Spring Night

Hey me, remember this: the first night in spring in Vermont when the frogs woke up that day and the Peepers are peeping and you're hanging out of the bathroom window looking at the fuzzy full moon behind some light clouds and feeling the warm spring breeze blow.

A Favorite Thing

One of my favorite things that anyone's ever said about me is, "Daddy! That lady's a witch!" Perceptive kid.

Evacuate!

Look who's hiding under the garage door right in the path of my car:

A Favorite Memory

This may sound kind of crazy but I used to be a scuba diver. I forget if I've mentioned that before in this blog. It was so long ago.

One of my favorite-memories-for-life is of sitting on the bounding bow of a boat in the water over Roca Redonda in the Galapagos Islands, listening to "Train in Vain" by the Clash on my Walkman, eating M&Ms and watching porpoises leap out of the water. It seems incredible that anyone could have that for a memory but I do.

"Train in Vain" came on my iPod today while I was waiting for the T in Davis Square station and I was brought back to that moment in 1987. The amazing things I've had the good fortune to do.

Back then I was also feeling pretty satisfied with myself because I had chosen not to do the dive at Roca Redondo that day. Chris McFarling, our naturalist guide, had made a big hullabaloo about how challenging the dive would be. He predicted masses of huge hammerheads, overpowering currents and I don't remember what-all else. Wonder whatever happened to that guy?

Anyway, I wasn't intimidated by what he said, I just wanted a day off. Isn't that funny? 

We'd encountered hammerheads before and they were, well, comical. There were two of them. They spotted me and my brother and were so startled that they bumped into each other head-on then took off in opposite directions. Maybe that was a lucky one-off but that was my experience of them. They didn't faze me. Nor the bull sea lions or the overpowering currents. What the hell does faze a twenty-something? Dreams about being naked in class on surprise final exam day for a class you forgot you'd enrolled in is about it. 

I just decided I wanted a day off and I was damn proud of myself for taking it and not caving to pressure of any kind. I was having such a great time up there, on top of the boat and not under water, listening to my music, devouring my chocolate. 

I imagine I probably rewound "Train in Vain" at least a few times so I could enjoy it over and over. That thought reminded me of the old technology and how you had to rewind. You had to wait for the tape to spool back so you could play it again. Not anymore. 

I tell ya, back in my day...

Well the old lady's mind is going for sure. I bet I've told this whole memory here before. Maybe not the part about rewinding. 

But golly gee, you can still take a dive trip on the same boat, the Encantada, today! Amazing!

The folks who went on that dive reported a great dive when they got back but no one was eaten or lost at sea. I sound disappointed about that, don't I? I just feel that in retrospect, the dive didn't live up to Chris' hype. No doubt for the best.

Of course in the Galapagos there are no "safe" dives and no boring dives.

What a privilege. 

Boston Area Winter Plus A Note From Vermont

I drove out to Wellesley today to go to my sister-in-law's Stella and Dot open house. While driving on Route 2 I was amazed by how ashy everything looks on a day in January when it's supposed to snow but it hasn't started to yet.

When I left Wellesley I took the Mass Pike from 128 to Prudential Center. As I drove under the city I looked at the gritty, blackened, concrete ceiling above me and thought "By God I love this filthy town." I really do. It's filthy and freezing and I really love living here.

Meanwhile, Pete is in Vermont, warm and cozy in his studio, looking out the window at an owl hunting:

Photo by Pete.

This Is What I Thought I Could Do

Hold on to your hats! "Creative" punctuation ahead - and a lot of gobbledygook. But then this is a blog.

One big thing that happened this year is that Pete and I entertained the idea of selling our place in Vermont and moving to Durham, North Carolina.

This was traumatic for me. It forced me to face the fact that I'd been undervaluing the things that weren't working in the way we'd been living our lives. It showed me that my dreams had turned out to be just that: unrealistic and impractical. I wanted to do too much with too little time and no help. Nuts!

In Vermont I have an artist's dream studio: plenty of square footage, a sink, a deck (! What artist even dreams of having a deck off their studio? For many artists even a sink is a dream) near but not in my house, safely accessible at all hours, very few distractions, surrounded by wildlife and incredible views. It's probably the best studio I'll ever have. How could I think of giving that up?

Because it's frigging lonely up there! We're too far from our friends and family. We keep having to travel so we can fulfill our family duties and charge our social batteries.

Every time I leave it upsets my creative rhythm which takes days to re-establish - a problem I couldn't figure out how to get around. Thanks to list-making I have been able to keep producing work I'm proud of. My dreams were rosier though. I thought that if I had a great studio and dedicated my time to my work that my productivity would take off. Maybe it would have but in all the years we've been there I have rarely been able to devote the unbroken stretches of time to my work that I thought I would.

Ultimately that's life. Nobody can just be an artist. Everybody has family and needs to eat lunch and gets interrupted by the details of life. Everybody knows that life is where art comes from.

But it wasn't just my art-making that got interrupted. I wasn't around enough for my garden either. I had dreams of turning our property into a verdant paradise of multiple garden rooms, fruit trees and a potager.

I also thought I was going to decorate the house beautifully and cook gourmet meals made with vegetables we'd grown ourselves.

What an insane fantasy! Look out - here we go... I'll whip up some pear and ginger scones to have with home made yogurt first thing in the morning for breakfast! After an hour's walk in the woods with Fay, it's off to my studio to paint and sew and sculpt and create installations that are in demand the world over! With Pete's help I'll spend a couple of hours tending to the weeding, pruning dead-heading and other garden maintenance. Then it's back to the sparklingly clean and tidy house with the flowers I've picked for an arrangement to decorate the entry room table (we don't have an entry room table) I'll make us a lovely cucumber and green bean salad with fresh dill from the garden and poached fish for lunch! Then back to the studio for more brilliant creations! Then I'll work out for an hour (gotta keep in shape!) then go to the mailbox to pick up the multi-thousand-dollar checks that arrive there daily and then play with Fay in the yard for another hour. Then it's back to the house to create a delicious gourmet dinner with fresh baked pie for dessert! Satisfied, Pete and I will share a nightcap on the patio by the fire pit, under the stars and I'll knit while we discuss the arts, culture and the latest issue of the "New Yorker." Then we'll retire and spend an hour or so before sleep catching up on reading those "New Yorker"s and about physics, philosophy, history, movements in art and technology etc. Then off  to a peaceful night's sleep full of fascinating, revelatory dreams (G-rated version)

Uhhhh... Smoke much?

In fact, no, that ridiculousness was the product of my own, unaltered mind. I did that all by myself! That's like a month-and-a-half's worth of activity I imagined I could pack into every day, not to mention my plans for Pete's assistance that I didn't consult him about. Not to mention expecting Fay to remain young and healthy. I mean, it took about a week to just read that paragraph, didn't it?

So yeah, that wasn't working out at all and I was FRUSTRATED about it. I was a FAILURE for FAILING to accomplish the IMPOSSIBLE. But I kept trying! It was like I was trying to live in a Thomas Kinkade painting or something - a literal, two-dimensional painting. I clawed into that dream for everything I was worth. It took me traumatic months to begin to release my grip on that baroque tableau.

You know, when I look at it that way I see that I actually accomplished a lot, all things considered. I just was never able to complete even one aspect of that fantasy. We're so backed up on the "New Yorker." I mean I could chip away at things. I did bake and grow things and make art and learn (A LOT) I just don't live in my own wet-dream of aesthetic/intellectual/domestic productivity. I don't have Hermione's time turner. If I did I'd probably use it to nap anyway.

So we may still move down to Durham somewhere down the line. I've been trying to spend more time in one place. I've been in Cambridge for the last couple of weeks trying to catch up with friends and figure out a rational plan for moving forward. That's hard for me. I still don't want to give up any of my activities and I want to get a full time job. Clearly something still has to give. I do think my expectations have changed though.

The number one thing I've come to terms with is that I can't provide myself with enough mental stimulation all on my own. I'll need to be around more people which means I should be based in the city. I'll have to trade the company of the critters for my sanity. I love the critters. And the beauty and the solitude. Something has to give.

So please wish me luck!

HUGE WHITE SPIDER!!!

Starting the day after tomorrow I'm going to have time to think. I know - can you believe it? Hopefully this will lead to some very inspired blog posts. Fingers crossed.

Today, however, will be all about wildlife. I found this spider in our vestibule, hanging over the front door. I wonder how many times we've passed below it without knowing it was there?

The face on its back looks pretty friendly.

I'm very glad that no one at our house has arachnophobia. We'd probably need to move. Actually, when you think of all the spiders that routinely live in our house this one wouldn't be an issue - we'd have moved already.

Update: Our friend and wildlife expert, Don, says he thinks this is a Barn spider. So exotic. It's latin name is Araneus cavaticus (slightly more exotic) According to wikipedia, it is the same kind of spider as Charlotte in Charlotte's Web.

A Little On The Random Side

My friend Jenn kicks ass. She sent me an awesome tote bag with this image on it. Thanks Jenn!

I felt very proud of myself yesterday. It was my last day of a short course of antibiotics and the day I figured out that certain of the possible side effects were affecting me: I was depressed, disoriented and drowsy. Despite this (sorry about the alliteration) I was very productive. For example I set up this automatic container watering system for when I can't be home to water the plants:

I also did a lot of other dumb junk that's too boring to mention here. The end result was that when bed time rolled around I was pretty satisfied with myself. I re-read a little "Mindfulness in Plain English" and hit the hay.

At three AM Pete woke me up saying, "I think Fay's out in the hallway." He turned on the light and Fay was, in fact, in her bed. "Something's in the house," he said. We got up to investigate. Have you ever seen a flying squirrel? They're really cute. About the size of a chipmunk only grayer and they have the most adorable big eyes. This one was sitting on the windowsill in the upstairs room Pete uses for his office. It looked calmly at us when we turned on the lights. 

I eased over to the next window, opened it and removed the screen. We probably should have watched what happened next but we didn't. We just shut the door and checked back in five minutes. We think it left. We hope it left. We hope it doesn't come back with other family members.

Here's a photo of another peony in my garden. I love the intense color. I read the plant label yesterday. It's named after some lady but I don't remember who. (Note that there's a decorative "head" in the background of the photo)

Not to be confused with Paula Fay. Picture a bumble bee in there. Nice, huh?

 

Finally, I like these shoes:

They're Doc Martens.

Well Hello There!

It has been brought to my attention (hi Alex!) that I haven't posted in a while. Life keeps whizzing on by and I haven't had a lot of time to myself to think about things. That's my excuse.

For example, I met a celebrity:

I know he seems ornery in his films but keep in mind, he is an actor. In person he's quite charming.

Sassy!

This is a new piece I'll be showing this Friday

I make an excellent hermit.  I've been hiding out from people all week (maybe longer) and it's done me a world of good.

Here's a MIRACLE: I'm happily working away in my studio.  It's been months and months since I've been able to really work there and even longer since I was happy about it.  I'd force myself to chip away at things when I could and that was the best I could do.

I know, it's sad.  You're supposed to love what you do and making art is supposed to be fun and what's so hard about making dumb junk anyway?  

Many of you know the feelings to which I refer.  To the rest of you I say: even making poor quality art can be really difficult and demoralizing.  Maybe I mean to say that the thought that you might be making poor quality art can be especially difficult and demoralizing.

Now don't get the wrong idea.  I'm not saying I make poor quality art - though I highly doubt anything I've made will be setting fire to Art Basel Miami (South by Southwest for the visual arts crowd only with A LOT more money) anytime in the next decade or so. 

It's just that most of the time when you're making art you have NO IDEA AT ALL what you're doing or if it will be worth anything when you're done (whenever that is, if ever)  When I say "worth anything" I mean the effort before I mean worth money.

Taking the long view, making the effort is worth making the effort.  It's hard to maintain the long view day to day.  But here I am at the end of my recent forced-making rainbow and I actually do have something to show for all that work I made myself do.

I guess some people have more faith in themselves and are able to be content enjoying their processes and their efforts.  Maybe if I continue to meditate I can develop a better attitude.

It probably wouldn't hurt if Life could take it a little easier on me for a little while too.  Hi Life! XOXOXO! (Blows a kiss and waves frantically)

Here's something else from my studio: what I like to call companion planting.

While Pete, Fay and I were away for Thanksgiving the studio mice made Thanksgiving with my cyclamen.  They crawled into the pot and chewed every succulent stem, every leaf, every tender little growing sprout they could reach.  There was one survivor: a large leaf that had been suspended over its cactus neighbors.

So I rounded up the cacti and surrounded the cyclamen pot with them.  Then I took some conveniently available baby cacti and put them in pot as well (as you can see)  Then I crossed my fingers and hoped that that one surviving leaf could photosynthesize enough to carry the poor cyclamen along for a while.

So far so good - we have new growth.  I'll keep my fingers crossed though.  That one little leaf peeking out over the rim makes me a little nervous.  Mice can be very resourceful when they're hungry.

Finally, here is another wig my mom gave me for my birthday.  Thanks Mom!

Please don't yell at me for saying this because it's true: the years are really becoming apparent.  I am no longer twenty-eight.  Seriously.  Even though I think I am.

I did get carded at the grocery store yesterday.  I should mark that on my calendar - it may never happen again.  I think there was something wrong with that guy.  Or maybe he was trying to butter me up.

Birthday 2011

2010 was a difficult year.  For the first half I was pretty proud of myself for being able to compartmentalize the bad and the good and still find ways to enjoy myself.  Actually, I've been patting myself on the back about that ability for the last three years.  Unfortunately that particular emotional resource ran out a little after my dad died.  Since then I've had a hard time enjoying anything.  That's normal - it happens.  As long as I take care of myself I'll get that ability back.  I'm not worried, just waiting.

I did enjoy my birthday though, in a low-key way.  To celebrate we went to Hotel Del Coronado for New Years Day brunch in the Crown Room.  Here's what I wore:

Mom gave me the bag and the shoes for Christmas.  You'd have to feel at least a little bit uplifted by that combo, huh?  You might recognize the shoes from this post.

Here I am towards the end of the meal.  Notice that I have a tiramisu, three chocolate drinks, three little piles of chocolate mousse and a meringue.  The food at the brunch is stellar but my absolute favorite thing is that chocolate drink.  Maybe next time I'll get five!

After brunch we all walked on the beach.  Usually there's a chilly wind blowing on that beach but this day it was just warm and pleasant.  They have disco sand there: it glitters with golden mica.  So fancy!

Then Pete and I took Fay in her doggie stroller to smell the smellicans (pelican roosts really stink) at the La Jolla Cove.

Fay loves to sniff all the smells.  I kept waiting for someone to look into our stroller and say "What a hideous child!" Everybody just thought she was so cute. Well, she is.

When we got back to Mom's house the sun was setting.  It was an incredible sunset.  Pete and I stayed out on the lawn for about an hour watching it.

It was even beautiful to the east.  I had trouble deciding where to look.

I chose to see a phoenix in these clouds because I could use a rebirth.

After the sunset we all had dinner together.  Mom delegated the ordering of the cakes to my brother this year.  For some reason he ordered three birthday cakes for me. There have to be photos of them somewhere but I don't have them.  There was coconut, chocolate with white icing and a fruit tiramisu.  Against the odds, the fruit tiramisu was my hands down favorite.  I wish I had some right now.

So all in all a very pleasant birthday.  Ideal.  Comfortable, delicious and spent with my favorite people.  Way to start the new year.

Garden Visitors

I took Fay out in the front yard today at around 10:30 for her mid-morning squeezing.  While I was standing around looking at the weeds in the garden that I really ought to do something about it came to my attention that the birds were freaking out.  I had just read that chickadees make rapid chipping sounds when there's a predator in the area so I started looking up into the tops of all the tall trees.  I couldn't see anything so I thought maybe I was imagining things and returned to idly peering around the yard.  After a bit my glance fell on the apple tree.  There was a hawk sitting right there (where the red arrow is pointing) maybe thirty feet away from me, twenty from Fay.

Don't go looking for it in this photo - I didn't have my camera on me at the time.

Not your typical hawk vantage point.  I would never have looked for it there.  But there it was, looking right at me all nonchalant, like "What?  I'm just seeing how the apples are coming along.  I always relax here."

I try to be careful when I take Fay out in VT, especially at night.  There are things here that could eat her with no problem: big owls, coyotes, fishers.  I doubt a bear would eat her but I still wouldn't want her to meet one.  I'm pretty sure this hawk was smaller than Fay.  None the less, I went ahead and squeezed her.  When I looked up again the hawk had moved on.

I've been enjoying this volunteer foxglove that sprang up in the garden.  It has some fair competition from the mint but I'm hoping it will go to seed and start a colony.  I can hope.

I think it's elegant and etherial and that it goes well with the bird bath.

Tooth And Claw

The world is showing me its scary face today.  Or maybe I'm just agreeing to look today when I choose not to on other days.

Some days it seems like life really is a brutal struggle for survival - like on that nature series, "Planet Earth."  On those days my very first impulse is to make cupcakes.  Actually, my first impulse is to pull the covers over my head and stay in bed.  But if I do that I just think about how scared I am and I have to get up and distract myself somehow.

So I want to make cupcakes.  Small, cute, sweet, positive.

I was also thinking about the "attention to the moment" concept.  It does work.  It is calming.  At the moment I am having a nice cup of coffee with half and half and my belly is full from the scrambled eggs I made.  I even used truffle salt on them.  In a minute I'm going to get myself a cinnamon donut.  I'm sitting peacefully in my apartment, I don't have any itches, it's quiet, I have every expectation of tranquility and security.  Why worry ahead of time about things that may never happen?

I'm not even thinking about anything that might happen to me.  I'm thinking about horrible things that have happened to other people.

And despite the fact that I am quite comfortable I want to make cupcakes and buy nail polish and go to a book store and wear red shoes and do all of the things that make me think that life is stable and pleasant and not so bad after all.

Shy Girl (I Think It's A Girl)

Look who was kind enough not to bite the hell out of me when I picked up my gardening gloves today:

I found out she's a "Pisaurina Mira" or "Nursery Web" spider.  They don't trap prey in webs, they hunt and catch their prey.  They are no danger to humans but they can catch tadpoles and fish.

Somnolence

Fay and I are very tired.  I, for one, am stupid.

I couldn't wake up today.  Again.  I'm starting to wonder if I have Lyme Disease or anemia or something.

A good thing I have right now is an excellent view of a juvenile robin.  It's sitting on a branch outside my window.  Its mom came and give it some lunch a couple of minutes ago.  Now it's taking a nap with its little beak tucked into its wing.

Oh - there - it woke up and did a little stretch.  And settled back in to nap position.  Now a motorcycle went by and woke it up again.  Oh - and here comes Mom with some  more lunch.  Yay Mom!

April Snow

This is what yesterday morning looked like.



The water in the bird bath is frozen solid.  The pear tree is not just fluffy white with snow, it's fluffy white with snow-covered blossoms.  I have other videos from the same morning in which you can hear the frogs croaking.

Everything is back to normal today - in my neighborhood, at least.  The frogs seem fine, the pear blossoms are fine.  Some areas of Vermont got over twenty inches of snow.  Can you imagine the snow load a leafy tree could hold?  Lots of power-outages north of here.

Gothic Gardening

Boy, am I pooped.

I set out yesterday to plant my nine raspberry bushes.  They're bare root plants so you have to soak them "for several hours" before you put them out.  When I re-opened the box they came in, unwrapped them all and put them in the bucket to soak I discovered that - thank heaven - I really only had six plants.  PHEW!

My plan yesterday was to get 'em soaking while I prepared the spots I'd figured out to plant them in and actually plant them today.  Well, the spots I'd picked didn't work at all.  Finally I decided on a spot in the vegetable/flower garden that Michaela and I had prepared last fall.  I had myself a Guinness and pondered how much easier an already prepared spot would be.

I was feeling very optimistic today.  Only six plants and a prepared bed to put them in.  Plug 'n' play.  Ha ha ha ha ha!  What I riot I am.  I should have known better.

For you see, in my gardening this week I've been doing hand to root combat with SATAN'S SPAWN.  I knew this.

SATAN'S SPAWN is a particular kind of grass.  It looks like this:

Notice the robust pink color of the roots?  I find the color unspeakably chilling.  It is the sign of a grass root that can tunnel deep under your favorite sensitive shrub then burrow up  and entwine itself snugly into your shrub's root system.  You might, at first, admire the blushingly healthful appearance of the root until you go to yank it out and it's head snaps off in your fingers.  Congratulations!  You just made it stronger!  

These roots are total mo-fos.  To really get rid of this stuff you have to carefully dig up each tender root.  Any segment of root that you accidentally broke off and neglected to pick out produces another evil beast of a plant.  What's more, these roots are very good at appearing to be blackened and dead when in fact they are in fine working condition.

If you are (or are friendly with) a horror writer who is stuck for a good idea for a monster I strongly suggest spending about half an hour weeding grass roots out of a garden.  Different grasses have different alarming features.  That may be another story for another day.

Back to SATAN'S SPAWN.

Last fall Michaela and I did a buttload of hard work, spraying organic herbicide on the weeds then smothering them with cardboard and mulch.  The approach proved fatal to the majority of weeds that received this treatment but not to SATAN'S SPAWN.

So, today, out comes the shovel, up comes the mulch and the cardboard, open pops my mouth in alarm.  You guessed it - SATAN'S SPAWN.  No plug 'n' play for me.  Instead it was trench digging and hauling large clumps of root-infested soil up to a tarp I set out on the lawn.  

SATAN'S SPAWN must be killed, like a vampire, by exposing the root to plenty of sun.

Of course all of this took much more time and effort than I had planned.  I only got in half of the raspberries today.  I'm frightened for tomorrow.

Despite all of that this location for the raspberries is still better than the ones I was thinking of yesterday.  If I'd gone with one of those I would have had to remove a section of lawn about twenty feet long.  Then I would have had to remove rocks from and incorporate plenty of compost into the soil beneath the lawn.  At least this way I didn't have quite as many rocks to move.

My final horror for the gardening day occurred at the compost heap when I went to stab my shovel in and noticed a Spotted Salamander peeking out through the dirt.  I don't know what I would have done if I'd found salamander parts in the wheelbarrow.

I think I'll wait until next year to put in strawberries.

A Spring Morning

Here's something I like to see when I open the refrigerator door in the morning:

A day with rice balls all ready to go can't be all bad.

Here is my breakfast kale:

I made a kale and feta omelette and used the first garden chives of the spring.

Today has been eventful in a way - there are ducks on our pond and they were quacking loudly this morning. Our pond has a major leak so I hope it stays full long enough for the ducks to do what they need to do. Also, it rained a bit today. That meant I didn't have to turn the water on and water the pea and lettuce seeds I planted yesterday.

My vegetable gardening has always been half-assed. I'd stick stuff in here and there and mostly it would get eaten by woodchucks. After last fall though, when Michaela and I prepared the vegetable garden, I should probably put more thought into it. I ordered some fancy tomato plants from White Flower Farm. I also bought some corn seeds. I'm interested in potatoes, kale and brussels sprouts too. Maybe I should think about broccoli? Oh, and garlic!

Jeeze, I just checked out the last frost dates in my area and one page said May 30th and another said June 10th. Guess I'll be waiting a while to put that corn in.

In the mean time I'm checking out the alpine strawberry plants I moved up from Brookline to see if they've flowered yet. I've got to take it easy.

Alright, now I'm off to work some more on the lust blanket.

The Visitor

Today I have a visitor. Her name is Zoe and she's a dog. A dog from Oregon. Loose in my yard in Vermont.

I called the phone number on her tags and got the vet who spayed her and gave her her rabies shot. They told me her name and the name of her owner. They also called the number they have for the owner.

I googled the owner and I may have found something on Facebook, of all things. I sent someone with the same name as the owner a message on friggin' Facebook.

I still haven't heard anything but it's early yet I guess.

Back when it was daylight I was kind of hoping Zoe'd take off and head home on her own. Then it got dark and I heard a lot of howling coming from lots of different places. We do have coyotes out here. I looked to see if she'd gone. Nope. So I let her in.

She's is in great shape, nicely fed, pretty teeth and she's very nice. She's been brought up right: I'm eating my dinner right now and she's not paying any attention to me. No mooching from her, unlike some people we know. She's lying peacefully near my feet underneath the table.

Fay is sequestered upstairs. You know how she is around food. There'd be blood if she had her way.

I guess I'll watch Zoe tonight if I don't hear from the owner. I've got a call in to the animal control officer too. I guess we'll just have to wait and see now. Kind of not psyched.

Back To Earth

Wasn't that last post pretty? I neglected to mention that once I got home and unloaded the car I had to clean heaps of mouse crap off the stove top. It's that time of year - they want to come in where it's warm now.

As for Sailors' Delight - YES! Sun sun sun all week! I'm hoping to sneak the last of my fall gardening duties in in the next couple of days.