Tag Archives: hope

Not Much Cloth, but…

9 Mar

a lot of other stuff going on.

DSC00768

Hope is the same color as this wool Pendleton blanket. It was my mother’s. She washed/dried it once by mistake and it shrunk a lot. But still she used it for cover in her last years. The blanket was a gift from her best friend–a fine woman named Lucy.  I find the blanket all over the place. She travels with it. Like Linus. But never too far.

Seedlings are getting ready for the earth and I’m waffling back and forth–too early? too cold? go for it? We’re having a few nights this week in the mid 20’s. Maybe after that. The 10-day forecasts on weather.com help. But I wonder if it’s made me a bit less sensitive to the nuances that indicate how it might be. Sky color. Buds. Robins. Shadows. Birds. Worms.  Soil temp. Smells. Knee/shoulder aches?

Last week I experimented. Set out one each of very tender spinach, broccoli, lettuce, radicchio and kale. That night the temp was 24 degrees. They survived but have not recovered. And the rest–outside today, beginning the hardening off process:
DSC00773

DSC00774

Some amazing women are working the garden with me this year. “Dirt devas.” This is where we are now:
rows ready for seedlings–rich soil separated by straw and leaves. Soon–cabbage, broccoli, kale, collards, swiss chard, turnips and potatoes. This is 1/3 of the garden. Spring garden/fall garden. The rest of the space will house tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, beets, lettuce, radicchio, radishes and sweet potatoes.

DSC00780

DSC00781
and outside the fenced in garden–the start of an herb bed and a modified hugelkultur bed for winter squash.
DSC00783

DSC00777

This cloth I’m liking. Haven’t added much except rows of stitching and noticing the shift in my attention. From cloth to dirt. Looking for the common thread.DSC00787

Tags: , , ,

Gentling Hope

11 Feb

I didn’t get custody of Earl, way back in the summer when the blanket was split. And this has been the first time in forever that I’ve been w/o a four legged. Without a dog.

In the past, my dogs have been BIG. But I’m living in town now and my house is just little. So when I started looking at Brother Wolf Animal Rescue’s web site–hundreds of pics–I decided that I would get an adult dog. A LITTLE adult dog. Maybe so old that it would be hard to otherwise adopt. But little. I was thinking 25 pounds or so.

Started looking a few months ago. Stopped by the facility a few times. Looked at the web site so often that I knew the dogs by name. Banjo. Coco. Chloe. So many dogs needing “forever homes.” I surprised myself. Typically I would have snatched up the first dog that jumped up in its pen, or hung its head or barked for attention. But not this time. Some thing was different. A sense that some thing was coming and I just had to wait. And that some thing I was waiting for is called Hope.

Hope was shipped in from Virginia–shipped to our “no kill” shelter along with ten other little dogs. She comes from a “hoarding” situation–a person of not-quite-right inclination has kept over 30 dogs outside w/o shelter–for years–in all types of weather. Food scarce. Water –more scarce. And the dogs are in pretty bad shape. But when she came on Friday for a meet and greet–I knew w/o a doubt that Hope was meant to be here. She stayed for an hour. Her foster person took her back, she was spayed yesterday and I picked her up this morning at 7:45. Now she is home.

Everything startles her. She doesn’t know what a dog dish is. Or a washing machine. Or anything that makes noise. She is happiest when I’m on the floor at her level. Part of her pack. And she’s amazingly affectionate for one who has had almost no contact with two-leggeds.

I told Logan about her yesterday. He understood the need to be tender. Quiet. The need to let her approach him. She is tiny. Weighs 6 pounds. Fragile. They met this morning–another two hour school delay–and it went like this:DSC00700

DSC00709

DSC00707

As soon as this next winter front passes, another journey will be made up to Virginia–more dogs brought back from that same situation. I will foster one. Probably adopt it, but maybe not. It will all depend upon Hope.

Tags:

Taiji Cove Cloth–complete reversal

31 Jan

It wasn’t working.  Was that it?  Or was it that I couldn’t work from that place?   I said the portal was there.  An escape hatch.   An ingress to a gentler realm.  And I thought about the cloth’s direction a lot. But every stitch in cloth seemed to be reinforcing a horrible situation–and I realized I had to dwell in the land of “what could be” rather than reinforcing “what is” in this particular case.  So that’s where we are.  A new world for dolphins. A safe, free world

There will be a lot more kantha, and there will probably be a hand.  But Delphinius, the Dolphin constellation is intact and I’m  much more comfortable in my own skin.  The cloth is holding memory of what was there.  The anger.  The rage.  Despair.  The horror, even.  And I think that’s good.  That cloth holds memory.  But there’s more room now for hope and change to enter.  To move forward.  To replace the old paradigm with a new vision.

new taiji cove

There was a comment on my last post. I don’t have tv. But there’s a program–“Katie” as in Katie Couric. And this week one program was dedicated to “The Taiji Cove Controversy.” I was able to watch it via internet and highly recommend it–it was encouraging. Uplifting, even, because the world IS paying attention. And the people interviewed feel we’re right at that tipping point where enough public outrage is going to swing the balance in favor of the dolphins. You may have to sit through a 15 second bladder control commercial–but it’s worth the wait. http://katiecouric.com/videos/the-taiji-dolphin-controversy

We heard that this was a cultural tradition. And I was thinking in terms of centuries of exploitation. But no. 1969. That’s when it started. And it REALLY started in order to capture dolphins to sell to sea-world type places.

And it was a week of two snow days and two late-start days. A cold week. And here in NC, a black-ice week. My driveway goes uphill. I can stand at the top and move to the bottom w/o taking a step. But it was a good week. Days to observe busy little hands and eyes fascinated with captured bubbles in glass. I have several of these. Two were my mothers–they look like candies trapped for all eternity in a world of glass. But this one–this gold globe, this is his favorite. He can talk about it for hours. The beauty of it when the sunlight shines through. A personal solar system.

solar system

Tags: , , ,

A Crone’s Story

23 Jun

First there was this, early this morning,moon setting

Then there is this cloth. This cloth that started from a comment my grandson made. About how cool it would be to have a zipline to/from the moon. He wrote it down for me so I would remember. I started the cloth during our vacation.  Initially I thought it was just going to be a light-hearted piece.  Putting his comment to cloth.  It became something else all together.

We have been home now for one week and this is the story of how the cloth changed, and how I evolved with it. This was a peek through the hole in an oyster shell.window of a shell Her journey had taken her many place and the cosmic thread that held her in place–well, it was red and had sustained her for a long time.  She was connected to the moon yet able to fly.  But she couldn’t see.  Her vision was obscured. And she knew she needed to see things clearly.  Very clearly.  Cosmic flight can be a tricky thing.cosmic without eyes But I ignored what she was saying. I thought, “She’ll get over it. It will be o.k. in the long run.” And in the meanwhile, the base below her feet started changing. And it became very complex and jumbled.cosmic umbilicus 1 and it didn’t take long until the currents of the underworld were so unpleasant that she could hardly bear to stand there. At one point the red puppy grew fangs. It changed from a companion to a threatening creature. Drops of blood dripped from its mouth. I was beginning to listen now. Didn’t like what I was seeing and She didn’t like it either. And she talked for awhile.

Talked about transcending seemingly impossible challenges. Talked about soaring even when her tether appeared attached to powerful, limiting forces. What do we do in those instances?  What do we do? She felt she had choices.  That we always, in all ways, have choices. In fact, she insisted on taking responsibility for her life–for making her own choice.  It wasn’t an easy one.  There were many factors involved.  Many things to consider–but in the end, it was clear.   And so–heeding her surety of intention– with one quick motion the ties that were holding her down were severed.  The cloth was separated.  And suddenly the cloth was permeated with an amazing “lightness of being.”

cosmic umbilicus3

Still, there was work to do. She wanted a real face– she had a need to be seen for who and what she was.  A face that showed the map of her life. It’s trials and joys and work and weather. A crone’s face. And it took hours. There was a lot to think about.  A Lot.  And the eyes were next.   Of course she needed eyes.  To SEE things.  Not just to LOOK–but to SEE.  To see AND be seen.  And to understand what it was she was seeing.

I even heard her say that it’s never an easy process to really see deeply into the reality of   existence–and all its wonders.  And even though she’s still a bit shocked over the changes of the past week,  and yes–a bit sad– her eyes ARE open. Her heart is open as well–open and intact. The earth may still be her grounding reference, but she knows in her heart that her wings were meant for soaring.  And she gives thanks for the gift of sight.cronecompleteThis particular style of story telling was inspired by Saskia’s postings at  tales from the bird hut. Scroll down to “Little Bird has Left.”  The crone’s style–well, you’ll have to ask her about that.  And as you may have guessed by now,  my story and her story cannot be separated.

Tags: , , , , , , ,

%d bloggers like this: