I collect birdhouses now

Both functional (those are mounted in trees and look solid and functional) and decorative.  I imagine festooning a couple of trees with a variety of bright little dangling birdhouses.  And should anyone decide to occupy one of the decorative birdhouses, that’s ok too.  Some prefer style over function.

I have had a few kicking around that needed some repairs, and I finally got them out and repaired them and had a very creative hour painting on them that was glorious.  I haven’t had my paints out in years.

Then I announced to HW that he could keep an eye out for cute birdhouses at thrift stores/in the garbage for me, even if they were beat up.  “Oh, you want fixer-upper birdhouses?”

Little notebooks, little notebooks…

 

I made some little notebooks.  All paper salvaged from an office recycling, cut to fit with little cardstock images I found graphic and entertaining – a flight safety pamphlet (no, I didn’t remove it from the seatback pocket), the cover of an antique trashy paperback, postcards, and bits from calendars.

In theory it would be a good way to add value to paper and saved images, but it took rather forever to cut little stacks of paper to fit and match up some attractive front and back covers.

After I had them all ready to bind, I took them to my neighborhood copy store that smells like toner.  I wanted the spiral coil binding, but that required sending them away and waiting for days, so I accepted the Cerlox binding they could do immediately.

Voila, little notebooks!

A small but valuable accomplishment: beginning.

Having an odd sense of non-emotion now around the potential purchase of property.  It’s not at the top of my mind, hardly a priority in my day, yet the process is sailing along ever more smoothly.  It looks like it’s going ahead, and we’ll be on the new 5 acres of digs in a month, with a horse.  Every so often I think, oh yeah, in no time I’ll probably be on some land and life will look completely different.  I’m sure I’ll be bursting with excitement as soon as I pull the camper into the barn, and start cleaning brush and designing gardens, lists flying everywhere, but until then, other things dominate my head.

Like writing!  Praise be, we’re writing.  My friend and I are both working on big projects that have stayed more in the realm of vision than reality for far too long.  Now together, we’re making them real.  We have a writing date, and both of us sit down and click and stare sternly at our pages, pausing over word choices and spelling.  The half hour we promise to do turns into an hour and half every time.

I’m familiar with the way that an idea is perfect and glowing, bursting with energy and perfection, but then you sit at the keyboard filled with intention, and the words don’t come out in nice sentences with the pop you imagined.  Three hours later you look up hungry, thinking you still have to finish it up, rewrite the beginning, and edit the whole thing, let alone format and post it.  I know that song.  That’s just what it takes to make something real instead of a fantasy.

As I plunge into the hitchhiking book it feels like I knew it would take time, but now I know how much.  The table of contents that flowed out of me on a break between rides on my last trip is a blessing.  It gives a structure and creates a list of topics.  Every day I’m tackling one little category and writing about it.  I’m sure every word will change in the edits that will be required, but right now I’m getting the ideas out in words.  It’s terrible, artless writing, but it’s out there now, and after all of it is “out” will come the stage of editing to make all those pieces readable and entertaining.  Then will come the stage of editing that will give it form and cohesion.  It’s a hell of a lot of work, and I “knew” that before, but now I KNOW.  And it’s underway, which is spectacular.  A small but valuable accomplishment: beginning.

Reindeer

The hatch-battening days have struck.  Today was not cool by numbers, but had that piercing quality that makes you wish you were wearing a warmer hat, and mentally assess your coat and scarf and mitten collection.  Will it be enough?  The days that soberingly remind you that winter is cold, and reminds you what that feels like.

Inspired by the possibility of earning a little money at Xmas craft fairs, today the kids and I opened Santa’s workshop and made some prototype reindeer.  First we filled the back of my sexy new truck with branches and dragged them home, importing that wonderful wood and snow smell of Christmas.  It went incredibly well.  The green wood was really easy to cut and drill, and the process was creative, flexible, and rewarding, rarely frustrating.  The oldest boy amazed me by pumping out three different sizes.  The smallest one is only an inch and a half tall.  The “head twig” was too tiny for him to drill for antlers.  We’ll see how large a team, or herd, we can create tomorrow.  This should be good.

Its almost like they hatch- they just come together as though they were meant to, and then they emerge- full of personality and mocking their intended design, if you started out with one.

It’s Halloween costume time.

A couple I know with three children have welcomed Kevin and I into their backyard, and they have the grace to make me feel entirely welcome and comfortable in their house at all times, like an unplanned roommate.  I feel quite useful with my sewing skills, and have started early on the kids’ costumes.  With so much time, we’ve tackled some most imaginative ideas.

The oldest boy is going to be a shark, formerly a fair-prize-sized stuffed dolphin, emptied of its stuffing.  It’s taken some work to make the transition from a friendly looking dolphin to a shark menacing and realistic enough to satisfy an 11yr-old.

The littlest girl wanted to be a Smurfette, so I created a one-piece leotard that zips up the back out of a garishly blue woman’s sweater.  That’s her smurf skin, topped by the white dress (made from an adult white t-shirt) , a blond wig, white stocking hat (made from another t-shirt with a handful of polyfil stuffing for the distinctive shape), and some white “shoes” made out of some fleecy slippers that velcro over her normal shoes.  Impossibly adorable.

The middle boy wanted to be a dead Energizer bunny (a crafty bit of anti-brand attitude I thoroughly appreciated), so I started on a one-piece back zippered bunny suit that resembled pink Pjs but for the integral hood.  Just after the requisite larger than life ears were ready, he decided he wanted to drop the Energizer part and just be a dead/zombied pink bunny.  Supporting the ridiculously large ears wasn’t easy, and I didn’t think it would work at times, but they turned out amazing!  Almost half his height again tall, the giant ears defy gravity and are very adjustable.

Health

The biggest goal of my life right now is health.  Turns out “health” is a very complex concept.  I want physical, financial, spiritual, mental health for myself, but seeing as I’m one organism in a giant ecosystem, that includes all species, and all beings, and all humans on this planet, then my health is inextricably linked to the health of the whole planet.  Racial violence, and war, and starvation, and habitat destruction, and species extinction- these are monumental tragedies and we are aware of that pain in our subtle bodies whether or not we wallow in news, or recycle, or grow organic gardens.  Try as we might, we are not insulated from any of it.

 

Can't wait for the pears. This is the first crop on a young tree.

 

I think the pervasive toxins and mega-germs and new strains of pests that get new names and chatted up in the media are a physical manifestation, or symbol, of this fact that we’ve collectively ignored for too long- that we share everything.  Can’t be ignored any more.  Can’t run to the hills, it rains acid there too.  Germs circulate the world, we breathe each others’ air, we ingest each others’ garbage.  An individual cannot hide from the whole.  The “everything” we notice we’re sharing tends to be bad, but joy, ecstasy, and prayer also circle the world and affect everyone, positively.

The question I always ask: “What can you get up tomorrow and do differently, knowing that?”

Fools Rushing In

Well, we cant say no one warned us.  The verdict on small-scale farming is unanimous-”it’s F-ing hard work”.

I paraphrase.

Everyone says they had rose-coloured visions of gazing at the sun-dappled pasture over the cooling jewel-coloured jelly jars, crafting, painting, reading…and the reality involves vomiting goats and falling into bed with brutalized muscles.

But, (you couldn’t see this coming)I want to do it anyway, and insist that “it’s gonna be different.”  I’m not yet 40; I make no claim to wisdom.

For me, leisure is a strong enough imperative now that I just might have the fortitude to safeguard it.  I’ve long thought of myself as a lazy person trapped in the body of an incredibly energetic and effective person.  I privately long to live like a cat, and I fantasize rapturously about sleep.

However, I now believe the trapped personality is a creative one, and creativity requires fallow time.  14% fallow time, by all accounts.  For that, I’m long, long overdue.

My primary focus of five years was improving a house to sell, working a real job, and trying to borrow enough money to keep working on house (rinse and repeat). 

2018 calendars

Zazzle calendars are on sale right now!  If you’re familiar with my photographer brother’s landscape photography (occasionally featured here) and amazing calendars, now is a great time to order one!  They’re 60% off today through tomorrow at https://www.zazzle.com/derekkind.  If you’re not familiar… don’t miss out any longer:  DerekKind.com

Aprés maintenant, le deluge

It’s been a hard summer, and my blog posting habits have suffered.  I have a big backlog of photos I intended to post and chick pics too cute not to, plus an unexpected opportunity to do some catch up posting, so…here comes a series of posts that should have gone up earlier in the summer!