be inseminated with his sperm and would give birth to his babies, according to two award-winning scientists and an adviser to large companies and wealthy individuals, all of whom Mr. Epstein told about it.

It was not a secret. The adviser, for example, said he was told about the plans not only by Mr. Epstein, at a gathering at his Manhattan townhouse, but also by at least one prominent member of the business community. One of the scientists said Mr. Epstein divulged his idea in 2001 at a dinner at the same townhouse; the other recalled Mr. Epstein discussing it with him at a 2006 conference that he hosted in St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands.”  https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/31/business/jeffrey-epstein-eugenics.html

In the New York Times article, Pinker disavows a relationship with Epstein, saying he thought he was an “intellectual imposter,” using adolescent humor to switch subjects if a conversation wasn’t going his way. Now who does that remind you of?

Last weekend I was recounting this example of student activism to a friend at a holiday party. We were two drinks in and the party was heating up when I heard a woman’s voice from across the room yell,

“HE WAS MURDERED!”

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Silent Night

Posted in BBC, Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, racism, tagged , , , , , , , , on August 13, 2019| 2 Comments »

It was almost 2 am, my mind was a jumble of raw nerve endings. I tried to concentrate on my breath, to meditate my way back to sleep, but I ended up instead tracing the alphabet with my feet. Ankle exercises can be comforting. Then it suddenly got very dark. tomb-like-dark. And it was quiet, no house humming quiet. I wondered if it was just that Bob’s phone stopped lighting up. He had returned from a trip to FL, visiting his brother. But the alarm clock was black; our power was out.

Today it’s supposed to creep up toward 100 degrees, one of the hottest days of the year.

So what did I do? I woke Bob of course, after all maybe it was just a fuse that needed to switch. But it was the whole street, all the street lamps were out, thousands of people without power.

Are you a midnight wanderer? Do you raid the refrigerator at night, or watch TV when you can’t sleep? I’m a Reader with a capital R. So after 2 hours of mingling our feet and talking by flashlight, commiserating about our old whole house generator in the mountains, when the power finally came back on I picked up a National Geographic magazine about Migration.

It was like a crash course in “How Not to be a White Supremacist!” Because 1) tracing DNA has become so affordable, and 2) some tiny, miniscule bone in our inner ear that is the most dense bone in our body has been storing all of our primitive ancestors’ secrets since the Ice Age, therefore 3) anthropologists have been able to trace the Three Great Human Migrations!

“Who Were the First Europeans?” by Andrew Curry is in this month’s issue A WORLD ON THE MOVE. “Europeans living today, in whatever country, are a varying mix of ancient bloodlines hailing from Africa, the Middle East, and the Russian Steppe.” In other words neo-Nazis, get over yourselves and your replacement theory. https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/2019/07/first-europeans-immigrants-genetic-testing-feature/

We are all descendants of farmers who tolerated nomads (hunter/gatherers) and then rode horses across continents as plague almost decimated our species. That’s a pretty small nutshell, but some people were dark with green eyes, and some were light with brown eyes and somehow we managed to survive, together. Last night:

I was worrying about the Love Bug who starts 2nd Grade today. We spent the afternoon together and she had a fever, an ear infection, would her parents send her to school?

I was worrying about Great Grandma Ada, because she worries about me all the time so I thought I’d return the favor.

I was worrying about children separated from their parents because I was separated from my Mother the Flapper when I was 10 months old.

This morning I was surprised by how low the Trump administration could go, though I really shouldn’t have been. He is changing the rules and regulations for LEGAL immigrants to obtain a green card, making it more difficult to obtain visas or become citizens. Why you may ask? If a person has relied on any form of public assistance for more than ONE year, they will be invited to leave! The article was hiding inside the BBC News website. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49323610

This bears repeating – LEGAL Immigrants who do not meet the GOP’s rules of “self-sufficiency” will be deported. So legal immigrants working part-time at Walmart will have to go if they rely on food aid or public housing….

I didn’t go to this year’s East Nashville Tomato Festival because Bob wasn’t here, but also because I’m becoming afraid of crowds. What keeps you up in the middle of the night?

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Nana Camp

Posted in Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , on July 16, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Did you go to summer camp? Swim in a lake that glistened like diamonds in the sun? Play jacks on the front porch and sleep in a frozen cabin in the mountains with a nun secluded in one corner behind a locked door? Rise to a recording of Reveille every morning and assemble under the flag pole for inspection? Sing your heart out to the Virgin Mary!

No? Well I loved it! I mean I actually dreamt about that place, Camp St Joseph for Girls, into my adult years; so it’s no wonder I jumped at the chance to hold a little day camp of my own for the Love Bug this week. Her brother would be in his pre-school program, and it seems that Pop Bob is busy with other things, so the girls will be large and in charge.

Today we are picking up the Bride and Great Grandma Ada for a trip to The Frist Museum. https://fristartmuseum.org/ Today will be Nana Camp on Wheels.

Four generations will roam the gallery exhibit of “Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera and Mexican Modernism…”

“Kahlo infused her work with mexicanidad, an identification with Mexico’s distinct national history, traditions, culture, and natural environment, but in a much more personal way. About a third of her paintings are self-portraits, the works for which she is now most celebrated. They accentuate her distinctive appearance, characterized by a v-shaped unibrow, deep brown eyes, mustache, carefully coiffed hair with braids, and indigenous Mexican clothing. In Diego on My Mind(Self-Portrait as Tehuana), for example, she crowns herself with a festive indigenous Mexican headdress known as a resplandor.” 

So while Mr T terrorizes undocumented immigrants with ICE raids, we will be viewing an exhibition of fine art collected by Eastern European immigrants to Mexico before WWII. “Jacques and Natasha Gelman were glamorous and wealthy Eastern European refugees who married in Mexico in 1941, took part in Mexico City’s vibrant art scene, and acquired art mostly from their artist friends.”

While refugees are separated from their families and caged without access to showers or even toothpaste at our southern border, we will delight in the art of our Mexican neighbors. The irony doesn’t escape me. We now have a commander in chief with bone spurs who loved to cavort with Jeffrey Epstein and tells Congresswomen of color to return to the countries of their origin. His language by Tweet is not so subtle, coded to signal his white nationalist/supremacist/misogynist followers that it’s OK to hate the “Other.”

For awhile I was immune to his horrible early morning Tweet tirade probably made from his golden toilet seat, I was news-free. But I’m home for better or worse. My first day in Nashville I awoke to a headache and sore throat, a viral cold had attacked me. The City is tearing up our alley to fix some damage an apartment building has done to the ancient sewers, so jackhammers punctuate my mornings. And Bob has replaced the classical music station on our Sonos with old-time Rock and Roll. Nothing stands in the way of progress, as Adelaide’s Lament would say, “A person can develop a BAD BAD cold!”  Achoo!

Did I mention that Day 1 of Nana Camp included learning to play pranks!

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The Wild Orchid

Posted in books, Books, Journaling, Wedding, Country, tagged , , , , , , , , on March 5, 2019| 2 Comments »

This weekend we had our very first double sleepover. We picked up both Grandkids around lunchtime Saturday and returned them to their grateful parents on Sunday. Bob warned me not to get my hopes up, four year olds may meltdown at bedtime and need to go home in his PJs. I however, would have none of that thinking, we were going to have so much fun, my L’il Pumpkin would forget where he was and sleep like an angel. Which, spoiler alert, they both did!

When we arrived at our townhouse it was cold and drizzly with an Amazon box on the front porch. I’d been collecting beads and jewelry making tools for the Love Bug for awhile now, and had recently found a cute craft box for her. She is very much like my daughter, her Mama; type A, hyper-organized, in love with the Container Store. I knew she’d love her craft box, but I needed something for her brother.

Thank goodness for two day delivery service. I ordered a small tackle box and a bunch of kid-sized real tools for the L’il Pumpkin. I had a plan but forgot to tell Bob about it, luckily he pitched right in – explaining each tool, then trudging up the steps together, they began “fixing” things, including the squeaky daybed he and his sister would be sleeping on that night!

I know – raising gender neutral kids is new to me, though I did help the Pumpkin make a Black Panther necklace!

Then we went out for a trek in Ms Berdelle’s Secret Garden. We searched in the misty rain for Tinkerbell trim – small, delightful pieces of nature to design and  construct a fairy house: pine cones, bark, leaves, dead flowers, berries, stones, snail shells. Anything glorious and small would do. I didn’t dig up moss for a thatched roof because Bob said it’s still living and we’re not arguing anymore over little things like that.

Every summer at Camp St Joseph for Girls I loved hiking through the woods and coming upon a fairy circle; a large, round patch of sumptuous moss surrounded by ferns in the dappled sunlight. I’m sure my love of mystery and magic began there in the Catskill Mountains many years ago.

When we returned home I started cooking dinner for four again! Mrs Zimmerman’s shallot chicken, mashed potatoes (little clouds), and broccoli (little tress). At Nana and Pop Bob’s house they can watch TV while I’m cooking and eat as little or as much as they want. It warmed my heart to see how much these two love butter! We followed that up with popsicles because we’re saving popsicle sticks for the fairy house. Then we played a good game of Alphabet Fish and the Li’il Pumpkin won!

After pulling out the trundle bed, we read my Editor Lisa Winkler’s book about a girl named Zimmerman, “Amanda at Bat” https://www.amazon.com/Amanda-at-Bat-Lisa-Winkler/dp/1533240094  It is a wonderful story about speaking up and making sure your voice is heard. And their eyes were starting to droop by the end of “Escargot,” while the Frozen night light sent its bat signal onto the ceiling of our 2nd bedroom. Good Night Room.

Long story semi-short, we all slept like babies and Bob made blueberry pancakes in the morning. Then we high-tailed it off to Great Grandma Ada and Hudson’s apartment to build our fairy house. Bob and I had made an executive decision to skip Hebrew School, sorry cousin Nancy! We’ve made a brave start jockeying a glue gun like nobody’s business, and we’re relying on Hudson to carve a tiny crooked fairy door. We have a very special tree stump in mind… then the Bride arrived to pick them up.

I was going to write about orchid and dandelion children. How one needs special care and an exquisite environment, while the other will flourish no matter where they find themselves. That’s the program I was listening to on NPR when I sat down to write, an old rehash of nature vs nurture. My Love Bug was definitely a wild orchid baby, the kind who would wake at the sound of a pin dropping, while her brother could sleep through a smoke alarm.

And I realized that I was a mixture of the two, a child who was smothered by my foster mother Nell, and never allowed to have a sleepover, yet my St Joseph camp mates could never wake me when it was time to head out into the night looking for trouble. But don’t worry, I found my own trouble eventually!

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