windthread

this morning,  first light,  hung these.   Begun and left resting.

 

last night,  in the awake time,  around 2:30,  turning on the dim light,  and a strong fluttering at the window,  strong,  and i couldn't see and wasn't prepared….where were my crocs???? or the other shoes????  so i turned it off.  But tonight.  i'll be prepared.  It's a large being.  I'll turn on the solar light.  Be ready.    So…this Cloth,  one again about the Asking.  A small cloth, 6X6.  Only waiting for some one more thing.

 

 

and i thought that was it,  but while giving Water to B,  i walked up and found this.  A small Madia.  One.  I looked everywhere and yes,  only one.  That somehow made its way from A.  And i haven't talked about that,  but the Madia…this season there are MANY.   Everything there is fragrant with their scent.   When i walk up after Giving water,  the scent clings and travels with me.  And here….amazingly,  a plant.   

I listened to Future Primitives podcast….interview with Pip Waller and Lucy Wells,  their book  Touched by Nature Plant Spirit Medicine Journeys.  and as always,  was if the interview was For Me….they are in Wales.  a quote about what working with the plant spirits is…." a breaking down of who i think i am."  Plants have things they Want to Tell.  Madia.  Traveled up,  through the pine and Live Oak forest to live alone,  small but strong,  on the upper hill of B.  Letting me find her today.

 

the gold/orange of her petals

Alyssia usually cares for Talkie's needs but i do today.  Going in to where her palace is,  checking the water in the drip system thing.  All's well.    I open the back of her nesting place and there are 6 eggs.  It's been a while.  But these eggs are fresh and vibrant even in the 102 temp of today.  It's a miracle, really,  isn't it?  Food.  Eggs.  Which can be so many things,  eggs.  And they are totally  self preserved….deep gold yolk and lilting white.   This Earth.  This Earth Gives Everything.

It's her second birth day today.   She has completed 2 years on this Earth in the circumstances to which she was born.  They say, some buddhist teachings,  and this is loosely put,  they say that at an appointed time,  the "soul" of  the deceased person  "scans" many possibilities and upon "seeing"  a particular copulating couple,  

enters.  to begin again,  to continue ripening karma.   

 my daughter,  Jenny the Pragmatic,  had a moment  once when she was probably 3.   We were around the dining room table,  me, the kids, my friend and co-worker Nancy who had dinner with us most evenings after work….Nancy and i would go on and on about what had happened at work that day,  off and on we would talk to the kids.  My son would have been one.  We had a White Russian and all was Good and Easy.  The white russian was while i prepared the meal.  That was a big kitchen.  Nancy would sit in the rocking chair and Jenny would hang with her,  my son would crawl around.  He liked feeling Nancy's legs,  she wore pantie  hose.  

we were talking as usual and there was a pause and Jenny said,  Care Full y and Clearly,  from her  highchair without the tray anymore,  Jenny said   "I flew and i flew and i flew.  I flew through the dark to find you."   Nancy and i stopped and looked at her.

  There was silence and i said…What?   And she repeated herself.  Exactly.   Nancy remembers this.

This soul, Emrie,  this Being,  loves everything.   Even the foods she doesn't like,  but will Try but then spit into the trash,  she says Goodbye to.   She loves her toys,  her water pool,  the Goats,  Tay,  Puppie,  and even Talkie tho she is a little afraid of her.  She loves grasses and Trees and Leaves and rocks.  She loves tools and pencils and crayons and sticks and metal washers that spin and pillows and string and bits of cloth.  She loves the people who walk past her house.  Alyssia said the other day that when a group of people walk by,  Emrie runs to the gate to say Hello and then is happy for hours after,  just because of that…the people walking by.   They live in a rough neighborhood, sorta.  Lots of foot traffic.  Walking to get their drugs.  To Emrie,  they are beauty full.   We talked about how Emrie is an Extrovert.  How we need to begin honoring that.  Taking her to places we might not go ourselves,  because she loves PEOPLE.

She loves big birds overhead,  the vultures that soar in circles,  Airplanes,  even when she can't see them,  only hear them.  Sirens of police cars and flashing lights.  Helicopters that fly low,  looking for drug grows or bad electric lines.    She knows the names of these things and CALLS LOUD to them….pulling on us to Call too….and wave

Emrie loves Everything.   They arrived in Houston.  I haven't talked to Alyssia but Jenny was here today and did.  She said Emrie LOVED the flight.  When Alyssia told her to look…see the clouds…see that they were IN the clouds,  Emrie at first covered her face.  But then she looked and was in AWE.  She understands these things,  somehow,   She understood that she was IN the clouds that we watch in the sky everyday,  UP  FAR.  She somehow Got it.

they are in Houston.  and i somehow didn't click,  but her father is a cop.  or,  Police Officer as we now say,  because he is her father.  She will recognize him,  somehow,  by smell maybe.  She will recognize the connection.  He will flash the flashers on his patrol car for her.  None of this will be lost on her.   The grandma there will take her to her church and reintroduce her to the congregation.   The aunties will dote.  They will all cook and play music and there will be all manner of things floating in the back yard swimming pool.

It's important to Alyssia that her children have strong ties to their fathers.  With the "Lupus" she can't be sure how life will go for her.  We talked some of that today,  Jenny and I and she said that it's good.  That she has told Alyssia that she would not want to "raise" her kids,  that she would like them to come for summer vacations,  but she wouldn't want to raise them and my Heart stopped and i thought….I WILL,  but then knew that i can't…i won't be alive.  

So…i am jealous,  of all the Great and GRAND commotion there of that Family  but i quiet myself and know too that it's Good.

Emrie picked well….when she flew and flew.   So many.  Love her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

planting SunFlowers is an act of love,  watching them grow taller and taller fills us with love,  the BLOOM of the FACE of the SunFlower loves us back,  love love love,  repeat,  ad infinitum.

 

i love too this photograph,  hastily taken,  but forever will represent  the moment when i found this cloth in one of the baskets retrieved from the storage unit and sitting at Campsite B till brought up Here,  to campsite C  where i now live.  The basket sits on the bench until i take the time to empty it out and be sure no spider has nested there.  This too.  And it's on the Janet Chair.

one photograph,  holding SO MUCH,  holding the Whole of what Jude has given over years of time,  holding where i Was,  Where i recently was, and   Where i am now.

My life to me is represented in my mind as snap shots.  I don't think or remember in words,  but rather images.  A single image can represent years,  a relationship with things or someone,  revelation.

I recently found self googling Annie Leibovitz,  …."portrait photographer often engages subjects in intimate settings and poses."  and i thought of that as i looked at this pic…it's a Portrait.  of cloth,  not a person,  but equal,  cloth being so alive to me

and i thought as much as i love Making with cloth,  love how they teach,  I love so much Photographing cloth.  The phrase…"when things settle"  seems to come up a lot lately.  So i thought today,  When Things Settle,  i want to make paper images of a lot of the pics i take as i Make.   Maybe like greeting card size and on good paper,  greeting card weight.  So i can hold the images in my hand.  Keep them in a pile.  a shoe box.  Pick them up sometimes and feel all the moments again.    I hope i will do this.  Looking on this screen,  the screen of the phone is good,  and adequate.  But to hold something in my hands  at dawn or dimming light…i think i want this.

 

 

 

brought up a basket from the Stuff at Campsite B.  It's been a long time,  even for still being in New Mexico standards,  because here,  the 9 patch i DID MAKE.   I did make a nine patch and as i hold it today,  test it for strength of stitch,  it's a fine nine patch,  selvages  neatly invisibly basted down.  Yup.   And i love how Jude loves them.  Find deep satisfaction from watching and listening,  from reading how others find great pleasure in them.  Love.  But for me…,  just no.  Just not.  Don't know why,  but

 

and then,  woven ripped strips…these,  yes.  Can feel the ripping,  the Pleasure of the weave,  remembering how i knew,  doing this,  that i could MAKE anything i might need from strips of ripped cloth.  I could weave a home.  I could weave something of strength and Use,  even if the cloths were not aesthetically  "right",  i COULD meet the NEED.  Was Good to find these today.

it didn't appear as i thought it would,  but here.  Now.  As witness.  To document the times of Heart.  The colors of her photograph to my inbox so vibrant.   But this,  at least.  To document the Love.

.

this is Marti's cloth and just from the screen on my laptop…not a good image of it's Beauty,  the depth of color.  But i wanted it here,  as Witness to what we are doing.  Doing with Cloth

How Beauty FULL.  the taking apart,  the setting aside,  the piecing.  Together,  the work,  to find a Way.

Marti…i carried all your words with me when i went down to give water.  After that,  i went further down to the creek that flows here,  a small sister to the Rio Grande,  i sat and then slid down the bank,  INTO.  I stood there,  with your words and Heart.  Water flowed.  Past.  Cool,  softly moving.  The Rio Grande has seen so much.  Is so constricted from it's original meandering form….no more flood plains…constricted,  but yet it feeds the Bosque.  It's not the river.  It's us.  We are death.  River flows.  I am so beyond glad that you went…it is what i had hoped you might be able to do…to go to her.

 

 

you might have noticed in the past pics,  the two dark marks just near the lavender piece.  If not,  you can go back and look.  Today i accepted them as part of what this Cloth is asking.  Two figures. A woman.  A child.  

six inch scissors.  These were hiding.   I climbed up into the raised bed and over the top to where the SunFlowers live.  The vines had traveled there.  And looking from the back and down,  found these.  Hidden.  They,  or one of them,  are delicious.  Crisp even in their size.  They come as a blessing from the Universe.

 

so grateful that this Cloth came at this time.  It Holds me as i try to understand the world of yesterday's post., as i work to find the way to live within the dichotomy of the simultaneous realities.  If i could,  it would be this one I would give to Everyone.

this is one of Emrie's favorite friends.  Their name is Purple.

My grand children are mixed.  Biracial.  Half Black,   half  White.  Emrie,  my BeLov~ed Emrie is multiracial.  Half her mixed mother, half her father who is of  El Salvadoran people.  Emrie's mother,  my Alyssia,  has a spanish last name;  her marriage to her son Julian's father who is of Puerto Rican people.  Emrie carries her father's spanish last name.  Emrie and Alyssia are brown skinned.  We are all American.

We are all American.

I am stunned that i am writing that,  twice,  now  3 times,  We are all American.

on the weekend,  Alyssia and Emrie will fly to visit Emrie's father and his family of many Aunts and cousins,  a grandma.  To Texas.  To the state where the child cages are.  And i am afraid.  Things happen in airports nowdays.  and I understand that probably half of the population of these United States don't mind.  I am not afraid of Trump.  He is almost beside the point.  I am afraid because i understand that probably half of my fellow citizens don't mind.  My lifelong drift in white privilege is over.

kidding pens

 

 

that extend to the corridor.

 

 

i could tell this two ways. One,  a very young praying mantis,  on the T Post in the middle of all of this,  a T  post that needed to  be removed,  Alyssia saw it.  Called…gramma!,   and yes.  Here in the midst of all the building commotion,  a young,  very young praying mantis.  How great.

Way two.  It won't GO.  it stays.  first on the T Post,  then to Alyssia's hand,  then on to my hand and up,  my shoulder where it sits.  Sits.  Looking.  SEEing Us.    We try a few times to shift it over to the tree branch,  it is wanting to stay…with us,  ON us.  But we move it.  To the Tree.  Asking it.  Please.  It is   Witness to our doing.  Deliberate and Aware.  Telling Us.  a Part of what is happening here.

 

working with thoughts about framing in Jude's post.   These fragments might be seen as framing.  I do this off and on….things along the central image.  But for me,  they are not framing,  or a border,  often,  they are actually the  Story,  the Narrative to an image in the center of the cloth that is a still frame of that Story.  Borders,  frames,  are alive and moving,  taking,  telling. 

in this Cloth,  the fragments that Hold the center,  these are the talking of this Story about Subliminal.  They are

the Subliminal

in all its forms.  They move,  into and out of,  showing.  Showing how it is that so MUCH creates the Still Moment Inside.

on this lower right side….there is a single fragment missing.  A space.  I don't know what it is,  but i will find it.

we all worked again today.  Maybe tomorrow,  a pic.  The kidding pens.  We work.  Goats come in and and out,  looking,  touching with their lips,  how Goats do.  No one exhibiting the signs of imminent birthing.  I picked the first cucumber.  Emrie's tomato plant,  a cherry tomato,   has 23 little greens.   Julian comes home in less than three weeks.  Tomorrow is Alyssia's birthday.  31 years.  I was there.  That morning of her birth.