a lesson learned…..

This week or parts of it, I might have been spending with a friend.  At my request, his journey to my address was not made, even though originally I was to do the traveling.  In speaking of New Year’s Eve, he declared, “I often spend New Year’s Eve drinking and writing in my diary, or going to a tepid party and wishing I could go home and drink and write in my diary.”

I took that suggestion to heart, and have for part of this day done exactly that.  The oddest thing is that after having met a new person last week (was it only last week?), I have met yet another.  I will leave the commentary until more time passes.  Are these the bright, honest people for whom I have waited?  Searched all these many months?  Surely one will stand out above the other soon.

I’m afraid I am a bloody bore on this festive (for some) occasion.  I will take to my bed after watching an episode of Lillie… the lovely period production of the life and times of Lillie Langtry (supplied by Netflix).  I am always intrigued by these productions that are so close to the story as we know it. 

And this photo is one of hundreds, perhaps thousands taken by one of many of the famous who were allowed into her precious life.  Enough said.

So, I thank my friend for providing a lesson for me on this day of days.  I am quite happy, content and not at all wishing to be with friends, family or others to bring in the new year.  I’m also sure that I’ll be thrilled in the morning, waking up on my own, not having to make breakfast for anyone.  

( The next bit is homage to another Lily… this time Lily Tomlin…for those of you who remember this bit.)

And that’s the truth, 

Treated myself to a wonderful massage today.  Kate outdid herself.  Caused me to energize in a way I hadn’t felt for months and months…. perhaps never.  Spent time doing chores I had left undone for months!  Thanks, Kate.

Good night, my dears.  Grateful that the world is still revolving….. reminds me of a line in one of my favorite songs ever…….

Please note lyrics do not repeat….. love that.

And I can’t let the old year go by without a quick performance of my fave of all time. I can’t help dancing around when this comes on ANYWHERE!

Dig the bass drum action.  Oh yeah, they’re from Sacramento!

later…………..

day of meditation….

My ergo regarding my day of deep meditation includes more clarity than I would like to admit.  Frustration, plenty of questions, unexpected intrusions, changes of temperature, passage of time, need for bodily nutritional sustenance, and many other things that I thought would take considerable consideration melted into the ethers.  I was totally alone, save for the noise of the air conditioner (heater in this case).  

The reason for the art was there…. even why the diverse aspects of the art.

The art itself was there.

Questions were answered honestly and in a totally forthright manner.

I am exhausted and unable to sleep, but totally re-energized… a rejuvination, you could say.

I go to my little job this morning in a few minutes having finally leapt into bed at 4 and out again at 6:15am.

So easily called back to that amazing place.  The day was quite fascinating……. I did many chores that had been waiting for days. I had thought the actual doing of them through so many times, that I did them on autopilot. Each time I took a break, my mind charged me with yet another task while keeping part of my brain quite focused on the primary purpose of the day.  

There are several heavy weights that are still with me.  Those are on the way out, albeit slowly.  The plans are afoot — and will be carried out in an orderly manner.

I’ve always found it most interesting that there are times when typing meditation that it comes out medication or mediation.  Those are the times I look closely at my life, realizing that my brain is having a conversation with itself!

I leave you this morning with a smile on my face and a song in my heart, wondering the temperature outside, and wishing to jump back into my bed in my altogether and make like a big X.

I’ll be back later……………

hysterectomy + 3 months, part one

Yes, I made it.  Exactly three months ago today on September 29th, also a Monday, I was perched upon a hospital gurney awaiting the great push into the operating room.  Of course, I had to answer the same series of questions for each person who appeared at my gurneyside.  The lineup began with the intake nurse, and was followed in somewhat rapid succession by one anaesthesiologist, then another, the surgeon (my own gyn) and his resident assistant, the actual nurse, another anaesthesiologist, and I’m sure one or two others.

By this time, it was nearly 7:30am (I’d arrived at hospital with my son, Sam and a friend at 5:30am).  My entourage in the waiting room thought I was already under the knife.  As I dozed in the pre-op room, I was suddenly awakened by the realization that I was moving.  Thinking I was dreaming, I relaxed into the ride which ended as we drove through a door into a room where the lights were bright… but not screamingly so.  I looked around at those present, saw the surgeon, Dr. Mark Seaver (my hero!), and all the other aforementioned personnae, heard the anaesthesiologist say, “I’m going to give you a little something to……”    and that’s all I remember from that room.

I do remember that it was quite cold, and that my surgeon had on a cap that was made out of black and white fabric reminiscent of a particular breed of cattle.  More on that another time.

I remember being very relaxed, not at all fearful, just happy that I was in good hands.  After all, I had asked over a hundred friends and relatives to meditate, pray, think positively about my surgery from about two weeks prior to the event.  I don’t usually ask anyone for anything.  I truly believe that simple request made my run up to surgery, the actual surgery and subsequent recovery a brush of a whisker rather than a fearful, painful occasion.

To be continued tomorrow…..

so I’m awake…

had a wonderful shower, prepared to install new shower curtain…… it stuck together in several places.  Means I have to return to the store from whence I purchased the dreadful thing…. tomorrow.

As I said yesterday, I will be engaged in meditating for most of today.  The projected start time is 9am.  I will be embedded in fabric, in clay, in thought.

I don’t feel “well” today.  Trepidation, guilt, hunger, hope for the future.  I can smell a tangerine that is past its best.  What a permeating odor it produces.  

Some obsessive compulsive issues coming up today.  Picked up a basket in the studio a couple of days ago and several stray beads came rolling out. Now you most likely don’t know this, but I don’t like walking on a floor that has extraneous stuff on it – such as beads and little bits of junk.  So the broom will be employed throughout the house this morning.  I should use the wonderful vacuum cleaner I got a couple of years ago, but it’s buried at the back of a closet somewhere.

A modicum of disorder is tolerable, but at a certain point, all progress stops whilst I engage in returning the place to order.  This morning, took the beginnings of the new red white and black piece off the wall to press it with the iron (I do so love ironing… seriously!).  In doing so, I sat down and refolded maybe 20 pieces of cloth from whence I had cut a few random shapes yesterday.  A few moments spent so that I can continue with the ironing et al. in a few minutes.

Going to have a good cuppa this morning.  Even bought real milk for the experience.  Strong English tea, full of caffeine and milk.  Yes.  When I lived in England, I got addicted to it and tolerated severe headaches as my withdrawals.  That’s when I used to drink several pots of tea each day, between teaching music at a couple of prestigious schools and working diligently at the landscape nursery across the street from home.  That was a pursuit second to none for me.  My hands were in the soil every day, either pricking out seedlings, sideshooting tomato plants, rearranging the plants into a new formation or laughing at the boss’ jokes.  I loved every minute. Spent most of my wages on produce in the greengrocery attached to the nursery.  It was there that I met a woman, Mrs. Bates, who not only lived across the road from me, but also could do her sums with incredible speed and accuracy.  Some days she couldn’t add one + one.  Fascinating.

What’s all this remembering?  

Ok. I’m going to start this process now.  Start with ironing the fabrics for the wall piece.  As my life begins its simplification, the art seems to get more complex.  Transference?  I’m thinking it might be relaxing to simplify the art……. but that’s where I get it all out.

later……………

floor work…

Perish the thought that you might think I have started an exercise routine!

My floor word recollection in a previous posting referred to cutting fabric on a large, flat surface.  The floor.  

In my minor reminiscence, I also recalled when I first started making clay objects.  I had a small piece of plywood on the floor in front of me, coiling and pinching pots as fast as my little hands would take me… .mind you, my hands were hardly small, as I was maybe in my early 20s living at Selby Ranch (the apartments, not the horse ranch that was there first) experimenting with clay — which I adored.

I had been introduced to clay by a former friend…. yes, I too have “former” friends.  She did things that were inexplicable and so downright objectionable that I could not bear to be around her, even though we had seen each other through high school and college.  She purported to be a wonderful kindergarten teacher, but treated her children abominably, during which time her husband left her.  Both of her children have been incarcerated for various issues.  Such as you might think typical, she subsequently went back to college, and got a master’s degree in marriage and family counseling, and has a private practice.  I happen to know that she is the same woman I knew…. nothing has changed.  No further comments, your honor.

What started that?  Oh the mention of clay.  Interesting.  I got a book on handbuilding clay shortly after starting, and saw on the cover a native American woman sitting on the ground, building her clay pottery on the ground.  Thought someone had taken a photo of me, but alas, it was many years prior to my experience.

It was then that I left clay behind until about 5 years ago, whereupon I dug into the clay, got my fingernails all icky, and loved every minute.  Have stopped only for a few days since then.  Even took vacations around clay…. in Taos, NM in July 2007, and Tahlequah, OK in July 2008.  Changed my perception and processes forever.

Now, I’m really tired.  Perhaps having avoided that nap, I will be able to sleep for a slightly longer period tonight.  

I’m going to the land of nod.

later………………

change of plans….

As I said, predictability is not my forte, unless like my son, you’ve known me over 20 years.

Went in to take a short nap, and instead moved the bed to the preferred position, with one of the small chests of drawers by the door adorned with the little 15″ tv.  It’s a start.  Odd how moving the bed has opened up a load of possibilities.  I will go get my koa rocker or the beaver tail Morris chair soon.  Now, there’s even room for a small table where I can write…. with pen and paper!

Very much excitement in my brain tonight, accompanied by a tweet bit of who knows what.  

All I know is that I am where I need to be.  I’m doing what I need to be doing.  

Tomorrow is a day of meditation and reflection.  Hoping for momentary clarity.

Tune in for the next installment.  You are all very dear to me.

later………………..

unwarranted

When you least expect it, they all say, it will jump up and bite you in the most unlikely place……. before you have your wits about you, the poisonous wretch will kill you.  In this case, the one who sucked out the poison reaped the reward.

I have been brought to my senses.  Today I am alive, heard, awakened, unstifled, open, extubated, unnumbed, and believe it or not…. grateful.

The red white and black fabric piece is started (pieces cut). The clay ideas are bursting out of my brain, and will tomorrow be applied to the waiting cold earthlike red clay in my studio outside.

As to my comments the other day regarding whether I should continue any of this artistic nonsense….. suffice it to say that it has been unleashed and woe be to any man or woman who stands in my way from this moment on.

The table and shelves in storage will have to wait until I finish those items in process.  I have only just had a recollected vision of my first cutting of fabric as a child.  I followed the lead of my mother and grandmother who both sat on the floor, feet and legs splayed widely apart, fabric with patterns pinned on, the sound of the sharp scissors cutting madly through the cloth.

Many years ago, I stopped using pins, and actually ended my hand made clothing pursuits as well.  Why stop with the pins?  Grandma gave me a simple patchwork quilt that had been tied by hand.  Unfortunately, in the initial pinning together, she missed taking out one crucial pin which I found one night as I rolled up in the offending quilt.  My scream brought several family members running.  It was from that night that I resolved to use no straight pins.  Where pins were/are needed, I use safety pins that I close judiciously as soon as they enter the fabric.  You can feel a bloomin’ safety pin much easier than a straight pin.  I’ve even used fabric glue a couple of times, none of which I enjoy, for there is that little dab place that dries hard and makes the entry of a needle near impossible if it happens that more than one dab place happen to line up, making a severely difficult place to sew on a bead or other object.

Where am I? 

Ah, yes.  I was searching for the safety pins with which I will temporarily apply the circles of redonwhite, whiteonred, blackonwhite, whiteonblack, and so on.  Progress will be documented here periodically.  You will see the work go from piles of fabric to finished product.  Might take a couple of weeks, as my additions of beads and other stitchings and silks and stones are getting more and more complex as time passes.

I would like to go to bed and dream for a while right now.  Perhaps I shall do just that.

With the exception of the kitchen floor and front room addition of flowers I got a couple of days ago, those two rooms are very close to being finished. The pink bedroom and subsequent new fabric studio are finished except for the hanging of a lovely beaded bag I bought and the laying of two pink rugs for by the bedside and at the foot of the bed, which I will be turning a different direction tomorrow morning, or perhaps even this evening.

Found the safety pins.  I’m off to finish a bit of the placement on the background fabric.  Most people like the backgrounds I choose.  This one is a shocker…. black and white batik…. black background with little brush strokes of white all over.  I love it!

Going to take a nap, then take a shower.  Don’t get me started about showers.

By the way, tomorrow brings the third month anniversary of my surgery.  I will be listing the things I can do, those I don’t wish to do, and where I’m going as a result of the surgery…. but of course, I never usually stick to the course laid out in front of me.  We’ll see, dear ones.

later…………

fabric…

I just remembered that I paid $50 for a class at JR Flamingo fabric shop back in June.  I cancelled my participation in the class way back when.  They still have my $50.  I think I’d better go over there today, before they forget what I’m owed.  I hope they will give me the dollar value in Kaffe Fassett fabrics that I greatly love.  I would rather have the cash, but feel that might be unlikely now.  

Can’t hurt to try.  

Off to meet my new friend again in a bit.

Sorted through red white and black fabrics this morning.  Interesting what I found .  Took a couple of snaps of the chosen fabrics for you to see….

There will also be red white and black silks.

And now I must away, once more, with visions of fabrics and beads dashing about in my brain.

later……………..

Another day, another…….man

Morning, dearies.  I’m chuffed this morning.  For some ungodly reason, I was thrown together with someone last night… someone about whom I am quite curious, and who is also quite curious about me.  We all met over a delicious Korean dinner.  I always knew there could be attraction at first sight, but this was extraordinary.  It was not even lust or love at first sight, but a strange ne’er before felt state of confusion over which all else had no control.  

Yes, the universe has provided.  

Now, my next chore is to cancel all previously arranged engagements for at least the next few weeks so that what may will out has the space and time to do so.

This feels strange enough for me to toss aside all who still are interested in the old broad.  We spoke of the “C” word — creativity, the process, the channeling, the abandon during creation, and many other things.

You say I’m nuts?  I’ve heard that before, but this time I was not the seeker, dear friends.  I went to the get-together as an innocent… 

The art in me has erupted again.  In red white and black.  Happy to proclaim my part in the world of creativity once again.  This weekend, barring rain or snow in my back yard, I will rent a small van and go to the storage place to get my granny’s work table, and some bookshelves made by a would be lover back nearly 15 years ago.  He is also with me every day in spirit.

Oh let me go do my duty, dears.  The green silk fabric will have to take a back seat for now.  I’m on to the blatant.  Au revoir pour le moment.

later……………….

apologies, Sir Harold…

My dear Sir Harold.  

I hope you will forgive me for diving into Eartha Kitt’s youtubes prior to yours. Pinteresque is a poignant descriptor, which could also refer to one of the doctors with whom I used to work, Joseph Pinter, M.D., now working and thriving in Portland, Oregon.  One of the most relevant wits in my world until a year or so ago.  Here’s to Joe!

 

 

Dr. Joe Pinter

Now I’ve done it again.  Left you behind Sir Harold.  

 

Lest we forget your misunderstood humour….

au revoir