Stream of Consciousness

Heavenly Hostas!

                                                   
Those who are awake live in a state of constant amazement.
—The Buddha

Since the sun returned, I've been out in our shade garden weeding, pruning, raking, yanking out the overly-zealous day lilies and then planting a few new lovelies including several clematis along the side path's fence, nasturtiums, geraniums in window boxes, a silvery dianthus and a miniature geranium you can actually walk on, another lily of the valley, a coral bells called "Firefly" that is supposed to be a magnet for hummingbirds, and a host of heavenly hostas with really gorgeous names like Elegans, Kressa Cream Edge, Blue Cadet, Stained Glass and June, the specimen featured above. Oh yeah and let's not forget last year's lilliputian, Elvis Lives. Who knew the plantain lily would become my new favorite plant? 

Purple Petunias, Blue Hydrangeas, and Macaroni and Cheese

If you take care of each moment, you will take care of all time.

- The Buddha

It's nearly nine p.m., a July summer night. I'm sitting out in our garden on one of the new chairs that go with the new table where four can comfortable sit, even eat—en plein air entertaining finally and at long last. It's actually quite nice to have a large enough table. I put hydrangea in a vase in the center and even with my sunset clutter—telephone, two magazines, a glass of white wine—there's still plenty of room to breathe. Even my pink and orange oilcloth from Corvallis days fits. Maybe this will become my new summer writing room. Especially this time of day when the sun is nearly down and there's no glare on the iBook screen.

I continue to be the woman now with only 23 teeth. With a hole in my upper left mouth where tooth #13, the molar just after my canine, has gone missing, victim to an ancient filling that led to a too-deep-to-fix crack. When I smile, I truly look like a character out of Deliverance. I get to live on "spoonable" foods for two weeks. Fruit and yogurt smoothies. Mashed potatoes. Soups. Tonight I whipped up a many days supply of macaroni and cheese. Next week, I head back to the periodontist for a check-up then a week later (I think) stitches come out. This is all about putting a flap of skin over my existing bone (which was luckily in better shape than the dentist anticipated so I did not need an extra infusion of freaky cow bone) which will then grow and strengthen enough, I guess, to hold a screw which can hold an implant which can then take, finally, next February or March a freaking crown. All for the price of a small used car. Welcome to health care in America. 

I continue to hole up in our wonderful home now with a hole (of sorts in my mouth.) The standard poodle/poodles two doors down is/are out doing their lovely (not!) annoying bark. Life in the city. In the Corvallis woods, it was the hoot of the great horned owl. 

The sun over the Columbia is westward ho, lilac tonight and the palest white and orange, edging toward indigo. I can still see the reflection of the Y-shaped trunk of one of our big leaf maples in the smooth old glass of our bedroom window. I can hear one of the ice cream mini-vans or cars wending its way on a nearby street. Why is that such a happy sound? Birds do their evening singsong thing, the freight train down on Lombard lumbers past. The winds rustles the branches of the trees. 

I walked to Alberta today to buy cat food. Noticed an orange-backed ladybug on the arm of one of our new chairs. Planted purple petunias in between the orange and red and pink impatiens out front below the Obama yard sign. Strung laundry out on the driveway retractable line. There were poems in the works, too, today's two about Bob Dylan in a way, of all odd things. I whipped up macaroni and cheese from scratch, whole wheat elbows, the top a bread crumb and fresh savory and marjoram from our herb-garden-in-training in the driveway's pots. 

I called my Los Angeles son and left a jokey message about my missing tooth. I read movie reviews in the two issues of the New Yorker that arrived today. Who knows what that delay was about? I watered flowers, washed dishes, scooped food into bowls for the cats. Listened to k.d. lang's wonderful songs by Canadians. Damn, I love that CD. Picked a spider from my older Cape May sweatshirt as I'm sitting here now, and still the daylight is just starting to fade enough to warrant lighting my campfire, as I call it, my various garden candle holders and votives. 

Most of my relatives on my father's side were missing teeth. That thought occurred to me earlier today as I was continuing the journey of getting used to the gap on the upper left side of my mouth. A tiny voice in my head saying something like, "Who do you think you are, missy? None of us escape what we come from, our fate." There are days when I think I have so much to atone for—the way I ran, the way I dismissed those folks, the embarrassment I so often felt mixed with the confusion of the intense love and devotion I also felt for those people. The generation before my parents, my father's people, all living there almost in a communal household in the small house on Shonk Street in Plymouth. For quite a while now, that entire world has been long gone. And now here I am, edging into my middle 50s, three thousand miles away from home, that home, wondering at least once a day how did I get here. Wondering at least once each day how much time I have left. Wondering if those people, my family on Shonk Street, wondered the same thing in between their stories(as they called soap operas) in the afternoon, in between the endless pots of coffee made for Uncle Jackie and the carefully planned trips to the Acme for their weekly "order" that also included his Chase and Sanborn and Viceroy cigarettes. Friday night fish dinners from B&Js, the bar on the corner, were maybe their only weekly treat. Did they sit in that house, not unlike post-modern, far-removed me, wondering as well when, when, when? 

Today, as I walked, I listened to the tiny iPod shuffle. Bob Dylan came on. It's not dark yet, but it's getting there. That's where I sit right now, waiting, watching the day's last light fade. Pretty soon I will need to kick in my touch typing skills in order to see the keyboard. A nice way to end a quiet, un-busy day. It is, however, quite remarkable how long one can sit outside and still see light in the sky...

A Summer Morning...

The present moment is a powerful goddess. —Goethe

It's Friday. The sun has been shining for days. The day lilies opened yesterday while our new driveway gate/fence was being installed. Gorgeous shadows from the maple tree branches fall across its wood. The hydrangeas looked especially blue and pale purple this morning while the computerized irrigation system was doing its automatic thing. Later, it will heat up but right now it's about perfect, no humidity and just a bit above 60 degrees Fahrenheit. Tonight, there's a free concert in Fernhill Park, The LaRhonda Steele Band, soulful R&B. We'll pack a picnic and walk there and see what it's all about.  

What Constitutes a Good Day...

Today I made a conscious effort to change some of how I do things rather than fixate on what I do and be all crabby about not doing enough, being disciplined, etc. (my usual state). I tried to focus my morning journal pages rather than letting them descend into the negative and pointless. I wrote several post cards and even a few letters to friends. I sorted a pile on my desk which included an unopened letter from which I learned that a friend's mother had died back in March. Which led to another letter to that friend to offer condolences and explain my belated response to her news. I ate protein for a late breakfast (broccoli and leek quiche that I threw together last night—love those whole wheat frozen crusts at New Seasons) which meant I was then able to easily do the power walk to/from the grocery, the pharmacy (needed my Vitamin D supplements after learning about my deficiency on Wednesday) and Winston's to check in on their remodeling project.   

Then back to find two boxes tucked into the privet underneath the mailbox. Bamboo and a money tree -- feng shui housewarming/good luck gifts from L., one of my oldest friends from back in Plymouth, Pennsylvania days. What a delight. I unpacked them both. The bamboo looks super on the oak sideboard in the living room and the money tree in its funky vase found a perfect home in the teal-and-yellow bathroom. This led to writing another note of thanks to L. and her husband and daughter for this unexpected, thoughtful gift. Then I called a friend and gabbed with her while I weeded and scraped moss from the bricks that line the pathways in the garden that's our back yard. After that? Some newspaper skimming and Portland's 89.1 jazz station tuned in on the radio. 

I didn't write today, above and beyond those journal pages and letters. 

I didn't read much (yet) above and beyond the newspaper.

I ate two healthy meals (so far), exercised, and got through another annual mammogram exam. 

I unloaded and loaded a dishwasher. 

I stopped at the dry cleaner on MLK and the PO on Killingsworth. 

I watched a YouTube video of a guy popping on So You Think You Can Dance, sent by a friend along with a schtick about aging by George Carlin.

I read an article in the New York Times about our neighborhood here in Portland, and the attempts of the Restorative Listening Project to get folks to talk about race relations, gentrification, among other things. 

I ordered a yard sign from Obama '08 after I learned from the guy selling Obama stuff outside of the PO that yard signs are in short supply and people are even having them stolen from their yards! 

I'm not up at Last Thursday on Alberta Street this evening because I find I weary of the social, chitchat energy as the sun starts to set. Added to the fact that I am weary of venturing out into the world solo and alone. 

Part of me wishes I had more pep to make the scene, whatever that means these days. "When I was younger..." that's what I start to think. But that's not me anymore. I'm now this person who prefers solitude, and quiet, and lots of uninterrupted, peaceful stretches in my day. This slow-settling evening quiet time here alone with cats, inside this lovely home, after watering the New Guinea impatiens and dumping the weeds into the yard waste container in the garage. The person contemplating ordering a pizza from Hot Lips because I now live in the city and they deliver, wonder of wonders. 

Happy to share photos of our wonderful garden and home with a few friends. Glad to have landed, to be able to feather our nest. 

Saturday Night Thunderstorm Blues

After a day spent outside, much fun with gardening, puttering with house chores while surrounded by sun and shadows and the happy red of geraniums in window boxes, we're now having one of those rare Pacific Northwest thunder-and-lightning fests this eve. I think since we moved here ten years ago this is maybe #4 or #5 -- that's how rare. But before the rain and fireworks began, the skies were gorgeous: violet, orange, mauve, salmon, and a muted rainbow. How fabulous is that? 

Another work outside day because the sun and clear skies were unexpected. So, more pruning, more pole pruning of the giant Oregon maples that offer a green-dappled canopy over our back yard garden. Re-painting of the back garden furniture. Window cleaning. Scrubbing and then painting of the front door steps. Replacing the terra cotta pots of geraniums, begonias, and the gerbera daisy on the freshly greened steps. Dinner and then a sunset passegiatta around the Woodlawn neck of our neighborhood woods. A good, simple, hard-working, easy day. 

Another friend's parent died this morning. We seem to have clearly entered that phase of life. Passages, losses, transitions, mourning. Still, a violet-and-salmon sunset can bewitch and beguile. 

 

Here We Are in the Years...

We took our time today.  I woke late.  Ate lunch instead of breakfast. Before we headed off in separate, no-map-needed directions on errands: John to the cantina, the Billa supermercato, the ufficio postale while I ventured to the lirbreria a.k.a. bookstore to score one of the fairly hot-off-the-presses Molskine guides to Venezia to use as my journal-of-record of this trip. John admitted later than somehow, mapless, he got lost on his way back from his sojourn. I, on the other hand, did my tour of the arty shoppes in Campo Carmini and San Margherita, just before everybody closed their doors for Monday's extendo-lunch.

Afternoon brought major gray and downpour rains. John napped while I sped through Joseph Brodsky's paean to Venice, Watermark.  An odd, not entirely appealing little book. Then we suited up with string bag and Euros to head out to the Punto for  more lunch fixings before an African drum and dance concert at 6 pm.  We detoured into a church in an adjoining campo  (of course, and why not?) killing time before the concert -- San Pantalon was another obscure Catholic who saved Venetians from the plague and thus won canonization for his heroic efforts.  The ceiling paintings in the church were opulent and remarkable. Sadly, their painter, Fumiari, died from a scaffold fall after 24 years working on his art. Who is the barber here, really?

I love drumming, corny and hippie-ish as that sounds to admit. I may take it up once and for all when we get back to Portland, Oregon Country Fair drumming circle be damned. What was cool about the event in San Margherita was that, indeed, novices from the audience were invited to drum on in.  I loved watching the facial expressions of the amateurs as they figured out how to get into the rhythmic groove -- disbelief, tentativeness, weird, serendipitous happiness. Many people on their way to somewhere else seemed to interrupt the flow of their days to stop and listen to the music. Kids and hipster teens from the university moved along with the beat. The bells never stopped.

We're off by train to Padua to see Giotto's frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel tomorrow. A grand day out, all of 12 miles away.  St. Anthony's tongue and larynx will also be treats in Il Santo after our art history tour. It doesn't get much better than this!

Crisp and Clear

Arctic chill has blanketed our corner of Oregon. Winds are stirring the firs and sequoias, up from the Columbia River which isn't that far from our house. Even around the summit of Mt. Hood, it's so clear you can see the snow swirl. Bright blue sky by day, bright white full moon at night. The kind of brisk that makes you feel achingly good and tired after a walk. Chill that makes you glad to be able to stay in a warm inside.

A woman behind the deli counter at New Seasons is wearing a skirt made of knotted scarves, all different colors and lengths, tied to a belt or waistband and this get-up over tights or a pair of pants. A white truck spent a good part of the afternoon in the driveway of our new house. When I headed out to walk earlier, it was rumbling down the street past here. Rhododendrons are starting to bud, as well as other shrubs that I don't yet recognize along a few houses on my walk. How can it be the 3rd week of January and hinting at spring? That's what I love about living out here. The overall temperateness. Even with a few days, or a week, of temperatures that barely climb above freezing, a purple primrose and a red rosebud bloom.

Down By the River

We spent today with wonderful friends. One is moving to Portland for four months for a job. We walked around his new neighborhood, pointing out sights, checking out the basketball arena, enduring the chill winds about to arrive—Arctic, we hear. J. took this photo of a grain elevator with an ad for the Portland Trailblazers emblazoned on its side. Great to walk, talk, laugh, chat. We are all a bit like pioneers in this livable city, open eyes and making our way.

Olive Oil and Tea Lights

What a whirl life has been of late! It is barely five days since we had an offer accepted on a beautiful home barely two blocks down the street from where we currently live. The way it all unfolded had such an air of the "meant to be" about it; it's already revelatory in the looking-back at what happened, not to see signs and portents at every step of the way...

We'd seen a house over the weekend that looked promising and were thinking of making a low-ball offer on that. There were issues—punky wooden siding, a 70-year old oil furnace and requisite buried tank, and the whole mystery of who, really, has owned the place since it changed hands last May. Then, on Monday, Jan 7th, another promising house came on the market. I did a drive-by, we got our realtor to take us to tour it, and we decided to put in an offer on that. Again, slightly lower than asking price but we are in, after all, an alleged buyers' market. Tuesday, January 8th brought acceptance of our offer by the divorcing sellers. All that was needed was the signature of the selling wife. But she was at work and her realtor didn't want to disturb her? Then our realtor mentioned word of another, higher offer having come in. Hmm. Something fishy. Needless to say, the Is didn't get dotted and the Ts crossed that night. The next morning, still no word. By that point, I had started to have cold feet. Worrying we'd acted too hastily, worrying I didn't really want to live in the Wilshire part of town, sad to be leaving behind this neck of the woods I've grown quite fond of.

The sun was out so I decided I had to get out on a walk. We needed bulk olive oil so I struck out for the co-op on Alberta Street, an empty Muir Glen pasta sauce jar for the oil in my white string bag. I turned my cell phone's ringer on in case our realtor would call with an update. I headed down 22nd Ave. A "For Sale" sign—it wasn't there the day before, I swear—was on a house barely two blocks away. I walked down the driveway (no one appeared to be home) and had my breath taken away by the sight of the gorgeous garden (complete with Buddha) there. There were fussy-looking curtains on many of the windows so I told myself it was probably one of those "old-lady" houses in need of major fixing up. So I walked on.

At the co-op, I also found and bought twenty tea light candles to go in the rainbow-glass votives that sit on the window sill near the dining table. Just a few days before, when I put the last five into the colored glass holders, I'd been wondering where I would get more of them. I came home via Alberta Street. It felt so great to be up there. People at coffee shops, restaurants, all kinds of stores selling hip clothes, plants, office supplies, Mexican food. I think I was feeling even more regret about leaving behind this neck of Northeast Portland.

On 22nd again, across the street from Alberta Park, the phone rang and it was our realtor. Indeed, the sellers had let our offer expire, opened the 2nd one, it was higher and wanted to take that. They'd give us a chance to match their offer. I knew J. wouldn't go for that and, truth to tell, after my revelatory walk to and from the co-op, I felt relieved. I walked down 22nd and talked on the cell phone, something I rarely do, until I was pretty much across the street from the house-with-for-sale-sign I'd seen earlier. Before the conversation was over, I'd already told our realtor the address of the new listing and asked her to see what she could find out.

When we talked next, we decided to go look at the new house that afternoon. The minute our realtor opened the side door and I saw the 1930s retro kitchen, I was hooked.

John felt the same way when he stepped into the house later that day, at dusk. We decided to make an offer that night. The next day, I went to the cinemas inside Lloyd Center Mall (where there's a skating rink, the one where Tonya Harding used to practice) to see Atonement at the noon matinee. I figured it would kill time and thus take my mind off the stress of waiting for our realtor to let us know if the sellers had accepted our offer. Just as Vanessa Redgrave is making her speech in the closing moments of the movie, I saw my cell phone light up and heard its vibrating buzz. I chose art over commerce and waited for the movie to end!

It was indeed E. telling us our offer had been accepted. And that two more appointments to show the house were already scheduled for that evening. She was on her way to get me at the mall cinema. She pulled up as I emerged from the mall doors. We jetted over the Burnside Bridge to then meet J. at his office downtown. We signed the acceptance offer in Lorne and Dottie's coffee shop, forty minutes after the sellers had signed their papers. E. headed back to her office to fax the paperwork to the other realtors. I walked to the light rail stop by J.'s work and rode the train across the river, back to Lloyd Center where I'd left the truck in the outdoor parking lot. The sky was tinted rose; a yellow-and-gray barge made its way down the Willamette, the water in front of its prow parting in a perfect V. I thought, this is where I live, this is my home, my new city. How great is that?

And what if I hadn't decided to head up to Alberta Street to get $7 worth of bulk olive oil and twenty tea lights? It's hard not to feel an inevitability about the way the events around us finding our new home unfolded. So now the re-packing up begins...

Our Portland Clown Tree

Usually we have two holiday trees. But now that we live in the Little House in the Big City, that wasn't an option this year. Also, neither of us were in the holiday mood, for a whole host of defensible reasons. So, not long after my St. Nicholas Day birthday, we headed up to Alberta Street and bought the top of a Douglas fir tree for $10 from a crew of holy rollers who've taken over the side yard at what used to be the Clown House until the clowns—they were like Jesus without the good intentions—had to move because the rent went up.

A clown tree from the former Clown House doesn't deserve fancy decorations. While I put a few of my fancier Czech and German hand blown ornaments here and there amongst the branches, mostly we have the kitsch and schlock adorning the branches this year. This includes the corn husk ornament named Fart made by my son in 1st or 2nd grade (and later chewed by G's maniac dog, Sati). John's son's paper wreath and his paper fireplace (faded construction paper from 1984) and assorted glass balls with glitter names of assorted people on them compliments of John's daughter and Elmer's glue. There are glitter tiaras from the turn of the century celebrations, 1999 to 2000, and a ruby glitter slipper that reminds one of Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz. We have not one but three maybe FOUR Elvis Presley-related items. And my 1959 Barbie doll's head (chewed by a different dog, don't ask!) on the top instead of a star. And the Barbie ornament bought for $2 at the Ithaca Woolworth's and wrapped by our Elmira, New York movers in layers and layers of bubbles, more than the Tiffany lampshade in its thin piece of newsprint in the same box.

Glass icicles. Green, red, and silver glitter-covered strings of beads. Balinese wooden puppet ornaments. Origami. Light in the primary colors of the rainbow. A potato, a pickle, a tiny green frog. Carved gourds made in the mountains of Peru. A red AIDS ribbon. White stars and birds for peace and joy and happiness in the coming year. 3-D glasses. Need I add more?