REDONDOWRITER'S SACRED ORDINARY

Port Angeles All-American Hometown 4th of July Parade

Firetrucks, flatbed trucks, tractors, lumber trucks, tractors and all kinds of vehicles were filled with local groups doing their thing. 

Every child received a flag and every group who marched in the parade threw candy, so each kid came home with a bag just like Halloween. This is my grandson Zach with his flag. 

This is Laura, Arlo, Joe and Zach. The kids were besides themselves with excitement.

I got a big kick out of all the seniors participating in the parade--retirement communities and their buses, and the senior center bus itself. But check out the following picture: the Senior Center belly dancer students. 

And, what would a hometown parade be without the presence of the local public libraries, one of my passions, as you know? These are the employees of the North Olympic Library System doing synchronized drill routines with their library carts. 

There were dozens of photos, but these are some highlights. The frosting on the cake, however, was that when bedtime came, Zach asked if he could sleep with me. My heart melted. My eldest grandkids Whitney and Anthony (22, 21) slept over so often when they were little, but I haven't slept with a little kid for a long, long time. He chose a stuffed rabbit that he said would be for both of us, we read two stories, sang some songs, and finally he fell asleep. I just kept laying there saying to myself, "Thank you, God, thank you, thank you." 

A Quick Check-in from Port Angeles, WA

This is Lake Dawn, right outside the Hurricane Ridge gate to Olympic National Park. I have posted photos of the lake for the past five years as my eldest son's home is built by it. This shot was about 7:30 p.m. tonight. My grandson Zach and I watched a man canoeing and I listened to birds calling back and forth. Grandson Arlo had already gone to sleep. I believe that I live in an idyllic place in Redondo Beach, but each time I visit, summer, spring or even winter, I am awe-struck with the beauty of the place. I'm a Southern California woman but how lucky can you get to visit such a gorgeous place and be with the people I love so much. 

And back home, Cookie is being well taken care of by the team of Christy and Lorenzo--and she is doing great in my absence. 

So the Gods Shake Us From Our Sleep -- Mary Oliver

Gratitude comes in many forms, but almost always it is about the little things we simply take for granted.

For instance, who would think that watching an 85-year-old woman playing a slot machine in a casino would seem so sacred? But, it did to me yesterday. I know there are cultural stereotypes about elderly people frequenting the casinos, but when it is my sister doing it, it tickles me to the tips of my toes. Her late husband loved Vegas and Reno and she was a good egg and went right along with him all those years. Not a gambler by nature, she limits herself to $20 a visit about four times a year--on a penny machine at a local Indian casino. She drove us there, we had a humongous buffet, and then spent a lot of time together at home chatting--and watching yet another movie. Gran Torino. 

My mind immediately turned to Mary Oliver this morning. Being on vacation and undistracted by "have tos" at home and work, make me appreciate everything so acutely. Here's Mary Oliver telling it like it is. 

Gratitude

What did you notice?

 The dew snail;

the low-flying sparrow;

the bat, on the wind, in the dark;

big-chested geese, in the V of sleekest performance;

the soft toad, patient in the hot sand;

the sweet-hungry ants;

the uproar of mice in the empty house;

the tin music of the cricket’s body;

the blouse of the goldenrod.

 What did you hear?

 The thrush greeting the morning;

the little bluebirds in their hot box;

the salty talk of the wren,

then the deep cup of the hour of silence.

What did you admire?

The oaks, letting down their dark and hairy fruit;

the carrot, rising in its elongated waist;

the onion, sheet after sheet, curved inward to the

    pale green wand;

at the end of summer the brassy dust, the almost liquid

    beauty of the flowers;

then the ferns, scrawned black by the frost.

 What astonished you?

 The swallows making their dip and turn over the water.

 What would you like to see again?

 My dog: her energy and exuberance, her willingness,

    her language beyond all nimbleness of tongue, her

    recklessness, her loyalty, her sweetness, her

    sturdy legs, her curled black lip, her snap.

 What was most tender?

 Queen Anne’s lace, with its parsnip root;

the everlasting in its bonnets of wool;

the kinks and turns of the tupelo’s body;

the tall, blank banks of sand;

the clam, clamped down.

 What was most wonderful?

 The sea, and its wide shoulders;

the sea and its triangles;

the sea lying back on its long athlete’s spine.

 What did you think was happening?

The green breast of the hummingbird;

the eye of the pond;

the wet face of the lily;

the bright, puckered knee of the broken oak;

the red tulip of the fox’s mouth;

the up-swing, the down-pour, the frayed sleeve

  of the first snow—

--so the gods shake us from our sleep.

A Wi-Fi Visit From the Tumwater, WA Public Library

Now, if you want next to perfect weather, you need to be in Tumwater, WA today. I write to you from the Tumwater Timberland Library, which is about a mile from my sister's home. It's here I can get wi fi.

In fact, I've become so accustomed to dropping into libraries when I travel when where I'm staying doesn't have wi fi, but then libraries are my home away from home anywhere I go. 

This library has a very small Friends of the Library section, but I always find great books and magazines here and I did today.

I arrived yesterday and my sis and I joyfully reunited after a 10 month in between of seeing one another. You've heard me talk about Betty before--an 85-year-old larger-than-life kind of woman. She has cooked up a storm for us and last night we watched back-to-back movies of her choice, neither I had seen before. Nights in Rodanthe was a little too schmaltzy for me, but the scenery sure was beautiful. Flywheel is a Christian movie she really wanted to share and it had its humorous side along with the ageless message. The actors in Albany GA were priceless. Tonight it is Gran Torino, a film I'm looking forward to.

Betty took us to the Red Wing Casino today as she loves to play the slots and often arranges bus tours there of her senior complex members.Casinos are not my thing but I got some great photos of her at the slots and then we had a humongous and extremely reasonable buffet. She always delights in showing me the beautiful countryside although building still seems to be going on here.

Tomorrow we will visit some of her friends in the afternoon, after her weekly hair appointment. Needless to say, I'll spend that two hours back in the Tumwater Library. By the way, I'm reading Shanghai Girls and it is fabulous!

SoulCollage®: The Divine Feminine

This morning, if all went well, I flew from Los Angeles to Seattle, took a shuttle to Tumwater, WA and am with my sister--probably watching Gran Torino. I have scheduled this SoulCollage®  post as I know I'm not likely to have access to the Internet, at least not at her home. She has dial-up and I no longer have the patience for it. On Friday I will drive to Port Angeles to stay with my son and his family and where we will celebrate Arlo's first birthday. 

I call this card "The Divine Feminine" and it is in the Council suit. 

I am the one who is always juggling my spiritual side with my sensual/sexual side and then remembering that it isn't either/or, but all. 

Because I have co-existed with clinical depression all my life, I am the one who feels the flutter and heat of impending death even when my life is in balance. But, I have learned to dance with it. 

I am the one who requires a certain sense of mystery in my femininity and spirituality, but I largely keep this tendency under wraps except with people I really trust. 

I am the one who honors the feminine with the rosary, which I still often pray as I fall asleep at night. 

I am the one who never embraced the feminine in myself until I became a crone and now I rejoice in it daily. 

If I could ask this card a question it would probably be, "

Creating an Antique Pillow of Pins

On the recent tour of historic homes in Redondo Beach, I took photos of many accessories or treatments that I put in my "creative file." This pillow on the bed at the Murphy house, an incredible restored craftsman bungalow a block from my home, really caught my eye. I didn't get a chance to ask Susan about it, but the pillow itself was red velvet, which fit in with her decor. It was covered with old pins and I bet all of them have special significance to her. What a great idea! And even the craft-challenged could do this. I have many pins in my jewelry drawers that were my grandmother's, my mom's, and mine but they aren't "up-to-date" to wear with today's fashions. By the way, click to make the photos bigger to get the full sense of the pillow.

 

This is Susan's house, by the way, with the proverbial white picket fence and the big hydrangea bushes in front. Inside it is filled with interesting furniture and features, of course, all the built-in cabinetry that houses had in those days.

There is a touch of modern, however. Can you spot it?

Journal Covers Front and Back

Just thought you might like to see the front and back covers of my current journal. I am so looking forward to taking Teesha Moore's Summer Play Workshop in Port Townsend, WA in July, however. I'll officially learn how to make and keep an art journal. 

This is the front cover. It is a 9 x 12" sketchpad journal with hard covers.

And this is the back. I had some varnish problems in the green area and I'm too lazy to go back and fix it up. Other than a few SoulCollage® cards, it has been an artless summer. 

Volunteering at the Zimmerman House for Historic Tour

Today I spent several hours as a volunteer at the Zimmerman house, one of the 10 houses on the Redondo Beach Historical Society's Home Tour. I had seen all the houses the weekend before, but was very pleased to be assigned to the Zimmerman House. They are my neighbors and friends and live right across the street. It is so refreshing to see all the "old" houses as most house tours I go on are mac-mansions where I always come away with paradoxical feelings. I can appreciate old homes; I grew up in one!

The house was built in 1910 and the Zimmerman's moved there in the late 1960s after the facade of the house had been changed from classic craftsman to what you see here. The interior, however, has been restored to the era in which it was built. It helps that J. is an artist and an interior decorator who has a passion for craftsman period decorating. 

From the outside, the mother-in-law house in the back is faithful to 1910. It is a rental and inside it's adorable with its own patio in the back. 

This is the recently upgraded kitchen--and note the wallpaper, which had to special ordered. All the cupboards have been restored and bead boarding throughout replaced. 

This is a close-up of the kitchen wallpaper. 

This is the spectacular wallpaper and moulding in the dining area. How I wish you could see this house, filled with J's art, comfy sitting areas and special touches that make you feel like you have stepped back in time. 

It was a nice respite yesterday from the work week and prep for traveling--and dealing with the spate of celebrity deaths. I also got word that the founder of Santa Monica's Center for the Partially Sighted where I worked for two years way back when had died on Thursday. Dr. Sam Genensky was a scientist who had been blinded at birth from the drops placed in his eyes. He overcame this and came to be a pioneer in the low vision field.