windthread

recent posts

about

Home

Home is not necessarily Here,  or Somewhere Else.  Home can be anywhere,  really.  It's where your space is.  Uninterrupted.  The Space of You.

When i can be Home,  even when Home is taken Over by the UnderWorld,  i am at home within my Self.  So…maybe my Self,  when it can be primary,  is Home enough.  maybe not even Primary,  but of equal weight.  Even that is enough.

All week i had to be up and ready to be Somewhere Else.  For me,  it takes its Toll.  Always has,  but for whatever reason,  now even more.  Some thought would be good,  about this.

 

DSCN6168f

Wind blurring bloom,  but Bloom, nonetheless

 

DSCN6170f

a Marker of having kept things Safe here.  Hanging over Ramon's grave.  How it's been a Hospice.

 

DSCN6174f

the incredible Relief of  Cloth Making.  That happens in the Home.  in the Home Space.

 

DSCN6177f

Who IS IT?  Cat Mother?  Me?  All of Us?  the Feminine.  No matter,  even if it is the spore of the ringworm fungus,  it's that never ending momement toward Life.  All of Us,  no more,  no less.  Just Life.  Just Going.  Doing the best we can with what we know in the moment.  I love how that yellow/gold thing is Her flower,  her emblem for having the whatever it takes.  If it works or if it doesn't,  we try and follow our own imperative.   and no one should judge that.

 

 

 

 

Posted in

36 responses to “Home”

  1. jaime Avatar
    jaime

    Two years ago this month I dismantled the home I had lived in for 40 years. The little cabin in the woods by the river. The house I had raised my only son in. The house where I divorced my husband. The home where I had 10 cats and 2 dogs and had the time of my life.I found myself there and learned to love myself there. I left because my mother had fallen and broken her hip. I came here to take care of her. Then she was diagnosed with cancer that has spread to her brain. I still miss my other home but wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. For now. Moving is not easy. Neither is the waiting. But I am still intact. The rest of it is just stuff. Hope that helps. You will arrive with yourself. Then share it on cloth with the rest of us. Love ya.

    Like

    Reply
  2. joanne Avatar
    joanne

    I, also, don’t like having to “be some where else” when I would rather just be home by myself.
    today was my 9 hour “work away” and I am tired and my muscles ache. Too much standing.
    But I had the opportunity to talk with some amazing gardeners, teach a class, repot some houseplants and catch up with the young ones at work. That was nice. the nine hours away from home–not so much.

    Like

    Reply
  3. Mo Crow Avatar
    Mo Crow

    love your magic black & white thread beads weaving through

    Like

    Reply
  4. Michelle in NYC Avatar
    Michelle in NYC

    When I retreat to the apartment I’ve occupied, fought for, loved in and suffered the loss of love in, sheltered cats and dogs and two injured birds within for forty eight years – I close the door and drop out of the mass of humanity I face whenever I go out in this City and I think of the homeless and what that means to never have a space of safety to call ones own, like refugees. Of course I too carry home within, but I’m acutely aware I have never been without physical shelter.
    Your beautiful land and rooms, the way you have been there are so stamped in the soil I’m imagining the imprint, the way the creatures who will remain when you leave might feel your absence (toads, lizards,
    stray cats, microbes, and all. The cloth…it carries your experience and feelings into another form. “She” is a wise one.

    Like

    Reply
  5. ² Avatar
    ²

    the blue flower in the middle of
    the diagonal of the iron thread ,
    she just show her face for a few hours

    Like

    Reply
  6. julie Avatar
    julie

    For me, too many away days disconnects me from my source. I know what you are saying, the source is not the stuff of the house but the opportunity to exhale. I notice w my mom, in worsening dementia, that leaving her house for more than an hour now makes her anxious…which makes her act worse. There is something unseen, something in the air of Home that feeds and calms.
    And yet, I never feel that way while travelling, maybe because our adventures also feed me.
    And yes, imagining the homeless, never receiving this food.

    Like

    Reply
  7. Deb G Avatar
    Deb G

    This is a beautiful post and makes me think of many things, what home might mean for all of us, how we define it. As much as I love it, the place that is my shelter and refugee, that is casually called home…is really not it. It isn’t a physical place but rather an emotional space.

    Like

    Reply
  8. Carolyn Petersen Avatar
    Carolyn Petersen

    I have been living with my mother most of the time for three and a half years. My home is down the block. You remember Pittsfield Village? My two cats live there and I visit each afternoon and maybe take a nap. My 95 year old mother has hospice at her home and will pass in hours or a few days. I feel between two worlds. My home doesn’t feel like home any more. Her house never felt like home. I understand and as Roy Rodgers sang, “Happy trails to you”. I am hopeing for better days. Is this cloth spoken for? If not, I would like it.

    Like

    Reply
  9. Carolyn Petersen Avatar
    Carolyn Petersen

    Check out the lyrics for Happy Trails, written by Dale Evens.

    Like

    Reply
  10. grace Avatar
    grace

    Carolyn…Kay had told me about your mother reaching her final
    times…and i wondered if this Cloth would have meaning to you.
    I do remember Pittsfield Village well and over the years
    have thought of you there with your cats. And i think in this
    moment how your cats have Held Place there, for you, in your home, which is also their home
    while you walked this right of passage with your mother and
    i think about the word covenant, as Caroline Myss speaks of it.
    And it is my sense of it all, that once you have fulfilled this
    covenant, there will be an exhilaration. a Freedom. Because
    of your Fierce Walk. Better days beyond knowing at this point.
    I will finish the Cloth as Your Cloth.
    Much Much Love to you
    and as Cynthia says…Gentle Day. There Will be many
    Gentle Days coming. More Love. I unpacked the prayer basket. You, your cats, are there.

    Like

    Reply
  11. grace Avatar
    grace

    I know them already by heart, since a child.
    Dale Evens reminds me of Jimmy Carter.

    Like

    Reply
  12. joy in az Avatar
    joy in az

    you distilled the home-feeling into words perfectly, grace… beautiful art form.
    as I grow older a home-of-my-own is more important than ever… the space where I am myself without judgment, without the need to please others.. where i can sort out how I truly feel about things and make adjustments..
    any temporary place becomes home for me quickly, including motel rooms, campsites, etc.. i always say goodbye to the place privately and thank it for being there for me..
    after stressful times i come home and hug a wall corner and cry like i would with an old friend

    Like

    Reply
  13. cathy Avatar
    cathy

    Home seems so much more important as we age. That place we call home. I love my home and being in it with my two cats. We are comfortable here. Cloth-making is strictly for at home. I have tried but cannot do it elsewhere. Safe space. Be safe!

    Like

    Reply
  14. grace Avatar
    grace

    TO HABERLER FORUM….RE COMMENTING WITH JUST THE LINK…I AM UNCOMFORTABLE WITH THAT. I DELETED IT. wITH mICHELLE’S RECENT PROBLEMS, AM A LITTLE ON GUARD. I AM IGNORANT ABOUT HOW TO FIX THINGS IF THERE IS A GLITCH. PLEASE GIVE US A HINT WHO YOU MIGHT BE??????
    SORRY, LOVE, GRACE

    Like

    Reply
  15. grace Avatar
    grace

    your words have strong Visuals…that home in the woods by the river, the Place where you are now, and there is a sense for
    me that you will go back.
    Places where we find ourselves. Different selves, different
    Places. We go where we need to.
    and yes. we arrive with ourselves. we remain intact.
    i sit with these thoughts. What a great thing it all is.
    Husbands, children, dogs, cats, rivers, woods, homes, mothers, leaving, arriving, missing, Going. Lives. How Elegant they are.
    Thank You for your words. Love to you……

    Like

    Reply
  16. grace Avatar
    grace

    things are in the Away that give us More. We bring it back,
    mix it In. and then, in the being home, we weave it all
    together. Home needs to tip the scale for me. Away can
    be, but Home needs to absorb it, take it in.
    There’s more here, but i can’t “get to it” in this moment…

    Like

    Reply
  17. grace Avatar
    grace

    the thread beads…yes…i stitch and then i run finger tip
    over them…the feeling of that….

    Like

    Reply
  18. grace Avatar
    grace

    over time, i feel i know your home of 48 years. I feel you
    There, i feel you OUT in the City, i feel you coming Home.
    Closing the Door. just love this sensation….closing the door.

    Like

    Reply
  19. grace Avatar
    grace

    yes, Maria…just in the Morning.
    but in the Next morning, there she is again….

    Like

    Reply
  20. grace Avatar
    grace

    travel. Travel implies returning Home. a going From and a
    Returning to.

    Like

    Reply
  21. grace Avatar
    grace

    i Make Home. I have done that. Finding Place and making Home.
    it can be many places, which it has in the years of my adulthood. But Home remains to me to be a place where the stuff for my Making can rest and be dry and safe. and i can Make. Home is also able to be temporary. but there are seeds planted that grow. This is a sense of Home, too. Planting and growing. Giving Water.
    Where i give Water.
    i think about as a child. down by the creek. i made my first
    Home. Took my stuff. Ways to keep it dry. Ways to keep my
    Self dry and safe. Which was both emotional and physical.

    Like

    Reply
  22. grace Avatar
    grace

    i so much love when that pic shows up….the woman with the staff and says joy in az…..
    and yes…temporary places, quickly, yes….time spent does not
    matter, the feeling does
    but a Shelter. Shelter. temporary, long term, doesn’t matter.
    Shelter.

    Like

    Reply
  23. grace Avatar
    grace

    i can’t either…make from other places. I can make temporary things…i remember sitting in a parking lot, waiting for my daughter, and making a small, like totally small shrine from sticks and wisps from cigarette wrapers and other thrown away things like candy bars…building this Shrine that was only for
    such limited moments…an installation kind of
    which is great because i have such a STRONG memory of it..how it felt….but Space and Time they are something else

    Like

    Reply
  24. Wendy@ Late StartStudio Avatar
    Wendy@ Late StartStudio

    I’ve thought for a while about how home came with a sense of self, that sense of being comfortable in your own skin . . . how else can you create one? If I move to a new space I fill it with music I love and I dance. I imagine it filling the space from the ceiling down and squeezing everything else out. And your cloth making/cloth marking surely comes from your sense of self, your home.
    I’m home. . . I can hear the waves on the beach, smell the sea.

    Like

    Reply
  25. jude Avatar
    jude

    yes, Home is a sense …

    Like

    Reply
  26. Michelle in NYC Avatar
    Michelle in NYC

    Better to err on the safety side. Wise choice. Many trolls lurk unfortunately.

    Like

    Reply
  27. saskia Avatar
    saskia

    have removed several ‘comments’ like what you refer to and haven’t heard from them since, confirming my suspicion they are indeed trolls

    Like

    Reply
  28. saskia Avatar
    saskia

    however much i love my home, i realise i could leave and start over again elsewhere; not without some heartache and wrencing of the gut, but am sure i would make home where ever, as will you

    Like

    Reply
  29. saskia Avatar
    saskia

    wrenching

    Like

    Reply
  30. Acey Avatar
    Acey

    Hi Grace. Catching up to the moment(s) again. Really love this cloth a lot. Kinda wish i had a Cat Mother of my own right about now…

    Like

    Reply
  31. Dakotah Avatar
    Dakotah

    I’ve been at home for a long time, years. It’s a luxury, but can also be a prison at times. I ought to get out more, plan to start soon…every week go see/check on my mom, visit H at work, maybe even help out some, work more intently on getting my therapy practice started. But I do love staying home, especially when I’m stitching.
    I’m also overrun with cats. It happens so fast, doesn’t it? One is pregnant again. And we couldn’t find homes for the kittens or even room at the shelters and still no help getting the girls spayed. Despite all this I love them all, love each of their personalities, want to keep them all here with me.
    Above the eyes…do you see a cat, too? A lot going on in this cloth. Like Gideon encapsulated all of you, all of that place…

    Like

    Reply
  32. grace Avatar
    grace

    if i love, there will be some wrenching

    Like

    Reply
  33. grace Avatar
    grace

    i’m not so much a dancer…maybe i should begin?

    Like

    Reply
  34. grace Avatar
    grace

    it’s so many many things

    Like

    Reply
  35. grace Avatar
    grace

    thank you, Acey…am happy you love the Cloth….
    Cat Mothers know a lot about Life, how it works,

    Like

    Reply
  36. grace Avatar
    grace

    well…at almost 72…it’s time that it’s ok i think.
    What is your therapy practice?
    i know…your cats. I couldn’t do that, the repeated
    pregnancies… To give them the freedom to just live…
    yes…Gideon opened the door to so much more

    Like

    Reply

Leave a comment