....was had by all! My grumpy is gone (long gone); as is usually the case, all was well and ended well. Our Thanksgiving table had four, not twelve - but...(all together now) more for the rest of us! And oh, my dear ones, there WAS. Everything was as delicious as always - I am a fan of the Typical Repast: roast turkey, dressing, wild rice with sausage, corn pudding, cranberry sauce, gravy.
NOTE: Regarding cranberry sauce. Every year we have BOTH kinds (and you know what they are, I'm sure), There's the sort of whole-berry type; there's the jelled type. Since a wee girlie, my Lovely Daughter has expressed a determined preference for the jelled kind - you have to be able to see the round lines around it from the can. Might I add, this suits me, as I like both kinds, and as long as we HAVE both kinds, there is (all together again) more for the rest of us! There's something about the blending of flavors of Thanksgiving that's just so satisfying!
As usual, Mr Dearling did the bulk of the cooking. The man has a Gift with turkey. Furthermore, we had the genuine pleasure of sharing our table with Molly Bee , who is a special knitty friend of mine and Lovely Daughter's. She's of an age with Lovely Daughter - I consider her my "other daughter by another mother". She endeared herself to us more (if possible) by bringing along a Nantucket Cranberry Pie. Let me say this about that: OH YUMMM-OH! (Lest we come up short after the meal, she also brought along her lovely apple dumplings, and Lovely Daughter came bearing her annual delicious pecan pie.) Only the fact that I am a Jewish Bubbeh, and therefore aware that one should have a meal BEFORE dessert prevented my throwing tradition to the wind and just downright having dessert first.
So...as I did not do this before, and as it's never too late to be all over verklempt: My many blessings are foremost in my mind every day, not just at Thanksgiving, but the fact that I have arrived at this point in my life, this age, and find myself comfortable, secure, safe, healthy, and surrounded by cherished friends and beloved family is something worth mentioning at Thanksgiving time.
Mr Dearling exercised his annual prerogative by asking us each to name something for which we are thankful - OTHER THAN the usual family, friends, health &c &c. Because those things are always at the top of the list, that was something of a challenge - but it occurred to me that I'm just awfully tickled to be able to share my love of history at the museum, and moreso, that I'm able to put on fun costumes and go speechify at senior centers around town. Having the fun and privilege and joy of that just tickles me pink.
I'm awfully pleased that I live in these days of innerwebs and can google and twitter and all that (can you imagine the effect of saying "I'm not sure what kind of person he is, I'll just go google him up" in 1950? I can!) And of course, I'm most earnestly grateful that my station in life and my own little nest are such that I can share my existence with my two kitties (WARNING: verklempt alert). It's no accident that the first word on the title of this blog is "CATS". I feel as though a pet (in general) and cats (specifically) are the Soul of a home, and my kitties? Well - my cats are really my darling treasures...especially my Evangeline, my stout black kitty.
If we found ourselves in the Middle Ages, Evangeline and I would surely be hunted down as witches, because she IS my Familiar, my companion, -- in fact, although in "His Dark Materials" the characters' daemons are the opposite sex, Evangeline IS my "daemon". I've always loved my kitties, but she and I share a bond I haven't enjoyed with other pets.
DISCLAIMER: our wee brown tabby, Lilliane, is a sweet darling too (albeit she is a genuine certifiable paschkudnik) but she is very pointedly "her Da's cat". She snuggles with me sometimes, and sits near me sometimes, but she clearly, unequivocally, most assuredly owns Mr Dearling. She can bend him to her will (example: leaving the clean clothes in the laundry basket for hours because she's sleeping on them) with just a strong gaze from her big green eyes. So don't be thinking she's all ignored and stuff. She's not.
You know, being unhappy over social mishaps (such as I was dealing with on Thanksgiving Day) really is, after the first flush, a conscious decision. I'm over it - that was SO last week! And anyone with the embarrassment of riches such as I am blessed with is in no position to hold on to grumpy.
So now the Holiday Season is officially on - let the merriment begin!
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Two Rants
I am preparing my Thanksgiving message - be forewarned. I get maudlin, verklempt, sappy, soppy and cloying. I fairly REVEL in it; chalk it up to my being OLD ENOUGH that I have a lot for which I am eye-wateringly grateful.
But first....
Rant #1: I am outraged and appalled at the whole TSA thing. You get a choice of being seen (virtually) nekkid by someone who is "scanning" or being groped by someone else. It' s been in the news a lot lately. Now, I wouldn't even have a problem with the Nekkid Scan so much if it were simply that the images vanished instantly the minute you walked out. I'd even go along with the ability to take a photo IF -- IF -- there was something clearly dangerous that warranted using the image.
But no, I understand there are nekkid scans of people (allegedly either laughable, ugly or "hot") that HAVE made their way out of the airports and onto the innerwebs. Even if there's no way to actually identify the victim...erhm....subject, I draw the line there. The story I read (and no, sadly, I don't have the documention which means this is "hearsay" or by legal definition, "bullshit") said that the TSA had no way to figure out who was stealing the images and posting them on the innerwebs. Shucks.
HOWEVER - that being said, I hope no one tries pulling some kind of a scene during this Thanksgiving holiday travel scene. I've read about the boycott or "opt-out" or what will you and the hippie-rebel-outraged-old-lady part of me shouts "RIGHT ON, BRUTHAH!!" But the old-grandma part of me thinks of all the other old grandmas whose families might be so delayed by something like this that whole family holidays are uprooted, spoiled, cancelled. What's the right thing to do? Damned if I know. Looks like a lose-lose to me. For my part? I b'lieve I may just avoid flying anywhere any more. Fortuately, I guess, my life is such that travel of any part is not urgent, and we sort of like seeing the sights when we go anywhere. Furthermore, if god meant us to fly, she'd have given us wings and big mammary muscles. Shaddup.
Rant #2: Everyone knows that the use of tobacco carries with it the potential for certain health hazards. That has been made abundantly clear - and in case somehow someone missed it, there are dire warnings on cigarette packs. Non-smokers don't see them, probably don't care, and are thus unaffected. SMOKERS do see them, probably care to a greater or lesser degree....and have either made up their mind, as a result, to:
a) quit smoking, by sheer dint of athletic prowess or by emotional or chemical help;
b) cut way back, which does reduce some of the hazards, while still being aware that the hazards are there and they're still potentially going to develop the health problems;
c) know all that and continue to smoke, for whatever reason.
Now - I smoked for years, up to about a pack a day (in the days when I was collecting my Raleigh coupons). Anyone know if there's any value to eleventy-bagillion Raleigh coupons? I HAD to start smoking. I played a character on stage who smoked. And I was a theater person and we were cool and all sat around smoking. I was also a writer, and a big glass ashtray was as necessary as the typewriter it sat next to.
I quit smoking - while I was pregnant, at least, and I never did smoke into my kids' faces (that I know of -- certainly not intentionally). I knew the pleasure of a "cigarette after". When I met Mr Dearling, he mentioned that he didn't care for smoking, that it made him quite ill. I quit smoking in the house or car or anywhere he might be (realizing early on that if I let this one go I deserved to just be walled up and forgotten, even without the wine....five points for recognizing the allusion). I still smoked occasionally, out with other folks or wossname.
Present status? I feel pretty bad for people who are literally hooked on tobacco, people whose lives are interrupted by the need for a smoke, the people who can't take a four-hour flighte because they can't "step out for a cig" (whether or not they're seen nekkid first). I feel sorry for people who lose relationships, alienate friends or risk children by the Great Need. But by the same token, it IS A CHOICE. Even the most hard-bitten, hard-core smokers CAN live through withdrawal; you don't DIE without tobacco. (And yes, you in the back muttering "they can die WITH it" under your breath, that's true - says so right on the pack).
But I still occasionally enjoy a smoke. VERY occasionally, and since the damned things cost as much as a bottle of wine, they should be used the same way. (That doesn't count Chocovine, which I feel inclined to enjoy a lot oftener than a cigarette...OR Absinthe, my new fave, which no one enjoys very often.)
SIDE NOTE: I love Absinthe, it's legal again. I love the taste (anise, which a lot of people don't like) and I love the frou-frou. You have to put it in a tiny glass, and then suspend a slotted silver spoon over it. You then put a sugar cube on the spoon and VERY SLOWLY drip ice water over the sugar which dissolves down into the glass, giving the absinthe a shimmery greenish glow. "The Green Faery". It's dramatic, it's frou-frou, it was the talk of Paris among the intelligentsia and artistes and writers of the 19th century. I'd probably drink it even if I didn't like it, for the drama. Back to my rant.
OK - so smoking. I saw a commercial for the Next Big Deterrent. They're literally going to put pictures on the packs of dead people with their "Y"-shaped autopsy incisions crudely stitched back up (not done by anyone on CSI clearly). Or pictures of a young man in his coffin. Or a young woman with a nasal cannula and dismal eyes. Or the lungs - you know the ones: shrivelled, blackened, rotten-looking.
Now - with a reminder to those who know me (and information for those who don't): I tend toward the irreverent. So how did the information and illustrations of these new picture warnings affect me?
TRADING CARD PACKS!! I hope they're on my brand, because I want them ALL! I want a mint-condition collector set -- and I hope there's a website where they can be traded -- "I'll give you two Rotten Lungs for a mint-condition Dead Guy Inna Coffin! I have three Autopsy Guys, anyone need an extra? Or I'll trade all three for a Dying Girl.....
That's what they look like to me. Just sayin'.
Rant #1: I am outraged and appalled at the whole TSA thing. You get a choice of being seen (virtually) nekkid by someone who is "scanning" or being groped by someone else. It' s been in the news a lot lately. Now, I wouldn't even have a problem with the Nekkid Scan so much if it were simply that the images vanished instantly the minute you walked out. I'd even go along with the ability to take a photo IF -- IF -- there was something clearly dangerous that warranted using the image.
But no, I understand there are nekkid scans of people (allegedly either laughable, ugly or "hot") that HAVE made their way out of the airports and onto the innerwebs. Even if there's no way to actually identify the victim...erhm....subject, I draw the line there. The story I read (and no, sadly, I don't have the documention which means this is "hearsay" or by legal definition, "bullshit") said that the TSA had no way to figure out who was stealing the images and posting them on the innerwebs. Shucks.
HOWEVER - that being said, I hope no one tries pulling some kind of a scene during this Thanksgiving holiday travel scene. I've read about the boycott or "opt-out" or what will you and the hippie-rebel-outraged-old-lady part of me shouts "RIGHT ON, BRUTHAH!!" But the old-grandma part of me thinks of all the other old grandmas whose families might be so delayed by something like this that whole family holidays are uprooted, spoiled, cancelled. What's the right thing to do? Damned if I know. Looks like a lose-lose to me. For my part? I b'lieve I may just avoid flying anywhere any more. Fortuately, I guess, my life is such that travel of any part is not urgent, and we sort of like seeing the sights when we go anywhere. Furthermore, if god meant us to fly, she'd have given us wings and big mammary muscles. Shaddup.
Rant #2: Everyone knows that the use of tobacco carries with it the potential for certain health hazards. That has been made abundantly clear - and in case somehow someone missed it, there are dire warnings on cigarette packs. Non-smokers don't see them, probably don't care, and are thus unaffected. SMOKERS do see them, probably care to a greater or lesser degree....and have either made up their mind, as a result, to:
a) quit smoking, by sheer dint of athletic prowess or by emotional or chemical help;
b) cut way back, which does reduce some of the hazards, while still being aware that the hazards are there and they're still potentially going to develop the health problems;
c) know all that and continue to smoke, for whatever reason.
Now - I smoked for years, up to about a pack a day (in the days when I was collecting my Raleigh coupons). Anyone know if there's any value to eleventy-bagillion Raleigh coupons? I HAD to start smoking. I played a character on stage who smoked. And I was a theater person and we were cool and all sat around smoking. I was also a writer, and a big glass ashtray was as necessary as the typewriter it sat next to.
I quit smoking - while I was pregnant, at least, and I never did smoke into my kids' faces (that I know of -- certainly not intentionally). I knew the pleasure of a "cigarette after". When I met Mr Dearling, he mentioned that he didn't care for smoking, that it made him quite ill. I quit smoking in the house or car or anywhere he might be (realizing early on that if I let this one go I deserved to just be walled up and forgotten, even without the wine....five points for recognizing the allusion). I still smoked occasionally, out with other folks or wossname.
Present status? I feel pretty bad for people who are literally hooked on tobacco, people whose lives are interrupted by the need for a smoke, the people who can't take a four-hour flighte because they can't "step out for a cig" (whether or not they're seen nekkid first). I feel sorry for people who lose relationships, alienate friends or risk children by the Great Need. But by the same token, it IS A CHOICE. Even the most hard-bitten, hard-core smokers CAN live through withdrawal; you don't DIE without tobacco. (And yes, you in the back muttering "they can die WITH it" under your breath, that's true - says so right on the pack).
But I still occasionally enjoy a smoke. VERY occasionally, and since the damned things cost as much as a bottle of wine, they should be used the same way. (That doesn't count Chocovine, which I feel inclined to enjoy a lot oftener than a cigarette...OR Absinthe, my new fave, which no one enjoys very often.)
SIDE NOTE: I love Absinthe, it's legal again. I love the taste (anise, which a lot of people don't like) and I love the frou-frou. You have to put it in a tiny glass, and then suspend a slotted silver spoon over it. You then put a sugar cube on the spoon and VERY SLOWLY drip ice water over the sugar which dissolves down into the glass, giving the absinthe a shimmery greenish glow. "The Green Faery". It's dramatic, it's frou-frou, it was the talk of Paris among the intelligentsia and artistes and writers of the 19th century. I'd probably drink it even if I didn't like it, for the drama. Back to my rant.
OK - so smoking. I saw a commercial for the Next Big Deterrent. They're literally going to put pictures on the packs of dead people with their "Y"-shaped autopsy incisions crudely stitched back up (not done by anyone on CSI clearly). Or pictures of a young man in his coffin. Or a young woman with a nasal cannula and dismal eyes. Or the lungs - you know the ones: shrivelled, blackened, rotten-looking.
Now - with a reminder to those who know me (and information for those who don't): I tend toward the irreverent. So how did the information and illustrations of these new picture warnings affect me?
TRADING CARD PACKS!! I hope they're on my brand, because I want them ALL! I want a mint-condition collector set -- and I hope there's a website where they can be traded -- "I'll give you two Rotten Lungs for a mint-condition Dead Guy Inna Coffin! I have three Autopsy Guys, anyone need an extra? Or I'll trade all three for a Dying Girl.....
That's what they look like to me. Just sayin'.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Count the Words....
All right, I'll accept all brickbats and tsk tsks and "man are you a crappy blogger". Will it redeem me at all if I mention Best Intentions to Improve? (Yes, you in the back, you probably have heard it before; shaddup.)
However. Right about now I AM counting words - yes, I'm doing NaNoWriMo again. I'm about to go off to a favorite writing spot and attempt to break 40k. (Being a Professional Typist for all those years is paying off...a tip o' the hat to Mr. Johnson, who told me in 11th grade that I should learn typing "so that you'll have a saleable skill in case you never marry".) Of course, I married three times, HA HA I showed HIM! But my Chosen Profession of being a classical ballerina crashed when I learned that you had to be 5'4" for any professional company, hence the Secretarial Career.
So for the moment I'm pretty much going to be hunched over my netbook pounding. But I have a new post begun here, and here's a teaser: it's a Rant that will probably offend a whole bunch o' people (if they ever read it, which is unlikely, but I'll feel better).
I'm at that point in my NaNo novel where all of my characters have turned on me. The lovely old priest seems to be some kind of wonky killer or something; the main guy just may be worse than the priest, and next thing I know, the rabbi is going to drop a milchig fork in the drawer with the fleishig silverware.
Oy.
However. Right about now I AM counting words - yes, I'm doing NaNoWriMo again. I'm about to go off to a favorite writing spot and attempt to break 40k. (Being a Professional Typist for all those years is paying off...a tip o' the hat to Mr. Johnson, who told me in 11th grade that I should learn typing "so that you'll have a saleable skill in case you never marry".) Of course, I married three times, HA HA I showed HIM! But my Chosen Profession of being a classical ballerina crashed when I learned that you had to be 5'4" for any professional company, hence the Secretarial Career.
So for the moment I'm pretty much going to be hunched over my netbook pounding. But I have a new post begun here, and here's a teaser: it's a Rant that will probably offend a whole bunch o' people (if they ever read it, which is unlikely, but I'll feel better).
I'm at that point in my NaNo novel where all of my characters have turned on me. The lovely old priest seems to be some kind of wonky killer or something; the main guy just may be worse than the priest, and next thing I know, the rabbi is going to drop a milchig fork in the drawer with the fleishig silverware.
Oy.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Remember --
November 10, 1975
35 years ago today
The Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a sudden squall on Lake Superior, around 17 miles from Whitefish Bay. It sank quickly, no distress signals reported, carrying all 29 aboard to their frigid deaths. When the wreck was found, it was discovered to be as above: broken in two.
The song (everyone knows the song) says that Lake Superior "never gives up her dead" - the fact is, that's a fact. The water is so cold that the usual bacteria who cause disintegration and the creation of gases which cause the corpse to float are absent. Lake Superior keeps her dead.
I mark this date - as a lover of Lake Superior and as a woman whose family (or part of it) made its living on the lake and witnessed her beauty and her fury.
A fact which brings tears to my eyes: every year the light at Split Rock (no longer in regular use) is illuminated on November 10th, to remember and honor the crew of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
One day I will be there to see it.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Here's ANOTHER Fine Library You've Got Me Into....
This one is in Marquette, and it IS a FINE library. There is the ubiquitous free wifi...but in ths beautiful and spacious old building there is a second floor which has (among the many shelves of books) rows of dark wood desks, each with dividers rendering it private from the next. There is ample plug-in-place-ness. And this desk is large enough to accommodate a full-sized laptop and a large bunch of books or other materials.
Mr. Dearling returns to tell me he's found breathtaking reading rooms with fireplaces, wonderful comfortable chairs, &c, where e will happily bide his time while I handle my emails and....ok, I admit it....tend to my little plot on Frontierville in Facebook. It really is so comfortable here, though, that one is tempted to linger over reading other blogs, checking out all the LOLs (Cute Overload, Historic LOLs, Happy Chair is Happy -- not taking time to put links here, but I suspect I'm not the only one who spends that kind of time chuckling over the available offerings).
We had a couple of errands to tend to "in town" - some purchases, &c - and I find myself feeling an emotion that I forgot I had ever experienced before: when I was ending my senior year in high school, I had my First Real Beau, whom I adored. He took me, on a few occasions, home with him - and "home" was a farm near Aberdeen, South Dakota. I was introduced to his large family and to my first real experience on a midwestern farm. There were chickens, a few dairy cows - and he and his father grew crops too, though I disremember what they were. (It comes to me - that might be where my newly-rediscovered addiction to the glory that is fresh, sweet, RAW milk came from...but I digress.)
Anyway, I chipped in with work, rather than just sit around, and I got pretty decent at collecting eggs and even mucking out the henhouse. As a result, on the day that his mother and sister were "going in to town", I was allowed to go along and was even given a few dollars of "egg money".
Well -- I found I really did not WANT to "dress up" and go into town shopping. I managed, and was of course polite to the mother, the sister, and the girl cousin who went with us. But I found myself wishing I could just "go home" and stay around the cows and so on. And....today, I found myself sort of feeling that way again! Mr. Dearling loves coming to this cabin so he can use it as a base camp for his walking tours, &c. I, on the other hand, LOVE just being THERE.
My decisions involve "Do I knit on the sofa, or in the rocking chair in front of the fire?" Or "Is it warm enough to lounge around on the screened-in porch to read?" or...."how about spending ALL DAY in the loft at that perfect little desk where I can write, uninterrupted, except to gaze out the window at the dancing aspens and fluttering brilliant leaves"?
I finished another knitting project last night - it had been in the bottom of a basket for about two years, but I discovered the pattern and was able to sort it out and complete it. It's a yarmulke. But....well, I followed it exactly and used size 1 needles, but - I think I'll have to find a Jewish Sasquatch; it's rather large. Oh well - there are dimensions involved and those are numbers (see previous post).
As for right now - I'm happy to wrap it up and "go home" to the cabin. Mr. Dearling has another outing planned for our last two days here, but I'm staying in. It's not specious though -- I took out a novel I've been working on, began rereading it from the beginning - and had an EPIPHANY! I suddenly realized that there was something could be done MUCH better, and I can hardly wait to settle back in at the desk and start my revision!!
Hope you're all enjoying the same rich and beautiful autumn where you are, as we're seeing here. I'm glad to recall that "peak" should just be about settling in at home so we won't miss it there. I'll post again from home, the promised tale of the Wonderful Person ( patience, friends, patience!) I hear my Lovely Daughter chortling; I'm not known to possess that particular virtue myself.
Back to the absence of innerwebs. (I wonder - would I relish every instant of this as much, if I didn't know the full range of technology IS at my fingertips at home?)
Mr. Dearling returns to tell me he's found breathtaking reading rooms with fireplaces, wonderful comfortable chairs, &c, where e will happily bide his time while I handle my emails and....ok, I admit it....tend to my little plot on Frontierville in Facebook. It really is so comfortable here, though, that one is tempted to linger over reading other blogs, checking out all the LOLs (Cute Overload, Historic LOLs, Happy Chair is Happy -- not taking time to put links here, but I suspect I'm not the only one who spends that kind of time chuckling over the available offerings).
We had a couple of errands to tend to "in town" - some purchases, &c - and I find myself feeling an emotion that I forgot I had ever experienced before: when I was ending my senior year in high school, I had my First Real Beau, whom I adored. He took me, on a few occasions, home with him - and "home" was a farm near Aberdeen, South Dakota. I was introduced to his large family and to my first real experience on a midwestern farm. There were chickens, a few dairy cows - and he and his father grew crops too, though I disremember what they were. (It comes to me - that might be where my newly-rediscovered addiction to the glory that is fresh, sweet, RAW milk came from...but I digress.)
Anyway, I chipped in with work, rather than just sit around, and I got pretty decent at collecting eggs and even mucking out the henhouse. As a result, on the day that his mother and sister were "going in to town", I was allowed to go along and was even given a few dollars of "egg money".
Well -- I found I really did not WANT to "dress up" and go into town shopping. I managed, and was of course polite to the mother, the sister, and the girl cousin who went with us. But I found myself wishing I could just "go home" and stay around the cows and so on. And....today, I found myself sort of feeling that way again! Mr. Dearling loves coming to this cabin so he can use it as a base camp for his walking tours, &c. I, on the other hand, LOVE just being THERE.
My decisions involve "Do I knit on the sofa, or in the rocking chair in front of the fire?" Or "Is it warm enough to lounge around on the screened-in porch to read?" or...."how about spending ALL DAY in the loft at that perfect little desk where I can write, uninterrupted, except to gaze out the window at the dancing aspens and fluttering brilliant leaves"?
I finished another knitting project last night - it had been in the bottom of a basket for about two years, but I discovered the pattern and was able to sort it out and complete it. It's a yarmulke. But....well, I followed it exactly and used size 1 needles, but - I think I'll have to find a Jewish Sasquatch; it's rather large. Oh well - there are dimensions involved and those are numbers (see previous post).
As for right now - I'm happy to wrap it up and "go home" to the cabin. Mr. Dearling has another outing planned for our last two days here, but I'm staying in. It's not specious though -- I took out a novel I've been working on, began rereading it from the beginning - and had an EPIPHANY! I suddenly realized that there was something could be done MUCH better, and I can hardly wait to settle back in at the desk and start my revision!!
Hope you're all enjoying the same rich and beautiful autumn where you are, as we're seeing here. I'm glad to recall that "peak" should just be about settling in at home so we won't miss it there. I'll post again from home, the promised tale of the Wonderful Person ( patience, friends, patience!) I hear my Lovely Daughter chortling; I'm not known to possess that particular virtue myself.
Back to the absence of innerwebs. (I wonder - would I relish every instant of this as much, if I didn't know the full range of technology IS at my fingertips at home?)
Monday, October 4, 2010
Sequence?
OK, here's the deal: I started a blog post several days ago. But I wasn't where I could post all the pictures I wanted, so I didn't. So now it's in "EDIT" where I can eventually go tidy it up, fix the date and post it. Or not, because it'll be out of sequence.
But I think I'm past caring about sequence, so here's the deal: I will be posting about a Most Remarkable Day (with pictures). And it won't matter so much about sequence anyway, as it deals with meeting one of the most interesting, talented women I've had the pleasure to cross the path of. I'll give you a little teaser: when I was introduced to her (by Mr Dearling, at a fun event in a nearby town) I did NOT -- I repeat, I did not - squeal, and while (not) jumping up and down, declare "Are you really THE...(her name will appear here).
In the meantime, a few recent details: first, I am writing from the public library in Munising, Michigan, on the fourth of ten days we're spending in the forest cabin of friends. It's isolated, beautiful, thoroughly modern. It's comfortable beyond belief, and is heated by a (gas) potbelly stove. There are rocking chairs, comfortable sofas and a modern kitchen. This is the third (I think) year we've had this uncommon privilege. There IS no internet (hence the library) and there's no teevee (except one we could watch tapes or DVDs on if we had any, but we don't).
Mr Dearling spends his days out hiking and his evenings reading. I spend my days reading, knitting, writing (fiction), daydreaming and napping. I also spend my evenings in this manner, with the occasional game of Solitaire. In my lexicon, this is the definition of "bliss". So far I have finished two books, completed a muffler and a baby cap, finished about 2/3 of the Mason Dixon "Ball Band Dishcloth" (which I've tried unsuccessfully to figure out COUNTLESS times before) and made real progress on a baby wrap. I'll post pictures and book reviews shortly (but not today). I'm keeping a daily journal, some of which may be either blog material or at least notes for same.
I also brought along some games (Yahtzee, Bananagrams, Milles Bornes) which I mean to share with Mr Dearling, and I also brought my little Tarot deck for some study. And lest ye think I'm frittering - I also have two books along for program preparation for the museum...which is admittedly another form of delight.
So to go back a bit (and so that I can work in SOME pictures, which I feel obligated to include - AM I? Obligated to put in pictures? It hangs me up sometimes) - here's what occurred before we came up here:
I have a new beau. A sweetheart. My version of Raoul the Pool Boy. His name is Natty Bumpo. ("Pathfinder", get it?) His voice actually belongs to a fellow named Simon. He has a British accent.
For some of us (well, ME) finding our way around in this world is challenging. I cannot read maps. I don't do "turn north at the gas station". I'm a "right" or "left" kinda gal. Never, in any travels, have I seen roads that are red, or state lines that are bright blue. Because I am numerically dyslexic, things like "miles" don't mean anything to me. Enter Natty Bumpo.
This is what he looks like at home. Yes, I know - "geez, Dale-Harriet, that's just a plain ol' GPS thingie." YES! And because there are satellites in the arms of seraphim in the heavens, Natty (Simon) Bumpo can tell me how to get where I am going!! I've tested him, having him take me places I know. He works as if by magic (other than the time I was going to Barnes & Noble the back way and he almost had a nervous breakdown because I wouldn't turn around; he's forgiven me).
I am loving this thing, and will head off to Racine to my Writers' Fall Retreat confident that he will direct me STRAIGHT to my destination. I have to admit, there are things in this, the 21st century, that I like. A lot.
The day is passing, and I'm feeling anxious to leave all this civilization and return to the little refuge in the woods. I can report that the weather is crisp, nearly freezing at night, and that the fall colors are "at peak" as we say up here. I do know that I could not be happy living ANYWHERE that didn't have four distinct seasons, one of which was Autumn. The potbelly warms the whole of the cabin, and I love it dearly.
I will therefore leave you with a picture which reminds me of my happy home, as the ONLY thing that could be described as "lacking" in this heavenly place is, of course, my kitties. So - mindful of the grace, the dignity, the elegance which is my precious Evangeline:
Watch this space; we'll be coming back into town for at least one more connection to the Outer World.
But I think I'm past caring about sequence, so here's the deal: I will be posting about a Most Remarkable Day (with pictures). And it won't matter so much about sequence anyway, as it deals with meeting one of the most interesting, talented women I've had the pleasure to cross the path of. I'll give you a little teaser: when I was introduced to her (by Mr Dearling, at a fun event in a nearby town) I did NOT -- I repeat, I did not - squeal, and while (not) jumping up and down, declare "Are you really THE...(her name will appear here).
In the meantime, a few recent details: first, I am writing from the public library in Munising, Michigan, on the fourth of ten days we're spending in the forest cabin of friends. It's isolated, beautiful, thoroughly modern. It's comfortable beyond belief, and is heated by a (gas) potbelly stove. There are rocking chairs, comfortable sofas and a modern kitchen. This is the third (I think) year we've had this uncommon privilege. There IS no internet (hence the library) and there's no teevee (except one we could watch tapes or DVDs on if we had any, but we don't).
Mr Dearling spends his days out hiking and his evenings reading. I spend my days reading, knitting, writing (fiction), daydreaming and napping. I also spend my evenings in this manner, with the occasional game of Solitaire. In my lexicon, this is the definition of "bliss". So far I have finished two books, completed a muffler and a baby cap, finished about 2/3 of the Mason Dixon "Ball Band Dishcloth" (which I've tried unsuccessfully to figure out COUNTLESS times before) and made real progress on a baby wrap. I'll post pictures and book reviews shortly (but not today). I'm keeping a daily journal, some of which may be either blog material or at least notes for same.
I also brought along some games (Yahtzee, Bananagrams, Milles Bornes) which I mean to share with Mr Dearling, and I also brought my little Tarot deck for some study. And lest ye think I'm frittering - I also have two books along for program preparation for the museum...which is admittedly another form of delight.
So to go back a bit (and so that I can work in SOME pictures, which I feel obligated to include - AM I? Obligated to put in pictures? It hangs me up sometimes) - here's what occurred before we came up here:
I have a new beau. A sweetheart. My version of Raoul the Pool Boy. His name is Natty Bumpo. ("Pathfinder", get it?) His voice actually belongs to a fellow named Simon. He has a British accent.
For some of us (well, ME) finding our way around in this world is challenging. I cannot read maps. I don't do "turn north at the gas station". I'm a "right" or "left" kinda gal. Never, in any travels, have I seen roads that are red, or state lines that are bright blue. Because I am numerically dyslexic, things like "miles" don't mean anything to me. Enter Natty Bumpo.
I am loving this thing, and will head off to Racine to my Writers' Fall Retreat confident that he will direct me STRAIGHT to my destination. I have to admit, there are things in this, the 21st century, that I like. A lot.
The day is passing, and I'm feeling anxious to leave all this civilization and return to the little refuge in the woods. I can report that the weather is crisp, nearly freezing at night, and that the fall colors are "at peak" as we say up here. I do know that I could not be happy living ANYWHERE that didn't have four distinct seasons, one of which was Autumn. The potbelly warms the whole of the cabin, and I love it dearly.
I will therefore leave you with a picture which reminds me of my happy home, as the ONLY thing that could be described as "lacking" in this heavenly place is, of course, my kitties. So - mindful of the grace, the dignity, the elegance which is my precious Evangeline:
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| Worshipful Daughter of Bast |
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