The Message We Never Want to Hear

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Dear Friends,

I posted just a couple of weeks ago about the elation of our nephew’s band’s huge success on their winning the Norwegian ‘Grammy’ (Spellemannprisen) for best rock band of the year. Today he is grieving the death in a car crash of his bandmate and dear friend Anders, Honningbarna‘s drummer. This is the kind of update that is most dreaded of all, but I thought it appropriate that you know this sequel to my earlier post. The news came this morning from my sister, but it already is in every newspaper there in Norway too–Fædrelandsvennen, Aftenposten, Dagbladet, VG, and more. I turn to you, my friends, because I know you are quick to support each other with your kindness and comfort. Please keep our nephew and all of the band’s family held close in your hearts.

Kathryn

Don’t Blame Monday

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It’s true, I’m among the horde of cruel people who put the onus for all our Monday growling and grumpiness and grunge on the day itself. Many of us see Monday as the End of All Things Fun, coming as it does on the heels of any sort of weekend respite or recreation we might have enjoyed. I’ve long had that nasty habit of looking in the mirror on a Monday and seeing monstrous presence there, only thinly veiled by the black cloud of my ill-humor.P&II think perhaps it’s time to take a little responsibility for the ogrish attitudes myself and reclaim Monday as the Beginning of something fresh and new–by making it that, if need be, by force. The end of one thing is almost inevitably the beginning of another, and if the follower isn’t to my liking, then who’s to change that but me? Isn’t it just possible that in the open spaces between my crotchety complaints and snarky remarks, there could be room for the tiny wedge of reinvention to be driven in for a start? I think I should see what I can accomplish in this. No need to keep glowering at a meanie in the mirror morosely.P&IOne of the first things, I suppose, is to make sure that my Mondays hold something that I look forward to eagerly, something to start my week with a measure of pleasure. So I am taking that step in a small way already: Monday is my day for planning and for clearing the decks. As an inveterate list-maker and lister-of-lists, it’s my day to ‘walk the fences’–and since my Spread (no, dears, my Texas ranch, not my posterior measurements) consists of a house on a typical city-sized lot, it’s not too hard to accomplish that part, at least in temporal terms. But I must do so with eyes wide open for details that need attention so that I know of all the things that require mending, tending or improving. Those light switches that are going to be replaced. (The replacements have already been bought–check!–so it remains only to install them: Note!) The wood handles on the washtub need a preservative oiling. The seed starters are lined up as kits in the garage work area but need to be assembled now. And with the Must Do list is the ever-mutant list of how-abouts: would the window coverings in the reading/TV room be better insulation and easier to open and close if I redo them? Can I put a more comfortable seating angle on that chair by shimming the front legs? Do I have all of the supplies from my shopping list for finishing that little art project? Is the grocery list for Tuesday complete?

There is a surprising amount of satisfaction in not just being able to cross little things off those perpetual lists as Finished but being able, as well, to refine the remaining items so that they are more clear and purposeful and prioritized, and give shape to the rest of a busy week for me. It’s just the way I operate. It also makes me feel a little freer and lighter about what pleasurable things I can do while accomplishing my list-work, how I can distribute things in the short and long term, and when I can break up the flow of Projects with Fun–this latter being an essential thing and not, then, needing to feel like a disruption of the flow but rather a welcome island in the stream. Me, I like a wildly numerous and exotic archipelago of what others might admittedly think purposeless delights in my life’s flow.

So I am on a campaign of making Mondays a favorite day for me by turning my old attitude on its ear. I always had a fondness for forcing a change in point of view by whatever literalistic or foolish means necessary, after all: if I can’t see my artwork with enough objectivity to make intelligent editorial decisions about it, I need to shift how I look at it in order to adjust how I see it. Stand on my head. Come into a dark room and turn on the light on it suddenly. Imagine I’m a six- or ninety-six-year-old looking at it and how I’d describe it.

In the case of Mondays, I’m guessing many a 96-year-old with healthy feelings toward life would simply be delighted at being alive for another one. And six is an age when everything is still new every day, and electric with possibility. Why shouldn’t I adopt both of those attitudes?

P&IFor now, I intend to arrange at least one additional Fun Thing to be included in my Mondays on a regular basis, but perhaps a different kind of fun each time, so that I can’t get jaded and lackadaisical about it. Certainly it should have elements of silliness included, because that’s something that never does grow old with me, and perhaps is part of the reason I expect I shan’t grow old myself any too soon. Looking out my window, I see that the bare-branched trees of winter are suddenly covered with black lace, that the intermittent wind gusts have kicked up a ballet of curlicued oak leaves in the corner of the patio, and that the cardinals stopping by for a nibble of grain have somehow taken on a much deeper and brighter hue of red. Is it a change of seasons coming on? Perhaps it’s just that I’m letting the seasons change within me.

It Finally Dawned on Me

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Another completely open secret: I am one of the world’s chief exponents of that special breed known as Not A Morning Person. Everyone who knows me even a little is well aware that it’s my firm belief that I am thoroughly Anti-ante-meridian. And that if the world should happen to come perilously close to its end before noonish wherever I happen to be, I will not be prepared to put on my cape and tights, grab my magic wand and zip off to the rescue. So sorry, y’all.

Yippee Skippy for me, I married a man who, despite being unable himself to hibernate for the long periods I require on a constant basis, is sympathetic to my pathetic plight and leaves me untormented, bedding yanked up around my ears, in my mummified position of contentedly deep sleep when he arises.

Except for emergencies and Sundays.

On Sundays, one of the six days a week that he works long hours, if I sleep my Required Daily Allowance, I’d either better’ve gone to bed by about 8 pm on Saturday–not often convenient for those married to guys who conduct, and whose many colleagues and students conduct, concerts at, say, 8 pm on Saturdays and such–or if I sleep in Sunday morning the next time I’ll see him is, well, Monday. That’s how it works for a church choirmaster, at least one with a can’t-dash-home-between length of commute and Evensong on the docket.

The remaining Sunday option for me is to get over myself. So I haul my carcass off of the oh-so-magnetic mattress in the pre-dawn dark and crawl around until I can find my way to join him in the car for the trek SSE toward the Big City. And guess what: I found out there’s pretty stuff all over the sky at sunrise.photoSometimes it’s just the coloration of the dawn that’s so painterly. Marked at the horizon with the lace edging of silhouetted trees and hedges and power transformers, it stretches violet and rose and salmon and gold as far as the bleary eye can see. Almost always, there are thousands of birds taking to the skies en route to their own day jobs, the egrets flapping like clean sheets on the laundry line as they head out fishing and the grackles peppering the air as they look for actual clean laundry to besmirch, the pigeons heading for delicious night shift dinner garbage for their breakfast and the hawks remaining puffed up in their patrician dignity on lampposts while watching for the first ambulatory happy-meal to scurry by below. Even the traffic, being sparser and lit up with twinkly head- and taillights, looks far less plebeian and grubby.photoI like the scenery next to me, too.

I can look around at all the glories of an awakening sky and be amazed and awed (yes, odd) and impressed and moved by this stuff I’d never see if I stayed abed. But really, I could get all that gushy admiration going by looking at a great sunset, right? Or if it has to be dawn, by ogling some nice Impressionist paintings or a super-duper set of postcards or some dandy cinematographer’s artwork on the big screen, and I’d never have to pry myself out of that come-hither blanket and pillow nest I so admire. Then I look at the scenery next to me again. I really like that scenery.

And it dawns on me. Seeing the sun rise may be all it’s cracked up to be, but so are NASCAR driving and alligator tagging and ice fishing, to those born to love those activities, and who am I to deprive them of their fill? No reason for me to compete for what I do not desire. I’m happy to report that I do, it turns out, appreciate a beautiful sunrise, but I have no particular need to reaffirm my appreciation except when it’s built into my limited opportunities to spend time with the man who, kinder chronographical conditions permitting, doesn’t harass me when I’m sleeping, even if the sun is getting a bit distant over the yardarm. Now, he is a sight for sorely sleepless eyes.photo

No Worries, Everything’s Okay Here! I’m doing Just Great! (Twitch, Twitch, Giggle)

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sketchbook

But my noodle is full of doodles!

Being and Nuttiness

Origami boats and hats

And frogs and swans

And paper cats

And chicken frills

And snowflake cuts:

These little pieces

Drive me nuts—

It’s not the cut-

And-paste, you see,

That makes me

Shake the acorn tree;

It’s just that

They should

Have the guts,

Barefaced, to call it

Therapy.

sketchbook

I mean, oodles of doodles!

 

Going Buggy

I wouldn’t say it bugs me

All that much to be indoors,

For after all my place is not

Much awfuller than yours,

Both having small enclosures and

These windows that won’t open,

And both beset with folks who have

Rude ways of interlopin’

Whenever you might think you’ve got

A chance to set things right

By putting forward fine ideas

Or going home at night,

But if it comes right down to choose,

I guess I’ll stick right here—

My rubber room; your office—

‘Least I’ll get reprieved next year.

Lighting Candles in the Vastness of the Dark

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photoIt’s easy in this big, busy world to feel sometimes that one is alone in the magnitude of space, a tiny voice calling out and not knowing if there’s anyone who will answer. When times are grim, that is quite simply the pervasive sense. When my youngest nephew was very small and spending his first overnight at his grandparents’, my mother tiptoed down the darkened hall before turning in for sleep and heard his little voice coming out of the doorway with the plaintive little inquiry: “Is there anybody here who knows me?”

Like him, I have always eventually been answered in my timid forays into the fearful or unknown with rescuers coming to my aid, whether in a literal sense or in the sometimes equally powerful act of offering emotional and companionable solidarity. I’m here for you; I hear you. It doesn’t always have to be more than that, though I can’t imagine there are many who would find themselves able to be surfeited when it comes to genuine kindness and support; sometimes just knowing that there is somebody else somewhere in this overwhelming life who cares what happens to us is grace enough.

Entering the seemingly surreal world of the blogosphere is certainly sufficient intimidation and unfamiliarity for most of us, and a place where we well might feel we’re talking into empty nothingness. The discovery that there are not only fellow wanderers in the place, indeed, but kindred spirits–well, that is more than just a comfort. It’s a relief and a joy and the sighting of rescue breaking through the impenetrable dark with, however tiny, a candle flame. Amazing how that infinitesimal light pierces the gloom and begins to widen. How it begins to be passed from one to the other until a seeming infinity of tiny flames has suddenly coalesced into blazing daylight!

That is the kind of friendship that shifts from virtual to virtuous in a rather quick succession of conversations and shared thoughts and dreams, where we go swiftly from meeting-in-passing to knowing that it matters that each little flame be tended thoughtfully. True community, it turns out, can be cultivated in dimensions that know no boundaries of physical space. It grows in sharing commonalities and respecting and treasuring the uniqueness and differences of opinion and belief and history that give so much deeper meaning to what we do hold in common.

So I pay grateful tribute to those who have answered my voice in the darkness, who have shone light upon my blogging life and more importantly, shed light in every direction by the mere warmth and passion of their spirits through their own voices in blogging. There should be a much more beautiful and euphonious name for this dimension of community than Blog, Blogger, Blogged, Blogging–all of them sound, if not rude, then at the least terribly plebeian. But then, perhaps the true beauty of the construct is its very ability to carry our unvarnished, unembellished humanity if not on golden wings then on plainly mortal feet, all of us walking along, however trepidatiously, speaking softly to others we only trust are there, carrying our little candles ahead of us with quavering hope.

Lately I have been reminded of this sharing of light and warmth yet again by the gifts of three further Versatile Blogger Award recognitions by that Beautiful Spirit, Alpha, at Aspire.Motivate.Succeed., the warm and wonderful master of his well-tended garden, Bishop, at Bishop 9396’s Blog, and the Bardess, DM Denton, who shows magnificent visual and verbal ambidexterity. From three people who demonstrate great versatility indeed I take it as a high compliment.

And I have now been granted the Candle Lighter Award by dear ‘Nessa at Stronghold. She is a bright light indeed for such a young torch-bearer, bringing her insights and opening discussions on many a topic that could fall into the dark but for the repeated loving applications of the light of inquiry and passion that she offers in her forum. All are free to ponder there the complexities of life, love and the human psyche that cross all boundaries of age and experience. Precisely the kind of place that welcomes shared illumination just as I’ve been describing here.

Candle Lighter Award logoThe Candle Lighter Award has been variously described in terms of its requirements, so I thought I’d see if I could trace it back, and behold, this award’s creator actually maintains an open link so that we can bask in her generous and thoughtful gift. So raise your lamps high with me, won’t you, and we’ll thank her for this kind and inspiring offering. Thank you, then, both to Kate, the nurturing mother of this Award, at Believe Anyway, and to ‘Nessa, who believes strongly enough to shine her own light in the darkness.

Kate is especially generous and ingenious, I think, in opting to simply let the award she conceived stand on its own, requiring no response or action other than that one should, appropriately, shine light upon its meaning as a representation of positivity and hope and illumination in and of itself and the thoughtful sharing of it ought to recognize those whom the giver sees as showing those qualities in blog work. To further those beliefs and ideals, I will of course share the names of a small few bloggers who represent the vigor of meaningful optimism, teaching and leading and sharing the light through their munificent and loving work. And as ‘Nessa has reminded me, many of the brightest lights are those that persist to shine in the darkest places.photo

Thus I gladly pass the torch to my friends at PsycheVida, The Invisible Shadow, Aspire.Motivate.Succeed., The Human Picture, G (of G Caffe), and Year-Struck, who all know the light well, if partially by virtue of having known or passed through various dark places, and choose to shine their better selves abroad like rays of sunlight.

I have handed the Versatile Blogger Award along (as well as a few others with similar requirements) enough times that I fear I shall put your lights out, all of you, if I should share another laundry-list of factoids about my shining self, and know that you’ll find more than enough of my self-revelatory chatter just by wandering around my blog any day of the week. But I hope that you will also attend to the following fellow off-road-thinkers who certainly deserve a badge of Versatility for their wide-ranging skills and interests, again without requiring anything of them in return other than that they should rejoice in being in company that deeply appreciates the surprising and wonderful collection of wits that each of them represents.VBA logo

To Marie, tending home, garden, and a next-gen toddler in her Little Corner of Rhode Island; to Ellen, who writes and paints and draws and sets the cultural coordinates of her region at Nine Lives Studio; to Bella of winsomebella, a magical land where passionate soul-searching merges with poetry and photography, travel and storytelling; to John, cooking up history and food and familial love in the Bartolini Kitchens; and to Nia, who intertwines photography with food, the tails of cats with tales of travel, and wonderful daily expressions of local culture to charm and amaze us.

Some of you, I know, have been laureates of these specific and many other blogging awards, and deservedly so, so I neither demand of you that you accept (though it’s pretty much an impossibility to make me un-like you once I’ve decided I like you, as far as that goes!) nor that you ‘keep passing the dessert around the table’. Your blogs and excellence speak for themselves, and if you wish to share the joy further then I am delighted to have put it in your hands for the sharing. Because that is the whole beauty of this place we call the blogging community. There’s dessert and light and warmth enough here for everyone.photo

To Begin with a Seed

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photoThe whole idea that a towering sequoia can be sprung from a single, minute seed is preposterous. It’s not that I think this operation is analogous to those amusing party-trick capsules one can buy for kids, where once the pill-like mite is submerged in water, out springs a dinosaur: a sequoia is not masterfully compressed as a whole, living, full-sized tree into its seed to wow us with its razzle-dazzle emergence.

This is a much subtler, more complex, and truly far more astonishing thing, a seed containing all of the raw material and instructions for growing a full-scale, magnificent conifer. It’s more as if a very small package arrived on the front porch, seemingly from IKEA, yet containing every bolt, panel, screw and window, every necessary iota, for making the whole Empire State Building, and when the box was slit open for a peek inside, the building proceeded to assemble itself carefully and perfectly, over a few years, without any intervention from the recipient. Furthermore, if left to its own devices, it will tend to its own growth and maintenance without any aid from humans at all. Repair and beautification and renewal are included in the package with a tree-lifetime guarantee at no extra cost.P&I

This wonder is replicated uncountable times not only in the massive and miraculous evergreen forests but in every growing thing in the earth that emerges at its birth from a seed. And that’s how, despite my impressive impatience and legendary laziness–which in combination would seemingly guarantee my gardening only with the most mature plants I can finagle onto my property and into the soil, I became enamored of gardening from seed. Oh, I still love the instant gratification of transplants and bedding plants and bare-root behemoths and all of that, but to watch this scarcely-believable process of the infinitesimal exploding (in slow motion, mind you) into the impressively complex is, well, intoxicating.photo

So I have built up a stash of both collected and purchased seeds that I will attempt to nurture into something more substantial over the seasons, and will play the frivolous farmer, the mad scientist of the weed-patch and the proud parent of whatever scrawny or stupendous growing things I can coax out of those jewel cases, their seeds. I will fuss and fume and furrow both the garden and my brow as I try to conjure their beauties out of those weird and fantastical little lock-boxes of seed and I will talk sternly to the reluctant and coo at the flourishing as though I really had anything at all to do with their excellence when in fact I’m just unleashing them to do what comes naturally in the first place. With appropriate respect for their admirable powers, and love for their bloom and fruitfulness, of course. Of course.

She is a Bringer of Light

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It’s a beautiful day today.

It’s been raining cats, dogs, longhorn cattle and armadillos all night long in the north of Texas, decorated with streaky lightning and accompanied by the timpani of repeated rolls and crashes of thunder, and the front yard is now a series of canals and minor swamps, the back patio steps a reflecting pool high as my ankles. The grey felt of the sky remained uninterrupted in its scowl from imperceptible dawn to murky dusk, and the low-hanging clouds coughed out leftovers from the night’s storms at intervals all the while. And it’s a beautiful day.

It’s my sister’s birthday. She who came next in line after me among the four woman-children born to my parents is now a year older by our reckoning and all the more beloved as each year passes. It should be no surprise that she is to me still something of a mystery and decidedly a treasure, the first of my younger sisters to be subjected to my admittedly unskilled ministrations in my first job as Big Sister, who (thankfully) proved far too strong to quail at them and yet somehow still likes me.photo collage

It can’t have been easy for her. I will never claim to have been a particularly dandy specimen of a sister to any of them, but since I was sometimes the babysitter-designate and often the closest to hand when this little one was to be led or tended, she probably bore the worst of it. That she was born beautiful, a dainty doll of a creature–despite my fond declaration of “Oh, look at the ugly little thing!” when faced with her fresh out of the delivery room where, to my childish surprise, she turned out not to look like a six-month-old cooing and coiffed infant–must have perplexed me, since I was already old enough to notice that everyone unavoidably fawned over the pretty baby and we old, used up grade-schoolers were dull goods by then.

That she quickly proved to be clever, bright, charming and unreasonably likeable, even by her sisters, could have been an annoyance. That she had interests and intelligence and exponentially increasing skills in areas that to this day remain closed doors to my would-be prying mind (have I mentioned math lately? Sports?? ) could have been supremely irritating and possibly deserving of sisterly sabotage. That she did all of this and much more while remaining cheery and likeable could have simply driven us all over the cliff.

But aside from the inevitable struggles of a girl who discovered she was not only wise and talented and admired, but in extraordinarily different ways from the rest of us and who was additionally a frightful perfectionist and self-critic, she had the Secret Weapon few can wield: she was, and is, a bringer of light.photo

There are certain people who brighten the room merely by vacating it, and then there are those special, miraculous few who can do the reverse magic. My sister is one of the latter rare creatures. I have often thought that it is no coincidence that from when she was quite tiny her favorite color was yellow. The color we associate with sunshine and happiness and precious gold. She is a ray of human light and when I think of how fortunate I am to have three incredibly dear sisters and among them, this incandescent bit of sweetness, I am suffused with sunlight myself.

Happy birthday, dear Sister, and long may you shine. You are a gift and a golden treasure, and loved more deeply than a few words can ever say.

photo

Foodie Tuesday: Nothing Freaky about Frikadeller

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Kjøttkaker, as they’re known in my Norwegian-descended (and oh, how far we can descend!) family, or frikadeller, as the Danes and some other ‘cousins’ of ours call them, are simply and literally seasoned ground (minced) meat cakes. My husband finds them strange because they aren’t cozied up inside a hamburger bun, since that’s pretty much what the patties are, though usually on a slightly smaller scale. He finds it equally strange to serve them without a nice tomato-based sauce over the top of some beautiful fresh pasta, since again, they’re pretty much meatballs too, though usually on a slightly larger scale. And they certainly aren’t meatloaves, being far too teensy to serve sliced to anyone without smirking at the sheer silliness of it, though it might be worth it just to watch their expressions, while you counted out five peas per person alongside the meat and baked one fingerling potato for each. In any case, it’s really no surprise that these little dandies should suffer an identity crisis on this side of the pond.

Truth be told, said spouse isn’t a huge fan of ground meats outside of some favorite places where they commonly lurk, as in the previously mentioned hamburgers, or as meatballs in pasta sauce, or in a nicely spicy taco filling. The texture isn’t all that appealing to him without some distracting vehicle or accompaniment. I will have to continue on my search for some other alternatives or just know that any kjøttkaker cooked up around here are all mine for the munching. Hmm, was I thinking there was anything wrong with that scenario? How ridiculous!

Because I do like a nice chopped meat treat of one sort or another occasionally. So I made up a batch the other day. These are no more than a lightly-mixed blend of equal parts ground beef, veal and pork (about a half pound each, I suppose) with a couple of eggs to bind them and boost their nutrients a bit, some salt, black pepper, smoked paprika, ground coriander and a nice toss of shredded Parmesan for a touch of textural variety. I oven-baked them (in bacon fat, because I’m a flavor-holic), having made a big enough batch to freeze a bunch and have a few left in the fridge for weekday meals in the short term. Then I stuck the ones headed for supper into the skillet where the side-dishes were waiting, so all would arrive together hot at the table.photoWhile the patties were roasting, I’d cooked up a nice big batch of crimini mushrooms in butter and my homemade bone broth, set them aside and lightly cooked some nice thin green beans in the fat of the pan, and then layered it all back up together. While the vegetable portion of the program rested a moment, I’d taken the meat patties out of the oven, poured off the fat and scooped up all of those nice meaty drippings into a little container where I whipped them up with some heavy cream. The drippings were already plenty well seasoned and nicely condensed by their medieval-hot-tub adventures in the oven, so I had Instant Gravy of a kind you’re not likely to find in a packet of powdered whatsis on your grocery’s shelf. Which is to say, rich and flavorsome enough even for the likes of me.photoAll I added at table were some nice little fresh tomatoes to add a bit of color both to the plating and to the palate, a brightener welcome alongside the warmth and savory goodness of the rest. A little shot of sunshine is always welcome, whether in the kitchen or on the grinning face of someone happily gobbling up what’s served for supper.photo

Happy Chinese New Year, Y’All!

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That’s Texan for 新年快樂 and today is the start of the Year of the Dragon! So in addition to being a big year for my youngest sister thanks to her year of birth, this should be a year of power and prosperity for all, as the dragon is symbolic of not only royalty but is the only truly rare creature in the Chinese zodiac, being supposedly mythical and all. I happen to know where one or two hang out, but then I am kind of special, being a Rat (we Rats won the Emperor’s race between the twelve great creatures, for those of you not in the know).

And why should an old Norsk-descendant-living-in-north-Texas like me care about Dragons and Chinese calendars? Because I find all sorts of cultural treasures from all sorts of rich cultures fascinating, and why wouldn’t anyone. It’s an ecumenical sort of thing with me: most cultures have at many levels interests, beliefs and strengths that are not only worthy of examination but surprisingly held in common by many, if not most, others–simply under different names–and I think it’s tremendously impressive and endlessly intriguing to learn how our seemingly diverse nationalities, languages, customs and faiths ultimately intertwine.

Have you ever looked at a piece of Folk Art and thought that it might come from East Africa somewhere–but then thought that it might equally have come from the hands of Inuit artists or Suomi ones, dwellers in Oceania or Croatia or maybe somewhere in the heart of Syria? It’s amazingly frequent that one comes across such remarkably strong commonalities across cultures and borders that it takes a veritable forensic investigation and examination to determine a thing’s true origins. In many cases we learn along the way that in fact the point of “origin” for a single word, object, or idea as we know it was the end point of a long and winding journey through many cultures and across many borders.

That’s a mighty long-winded way of saying that it’s only natural in my view that I should be happy to learn more about and celebrate other nationalities’ and other people’s most fabulous and fascinating attributes.

The other aspect of my personal interest is simpler, perhaps: some of my Norwegian ancestors lived and worked in China in pre-Communist years and founded a school that is still flourishing under the care of Chinese teachers and administrators. For all that I deplore about the darker sort of “evangelism” practiced by many missionaries under the guise of Christian faith (and perhaps others), this kind of mutual interchange of ideas and contribution of efforts strikes me as among the best in any relationship and one I’m happy to recognize. My mother’s cousin, at the time the Norwegian Ambassador in Beijing, took my visiting aunt to the school a few years ago and they were welcomed like some sort of heroes returning from the mists of time on their arrival merely for being descended from the school’s founders, so I think it safe to say that this was seen as a more positive influence than some.

And finally, my love of things Chinese comes from wonderful friends who either are Chinese by birth or descent themselves or have spent joyful time immersed in China and Chinese culture. One such couple would be my “extra grandparents” the wonderful Talbert and Ella, who had also lived with great happiness for years of missionary work in China. Again, I know both from their deeply gentle and thoughtful natures as surrogate grandparents and from the fact that they were in the first party of Westerners actually invited to return to the Chinese interior after the flowering of détente, that this was a true love for them. The plain yet happy upshot in my middle-American life was that as a young girl I was taught by Talbert how to hold my chopsticks properly, grew up eating genuine and very humble stir-fries in my Norwegian-American home because Ella shared her know-how with Mom (long before Americans ever knew of any Asian foods more authentic than Chop Suey and Egg Foo Yong as defined by westernized restaurants), and I was regaled with tales of a magical kingdom that was surprisingly real.

When we lived outside Chicago for a couple of years during that time, a highlight was a dinner Talbert and Ella took us to at a classic hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant of the truly authentic sort, where Talbert chattered in Mandarin with the delighted owner and ordered us an unforgettably delicious feast. The owner was so taken with us that when he discovered that our party there was coincidentally on my (11th?) birthday, he came out and very ceremoniously presented me with a whole packet of chopsticks bearing a series of characters meant for good fortune, and even wrote them down. Such was the delight of the occasion that I can still show you that slip of paper. I made a little graphic out of the characters too, and will share that with you as well, as a token of my good wishes to you for this year. And most of all, because China, through its beauties of people’s shining souls, its art, its rich and almost infinitely ancient culture, its fabulous food and its dreamlike diversity has been such a gift to me all of my life, I wish all of you a very Happy Chinese New Year!

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Happiness! Prosperity! Longevity! Peace!

 

And since I know you’re still wondering, yes, I did go and look up the local dragon. It’s not so much that they’re shy, but being both rare and royal, they’re understandably a little bit protective of their privacy. This particular dragon was lounging around with a unicorn friend and just let me have a quick peep, seeing that it’s His Year, so I could report back to you with confidence that it’s going to be a grand one indeed.digital image from a P&I drawing

The Red Shoes Dairy

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mixed media illustration

The Human Animal strikes again. And if you recognize the tune, I'm not using it to *blame* anyone, mind you, just to say we're all in this together . . .

Since I’ve already allowed as to how I’m pretty much a farm animal at heart, doing what comes naturally to me and without excessive amounts of couth or savoir-faire, I’m constantly amazed at the ever-so-much-cooler people who deign to hang around with me. Maybe my rare moments of actual and impressive wonderfulness have sufficiently inured them to my shortcomings so that they can kindly turn a blind eye when despite my wanting to be on my best behavior and attempting refinement I fail, sometimes spectacularly, to do so. I dress up in my prettiest red high-heeled shoes and yet I still go and Step in It. And if you don’t know what I mean by It, you have clearly not been paying attention around here.

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My own Ruby Slippers have taken me to many an Oz . . .

Yet despite my persistent trippings-up and fallings-down, somehow I have thus far not only always ended up right back on my red-shod feet but in the midst of this great, forgiving, and ever so friendly good company, wherever in this world or my own universe I’ve happened to land. So I have ceased to be surprised when people come knocking at my door bearing presents and kisses and kindness of every sort. It’s not my deserving, you see, nor any prowess I’ve shown for being dignified and distinguished, so much as the boundless goodwill and generosity of spirit in those around me. While I may not be fabulously tasteful myself, I do have fabulous taste in other people.

Thus it comes as less of a shock than a delightful piece of exceeding niceness when my admirable and ever-sparkling muse over at Year-Struck has popped by with another glamorous pair of red heels for me to try on and admire. Maybe even to grow into, if I can. It’s not that my feet are so dainty in size but that my Educator skills are pretty itty-bitty and underdeveloped. However, if the award allows for conferral upon those who are getting a superb education here ourselves, why then I’m your woman.

With that, I will gratefully and happily accept the challenge. My wish is to share the award further, however, with some blogging friends who are educator-bloggers. I bow to those who have been particularly good at educating me and others, both with the content of their posts in which they teach us great and useful and desirable things and in their mentoring commentaries and the supportive role they play for those of us who follow in their admirable footsteps. Please rise and sing a hymn of happiness with me for these guardian angels in our midst:

Cecilia (thekitchensgarden), Marie (mylittlecornerofrhodeisland), Claire (promenadeplantings), Steve (portraitsofwildflowers and wordconnections), and John (fromthebartolinikitchens). The only rule I’ve been able to ascertain as purportedly attached to this award is to use it to recognize five of my most supportive commenters from recent posts, and as it happens, these folk are not only stupendous teaching mavens in their respective areas of expertise but are just that sort of supportive commenters referred to in that single shining rubric. So I can fulfill my own agenda whilst pretending to comply with the award’s original intent. Pretty much the way your Miss Passive-Aggressive correspondent tends to behave most of the time. I wink at you in your newly conferred complicity.

The Lovely Lauren Scott, meanwhile, has also graciously extended One Lovely Blog Award to reach me over here in my gift-strewn cubbyhole. As her blog is simply shimmering with genuine loveliness, I can easily ascertain why she would be a recipient herself, and can only assume that she is able to accomplish such a beautiful environment there by wearing some nearly-purple-they’re-so-rose-colored glasses, whereby I appear worthy of the award myself. Another excellent reason for me to be thankful I surround myself with such fine companions!

This award does ask that we share a little bit about ourselves once again in order to ‘earn’ the honor, which I think is only fair. To me. Not so much to those of you who have sat through over half a year of my yammering about myself, but bear with me.

What haven’t I already revealed to you about my inner workings (or playings, if we’re to be realistic about it)?

Did you know that:

I love a good thunder-and-lightning storm. Throw in some hail and I’m entertained for a long time. But don’t get it on my car or happening with me stuck under a big tree with my umbrella up, please.

When I try to wear ‘warm’ colors, especially a good deep yellow, I look just like I have severe jaundice and must be rushed immediately to the emergency ward. People who have to look at me when I wear such colors should also be treated with some kindness, to help them recover from the horror of my appearance.

I took an Archery class in college and enjoyed it quite a bit; I was even fairly decent at it. I probably couldn’t even draw a 60-pound bowstring nowadays. But give me a half hour and I’ll give it a try.

Dante Alighieri wasn’t quite thorough enough for my taste as he missed describing a particularly subterranean Level where Bullies should take up their eternal residence.

Being near natural water sources–oceans, lakes, rivers, waterfalls, ponds, and all of their cousins–is a source, also, of tremendous pleasure and comfort to me.

I would like to have the resources to design any object, from buildings to clothing, tools, pieces of furniture, vehicles, jewelry, gardens, hardware, housewares–you name it–and then hand off the plans to world-class craftspeople and see the designs realized. And then put to use, hither and yon.

Funny sounding words make me happy. Blubber! Flabbergasted! Cooties! Marsupial! Splurge! Glyptography! Carbuncle!

One Lovely Blog Award logo

This is my chance to recognize some really lovely blogs and their creators, those who fill each post with heart. I know a whole lot of people who are especially gifted at creating an environment that, for sometimes very different reasons from one blog to another–or even from one post on the same blog to another–compel me to return again and again. These are bloggers who make magic on a regular basis, with words and images and ideas that carry me along and fill me with amazement and inspiration, dark reflection and introspection and great measures of pleasure. I commend to your attention these marvelous and yes, truly lovely bloggers.

Barbara (just a smidgen)

Desi (The valentine 4)

B. (Just Add Attitude)

Raymund (Ang Sarap)

Geni (Sweet and Crumby)

Dennis (The Bard on the Hill)

Cyndi (Cfbookchick)

Caroline (sweetcarolinescooking)

Eve (Redwater Ramblings)

Eden (litrato-ngayon)

Allison (“Il Faut Goûter”)

Bella (winsomebella)

Nors (Foodtrip)

Sawsan (Chef in disguise)

‘Nessa (Stronghold)

David (DFB Poetry and Painting)

Lindy Lee (Poetic Licensee)

Teri (Images by T. Dashfield)

Tanya (Chica Andaluza)

Belle (belleofthecarnival)

Geraldine (Alternative Poet)

I was just reminded by one of my ‘honorees’ of the many fine reasons for politely declining blogging awards, not least of which is the duty imposed by response and acceptance. While one of the excellent reasons for declining would clearly be modesty or humility, as you all know I have neither. But I was also taught that accepting an undeserved gift with good grace is a certain sort of return gift in itself.

Furthermore, as I told my correspondent in this instance, the real reason I perpetuate any of these awards is simply to bring the standouts among my blogging compatriots to others’ attention. If not for that, I would indeed have declined all of these kindly meant notices myself, but this gives an unknown like me the chance to showcase some of the other writers and thinkers whose work I really admire for one reason or another, or for many reasons. Having responded to a number of these awards, I know that simply responding properly is in fact quite a bit harder than making up one’s usual post, because the content is externally dictated, and let’s face it, even a mathematical dullard like me can do enough basic sequential thinking to realize not only that the passing out of the laurels to new honorees becomes an obvious exponential impossibility but that merely fulfilling the self-revelatory or self-evaluative portion of the requirement becomes onerous when repeated. Especially when all I ever talk about on my blog is All Me All the Time anyhow!

Therefore I refuse to enforce any “rules” among the honorees I choose, hoping only that you and your companions will accept my personal admiration and accolades and feel free to bask privately, if that’s not anathema. So there are no chains requiring the smiting, nor any other attachments except the one of hoping that each of you will allow me to trumpet your blogs to my modest yet lively readership because I know others will appreciate what you offer! If you like to ‘play the game’–why, that’s another thing entirely! Passing along gifts in blog-dom is not the same as Re-gifting in the wrapping-and-ribbons world, so my real gift to you, since I believe you all earned the recognition, is that I don’t require you to respond in any particular way, or at all, if you don’t wish.

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Having Red Shoes has never turned me into a dancer, alas, but only a vain creature . . . this is an instance when I greatly prefer my own sort of amusing fantasy to the dark old fairytales . . .

PS–I wasn’t (entirely) trying to be cruel, tricking you with that post title and all, so if you are here just hoping to catch a glimpse of David Duchovny, I’ll give you something to ameliorate my sins if you’ll forgive me once again. The Red Shoe Diaries aren’t exactly my sort of thing, but you know how my frivolous mind works, and when I see a pair of red shoes, no matter how Educational they’re meant to be, well . . .