Usefulness

I don't know (yet) what that title or this photo has to do with anything. I've been slow with the photos lately, having misplaced the cord that connects my external hard drive and blah blah blah a lot of boring technical stuff that keeps me from using my digital SLR. I'm still picking up the Bronica from time to time, but am slower than usual getting those little rolls of film into the shop for developing. I've got a good roll in my bag that has been there for over a week! Maybe that will change soon, maybe it won't. So yesterday I was clearing out the jumbled drawers of my desk and going through old CDs of scanned photos, labeling them and matching them up with their cases (I'm so guilty of CD abuse) and looking for little unpublished photos that might inspire a bit of writing.

I took this one last fall when Tom and I went on the Festival of Family Farms tour. That is still, for me, one of the highlights of having lived at the mini-farm these past seven months. I loved being out on a field trip with him, visiting farms that I now think of as neighbors, thinking about all the possible things. This little corner of an outbuilding was so interesting to me as a record of what people were up to there, the business of the place. All the ugly plugs and weird little tools and rusted metal panels remind me now of our basement, the garage, the hard parts of the house, and the things that make things go. Having a house is a constant act of care, a practice in patience and in both vigilance and a certain blindness, the kind of blindness that keeps you from being overwhelmed by the piles of things to be taken to the dump, the pails of old paint left by former owners, the light fixtures in the bathroom that have to fall to the bottom of the to-do list, being functional and harmless, if unpleasant to look at. I keep thinking about, longing for, a way to keep track of it all without overwhelming myself. I keep longing for better systems, more routine, and being grateful for what we have established. 

One thing I  love is the weekly yard walk we do. Most every weekend, I pull on wellies and a warm coat and follow Tom around the property as he points out things he's been working on or thinking about. I almost always forget to take the camera and have to run back to the house to get it. Same thing with mittens. Once I'm outside, I'm loathe to go back in until I'm well and truly frozen, because that's when the convocation of eagles shows up, or the vine around the bench swing begs to be pruned, or the frogs start chirping, or some other thing presents itself for my attention. There's nothing more satisfying in that moment than giving it. There is a use to all that beauty - it's the way it woos me into wanting to keep working at it, to tend and trim and take great care with that little patch of land and the house on it that serves us so well. 

Upside Down Moustache Time

Kate and I went to Sambar the other night, the first time I had been there in a long time. We knew Michael the bartender (of course), and the exceedingly pretty waitress, and the sommelier is an old friend of Clay's from their Campagne days. At one of the six tables, there was a couple I know, eating frites and drinking champagne and looking happy and talking about moving in together. One of the women sitting at the bar was someone Kate had met at one of her many pie events, and who I swear I've met before. That's one of many things I love about that place. I've been away from Seattle enough lately that Ballard is full of new restaurants and shops I've never been in, but Sambar stays both familiar and shiny new. 

I have two days of my alternate universe this week. Sushi and salons and coffee shops and french food and sleeping in my loaned bed at Kate's house. Maybe I shouldn't be taking a break from shopping for 25x15x1 inch furnace filters, but I am. The distance from the mini-farm might be good for now, I find myself rambling to Kate about how I need to get my act together, prioritize, organize, quit feeling like I'm wasting time. I realize I need a dose of humor and comfort, some way to forgive my own shortcomings, which include failure to unpack, poor spacial organization skills, procrastination and a tendency to wear sweaters one time too many before washing them. 

Winter Madness

Little Mechanics


Max Guns It


Thomas Loves Speed


We have more snow in Vermont than I think I've ever seen there. The banks are taller than the boys, which is useful when they are snowmobiling.

Kind of like giant bumpers.

I am reposting these, so that you can appreciate anew just how crazy these boys are. Not even three and I think they drive a snowmobile better than I could - except for the braking part, of course. And also so that Papa Gary can see just how crazy the twins are on the snowmobile.

How To Visit The Mini-Farm: Part m, Part t

Start by being two, and a twin. Wear the biggest pom-pom you can find. Don't bring directions, you don't need them. You're two. Let this be one of those places so familiar to you that you don't even know where it is, just what it's like. Be curious. Find out. Look in the barn, open cabinets, flush the toilet, see what happens. Look for animals, find only the dog. Be curious about her, but shy. Fall in love with the riding lawn mower. Point to things. Eat as many tangerines as your mom will let you. Hop on pop. Hug your aunt, she sounds like mom. Sleep in a tent (indoors) with a tiger (stuffed). Be adored. Wake before everyone else, open doors, peek inside. No one really minds. Wave goodbye when you leave, buckled into your carseat again. Forget your sippy cup. Make dad drive back. Drive away again. Grow up a little, not too much. 

Come back. Come back soon. You are missed. 

Eagle Fest

The weekend has been too short. I haven't put together the new wardrobe I bought for the same room upstairs, the one that will allow me to move beyond boxes, get clothes off the floor, make weekday mornings easier, or set up the little bench with the baskets underneath it. I didn't make gougeres or fish tacos, or finish all the promotion and merit increase letters for work, and now I'm leaving sick Tom with nothing easy to make himself to eat (except frozen pizzas) while I go to Dad's for dinner, a trip that will be 5 hours at least because of the drive. I have to admit, I feel a little discouraged and behind. 

Which makes this the right time to remind myself that I did get to the grocery store and to think again about how yesterday afternoon, six bald eagles sailed and swooped over our back field while we stood there, amazed. They were so close, you could almost feel the weight in their bodies as their huge wings labored to lift them higher, then extended to stillness, coasting. I got a few rows done on our couch blanket, and made fresh-squeezed orange juice, and most everything else will have to wait.

Blue

Creede was the first place I ever really felt the weather intensely. I had to think about that a bit, before I typed it here. Growing up in Seattle, you do feel the weather. We have seasons, vivid memories of the occasional snow in the winter, streets closed, sledding, or summer t-shirt weather, the way there was still a chill in the morning when I went outside to ride my bike, probably the last days of me rising early on purpose, and of course there was always rain. We did feel the rain intensely, but in such a different way, and maybe the difference has something to do with the fact that it was more of a mood than a force.  

In the city, rain was something that, in a matter of minutes, you could get away from. Even if you get caught in a downpour on the way home from the bus, there are dry things at home, you can take your wet shoes off, towel off your hair and put your PJs on.

The rain is back, and my whole house has wet shoes it can't take off. There is a constant trickle through the basement and the sump pump goes off periodically all through the night. Thomas Road is closed again, and so is Allen West just past Chuckanut. The water in the fields reflects the moon at night, and it ripples in the wind, almost as though it had a tide, and maybe it does.

Three Years Ago

I didn't have a good camera. I didn't even know what a good camera was. I liked taking pictures, though, and when I look back now, there are still photos I like from back then. Like this one, frost on a few little tufts of grass next to the hot springs in Colorado where I spent a night with some of my favorite friends three years ago this January. The hot springs in the freezing night air, steam rising from them - heaven. Those friends, also heaven.

We picked words for the year while we were there in Colorado. What did I chose then... bravery, I think? It worked. It was a year when I needed it, and it came, just enough. I haven't picked a word for this year yet, I'm at a bit of a loss. Two weeks in and it's a mixed bag so far.

When Tom and I walked outside this afternoon, there were frogs croaking everywhere, and a bald eagle in the tree, and I spent a roll of film on him and Emmy and it was almost 50 degrees, I think, but more importantly, it was not raining. What do you call the pool of flood water that lives behind our field for these wet winter weeks? There is some word between pond and puddle for it. Sometimes, I just struggle for the words. Today I tried to write an email that felt important, and finally, after writing and deleting and cutting and pasting, going away from it, coming back, I just gave up.  It might be one of those situations where saying little is best, and at this point in my life, I can live with that. I'm better at that than I used to be. That was how I ended up outside with Tom and Emmy - I had been drafting that email, until all the rewrites made me realize I should go outside and walk around, and then see how I feel.

When I came back inside, I felt the same as I had before, at least about the original email to which I was trying to respond. Wounded, incredulous, disappointed. A little scornful. Still, calmer. Resigned. Tom made bread and I watched the Golden Globes and ate tamales for dinner and drank some fresh apple cider and did the dishes, a few at a time, never quite finishing the whole sinkful. 

What's Gone

Sunday there was snow all day. Kate and I had a trip planned, me heading south down the island to meet her in one of my favorite little towns anywhere, meeting up for coffee and lamb chops and yarn and books and girl talk. I was going to take the big camera and a million layers, including fingerless gloves for my hands which more and more turn white at the fingertips in the winter cold. But once the snow starts like it does, things get unpredictable, and venturing over a sky-high bridge at a place called Deception Pass starts to seem  more stupid than adventurous. So we called it off, and when it warmed up, I took a field trip over to Anacortes, up the snowy hill and off to the yarn store for supplies for a blanket for our new couch. I bought groceries, filled up the car with gas, felt all stocked up for more winter. On the way home, a huge fog bank had rolled in, and the sun was setting, and I kicked myself for having left all the cameras at home. I do that, all the time. Then I vow to never leave the camera at home, then I vow to be okay with letting things go. That day, it was just me, frozen fog, sunset, the whole valley spread out, fields and trumpeter swans and red-tailed hawks and the long roads that take us where we want to go, and on every one something to see. 

Resolve

Everyone has been fed crescent rolls and coffee, Emmy is napping on her blanket on the couch and Tom is fooling around on a guitar. Some of my time over the weekend needs to be just this. Calm. I have resolutions too, though, a need to get things done. Those sweaters in the messy spare bedroom aren't going to fold and organize themselves, and at some point we need to put up the hardware for the new curtains in the living room, and take down the Christmas tree. For Christmas, I gave away some things handknit by me, a hat for Dad, one for Tom's sister Jenny, then a few weeks later I finished Jessica's Lighter Lights Darker Darks hat, which turned out to be the red-tail hawk hat in the end. She wore it to the Longhorn for taco Tuesday and I loved looking at that hat on her so much that I vowed to knit more, and give away more. Time to learn honeycomb stitch for a navy alpaca scarf that will eventually makes it way to Maine.

Something New

The back porch finally defrosted the night before last. The last day of Jessica's visit, little snowy hailstones had fallen, covering it and sticking there, cemented by the cold nights. Inside, I wear a rotating selection of handknit hats, two layers of sweaters and there are two comforters on every bed. Every single day home over the holiday break was beautiful, rain, sleet or snow. We watched a redtail hawk catch something on the mole-infested croquet lawn (if only it had been the mole!) and the binoculars we got for Christmas were kept on a top shelf for easy access in case that bird which may or may not be an immature bald came back. Tom cooked good food and when I got really cold, I did dishes to warm up. The dining table is too close to the pellet stove to use it for heat, and anyway that funny noise it made last time we used it has made us wary. I know, time to go to the woodstove store and finally learn how to maintain the thing. In the mean time, I've been liking the bundling up, the fake suffering (oh no! it's a mere 64 degrees in the house!) and how nice it all makes a cup of hot tea seem.

Sun Today

kitchen at Tweets

There was a little. And we were aware all day of the solstice coming. I felt terrible mostly, headache from something or other, but at least there had been a good night's sleep, and things accomplished on Saturday. The holidays feel like homework I can never catch up on, then an obstacle race, then a long wait in the waiting room for next year. I don't know anyone who doesn't have some mixed feelings about the holidays, but opting out doesn't really happen either. I don't even want to opt out, but every year I do think about what will be most comfortable, and every year I take a guess, never sure. 

Still, there are only three more work days left, and then a few days of chaos, and then... time at home. For a little while there, I was cooking some, doing dishes, knew where things were in the kitchen, had clean laundry. But then there was the sinus infection and portrait class finals and clothes all over the spare room upstairs and the little room off the living room neglected, card table from Thanksgiving still up, and I have not even come close to doing my share of housework. I'm ready to look for curtains and replace the refrigerator, and at least sort clothes into piles. I'd like it if there was a day when I did all the cooking, washed all the dishes. Sometimes that feels good. The mini-farm taught me that.

Everything's fine once you get your crossover back

Outtake from final project for color portrait class

At some point this weekend, someone, Susan maybe, asked me what I needed to do when I got home on Sunday. I was thinking about the all-county Western Washington flood watch. The basement, the sump pump, the puddle that forms in our circular drive, the one that sits just on the other side of the fence from the greenhouse. Not to mention the photos on the wall at the coffee shop on the corner, the intersection of our road and Chuckanut Drive, completely submerged, the marquee changed to read "No wake zone." Not that there's anything I could do about it, but that's what I was thinking about.

I had gone to Seattle completely unprepared. I wore a long underwear shirt with dragonflies on it to the roller skating rink, a fur cape to dinner in the rain, suede boots all day both days and didn't have socks to wear roller skating (Jenn saved me with a pair she had in her car). I did have my knitting with me, and I worked on a hat while Jenn and I sat at her kitchen table, the night I stayed over at her place. We ate cereal and drank tea and talked about handwarmers and reading and which one of us had time for it and who did not, and it felt like a present to hear that she still wears the handwarmers I knit for her I don't even remember when. In the morning Freddy's little 4-year-old voice woke me up and I stayed in bed a little while listening to him and trying to commit the little things he said to memory. All that's with me now is the way he said he had gotten "soakin" the day before in the rain, and how he tricked me with the plastic poo he and his dad left in the room with his paintings for me to find. Tricky kid! Apparently he and Chris had been scheming all evening. 

It didn't matter, my unpreparedness. I went from one thing to the next, friend to friend, totally delighted to see every single one. I didn't care about my dirty hair or wet feet or anything else. The feeling of seeing everyone was the best thing. 

Even so, I wanted to get back to the valley. The Samish River, closest to our house, has gone up to 11 feet from 6, and is 7 feet from flood stage. Our road is closed just past Chuckanut, but it's not the way I need to go anyway. From inside the house you could hear the water streaming off the gutters after our movie ended. When I came home, though, the rain was gentle, and Tom and I went out in wellies and duck boots, did the usual backyard survey, feeling how soft the saturated ground has gotten, looking at the pond that has formed in the cow pasture, watched the trumpeter swans sail overhead and then glide in to the new water feature out there. If you look over our back fence just the right way, it looks like we have a view of a lake, or the ocean, or something much bigger than a puddle. It's pretty, and there is at least one bald eagle back in the biggest tree on the property, and I'm happy to be here, for however long I am. Sometimes it's obvious just how little that is up to me.

In Case You Were Wondering

The twins are on strike. They've chosen the Bob the Builder theme song as their anthem.

Quiet

At exit 212 on Monday, a coyote lingered in the median, so small he looked like a cat on first glance. The next day, an eagle tore apart its prey right there on the ball field at the corner of Chuckanut and Allen West. The hawks wait, on fence posts and guard rails, on snags and bare tree limbs, always. 

The other night, Tom sat on the edge of the bed playing guitar as I fell asleep. It was so pretty, a sound that equalled quietness by the sheer force of how gentle it was, in perfect harmony with rest.

A friend who I don't see often lost her husband yesterday, out of the blue. He was our age. When I called Karl to tell him, I couldn't help but cry. Who wouldn't? For some things, there is little consolation. He was a good person. Funny, and talented, and smart, the kind of man who looked at his wife with love and nearly always wore a smile. 

After

This morning I couldn't get the pancakes to cook right, hang together or hold blueberries. I browned Tom's egg a bit, and the medium-boiled eggs just weren't appealing. At dinner time I realized I just don't feel like cooking any more. I'm not sure I even feel like reheating. Yesterday evening the turkey sandwiches were so good, the poached salmon a bit tough and not really flavorful. There are two pounds of green beans already prepped, ready to just cook in butter. That might be dinner. We have so much cheese left, but the dip has expired. The little satsumas should have gone away with Allison and the boys, who could have eaten a dozen of them before breakfast, I think. The best part of their visit was going up to my bedroom the morning after Thanksgiving, crawling into bed with Thomas and Allison. He was awake and talking, Allison, barely. It wasn't long before he crept out in his little PJs, to go see what his brother and dad were doing downstairs. Allison put a sweater on over her nightgown and followed after him, but I just stayed in bed for a while. It's cold in that room in the morning, but the comforters and quilt are heavy and the white sheets are cozy. 

I haven't figured out what to hang on the wall up there yet, so there's a Karie Jane drawing that belongs to Tom, and that's it. He put it up there when we first moved in, and every once in a while he notices it again and says Hey! That's mine. There are so many Karie Jane pieces. Also four Todd Horton's and four Jessica Bonins, not counting Tom's. We moved the table that was in the little room by the kitchen into the living room by the wood pellet stove, and the little room by the kitchen has a couch now, and a side table, and its own tree. You can sit there and strum on the baritone ukulele when no one else is home, or drink hot chocolate and think about what art you want to hang where, or read the internets, or write a blog post. It's better this way. I made a striped hat that goes with my sparkly wellies, and very little progress on the trashed spare room, but I did wash a lot of kitchen towels, and sheets and the bathroom is still mostly clean and the big vacuum cleaner doesn't work now but you can still get by with the dustbuster on the area rugs if you're patient.

I don't know what's going to happen with the little study off the living room. For Thanksgiving it was the kid's room, sort-of, which wasn't too smart when you consider what a bad idea it is to slam that door that has all the glass in it. It turned out fine in the end, and nothing was broken, and nothing burned. Afterwards, we were tired, but sometimes a nap is another one of the best parts. 

This is it

We were determined to get a portrait of her. She was determined to bark. We both won.

All week there were rumors of snow, and all week I thought to myself, I hate having to cheer against it. Once we've been to the grocery store, and the drafts under the door have been stopped, and there are plenty of wood pellets for the pellet stove and I'm off for the week, then, I cheer for snow. Until then, I hope against it, regretfully. 

When I pictured going to the Anacortes farmer's market this weekend, I naively imagined the food vendors all cooking over their hot grills, tamales and pork tacos and vegan stir-fry wraps and maybe something with an egg in it. I was pretty sure there would be a latte. There had to be a latte, right? No. That wasn't the scene at all. In fact, it was so cold that the coffee in the thermos at the coffee stand had gone most of the way cold and the stand itself was practically blowing down in the chilly wind. There were lovely piles of produce at the few produce vendors who were there, but almost everyone seemed to be asking the vendors "What will you do with all the extra?" since the wind seemed to have kept people away. The beets I had my eyes on for roasting were on their way to the co-op, at least that's what I think I heard that vendor say. Ordinarily, a line two deep at a farmer's market is no deterrent for me, but Tom had been right when he declared the cold "unbearable" almost as soon as we got out of the car. It really was, because of the wind, mostly, and neither of us had dressed for it, so the beets stayed there and hopefully I'll catch up to them at the co-op tomorrow. There was no line for rainbow chard or red carrots, and the vendor piled a little tumble of loose carrots in with my bunch, and both big bundles only added up to $4. It was warmer inside, so we went there, where people were selling soaps and cheeses and dog biscuits and felted cell phone covers and snowman soup and beautiful looking puddings and baked things with cranberries.

Tom was sure that they only picked him for the door prize (every 20th person wins! the woman told him) because he was the grouchiest looking person there, and I liked that idea. Wouldn't it be brilliant if it were true? We bought a salt and pepper shaker and tasted a wheel of cheese that had been covered in cocoa powder and chile and black pepper, and Tom tried on hats but didn't find the right one. Afterwards, we had breakfast at Adrift, my favorite place in Anacortes. My mom took me there the first time I went, and it was crowded then and has been 20-minute-wait-crowded a few other times I've been there too. I've always been happy to wait, though, like the time Tom and I went to Todd's art opening and then afterwards had a late dinner where I got the last of whatever it was I wanted, and we sat at the counter, watching everything come out of the oven and off the stovetops on to the table in the middle of the kitchen where everything gets plated and arranged before it is promptly transferred to you where you wait. All the past waiting only served to make me feel lucky when we walked in at two and never slowed our stride from the time we walked into the restaurant until we sat down at our table in the room with all the books and the sails overhead and that painting of the gulls and sky, framed by what looks like driftwood that's been nibbled at artfully. Everything I ordered tasted like the right thing, and it was turning out to be the kind of day where even what looks like a boring old red apple sliced in a fan on your plate turns out to be a perfect crisp pear instead.

After errands we went home to Emmy, and I put the delicata squash in the oven right away, then for a little while watched Tom fiddle around with the sorts of things that you fiddle around with in the cold when you are trying to take care of a house, and then the squash was ready to come out, so I started cooking up the chard with onions and bacon and Tom put a pot of water on to boil for the tortellini and soon enough dinner was ready. It was a good food day.

On Friday the Molly Moon ice cream truck came to work and everyone came outside, whether they had warm coats or not. The rain started 30 minutes into their visit, but that only meant that we congregated in the lobby, comparing pumpkin clove to scout mint, hot fudge to vanilla caramel sauce. Some people had cones that their dishes of ice cream wore like hats, and I had whipped cream, jimmies and a cherry on top. The only thing I skipped was the walnuts. Never was a big walnuts fan.  Walnut fan or not, though, both days were days where there was very little to complain about.

First rule of cooking

Kate, who is skilled enough to leave the kitchen when she cooks, in our Ballard kitchen. 

(the kitchen I never use & in which I do not have one single possession or item of food)

Stay in the kitchen while you are cooking. This is something I am not good at. I'd rather have something else going at the same time, why is that? It leads to disaster, though, things stuck to the bottom of pans, burning, or failing to realize that I've got the wrong burner on, or accidentally turned the oven off after I preheated it to 450 for the steaks. I'm getting a little better, though, now I'll stay in the kitchen mostly, doing dishes if there is a little down time. Mostly, though, I'm still cooking too many things at a time. Pasta boiling and fresh cherry tomato sauce cooking and steaks being pan-seared before their trip into the oven, and a butter sauce on the stovetop, missing most of the ingredients that would make it qualify as a sauce rather than just melted butter. 

Last weekend that meant that I made the nice fresh cherry tomato sauce but ruined it with too much salt, until Tom came in to try and rescue it, and I opened the fridge to look for some miracle rescue ingredient that we were talking about when I saw the ricotta cheese that was supposed to be part of the sauce. Whoops. Forgot! Luckily, the ricotta did in fact rescue the sauce and it was delicious, though at that point there seemed to be about a gallon of it, owing to the fact that I had added every single tomato I could find and various other things before discovering the ricotta.

Oh well.

If anyone thinks that Thanksgiving dinner will be anything less than chaotic, well, then they are an intruder who doesn't know me and should be promptly invited to vacate the premises. Or they are related to Tom and should be settled in on the couch with a nice pumpkin cracker and some crab dip and possibly a hot cider. I don't know why I think that Thanksgiving will be lovely, but I do. Between the turkey, ham and salmon, one of those things has to turn out edible, right?

In which things get better

Around mile 21, there was a heron like a hitchhiker, standing right by the side of the road. At mile 18, there had been a bald eagle in a tree, same milepost where I saw an eagle drift over all the lanes of I-5, last time I made the morning drive from the mini-farm. The dessicated corn stalks that I had hoped to photograph in front of one of the abandoned houses on our street had already been cut down by the time I got back from California, but there are red blueberry bushes now, brighter than flame, and I know now how many things there are to photograph on Bow Hill Road.

Bow Hill Road is the route we took to the Bow Little Market the last time Kate was in town. They've got their holiday fair going this weekend, so tomorrow I'll be up before noon, eggs for breakfast, then on my way  to see what our Bow neighbors have to offer. There are errands to run as always too, a trip to Lowe's for a space heater for the upstairs bedroom, which won't get warm unless you've thoroughly roasted the downstairs rooms. Cozy is good, roasting is bad. Hopefully we'll pick up the last of our new light fixtures, and run some errands in preparation for Thanksgiving dinner, which is going to be the biggest gathering we've ever hosted at the mini-farm, double the size of the infamous bachelorette party. 

There's a frog in there somewhere

I did it again. Made what seemed like all the mistakes possible. But I'm getting better at recovery. I had the enlarger set to white, which was a problem since it turns everything red - Emma looked like she was playing guitar in a moodily lit nightclub rather than the northern California fall sunshine. Then the kickstand on the lens was wide open so duh everything was overexposed at first. But by the end of the night I had some beautiful 10 1/2 inch prints, if I do say so myself. I love seeing the images that big, even on the toy camera shots that I was printing, the color was pretty good. The Bronica shots are just downright gorgeous, so crisp, with rich bright color. If I could have gone out and spent more film that moment, at 10PM, I totally would have. 

The photo above, just a snapshot. Tom and I were in the yard and he spotted one of the sweet bright green  wee frogs that live there, and I wanted to capture it. So there it is. A frog.

Just showing up

I'm not sure which writer is was who said to pay attention to the stories you find yourself telling over and over, to find where the meat is. On the radio today, there is another story about the new Cleopatra biography and two about sonar affecting marine mammals and what is being done to fix that. I'm thinking about hot chocolate and seasonal ice cream flavors and color correction. The photo above is the one that came out right in the color darkroom the other night, so I have finally dragged out my box of 11x14 paper and  will see how that goes tonight, with the help of my portrait class teacher. I have to give a talk on a photographer whose work speaks to me, so I'll introduce the class to Mary Randlett, even though I can't find a single color portrait she's done. I feel so clueless when it comes to fine art photographers, especially photographers who work in color. If you anyone out there has ideas about who I should be looking at, speak up! 

On the phone at night, Tom and I talk about Thanksgiving, what we need to do, what we want to make, me in my bed in Ballard and him wandering around the back field at the mini-farm, investigating Emmy's hunt near the greenhouse. I imagine him wearing the grey wool cardigan he fished out of Jessica's basket at the LaConner thrift store and tell him to give Emmy a pet for me. I've got another night in Ballard before I can join them and our new light fixtures for hot tea and knitting on the couch before bed. 

Pretty Much Everyone Was Smiling

It was a big deal for me to ask the other writers in my workshop to pose for portraits for me. The fact that part of the piece I wrote for the workshop and then read in class talked about what a terrible student I was for my first photo class only added to the angst. But in the end, people volunteered and were patient with my fiddly focusing and even Ron C agreed to a photo, all Ray-Banned, silver-haired, well-seasoned cool, but not before specifying that the portrait should be for my own use only, of course. It was a good week, just enough clothes packed, all the signed books I came home with fitting into my luggage, but just barely. The week felt economical, well-used, not a moment wasted or to spare. There was the trip to coffee in town every morning, then the rush off to workshop til noon, panel discussions after lunch, readings at  night, and then a few nights crammed into Sarah and Emma's room, with bananagrams and chocolate and gossip about ourselves and bad song lyrics. Always bad song lyrics. 

I came home with a notebook full of scribbles, a few word documents and some thoughts about form. I've never really thought about form before, how to map out a piece of writing, in my case, just how to put a frame around the space I'll make for sitting down, writing out what I've got. 

This is about as close as we got to Happy Birthday

It's harder than you might think to get two toddlers to sing or say happy birthday and simultaneously film yourself and them doing it. I'm just sayin'.

So Close

The lattes at Toby's have changed a bit since this photo was taken, that year when the lattes were rich and caramely one day, and bubbly and bitter the next. Kae, Pam, Greg and I have driven in both mornings, both mornings the large lattes in their nubbly brown sleeves have been the right temperature, velvety foam, and the  flavor - deep coffee coffee coffee. The treats have changed too, the first day we ordered three Love Bites and a Thumbprint. The love bites were little mounds of buttery nuts held together by something just the right amount of sweet. Today it was some kind of apple pastry, SO. MUCH. BUTTER! I love egg breakfasts, but right now, coffee and sleep take precedence so I haven't made it to the cafeteria for eggs once. Maybe tomorrow, after our slumber party in Pam's room, and a late night of Bananagrams?

Both workshop days have involved multiple writing exercise as well as some gentle homework at night, so there is writing being done here. On the airplane, one of the books that Mark Doty had assigned us to read for workshop, Maggie Nelson's Bluets, turned out to be a catalyst for a little piece of writing that flew onto the page so quickly that I literally don't even remember what it's about. I've been too busy with other words, other paragraphs to even go back and see. Later. As I was writing that, I thought I'd just share whatever I was working on in class on the blog. That was before I found out what I was working on. Now all I can say is, I'm not ready. I'm thinking about it, but not quite ready. 

Remedies

I was going to try to get to the darkroom tonight, but I never made it. It took me until 8 to finish up all the work I needed to do before leaving for a 3 (work) day vacation, and even then I ended up sending texts to my email address to remind myself to replenish employee bus passes and ask my volunteer Halloween party helpers to dig through the bags and bags of candy and bouncing eyeballs and candy and spider rings and plastic pumpkins and candy and monster napkins and candy and coloring things and candy to try and find the receipt I'll need to get reimbursed for all that candy. If they don't find it, I want my candy back. 

Some people around these rainy, windy parts are a bit jealous that I'm headed to California, sunshine, universal remedy. Of course, on the coast where I'll be, we're as likely to be fogged in as anything. The other day when I looked at the Tomales Bay webcam, it was like looking at a grey card. See what I did there? Cool photography reference. I'm traveling with the Big Camera for the first time tomorrow, and I feel dorky, excited and apprehensive. When I use it, I feel like people Expect something, and I avoid having anyone Expect anything of my creative endeavors. The nice thing is, it's so funny-looking that people are all distracted by the What-IS-it?! factor. I'm bringing three lenses and a reflector thingy and a couple boxes of film, and I am sacrificing shoes to do so. 

Home game

The Bow Little Market was just what I was hoping for. Small, with funny things you don't see everywhere. Little mini-lop rabbits, handmade soakers in bright colors with little organic cotton velour nappies to go underneath, four kinds of blueberry trees, white raspberry bushes, handknit dish cloths, penants with the names of all the neighboring towns out here, a stand making fresh tortillas, a band with an accordion and acoustic guitars and a woman with a feather in her hat spinning the most beautifully colored yarn. She was wearing a long handknit skirt, caramelly patchwork, and a dark tweed one hanging on a hanger on a peg, little lacey edging at the bottom. There were no prices or labels on any of her yarns, except one dusky lace-weight skein, 945 yards of handspun wool, cashmere, mohair, angora. That skein just had a little torn handwritten note, with the yardage and ingredients. When I asked her if she sold her yarn, she said she never had before. I wanted everything, the grassy greens, the orange skeins with a little blue twisted in to brighten it up, sunset colors, dark fall browns that changed color unpredictably. So pretty. The woman who had spun the yarn open her eyes real wide when I told her the price that I thought would be a good deal and talked me down by ten dollars and I left with 945 fine delicate yards of handspun yarn and her contact information, even though I have no right to bring another ounce of wool into this house. 

Kate's visiting, and the Bow Little Market was our field trip with Jessica. All the colors are changing, and Bow Hill Road is a pretty drive from the Lucky Dumpster and back. I could have stopped twenty times for photos but water from the blueberry trees in the back seat was seaping into the floor mats and we needed a coffee from Tweets and there was the store for Jess to tend to and, in theory, Kate and I needed to get to the co-op for dinner supplies, which we have still not procured. Kate got cookies from the Breadfarm and ate them sitting on the couch with a cup of tea and a blanket on her lap and Tom and I watched a hawk devour a rodent in the big tree where the ropes from an old tree swing still hang. Dad's cataract surgery went well, so now he can get around without putting glasses on first thing, and my headache eventually went away. Kate fell asleep for a while but now she's waking up and it's time to hit the road for Mt Vernon to get crab and artichoke dip and something to put in the oven that will be warm and filling later. 

Waiting

So happy I get to go home and see this girl tonight.

And the man who belongs with her.

I didn't tell you much about it before now

At the annual Hugo House auction, a group of us chipped in to buy a yacht tour of the Duwamish River,  with Frances McCue, (one of the Hugo House co-founders and author of a recent book, The Car That Brought You Here Still Runs, about the Northwest towns that are the settings for many of Richard Hugo's poems) as our tour guide. I love Richard Hugo's book about writing, The Triggering Town, and the book Frances' has written is gorgeous, with photos by Mary Randlett, a really wonderful photographer who is one of my new heroes. 

I wish I could tell you all the interesting things Frances told us about the Duwamish, but I don't remember it with enough accuracy to do it justice. It's a Superfund site and so plenty of the history is tragic, as you can imagine, but also fascinating since it's so integral to the history of the city and floating down the river made Frances' stories just that much more evocative and vivid. The best part was when she read part of a Hugo poem. She asked us if she could, as though any of us would have done anything other than beg her to go on. It was a rare sunny day in late September, what could be better than to be read to?

Gena and Jennifer were the perfect company on this trip, both whip-smart women who are always up for an adventure. They also both have that particular kind of wonderfully curious minds that make certain people so much fun to talk to. At dinner afterwards, I kept wishing I could be part of all the conversations happening simultaneously, since Frances, Rose, Jim and Dan are exactly the same way.

Rose is on the Hugo House board with me, and was generous enough to donate the trip on her boat, the Celestine. She and her husband spend a few months a year living on the Celestine, most recently up in the San Juans and Gulf Islands. Speaking of women always up for an adventure... in her former life she was a litigator and she also fits in the category of whip-smart. 

Totally underexposed, taken as we left the boat at sunset, but I love this one of Gena. I feel like I've known her and Jennifer for several lifetimes and I love that too.

Impossibilities of light

I love this one of Tom. His look, that little feather. This version of it is from a scan of a medium-format negative, but in the darkroom the other night, I was trying to print on paper from the negative. I guess you can sort-of see the problems with the photo even here, though my print photos didn't turn out as good as this. It was so bright out, and I had his face in shadow and after 4 or 5 versions we decided that this print was best for illustrating why I might want to use fill flash outside on bright days. The right exposure for his face is the wrong exposure for the background and never the twain shall meet. That's what it all boils down to. 

My day job felt a little like that this week. The impossibility of it all had been baked in from the start, or something. I've noticed that I think about all that differently these days, now that I have the mini-farm and mortgage to look after. This is both good and bad, a sense of greater purpose as well as a little fear at the heaviness of it all. Heading into the weekend, the overall feeling is that my own life needs me, and that hour drive home is a good time to shed whatever work energy might be clinging to me when I walk out the door in the evenings. Once I turn on to Cook Road, it's time to be ready to pet the dog, and survey all the little changes that take place over a week on an acre of land, to look out for the bald eagles that have come back to our trees and to pay enough attention to notice and fall even more in love with everything that's there. 

I didn't know how to choose

Photo class this quarter is portraits. I already have so many of Jessica that I could print up, but I'm sure I'll still be after more as the quarter proceeds. This weekend we sat in my car talking, in the parking lot at the school, looking out at the rain, the wet fields where she and James walk Champ, the old barn that's falling down on that side of Edison. As always, she just looked so pretty. She's one of those people who, for me, seems to have a face that is perpetually full of good intent.

These Ones From Amber

I buy capes but don't always wear them. Still I want to buy more. I covet and cherish vegetables from my friends' gardens. I have a nervous habit that I won't tell you about. I'm trying to take more vitamins, drink more water and avoid MSG. I hate that they show ads for horror movies during Sunday morning football games. I like to bring my lunch to work, and I love rice in soups.

Look Carefully

All I can say about this week is, it is over. It was seriously slugs on slugs around here. Click to make that photo larger, if you dare.

Mini Birthday

You had a mini tour, I had a mini birthday! It was the tenth anniversary of 27 or the seventh anniversary of 30. Whatever it was, it was sweet.

And thanks Mom, for having me.

So, Okay.

Mini-tour did not proceed as pictured. It started with rain and Krusty Pups and the jumbotron and metal folding chairs and cheap clear plastic ponchos at the Puyallup fair. We never did get to see the draft horses and Jess didn't get her soft serve, which in my opinion means I owe her one and I do look forward to making good on that one. But the three of us had a good drive out to Puyallup, just happy to be with some of my best ladies and then Dakota was added once we got there. The rain let up a bit and Willie's new haircut was cute and even though it was odd trying to choose between looking at him way up there on the stage with my naked eyes or up close in jumbotron detail on the big screen, I was just happy to see him. Jessica and I stayed up late talking to Kate and then even later once Jessica and I got all settled in upstairs, me in the new bed Kate set up for me and Jess on the air mattress that, inflated, fills up the whole rest of that top floor.  The next morning Jessica and I had quiche at Honore and then I ran around town collecting what is starting to feel like all the little bits and pieces of myself before driving off to Portland in the rain. 

This morning at the mini-farm I woke up talking about the anxiety dream I had last night. I was in Santa Fe for the weekend, time run out on my dorm room and overdue back in Seattle, with nothing packed to go at all. "Sounds like your life right now," Tom said, and he was right. That trip to Portland was so good and so disconnected at the same time. I spent 30 hours at the Edgefield, the last part of Friday in Ruby's soaking pool late into the evening, in the warm dark rain, then reading magazines in my room while my toenails dried. The next day I talked on the phone in a little shelter in the garden while the rain kept coming down around me, soaking the lawn where we would sit to see Willie later. I sat in the cozy bar at the Black Rabbit for breakfast and thought about Nell Thorn and then went back later for chowder and a salad for dinner. The big covered porch with its adirondack chairs was perfect for reading too, even though the novel I brought to read completely turned me off after the first ten pages. It turned out to be a good thing that I had indulged in both Vogue and Vanity Fair before I left Seattle. 

Even all that relaxing felt unsettling, though. The best part was seeing Amber and Charla and Candice, and having Michael standing in front of me at Willie, turning around for no reason other than to smile to me. I fell in love with Amber's kids and Candice's girls all over again, and filled rolls of film that haven't even been dropped off for developing yet. 

And that's a whole other story. How I came home Sunday feeling strange, not knowing if it was too much car time, or what. A cold, was what it turned out to be. Two days at home feeling like someone had punched me in the sinuses. Luckily there was Tom with glasses of fresh-squeezed juice from the organic valencia oranges that we buy from the co-op by the big paper sackful, and a real breakfast every morning, perfectly fried eggs and potatoes with cheese and kale. I don't need to tell you that it was a little hard to go back to work on that third day, but reminding myself that work is what makes all this possible helps. The life I'm living out of bags and boxes right now  may feel unfinished and hectic, disorganized and junked up and always running late, but I want it, for sure.

Mini-tour!

I'm off on my mini-tour with Willie Nelson! I couldn't be more excited. Last night Farmer Tom and I watched The Real Dirt on Farmer John, which I loved and was totally choked up over. I adored his mom and all those wonderful color films of his childhood on the farm. What an awesome lady she was.   Of course the movie highlighted the challenges to family farms, and only made me appreciate Willie's Farm Aid work more. I'm so happy to live in the Skagit Valley and shop from local farms at our wonderful co-op in Mount Vernon, and all the honor stands within close driving distance of our place. Next year we'll have crops of our own, I'm sure! 

First stop is the Puyallup fair with the ladies, Lisa, Jess and Dakota. I'm hoping we get there in time for some fair fun, but even if we just see Willie, I'll be a happy girl. I made all the ladies little party favors, CDs with podcasts from Fresh Air's country week, interviews with Willie, Dolly and others. 

Friday I drive away from Ballard for my annual pilgrimage to the Edgefield. This time I get to stay there a night, not the night of the concert, but I'm still excited about it. Willie plays in Bend Friday night so he won't be there, but we'll see him Saturday night, when Amber and Seth and Charla and Michael and his whole birthday gang join me on a lawn that is hopefully not too terribly damp. Either way, I'll be there with my knitting, waiting for round two. 

Hope your weekend is just as fun! 

Meanwhile

The farmhouse looked so good when I came back to it last Friday. Some of it was just how happy I was to be there, to have a weekend, to be off the road for at least a bit. But most of it was everything that Tom had done since I was there last. The living room looked warm and cozy and the table where we eat made me want to sit down with a bowl of something hot, and everything had been cleaned, even our never-ending seemingly self-refilling dish sink. Everything. 

I haven't been so good, myself, at the nesting. Terrible, in fact. I've done some laundry. I put two little bird figurines in a place I liked on the window sill in the living room. Other than that, I just try to do some dishes when I can, and move things out of Tom's way, but I still leave my knitting around and my mail is also everywhere and my bedroom is an absolute mess. It's been hard to find pants. That kind of mess. 

When I came home to Kate and Jason's house the other day, they were nesting too. I could see through the big picture window that Kate was putting something on a shelf, standing back to look at it, gesturing to Jason. They both looked out and saw my car and looked surprised but smiled, waved. That was nice. It's been good to go there. Good to see all the little changes they've made since last time I was there. Was that painting of the frigate there in the bathroom before? Where was that bookshelf before? Have I ever seen that poster for Two-Lane Blacktop? You can tell they're happy doing all of it, and that makes home nice. 

Farm Birds

Neither one of us was sure how the bird got in the house, but there it was, perched on top of the refrigerator. It was what dad would call an LBB, or Little Brown Bird. Officially, you know. Tom and I had been out on the front porch, just looking at the night, the wisteria growing up over the roof, lovely and needing a trim. We didn't know there were birds sleeping in the wisteria, and couldn't see them, that's how thick it is there. As we looked at all the little parts of the house, we kept flushing them out of their night-time hiding places, rustle of leaves, rustle of wings. It wasn't until after I had gone inside to finish an email. and closed the door, that Tom discovered the indoor bird. Maybe it came in when I was taking photos of Tom and Emmy like the one above, too dark, blurry, but to my liking anyway. Maybe Tom let it in when he came in, though I doubt it. All we had to do to get it out was walk towards it - it let out one sharp sweet little chirp, tart like small candy, and flew directly through the entire length of the house and out the front door.

I'm starting to see photos again. My film cameras are still mostly in their bags, but I've started to make a move for the digital camera more frequently. It's just expedient, and good in low light, in a way. I went running for the first time in ages today, and kept looking at the red barn with the fish sculptures on the side of it, the buildings half-hidden by the height of corn stalks, the way the yellow flowers looked by that metal gate that led to the corn fields near the dike. The farmhouse and life there is presenting itself to me in different ways too, now, the way Pam's ranch did when I stayed there and took photo after photo, every day, little variations on all the corners of the land I liked to look at. 

So many things made it a good weekend, but one of the nicest things was just looking, and seeing. 

Or Not

I didn't take a single photo this weekend. It was kind of a nice change. I did finish knitting a shawl, the first thing I've knit in months and months, and it only took me a week. My hands were sore at the end of it, but it was worth it. Mostly I just petted Emmy, walked around the property, made food, ate food, did dishes, drove to Anacortes (three times!), bought groceries (also three times), watched movies from the 80s about country singers (three of them), and slept.

This week I'm staying at my Ballard room. In some ways, the simplicity is nice, and I can't tell you how much I LOVE having a functional closet, getting dressed in the morning is so easy, but I do miss the mini-farm. Time with Susan, Lisa and Stumptown consoles me. 

Lament

For our former blog format. Oh old blog! How I miss you!

Jess is not grossed out by slugs

Oops.

photo by Lisa Robbins

Um. I think I kinda screwed up the blog. Sorry! 

We'll get it worked out soon, I promise...

Having Time

from Seamus' birthday party last Sunday

The drive home was lovely last night. It shouldn't have been. All day I debated whether to go home or back to Ballard, and at the very last minute I decided to head north, only to find all lanes of I-5 closed, in both directions. I didn't mean to head all the way out to Mukilteo, but that was where I ended up, in my search for a detour, and if there hadn't been a line for the ferry I would have been sorely tempted to hop on the Whidbey Island ferry and go home that way. It was getting late, and the light was low and warm-looking, and Whidbey and the San Juans have been so tempting lately. Instead, I drove along the water for a ways before heading back east, just north of where the freeway was closed.  I lucked out and hit it right at the first open onramp. 

There was a Willie Nelson interview on Fresh Air, and then the baseball game was on and the light was not fall light, it was late summer, and when I got to the Skagit Valley Food Co-op, there were no lines and the peaches weren't soft, they were just hard enough to ripen in time for the long weekend, and the first crop of Washington apples was there and I thought I'd just do a little shopping, but I kept thinking about chips and salsa to watch the Seahawks game with tonight, peanut butter ice cream for Tom, meals for the long weekend, my favorite tortillas, a box of black licorice, and stuffed manicotti for dinner and pretty soon three bags were full and I was driving home through twilight, still content, not feeling late at all.