windthread

this is unnecessary and probably inappropriate to  put here,  but in the name of Transparency,  i think, So What.

Spent the day at the Old Cowboy's house.  It's  Done.   A modest amount in the center of the garage to go to the dump.  A lot of cardboard boxes to smash and tie for recycle.  Otherwise….except for his brand new lightweight transport wheelchair and his beloved wheeled walker thingy that go to Hospice this next week,  everything is gone.  Well,  a small box of his slippershoes,  his teeth.  His glasses.  I was going to bring them home today.  They will be buried at the Raft here,  but somehow,  it was a Not Yet.  So they wait there.  I don't know for what. 

Outside there is now a real estate sign with a "lock box" for the key to the house…to 
show

Feelings.

So unless something changes,  which it probably won't,  his

Home

will be sold.   

The money from that will go to my GrandDaughter Alyssia.  For Whatever.  

There is some other money.  That will be divided between my daughter, son and floundering grandson.

Hopefully,  there will be enough that i will buy that piece of property next door to me.  My buffer against the world.  We'll see.

And when it's over and Done,  i can go back to being me.  Whoever me is.

During the Dust Bowl,  Old Cowboy's mother and father,  Leroy and Flossie,  set out from Clayton New Mexico for Colorado.  They arrived at Steam Boat Springs and with the help of someone,  bought land and a small herd of cattle.  They were "bankrolled".   They lived and raised that herd to a very very Good herd.  They raised their only child,  the Old Cowboy,  who was from birth challenged by significant physical handicaps. But they taught him and he learned.  Then Leroy just died one day,  on the couch in their livingroom.  Old Cowboy,  in his 40's and his mother Flossie kept the ranch going.  It wasn't easy.  And when Flossie died,  Old Cowboy,  in his early 60's sold that ranch to become ski runs and condominiums.  He floated down here to Socorro New Mexico and that's where our story began.

i know the whole of the story,  the Before and then of course from when he got here because that's when i began to know him.  I know how all his money and all his Stuff were Everything to him.  And today,  all that knowing was very much with me as we finished it all up.  

Not long before he died,  he had a space of total clarity when he said…."  i will die,  and no one will care."  "it won't matter".  

i so clearly remember this moment and how there was such an urge to say Stuff.  To say nice stuff.  But i didn't.  I said some thing like….  people will care in their own way.   and in a certain way,  no.  it won't matter.   Our lives matter to Us.  as we live them.  this is when there is mattering.  In the living of it.  When that's done,  then……

so i did what i did today.  What comes of it comes of it.   What he might think about what will come of it will be in question.   He always said that i should take any money and buy a new car.  Buy a new house.  Get stuff.   I have no need.  So…i will pass it on.  I will bankroll others.  What they do with it in this day and age is for them to know.    I talked to him about all this today.  I know he listened.

 

 

this morning the computer corner lamp looked like Mardi Gras.

and whatever the "bugs" are…cold/flu…they are still alive and well inside my body so i just drifted.  Mostly, cleaned house.  

 

took water out and went back and forth to the WhatEver.  Just to be amazed.

 

and i read the interview that MO referenced and linked yesterday  and i went off to look at her art,

Audrey Niffenegger

probably many of you might have read her book….Time Traveler's Wife…..

in the interview she said:  "why make something that merely replicates reality when you can have reality.   My own interest lies in things that are impossible in some way."   ahhh.  and eeeee.  yes.  impossible in some way…or maybe not.  yes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

and then,  the "sky" became just a cloudy grey.

am thinking about the words magical realism.  

 

just at the end of the day i noticed this at the bottom of the front porch steps,  

turn your head to the right and there it is right by the wooden box….??????  What IS it?

 

got my finger wet with spit and  rubbed off the dirt….

I have No Idea.  What it looks most like is some very old piece of linoleum???

but it's Beauty FULL,  the colors,  the wildness of it's design,   and there's ways to deal with things….i could pick it out of the earth with my finger or a stick,  i could cover it back up,  make it hidden again as it must have been for a long long time,  or i can imagine things about it.  Maybe tomorrow i'll pour a little water on it and take another clearer pic.  

But this is actually a good example of what i was trying to think about all day…magical realism….how i have somehow for whatever reason in the last years,  lost my relationship with that.  Did i lose my Heart for it?,  My Eye for it?,  was it too hard to communicate so i just stopped trying?  Have i

"settled" ?   Because there's been too much other Stuff?  

 

 

found out today what that Off feeling was yesterday (and today some too, still)  the conversation in the grocery line etc was informative.  Everyone who has/had that "cold" is taking a long time to get over it.  It leaves a flu like residue.  So ok…

 

a lot of small stitching that doesn't show and in between a lot of looking at the fragments.   I just love the plain grey square with the two dots of red/orange thread.  This that came from Jude a long time ago in a batch of scraps she sent.  It's really beyond simple,  but so perfect here.  How it's surfaced now and then for so long,  but suddenly,  this,  it's Perfect Place.    and then,  that rectangle of  white with the black and blue marks that all look black really unless magnified like this….it's not much,  but where it is,  it's Everything.  Spent a lot of time just Looking.   Feeling why they feel so good.  Letting there not be an answer,  just the feeling.  So i guess, Looking and Feeling.

and then,  Goats.

 

we might remember how Great Caregiver Travis,  his woman Rebecca and the child Zarek want me to "make them some Goats".   I said ok,  when it's time, if they still wanted some.   Well….it's time.  November is the month.  5 month pregnancy and kidding in April.   So these months thinking and a lot of conversation off and on with Dog Trainer/Goat person Jan about WHO to breed,  WHY,  and today the day arrived….Here we have Cinderella.  Not the most flashy Goat,  marking wise,  and her scurs are unattractive,  but she is a WonderFULL young thing,  so gentle and Willing and doesn't mind anything about her being touched…teats for instance…..BIG PLUS…..she is the offspring of Ginger and Gideon.  She's 3 and never been bred.  

She'd like to be.  As you can see in the pic,  she is expressing her interest.  LOUD and in her very own odd gutteral/human kind of sound.  She started first thing this morning at the little gate that faces the buck yards.  Kept it up all day.  And yes,  upon looking,  her ….what would you like me to call it… her twat is drippy.  Okey Dokey.   So i have tonight to decide.

Part of me does NOT want to breed any  of them.  Part of me wants a year of Adding Nothing.  A year to just experience things without any thing but the Minimum.

Part of me wants to give kids to Travis and Rebecca and end up with milking does and make some cheese again which is such a DEEPLY satisfying thing.   I still really have no clue about how life is going to feel without the Old Cowboy, it's too soon.  Maybe there will be a LOT of room for milking.

They come into heat every month.  So it's not like this is IT,  but it's the most perfect time for kidding and beginning milking after weaning.  Next month would be ok too,  but one more month to think about it won't make any difference i'm thinking.  I either do or i don't.  Maybe i can dream an answer.

 

so that's Cinderella at the end of the picnic table.  Her mother Ginger on the table.  Under the table at the far end is Mercy with the crescent moon on her forehead.  The second one i would breed.  Because i Love her.  And she loves me.

In the foreground is Karma.  Well not the fore fore ground,  but in front of Cinderella.  Karma is the MOST BEAUTY FULL GOAT.   I would LOVE to breed her.  She so far does NOT allow touching.  This can change with kidding.  During delivery,  they all allow contact and allow contact because of the kids.  Just because she hasn't,  doesn't mean she might not become the greatest milking Goat.  so,  eeeee.

And back to the beginning.  Wishing for nothing but looking.  And back to the words of Nisargadatta Maharaj,  Do Not Add.  

I add.  Over and Over,  I add.

 

 

 

 

 

can't say why.   Late to work Away so late returning.  Stuff just feels ….off.

 

 

 

 

 

stitching down the very small fragments,  slow.   Very slow.  And reminding self that nothing here is for sure yet.  Just Looking.

a slip of the mouse in Picasa.   Interesting.

While working,  i listened to the most recent interview at On Being…with Ann Hamilton.  It's wonderFULL and rich with so so much,   i listened twice and i will listen again.   and could have written down a zillion things,  but i did write how she refers to  Time as a process,  as a material.   how do you let things take the time they actually need.

in and Out,  the afternoon which comes so soon and very suddenly becomes evening,  i looked and pulled things around,  thinking something, but not really being able to see what the something was/is

 

 

so…like this.  Maybe i will see what this feels like?  What it might mean?   Pulling stuff around,  changing it,  i was thinking about it coming into American Holiday season,  Thanksgiving, first and of course there are thoughts about one's family of origin and i thought about my mother,  how every single phone conversation included two questions.  Did you go to church this Sunday?   Why aren't you Here?  For years.   And i thought ok,  i'll make an installation here,  that is just in front of the Raft, that would Include the Raft and also that chair to the left that holds the Mirror  and how maybe it can be some kind of church.  Like a Church for Crows?   It can take all winter.  it can take the time it needs.    I think so.

 

 

 

i'd put it out of my mind for a week,  let self forget,  but today…ok….there's still things to do at the Old Cowboy's house.  Still Stuff.   The realtor woman would like it empty in another week or so.   I loaded the truck for the Thrift Shop Final Run.   Done.  and she said,  once the sign goes up,  anything outside is fair game.  To take the yard furniture if i was intending to or someone would.   

These 4 pieces are companion pieces to the Doe Goats picnic table in the middle pen.  OCB's down the street neighbor Charley was trying his hand at carpentry and made them for him just not long after he moved in there.    OCB liked Charley a lot.   So they meant a lot to him.  Charley was killed not long after in a freeway accident.  Young father of 4.  So they meant more.  

There are 13 chairs here already.  Some the ones my granddaughter Alyssia has always called the Ghost Chairs…like the one with the Mirror on it and the one hidden in the Giant Secatan Grasses.  For Ghosts.  And there are others like it,  3 under the Old Apricot Tree in front,  only 2 "sitable"…the others so falling apart….Bill's father Lee built all those.   Then there are the 2  Janet Chairs that i stole.  And two aluminum lawn chairs,  one a rocking chair,  that belonged to OCB's mother Flossie.  So that's a very adequate amount of chairs for one human being who rarely SITS anyway.   But…what do i do?  I guess i could have loaded Them up for the Thrift Shop too.  someone would be very happy.  But i didn't.   After the Thrift Shop Trip i hauled the bench,  which is HEAVY and AWKWARD inch by inch and heisted it up into the truck ,  got into the truck bed and Pulled it in….2 chairs and the little endtable easy peasy and here,  unloaded them out by the Raft.  In front of the Albatros and also Tenzen and Nogal's stinky yard….of course,  just the place for visiting…..but where else?  I guess i could put them in the Way Back for the Does to sit on…they would….. but i walked around and really,  i don't know.  Maybe over by the Big Compost?  I always have trouble staying the needed amount of time watering it.  Maybe if i had such a nice bench to sit on,  i might be inclined to hang out?    Nice thought, but probably not.  If i do sit,  i sit on rocks,  or the long wood that makes the raised beds.

anyway….they are here.  A little more of the Old Cowboy is here.  In a box atop the refrigerator at his house are his slipper shoes,  his glasses and his teeth.   When everything else is gone  i'll bring them home and bury them out by the Raft.  

 

 

 

 

 

i say Cloth itself makes decisions,  makes

moves

presents its Self

Moves.

Jude,  for whom i hold the Highest Esteme,  says she disagrees,  but i too,  disagree.

Cloth Presents and Moves.

This is a really Great Cloth for thinking about this….how it began with nothing but that face that kept being present and prominent on the table and then got laid upon a cloth with two very neutral scraps.  And for a long time, that was IT.   But then,  All the rest of this began to happen.  Do I DO IT?  How does this work?   DO I  envision something and then make it happen?   

With this perfect example,  NO.  None of this is something i envisioned.  I simply put stuff.  I put stuff that Shows UP.

So,  What Is It?

I don't know and it really doesn't matter.  It's how it goes.

 

and how it goes,  i took that 20 minute nap and woke,  there,  next to the table,  infront of the futon couch,  and sat up and looked at the cloth there and then down and noticed the scrap on the floor.

Pick it up and put it There….and it changes everything,  changes the Whole Story which i don't even know yet

 

 

so,  while still a little ify,  i finished up the Christmas list.  I don't do Christmas.  But little kids do.

So.  A Pokemon Pikachu Pillow.   A Disney Princess Play CD Player,   A dancing ballerina, musical jewelry box which i will need to paint the dancing ballerina brown…  2 books on meditation…Charlotte and the Quiet Place    A Handful of Quiet Happiness in four pebbles by Thich  Nhat Hanh

 

and for all three kids,  LED  Headlamp Flashlights.

 

and in my world

 

fragments of the Dream

so…Better,  for sure.  Have turned the corner.  But still.  

That Altered State of Sick.   Which i would ordinarily ignore,  but for some reason,  am kind of interested in.  I so rarely Get sick…..

and mid morning i as usual looked over to my left from the Morning Chair and there,  where its been on the shelf for a very long time

Two Old Women    An Alaska Legend of Betrayal, Courage and Survival by Velma Wallis

It's a short book that Marti loaned me a long time ago.  And suddenly,  today,  i read it.  Just a couple hours.  A very Plain Story,  told in a very Plain way,  but so truthfully that the "movie" it created while reading was immediate.   A story passed down generations of a time before the arrival of Western culture.

and when finished,  the huge thought was…..How strange we have become….human beings today.  Just how so Strange.