windthread

Alyssia was recruited into the Navy right out of High School.  She served two tours.   Her first deployment  was to Korea.  She brought these back.  Ordinarily they lie flat on a shelf.   But i thought of them.  Like the nana here,  the bathroom fixtures are old.  The kids are young.   When Julian was Three,  he used the water tank to pull himself onto the toilet.  loosening it a little.  

 

and who would have Imagined????……Cousins from the 9 Patch Clan arrived from Long Island NY!!!

They are 6 hours away…Alyssia and kids.

 

 

I graduated from high school in 1963.  Married in 1968.   i was 21.  Had my first child,  daughter Jenny, in 1972.  I was 26.  Son,  Jonathan  1975.  I was 29.    I stayed married to their dad for a month shy of 10 years.    During those years,  the 70's,  the house was FULL.  Always stray people living with us.  Sometimes with children.  My brother's first wife lived with us …her two kids,  off and on.  There was  no thought to it,  it just WAS.   Often.  And then the kids were early teenagers and there would be stray friends who lived with us.  No thought to it,  it just Was.

Like a tangle of Ferrets.

As it seems to be turning out,  the kids will all be here at the same time.  Once again,  that propensity…Ferretness.   Now emphasized by the fact that this is a 12X45 home.   Not the two story place of early days.   More Ferret~ish.   

Am having many feelings.  I bought a lot of food today.  Will spend tomorrow and Sunday cooking with work OutSide inbetween.   In Between.  In Between.  My kids.  My Children.  Their Children.  Feral to a degree,  us,  sharp fast humor,  kids the 3rd generation so Verbal…or is it the 4th generation???????????????oh,  eeeeeee…if i am one and my daughter and son are two and Alyssia is three,  then the kids are the 3rd and 4th………..I breathe and EXhale.

there just now was a beauty FULL and perfect STORM,  great lightning strikes,  Thunder Man throwing the bolts hard and fast,  RAIN.  Sky Water,

 

Son's birthday.  We'll do it like it was in that other life.

 

Jude's Winter Bitch watches

I am at the Cause of them.   My children.  and so…on,  …..to their children.   I am at the Cause.   I said Yes.  I grew them Inside my Body.

all began simply enough…giving water…

 

double click.   Two friends.   I give water and two friends benefit and give me back,  benefit.  Merit.

 

day continues and i check off stuff on my list,  feeling pretty fancy.

 

i think how patiently Cloth waits.   I go along,  doing,  and all is well,  better than well.   Travis is coming because i realized that i can't play a DVD.  The other day he came and we saw that the new computer didn't have the correct hardware so it  was ordered.  Arrived today from my most loved UPS driver Terri.   I called Travis.  Left a message.  It's here.  

Continue to go along,  still feeling fancy,  and still feeling like everything was….well,  how i wanted it to be till i ran water in the bathroom sink and heard something that was NOT RIGHT.

 

 

i feel the pipe and there is this HOLE,  this HUGE HOLE in the U joint.  Go out to the Albatross and find the pipe wrenches…get them part way off but then so unsure 

Wait.

Travis comes.  finishes taking them off.  Tomorrow i'll go to the hardware with these pieces and they'll give me what i need.  Sunday Travis will come back and put them together.

At first i thought O!…what an imperfect moment!….O!  but then i realized how perfect a moment it was,  when Travis was already coming to install the DVD thing…could not really be MORE perfect and so OK.  We just go.  ok.  and ok and ok and ok.

The reason i wanted to use a DVD function is this:

 

i don't know how i came across this.  ????  But i did and i ordered it.  And it's the reason i wanted to be able to use a DVD.  And i just finished watching it.  And everything makes sense in it's own nonsensical way.   I am Grateful for a Lot of stuff.  Grateful. 

 

so…Going.  and it's Good.  Moving along.  Feeling easy.  And all the while there are many separate parallel thought threads.  About how if it were just my own kids,  i would be doing next to nothing other than washing sheets and pillow cases,  thinking about what to feed them.  Otherwise,  all my daily living Stuff could just be pushed aside a little,  like just enough room to set a plate.

So what makes this different?  ok…it's How It Is With An Old Nana.  First,  of course there is my son's Woman, Heather.   I am her husband type person's Mother.  So there's that, right away.  She knows stories.  He tells her the stories.  She knows that i am more than a little "layed back".  That i always was.  Heather is orderly and has concerns. So.  To make it comfortable for her.  This is important.  But the most important to me about this first burst of family is the Giana.  Giana Lily who i wanted named Alluvial Fan but got vetoed.  Soon she will be three years old.  I only saw her when she was less than a year old.  So we are new to each other although son stops at my photograph on the way down the stairs and tells Her stories.  I see her on Facebook.  So we know something of each other.  Something.

They live in Colorado.  They go camping in the mountains.  But still,  Giana is a girly girl i think?  Maybe not.  We'll find out.

 

The Shelf.  Top two have been cleared for Visiting.  Bottom one  still has my stuff.  

The turtle basket.

 

i looked at Walmart,  the only store in town,  hoping for a bag of little plastic animals.  But not.  i guess bags of little plastic animals are lost in space now.  But there WAS a princess and her Friends.  Ok.

 

She has a very nice dress.  I looked and it can come off…velcro….but she would be naked then.  If i were a Good Old Nana,  i might drive self nuts making her a pair of shorts and a Ttop.  But i'm not that kind of Old Nana so……….

When Giana and i go out…which to me is the Whole Point of the visit,….when Giana and i go Out to Build a World under the Old Apricot tree,  build mountains and bridges and huts and lakes with the hose,  when we BUILD A WORLD,  the princess will need to wear her nice dress.  OR go naked.  it will be up to Giana.  If she wears her dress,  it will become all muddy.  We can wash it and hang it to dry?  or not.  We can take the Princess with us when we feed the Goats.  I have a little pouch Giana can wear for that.  The princess can be in it as well as some peanuts. 

As i write this stuff,  i am so Smiling.  I love kids.  I love their minds.  I love finding out what they think and what they SAY and the oh so excellent way they SAY stuff…their choice of words…..I SMILE….

it's the weekend of my son's birthday,  her dad.  I was going to make my crashed pound cake but then though not…Giana and i will banish him and her mother to somewhere else and we will create

Banana  Splits.  These,  she can do as she will.  They will be her Creations.  So.  OK and more OK.

 

After she's gone,  both top two shelves will be for Julian (7) and Destiny (8).  For THEIR stuff.  They are Makers.  Alyssia has caused this in them.  They MAKE stuff.  As i go here,  i think of things we might Make.  I got the Inktense Pencils for them.  There is collage stuff.  and of course,  there's tons of Cloth.  Julian i kind of know.  He's been here off and on.  Destiny i have yet to meet.  We will LEARN eachother as it goes.  But i will be ready.  This is Important.  They are very much into coming to where the Goats are.  They know that their Nana there in California will bring these Goats there.  But this does not dim at all the Thing of the Goats.  Destiny has been with Alyssia for a year now and is hungry for Family.  Hungry.  I will see what she wants  and do my best to FEED her soul.

 

the table is Clean.  Here we will eat together,  like at Dana's , but different.  Here we will eat what we make to feed ourselves together.  Everyone works.

 

since there is no guest room,  this wall shelf/counter is emptied.  Here the stuff in their back packs can go.  To make it as easy as it can be.  All the baskets of scraps have been moved for this.  A ritual in its own way.

 

 

 

Last evening.  Sheets on the clothesline.  Tonight it is 

Still.

 

 

 

 

 

things getting moved around

 

finding their place

 

half way through the Before

 

Tomato Woman,  folded leaves and all….maybe they are praying….but She Goes….

 

 

First bell pepper…deep in the center with a star

 

First two Yellow Hots….blowing in Wind

BIG day.  Made exact arrangements with down road neighbor for the Y posts…tree trunks for the Shade House.  His son is there,   will pull them.  Son is young and strong, and also a Dancer…Native,  at PowWows,  Award Winning.    Good Energy for the Shade House.  When i see them no longer standing,  i will get the Old Cowboy's truck that lives at Bill's and we will load and haul here.  

Did weeds at the Old Cowboy's with Travis.

Bought a bathmat at Walmart and the stuff to clean inside computer that was making chirping sounds.  Cleaned it.  

Stopped at Dog Trainer Jan's for 3 doz eggs and a gallon of goat milk for making cheese for the mandatory curry for the Son's visit.  She gave me IceCream from the goat milk…Sublime…Nigerians give the sweetest cream.

While there, held 3 Goat kids to get their horns banded.  All from Sunny Ray who was glad to see me but not needy.

for some odd reason,  there is a smell in the kitchen that reminds me of new cedar shavings in a hamster's cage.  Maybe because we always had hamsters when the kids were little.  Bodies remember things that the mind does not.  I am a Mother,  a Gramz,  a Nana,  an Old Nana all these i will be in the next few weeks.  I am also Me.  Winter Bitch is watching me prepare for the Ritual.

 

 

 

 

it looks like one will follow the other.  First son and his family and right the same day they leave,  Alyssia and the two kids.    So for almost the next month,  it's THIS.  I don't know at all what the THIS will entail,  we will find out when we wake up in the mornings. 

This week will be involved with imagining ways that will work with a 7 and 8 year old human being here.  I need to clear space in the ROOM.  First so the table becomes a table where people sit down together to eat.  Then there needs to be space on the wall table for their Stuff.  Kids bring stuff.  So the Room is next.

and whenever it is cool enough,  early mornings and maybe even evenings,  i want to cut clear paths in the Kochia weeds so they can easily see them,  stay to them.  This will allow the lizards to feel safe with all this new commotion that they don't know.  I need to negotiate getting those Y tree trunks over here for the building of the Shade House.  

There's a lot to do.

So i'm thinking that there might be just pictures here for a while.  Or maybe not.  But am giving self that option.  In the case there is,  no need for response although you know i always love to know you are With me……

 

at Work Away today i did a boat load of laundry while i was cleaning*.  All the sheets and pillow cases, towels etc.   And the futon cover.  How it Held.  How it became more even a whole unto itself. All hand stitched.  How the mending was Good.  SO.  the mother,  the Nana,  the Gramz, the Old Nana…the things that i am,  this is who i become full time now for the next while.  

*they are gone to Maine for some weeks.  I clean for the housesitter

it does appear that there actually is clear change in weather these last few months…March through today.  I want to note this here so i can remember for the Next Year's gardening.  

Where ordinarily there would be great Wind in March,  there was some and it continued through April and May.   Where ordinarily,  in May and maybe June there would be a few intermittent 100 degree days,  2016 there have been several and the days inbetween staying in the very high 90's.  This month has brought Wind Storms….monsoon like, as in late afternoon,  high Winds,  dry heat,  lightning/thunder but no rain. Every day.  Amazingly,  i didn't write down when i put the tomato seedlings out.  But it was later than usual,  probably mid May.  So these weeks would have been the time for them to establish themselves for producing.  Things looked Great for a while.  They blossomed,  some began fruiting.  But then in the last couple weeks…

 

this curling in of the leaves.

 

 

Curley Top??????   a viral disease that is brought by the beet leafhopper,  1/10th inch insect.  The remedy for Curley Top is to pull the plant immediately and either burn it or bag it and remove from property.   so i read and read and remembered the few times that i DID have Curley Top….and this i'm pretty sure is NOT.  The curling in yes,  but no thickening,  no browning.  The leaves do not become deformed,  just uhhhh, close.   

 

Down the row where there is partial shade from Doris' Snake Tree,  things are good.  The partial shade and the fact that they are out of the path of Wind.

The thought of pulling plants is heartbreaking.  I can barely  make self do it.  So i wait a little while more.  But what i need to learn from this is that Next Year,  just in case this is a Change and not a fluke,  i need to make frames arching over them with some kind of cloth cover.  Until the summer settles.   Make the arch from top of fence down,  with fencing…anchor at the wood bed frame.

Find a lesson in every failure…who said that?

through screen door this morning…double click

 

So wild,  so fiercely FINE ….and says…..Just GO

 

just a little something more

 

 

a short time passing and look at the change.  The first two Cloths i sent to Wendy Golden Levitt were at her request for "curtains"  for the childrens studio windows.  2 of them.  But soon on arriving they became "Window Hangers".  And soon spent more time off the windows and used for wrapping or even once,  a raft in the Tsunami.  I was looking long on Judy Martin's blog at her incredible Cloth of Wind and Light and remembered this.  It immediately connected with this oh so thin piece of linen.  Cloth of Light.   Window Hanger.   This is pinned to the curtain behind the computer screen…a south window.  I'll photograph it as it tracks the movement of Light through a day.  And Window Hangers.

maybe i want to do that for a while?  Things for windows,  things of Light,  things to set our mindhearts loose?

 

 

 

 

 

the three words of the times

 

so

 

 

when i said whatever it was that i said about Mending the other day,  about feeling like i was

loving

it

did i say that?,  i think i did but i don't want to go back to look,  well,  there's mending and there's mending.  Some mending is for enhancement,  for Beauty.  Some mending like i've been doing for a few days now is out of necessity.  That futon cover.  It's necessary.  On the seat of the futon there are two pieces of memory foam for the comfort of couch sleepers every now and then.  If i had somewhere to put them,  i could just have the futon itself which would be great.  But i don't so they have to be covered.  Hence,  the denim thing.  There IS the other thing that is the light blue grey one but that's impractical when company is here,  especially a 3 year old and the  old dog of theirs that is used to being on furniture.  And so.  After all this time, years,  i gave in to finishing the "hem".  There are two lines of stitches.  There should and will be a third.  But not now.  Two's good.  DONE FOR NOW.

then the denim "uniform"….mended in the places where too much of my skin was exposed.  Now i am more civilized.   The last two "uniforms" bit the dust.  Just shredded in the washing machine.  The two, this is one, the two i have now are not loved yet.  Not worn enough,  thin enough.   But the only way to have that "hand" is to wear and wash.  So ok.  and the necessity of this refers to something to wear when my son comes at the end of the week ahead.

 

this is my 2016 uniform.  I wear it every day.  If i have to go somewhere,  i put other things on.  A T shirt and a skirt  or something.  But get back home and put this Creature back on.  An old India Import item…very thin cotton, but strong.  And faded to the most odd color that is really desert camouflage.  I wonder what color it was in the beginning?  Anyway,  this year it's my uniform.  I've had it for a couple years from the thrift shop but didn't wear it because the eyelet makes it see through.  But somehow i have become emboldened this year and don't care.  In this cloistered world of privacy fence,  the only time i can be seen is when one of the very tall pieces of farm machinery is driving by or when the guy across the ditch is right at the top of the ditch bank.  In both those moments,  i just drop to a squat position until they pass.  It's long enough to cover my butt.  Kinda a mini uniform.  Anyway,  won't work with son and his family.  OK.  So ENOUGH of mending for necessity. 

Christa Tippet…On Being…this week's focus is  Ambiguous Loss.  I listened today while …mending.

need to listen again.  Ambiguity.  and then that word Binary which is arising so often lately….binary as in the hawk/dove binary   or gone/but not gone binary  

Binary.  a beauty FULL concept.  as is Ambiguity.  There is a LOT of both in my heart/mind lately.

 

Cleaning the bookshelves, i found this.  Had forgotten all about it.  It was from when daughter and i were on a roll.  When she had convinced me to move to California.  Before her job fell through and we hauled all the Goats back here.  So…4 years ago.  

This computer can't play a DVD.  Travis just came and left.  We ordered the thing that will allow it.  But for now,  me and you can google this and there are UTubes.  I watched a couple and a Ted talk.  and this morning i was totally ENERGIZED.  i CAN do this.  Down the road on the way to Lemitar about 4 miles is a piece of land with piles of junk tires.  In the other direction is a metal salvage place with a couple acres of metal…from doors of vehicles,  swamp coolers,  appliances.  There is dirt here.  I could put up some notices and collect bottles,  plastic and glass.  There is the New Mexico Tech college in town with an engineering program filled with nerdy students.  I have land.  Soon, hopefully, will have a little More land.  I can DO this.  I really Can.   All it takes is the Will.  Do i have it?  All the on and off conversation about Use…THIS is Use.  Do i have the will?????

Praying Mantis have been in the wind…just sent that Cloth, yesterday to Michigan…thinking much of them,  how they are,  how they make me FEEL.  Went out this morning to do the Goat thing,  feeding first and then water and 

 

i lift that top handle to turn the water on.  Then,  turn the knob to let it flow through the hose.  So i did.  Lifted that top thing.  Went to put my hand on the knob and BRAIN said….STOP!

looked and……….in this pic you can barely see

 

maybe 3/8 of an inch tops….

 

 

Mantis Rule the World

 

 

the worst corner of this house.   I didn't take an "after" but now everything is vacuumed,  each book,  each magazine.  Vibration is HIGH.

 

OutSide,  where the Very Young Vitex,   blooms!     I would not have expected this.  Usually it takes a year to establish roots and Place,  but not here.   A wild morning glory vines its self and i will leave it as long as it seems that they are co-habiting.

 

two New wild sunflowers.  This seems to be their year.  they are Fierce and Strong.

 

the One in front of the Guinea Hen Palace…as tall as i am and beginning her first bloom.