windthread

i may have done it.  a face that carrys some age.  will have to look long to see what exactly it is that makes me see that.  and she is Singing.  otherwise, everything is just Maybe.

 

a print out.  Six Crows, her hair,  and i think Grasses along the side of River.

i'd begun a "song" coming from her mouth, a Red Thread.  but i don't know.  took it away.  maybe i'll put it back.  maybe it won't be red, but rather the color of the River.

otherwise, MUCH work, trying to make it Easy to seperate the Goats.  MUCH.  doing and Undoing and Different Doing. it would be SO easy to just buy a large dog kennel.

 

again.  how the Cloth creates itself.  the "dress" moved itself to the center of the table.  it was a piece of a very small size blouse from the Thrift Shop last week…over dyed in the black bean.

 

how it Was

 

the part of the yoke i cut off to overdye

 

the long blue was ripped.

 

mud earth  brown underneath.  maybe more…different earth brown?  (s) ?

so..it has a name.

River

 

 

so i have finished the Karma Hat cloth.  today i tacked the black beans to that Runner

it's the First Time i have not had  "another" cloth waiting in my mind.  my mind is empty.  i think it feels odd.  but i'm not sure.   What if the Karma Hat were the last cloth i ever make?

i worked away again and came home to do things outside.  like scrub out Drinking Tubs.  rearrange the feed hay bales.  and my mind was still at the River.

Escondida (Hidden in spanish) is about 5 miles away.  it occured to me that i could go Often, even every day, really,  and Witness Her after this time of Reprieve.  i could.  and there are other places along her shore where i could go.  Take Chinche who would be thrilled beyond her wildest dreams.

and suddenly, i remembered to go look

 

from:

Meinrad Craighead.  you may remember i have talked about her before.   i don't know what she is doing now.  She lives in Albuquerque along the banks of the Rio Grande.  she had fallen ill.  no longer teaches.

maybe i will read this book front to back.  truth is, i never read the text.  only looked at the pictures.  maybe it's time to read her words?

 

of all the bean dye,  this is my favorite.  it's just the end of a long strip, most of which is underneath the blue strip.  i couldn't tear it off.  and i look at it with such PLEASURE and think that it is only fairly recently that i could imagine choosing this as my favorite.  Things have changed for me.

 

 

 

a work away day.  longish one.  and on the way home, i stopped at the little grocery, Supermart,  and walking out to the parking lot see an elderly man getting into a truck with the Cement Sand and Gravel sign on it's door…A-1 Sand and Gravel.  so i went around and asked him,  the difference between gravel and crusher fines.  he was, as people ARE here,  very interested in my question and very willing to take however much time to answer me.  he wanted to know what i was going to DO with the gravel?  listened intently all about the Goats, their path,  their sleeping shelters,  the low area on the Other Side where the truck was sitting stuck.    crusher fines he said.  and more, COURSE crusher fines.  and he said "you can trust me.  all my life i have hauled stone.  it's what i know".  so.  ok.  and if we were wondering about taking on the 3x/wk Alz. B responsibility…well, it buys 10 tons of crusher fines plus delivery.  so, ok.    and getting Home, 

the first thought was to do Nothing or take a nap.  but this is an example of what having the Goats has done for me.  it has enlivened the NEED to Just Go.  so….i dug the rear tires out, put pieces of bark under the tires and…..TaDAA!  OUT!   and now that area can dry up some so i can have the crusher fines delivered.  and Then, i thought, do nothing or take a nap but….why Waste a completely beautiful and DRY early evening, so….

Chinche and i hopped in the truck and went to see the river.

 

 

 

 

for a few years, she has diminished.  just a week ago, she was sand.  wet sand.  but sand.  up further north, on the Isleta Pueblo,  they call her the Blue Mother.  Blue Mother has been reduced to sand mother by the stealing of her beingness for water use.  both in New Mexico and cubic water feet sold to Texas years ago.  she was sold.  she was Reduced.  enslaved.  

today, she flowed.  all mud colored and blue and there were flood plains like in the old days.  like, but not real flood plains, but enough Like flood plains.  it brought tears.  and as we stood on the bridge across her, me and Chinche, now and then other cars and trucks would stop.  people would get out and stand, looking.  silently.  looking at our River.   she is no longer the Rio Grande of old, but today she was Big.  a Big River.  in spite of us all.

 

 

 

 

 

am going to put this here now

Finished.  Enough.  

i am going to go haul bales of feed today.  it's out way back through their horse arena and paddock.  it's as likely as not i'll get the truck stuck.  or/and stuck bringing it in here through the swamp out there to the Albatros.  so, it's a beautifully Sun filled ify day.  and they are done.  Ready.

ADDENDUM:

stuck.

but the good thing is, it's Here.  i could unload with the wheelbarrow.  

 

so…these last days, including last night AGAIN and on into half a day to day of RAIN,  are challenging.  and as i listened to the rain pouring down on us from the "sky",  i had thoughts.  and Beth said something about Endurance.  was that her word?  close anyway.  and again, i had thoughts.  and

it made me wonder, as in "lets Re View"…..am i a glass half full person? or a glass half empty.  really.

in the last years, when things get hard for whatever reason,  i always find self going to other places in this world that help me see that my own perceived hardship is what it is, but many others are bent under many many kinds of hardship.  an easy one right now is the women refugees from Syria.  their children in hand, walking, with one bag of belongings to Somewhere,  most likely where they are not really welcome.  so.  How do my puddles compare?, this family of Goats i belong to. ?.  Not so much, right?  right.  and i remember being brought up by my mother who had little to offer on the glass half full side.  but she told the parable over and over about the man with no feet.  you all probably know that.  but i was whining once in junior high school about needing a certain kind of shoe for a school dance and she repeated it again.  about feeling bad, having not the proper shoes until seeing the man with no feet.  or something like that, which she applied to various kinds of whining and i would feel angry at her because i felt like she was suggesting that my own feeling, whatever they were, were unimportant.  that she was wanting me to DENY my own experience.  but it stuck.  that Image.

my daughter, Jenny, had most of this herd of Goats for going on 3 years.  She put her Heart and Soul into them.  Into learning and then following through to improve this herd, to make it the best Dairy herd she could as she went along.  there were hard things.  the dogs that attacked and stole the new born kid.  the next night returning and SnowBunny, who you see here today, defending the herd and being so wounded and torn.  Jenny caring for her for weeks in what the Vet said was a lost cause.  but again,  SnowBunny is here.  scratching her ears, neck and chest, you can feel the scars.  but she's here.  and she is SnowBunny.  the Matriarch.  She and her daughter Ona and granddaughter Onday run this herd.  and so.

then, Circumstance.  and now they are all HERE, until Jenny can take them again.  if that is how it goes.  and who knows.  but it won't be for a while.  a year?  2?  and we are all here, Now.   these are the days we have.  days we are Alive.

that's SnowBunny, standing.

 

 

 

 

 

and while taking these, i notice that in the Oasis, the Side Oat Grama, a prized Native Grass, has flourished.

 

and too,  a native Aster seeded and multiplied.

and i'd forgotten.  out by the back gate is a small pile of gravel from when they used it to put in the posts for the fence.  i can haul that for Time Being to shore up the Shelters some.  Enough.  

and i made a plan.  no need to worry about all the puddles.  all that's needed is a Path.  Goats love Paths.  they go this way already, it's the high ground.  so.  bring the wheelbarrow around and haul that gravel to fortify.  and i look and have been seeing an extension on the little back porch.  do that.  they love to pile up on there when it's not raining.  it's where they sleep.  and, really, it's not ever raining much here.  in the Cold Months,  there's not a lot of Snow.  or any.  so…extend the porch.  i can do that myself.  and make that Path.  i can do that myself too.  OK.  some things tho are hard with just one.

so i'll put this up at the Grocery Store.  i wrote…a woman/girl.  i am thinking about that.  maybe i shouldn't say that.  ????  who knows.  maybe there is some very good young man?   haven't decided yet.  but you need to ask for what you need., for sure.

and about endurance.  about Just Going.  i wrote a little while ago about waking to the question of what would be more uhhhh,  worthwhile to be doing?  or,  what i would Rather be doing?   and again, today,  the answer is This is Good.  if i wasn't doing This, maybe, yes., i would have more time for Cloth Making.  but then,  the Cloth Making, those stories, are about Life.  and  you need a life to talk about life, yes???   and there is always the sense that the Cloth Making is FOR me.  this thing with the Goats is about All of It.

and up there in the Circle of Day is the beginning of Crow.  as far as i got.  today.

 

 

what? does one do when woken at around 2 something A.M. because it's raining in the window on your head?????

go look for the push pins that pin the plastic closed over it,  the window,  not the head,  and while at it, notice how the colors look on the chair and find the camera, take a pic.

so it started again at about 2 a.m.  and continued HEAVY,  some reprieve for about 20 min at about 10:30 a.m….fed the Goats…and then on until somewhere around well, 2:30 p.m.    during that Rain time, i thickened the stick for the Flag.  no point in showing that.   and i finally cleaned up the table.  no point in showing that.  during the 15 minutes i collected some marigolds and some of the pods of Doris's Snake Tree

 

 

and once it was SUN SHINING,  i spent the afternoon early eve pulling the giant Kochia weeds, flinging them over the fences to the Goats.   Wishing i could just let them loose to forage for themselves, which they would LOVE, but would this would also include the remaining trees and bushes.   i'm not ready for that yet.  maybe never.  Because of the Rain, they literally slid out of the earth.  so i pulled and flung, pulled and flung.   often forgetting myself by the rhythm of it.  toward the end of the day i moved over near the Buck Pen so i could eavesdrop on them.  When i go to the fence, there is all the pushing and jealousy.  so i didn't.  i knelt down and pulled that way or squatting,  and just listened.   Things have changed a lot for Gideon.  his arthritis is really crippling.  but he gets around.  no longer is the dominate Buck he was,  but also,  next in line is his son, Sunny Ray, who is pretty much all talk.  so i listened to the talk.  it's really quite endearing.  he practices on his Father and Guideon just stands there, listening.  and really, i'm pretty sure, appreciates the homage and attention.  Sexuality to Goats is just that.  a Feeling.  anyone can be the object of the Feeling.  They don't mind.  Whatever.

Gideon, the subdued old man

 

Gideon's son.  Sunny Ray.  one year old and just coming into his own.  the most overtly virile.  but also the same sweetness from when he was a baby.  he would love it if i came into their pen and he could try to sit on my lap.  i wish he could too.  but he is too big and his lap sitting feelings are tangled up in other kinds of feelings.  and so.  

his horns are scurs.  unsuccessful attempt at disbudding.  so…they are There, but also for whatever reason that no one knows really,  i've searched and searched for info,  also don't give him the same sense of dominance that Buckwheat had with his natural horns.  maybe because many of the nerves are dead?  it's interesting.  it's almost as if he doesn't know he has horns.  he doesn't take advantage of them at all.  

and then, there is TenZen.

named after the Dalai Lama.  Daughter bought him from a breeder in Boston, Mass.  he flew here in a cargo plane at 3 mos.  the most gentle of all.  the most unassuming.  the most willing to give way.  He accomodates Sunny Ray every morning by doing the head butting routine atop their shelter house.  he wins sometimes.  sometimes doesn't.  but it's all the same to him.  he is shy and skittish to a lot of overt handling but does love to be touched.  all while i was pulling weeds out there, he talked to me.  has a very soft voice, surprisingly soft and he talked.  we had a LOT of eye contact.  he's good at that.

so

i listened to them.  watched them through my squatted spots among the tall weeds.  soon,  any day, really, i'll have to put little Nogal in there.   When i put Sunny Ray in there last year, i was so angry at him.  he was i think the same age really as Nogal.  but it was the day that Lucky Star was kidding and all the does were in that front pen and anxious.  Sunny Ray was too.  but his way of expressing his anxiety was to mount everyone as best he could over and over, mumble his very best love words over and over and i was so frustrated i just left Lucky Star's side and grabbed him and stuck him in with Gideon, TenZen and Buckwheat.  Done.  it was the last kidding and i was exhausted and didn't have an inch of energy left for anything.  remember, 14 kids were born.  and he, Sunny Ray, was miserable for days.  he hid.  he cried for his mother.  he hid and he cried.  and then, suddenly, it was done.  Buckwheat and Gideon pushed him around for a couple months and then just ignorned him.  

and here we go again.  THIS year.  i keep Nogal to keep Buckwheats genetics for Jenny's herd.  and as i watched and listened today, i worked to understand the way They experience things.  Nogal will miss his mother for some days.  but he is a Buck.  his Buckness is what he IS.  and i am hoping he can find his place with them.  if not, i'll take him to the vet and get him surgically castrated.  he can live a softer, less energetic life that way.  but …..

so…the end of maybe the last of the BIG RAIN days of 2013.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 so into the juice.  and really, not for long at all.  CHANGES.  

i put pieces in that i most likely would not have used in their original state.  and with the overdye, was startled by Relationship that i would not have imagined before.

i put them on this linen/cotton table runner that i found at the thrift shop yesterday.  right now, just pinned.  but i'll very loosly baste them on to document what's happening with the dye experiments.  for now tho, this.  the colors were tweaked.  all except one changed.  the one that didn't is the lower right.  i remained as it was in the beginning.  

so…am looking.  looking at how, somehow, there came to be a relationship between them all.  i could very easily use these scraps, all of them.   even, really, the one that didn't change at all…????

trying to see what it IS that really changed how i perceive these scraps.  Jude is talking about a Full Spectrum of colors, which would include All colors.  even the ones that i find difficult.  the "pure" colors of the color wheel…primary colors.  how can i be Inclusive?  do i need to be?  do i Want to be?  …..  but for sure, i want to KNOW some things about the need or want.  

 

i like them even better at a distance.  but that's useless, because what i make is close up stuff.  Please ignore the dust.

and i wanted to see what the stick of the Flag might look like.  so i began that.  Wind blew the wind strips around…and it was good.

 

 

 

 

it was very evident how dry this Earth has been.  by mid day all the pools of standing water were gone.  just layers of sticky mud

i cleaned for Old Cowboy today.  then visited Alz B and fed her lunch.  one of the other residents, Marilyn who used to be in the Alzheimer's Unit with B and got "voted off the island" too,  was doing something odd.  my guess was that she was having very low grade seizure activity…in an on going way.  all through lunch,  she was at the table across the way from us and i could watch her.  so after lunch,  i pulled up a chair to her wheel chair.  she only looked at me once, when i first appeared and said her name.  but then remained involved in the Internal activity.  i very lightly stroked her shoulders, her neck.  running my hand down the back of her head.  she liked that.  i can't tell you how exactly i knew, but she did and i knew.    and i asked one of the nurses when they passed and yes.  a very mild seizure activity.  Unless you are family or otherwise authorized  person, they cant give any information.  so i didn't ask.   But for whatever reason, i want to say it here.  Document.

Marilyn was having a difficult time today.  her body was doing things that she didn't understand and had no control over.  it was worrying her in some way, i'm not sure how.  All i know about Marilyn is that she lived alone  west of here.  she had dogs and horses.  she has never had a visitor that i have seen in a year.

then, i got more Goat pellets from the one feed store.  i'd left a whole new bag in the truck bed Monday and it swelled twice its size from the rain.  i'll see if the guy down the road might be able to feed it to his pig.  at the other feed store i got 2 bales of straw.

managed to pop open that little fence gate with a hammer and a "wonder bar" (it swells tight with moisture) and unload while the Goats were preoccupied with their pellets.  spread it.  for this moment it will provide a barrier from the mud.  

Jude's Magic was the only one that watched.

Arctica knew i was doing something.  but she continued to work at the dead Russian Olive.  with horses, they call it "cribbing".  a kind of compulsive gnawing on whatever there is to gnaw on.  the Goats work away at this tree when there is some anxiety.  they also "crib" the back door.  sometimes during the night.

and then…there was maybe 4 very small raindrops 

and here they came.  Surprised and interested to find the straw.  soon, they were all there.

according to the National Weather Service, there is supposed to be more storm tonight.

When i was at the second feed store, there was a Navajo woman there.  she bought a wire "dog crate"  the medium size.  she said to the store guy, for their lambs.  so, being me,  at the counter, when she was paying, i asked her….do you worry about them?  the sheep?  when it's like this?  and she turned her head somewhat in my direction, but not entirely. ( never look into someone's face) and laughed that oh so singular soft Navajo laugh sound, and her head tilted sideways.  she didn't really answer me.  i know they raise sheep.  have for generations.  some are kept for wool.  the  little ones sold for whatever and that includes meat.  they understand things.  it is simply inside them.  it was simply inside her.  i know that when her ewes birth, she is there.  i know she watches over her herd like she is the Mother herself.  and i also know that they go so further than i know how in understanding How It Is.  her laugh was soft.  the turning of her head, kind.  she knew very well what this old hippy was asking.  she did not answer.  and that in itself is my answer.  

Find Out For Yourself.

so.

now,  this day is ending and the Crickets have begun.  i saw today several very small lizards born last month probably.  THEY are in a world that is Perfect to them.  could not be more perfect.  and i put some black beans in the copper pot to sit tonight, catching Rain.  i look at this face and  try to see,  really,  like, Very Really,  how truly beautiful it is that Cloth Making tells me things.  How when i first drew that face and placed the Karma Hat on it…i had no idea.  i just DID it.  and how since, it has continued of its own accord.  and how as i go through my days i think of the "look" and try to make my own face like that….how it feels.  how it loosens things.  how it lets things Be.

 

 

 

 

at first i would have written,  an AWFUL day  or  a HARD day  or a FRIGHTENING day  or a day of SAD or a day of WORRY or…..

but none really were exact enough to say.  i would say one in my mind and it would be immediately countered by the fact that it is just a day of inordinate RAIN.  it has poured rain.  non~stop since in the middle of last night sometime.  poured.  and i mean non~stop.  more rain today than we got for the entire Monsoon weeks.  More than half of all the earth in this Place has standing water.  there has not been a single vehicle come or go down this road or any leading to it in 3 directions.  that's not true.  Early this morning the UPS woman barreled her way through.  but that was many hours ago.  

ceiling by the door in the ROOM.

this is Nothing compared to outside where the Goats are.  it's Mud.  they do not know what to do.

there really is nothing they Can do that is ok.  it's mud.  

the forecast is for Rain the next 3 days.  the last time this happened i think was 15 years ago?  so, i can say to myself then, well, it isn't "really" like this.   but what if it might be again?,  or more often?  i need to think of what i can do for the Goats.   once it's happening, they are helpless and so am i,  to help them.

but what i did was stitch round and round, the revolutions of DayNight on the cloth.  and i kept looking at her face, ….that expression of hers and though i couldn't possibly assume it today,  it did ease the feelings and they came and went.   it WILL stop raining sometime.  and most likely, everyone will survive and we will be Just Going again.  

and i almost forgot to say.  That's!  what all the comotion was for last evening.  Animals know.  are so suseptible to changes in barometric pressure.