Frenemies
When cat and dog and sheep and goat, yea, fox and hen and hog and stoat
Befriend each other, work and play like boon companions, night and day,
It’s time to question if the world as we have known it is unfurled,
Unraveled, undefined, undone–if we should pack our bags and run–
For such behavior’s a disgrace and flies in Mother Nature’s face.
So, be alert! The fox and hen, sheep and the goats, like gods and men,
Belong apart; the stoat and hog must not be friends, nor cat and dog.
SoundingIn the hands of a master
The melody played so sweetly runs
Like a playful rivulet down the hall
Spilling an invitation to
Light-footed dancing, to
Birds chittering along, to light
Flickering between the window blinds
To call all of us down the passage
To bathe in its cool music
All our Loves
All our friends are singing
In the chorus on a Saturday
And though I know they will be fine
And sing it well, I have to say
That hearing all our friends ring out
In chorus is more complex still
Than polyphonic harmonies
And counterpoint, and what we will
Be loving best and savoring
On the occasion, likely, is
The sheer delight of soaking in
That all these loves are mine and his
I’ve already told you that I am in reality an empress: the Empress of the Ordinary. And that that is not only, in my mind, a good thing and no insult or self-deprecation at all, but also something that I have learned to appreciate and cultivate over the years. In addition to that, I have learned here in the ether that I am another fine sort of royalty: the kind of royalty that is conferred by generous and gracious friends. One of my favorite tokens or badges of such worth is of course the marvelous and sometimes delightfully over-the-top supportive, helpful and complimentary comments I receive here on my posts and the companion ‘chat’ of thoughtful, responsive conversations I get to hold with friends over at their blog homes.
Another sign of my acquired dignity here in Bloglandia is the wondrous array of blog awards handed to me by my blogging friends. It took me some time to figure out that, unlike some other kinds of awards, I need not have earned them in some way with outlandish personal achievements or superhuman qualities, because they are gifts. I am Versatile, Appreciated, Liebster, Educational, Lovely, a Candle Lighter, a producer of Awesome Content, Kreativ, Sunshiny, Stylish, Inspiring and Sweet not by birth or accomplishment but because my friends have designated me so, have named me so.
So I acknowledge these latest halo handouts that have been granted me by the magnanimous Mandy, lavish Lauren and noble ‘Nessa with a full heart (not to mention trophy-case!) and I hope, still being honest or modest enough to understand that my worth is found in the kind hearts of others, not in all of these admittedly shiny and impressive titles they give me to reflect that kindness. For a little fun, I am posting, along with the representations of those awards not previously dwelling on my blog’s sidebar, photos of myself as I have attempted to measure up to them over the years.
I have not always been Little Miss Sunshine, as anyone can tell you, but here I was at Auntie Ingeborg's, practicing; if ever there was a person who practiced the deliberate art of being sunshiny and inspired others to try it on for size, it was Auntie.
Once I was invited to a gallery opening whose invitation instructed all attendees to put on their best "Sleaze-Gauche" look for the occasion. I had a lot of fun thrift shopping, and outfitted myself quite completely for a very respectably tiny sum.
Never mind being Inspiring, just being Inspired isn't always easy. I have to admit to having occasionally attempted to acquire the latter state by artificial means. Of course, this was before graduate school, where we all learn to be perpetually inspired and inspiring (insert sound of raucous snorts of laughter here)!
I could just kiss you all for being so sweet to me. But since we're at some distance from each other, I'll have to settle for the proxy of my Gravatar smooch planted on the lovely door-guardian camel at the Seattle Asian Art Museum, a place on which I also happen to be sweet.
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!
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.
Just what is it that makes today's creatures so familiar, so . . .
This just in from the Department of Everything Old is New Again, Déjà vu Division: the life of the general populace continues to be lived in well-worn grooves. We do what we do the way we’ve always done it, because that feels familiar and safe and because being challenged and growing are such hard work. It’s funny, though: sometimes it’s this very tendency that leads us directly–bump!–into contact with surprises and serendipitously good new things.
Take Doing the Chores, for instance. I do essentially the same set of major items nearly every day of the week, weeks on end, years at a time. But cleaning the same countertop as always in the kitchen I come across a new ant trail, and that leads me to call Mr Enemy-of-the-Bug-People, and that leads to the investigation that uncovers the Great Carpenter Ant Conspiracy before it can topple my little empire. I take a walk around the exact same route as usual and see a new kind of plant I’ve never seen before and think I may have discovered a pretty native flowering plant that might be a great addition when I get enough saved up to rehab and xeriscape our yard.
And there’s the whole thing about ‘going live’ (as far as I’ve done so by being a new-fledged blogger). While I’ve gone so far with change as to practice my dark arts of writing and drawing and photography and such in a public forum instead of closeted in an obscure garret amid a hovering handful of tubercular bohemians (a.k.a. other artistes), I am still just practicing the same arts with like tools and with similar ends. And here I am, thanks to the instant-community of the internet, seeing endless other writers and artists at work in the same new “studio complex”, learning a world of marvelous new ideas about subject, medium, technique and style, and most of all, “meeting” these impressive and engaging and artful people. Just by doing the writing and drawing that I’ve always done, only in a new work space, suddenly I have the opportunity to connect with some truly wonderful new friends.
And those friends bring me full circle in their own way, too, because as always, the roots of friendship grow best in common ground. The arts and interests and ideas that we share are the rich place where friendships are sown and nurtured. We all look for those things most familiar to us all, reflections of our own lives and loves, in choosing with whom we’d like to spend our time. No wonder I thought I recognized you!
Interesting, isn't it, how much alike we are while being so incredibly different from each other?
Art-Colored Glasses 
