It's not spring, yet

Each morning I put on my light weight spring fleece and proceed with the morning. When breakfast is done, a couple of hours later, I still am not warm, and change into my heavy duty winter fleece for the rest of the day. It really isn't spring, yet.

Our governor and his team are staggering reopening of the state. This poor fellow is a Republican to the end of his toenails, yet his plan to have us up and running again has his fellow Republicans beating on the statehouse door in frustration. A couple are suing for the "right" to throw everyone back in the arena, say on Friday. 

I went outside to admire my "garden", all of one plus pots. I didn't try for pictures, but the zinnia pot is littered with little green double leaves. The ranunculus  pot has little specs of greenery here and there. If saying anything to me, it is "Don't forget Friday is mandevillas! Don't forget!"

And I spent the rest of the day hemming the black and cream towels. They seemed iffy to me as I wove them, but the rest of the process melded the weave together. Charming, right out of a twenties kitchen.

Because I put the last full bobbin in the bobbin case when I started, I concluded my day filling all my bobbins again.

Good to go for quite some time. I cannot remember when I last had twelve bobbins full.
  

It's raining on Sunday

There is no sunshine for the cat to sleep the day away, basking in a pool of heat and light. I am finishing towels. Every time I stand, he is literally underfoot, foiling every move. I should have a step counter; I am taking countless more today not to trip or stumble, even to literally walk through a door.

This is a picture of a mizerble day. It's rain falling, relentlessly. I hope it plays for you.

Except for watching my feet and ignoring outdoors, I'm in a reasonable frame of mind. I'm within ten pages of finishing Sapiens, Yuval Harari, a brief history of human kind. It will be a while before I open the next volume, Homo Deus. It's as thick as Sapiens, which five hundred pages were a "brief" history of our world.

That said, I have read all the pages over the last month and not tossed it aside for anther read. It is fascinating. In the beginning, there were all of us. Homo erectus, habilis, Neanderthal, Denisovan,and so on through nine identified Homo species, plus dinosaurs, Dodos, saber toothed cats, extinct trees, fish, insects. We outlasted them all, and not by war or forced marches.

I think next I will move on to another Alexandra Fuller. I first read Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight, the story of her childhood as the daughter of eccentric post revolutionary parents in Africa. It was interesting and sympathetic and compelling. I could have recommended it, but my own life kept interfering. I decided to read another, and got Travel Light, Move Fast. 

It was the same sort of good reading, recommended book, until right  there at the end. It was a clap to the head. There in the stack you can see how many more Alexandra Fuller's there now are to read.

And Keith Richardson is upside down in there. His bare chest is too much to look at at breakfast. There's one called Maphead, an alternate name for my sister. That sounded interesting, and probably will break up some other reading.

So that's Sunday in a rainy Ohio lock down. I am interested to see if that rain is raining.

No rain. Some white streaks must inflame your imagination. I should learn how to do videos, but it's 4:30, and I'm ready to make supper. Have a good week. Our sun will shine on Tuesday.

A lot of day for one day

Days have drifted slowly, somnambulant, looney, like sleepwalking these couple of months. Since our governor shut down my state, the only touchstone of reality is trash pickup. I do a little or a bit, or nothing. I talk to my neighbor, my sister, my daughter. I go to the mailbox, for the weekly collection of junk mail.

I did hope the crisis would end junk mail. There is a perceptible lessening, but alas, it remains with us.

Today I took the black and cream off the loom, to begin the end process.

First it goes to the serger to secure the cut ends. I put the end under the presser foot and began sewing--without lowering the presser foot. Decent words will not describe the mess I had. With tweezers I commenced removing the threads jammed solidly in the throat plate and around the presser foot.

The I began rethreading the machine, leaving to the end the one needle I swore I never would unthread, the one inside, behind and threaded from back to front. I got to it and could not get it threaded. I called my sister. No answer. I tried for another hour, and then my memory shouted, you need a bridge cleaner!

I called my sister again; she has the same serger and surely would have a pack of bridge cleaners. No answer.

I checked Amazon. I would pay expedited delivery to get them tomorrow! I'm not kidding you, bridge cleaners are not a priority for Amazon, which proclaims to have rearranged shipping priorities to get what is needed the most out the soonest. No bridge cleaners before June.

I called my drug store. Try to make a twenty something understand! Finally I moaned "You certainly aren't even old enough to have a bridge!" I refined my description as I delt with several more drug stores. It's a mono filament line with a loop on one end to guide under a tooth bridge for cleaning.

My doorbell rang. My gentleman neighbor across the way told me someone he did not recognize was driving through the park, hoping to find me. He offered to stay, in case it was an unsavory character and I might need rescuing. But I said I was fine and went to the street, and met someone who introduced herself as an old customer.

She knew I lived in the park because I'd mentioned it, and she knew if she asked enough people she would find me. She wanted to buy towels for gifts for an upcoming wedding. Lovely. I brought her into the studio and she left with four yellow towels for the bride and a kiwi towel for her kitchen.

My sister called and yes, she only yesterday found an old box of bridge cleaners in the drawer of one of the old studio sewing machines. She would bring it over after supper.

At the end of my day that had flipped from nothing to overflowing, Jan knocked on my door and yoo-hooed. "It's me and here are the bridge cleaners."

And I immediately responded, "since you're here, will you rethread that last needle. You know, the one threaded back to front!" And she sat down to do it. Bridge cleaner in hand, she turned it this way and that, trying to see how we used to do it. Then she said,"We have the same machines. Why doesn't this have a slot in it?"

Mechanical whiz that she is, she pressed this and pushed that, trying to make something move to get at the needle. And then she found the tiny switch that opened the top of the threading space in that needle so the thread could just be dropped in. Flip the switch, close the hole, job done.

She played with the cat for a bit, and went home. I secured the ends of the fabric and sent it through the washer and dryer. Towels tomorrow.

Tomorrow will be a little more busy than most days.

An answer at last?

We had snow late last week. I waited for the sunshine to take care of it, and went out grocery shopping.

I think this is a sparrow or some small bird hopping on by. This picture is just a small indication of filling boredom.

I have been tracking these little fellows. Every day it's "Come on! Come on!"

The same with these big fellows, too. There actually are three fat buds there, and I think they will be some sort of fancy, feathered tulips.

Today is just too lovely.  High in the mid sixties, light film of overcast, bright sunshine. And I've been rewarded. I believe these are ten petal anemone. And it seems today was the end of spring. The rest of the week if forecast forties and rain.

Some of you may remember I signed on with 23andMe  several years ago. I frequently get notices, "you have new relatives!", and I don't react to them because the generations aren't near enough to me to be excited. 

I am intrigued how further down they are drilling on all of us, me included. I now am incredibly Neanderthal, for instance. I have 293 Neanderthal "Variants", more than 83 percent of all the rest of their clients.

Recently I had an email from a young, new 23andMe client, asking me about her relatives. She probably didn't understand that 3rd or 4th cousins and pretty far down the ladder. I explained what I know about how it works and told her worst of all, she probably is part of my great-great grandmother Cox's family, maiden name Smith, and all my research dead ended with her. She is the grandmother who succumbed to the 1918 flu epidemic.

23andMe also tweaked me with a new clue, I have three close relatives. Of course, I must upgrade for more information. Or I could sort on the oceans of data they give me and see what I find. And by golly, I found several new relatives sharing my paternal grandmother's maiden name in their genealogy. One still lives in this state.

His info said he's 47 years old, and new to this game. A new generation looking back. I sent an email and had an answer in hours. We are related; his maternal great-grandmother was a younger sister of my grandmother!

I asked if he could throw out my question, why did my grandfather marry my grandmother, a teenager fifteen years younger. He answered  he would do that; "some of them are still alive and "Jay, who's ninety, is a real talker!"

So, another cousin has answered and I will ask him to go stir up his old aunts and uncles, too. I would love to know. And it won't hurt them to learn some ancestors were scoundrels.

Locked down for the greater good

I make notes on my desk pad of topics that could make a decent post. I make a lot of notes on the pad, and line through them when done. Eventually the sight of the desk pad could make me crazy, and I tear it off and start with a shiny new sheet of paper. 

For the first time ever, somewhere in the six or eight weeks of the top sheet of paper, I’d lifted that sheet and wrote a note on the next sheet, that I’m using now. It says “nothing that’s wrong with me will kill me, but it all slows me down.” Apparently I thought that a fine topic sentence.

And now I thought, that’s some gruesome homily to throw out at Covid-19.  But it’s not, as long as I don’t actually have the virus. On the other hand, avoiding the virus is slowing me down. 

Interesting,  the drastic measure of shutting down the country has held the death rate of the virus to a very few percentage points above the annual death rate of flu, or heart disease. The flaw in this thinking being, we have a vaccination for flu and we know how to prevent heart disease.

Human nature being human nature, we spit at heart disease. We smoke, we drink, we are obese, and we rely on modern medicine to save us. We fill up entire hospital wards with our heart problems, and bring up new generations of heart specialists to save us.  

Enough of us are vaccinated against the flu viruses to hold down our hospital bed occupation to the same as the heart patients. And the hospitals are nearly full, and the health care professionals are all occupied, and here comes Covid-19.

We’ve been warned before. We had a flu epidemic in 1918 that killed more millions that are truly known. But that was a century ago, you know. Four generations. We didn’t invest in better education, more health care professionals, more research labs, more hospitals. They cost, and the money flowed elsewhere. It could even have flowed into great funds available to slam into a problem the instant it’s recognized.

But you know me, the tree hugging liberal—all the money has gone to make a pitiful few grossly rich, and an even more pitifully few of them willing to put their money to the solution. Not the way it should be, in my opinion.

Back to the present, here we are, locked down for the greater good. And suddenly we have rebellion, fomented by the leader of the country, to end lock down, back to normal, now, overnight, with no plan. There is a price for this, of course, and some of us know what the science professionals are telling us, the price is the lives of the children and their grandparents. 

Collateral damage, as it’s called. But it allows the generation in the middle to make money, keep up the house payments, go to the beach, send the children to college.

I don’t know an answer. Just a few could be, send tax dollars to research. Earmark some to fund emergencies from the bottom up, from household income to hospital expansion. Use common sense. Make your employees help in a plan of six foot distancing, hand washing, face masks, going home if sick. Agree to emergency measures for the short term; off site schooling, and work.

This is my grandmother, at age sixteen. Already her mother had died in the flu epidemic of 1918. The previous recession had so restricted he father’s income that her mother made their home a boarding home. My grandmother still did all the laundry, cooked the meals, and cleaned up. There at home she was working as hard as the health care professionals of her time. 

My mother was raised with the same work ethic. Even though she has retired from a regular job, she walked into our studio and said “teach me to weave.”  When she passed, we found we had to hire two weavers to replace her.

I grew up knowing I was ultimately responsible for my upkeep. My daughters hopefully learned the same.

I think the solution to pandemics is meeting them with a plan. Not my plan, but one worked out by our leaders, for the greater good, and with our agreement. 

Another interesting fact, there have been no cases of Covid-19 in my zip code, or some abutting zip codes. The official reason cited is “The National Park”, and lack of people. How about a lot more parks! 44264, that's me.

Another fine story

There is another "show" story I tell. My sister, too, and if she reads this, I know she will chime in. We're glad to have each other to swear to this, even while we are doubled in laughter, tears running.

In the beginning we had not established our raison d'etre; we did not know if we wanted to be spinners or weavers. Way back in the mid-eighties we began taking our tiny output to local shows, and always brought our spinning wheels.

For Jan, this was a life saving device, because way back then she was too shy to talk to people, let alone look look up at them. She always knew if the customer was a "be-backer" by the shoes. So she bagged and said "thank you very much" while I tended customers, wrote receipts and made change.

We were at a show at Schoenbrunn Village, spinning, talking to people who gathered to watch, making a few sales. Word to the wise: if you're serious about earning a living, don't demonstrate. You choke up your whole sales area in curious folks, who also beg to be allowed to try, and generally don't spend money.

The fleece we were spinning that day was "in the grease". There was no further processing to clean the wool. We had our cards and were carding the locks as we spun them. This can be a messy process, the vegetation the sheep wandered about in was amply embedded in the fleece and was falling into our laps as we carded.

Toward the end of the day we each had a fair amount of debris piled to our sides. Little stems, seeds and probably a bit of dung, too, though we would have skirted the fleece before we brought it to spin.

A young woman sat near us much of the day, watching us spin, asking questions. At the end of the day, as we were closing up shop, she stayed close, still talking. And the last thing she did was gather up our piles of carding debris, carefully wrapping all in some paper towels.

"Why do you want that?" one or the other of us asked.

"I'll take it home, plant it and grow my own sheep!"

When we retired at the end of 2003, we were established niche weavers at shows in the east of this country. There still were good stories to be had; some are coming back to me as I started to type that I don't remember any more. 

I think I'll make a list and amuse you as we sit at our virtual hearths, day after day, waiting for the end of the actual lockdowns.

PS: my sister moved from weaving to quilting, and is herself a successful business owner.

I have a few old photos archived. It actually took both of us to set up this steel framed booth. When I began exhibiting alone at shows, we bought a LiteDome, a lovely professional set up. But here is our first booth, quite home grown.

The pickle

Most of the day it has rained, except when it snowed. Some things went wrong, most went right. At least it all got done. On the whole, the day reminded me of Dick Goddard and the pickle.

Dick Goddard was the meteorologist for one of the three Cleveland television stations. Three stations! That’s how old this story must be. I’ll look up some pictures to include of the long running weatherman.

I remember Dick on the dorm televisions when I was in college in the sixties, and on our little black and white television in the seventies. He was there in the eighties and nineties, and forever.

He made weather boards to show us what was going on. He strung up white pointed front lines. He had whirly tornados and glorious sunshine. He had white clouds and he had grey clouds with rain.

Once Dick was not there and the station manager was tapped for the weather job for the day. He stood bravely by Dick’s weather board and managed very well until he came to the weekend forecast of rain.

“Now for the weekend,” he said, “we’re dealing with the pickle again!” If there was noise in the studio, it went dead quiet. If it were color TV, his red face would have been noted. He was obviously disconcerted. He opened his mouth again, to put his foot in further.

“Those rain clouds look just like pickles. Don’t you agree? Every time I see them on his boards, I think ‘well, we’re under a pickle again!’”

When I was the artist at shows, the pickle was too familiar. At a show at Sea World in Aurora, Ohio, artists were shoulder to shoulder around the main concourse. It was a two weekend show and we didn’t have to tear down our displays during the week. I suppose the regular season was over and this was prior to other entertainment.

The artist next to me was a water colorist. The first weekend we chatted, and as the weather forecast looked more ominous, Dick Goddard’s pickle sprang to mind and I told her of the night I saw the pickle broadcast.

It did rain most of the week, but the next weekend was glorious sunshine. When I arrived early Saturday morning to set up, the water color artist presented me with a special memento.

She had painted our two tents, huddled together, under a fat, ominous raining pickle. And one said to the other, “This is a fine pickle we’re under!”

I always hung several small pictures in my booth, mostly of us weaving or sewing. And I hung the pickle, too, and was happy to explain to anyone who noticed.

This is post 1,500!

A lot to post, and no mention of you know who and what

The easiest way for me is illustrations with explanations:

A fine, long legged flying insect.  Google thinks it's a wolf spider. Google is so wrong, but I don't know what it is, either. On to the real news.

The yellow towels are finished, and up on the Towels for Sale tab.

Here's a new color wheel of what I have available. Next time I will do a far better job of the cream in the center.

The next towel is black and cream. This is a special order for a special person, and anything left will be for sale. Or, when I make my next thread order, black will top the list.

And another friend made another mask. I love this. Look at all those little eyes: I'm looking at you!

I have read and/or reread a lot of books. Since I cannot pass them off to anyone, most of the books completed are lining the shelf under the television, which I have not watched in the last unmentionable years.

And finally, I called my wonderful nursery across the road, and had a dear conversation with my favorite nursery owner. Suncrest Gardens is the name. Wonderful place. Right now they have "curbside service only", but they will reopen by May 1st, if the creek don't rise. And, they will have the mandevillas, in stock, priced and ready to go.

Ohio probably will stay closed through April, says the governor

No comedian, I, but I have a wonderful rejoinder I've tried on several. People end their cheery texts asking "Do you need anything?", and now I answer "A haircut!" My daughter did respond, "You and the rest of Ohio!".

It led me to think of satisfying things.

Back in 88, when we moved into the big house, a phone call came with the offer of a credit card. I didn't want it, but the fellow was persistent, and I finally caved at "and the interest rate is 9.99% for life."

Eventually I fell into the habit of using it for our business, to reserve motel rooms. The card had a fabulous number. I would begin reading 4444 and pause. Then read 0000 and pause. Often I was asked if the next numbers were seven, or more zeroes, or some numbers particular to them. But the rest were ordinary. It was a New York bank, Chase.

Credit was so easy back then, and Chase kept raising the limit on the card, still at 9.99% for life. In the early 2000'nds, I bought a car with that card. A Chrysler Town and Country. Then money got tighter and Chase raised my rate. I complained a long way up the line about my 9.99% for life being taken (not without due warning), and got a reprieve for about a year. 

When the 9.99% for life eventually was rescinded, I destroyed the card. I took all my business from Chase to a local bank, my IRA's included. I remember the branch manager stopping me in the lobby, to change my mind, and telling her and everyone listening, I would never again deal with a New York bank. And I haven't.

Weather was so nice, earlier in the week, but today, it snowed. And rained, and snowed. Some thunder and lightening, too.

I finally made a trip to the drug store, to keep my heart doctor happy. No more strokes! That certainly looks like a fat tulip bud in there.

And waiting in line at the drug store, another sure, sure sign:

 More stories tomorrow. One includes mandevillas.

Recovery

An explanation. I slipped down the slough of despair again. I'm a focused and oriented person, on the whole. I've been told that as a child I slapped the wind around for blowing in my face.

When we elected the orange idiot, I was as angry as any. I couldn't walk on Washington, but I was burning hot infuriated that a known misogynist, xenophobe could slip into the white house on a fluke. Not even with daddy's noodge to the Supreme Court, like GW, but simply on the electoral collage majority of fellow misogynists and xenophobes.

The might of this great nation, stockpiled again over the eight years of the previous administration, has been squandered so that fat white men could take the profit of the stock market. What we had is gone. Our greatest asset, intelligent and strong leadership, is gone.

When this crisis hit, we were told to be happy, don't worry, long after we needed to move in and take care. Now thousands around the world and at home are dying. Dying for want of supplies and equipment that are not in the storehouses, not in a reliable system of distribution.

Who is dying. A lot of old people A lot of less old people, with years to contribute. A lot of middle aged people, and young people, lives ahead of them Many, many in the medical profession, working non stop to save patients, and felled in duty. Youngsters, babies who have not even lived a life, dying because the greatest nation in the world could not rally round.

I was livid with anger four years ago. Now I am fighting despair at all the lost lives. That effing Russia, the great manipulator of this country's fair elections, is sending a cargo plane of sixty tons of masks, ventilators and other items the medical community is begging for. Thank you, Russia. Clever propaganda move. We'll take the lot of it.

This morning I still was crying at helplessness in the overwhelming futility of doing nothing except staying home. I wove off the next to last fourth of bobbins of yellow. When my back hurt, I quit for lunch, and had an orange and some crackers. At least I'd cried enough.

I leafed through the notebook; what to make for supper? I went all the way to the back. Nothing. I went to survey the pantry. A lot of stuff, and a small jar of some rice mixture. Spanish Rice! Of all the dishes I've worked at since I came to this trailer, Spanish rice is not one. I had all the ingredients except peppers and ground meat. I've used bacon for meat since Laura left, and I wouldn't make a trip to the store just for peppers.

Cornbread always accompanied Spanish rice as a child, so I began with that, and put together the Spanish rice to go into the oven when the cornbread vacated. I took the timer back to the studio and wove another couple of bobbins in the last forty minutes on the clock.

This was the best I've ever had. And no, I did not walk today. When it stopped raining, it was damp cold. Tomorrow will be lovely and I will be out in it, and feeling better.

Reality is trumping out

Every day is more difficult, knowing how many more are sick and dying. Really going nowhere, knowing the the wave is rolling relentlessly toward us. Knowing the people serving us in "necessary" jobs probably would prefer to be home, feeling safer. Certainly not handing change and receipts to us past plastic shields.

At the post office Friday. The shield just went up. It wasn't up earlier in the week. I didn't have the heart to tell him his sign had an error.

Our governor stepped up early in March, closing schools, business, large gatherings. Ohio's deaths are 142 this morning, but will surge from here on out. 

I cannot shake this overwhelming sadness today. Cathy and I set out on a walk at lunchtime, up to the mailboxes.

On the way home. The mailboxes are across the road, hidden by the building behind me.  I am so pleased with the walking sticks. I've shortened them again, to put my arms at right angles. I need to shorten the wrist straps, too, but my fingers and thumbs aren't strong enough to release the catch.

I'm standing on my street, and when I got to my house, half way down, I took a picture back up the hill.

That is my driveway in the foreground. I actually walked farther today. Cathy lives behind me, on the next street to the left. I strolled (haha) over the turf behind our houses to her house and waited on her porch. Then we walked up her street (my old street), over to the mail boxes, back to my street and down to my house.

Thunderstorms are due overnight and all day tomorow. Rain on and off for the rest of the week. We'll see.

Beautiful, beautiful day

I got up determined to do something on such a beautiful day! I had ranuculus bulbs to plant and zinnia seeds to plant. I had a snow shovel to put in the shed and potting soil and a trowel to get out. And most of all a trip to the mail box with my new ready tripper.

I moved pots, planted seeds and bulbs and took a fifteen minute power nap before Cathy came up the street to walk with me to the mail box.

I ordered hiking poles to try walking with. I hiked with them from one end of the trailer to the other and back again with no mishaps. But I wanted company on my first trip solo, and Cathy was happy to go. She walks every day that she can, and was happy for a new walking companion. I told her we'd see.

So off we went at noon, to the mail boxes, Cathy aghast at all the ceramic pots and bags of dirt I'd shoved around all morning. Me, too, but I slung the New Yorker bag over my shoulder. grasped my poles and off we went.

The trip up was totally uneventful, and Cathy was impressed. We've walked places together, like into the movie lobby or down to the seats, and she's been concerned. This time it was "Damn, girl, look at you!" 

There was one trick spot on the way home. Beginning at the house before mine, the road drops pretty fast. I lost my pole gait, and merely shuffled and hung on. That will take some practice. But I made it. I figured it was 570 feet to the mail boxes, so that was two tenths of a mile round trip. 

Not bad for the first really sustained effort since I broke my leg, almost two years ago.  We agreed to go again tomorrow.

When I came in, there was a surprise box in my mail bag. A box of marzipan and a birthday card from Ann. The card is too clever, and the marzipan too good. I texted her a thank you and she responded it came back with her from England, especially for the marzipan addict, and would have been closer to my birthday but for the damn two week quarantine.

I made waffles for supper, and had the pretty red strawberry in the corner for dessert. I restrained myself. I had only three marzipan's today. Maybe I can make them last three more days.

Throw it against the wall, see if it sticks

I went out today, to the post office and the drug store drive through, to pick up a prescription. I could have gone to the grocery store for more greens and to the gas station to fill up. But some friends are using all frozen veggies and the gas tank just went below a half. 

Things change every day, for better or worse. I have plenty of frozen vegetables on hand, so the gas tank can just wait.

It was so good to go outdoors and do more than stand on the porch, breathing in and out and listening to the deafening silence. I could use the post office in the Falls; it's much closer. But I always go to the one in Peninsula. It's the one I used for years, for the township, and it feels right.

The heron was at the pond on Truxel. It was between the pond and the road.  Or, me and the pond, from its point of view. I drove to the end, turned around and slowly approached, pulling off the road. And it lifted its great wings and flew down toward the river. I pulled into the Boy Scout camp to turn around, and started slowly for the post office, scanning, scanning the pond.

And there it was, at the end of the pond. Another U-turn at the end of the road and the slow approach to the heron. As my tires sounded on gravel, up went the wings. I swear, they take off on that first graceful flap. It sailed to the head of the pond. I slowly approached. Whoooosh, it was gone. The last U-turn and off to the post office.

I chose Quick Road to drive up from the valley, and stopped at the cross country trail head to take a look. 

Away in the distance, two tiny walkers. I turned to take a picture

and when I looked back, maybe the same couple coming back. Nah.

I stopped for the mail, and had a letter from my youngest daughter. 

She sent me two masks she made. I am so pleased to have them. My sister made the yellow mask, on top, and I haven't had opportunity to wash it between wearings. So, I washed all three, because Shelly's were impregnated with her perfume, and it gave me a headache on testing it.

Then some weaving, and now it's time for supper. Another day in the books. Booooring.