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Monday, March 31, 2008
Raking in Indiana
The snow is gone, probably because the temperature has climbed through the night and day to 57˚ and is supposed to hit 60K. Everything is wet and if you were using the moss on the north side of the tree for guidance out of this land hereabouts, you're direction is would be well-marked. The sun is above layers of gauzy overcast and I would imagine anyone flying high up on a flight from San Diego to here would just about cry when the plane descended and entered the gloom.
I keep thinking: My ancestors settled this state - maternal in the north and paternal in the south . . . What WERE they thinking???
Anyway, I took my trusty - not really, it's plastic - rake and went out back. It was like raking washcloths, wet ones, ones that had been used by a kid and left wadded up in odd shapes. I didn't rake a whole lot, but those leaves were heavy and clinging to the ground. I picked up sticks too, although I really am not fond of that job; I sincerely suspect that some sticks hide and then pop out when I think I have got them all
Tonight it is to rain. And tomorrow is a high of 48˚ and wind. Yes!! Wind, I love it. Dear, dear wind, please dry us out. We need to dry out and have a temperature above 50˚ so I can finish staining the fence. Last summer was so brutally hot that we put it off to fall and then the weather was just not good for painting. This is what happened: We painted and painted when we could and I told my grandson to just "paint around" the one woodpile and we would move the wood and paint that part later.
We got caught and could paint no more, so we left the wood, until we needed a fire. Then as we drew wood from out variously seasoned piles, the unpainted portion of the fence appeared. It really stands out now. I'd post a picture, but WordPress has not resolved the upload problem - probably a good thing.
I am thinking of starting a fire to drive out the dampness and fill the air with the cozy and comforting (to me) scent of wood smoke. A couple of Yankee Candle tarts and we'll be all set.
It wouldn't be so bad in this state if at least it had a romantic and adventurous history. No one yearns to go to Indiana; to add insult to injury, we used to be the Northwest Territory. Not anymore, Oregon and Washington have that nickname - - and they also have mountains and seacoast and tales of horses and buffalo and all sorts of things. Excuse me, but I have never heard of the Indiana Trail.
Even North Dakota says rugged individual and strength of character. And it's next to Montana, home of the Big Sky and Chet Huntley.
So why am I here? Shoot, that's a darn good question. I don't know, maybe it gives me confidence - I can face problems and say, "Ha! I am not fazed. I have lived in Indiana, the Great State of Non-Descript.
Have you ever heard, "Eli Manning, you just won the Super Bowl, what are you going to do?"
"Why, I'm going to Indiana!"
Oh, wait a minute . . . maybe I should have thought this sarcastic comment out.
I like having this Internet connection; I like having a word processing program that just lets me go back and delete without an eraser; I like having a printer, no having to painstakingly type each word and use thin paper so the erasures would not show so much. I love this stuff - cable TV and DVD's and digital camera pictures going on the computer. Ipods and digital recorders, cell phones - heck, I thought cordless phones were cool. It took me forever to realize I could actually walk away from the main phone base.
However, I sometimes think I would have liked to have lived in the old days - not the old, old days, but the ones where Rudy Vallee first crooned through his megaphone and everyone seemed so cheerful singing, The Stein Song. Sometimes I sit here with old songs coming out of itunes and visions of raccoon coats in my mind.
Spring Break is over and I an sitting Indian fashion on the end of the sofa, about 45 minutes away from taking Alison to the hospital and getting kids to school - except one. Colin developed a sore throat and fever on Saturday and got antibiotics at the After Hours clinic yesterday. Let's see, Cameron was sick, then Summer was sick (You don't want to be around Summer when she is sick.), Alison was sick and some time in this Time of Germs, I was sick. I think we will be between three weeks and a month of having someone home and not at school.
I have been staying late on some of the Spring Break nights, because for most of my life I have been a night owl.
I had to leave writing this and on my return, about an hour later, I realize that for a lot of my life I was actually a night owl and an early bird. But I am too old for that now - too old to stay up to two and get up at six.
I can remember staying up all night and all day and late into the next day and not thinking a thing about it. But lately I have read that while we sleep, our brain is making more chemicals that we need to . . . oh, think. So, getting sleep is a duty; yes, that's it - a duty. Well, I think I'll do my duty tonight about nine.
I listened to an interview this morning where someone made the point about political correctness having the effect of putting the importance on what people feel they should say think as opposed as to what they really do think. My mind works in weird ways. As I was about to move away from the page, I looked at the banner of cows and into my mind popped:
My cow burns at both its ends, It will not last the night. But, oh, my foes and oh, my friends, It gives a lovely light
Now, where the heck did that come from? But this isn't anything to do with political correctness because I don't want to burn cows. Obviously, this must be symbolism, a Freudian thing. Or maybe it is just a silly attack - my mind wandering on to the remark: Emily's first draft was not quite there, yet.
I have, during these months of winter, been able to pick-up a 12 pack of Lipton's Diet Green Tea, Peach flavor. Now, I haven't done it often, but when I have, there has been a pack for me. Not now. Knowing I would be wanting a lot of iced tea soon, I checked out the stores and found, "Yes, we have no peachanas." Well, rats. I really liked that peach. They had lots of the flavors I don't care for, but no peach and my only hope was that the new berry flavor would do. Today I tried it, and it is okay. Different from peach, but better than the others - much better.
I love to drink iced tea in the summer. That I am drinking it poured over ice out of a bottle would be news to my grandmother. She always made hot tea and it was poured over ice that cracked. It had no flavors other than "tea" and back then I had no idea there were different kinds of tea, anyway, let alone flavors. The glasses were tall and thin and the spoons long and graceful; condensation formed on the outside. As I grew older, I learned by example to run the glass slowly over my forehead when we were sitting on the porch. Of course, you didn't do that at the dinner table.
I was so fortunate as a little, little girl. The war was over and people were happy; people gave you the things they had wanted in the Depression. My father took graduate courses in the summer on the GI Bill and one year we were in Bloomington for the whole year. We lived downstairs from a Chinese gentleman who had a daughter my age - only she was in China with her mother and couldn't get permission to come. I'm told he used to come and see me and that I was afraid of him. I have no idea why and now I feel sorry. And somehow I have come back to tea - tea in china cups with a man from China during a Midwestern winter.
I feel sorry for the cute little pseudo-orphaned polar bear cub at the German zoo who was brought to - uh, let's call it - "really bigness" by the people. Knut is the bear whose picture has been on the Internet news a lot lately - you know the one, the picture where it seems he is trying to bite, eat, whatever a kid and would have succeeded had it not been for the Plexiglas barrier his face rammed against.
As I understand it, the people who were with him all the time, the ones he thought were friends and family, decided it was time for him to live like a bear, alone in his cage. (I guess they call them enclosures now.) He has, in a very real sense, been abandoned. This time he is no longer the incredibly cute little polar bear cub and some people in the zoo community are calling him - forgive me - a psycho bear.
My mother has had just about enough of Bush taking it on the chin because of the war in Iraq. She asks me what these people who criticize want . . . for more people to blow up more things and hurt more people on our soil. The Twin Towers, the Pentagon . . . and the targeted White House. She remembers the attack on Pearl Harbor; she remembers the speech on December 8, that announced "A state of war exists . . ."
And this morning I found myself murmuring the lines of a 1914 Kipling poem:
FOR all we have and are, For all our children’s fate, Stand up and take the war. The Hun is at the gate!
Yesterday was Tuesday and Tuesdays are the "new movies at Redbox" day. I rented Kite Runner and Love in the time of Cholera - the first will demand that I find the book so I can re-read some parts and the second will leave me with . . . well, I don't know what. I wasn't particularly interested in renting the movie or seeing it, but felt it was an investment in my reference knowledge base. The book was a bestseller, but I didn't read it; the movie is a convenient "Cliff's Notes". I have to confess that I just don't care much for South American subjects and, quite frankly, I am not a fan of Gabriel Garcia Márquez, even though he won the 1982 Nobel Prize. So we shall see.
I think last year at this time I was in San Diego, totally soaking up all the things I have come to totally love about the place: breakfast at Kono's and sipping a soda on the balcony of of the little coffee house. The staircase is through a non-descript doorway and lots of times - given the right time of day and year - you may have it to yourself or have to share with only a couple of folks. Last year, one day the wind was strong off the ocean and sand was blowing right at us, but there was a sheltered corner and we stayed quite a while.
The beach was deserted and the little booths that sell sweatshirts and sun umbrellas and tee-shirts to take home for relatives were shuttered. Sand drifted like snow. I think I would have been happy there to stay all day, just watching the occasional person pass beneath us. I was lured away by the mall and the Apple Store.
The wind wasn't particularly cold for a northerner, but it was strong - gusts around 40 mph. and it brought to mind the famous line: dry leaves before the wild hurricane fly. I was glad for it; we need something to dry out everything so we can start getting things in order. We've had a long time of frozen ground, thawing ground, re-freezing and heaving ground. It's a mess, but as they say on so many TLC shows, it's our mess.
To determine what animal you most resemble in the quiz featured in the post below, they ask you a bunch of questions, answers to which range from a wide scope of diverse choices to those which ask you to narrow in on one facet of a topic.
But, as I sit here, pondering my baby pandahood, it occurs to me that I probably qualify for my own personalized set of questions for kooks.
Do you prefer to nap on a bed or curled up on a sofa with an afghan pulled over all of you, including your head?
Which do you crave more - peanut butter or candy?
Would your home look like a real estate model or a second hand shop with narrow paths between odd objects?
Do you feel a loyalty to inanimate stuffed animals that have become threadbare? Y/N
If your spouse woke you from a deep sleep and said, "The Assyrian," would you respond "What?" or say, "came down like a wolf on the fold and his cohorts . . . "?
Are there certain common English words that are the default punchline to joking questions? Example: trucks.
Would you sit in the rain on a Pacific beach and watch the gray water or go do something in a dry place?
If you saw a new gadget, would you think, "I can make that with my grandmother's old potato masher and duct tape"? Y/N
Have you been torn between the old school punctuation outside a quoted word or phrase and the new school's idea to stick in inside the closing quote? Y/N
If you are reading a mystery and think you have figured out the killer, do you go to the back of the book, find out and then go back to reading slowly and enjoying the writing OR do you race through the rest of the book to see what happens, totally missing clues and well-phrased sentences?
Do you ever feel like punching someone in the nose?
Here's a little quote from a Wikipedia article; it does not surprise me. In fact, when I saw I was a baby panda, I thought, "Gee, they're kind of mean, aren't they?
Though giant pandas are often assumed docile, they have been known to attack humans, presumably out of irritation rather than predatory behavior.
My mother said to me around Christmas that she had noticed women wearing colorful versions of "that hat you got your dad" - the mad bomber hat. I don't know where I got it. It was a long time ago.
The hat was sort of a joking Christmas present because when I was in high school, he used to drive me crazy by sticking the zipped-off hood of a parka coat on his head to putter around outside or walk the dog. The sideflaps poked out down around chin level like beagle ears. Overall, it gave him the look of a homeless man. It was some shade of green; I can't really call it forth clearly in my mind's eye because I always rolled my eyes when I looked out the window and saw him wearing it.
When I saw the Mad Bomber hat years later, I knew I had to get it for him. That Christmas morning, I remember my mother telling my aunt about the infamous hood and remarking, "She hated it, just hated it." He wore the Mad Bomber and I think it kept him warm, and that I had learned, was the important thing.
Then these stylish versions turned up at Eddie Bauer and Mother took a fancy to them, so I got her one for a late Christmas present - although she insisted on paying for it. I got her, though, I told her it was half as much as it was. Hers is blue with the fur in the usual places - on the forehead flap that folds down, on the ear flaps and around the edges of the neck. Mother is 81; she has panache.
She wore it down to the bookmobile and into a couple of her thrift shop haunts. She doesn't wear it to chop kindling; she says she doesn't want to get it dirty.
Yes, of course I ripped this off from the Weather Channel website. Do you see the left hand part of that white streak across the country up by the Great Lakes? We are under it. Kind of looks like Zorro went to make his mark and only got the first slash in, doesn't it?
Little Ann was a cocker spaniel, and, I suppose, in the heaven that dogs just have to go to, I guess she still is - a cocker spaniel angel. We loved her dearly; she loved my husband to bits, was fond of Quentin and tolerated me. She was, however, a free spirit.
Little Ann came from the Butler County, Ohio, Animal Shelter. She was about a year old and, by the way, had never had her tail docked. I think she was probably born and said, "I'm emancipating myself; I'm out of here." Of course, she gave Quentin the smiling, happy look that said, "I know you're going to take me home. I know it. I know it. I'm so happy. I love you. I love you. I love you."
So we took her home. And she promptly took off. She had used us for her escape. Ah, but she did not know her new adversary. She wasn't going to break my son's heart. I kept tracking her down and she kept running away. She did that for 13 years. Of course, somewhere along the line, she would run away and I had learned to shout, "Fine, find your meals somewhere," and she would be scratching to come in when she had wandered around enough. If you wanted her back right away, the trick was to take about five steps to chase her, and then turn your back and walk away. She would follow.
I remember taking her to the Fairgrounds. When it was time to leave, she would not get in the car. I would drive a few feet and she would run along behind. I'd stop and open the door and she would run off. Many is the time I drove the few blocks home with a dog following a car that stopped every half-block for her. I would get so furious. And I'd turn round and take her to the Fairgrounds the next day. We got another dog, Sally, and Little Ann would get Sally to run beside her and then she would run past a tree and Sally, watching Little Ann, would run into it.
One time, when Quentin was a senior, he got so incredibly upset with her that he bowled her in the porch door. She rolled over and over along the carpet to the other end and bounced off the wall. Did not faze her.
She would come for Cameron when he came to live with us. He was five or six and he would see her make an escape and run for the door, calling, "I'll save you, Ann." And she would look at him and come. He called her Sweetums. We would get him up late at night to stand in the door and call, "Come here, Sweetums," when she was being especially stubborn.
I took her to Mother's a lot, although we just had to take it for granted she would show up when it was time to go home. She liked to make trips out at night and she would buffalo me into believing she had "to go". She'd be off and I'd have to get Mother to demand, "Little Ann, you get in here right now." A lot of folks are a little cowed by Mother.
Anyway, one night, we were there and she went out and came in willingly. Thank you, Ann. She had been skunked, right on the forehead. At 2 am, we bathed her in tomato juice and vinegar and Dawn dishwashing liquid - which is supposed to work. We thought it had. I returned home the next day and everyone exclaimed, "WHAT is that stench?" More baths - nurse baths, the ones where my daughter-in-law scrubbed her with one of those net mesh things and then rinsed . . . and then did it again.
I don't know if it was the actual skunking or the nurse baths, but Little Ann stayed clear of skunks from then on.
She got old and she got cancer. We did what we could but she got worse. Her spirit was so indomitable I knew she would never give up - I had her put to sleep.
Ah, Little Ann, I can hear St. Peter calling now: "Little Ann, you get back in here . . . Do you hear me? Don't make me get the Big Guy . . . "
I am up because I have to take my daughter-in-law, who doesn't drive, to work at the hospital; she likes to get there early for her 12 hour shift of nursing. Tomorrow I will do it again . . . but today, today, I see white, slick roadways out there. But this is not as bad as it could have been; our snow measurement is less than an inch and the predictions for much more have been cut back. Auggghhhhhh. Given the percentage of good calls by the weather guys in our area this year, that might mean we will actually wind up snowbound.
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UPDATE: 6:45 am. Sydney's tracks are filled in and more and the snow is coming down fast and furious. On the way to the hospital I followed a little car with the taillights of Corvette going 20 mph; no way I was passing him on the right. On the way home, I met a salt truck and my first thought was to be nice and safe in it. Well, it is big . . . but all the salt is behind it. That could be a bummer. Anyway, if this keeps up, we could have a lot of snow. ACK.
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What I am doing here is reacting to the situation in a manner influenced by the Internet and The Weather Channel - this awareness of everyone's weather and emphasis on our own, in light of what is going on elsewhere. Hey, we have had many, many snows in March and April; this is really northern Northern Indiana and this is the way it sometimes goes.
Shoot, back in 1935, they a terrible time getting to the hospital when my cousin Freddie was born because of a blizzard.
Shoot, back in 2000, Quentin and I went by two semis and lots of cars that had slid off the highway on our way to Indianapolis. In fact, just as we thought we were out of it, we felt the tires let loose on an overpass. We got lucky. And then it was nothing but just rain.
I got him to the airport and then went over to Fountain County to check on the engraving that was supposed to be added to my father's tombstone. I remember pulling into the cemetery - The Kingman Fraternal Cemetery - very early on a foggy morning. It was too early to stop at anyone's house and I was really too tired to go anyway. So I pulled the car off to the side of the cemetery lane, climbed in the backseat and went to sleep beneath one of the sleeping bags we never travel without. I awoke to bright sunlight and a clear sky. The morning of incredible snowy ice could have been a dream.
When I got home that night, everyone had tales of how things had come to a standstill after we left - road warnings were issued: stay home. It seems Quentin and I had unknowingly been traveling in a break of the storm - it had been much worse on the highway about a half-hour before we passed and new yuckier ice and snow were following us.
I told them I had slept in a cemetery that morning. Now that impressed them. Hey, it was bigger news than bad weather in Northern Indiana when it was supposed to be spring.
I was up 'til one this morning, trying to get something to work between Google and me. I didn't get it working, but I figured out exactly what was broken, which is an accomplishment for this little cookie from the slide rule generation. (I remember I was really pleased to have a "round" slide rule to carry in my purse. Wonder where it is now?)
I overslept and woke thinking, "What if my heart stops today?" I thought about pulling the blanket up over my head. But I got up and hollered - yes, hollered and I do hate the yelling from room to room thing. Got Cameron dropped off at school and waved at Summer and Alison - our resident sickies - misplaced and found my mini-recorder, stuffed extra batteries in my vest and headed out the door. Then I came back in for the keys.
Called Mother from the car and told her I'd call again later.
Then the old, old diesel and I trundled on down the road . . . and it was sunny.
I had a great time at the construction site. The guy from the energy agency, the vocational instructor, learning so many new things about special ways to do basement walls and something called "sip" walls and recessed ceiling lights that have the potential to be big heat losers.
I liked the instructor; he was one of those fellows I could drive across the country with and not feel as if we had to cut the car in half or flip a coin to see who got killed between here and California. The kids were great; I like good kids - really like them. At one point I said, climbing up and over a big, big stack of plywood, "Hey, I'm sixty guys, give me a hand." I lied; I'm 59. I had to laugh; when I tell my age to most, a lot exclaim that I can't be that old (which, of course, is why I mention it in the first place). When you're dealing with high school juniors and seniors, they don't react like that. You're old. Oh, yeah.
I told the instructor the hour I spent there had made my day - that I'd be upbeat all day. So far, so good - even if I can't tweak the template to get Google to see what I want it to see for a few hours.
Sydney and I even went out to the fairgrounds and he got to run and sniff, sniff, sniff. The wind switched over and was coming from the north, however, and I took shelter from the gusts on the south side of the log cabin, looking down toward the grandstand, a view that was always so pleasing until the ancient structure burned down. The new one is metal and safer, but it doesn't tug at my emotions the way the old wooden white one did.
Floral Hall is always a good link from the past to me to the future. I'm sure it leans to the north, but they tell me it's solid. At the fair, it's home to quilts and local history; flowers and canned goods are there too, but the display is pretty small, compared to the days of my childhood when I was taught to scrape the paraffin off the top of the jelly and jam my grandma made.
Tonight it gets colder; tomorrow it snows. Well, that's okay.
" . . . woke thinking, "What is my heart stops today?" Okay, so I've got my ups and downs.
You are aware of the snow globes that make such lovely winter scenes. I think I live in a rain globe - as if someone put me in a recycling fountain and put a ball of glass around me and my fountain. Probably there is a wooden base down there, maybe with a little wind up switch that sets some song playing.
I just looked on itunes and a search for "rain" yields the full 150 choices; as does one for "raindrop" - and both have some selections marked "explicit" in red. I don't want to know anything about this. No red stuff - no.
Ah, but wait, all is not lost - I see itunes thinks I may have erred in my spelling - they are listing under the artist category a group called "Reindeer Section" . . . Unfortunately, I could not leave it with those three dots; I clicked on the group which is Alternative and found the album, "Y'all Get Scared Now, Ya Hear" from 2001. And, they also have a follow-up album - "Son of Evil Reindeer."
They are a Scottish group and YES, one of their songs is "Raindrop" so I guess I see the itunes logic. No, they aren't a Scottish group; they are a group of musicians from Scottish groups. I wish I could copy the album review here, but maybe I've gone far enough - or too far already.
I know; I'll have my rain globe play "You Are My Sunshine."
This was nice. Last night just as I was going to sleep I thought about my husband's great aunt Cuba and wondered what was her husband's first and last name. And my brain was able to pull the information out of some crevasse. Good chemicals from the success uplifted my spirits.
It was a little tricky; I knew he name was a "bit" different, with the flavor of a foreign country to it, but just trying to think of those types of names didn't yield anything. So I did the old alphabet trick. I got really teased by the "E" category, as if I were almost there. I forced myself to go on and as I hit "I" territory, it came to me - Ivan. YES. YES. YES. YES. WOO-HOO.
But my body craved more of the good chemical of success and I thought . . . last name? last name? last name?
The alphabet again. Trying to hear my husband's voice in my head . . . almost saying the name. Oh, gosh, I was getting toward the end - past the "R" section and the "T" faction and getting nervous . . . and then, then, my mouth said it and I heard my husband's voice say it at the same time: Vilander. Ivan Vilander.
Not that this has much importance, if any, but it sure felt good to have some brain cells firing.
My mother in NE LaGrange County says the sky is lightening up and if the usual pattern holds, we should be seeing some sun in NW Noble County in a few minutes. Do like the Whos and cry, "Sun, we are here. We are here."
UPDATE: Thank you, thank you, thank you. I almost see shadows outside because the sun is almost out. I had about given up and then, the total gloom lifted. Summer is throwing up; I almost typed "puking" and I don't know why. I don't talk that way.
UPDATE 2: Okay, fine, now it's gloomy again . . . and cold . . . and I think I want to jump out of my skin. Yeah, it's windy, too. Gloom sky - we must find a nice Indian to to the sunshine dance.
Here I sit, looking out a half wall of windows at shrubs and bits of sky. Even with the light on, I can differentiate sky from shrub - it is not just a dark mass. So, dawn is coming. Ah, I think it is a gray sky again. Well, that is ultimately okay, although I could use a good dose of sunlight.
Yesterday was a teaser day - first sun and clear sky, then clouds rolled in when they weren't predicted (not surprised), then the sun picked out in changing blue pools . . . and finally, finally, the sky was one big piece of construction paper azure blue again. But it was late in the afternoon and chilly to cold; in the backyard, the leaves were frozen to the ground, so I propped the rake against the side of the house and popped back inside.
Another sick one is on the sofa, up half the night with a sore throat. Drat.
Still, we await the day so we can carpe it and gather our rosebuds.
Remember when I thought he had managed to get a case of frostbite in the Green Bay game that result in disaster? Well, of course, I was wrong. I just didn't know how wrong; he has saved face, boy, has he saved face. He is getting 21 MILLION dollars to coach for four more years. READ HERE and there is a picture of his face.
I have come to really like sunny days; I have learned my lesson from this dismal Northern Indiana winter of 2007/2008. And today it is sunny, right now and it is predicted to remain so. If it does not, I may just have to go hunt Jim Cantore down. Today is also the Kendallville Home & Garden Show; it was yesterday too, but I forgot. I think my mind was dimmed by the overcast. It's a small show, but, hey, what the hey? Or something like that.
No, no one would really rent a purse. A handbag is a different story, however. Handbag is Queen of England and the late Queen Mum; Margaret Thatcher knew a handbag was classier, that's why the green grocer's daughter carried one, somewhat to the alleged annoyance of the Queen. They - and I don't know who I mean by that they - are now renting expensive handbags and jewelry to ladies. I am not surprised by this. Someone apparently listened to enough sales personnel talking about charity fundraiser customers "buying a dress" and leaving the tags on, but tucked in . . . and then, yes, returning the dress. Often they sported perspiration stains on the satin and enough of a leftover expensive fragrance to leave the sales people fuming. But, of course, they could say nothing to the wannabe Mrs. Astor's. The rationale for the buyers/returnees was, of course, that the salon should be thankful for the - cough, cough - advertising . . . ooooh, such as commercial word, dontcha know.
Anyway, take a look at this WEBSITE; I found it on the right sidebar of the Pioneer Woman's site. Now, wait a minute. It strikes me that rental handbags and jewelry are on a site where people come to see men in chaps and lovely mares, not to mention calves losing nuts and vast vistas of the prairie. It strikes me as odd. Or not. I can see ladies wanting to feel a part of a western ranch life - wannabe pioneer women if you will. So this is a place where you advertise rental high fashion, designer wares? Is this target advertising . . . oh, the questions that conjures up.
I got all the cans from the better part of this winter ready to the recycling place. It took a long time; some of the bags had broken, quite possibly because I had nudged them when backing up and they were covered with snow. Or maybe I nudged them on days when the snow had blown off and they were in plain sight - if it had been light. Of course, some times I didn't think to look at all.
The temperature was warm enough for me to be out in shirt sleeves and there was a slight breeze from the southwest. I know this because when I straightened up to rest occasionally, the loose strands of my hair would blow around my face, and I would have looking to the northeast. There was a lot of time to think.
My mother read an article about Belle Gunness and suggested I look her up on the Internet; seems she's a serial killer that died in a fire in La Porte; no, wait, it might be that she faked her death and moved to California where she did a few more deadly deeds. So, I looked her up and found THIS, which takes the story up to the fire. I need more information, so I'm taking a deep breath and diving into the Google pool.
Gasp, gasp. Another LINK and they are both with a black background - this one has a line of dripping blood. And, then there is the Wikipedia entry: stuff about Belle Gunness including the fact that a rock band in the Netherlands was named after her . . . and the lyrics to a folk song:
In old Indiana, not far from LaPorte, There once lived a woman, a home lovin' sort. Belle wanted a husband, she wanted one bad, She placed in the papers a lonely hearts ad. Men came to Belle Gunness to share food and bed, Not knowing that soon they'd be knocked in the head. But while they were sleeping, she'd lift the door latch. She'd kill them and plant them in her tater patch.
Well, I'll have things to tell Mother tonight, not the least of which is that DNA testing is being planned for the Belle in the fire and the one in California.
I was watching a show a couple of nights ago; I don't remember what it was, because I wasn't really watching. The TV was on. Now, I think it was this show that had a segment about a French caver lost in a maze of caves and the things his brain automatically did to allow him to survive. Probably, I realize now, this was something on the Discovery Channel . . . the phrase "human limits" is tickling my memory.
It doesn't matter where I heard it, and actually I am now worrying that I can't remember what my primary activity was when the show was on. Rats, another senior moment. I'm been typing aimlessly here - although I tried to get you to assume there was a purpose - because I have delaying facing the dilemma of my lament about life being short and my overweight status. This comes right after I blogged about actually living better and actually losing ten pounds as well.
So, do you remember I was taking note of the ornaments on my special sitting room tree? Well, I didn't forget; I just wandered off in other areas for awhile. This little embroidered material is from many decades ago. I did it while sitting on the enclosed front porch of our house in LaGrange County - in the little village of Scott - with my grandmother sitting beside me doing her own piece, something with French knots, I think.
That would have been in the fifties; yes, I decided to go ahead and get graphic with the numbers. The porch is, for the most part, the same as it was then, and often my mother and I sit out there and read or do sudokus. I did a lot of embroidery over the years and then my fingers started to tingle when I would hold the needle and so I finished up the project I was on and didn't do another.
I was going to say a few things about Grandma, but I got sidetracked again. She was born in 1881 in Lima, Indiana (now Howe) to Wesley Wisler and Martha Fowler Wisler. My mother wasn't born until 1926, so I had a pretty direct link to the real horse and buggy days. I remember the way she smelled - clean and starched - and it does seem odd that someone I knew so well and loved so dearly is a complete stranger to those in my life now, with the exception of my mother.
Heavens, I didn't mention her name. It was Jessie Ethel Wisler. I used to giggle at the the Ethel part. She was named after her father's brother Jesse who moved to Mancelona, Michigan and started a business. She was first married to Harry Huff and had two children, Lucile Elizabeth and Stanley Malcolm. Harry died of Bright's Disease and some years later she married my grandfather, John Michael Shimp.
Grandpa had been married before also and his wife had died following a miscarriage; she had been all right when he left the hospital, but when he got home, they called with the message she had bled to death. (I didn't feel like spelling hemorrhaged, but then felt I was being a chicken so here it is.) It changed him, this event. They say he withdrew into himself. He died when I was 10 and they found he had one of my school pictures in his wallet. I remember hearing Grandma say, "He must have picked it up off the table."
I have some pictures of him in his youth. In one he is sitting on a thresher, I think in a coat, tie and hat; I know that at one time he traveled out to the Dakotas with a crew, harvesting grain. I'll have to scan them into my computer, along with my grandmother's graduation photo.
But back to the embroidery. I don't think we ever framed it; I think I just kept itfolded up in some drawer or box or maybe both at one time or another. At any rate, I found it in my thirties, stuck it in a hoop and hung it on a nail. Then we moved and I stuck it in a drawer. When this tree went up and I was looking for stuff to put on it, I thought, "Why not."
I close my eyes and I can be on that porch again in one of the summers when my age was still in the single digits. And it is a nice thing to have tucked away in my memory box.
So Walt is a competent fellow, handling Tuco and managing to make blue meth and doing this while on chemotherapy. Somewhere along the line, Walt lost his "I can't believe this humor". He does not lose his pants; he does not pull money out of his pool and put it in a dryer; he no longer teaches chemistry to high-schoolers. Yes, I realize he purchased not your usual ski masks for the robbery and, yes, he and Jesse did take the opportunity to wrap rope around the port-a-potty the security guard had entered - with magazine. It wasn't funny - to me - because I knew Walt was not going to have to do anything to make this work. The writers, who I guess came back from being on strike with fewer brain cells, give it the Obi Wan Kenobi treatment . . . Everything will be just fine and they will get away with a barrel of the chemical they need; you don't need to look for anything clever in what is happening.
So what is happening? Well, Walt and Jesse are making a lot of meth and Walt is having conversations with Hank about what is legal and what is not. He killed a couple of people, but that was back in earlier episodes, and now he is talking in terms of prohibition. Walt, I don't think so. Don't rationalize; just say, "Hey, I woke up a little late to the fact that shit happens and so you might as well take what you can get - no holds barred."
But, Walt, you're so damned good at it. I'm sitting here thinking that you're making a lot of money because you are smart and are tapping into unrecognized aspects of that intelligence. I'm sitting here thinking, "Hey, I wish I were as smart as Walt."
And I'm not sure this is how it is supposed to work out with this show.
Well, it's not going to change until we let nature happen, do I'll shut up.
Oh, not much to say if I'm not complaining and muttering; since I don't have Andy Rooney's job, that doesn't work out either.
Silence . . . silence . . . I must have SOME positive, upbeat words to greet the new day? Okay. Hi there, day. How are you doing? Think your sun will shine or are you putting on clouds.
I guess some people are destined to be glum boxes. I have no talent for this cheery stuff.
I have known this for a long time. A lot of people have heard my first grade story, but I'm repeating it. Ahem: When I was in first grade, another girl - one who was always smiling and well-liked - and I did something nice for someone else. I have no memory of what it was, but the teacher gave us a compliment and a pat on the head. I thought to myself, "I should have received two pats on the head because it doesn't come naturally to me."
She was wearing the unlucky buffalo pendant, Buffy
Yes, a parking lot in Auburn. That's where we were on the first detour of our journey and then we had to go to Fort Wayne. Why, you ask. I tell you it is because of the mercurial Summer and Buffy, her buffalo pendant.
I emailed the governor (aka) Mitch Daniels (aka) "that boy"
Fool that I am, I emailed the governor about our distaste for Daylight Savings Time for the State of Indiana. Oh, it would be okay if we were on Central Time, but we are not.
We are pseudo-Easterners. Ew!
I do not believe we will get any answer other than a form letter, but at least we are letting "that boy" know that some things just don't go away for his constituency - especially the 81 year old one who was born in LaGrange County, whose mother was born in LaGrange County in 1881, whose grandmother was born in 1848 right across the state line in Michigan, and whose great-grandmother walked out here from New York.
Mother lived through the Depression here in LaGrange County; she sat in the Scott High School gym and listened to Roosevelt address the nation on December 8, 1941. Maybe Governor Daniels, you could take a take a moment to email, "Well, Ma'am, I have my reasons and I'm sorry you don't agree with them."
Oh, by the way, here's that boy's page and email: www.in.gov/gov/2310.htm Why not let him here from you about something on your mind - you can tell him Sarah and Jody say "Hey".
UPDATE: I already received stage one of the response:
Thank you for emailing Governor Mitch Daniels. The Governor appreciates that you took the time to contact his office and play an active role in the discussion about making Indiana a better place to live, work, and raise a family.
Your email will be shared with the appropriate staff for a response.
Again, thank you for contacting Governor Daniels' Office.
We used to call this fast time, back in the day. My mother and I still do; my younger son had to ask me what it meant. Of course, that may be because for a long time Indiana stayed on standard time all year, which was great considering how incredibly west we are in the Eastern Time Zone. Here we are in Indiana, getting up and going to bed with New York, Boston, and all the folks in Maine who can't get there from here.
Then a few years back, Mitch Daniels got himself elected governor and, gadzooks, we found ourselves on daylight savings time. Mother calls it GDT - for Governor Daniels or, more likely, God Damn Time.
I have yet to move my watch forward; my mother doesn't. I sent the governor an email back then but only got an intern's form reply. Aha, apparently Mitch does not understand he has lost Mother's vote - she calls him "That boy." And while she does not have a "Ditch Mitch" bumper sticker on her car, she just might be getting there.
It seems odd to see cars sliding on icy roads - or getting stuck on drifting roads - so close to where we are and to have dry pavement and blue sky. Yes, we have no storm. We are northern Indiana and we have clear roads. I think, "Ah, for once, luck."
Well, we missed the big storm - it went south; but the sun is looking a little done in here in March. I pushed it back up and it immediately took a nosedive, so I stuck it in a bush. We'll go from here when it's a little warmer.
Earlier today I wrote about the "Before You Go" CD/DVD that thanks the soldiers for what they have done. Then later, I was upstairs, brushing my teeth of all things, and it occurred to me that we certainly weren’t saying a very good thank you by making crappy cars and losing out to the Japanese and having a bunch of people who are happy to stay on welfare. Let’s get personal: I whine about not losing weight. Well, for Heaven’s Sake, surely I can take off ten pounds. Surely I can keep my lawn in better shape; surely I don’t need to use obscene language; there are lots and lots of “surely’s”.
Is it the camera business - and software that brings editing and enhancing to the amateur, not to mention printing - that is behind some blogs today. Well, yes, I would say so. Now, I don't know what was the chicken and what was the egg with the the Pioneer Woman but along with her stories of her life, there is a pictorial place that few of us experience - the Old West, the New West, the prairie, nature and so forth. So, yes, Nikon and Hewitt-Packard would take notice of the potential for marketing. And Adobe Photoshop - hey, is there much difference between being talked through a recipe and talked through photo editing? Probably not. And she is starting a whole new blog devoted to it, along with the Pioneer Woman Cooks blog.
Now, on the upper right sidebar of Confessions of a Pioneer Woman, Beside the Stream is featured - a blog with lots of pictures about the mountains and Colorado. This lady, I think her name is Alice, starts right off telling you she hadn't really taken pictures until a "professional" camera arrived at her house. And now she has a tutor. I don't know what brand of camera she has and it probably doesn't matter. I think the idea is to get people wanting to take more photos and do more things with them and that leads to overall growth in camera sales, software and accessories.
This is okay with me. Perhaps soon I will be looking each day at photos of living in a bayou, in a bunch of cities, in the desert, in the High Plains, in the Sierras, in resorts, and so forth. Well, it should be educational.
Say, anyone want to give me a fancy camera to capture a small Indiana town in photos. I'm from Lagrange County; I can do farms and Amish and Shipshewana. I'm from the pioneer stock of the area - I've got old photos that can be resurrected.
Nikon, Canon, Olympus . . . if you're interested, remember you can reach me at jodyvance@mac.com. Or leave a comment - I'll come running.
I am in the lucky generation; I am the daughter of those who were young during the Depression and in early adulthood in WWII. My grandmother made my mother a winter coat out of an older one, sprucing it up so it looked nice. When Roosevelt spoke the day after Pearl Harbor, she listened to it over the public address system in the school auditorium. My father went in the service in 1942 and came back to Indiana in late 1945 and was discharged at Fort Benjamin Harrison.
He was in the signal corps and said he never was a "real soldier". He's gone now. His hair was white and he had become frail.
I look at these pictures of old men and the pictures of young men in combat and realize they are the same. I feel for them; I feel for me. Something so important, something that reaches so deeply into your soul and it passes in a lifetime. Maybe that is the real reason they made stone and sculptors - because at least there is something to touch, something as strong as they were.
I think I'm coming up on two weeks of coughing. It has tapered off considerably . . . but I notice this little after-effect - I sit down and if there is a tilt to me, I will often wind up in nap phase. Obviously, this is a call for Mountain Dew Code Red - diet, of course.
Here is one of my beach trekkers - the right one to be precise. I think I am going to like it because it has a closed toe, open spots on the sides and a study sole. It's a great deal like the Sketchers that I got in San Diego several years ago and wore and wore and wore.
They send me these catalogues, but I don’t look at them . . . because I scope out the website daily. I love it when they have 30 to 40 dollar shams on sale for $1.50, not to mention all the other sale stuff. But, now I am thinking of paying (gasp) full price for some clothes for summer. To justify this, I will have to go back to my habit of changing my clothes in regard to what I am doing. Well, that’s not so bad. I’m going to look now and pick some stuff out . . . and then maybe I’ll head over to LL Bean. I feel like it should be a rose and yellow year - not together though. I think I have been a red and navy person my whole life long - it’s just so darn practical. Well, we’ll see; we’ll see. On the other hand, I’m always up for khaki - especially when it’s vintage (safari days) Banana Republic. Hey, better check ebay for “found in the attic” goodies.
Ghurka - that’s another ebay search.
As far as my feet are concerned, I already have my beach trekkers.
I've read about it; I've seen it in movies; I've seen it demonstrated in a classroom - now there's an iffy use for tax/tuition money. The idea is to list the pros of a decision or action on in one column and the cons in another. The reason for it is obvious; it's commonsense. I suppose a lot of people don't do it because they don't want to see written out in front of their face the truth of the matter. They have this really stupid urge to jump into the fire our of their warm frying pan and they don't want to have another hurdle between them and doing what they want to do.
However, this afternoon, I sat down and made two columns in my mind: people who are in my life and people who are gone. Now that's a heck of a thing to have staring you in the face.
I very much like the smell of wood smoke - the kind that comes from a fireplace or a woodstove. I like the smell of newly-washed hands. I enjoy the smell of candles as long as they are not the sweet, cloying smells of some artificial contrived wannabe classy salon. I do not like the smell of little old ladies, unless it is the cleanliness of soap and the clean fresh clothes. That last sentence is an odd one - one that I might have edited out at another time. But, heck, live with it; it's true.
My dog has bouts of pancreatitis and so we try to feed him neutral foods that are low in fats and easy to digest. Usually he gets chicken, rice and dog food (for vitamins) or buffalo meat, rice and dog food. When he gets the buffalo meat, I usually snitch a bit because it is so good. Sometimes we will brown regular ground beef and put it through a double draining procedure and every now and then I will warm up some Campbell’s Chunky Beef & Vegetable Soup and let him have some of the watered down broth on dog food. He loves that, but we have to be careful lest it taxes his little system. I almost forgot - sometimes he has minced steak warmed with dog food and a bit of water. That’s okay with him too.
Well, today, when I went for his buffalo meat, I saw that they had buffalo hot dogs in stock and on sale. Woo Hoo. It just so happened that I had a nice fire going at home and so, yes, I came home and roasted one and ate it. I still snitched a little of the buffalo meat, though. I love it . . . with absolutely no condiments. Love it, do you hear me? Love it, love it, love it.
Because I wanted to check on school delays, I checked the TV this morning and while nothing was scrolling along the bottom of the screen, the news people, talking about the Ohio primary, visited a Longaberger basket factory to discuss the recession and the fact that 1,000 workers had been laid off during the year. I looked at their site as one of the reporters mentioned Longaberger baskets as being as "must have" item in some households.
$750 for a spiral basket.
Here's a scenario: Someone feels sick and they grab for a receptacle. And it is a basket that costs hundreds. Hey, why does anyone need a basket that expensive? The gracious living thing?
A bout with the flu of 2008 and I was a lump on the sofa, a lump with a cough that fell asleep in the middle of DVD movies. I only felt pretty crummy for a couple of days with chills and fever, but I have been a lump for awhile. Of course, my normal functioning is just about that of a lump, so it probably hasn't mattered too much anyway.
Now I am sitting in the den, watching a fire and wondering if I have anything of interest to write.
Explorers used to go into unknown territory to see what was there; I am going into the realm of blogs to see what I can add, and, in writing posts about my life here in Northeast Indiana, to see what I can discover about myself and the place I live. Maybe this is not so much a new-fangled blog as it is an old-fashioned pot-bellied stove around which stories and news are exchanged and shared.
Yo, there. Okay, I don't exactly look like my picture here. I have written for some papers in different places and at present I am writing for the Kendallville Mall. You may have read some of my articles; you may not have.
A lot of the time I write for myself, and sometimes I don't do it on paper. Sometimes I write in my mind where the words can soothe or encourage or firmly establish a feeling in my memory place. Would that be my heart? Maybe.
Sometimes I write funny stuff; I think I am at times melancholy. I don't think of myself as a writer or storyteller. I believe I just have a need to attach words to things.
Perhaps it is a way of praying , a need such as that expressed by C.S. Lewis in the movie Shadowlands:"That's not why I pray, Harry. I pray because I can't help myself. I pray because I'm helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn't change God. It changes me."
