This child is a whiz at making something out of nothing! She was given a pair of penguin earrings yesterday by a dear family friend. We were invited tonighted to have dinner at Bo’s house. Bo and his wife like penguins. Grace whipped up a few for them. In fact, she spent all day making penguins. It kept her so occupied that I am thinking of declaring an animal for each day to see if she can create stuff. She made a caddy out of Pringles can, two polymer clay figures, a fridge magnet out of little melty plastic beady things, and a hand sewn stuffed toy. Cool stuff!!
Totally unrelated, we had another dog in the pool. Merlin apparently jumped with Freddy and clawed him heavily trying to get out. He did swim, doggy paddle, to the side but was re-directed to the ladder, where he promptly pulled himself out and ran away.
She said the word “nigger” out loud, loudly, in the locker room. I wouldn’t even print the whole word here if she hadn’t said it out loud, so loudly. It makes me cringe, cower, not want to be in the conversation. But she has lived with it her whole life. It follows her like a shadow, without benefit of a sun to warm her. It is always there, even when silent, unspoken. Even when spelled like this “n****r” How can a white person begin to understand that? I don’t think that we can. But as I told her, we can move forward.
It is so hard to separate “what happened” from “what is still happening” from “what could/should happen”. I believe that we meet people, not by accident, but because we are supposed to. Call it Karma, fate, synchronicity, Devine intervention, whatever. We are here to learn from each other, contribute to each other’s future.
My friend has a story to tell. We all do. We have voices that may or may not be audible. She had such passion sharing her story with me today. She conveyed the feeling of what it was like to be a young black girl and feel safe. What it took, how she got there and why she still looks around her in the parking lot at night. I encouraged her to share her story with others. To write, express herself, find her voice.
This is not a sauna story, but we were about 20 feet from the sauna, and we referenced the sauna, so I’m saying it’s close enough.
Here you see the Tomato Tree, with it’s 4 buckets. Tom has the 2 green ones, I have the buckets, five gallon this year. His are fancy self watering kinds with wicks, mine the old fashion kind, with crops on top to retain moisture. One is marigolds, the other sweet basil. Both have flowers.
To the left you can see some tomatoes which I grew from seed. Some started in bottles and some in jiffy pots. One of the vine tomatoes is in a self watering container, the other just a bucket. I put them side by side for comparison. We are keeping track of dates and yields and stuff to see what works next year.
We did get some bunches of grapes. I am off to pick some leaves to freeze. I do love stuffed grape leaves!
So far this is working much better than last year. The white bucket is 4 gallons, I thought it was too small because last year was such a dismal failure. This year it has about 50 baby tomatoes (grape) already. The difference? I started this one right side up and let the roots grow conventianally for a few weeks, then inverted and hung it up. We also started crushing our eggshells and adding to the 1/2 compost 1/2 coconut coir potting medium, with a handful of Tom’s special fertilizer. It is totally organic and is the best producer so far.
The blue bucket is the best cucumber in the lot. A joke because I went looking for a cuke plant to try upside down. I picked the best looking one, came home, planted it, and as the tag fell out, I read it. It is actually a pepper plant. Tom finds this very amusing. I did not as I really don’t like peppers. Oh well.
Yup. Three whole blueberries. Each one from a different bush. Mine was kind of dry and bitter. Tom said his was good. Ursula said hers was delicious. Now we wait until next year. Maybe the other 3 bushes will give us something too.
This time it was for a really sweet old lady. She was really old and her time had come. Still, it is sad to stand before an open casket and realize that the body has been vacated, she is no more the person that we knew. She is free and in a better place. There were 33 people at the service. 34 if you count the deceased. That is sad too. She had outlived all of her family and many of her friends.
I debated visiting her in the hospital. Having me go is like a kiss of death. If you want a relative to kick, just send me to say hi. It has taken as few as 20 minutes. It has happened enough that I really have a phobia about this. I opted not to go as she was mainly unconscious and had an infectious disease which required scrubbing, but I wrestled with that decision.
Grace made her a small octopus which she had on her nightstand, and all of the kids had painted things for her which were the only decorations over her bed. Her whole room was done in a very dignified manner, expensive, tasteful furnishings, not the kind you typically see in a nursing home. And then there were these pictures, hung with thumbtacks, out of place, definately not Martha-approved, but she loved them. And I loved that about her. She did request, however, that Grace’s next work “feature some human interest, in pastels”. I laughed at that, Grace said she’d try. Just before she leaned over and whispered in my ear, “what’s that?”
I didn’t go to the burial, but I’m glad I spared an hour of my busy time to bid farewell to my friend. ‘Til we meet again.
