Good morning from Winooski, Vermont. I’ve been on the road so much this new year that I haven’t been able to write consistently or well. So I’ve decided to shut my writing down again until I can do a better job of it. Right now I’m simply whirly gigged. Until then, I recommend two sites: Maine Wicked Goods Facebook page, where I blog every week and make up stories about the antiques the shop sells, and Clara Parkes’ blog. She’s a Maine knitter with great insights, photos, and quotes, and she writes like me, just better. Their web addresses are below:
Good evening from warm Brunswick. It peaked at 50 degrees today with just a few clouds in a stellar blue sky. My kind of winter. To start the year off well, we spent a half hour at the beach watching the dogs frolic and the waves dance. With my eyes shorn of cataracts, I noticed that the colors of both sand and sea were more vivid and defined, electric even. I’m besotted with my new eyesight.
Now it is evening and my husband and the dog are sleeping right next to me on the sofa, leaving me free to contemplate any goals or resolutions I want to make for the new year. When I was actively writing a diary from childhood to adulthood, I faithfully listed my resolutions on the first page of every new journal. But I think this last year was hard enough without adding unnecessary pressure for me to complete anything. It was enough that I got through with my wits and good humor still intact. So no. On this first day of 2023, I have no goals or resolutions. I’m setting myself on cruise control for a while.
And here’s some advice. If you are setting goals, please set them kindly. Persistence, drive, and motivation go a long way it’s true, but they can bite back through remorse, shame, and feelings of failure. Handle with care.
I leave you with a photo of today’s ocean view. Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good evening from Brunswick. Is it Stevie Nicks or Cyndi Lauper who sings Silent Night and makes a hit of it? I’ve got a mixed Christmas CD going and I’m unable to distinguish between their voices. I like the version, whoever it is. I’m on my own for a few hours. Man and dog are away watching the finals of the World Cup. The timing of the series seems odd, right before Christmas and colder too. When the girls played soccer, it was a spring and fall sport. I can’t remember them ever playing in snow. But snow is what we have–welcome winter, if I have to.
As of today we have a straight shot to Christmas and I’ve put my list of preparations aside so I can just enjoy everything. If I can go to a Christmas Eve service, if I can see my mom, if our little family can gather together, then the rest, as they say–even the gift giving–is gravy. We were raised to be a giving family and I like giving gifts at Christmas. When I was little I gave out some strange ones. What does a four-year old who has no money and doesn’t know how to use it anyway give to her much older brother? That year I think I gave him an unmatched sock. Once I was at school it was easier because I had access to art supplies and macaroni. You can do a lot with a paper plate, crayons, glue, and macaroni! I was never very good at art so the things I made were as far off from the model as you can get. Abstract. Confusing. Almost always very heavy. Still, I thought my presents were beautiful and gave them with full heart.
Once I started earning I veered away from making gifts, but I returned to the practice as an at home mom and our budget got tighter. As a family we became very creative with our Christmas projects–we made ornaments, candles, and our own paper. We painted clothespins, made stationary, and baked breads, cookies, and cakes. We only chose gifts that all of us could help with. So as soon as Liv could stir and had enough self-restraint to stop eating paint, she joined in. Now the girls live away but I continue making gifts; it helps to know how to knit. And these days no one has to guess at what I’ve made for them. I’m still not an artist but there’s this thing called the Internet…
Try to find some quiet moments this week, even if you are an extrovert. Peace is restorative. And if you are at all spiritual, this stretch is a perfect one to contemplate and be moved about. I think Linus got it just right.
Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good afternoon from brisk Brunswick. This afternoon I am attending a carol singalong. I haven’t attended one in years, or sung in a group for a while, so after I write this blog I’ll warm my voice up and try to iron the creases out of it. I remember when singing and sounding good were symbiotic. That was decades ago, I’m afraid…
Today is the third week of Advent and I’m balancing my time between reading and reflection and wrapping and shipping. It’s an incongruous pairing but it works for me because I finish my holiday shopping early and don’t see much of the commercial side of Christmas. I don’t hear the hawkers or see the neon signs beckoning me in. Like a child, I tire easily when over-stimulated. And so I keep things simple. There is one thing I wish I could add to my holiday traditions and that is baking cookies. My sisters make plates of homemade cookies for Christmas–thumb print, double layer, honey balls, chocolate peanut butter buckeyes, even old-fashioned pink and green spritz cookies. I hope they never stop, and girls, if you are reading this, I really appreciate your baking! I have all their recipes but I get this wave of lethargy when it comes to pulling out the baking sheets and ingredients. Perhaps I need some caffeine?
Lately I’ve been curious about how flood insurance works. If you buy a house that’s in a flood plain, are you required to get flood insurance? What if you can’t afford it? And why are homes sold in the first place if they are in flood plains? Somehow I think I’m looking at this topic through the lens of privilege again…I’ll have to research this topic and last week’s question about tree farms.
One more thought. I don’t think people should have to wait until their cataracts are fully developed to have corrective surgery. At sixty, I end this year with near perfect vision, an amazing gift to enjoy in my hopefully many years ahead in this life. The delight in restored vision is of course there when one is seventy, eighty, or even ninety, but the problem is you don’t get to enjoy it as long. I vote for free laser clinics all over the world. If I were running for office, that would be one of my platforms.
I include a photo of our dining room table and its Christmas finery. The table is special because my dad built it for me; underneath he wrote out on blocks of cedar, “I love you Lisa.” And one of my sisters quilted the runner for me. Toss in an antique mirror and a very old greyhound figurine, a poinsettia, some votives, and voila, Christmas magic.
Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Hello from sunny and crisp Brunswick. It is no surprise that I’ve been struggling to write lately. My focus is dull from an unclear purpose. And so, like Pooh, I’ve had a good think and have reshaped my main writing topics. Curiosity and Faith remain unchanged but I’ve added Aging. Let us see together what develops…
Curiosity–In New England we see many Christmas tree farms as we travel. When someone picks out a tree and it is chopped down, does the owner of the farm then dig up the roots to make room for replanting? How do they initiate a second crop in the same piece of land?
Faith–it’s the second week of Advent and I’m filled with a burning that doesn’t hurt. I can’t name this feeling or understand it, but I look for it every year about this time. It comes even in bleakness, unrelenting in its beauty. A mystery to me, though so familiar. I wonder if it’s even human? “…the calf and the young lion shall browse together with a little child to guide them.” Isaiah 11:1-10
Aging–many of my conversations with friends and family revolve around words or phrases not known to our grandparents-knee replacements, bone density, cataract surgery. We have so many more words now for pain and so many more names for conditions. Aging is now a science to be studied and sorted out. It makes us less lonely because we know more but maybe more scared because we don’t know enough.
I trimmed our tree this morning and have included a photo for you. Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good morning from sunny Brunswick. This week I thought I’d include a few vignettes from my autobiography–a work and a life in progress.
“What do you do when you receive a pink plastic parasol from your parents for your third birthday and you have no place to go? You stand outside the front stoop holding it above your head and wait for someone to see you. And when your next oldest sister stands beside you, you know she wants one too. But it’s your day, not hers. You hold on tight, perhaps feeling a little smug.”
“And then there are the times you dance in front of the stove in the second living room. And you jump back and forth and snap your fingers so fast that when you look at the old movie reel years later it looks like it’s on fast forward.”
“And for midnight, Christmas Eve, I am woken up, dressed, and brought to mass at St. Teresa’s, in the first pew on the right, sandwiched between the fur coats of big humans, and I am shivering in my new dress because the church is cold.”
Early memories indeed, but precious to me all the same. I leave you with a photo of a gift I received this past week. My mom had one like it in red and it always had needles poking out of it. Did your home carry something similar? Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good morning from sunny Brunswick. I am no longer wearing glasses, even though my left eye still needs to be repaired. My frames certainly hid a lot of my face’s history and I’m getting reacquainted with myself every time I look in the mirror. Thanks for all the good wishes. Everything went very well.
This morning as I turned back the clocks, I wondered what we would do without our calendars. How would we use the heavens to note our arbitrary celebrations? How would we all know when to celebrate Martin Luther King Day, or even Thanksgiving? I imagine with our intellectual abilities, we would figure it out, because so many of us humans are irrevocably tethered to the linear passage of time. But what if we weren’t? What if every new morning was just that, a new morning, and not the morning after the night before? Personally, I think I’d worry less and feel less pressure to perform or accomplish or make deadlines. I’ve never lived freeform; it’s appealing, isn’t it?
Tonight we slip into early darkness. For me, the colder weather and the shorter days are hurdles to face with bravery and stoicism. I have my candles and gas fire–my treadmill and books, knitting, and stationary. I have the voices and presence of friends and family. Even with all these comforts and blessings, the cold darkness still shakes me up. Perhaps the trick is to ignore my calendar’s seemingly unending march from winter to spring and concentrate on each new morning as a story in itself. Ah, I see now where this train of thought is going, living in the present! It’s worth a shot.
Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good morning from sunny Brunswick. Last week I wrote that I was appreciative of my eyesight. This week I continue that theme because my eyesight is about to get a whole lot better thanks to round one of cataract surgery. It has been several years since I was able to drive at night–too much blur and haziness to be safe about it. That film slowly crept into my daylight vision and I’m now dependent on a magnifying glass (antique of course) for small lettering and a larger type size for computer work. I’m on the young side for qualifying for the surgery, but my eyes don’t know that. Anyway, this is one operation I can get excited about.
If all goes right with corrections for both eyes, I shouldn’t need glasses at all, not even cheaters. That means for the first time, I’ll be able to shower and see straight. When I wake up in the middle of the night, I won’t have to reach for my glasses. No more dealing with foggy glasses when I travel from warm to cold and back again. In the course of big life questions, these are small things. At the same time, most of our days are made up of small things, at least mine are.
The only time I have thought having poor vision was an asset was at Christmas. I’d remove my glasses to look at the lights on the tree and see a lovely blurry haze of color. This year that won’t happen–I can adjust. My model for my operation’s success is my mother–who breezed through both corrections and came home in wonder and joy at the new dimension to her vision. Colors were vibrant again; she could see the Red Sox games on television right from her kitchen table. Joy and wonder–I can’t wait.
Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good morning from sunny Vermont. I attended a memorial service yesterday in Kents Corner and will head back home this afternoon. The foliage is still stunning here, even though the fuzzy browns of stick season have taken over. I’m grateful for my eyesight–I wouldn’t want to miss the show.
As October goes, I’m turning my sights toward winter and Christmas. All my woolens are out and my scraper is in the car (though more unnecessary now that my car fits in the garage). Perhaps next weekend I’ll tackle putting the gardens to bed and figure out how to clean out and refill the feeders. These are big jobs in my mind, but not insurmountable. I just wish I were taller and had a stronger back.
As to Christmas, I’ve corralled the gifts I’ve picked up throughout the year and have started “the great list” of things I hope to find for friends and family. Our custom has been to make our gifts, with my ideas and Tim’s cleverness, but not so for this year. And of course that leads me to Christmas music and the yearly question of when I should start listening to it. For most of my life I’ve waited until Thanksgiving; this was my dad’s rule. When Covid first struck I started in October. For this year, November 15th sounds about right. Since I don’t go shopping, I’m not inundated with early Christmas displays and over the top capitalism. I can approach Christmas with quiet and contemplative steps, inch up to it with anticipation and joy. I like that part of me.
Many of you will be thinking that I’m rushing the holidays. I say whenever joy finds you then revel in it. Life is fleeting after all. Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
Good morning from misty Maine. My dog Scout is pressed up against my thigh, curled up in his usual comma shape. He’s such a little thing but now that he’s had his teeth cleaned he gives quite a sharp and frightening snap when he’s not happy. We got him when he was about three from a rescue shelter. I had applied earlier to be added to the list for a little white dog. When I got the call that one was available, I took off from work and went to meet him. Despite all the noise and banging and clanging in the shelter, he seemed quite mellow and actually jumped up to be held. I knew then that this guy was coming home with me, but first he had to pass the test with my husband and daughter. Tim pulled Livia out of school and they too visited with him. After both giving him a thumbs up, I took him home the next day. He sniffed around the house and then jumped on my lap on the sofa for a good cuddle. We renamed him Scout.
Spike, as he was originally named, looked like a French Poodle in regard to fur and size, but was shaped like a Dachshund. He also had a few ribs sticking out in the wrong place. We asked for his history and were told that he came from the Carolinas. Some of his fur was dyed in pinks and purples.
As the newness wore off for all of us, we discovered behavior issues. Anytime anyone moved suddenly or lifted a leg, Scout went into the red zone, lunging, snapping, and barking. He reacted to loud noises. Later we realized that he hated the word “ouch.” Finally, any time a certain type of man was around–wearing work clothes and a cap–we’d have to remove him from the room. Scout is a perfect dog 95 percent of the time. The rest of the time he’s a hardship and a challenge. This is what happens when you commit to a rescue dog. You never know what you are inheriting.
Scout is near eleven now. He continues to be that blend of sweet and sour. We figure that he was beaten and kicked when he was very young, which would explain his oddly shaped ribs. If animals can suffer post traumatic stress disorder, then he definitely has it. I think if we get a pet after Scout, it will be a kitten, an animal young enough to know love right from the start. Puppies are beyond us now.
We’ve never been the best disciplinarians, but we have been the best at loving our dog. Every day we give him a huge amount of affection. And in return, he gives us a huge amount of love. It works fine as long as we keep his circle small. This means accommodating his carrying on when anyone comes to the door. It’s tiring. In committing to Scout every day, we keep that precarious balance between total love and unpredictable stress. We’ve been fortunate that most of our friends and family have patience with him. I will add that he’s never barked or lunged at me, ever. Somehow, the first time we met, he chose me as his safe place.
I appreciate our dog more than ever now that I’m alone. He comes to work with me, entertains me at home, and cuts up the emptiness that sometimes lingers in my life. He’s a good guy. And so I come around to the reason for this blog. Thank you all for taking pets in and loving them anyway. Check back next week for another segment of Finding Home.
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