Beautiful, Useful Things

            My father made beautiful, useful things with his hands and his tools. As far back as I can remember he had a well-equipped workshop in the garage which included a 1949 Shopsmith, an amazing multiple purpose woodworking tool that could saw, drill, sand, and best of all be a lathe on which he turned many intricate smooth objects like the posts and spindles on my brothers’ bunk beds, table legs, chair legs, candlesticks, and other decorative but useful items for our home.  I liked spending time with him while he worked, especially when he turned some blocky 4 x 4 post into a smoothly rounded, fluted, curving piece of beauty. I loved the smell of sawdust mingled with oil and the faint burning smell as his chisel cut into the swiftly turning block of wood.  I enjoyed the task of using fine sandpaper to further smooth the objects he turned on his lathe, luxuriating in the feel of the wood.

            After thirty years of knowing my father, I should have realized when I asked him drill 9 holes in a block of wood as a makeshift Chanukkiah* for my first Chanukah that he would not pay attention to my instructions, but instead create something incredibly beautiful that violated all traditional Jewish rules for a Chanukkiah.  A Baptist turned Methodist by marriage, my father knew nothing about my adopted religion. I think he wanted me to know that he supported me as I made this major change in my life, unlike my mother who took my conversion as a rejection of her and my childhood.

            I sent my dad (in California) a sketch of a plain, flat, block of wood with nine holes in a row. A few weeks later, I received (in Kentucky) a large box in return. Carefully wrapped in layers of tissue paper and newspaper was a work of art.

My first discovery was that he had chosen to use some of his precious chestnut wood instead of a scrap as I had suggested. The wood had been scavenged in the late 1970’s from his childhood home in Virginia. In the late 19th century before the blight destroyed most of the American chestnut trees, my grandfather had built the family home with chestnut paneling, stairs, railings, doors, molding, and other adornments.

Within the box was a block of wood, but unlike my sketch it had been carefully laminated in half inch layers of decreasing size, creating a double staircase effect with four steps on each side and a ninth platform at the top.  There were nine holes drilled, one in each step.  However, those holes were not for candles, for in the box, individually wrapped were nine perfect wooden cups, each with a stem to sit in the stair-stepped holes. Each cup had been turned separately on the lathe to perfect smoothness. They were all the same size, same diameter, same depth. The bottom of each cup had been curved like fat brandy snifters.  Each of those little wooden cups had to be turned on the lathe separately; checked and rechecked to make sure they were the same diameter, the same height, the same, length stem, so that when set in the stair-step block they would form a perfectly graduated holder for candles rising on both sides to a point in the middle.  I lifted each cup, turned them in my hands feeling the smoothness of the fine wood grain and placed them in the block one by one.

My father had carefully cut green felt and glued it to the bottom of the main block of wood, so that the bottom of it would not scratch or scar any surface it was place on. Then in the center of the bottom, he had left an opening in the felt, and in it he had burnt the words:  To SUE/from DAD/DEC 1981.

Thirty-seven Chanukahs have come and gone. Sometimes I consider getting a “proper” Chanukkiah. Jewish law and tradition say that all the candles in a Menorah or a Chanukkiah should be at the same height, because no day, and no person is more important than another. Also, Jewish law and tradition call for a new candles every night or a total of 44 candles, so most Chanukkiah are designed for small candles less than ¼ inch in diameter and only about 4 inches high. My father designed his candle holder for regular sized candle tapers - 2/3 of an inch in diameter and eight to ten inches in height. The cost of 44 regular sized candles is getting to be a little prohibitive these days even at Walmart.

But in the end, every year I use this cherished gift from my father. It may not meet the standards of Jewish law, but it is still beautiful and a product of love.

______________

*Most people refer to these as Menorahs. However, a Menorah is a seven branched candle stick used in synagogues and homes on the Sabbath. A Chanukkiah is a nine branched or holed candle holders used only for the eight days of Chanukah.

Pictures in My Mind

This morning an old friend posted a beautiful picture of a transitory moment when sun through a window was captured by an elegant, blue blown glass vase and then scattered across the room.  Without his picture I am sure that you are having difficulty imagining the fragile luminosity of this moment. 

It has been said so often as to become trite that a picture is worth a thousand words. But trite does not mean untrue. Well crafted words, whether poetry or prose can evoke elaborate mental images, even whole worlds in our minds. But the right single photograph can fix one moment, one experience that defies adequate description  and make it available for sharing and keeping for several lifetimes. 

Richard's picture was taken with his cell phone camera because as he said if he'd taken the time to go upstairs to get his good camera the angle of sunlight would have changed and the moment would be gone. The ubiquity of cell phone cameras and small pocket sized digital cameras has made the capture of such fleeting moments of beauty, wonder, delight, and humor easier than ever before. 

I am suddenly saddened as I think about dozens of astounding images in my mind, stored with hazy imprecision from a life-time of paying attention that cannot be shared with anyone else, and become fuzzy even to me. 

I particularly wish that I could borrow a TARDIS or some other vehicle of time travel and take a digital camera back to my 22 year old self, standing on the top of a hill in San Mateo, watching the setting sun slide beneath the gray marine layer and for a few brief moments turn the city of San Francisco into sparkling gold sandwiched between a lowering fog and a leaden bay. 

The Dog Ate Your Homework

For my two decades of teaching I thought that the apocryphal tale of "the dog ate my homework" was pure mythology. Then eight years ago, I found myself having to apologize to my students' for my dog eating THEIR homework!

I was forty-five years old before I had my first dog. In childhood I was for many years frightened of dogs. My great-uncle Tom took care of that by immersing me in the care of his lovable, boisterous kennel of hunting beagles, although I continued to be somewhat leery of large dogs for many more years. In college I had the opportunity to take care of a friend's dog for a month (his parents went to New Zealand and left the dog with him at college, but he was too busy with labs and research so I got to take care of most of Pokey's needs) and loved that experience.  

I wanted a dog for many years, but in my single academic existence of evening classes, trips to conferences, and long office hours I didn't feel like I was settled enough to care for a dog.  Instead I had a couple of much beloved cats. It wasn't until I married John in my forties that I had the privilege of having a dog as a companion. John's dog Missy was middle-aged when I met her, sweet, submissive, obedient, well trained,  and well-behaved dog in every way. She had been an adult and already trained when John rescued her some years before we met.  She lived to the ripe age of 19 years, quite ancient in doggie terms, and in her last years had cognitive difficulties that were endearing and heartbreaking at the same time. 

John didn't want to have another dog. He thought that there was only one dog for him and she was gone. But I knew we needed another dog. A year and a half after Missy's death, a young, large, female Shepard/Lab mix who was dumped in the neighborhood began to hang around our house and porch. Rosie the dog knew we needed a new dog and was persistent in her pursuit of the position. After a week we knew we had to take her in (or face the consequences of  a litter of pups a month or so down the road). 


We quickly learned that life with Missy had not  prepared us for life with a young, boisterous, dominant, untrained dog like Rosie. Rosie was a dog that was all heart, but she needed very strong "alpha" humans to take charge and give her not only love, but also discipline. Rosie chewed and ate things: sticks, socks, shoes, clothing, books, our students' homework (not ours), pillows, blankets, and one entire couch. Yes, Rosie ate an entire couch!

With the help of a wonderful trainer at PetSmart, we learned to gently help Rosie become a good companion and pack member.  But in the process we learned more than Rosie did, about the nature of dogs and the wonder of the bond between humans and dogs. Rosie remained a dominant personality, and we had to continual establish our leadership with Rosie. We had to learn how to be assertive, calm, in control pack leaders at all times. A lesson that was as beneficial to us as it was to Rosie. 

For six years we had the wonder of Rosie's company. Then tragically, all too soon we lost her to a devastating congenital illness two years ago. 

We still have dogs, Molly who joined us during the last year of Rosie's life, and blind Bob who was added to the family 18 months ago, and the lessons we learned from Rosie have made us better able to related to Molly and Bob who each have their own unique problems and issues. 

Old Cats Learn New Habits

Locutus in her younger days

 When we moved on to this property seventeen and a half years ago we were greeted by a little orange cat who was about four months old. That's what we called her "Little Orange Cat" which was to distinguish her from her much larger father Oscar. Little Orange Cat had a putative home next door, but she liked our yard and porch much better. 

She liked our dog Missy and liked to come up and rub on Missy when the dog was in the yard. She also liked to talk to us - all the orange cats I've known have been pretty vocal - and she liked to be petted. But she did not like being picked up. 

By the time the cold winds of autumn had started up, we'd gotten to know enough about our neighbor to realize that she didn't spay or neuter her cats and that she was lackadaisical about anything other than food.  So we formally decided to formally adopt little orange cat and make her cat #11 of our household. 

She needed a real name, so John took the three letters LOC and looked for a name to fit it. Being a big Star Trek Next Generation fan, the name John chose was Locutus, which of course was a male character. But it stuck and she's been Locutus for seventeen years. 

Locutus was never a lap cat or a snuggler. She tolerated petting, but did not like being picked up or held, and never voluntarily got into anyone's lap. But she liked snuggling with our dogs and with other cats. 

Now she is the oldest cat of a household of 10, senior kitty who rules the roost with her grumpy vocalizations. No one dares nose her away from her bowl! 

Always very talkative, in recent months Locutus has begun extensive vocalizing at night. She's never actually waken me up, but every time I am awake for a while, I will hear her warbling in a discontented voice about something. In just the last few weeks I've started getting up in the dark, picking her up and snuggling into my recliner with her. The first time I did it, I really expected her to wiggle away immediately - she'd always done so in her younger days. But as an old lady she really enjoys an hour or more of snuggling. 

This morning after dogs and cats were fed, but it was still dark, Locutus and I had a very nice warm cozy nap together for an hour. Old cats can learn new habits!

Locutus, Sheldon and two other cats like the dark warmth 

of an old dog crate in a corner of the living room. 

A January of Small Stones 19

dark crisp air
carries lilting melody
from a penny whistle
calling the "king of the faeries"
but only the dogs 
set dance in reply.

January 19, 2014

The questions of HONY

One of my daily addictions these days, along with millions of other people around the world is "Humans of New York" (fondly known among fans as HONY) the photography and interview project of Brandon Stanton. Brandon is a genius at capturing people both visually and through their words. You can view his work on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/humansofnewyork or his blog at http://www.humansofnewyork.com/. Brandon also has a top selling book of his photographs interviews available everywhere. 

Brandon has developed a series of stock questions that he has found help unlock the interesting stories of people's lives. Among them are:

"What was the happiest moment of your life?"
"What was the saddest moment of your life?"
"What was the most frightened you've ever been?"
"What's your greatest struggle right now?"
and finally "If you could give one piece of advice to a large group of people what would it be?"

Spending time reading the life stories that Brandon elicits, has gotten me to thinking about my own answers to those questions. I woke up this morning about 4:30 AM and spent the next ninety minutes thinking about those questions. Here's what I concluded:

"What was the happiest moment of your life?"

The summer of 2009 when I got to paint a mural for my college. Everything about my life was good, my parents were still alive, my husband and I were happy and healthy, and I got to spent an entire summer rediscovering the art that I loved so much (and getting paid!). It had been years since I'd done any painting, but it all came back to me, and I created something of beauty that will endure for years and be appreciated by many. 

"What was the saddest moment of your life?"

March 2012 when my mother and my dog Rosie died exactly one week apart. My mother was 89, had severe dementia and she frequently expressed the wish to die, so there was some sense of relief but still of course sadness, then when our beautiful, young dog suddenly became very ill two days later and died exactly a week after my mom the sadness simply overwhelmed me for weeks. 

"What was the most frightened you've ever been?" 

This is actually a toss up between two things. The first was in May 1982 on a Tuesday morning when I was told I had melanoma and that I had to report to the emergency room for surgery within two hours. The trauma of the diagnosis and immediate surgery was multiplied by the emergency room setting, where while I was being operated on with a local anesthesia an older woman in cardiac arrest was brought in to the cot next to mine, and I was totally aware of the doctors' unsuccessful efforts to revive her; she was declared dead and removed all while I was still being operated on. I was never more aware of my own mortality.

The second was probably a more sustained terror. In May 1980 in fear of my life, I had to move out of my apartment in the middle of the night (with the full cooperation of my landlords) to escape an alcoholic boyfriend who had suddenly turned violent. For several weeks I lived in fear that he would find my new apartment. He never did and life settled down.

"What's your greatest struggle right now?"

This is the easiest answer: making the changes in diet and activity to get a handle on my diabetes and improve my health so that I can look forward to enjoying the rest of my life and actually do all the things I've been planning for my retirement. 

and finally "If you could give one piece of advice to a large group of people what would it be?"

It's the same advice I give myself every single day: Each day is a gift, even the most difficult days. Do not pray for the day to end, do not wish your life away. Pray instead for the strength, patience and wisdom to live fully in each moment." 

 So now, even though its unlikely I'll be going to New York City any time soon, or even less likely encountering Brandon Stanton, I have my answers ready!

In Praise of Winter

At work today, a young woman making casual conversation asked me if I was "ready for summer." I hesitated, because it was one of those things that people say on a cold, grey day expecting only a pro-forma agreement, but then I said the truth "no, I'm not ready to let winter go yet." My response startled her, but she was working and needed to move on, so she just nodded and said bye.  

I am no longer as fond of cold weather as I was when I was younger. Winter weather exacerbates both my arthritis and my asthma. I dislike having to take all the additional medicines necessary to allow me to function when it is cold. I am also less confident of my ability to drive in sleet and snow as I once was. 

But I still love winter. I love how the forest becomes naked and the bones of the world show through - the rocks and crevasses, the bare forest floor. Every drive to work or store is a treasure hunt for the stark white fingers of sycamore trees. I love the lace of brown branches edging the mountains against the pale sky. I love the way the wind rattles the dry leaves and rubs the bare branches together. 

But most of all I love how winter makes spring possible. Until you have lived in a place (like California) where the transition from winter to spring is scarcely noticeable, where roses bloom all year round, you cannot truly appreciate how winter gives birth to spring.  So, no I am not pining for summer, nor waiting for spring, but living with joy in winter.

lovely late summer day

It was the way it ought to be in the Kentucky mountains at the end of August--warm but not hot--as the sun shot out golden rays before dipping below the crest of the hills.

My tomatoes are also doing just as they should, plump and red. These will be ready for picking tomorrow most likely.

today while the flowers still cling to the vine...

The first line of my favorite song from childhood "Today" performed by the New Christy Minstrels. Through the power of my iPod, I took a wonderful mental trip back through childhood, while enjoying the mountain scenery on my hour plus drive to and from in-service this morning.

Songs recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary, the New Christy Minstrels and Pete Seeger, that my brothers and I sang in the car on family trips, like "If I Had a Hammer," and "Little Houses made of Ticky Tacky," and "Michael Row the Boat Ashore." The version of that song on my iPod is from a live album, and features hundreds of audience voices joining the performers on repeated verses. And I was transported for a moment, to a day, when United Air Lines celebrating their first jet passenger planes from McDonnell-Douglas, had invited all San Francisco Maintenance Base employees and their families to a huge party in a cavernous hanger, with music by the New Christy Minstrels. I tell you, you have not heard anything until you hear 5,000 people, young and old, singing "Michael Row the Boat Ashore" inside the acoustic miracle of a jet hanger. It was, and continues to be the most awesome musical experience of my entire life.

the lessons of the wisteria

The beautiful pale violet flowering vine above is wisteria (this one is along a neighbor's fence just before the turn off to our lane).

Wisteria is a plant that does not bloom until it reaches maturity (which can be a few years for the Kentucky Wisteria that I see all around me, or more than a decade for the Chinese variant). Even then wisteria does not always blossom until it has experienced some type of distress -- like blows, explosions, and fire damage to the main trunk, shock to the roots (like extended freeze/thaw cycles), or drought. Clearly something about the last year, especially this past winter, created exactly the right conditions for wisteria, because it is more abundant in eastern Kentucky than I have seen in 14 years I've lived here.

For the first time it is impossible to miss the wisteria on my drive to work. In addition to lanes of redbud and dogwood this spring, I pass a half dozen places where wisteria has taken over an entire hillside. In each case, in the center of the massive cascades of wisteria, are the collapsed, shattered, rotting remains of a house, often barely visible in the vegetation.

Wisteria is a very long lived plant, an invasive plant that climbs walls, covers buildings, chokes giant trees -- luckily its a relatively slow growing plant (unlike kudzu). Home owners fifty, sixty years ago or even longer, planted wisteria near their homes. The home owners are long since gone, the houses decayed into near oblivion, but the wisteria has thrived and taken over the entire former homestead, climbing 80 foot trees, cascading down hillsides creating magical, fairy bowers.

There is something inspiring about a plant that blooms its best when damaged and distressed, and which creates its most beautiful landscapes on the bones of abandoned homes.

Monet's 1925 painting Wisteria at Monetalia.



My photo
Wisteria Wall by sgreerpitt is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://sunflowerroots.blogspot.com.

Sweet baby blue eyes

Here are the kittens at two weeks and two days old.

No genders or names yet.

The little feller with the raised head is the most active of the bunch.

No one has climbed out of the little bed yet. I'm sure that will happen soon.

under the lilacs

There is nothing so wonderful as the smell of lilacs. I'd only read about lilacs until I was 19 years old and a freshman in college. Lilacs require cold, snowy winters to flourish and bloom, so they just won't grow in coastal California -- my mother tried repeatedly, but was never successful in her attempts to produce lilacs.

At Oberlin College, behind the Conservatory of Music, hedge of lilacs that was more than 8 feet tall and 50 feet long; bountiful enough to allow a fragrance hungry freshman to purloin a few sprigs to perfume her dorm room.

In television series '30-something' (from the 1980's), there was an episode in which 'Elliot' was trying to win back his estranged wife 'Nancy' and filled the whole house with dozens of lilacs boughs. That certainly would have won me over.

Our long, snowy winter produced more than the usual supply of spring lilacs through out eastern Kentucky. The bushes are heavy with fragrant blooms. The ones in this photo are on the Southeast Whitesburg campus planted within the last two years, and this is the first year that they have had blooms.

(Under the Lilacs is one of Louisa May Alcott's lesser known children's novels).

spring has sprung

While I was laid up with the flu for five days--and deprived of access to the Internet at home--the outside temperatures have been rather more summer than spring (86 degrees F at the present moment) resulting in blossoms busting out all over.

On my first day back to work yesterday I stopped on the way in to Whitesburg to snap my favorite spring views.

It is always miraculous to me, that I can rely on these beautiful things happening every spring. That the yellow of the forsythia along the old high schools retaining wall will always be the exact same, in-your-face electric yellow, and the ornamental pear trees will always be heavenly clouds of pristine, creamy white. It is the glorious precision of nature, that the colors are always perfect, always the exact same, always vibrant, clear and true.

The photographs are always just a pale representation of the original. Over the winter, the colors fade in my mind to the dull approximations of the photographs. So each spring, when the flowers return its amazes me all over again in its brilliance. It is an annual miracle, that restores my faith, my soul and heart once again.

looking up in thanks

This was the sky view about 5 PM this evening in Letcher County.

It speaks for itself.









The other end of the rainbow below:

wildflowers

Our yard is encompassed with a bounty of wildflowers, shrubs and trees, with many treasures. Right is Virgin's Bower Vine (the white flowers) and Joe Pye Weed (the tall dusty violet headed stalks). But I had not been out to enjoy it much in the past month.

Between persistent rains, floods, flood clean up and John breaking three ribs a few weeks ago, our yard had gone unmown for at least four and maybe five weeks. John's ribs still are not up to tackling that kind of job. I managed to mow the small area inside our fence a week ago before my back gave out, but even that had grown back. We were getting depressed about the state of things.




Thursday I happened to run into a friend I hadn't seen for a while, and heard that her son was trying to earn money for college with odd jobs, but hadn't had much luck lately. We called Evan Friday morning, and by dinner time Friday, our yard was once again a pleasant place to spend time. That is, as long as one avoids the mud-plain left behind by the flood. (The coal company's workers fixed the driveways very nicely, but they just sprinked grass seed and straw on the mud).

I suspect Evan thought we were a little nuts, but he dutifully left the six foot radius circles of undisturbed growth around our big maples, where such late sumemr delights as goldenrod (above left) reside.
Along the fence we share with the Johnson's are not yet ripe pokeberries or pokeweed (below right) whose dark purple berries are a favorite with the birds. Over the last decade we've gone from one spindly plant to a small forest of pokeweed due to leaving them undisturbed and letting nature (and bird digestion) do its thing.

splash of yellow

In an otherwise gray and rainy day (though no where near as bad in eastern Kentucky as it was in Louisville today), this bed of black-eyed susans practically shouted with joy! The flowers are in beds behind the administration building on the Cumberland campus of Southeast Ky Community and Technical College.