Sunday Silence

As I face the blank screen I am aware of the blessing of silence so apt for a Sunday morning. No whine of air compressors, roar of leaf blowers (that is a week day activity)or even vroom vroom of my neighbors five vehicles being sequentially started and primed through some testing sequence that he knows, but I do not.

Silence is a blessing. My friend who is sailing sent a sail-mail this week about how wonderful it was to be able to see a gazillion of stars, a phenomenon that is usually lost to us because of the artificial light all around us. That email prompted me to remember camping in the high Sierras when I was in my teens. My family went with another family and the silence that summer night was palpable, a quiet so deep that when I ponder it now, I can understand why people are called to be hermits, why they prize being able to move noiselessly through the woods almost as though they are not there.

Big Sur and Point Lobos are two more places where the silence was like a cloak, a gentle presence of its own, inviting us to seek the Presence whom we look for in church. Once in a great while I have experienced that deep silence in church, but usually there is a bustle there as people come in and ready for a service or the sounds of the city impinge on the quiet interior of the church.

Liturgists have argued fiercely about the role of silence in the services they arrange. Those arguments definitely broke the silence in a manner that argued for the silence in themselves! I have always been on the side of those seeking silence. The most sacred moments of the liturgy convey themselves best if we are not asked to "participate" by making some noise--or even gestures. But then, I am "old school"--keep silence in church, keep silence in the halls while passing from one class to the next, or risk detention, keep silent if you don't have anything good or kind to say about someone else. (Silence here can speak louder than words, too.)

I give thanks today for silence and am blessed.

August 6, 2008

It has been sixty-three years since the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. A terrible thing and a tragedy, truly. I grew up in the shadow of that bomb. If you are a baby boomer, like me, you probably remember dropping under your school desk when the air alert siren sounded. It was only a drill, but it scared us.

Still, we are a long way from a world at peace. We still have to worry about weapons--nuclear and street--in our lives. We have not tempered our aggressive instincts or re-channeled them sufficiently and we have a long way to go. I remember reading that classic book, On Aggression, but I can't at the moment remember the author. (Google will tell me in a bit, I am sure.)(Two days later: Konrad Lorenz, and I probably still have a copy somewhere in the house.)

Peace requires respect, I think, for others. It requires as well prosperity and a different way of organizing our economy in a global world so that no one is left out. It is more than time for that. It is overdue.

I am glad to see that Americans have been driving less this summer and that oil prices are easing. We have a long way to go though before we get ourselves out of the oil trap. Some folks have become very wealthy while we drove and drove. The rest of us have been providing that wealth. There are probably other areas of our economy that would yield the same analysis if we scrutinized them a bit.

Today is also the Feast of the Transfiguration, one of those lesser celebrated feasts that is worth noting because it is about the last things and the expectation of the after life. It means more to me today than it did twenty years ago. To be free of the body, transfigured or transmogrified, is something I am beginning to look forward to. Not ready yet, but thinking of not having to worry about weather or food, housekeeping or watering the plants; never to worry about money again. Not ready yet, but looking forward.

In the mean time, I will pause to look at my little Peace banner hanging on the wall of my front entrance and take a few moments to get out the peace cranes that a friend and I made last year and ponder this anniversary, the need for peace and how friendship also enters into it.

I am grateful today that we have not used the atomic bomb again since WWII. I am grateful to be alive today and hoping for real peace.

Of Basil and Moths

The first part, the basil is the yummy part. The basils were transplanted to new eight inch pots on Friday and seem to be happy there. Saturday I topped them by snipping a bag full from the leggy parts of each plant. One plant is now on the deck because there isn't enough room on the potting shelf. That one was tipping over in such a way that each time I wheeled up to it a lovely bunch came into my lap, like a puppy greeting me and saying hello. The snipped bunches filled my kitchen colander and looked like an amazing amount. I rummaged around and found the delightful mincing gadget that is part of the Braun "stick blender". Chop, chop, whir, whir. This too, is not a toy, even though it looks like one, but a real, useful tool. The basil whirled down to one small container that will feed me pesto for three nights.

All summer and even earlier, I had noticed an up tick in the the flitter bug population. These are small, almost translucent moths that seem to whirl and whirl just out of my reach. In fact, Friday night, I even sprained my thumb trying to whack one by clapping my hands. Instead of hitting the moth, I walloped my right (and sore) thumb by slamming the heel of my left hand against it. Pain throughout the hand. Try wheeling one handed. Doesn't work well.

Sunday I discovered the source of the bugs. A nasty infestation of cocoons in a blanket that had been left too long on the living room couch. I usually use the couch as a kind of extended shelf for holding things to be sorted. Won't be doing that any more. The blanket is past salvage and now in a trash bag. The sofa needs vacuuming--and then on a regular basis. Housekeeping clearly isn't my forte!

In fact, while I garden with passion and joy, I keep house like a geek. I have laughed about that from time to time with friends, who I suspect do the same. It is funny until it gets to the point where it is negligent, as in the couch with the moths. So I suppose that it is never too late to grow up and take responsibility even for the housekeeping. Resolve: less clutter so that the cleaning can be accomplished.

I am grateful for the basil harvest and that it was only moths and not mice infesting my couch.

To do, to do and it is Friday Already!

How can this be? The pots for the basil plants arrived today and so transplanting is on my afternoon list.

Yesterday I happened to log on to a Cafepress chat and then realized it had been ages since I updated, so that is done. Part of the thing still doesn't work though and that is maddening, since it is something I have wasted time on before (over and over again and following the instructions doesn't work).

I have a new Squidoo that I launched yesterday called "we should stay at home on labor day and save gas". Very unwieldy. Will try to search for it to see if it comes up in Google and post a link later in the evening.

http://www.squidoo.com/weshouldstayathomeonlabordayandsavegas

I do believe that we can and should take back the economy. Analysts do not rule our actions. WE Do! We are not going to see the $5 per gallon gas that was being predicted in June, simply because people are driving less. Let's keep it up! Let's see if we can bring the price down to a more manageable level by staying home on Labor Day and other long weekends. We can fix things around the house, get to know our neighbors, read, watch movies, sleep in--all kinds of things that don't require gas or going anywhere to buy anything. Let's do it! We can.

Wouldn't it be great if we could also give thanks at home on Thanksgiving instead of having the mass exodus into massive holiday traffic jams that too often marks the beginning of this holiday? Wouldn't it be even better if we ignored Black Friday and stayed at home and began making our presents, writing our cards and generally having a saner and more economical holiday season? It isn't too early to plan for this too.

I would like to start a movement to take back the economy. It is ours. We make it. Let's shape it too. Let's not be afraid to regulate ourselves. It is in the Constitution that we are supposed to, so what if we did and we had a stable economy to show for our efforts? I believe this is part of stewardship of our resources and that we are called to do so. You can see my design for this at my Cafepress store and in the squidoo lens, Take Back the Economy for the People.

Well, that is a little off track from my to do list. But I wasn't doing that anyway. Happy weekend every one. Please drive as little as you can and help restore sanity to our economy. All of us will be grateful.

Harvesting Dinner

Last night I had the distinct pleasure of harvesting my dinner. What fun. I have never seen basil so big and so green, even though I grew it for years. There were several beans to go along with it.





I put the shredded Parmesan on the plate, put the cooked buckwheat noodles on top, let the cooking water (buckwheat noodles take little water)reduce with the olive oil, basil and garlic to make a little sauce and it was delicious. Could have used tomato or sweet pepper for color. Next time.

This is inspiring me to grow more garden! It is so much fun to be self-reliant, to have absolutely fresh food and to use what is on hand. Now I think I want to try making my own yogurt for the yogurt cheese maker for this would be a yummy variation on the Parmesan. Yogurt cheese with chopped basil and garlic would also be good.

What can I make for myself today? Hmmm. More basil.

The new toy that I bought from my niece's Pampered Chef business (see link to the right) is not a toy, but an excellent tool. It is the garlic press, the best one that I have ever owned. It presses the clove through the skin so peeling is not necessary. It comes with a cute and clever little tool that presses the residue back up into the press to clean it. No poking with a toothpick to get all the garlic out. I love it and will be pressing garlic frequently now. Yum

So this morning I am grateful and happy.

New Week and New Beginnings

Monday again and a whole week stretches invitingly ahead. Will I use it well or will it just slip by me? The weekend was spent on household chores. How can one person have so much laundry, so many dishes and so much stuff to shovel around? How can so much paper accumulate that needs to be shredded? The whole concept, as well as the shredders, didn't exist when I was growing up. Now I waste a major amount of time on this.

I am beginning to see that there really is a dining room here. Could be a pretty room too, with the clutter pushed back. There is slightly less mess in the living room which has been a holding for sorting room for the last year. Not what it was meant for. Today a friend is coming over to help me tackle that. A professional organizer, she is giving me the gift of her time. I am also hoping to sell the piano so that a major large piece of furniture will move on. Anyone want to buy a piano?

I spent some delightful time this morning reading Linda's blog. Jim has completed the race and they have a week in Hawaii before sailing on. Fair winds, little boat. Take my friends safely on their adventure and bring them home.

Meantime, my big adventure is to finely reclaim this house for a party to celebrate with family and friends. That is something to look forward to.

More later, when more is accomplished. I am grateful for good weather and the gift of time.

Friday at Week's End

A feeble pun on wit's end. I have been busy this week setting up a new watering schedule and devising a new way to do some of the watering chores myself. Two half gallon milk jugs and a watering can come into the kitchen sink and are filled then hauled to the porch to do the honors. People are away this weekend and so I want to see if I can manage this myself before finding more friends to help. So far so good. I have also potted up the irises a friend brought over in holding pots before someone can plant them in the ground.

The larger of the yellow roses that I posted Tuesday grew to be six inches across. A truly large rose. Three Mr. Lincoln's are fading on my counter now. As they fade they turn an almost purple not quite magenta color that I can't quite capture with my camera. (I probably need filters that I don't have. As well as knowledge that I don't have.) The camera is such a gift. My digital camera was preceded by a 35mm camera, a gift from my parents when I graduated from high school.

This week I have been scanning slides from that time into my desk top computer. It is amazing how many Christmas tree pictures my family took. As though we would never have another Christmas tree, we snapped shot after shot of the trees. The shots with the lights on never turned out. Then as I was laughing at myself for having expended so much film on the trees, and wishing also that I had taken more shots of the people, I found it: the magic Christmas tree.

One year in the eighties when a tree truly wasn't in the household budget and I had not expected to have one, Papa came into the house on Christmas eve day with a scrawny, not terribly beautiful tree, the last one in the grocery store lot. He went to the garage and brought in the boxes. He set it up where I would be able to look and look and look at it and even helped me decorate it. I hadn't thought that I had any pictures of it at all and the slides had turned a funny color, magenta like the roses on the counter. With the help of the computer, I brought it back to green again. It was such a joy to see it again. I spent hours that Christmas, in the evening with my feet up on a stool just looking at the tree. That was the first time, too that we did not put lights on a tree. It was so dry that I did not think it was a good idea to put the light on it. Papa was grateful. I have never put lights on one again. Symbol of the Light as it is, it doesn't need electricity to make it work for me. Everything on it is shiny and catches the light. I take better pictures of it this way too.

Somehow I think the picture taking is an attempt to fix the object. The picture is never quite the same. It doesn't capture the magic. It is why I keep taking pictures of the flowers too, I think, turning the ephemeral into something that lasts longer; holding on to memory that I don't quite trust to do the job without the visual cue.

Memory too is an elusive thing, not as fixed as we think it is, the memories change as we go forward in time. The way that I remember my childhood is not the same as the way I remembered it in my twenties. My memory of the Christmas trees, or the roses, is not the same as the trees or the items themselves. I will still try to hold the moments in time making memories by taking pictures for as long as I have the gift to see well enough to use the cameras. For the art, the technology and the gift of sight, I give thanks tonight and am grateful.

Friendship and Flowers

My friend Linda, who is like another sister to me--she was even born in the same month as my sister--has embarked on a new life under sail for the next three months. Before she left she brought me two roses from her beautiful yellow rose bush. I can share the pictures that I have been taking, but there is no way to share the fragrance over the internet--yet. (When that time comes, the computer will be able to deliver dinner too--not just by ordering out, that it can already do.)




Linda will be gone for three months as she and Jim sail from Hawaii to the San Juan islands, around the San Juan islands, in and around Puget Sound and then finally home to the Bay Area. (Jim is already on his way in a sailing race that began ten days ago.) I have linked to her blog, sea-of-change, since she is sharing this adventure with her friends on-line. I am excited about having a vicarious adventure along with her as she shares.

Looking at the roses and smelling the beautiful fragrance has made me think of her even more than I would have without them. Flowers are one of the interests that we share, along with gardening, cooking and photography. I am looking forward to pictures of the sea and sea creatures that I know she is eagerly looking forward to taking.

Friendship and flowers have a number of things in common, I think. Beauty is in both of them and they are both treasures. Tending and respect are needed for both and love is part of them too. Flowers remind us of how fragile life is and of how we need to slow down to appreciate it more. Friendship is one of the best things to slow down for.

So Linda, this blog post is for you. Thank you for the treasure of your friendship, your time, sharing your mind and your laughter as well as your kindness. Thank you for caring for me and for bringing me flowers (as well as food from TJ's--our nearby Trader Joe's). I miss you and will think of you often. Good sailing, good wind and good weather go with you and Jim. Godspeed you back to home, friends, the cats and Little Bird. The Fall will come quickly, I know. Fun and adventure aplenty abound in the meantime. Stay well.

Appleberry Promotion to end Domestic Violence

I am sending this to a number of people and organizations as a press release/promotion for my Mary Kay business. It is a bit long, but it is important to include all of the information, I think. Back to regular blogging later today or tomorrow. In case it is confusing to anyone, I have been Peggy to family and friends for most of my life, choosing recently to write and design under my baptismal name of Marguerite. So Peggy and Marguerite are one and the same person.

Independent Beauty Consultant, Peggy Manor of Mountain View, CA is participating in the Mary Kay promotion to break the cycle of domestic violence. From May through December of 2008 Mary Kay® will donate 100% of its profits from the sale of Beauty that Counts™Mary Kay Creme Lipstick® in Apple Berry to help change the lives of women and children around the world by partnering with Break the Cycle®.

In addition to the company’s donation, Peggy will donate 10% of her profits from all lipstick (and lipgloss sales) to the Community Services Agency of Mountain View for use in support of the women’s shelter that it sponsors.

Apple Berry is the most popular shade of lipstick in Mary Kay sales world wide, so it is particularly appropriate to this campaign since it suits the complexions and coloring of so many women of all ages. Free samples are available by contacting Peggy.

To see the Appleberry promotion on Peggy’s website please follow this link
http://www.marykay.com/peggymanor/company/appleberry/default.aspx?ab=sm_appleberry

For all Mary Kay products please visit Peggy's website http://marykay.com/peggymanor Products may be ordered directly through the website and all major credit cards are accepted. Peggy will also be happy to help you with a makeover using the newest, most beautiful mineral powder foundations and mineral cheek and eye colors. These products contain vitamins that are good for the skin, are long-lasting and in a new range of colors. Elegant brushes and compacts are available with these new products as well.

Contact Peggy at peggymanor@marykay.com with questions or to arrange for a consultation.

Mary Kay is committed to Break the Cycle's® work of preventing domestic violence by providing education to young people so that they will be able to build more positive lives. Mary Kay, Inc is sponsoring a prevention curriculum and DVD which will be available to groups working with young people.

If you are a teacher, counselor, minister, parent or family member who might utilize this curriculum, please let me know and I will email you when the DVD becomes available. For more information visit the web site at http://www.breakthecycle.org/

Birthdays

Today is my only nephew's thirtieth birthday. Such a beautiful baby he was and it doesn't seem that long ago. (Although in some ways more than that, time is doing an elliptical thing on me now at my age.) Now he is the father of a baby who will soon be one year old himself. They are all in Toledo, celebrating this milestone birthday and a first wedding anniversary.

We are the old folks now, even though we don't feel that old. Just tired. I remember Mama and Papa on the day my nephew, their first grandchild, was born. They were so proud and pleased, wishing that 2500 miles didn't separate them from holding him and oohing and ahing. Those same miles separate me today, but with email, and digital cameras and youtube, we are only minutes, even milliseconds away.

As I have reveled in the pictures being sent back and forth this year, I have also dug out the old photos, sent by snail mail and just as eagerly awaited and enjoyed. The pictures of a tiny baby lying still curled up and with his tiny little perfect rump in the air. Later the toddler. One Halloween a little boy in a Davy
Crockett hat and costume, perfectly tucked away and waiting for him, saved by his father's mother. A mental image of a large pile of luggage piled into the garage and a small boy asking, "Aunt Maggie do you always travel with so much luggage?" "Only when I'm moving home, my dear." (An equally impressive amount of luggage and boxes and whatever filled the borrowed van when his parents moved him to collage fourteen years later.) A photo of a small boy getting on the school bus for the first time is followed by many Christmas and Easter photos with a pretty little sister, both in their holiday best.

One year when Toledo stores where depleted of that year's perfect toy, Papa and I scoured the stores out here and found He-Man's castle. Before it was sent on I had to play with it myself (just checking to make sure that all the parts were really there, you know.)

Baseball, basketball, football and finally Lacrosse filled my nephew's growing up years along with school, friends, family and Scouts. One of my most cherished photos shows him with his parents on the occasion of his Eagle award. Now, I believe, he is leading a Cub Scout troop himself and coaching Lacrosse. Service is a family tradition as his Dad coached Little League and his Mom is still a scout leader.

Pictures of graduations have given way to one with a chocolate Labrador. That has finally given way to the picture on my dining room table. Taken on the beach at Key West it shows a handsome and confident young man with his beautiful new wife. I love you both. Happy birthday, happy first anniversary and many more. May you grow in love and peace.

Gardens

This is one view of my basil plants. They make a privacy screen of sorts between my front gate and my front door.

The marjoram has grown to be quite a pretty plant.

I am already dreaming of what will come next. Fall and winter vegetables would be good. I dream of kale and chard and onions and even more herbs. For next spring and summer flax and wheat and amaranth and teff--just enough of these major grain plants to have a demonstration garden that I can photograph for my writing and designs. I also want to put in a cover crop in the front yard, but finding helpers to do that may be too difficult. The front yard looks abandoned and it needs to be double-dug, not an easy task in hard, baked-clay soil.

It is amazing what sun, water, a good pot full of good soil and some tending will do for a plant. This marjoram was one of seven baby herbs given to me by a friend in a wonderful long planter that I still hope to use to grow scallions, radishes and carrots nearby where I can tend to them.

I think that the heat did in the beans. They were beautiful and delicious while they lasted. I hope for more next year.

I am setting up a Squidoo lens on Healing and Herbs and another on the mMeaning of Herbs. For like flowers, herbs also carry meanings that are symbolic--give your love basil along with the roses and the flowers can go in a jar while the basil goes into the blender to be made into dinner. Both signify love.

I am grateful to be recovering the garden and the lore that I spent time learning in the 1980's--two decades ago. It seems longer, but time is becoming compressed now--a sign that it will be time for me to go.

Prayer for a Farmer or Gardener

Last week while I sweltered, my plants throve. Basil is large and green and the best I have ever had. Marjoram in her pot looks almost as full and pretty as she would in a lovely well mulched spot in the ground. The roses are blooming. Indoors, each of the little pots in which I planted seeds a week and a half ago has baby plants in it.

The sea breeze, one of the most beneficent aspects of the climate where I live is blowing in on me as I write this. The house is a temperature that would be almost perfect any time of the year and wouldn't be anywhere near this warm in the winter.

Yesterday as I sorted a collection of holy cards that I have had for more than fifteen years, I came across one that has a prayer on the back titled, "Prayer of the Christian Farmer and Gardener". It seems like a suitable prayer to share in light of the weather disasters of June in the Midwest and California.

"O God, Source and Giver of all things, Who does manifest Thy infinite majesty, power and goodness in the earth about us, we give You honor and glory.

For the sun and the rain, for the manifold fruits of our fields, for the increase of our herds and flocks, we thank You. For the enrichment of our souls with divine grace, we are grateful.

Supreme Lord of the harvest, graciously accept us and the fruits of our toil, in union with Christ, Your Son, as atonement for our sins, for growth of Your Church, for peace and charity in our homes, for salvation to all. Amen."

That we have clement weather, rain in due season and respite from heat and from fire, from flood and from wind I pray. I am grateful tonight for cooler weather and for the friends who are making my beautiful garden possible and a blessing to me. Thank you all.

Saturday Blessings

Today's weather has been a blessing--summer at its absolute best! If it would just stay like this, I don't think many people would mind.

As I write I am looking out at my porch, the bag of potting soil under the potting bench, the basil plants in their pots on the top of it, tall enough now to begin forming a privacy screen between my half gate and my screen door. The rose bush that was looking most scraggly and shabby has come back beautifully in a bigger pot, fresh soil and a little shade. It is blooming prettily with pink roses.

The Mr. Lincoln is rapidly outgrowing its pot and will have to have a new one. (I think this is something like kids with school shoes. Every time you turn around they need new ones.) It is reaching toward the sky too and if each of the six buds it currently has mature, I will have six more magnificent and fragrant roses. M chose well when she picked this out for me last year.

The economic news this evening and yesterday has been so scary that I just cried and changed the channel to the weather channel. I can't believe the egregious stupidity and greed that went into making this mess and how much we are all going to suffer before it is over. Regulation and stability would make so much more sense.

On a lighter note I have added another goodie to my ultimate gadget wish list. Remote control for my bedroom drapes and I think it is within reach of my budget! Yippie skippie as my Mary Kay director says.

Over all I am grateful.

More Gadgets and Gizmos

The heat should abate today and just about everyone in the area is talking about it. How to cool the house more effectively? Today my neighborhood email list had a marvelous post from the President of our Neighborhood Association detailing all the various kinds of air-conditioning. There are many choices short of the costly solution of full air.

I am thinking about a ceiling fan or a roof exhaust fan to pull the hot air out of the house. Basically, if I can gain a few degrees I can stop fearing the heat exhaustion that inevitably sets in after several days of this. Ideally I would like something solar powered to make it not dependent on the power grid.

More fans are definitely in the offing. The ones that are small personal fans that run on batteries have struck me in the past as toys. Still they would be a back-up in case of a power outage.

The most decidedly low-tech cooling solution is dousing my hair in cold water in the morning. Personal evaporative cooling, stays with me in any room of my house. In addition, a long piece of discarded t-shirt fabric wrung out in cold water is draped around my neck.

Now if I could figure out a way to cool the computer!

More when the weather is cooler. I am grateful that I am surviving and that the fog is on the way!

Gadgets and Gizmos

The day went by quickly yesterday even though it was so hot. Today it will be hotter. A friend has lent me a spray mister that has a small, but powerful and effective fan for trial use. (I think I am going to buy one.) When I first saw it, I thought it looked kind of weird and awkward. It is an absolute Godsend. Everyone should have one. It is low tech, doesn't require electricity--survival in case of a power outage and is portable.

Right now at around 8:00 am it is cooler outside by five degrees than it is inside. Cool air is blowing in on me thanks to one of three box fans of varying age that I have in the house. These are fairly low tech too, actually. Faithful and simple in design they plug along year after year. Of course, they don't get used all year round. It doesn't feel like it could possibly become as hot as it is slated to be, but it will, so I need to run around the house closing windows behind me as I go. (Image a slightly elderly lady wheeling around her house wielding a cane. No she is not bats, nor is she chasing anything, the cane allows her to reach her window cranks and open and close, close and open. Tedious, but low tech, adaptable and effective.)

The "new" --nearly ten years old now, but I still think of it as new--furnace came with a programmable thermostat. I am tempted to put a piece of tape over the display. Do I really want to know how hot it is at the end of the day? Won't make me any cooler, but I can't resist looking at it.

My last gadget for this post is a lovely absolutely darling, kitchen toy er tool that scoops cookie dough in just perfect balls to plop on the baking sheet. It is a Pampered Chef goodie and may be ordered by clicking on the link to the right that goes to my niece, Jennifer Knapp's Pampered Chef site. (Shameless plug over.)