windthread

Talula, the other caregiver's child holding JustGoing

this is the first time i have had the urge to write the post ahead of posting and re-view my words, edit, then post.  but i don't really have time in this life for that.  so…it  will fall out of my mind as it comes.

not knowing anything

a beetle peeks up through the slat

and she suddenly looks up………and when i unload the pic i see one of the Lights at the fence

but then a lizard appears

so…she is Just Going.  i brought her out for a ride on the Raft.

this morning i woke with the "information" given about how the potential for Everything is Ever Present.  Everything.  easy/hard      beautiful/not     toward Life/against    kind/not  and on and on.  i received Derrick Jensen's latest book a couple days ago and have been reading a few paragraphs at a time.  The Derrick Jensen Reader…Writings on Environmental Revolution.  it is not easy reading.  but i knew that.  have all his books.  but also, of anyone at all in my lifetime awareness, he is the one who Stands, Facing what he knows,  and is unflinching.    and then in that last post, All That.  and then in so far today, how All That has turned, just enough, Just Enough, to let the light shine some where there was uncertainty about so much.   So, today rises with resolve.  and i was over at Michelle's NYC and her post just almost had me on my knees with Love for everything.  and i have been watching the first election in Libya (and for sure, That has the potential for Anything) and whatever comes of it,  they chose to have this moment of one voice, one vote which is beautiful.  and then…..there is a pic of Hillary Clinton.  and of all things, i felt this swell of love for her.  her hair is pulled straight back all no nonsense because i assume she doesn't have time for anything and she has bags under her eyes.  and i have never really liked her at all for a bunch of reasons,  but here, today,  i think how she has changed as Secretary of State over her term, how she has i think, maybe become a Stateswoman?????  how she is telling Syria that the sands are running out of the hourglass…a poet even????  and i felt love, yes, love.  even for Hillary.  and, well, a lot more.  but this enough.  Just wanted to note the moment because it belongs somewhat to that 19 year old in that pic of a couple days ago and it belongs to Alz B and her son and to my daughter and her refugee goats .  Life feels very ummmm, uhhh, swiftly turning today.  i want to Mark that.  i have fed the goats and it's quiet for this time and i am going to see how i can Mark this on the Housecoat.  i will mark the date with a Pitt pen.

 

it has been a very challenging week.  hard.  no use looking for better adjectives.  just hard.    the Alzheimer's person i care for began a hard crash and burn.  it was sudden and neither i nor her other caregiver expected it,  let alone B herself.  falling,  frantic searching for unremembered things,  almost total loss of coherence,  and what seemed like a total urge to Escape.  dear her.  dear us.  so her son was called back from Maine and we'll see today what we all think:   is this the moment we have known would come when she can no longer live at home?  or does he install an alarm system on her doors to the outside world and hire a third caregiver?   So, that.

and then,  at 1:10 in the middle of the night, that single   Bleeeeaaaaah

Lucky Star.  2 black and white spotted bucks and one red and white doe:

she was the first out.  there was confusion because it was night and they don't do well in the dark. Lucky does not clean her, i am wiping away her nose and trying to get all of the milling goats out of there into the yard pen.  Lucky goes out to and another is born out there, and another.  bringing them in, and yes the first is still breathing.  finageling Lucky in and closing the little wooden gate door making her feel trapped.  she is uncertain about what is happening and just stares at them, going from one to another.  none of the 3 make a sound.  they are smaller and much skinny ier than the others so far.  they all look so fragile, but the little doe looks hopeless.   so i get the light hooked up and sit there in my birth fluid soaked hose dress alternately rubbing them with a towel and holding them to her udder, until they begin to make sounds and she begins to lick them, clean them, taste them, know their scent.  by 4 something a.m.,  little doe is UP!

and by daybreak she is just going.  this is her from above

almost there.   and then, yes, There.  and she figures out what to do.  all by herself.   as do the little bucks.   and later in the day, Lucky is more and more restless,  so i decide to let her into the outside pen, back through that little wooden gate door.  things seem ok for a while but then there is comotion.   when i go around,  Ona and Onday have her cornered and are ramming her HARD, taking turns.  ramming her into the wood fence.  she is not fighting back.  i watch, stunned until she goes down to her knees and then run in and do whatever, i don't remember, some yelling, some pushing and pull her out by her collar and return her to her inside pen where the babies are.

i don't know.  daughter will come the first of the week.  we will think.  my guess tho is that we have reached some kind of "critical mass".   there are too many goats.  too many babies.  and the most difficult thing to think is that there are 3 more does to deliver.   oh, eee.

and the Monsoon rains have begun.  Intense and Huge Electrical Storms, sometimes one on the heels of another and goats DO NOT LIKE BEING WET.   they crowd into the guinea hen palace.  the uneasiness is Thick.  but in between all the above,  i have begun stitching a "housecoat"

a thin cotton blouse, shirttails cut off, sleeves, collar and buttons removed.  3 rectangles of tea dyed favorite cotton sheet stitched on and the strips begun to be stitched in place.   yesterday some Deb Lacativa cloth arrived in mail.  i opened the package right there, sitting at the neighborhood box unit mailbox down the road.  i pressed these brilliantly vibrant pieces to my face and breathed them in.  they comforted me.  fixed me.   And this morning all 3 babies have learned to bounce and head butt.  oh jeez.

 

 

 

 

 

Thunder Man is moving.  lightening.  but if i don't get this down here in the moment, it will be lost.  One way or the other.

Deb G provided the key.  in the last comment  that loosened the whole thing.  an innocent comment but it was what was needed.
the heat has broken.  like a fever.

i went out with the flash light to see what they were doing.  they are in the Albatross.  they are concerned.

the house, from where they can see.

ok.  this is risky business.  Thunder/Lightning is still overhead.  but i need to get this down.  if i would wait till morning, it wouldn't be the same.

Deb G commented and loosened it all.  i understand more.  re: that pic of 19 me.  what is was/is.

it's Willingness.  Willingness without Knowing.  Total Willingness, simply based upon the moment.  Clean.  Clear.

so much has happened since that single moment when someone snapped that pic.  experiences.  some good some not so much.  but the truth that remains within it all is that

I cannot keep stuff safe.  OR, just, I cannot keep anything.  i can just go.

in the moment of that pic, i was without past or future.  i was just there.  pure.  clean.  simple.

and this is where i am finding self again now.  just there.  just going.  it sort of is something about trust.  but more that that, really, a kind of Willingness.  a Willingness for Whatever.  who knows?

and here we are again, the Jude Thing, supposedly about cloth, but really, about Everything,

it's Just Going.

So.  ok.  it is a beautiful totally perfect New Mexico night.  the sky is illuminated by Storm.  Earlier, dragonflies filled the air.  FILLED the air.  the hose ran into the tree wells and toads came.  a spider came to drink.  i watched a spider drink.  and i am RElearning the truth that i cannot keep anything at all safe.  i cannot keep anything at all Right.  i need to just go. 

Thank You, Deb G.  Thank you and big big love………

 

i don't really know what to say.    it's all different.   i know that i had intended to post lots of goat pics but that didn't happen.  temps being at least 100, and friend Jane coming from Alaska, hmmmm.

and we didn't ready the goats for the albuquerque dairy goat show.  it would have been cruel.  prepping them and then hauling them.  not.  it's just Hot.  so all those great "plans" got set aside.

so…What?, then????  Jane brought some photographs from when we were mid 20's.  but she also brought this one.  i really have no memory of it.  but i do have this very INTENSE feeling about it.

it's not really a very complimentary pic.  BUT it is somehow, a photograph of my Self that for some reason i really really love.  and i am looking, and looking, trying to understand something.  i think i was probably 19.  i know it was before my kids.  i know, i think, it was before my marriage to my kids father at 21.  Nineteen.  the look on my face has me mesmerized.  there is something very similar that i am thinking/feeling in this pic that i am thinking/feeling Now.  i remember the blouse.  funny.  but i very distinctly remember the blouse.    and this sends a link over to Boro 2…to clothing….our costumes. 

and i wasn't going to make a rectangle "robe" thing.  again, Boro 2.  but today, i began stitching pieces together into strips.  maybe i am?

and i will say here that i am feeling somewhat adrift.  it's the first time in going on 3  years that Jude has been Off Line.  i am feeling that.

my bangs were sticking to my forehead.  they were totally drooping and annoying.  so…i got them into a rubberband and felt a little relief.

 

 

 

lierrekeith.com/vegmyth.htm

It's a good thing      that circumstance has not allowed me to name things.  i change too much.  Naming changes for me.  Tonight, just now, really, i was out watering the tomato plants and as she does, Magic caught my attention.  She  was standing off to the side.  Everyone else was wolfing down the Kochia i'd thrown in, but she was just watching.  Near the gate.  So, i spoke to her in quiet sounds, not to attract the attention of the others and she came…because she

notices things.

and i let her out.  And there she flew and spun and twirled and whirled and flew and spun.  The dogs ran with her.  She led them.   Until her mother came to the fence and said something and she spoke back and i captured her and let her back in where she and everyone else pretended nothing at all unusual had happened.

so…i am thinking a lot, almost constantly, about that thing of Kas Limaal that i found in Lierre Keith's book…The Vegetarian Myth.  Food Justice and Sustainability

Kas Limaal, a concept given to her from a Mayan Elder.  " Mutual indebtedness, mutual insparkedness.  the knowledge that every animal, plant, person, wind and season is indebted to the fruit of everything else"

and i would change this little goat's name.  Tonight her name is Kas Limaal.  (but she answers to Magic)

my friend Jane will be here Tuesday.  From Alaska.  Tuesday to Friday.  my daughter Jenny will be here.  Tuesday through Thursday.  my history and my present all in one place.  Jane and i have been friends since we were 16 and 17.  we were close by when our children were young.  we have kept close, all the years since, even though seperated by long distances.    So,  to have my  "before" and my "now" all within the same days will be Something.  My guess is that we won't probably do this again.   And there has been the urge to kind of..uhhh, spruce up.  I'd had plans to repaint the bathroom, finally tile the kitchen floor.  Things like that.  Just the Usual that regular people do.  But…what has happened instead is that i worked on the Noragi and then,  knew i would at least need to Look at cloth,  spent considerable time pinning things on the wall.  Standing.  Looking. 

And i brought the fold up bed in from the Albatros shed.  moved things around in the ROOM.  and in doing this, i realized that i very much could use a

cloth

for company.   I don't normally Have company.  But here i am.   and then in July and then in September,  the not quite 3 year old SunnyDay/DarkNight (Julian) greatgrandson will use this bed. So, hey ho.

 

 

 

 

I had mentioned a few times, my beloved heavy duty hooded zipup sweatshirt.  Of all the articles of clothing i own, this is to me,  really, the most important.  During a lot of the year, it goes over a thinner one and in the winter months maybe 2.  It is my work jacket.  It's hood is perfect, big enough to allow free movement, but just right to not be sliding off.   Last winter i replaced the heavy duty metal zipper.  But, the inner sleeves and both cuffs are worn.

There are a few other places, small, where there is significant wear.  But, for being some years old, and a Thrift Shop find to begin with,  it's quite strong.   I spend some time in the last days looking long at the photographs in that catalog for the Sri exhibit at the Portland Japanese Garden 2011,  Mottainai:  The Fabric of Life    Lessons in Frugality from Traditional Japan.  I looked through the book start to finish several times and lingered long on the photographs of the boro noragi, the work jacket.   Trying to create images in my mind of a woman to whom it might belong, trying to "watch" her as she went through her day.   Something about it just touches something deep in me.  I can't imagine anything more beautiful than this jacket.

So…here we have it.  The beginning of mine.  Right now, not much, really.  but being such a strong thing, i know it can go on as long as i choose to continue…years. 

One cuff,  the inner seam of one sleeve.  Now the other to go.

Something about this feels so Important.  So Significant.  Like some kind of Promise being made.

and then, i was whining in the last post about shade trees and to be sure not to misrepresent this Place,  there ARE trees left.  None are the really big ones that DID grow and then were lost for whatever their own reasons were.  But

beyond the picnic table you can see the latest effort…a second summer young cottonwood.  If it takes, it will provide more shade than anyone could imagine.

and here by the buck pen,  it's sister tree, up against the skeleton of Willow Boy, a beautiful globe willow that was killed by beetles a few years ago.

and there ARE trees in the "house yard"…small but provide shade.

and i tried to take pics of the goats but they were too uncooperative and little Sunny Ray kept trying to eat my hair and no one would stand still for one single minute.   My very old friend Jane is coming on Tuesday from Alaska.  Daughter Jenny will be here in the same days to get some of the does and babies ready to take to the Nigerian Dwarf Goat Show at the fairgrounds in Albuquerque.  I will assign Jane as the photographer and there should be some good pics then.  but in the meantime,  the bucks

beloved Tenzen

the young one, BuckWheat.  notice his stockings…need to get a better pic.

and oh so Beauty Full Gideon, who just as i snapped the pic, noticed a hummingbird overhead.

so, here we are.  Solstice 2012.

 

 

a funny, as in odd week.  i don't know why.  just out of focus, off balance.  just some.  ok, but just ok.

the grown goats would like more attention.  they would like it if i sat with them.  scratching.  talking.  they wished for that.

the young ones are busy learning.  this is Inky and his brother Darth Vader (just what i call them, not a name they will remain with). 

Sunny Ray, nibbling his sister,  Cinderella's chin.  practicing saying things to her that will, he's thinking, be useful in the future.  Goats are very verbal.  the exchanges between buck goats and does are almost startling unless you have heard them before.  the bucks have an extremely wide array of verbal exchanges that all the goats,  even the mature does understand.  it's, ummmm, really amazing to say the least.  so all that has begun.  and, as i watch and listen, i am also knowing that it is to no avail.  as soon as the daughter comes back again, they will all begin the process of being neutered,  the bucks…small rings clamped around their testicles which over a period of days, wither and drop off.  hmmmm.  so all this busyness is really for naught.  and i watch Cinderella and Magic, in their doe~ness receiving all this attention (well, the brothers to brother, too) but i think about Cinderella and Magic.  in another one to two months they Could be bred.  in goat world, life does not hesitate.  particularly with Nigerian Dwarves.  in their world of origin, they are prey to lion, cheetah, hyeena. 

and i began the first, really, boro work. 

this is one of the original hose dresses.  jumper.  it has been with me since my kids were little. so 30 some years.  it has worn so thin here…like a hanky, and once i began stitching, it became like gauze.

i cut slits so i could weave other cloth in.  and did.

it ended up feeling….bizzy.   the other side is as worn, but i am working that differently.  which do i like the most?  which is most efficient to sustain the integrity of the fabric? 

thinking a lot about the conversation of Deb G over in the Boro 2 workshop.  as in,  What if this were All i had and i needed to maintain it.

Thinking.

and during all this, the sunflowers have begun to bloom.  they are a mix of wild sunflower and the Zulu Prince that i used to plant.  this year, there are many.  strong.  really strong.  and i have been thinking about trees.  shade trees.  all the trees i have planted and that have grown and then died for yearly reasons.  some, insects.  some that harsh winter.  but to grow a shade tree is not nothing here.  and again, i am thinking about sustain  ability.  i watched Valerianna's video…her forest and i longed for just one tree this week.  just one.

 

 

 

ok.  What if i just go.  what if i just follow that urge to strengthen the placket…oh…i don't like that word for some reason.  what if i just strengthen the button thingys on either side.  weight them.

yes.  weight them.  they are really "strong" enough.  as is.  but they are not "weighted".  whatever that means.

i had to work today..away…and before i left i did this pinning………

i could barely wait till i got back home to look at it.  but then, could JUST look, as the refrigerater is almost totally dead and a new one (or, new to me) is going to be delivered tomorrow and i needed to Do Things to make that possible……and then the goats were yelling…HEY, OLD NANA, HEY, you in the denim jumper………!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  so i did goat stuff until they were satisfied.

but then…back to this.  WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?, i am wondering??????????????????