“Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly, your wholeness when you are broken, your innocence when you feel guilty, and your purpose when you are confused.”

a quote from Alan Cohen but I would have said it if I had thought of it first.

Imagination. I’ve been thinking about it since watching Anne of Green Gables. I admire her devotion to it, and of course, her skill.  It might be a good thing to be more imaginative. It would certainly be easier to write interesting stories if I exercised my ability to think outside of the normal. I tried it recently to see if my mundande, everyday life would take on a new excitement.

For instance, one day at work I entered the bathroom to prepare some equipment and noticed a syringe on the counter.  We use them a lot to hold alcohol or peroxide to clean equipment.  On closer examination this syringe had something dark in it.  Strange I thought. As I worked my attention wandered back to the syringe and then my imagination kicked in.  The dark thing had legs and was really quite large.  It looked like a roach, in fact, it was a roach.  How desperate it must have been to have crawled somehow into that really tiny space. Roaches are ancient insects with a survival rate like no other.  Did this one know he was doing something stupid from which he would never recover? Did he do it on a dare? Did someone leave this item on the counter for me to discover with or without a roach in it?  Let imagination run.

So how much of this is factual?  All of it so far.  I haven’t written the imaginative part yet.

the sand foundation before the cat

Joe spent several other afternoons figuring out a pattern for the pavers and carefully laying them, cutting some of them for the corners. And then, from his previous experience, Joe told me that I needed to keep the edges in place by putting down a cement anchor. Little sacks of cement needed – one for every two or three feet.  I just looked at him. Really? Let’s think of another way even if it’s not quite as good.  That’s called Shirley-style.  We turned the left over pavers on their side and buried them deep enough to anchor the edge, a little. I still need some cement on one side.  I have lost track of how much time Joe has spent so far. I may have to take out another mortgage on the house to pay him. Note for future: make sure DIY projects can be done by self and that you WANT to do them yourself.



multi-colored, nicely weathered look pavers





sanding the cracks



 The Cat

I am not a witch, she is not an enchanted maiden,
Yet she knows my ways, and I hers
As though a spell has been cast.
Have I done it to her, or she to me?
Or is it that I have heard her voice
A thousand times
And responded?

Wonder and Awe

Those sounds that play upon the drum of my ear
Strike the same flesh, bone and nerve
     and yet from each source a different voice,
     a different message, so distinct.
Lying in bed at night, listening to what is being said, I hear
     the water left running on the garden
And go to shut it off.

Readiness

A hand outstretched in the darkness,
   the corner of the table, the back of the sofa,
         ten steps to the door, the edge of the bed.
There is a light
   But I might be blind someday
      And I must practice.

You get to take this walk with me, in a virtual manner.  We were a one car family for a couple days so I’ve done a lot of walking and also learned to ride the bus home from work. Here we go.


sea grape trees turn gold/orange/purple and fall in the spring



they are like large plates and look beautiful on the ground

  

golden sea grape

The bus station where I can catch the bus that goes closest to home is a two mile walk from where I start.  I can get on a trolley that takes me there but timing is everything. I’ve ended up walking the two miles each day. Lots to see on the way…

The first mile is through a residential area with a lot of older beach houses. Many are frame built, some are on stilts but most are not. The yards are totally eclectic and a bit woodsy.  Lots of flowers and shrubs, texture and variety.




Most of the time the drawbridge is down





Today the barrier went down. I stopped because….

 




Bridge up for a yacht coming through  (while I nervously hope I don’t miss the bus)






I watched it go out into the Gulf.

 


At the other side where Coquina Beach begins





My bus, exquisitely air-conditioned


I had some interesting conversations both days with people from all around the area who had come out to the beach for the day. One lady I talked with turned out to be living in the mobile home park across the street from my house. Some people combine their bus ride with a bike section. They put their bike on the front carrier of the bus. I told one biker that I’d like to do that and he warned me to be flexible in my timing because there are only spaces for two bikes and sometimes you might be the third…


and full of riders both days



Me, glad to be sitting for the next 10 miles.



I have never taken a class on blogging or the internet and suddenly, tonight, I find out it’s a lot more confusing than I had imagined.  Really, I just like to write.  I used to do it on paper.  I wish that it would stay as simple as that but I clicked on something on the web and now I have to find out what I’ve done. 

Checking my facebook, I discovered a very interesting link to a blog post about gardening.  So I followed it and after reading for a while I thought to subscribe to this very interesting looking blog. Click. Now I have to decide about feeds and burning them. And widgets and chicklets. My blog name popped up automatically which was very cool but I’m not sure what I did to it.  I supposedly have a feed with an address but what on earth does it do? Am I feeding something out to other places or am I being fed something?  And how do I customize it and make it more attractive if I don’t know what it is? I’m sorry to be so stupid but it’s a whole different language and the people who speak it assume I know it.  I don’t.  I looked at my blog and nothing has changed there so maybe I’ll just ignore what happened tonight…  I did read that it was free, whatever it is.  Free is good, just sayin’.

In my mind, I’m an artist.  Outside of my mind, I am somewhat less than an artist.  I have a relentless desire to create that sometimes drives me to attempt things, like painting, about which I know nothing.  It’s so much harder than it looks. 

I picked up the framed canvas that I bought two years ago and got out my acrylic paints bought with a groupon and decided to paint a cat (inspired by the cat hair stuck on the canvas).  I love my cat and have always wanted to paint something to remind me of her – she is gray.  I mixed what I thought might be black paint with white paint which should have been gray, except the black was really thalo blue.  So I have a blue cat.  But she looked kind of funny sitting in the middle of a large white canvas and I didn’t really have a plan for any blue cat environment. Hmmm… 

I like yellow with blue, but because I didn’t rinse the blue out of the brush well enough I got a bunch of green too.  Grass maybe? Did I mention that the blue cat has no features? I decided I was painting her from the back.  I added some red. I don’t know why I did that – maybe hoping for a miracle discovery.

At that point, to avoid total disappointment, I changed the focus of my painting session.  New goal: cover the canvas and learn how these paints mix with each other and what textures they produce.  Realistically, I didn’t have my heart set on creating a masterpiece and that was wise. I learned that colors look better not mixed, but separate.  I learned that it’s better to have a general plan in mind if you don’t want to waste a lot of paint.  I developed a new appreciation for painting lessons, which I might actually seek out.  I’m just sayin’, it’s not that easy.  Will I try again? Probably. I have a lot of paint to use up.

Notice this is not a signed painting.

from my single serving birthday cake

This is the fourth day of birthweek, over the halfway mark and closing in fast on the finish line.  This is also the first free day I’ve had from work and perhaps my expectations of it were a bit high.  Or maybe I have in some strange way met those expectations already but don’t realize it. I haven’t been idle by any means.

Backing up a bit, Tuesday I did have a birthday adventure worth mentioning. I had asked a friend who has a large fruit/vegetable farm if I could have some of their post-season strawberry plants. Down here they plant large fields of them every fall and when they have fruited and been picked, they plow them under.  However, being from a different climate originally, I am well aware that you can keep strawberries growing and they will make new plants for the next season.  It’s a lot hotter here and they need proper protection and watering but the plants can survive the heat – I have done it successfully before, once.  I haven’t done it since because I haven’t had a place to plant them and the initial cost has been too much. Strawberry plants in the garden stores cost up to $3 each.  But my friend said to get all the plants I wanted, so I did. I got a couple helpers and we dug up close to 100 plants and brought them home.  I planted 50 that afternoon and have given some away and have a few still to plant.

my strawberry plants in the back of my car – on their way to a new home

Wednesday was an interesting day but only two of the happenings related to my birthday.  I got a present of two pieces of gum from a friend AND I found a birthday card from my parents under a stack of mail that had been lying around for a few days. It was a great card and definitely worth finding. It made me want to go look for other cards. Who knows? It happened once, it can happen again. 

And today, Thursday, was time for Boone coffee hour Florida style, at my house.  I had done a lot of the preparing Wednesday night and finished cooking some pancakes and making some potato hash while the crew gathered.  We had such a good time of eating and talking and sharing our lives and experiences.  I am thankful we have a family where up to four generations of people all value the times together enough to make sure they happen regularly, even at a cost.  Wendell and Lois drove down from Brooksville (which they have done three times this winter). They represent the oldest generation. And Gracie Lapointe is our youngest member of the family who was present.


Our four generation photo op




Just try getting this many heads in the picture when you’re taking it yourself.

Jerry brought me my only birthday cake so far – cute, small and chocolate. Gracie and I ate it. Rich was missing because he had to work and Dennis is not in the pictures because he left early. There were seven of us. 

I was left with a bit more than half the day to spend. I finished a book that I think God wanted me to read. I feel like I’m getting my next assignment, but more on that later.  I had a good talk on the phone with my Mom.  Now I’m going into my room with my art supplies and I’m not coming out until I create something.

If you have to go to work on your birthday, I hope you have as good a day on the job as I did today. It started at the same tedious hour in the dark of early morning, but the bright spot was that the husband came out to the kitchen with a card for me.  He had warned me that he had a lot of trouble picking out a card, and he told me about the one he didn’t get because although the front was complimentary, the inside wasn’t – we all know the kind he was talking about. I like the words on the front of the one he gave me “A friend is someone who reaches for your hand but touches your heart.” I think he was probably a little uncertain about the pic with it,  two little girls holding hands and skipping… oh well. And it did say happy birthday inside.  There are men for whom this kind of task is agonizingly difficult and I hold no ill feelings about being married to one. 



one “to do” and one to undo


I came in to the workplace (my client’s kitchen) and found this sweet little combo.  The card and gift balanced nicely with the to-do list and I felt quite celebrated. The night nurse left me a little birthday note on a paper towel and the housekeeper came by later with ingredients for a pie, which she put together and put in the oven. I have birthday berry pie! She had also seen my birthday come up on her facebook page and had left me a whole flat of strawberries on Saturday.  Her  teen-age daughter gave me some already shelled speckled butter beans to cook. They are amazingly good, I have discovered.  I love my friends at work!

clockwise from top: speckled butter beans, three berry pie, paper towel birthday greeting



As I recall, the flight up there would cost about the same as the haircut. But it was a nice cut.

So now I’m home blogging, cooking the beans and getting ready for the rest of the afternoon and evening.  Birthday week – bring it on!

A cold caught me last weekend.  (Why would anyone want to catch a cold?) I haven’t had one for a while so the experience is making me aware of how much I’ve been missing.  A cold virus does awful things to the body, and I don’t want to go into details because we all know what a cold is like, probably.  I have extra concerns because I work with someone who cannot cope with a respiratory virus in the same way most of us do.  If you can’t really cough when your body wants to, can’t really blow your own nose, and can’t move yourself in bed at night you don’t want to get a cold.

Today I’ve been able to stay at home and do things to boost my immune system and help it fight, but the first couple of days I had to go to work.  I mostly had a terrible headache and scratchy throat and didn’t have a lot of coughing to deal with yet so I worked and wore a mask.  Try covering your head up with a blanket and breathing for a while. It results in feeling a bit oxygen deprived and that’s what a mask feels like, especially when you’re huffing and puffing with exertion. The only thing good about a mask is that no one can see when your nose is dripping. But that is gross.

I am praying to get past the worst parts of this malady quickly.  One experiment I’m working on is trying to avoid taking OTC cold medicines.  My theory is that they dry me up too much and since I’m not a big water drinker anyway, I dry up easily. And then I get laryngitis, or borderline pneumonia. So far, so good.  I’m hoping to be able to sing this weekend and not be so toxic that I have to stay away from all the fun things that I was going to do.  So… out to the kitchen for a vitamin C cocktail and then to bed for a good night’s sleep. Flooding my mind with optimism….