Breaking Glass Therapy

Some memories drift across my brain like a simple whistled melody.  Others are more like being suddenly run over by a marching band.  I had two of the second variety this morning.
I killed a coffee mug.  It splattered glass all over the kitchen and while I was cleaning it up I said, "We're just normal people.  We have supper."
I spoke a memory of my father saying that in a grouchy voice when I was a teenager.  I had asked what we were having for dinner and that somehow ticked him off - my use of dinner instead of supper.
Whenever Papa rose his voice - or worse - spoke in that angry voice that wasn't loud - big fear filled my chest and tears started filling my eyes.  I had to be careful not to let those tears spill because that would only make things worse.
Let me assure you, my father never hit me, or grounded me, or punished me in anyway except with his voice, his words, and his eyes.  I would have rather he'd knock me across the room.
Sometimes, my transgressions or my possible transgressions were obvious.  "If I hear there was alcohol at that party, you might as well never come home."  Or "Don't you even have enough of a brain to come in out of the rain?"  Or the really horrible, "Don't make me ashamed."
But why, this morning, while on my hands and knees with a brush and a dustpan, did the dinner vs supper memory kick me in the head?
And you know what I thought?  I thought, "Well that was just a foolish thing to terrify your daughter over."  It was't until then that I realized my father's anger that day had absolutely nothing to do with me.  He probably had a headache, or maybe a bad day at work, or who knows.  But it wasn't about me.   Still whenever a man raises his voice, I'm frozen with that fear.  Hmmmm.  I think I'm over that now.

The second memory came while I was looking at the floor with my less than acute vision, trying to find any little shards of glass my first two sweepings had missed.  Suddenly I was about five years old with my little broom and dustpan and I was "helping" Mom sweep the kitchen floor.  She had a nice pile of crumbs and stuff in her dustpan and I didn't have much at all in mine.  I asked her why she could find more dirt than I could and she sort of laughed and said, "I have years of experience."
That one was a happy memory of Mom and me.  I haven't had enough of those lately.  Just think!  I probably saved myself years of therapy with one broken coffee mug.

I'm grateful.

Some Good Shit

I am assuming that anyone who reads Fay's Of Life already recycles metal, glass, plastic and paper. If you don't, please stop right now and spank your butt.  However, there's more you can do to spare landfills and sewage systems while getting black gold for your garden.  You've gotta compost, Baybees!  Composting can be as simple or as complicated as you want to make it.  I am currently doing number two (on a one to ten simplicity scale, of course.)
The easiest way I've ever composted involved my chooks and sheep.  Back in the day, I had a beautiful cedar hen house, with a goodly number of girls happily living there.  They ran around and ate bugs of all varieties and anything green they could get their smiling beaks on. Such beautiful, big eggs they gave us with such bright orange yolks!
I also had a goodly number of sheep, who would also eat anything that grew within reach.  Both groups ate any vegetable or fruit scraps I had, trimmings from the veggie garden, plant-based leftovers, and the veggie/fruit trimmings and stale bread from the organic grocery where I baked.
Then they pooped.
The poop went onto a pile where it cooled down a bit before getting tilled into the huge veggie garden, causing the plants to be incredibly happy and produce lots of veggies which the man and I ate and shared with the chickens and the sheep.   See how that works.  Sort of a big circle.  Veggie - chicken/sheep - poop - soil - veggie.
I know, I know, it's brilliant, but trust me, I'm not the one who invented it.  Mother had it all figured out.
Luckily, one can still easily compost without the benefit of sheep or hens.  Now I have a big black container.  If you have so much money that it's clogging your pores, you can buy a fancy schmancy compost bin.  You can also use a garbage can.  Gourd knows, the suckers are made of plastic and will probably still be here when the dinosaurs roam the planet again, but they exist and you might as well put one to good use.
First cut the bottom out of it and find a nice place in your yard to put it.  Put it where it's going to soak up sunshine and get mighty hot inside.  Rot likes hot.  And ya gotta have the rot.  Cut some vents in the sides because rot likes air, too.
Next, forget you have a garbage disposer.  When you peel veggies or fruit, put the bits in a container of some kind.  If you have more money than you know what to do with, send some to me.  Then buy some fancy schmancy compost collecting crock.  Otherwise a coffee can works fine.  You aren't going to keep it around long enough to stink up your house.  Then you put all compostable stuff in that coffee can and empty it in the compost bin every evening after dinner and before the news.

GOOD FOR THE CAN

any veggie or fruit bits

egg shells that have been crushed

stale bread (go ahead and tear it up if it's a whole baguette)

coffee grounds and paper filters 

leftover coffee

leftover wine (hahahahaha. . . who has leftover wine!)

tea bags

bad birthday cake

BAD FOR THE CAN

any part of a dead animal

gravy (it's got dead animal in it)

eggs 

anything so toxic that you shouldn't be ingesting it anyway (sweet drinks, soda, candy)

anything dairy (good gourd, I hope you know what dairy is)

You will also add stuff like lawn clippings (which of course you will not have poisoned with chemicals because if you have you can't be my friend), leaf mulch, the soft clippings from your hedges,  the flowers your sweetie got you that have turned yucky, saw dust, twigs.  Basically you can compost all the stuff you might have been burning or putting in those big plastic bags.  You want to keep the composting material moist.  You don't want it sitting in water, but you don't want it to dry out, either.

Go to your garden center and get a bag of lime.  Not fancy schmancy granulated schmanulated lime, just plain ol' powdered lime stone. (The limes that go with margaritas can also go into the compost.)  Every now and then sprinkle some of that lime on top of what's in your bin.  Use enough to make the surface look like about 1/4" of snow fell onto grass.  The lime helps stuff decompose and that's what we're after here.

Now here's the real poop on how to make great compost!  You need manure.  Preferably bird or ruminant manure.  Find a friend with chickens or sheep, goats, or cows, and ask them very nicely if you can have some shit.  They will probably tell you to come and get it.  If you have no friends of this quality, you can buy some composted manure at your garden store.  It's a sad thing, but you can do it. If you know of a park with geese, you can go scoop up goose poop.  Many people will stay far away from you and snicker, but no one will stop you.  

GOOD POOP

cow

bull (that's a boy cow)

steer (that's a sort of boy cow)

sheep

goat

chicken

turkey

parakeet

alligator

turtle

gold fish

llama 

OKAY POOP

horse

pig (only happy, free range pigs)

BAD POOP

dog

cat

people

raccoon 

Why are some poops better than others?  I'm glad you asked that, Cindy.  Ruminants, such as cattle, sheep, and goats, have four stomachs and cameldae, such as llamas, alpacas, and camels, have three. This gives their bodies a lot of opportunity to digest seeds and stuff.  So while you can use happy pig poop and horse shit in your compost, you might just end up with some dandelion seeds in it.  However, the compost will probably get hot enough to burn most of them off anyway.  

I reckon birds grind up any seeds they eat in their gizzards.  By the way, do you know why birds eat tiny rocks?  (FInd the answer at the end of this educational essay.)  Usually, if you are collecting crap from feathered friends, you'll get some straw, or newspapers or something with it.  That's just a bonus that can go right into the compost bin. 

You don't want to use the bad poop because that's just gross.  That poop contains e. coli and other nasty germs.  We like good, clean compost. 

Newspaper, corrugated cardboard, and paper that isn't shiny and that is printed with soy ink, can all be easily composted, however it only adds bulk and not much in the way of nutrients.  But what the heck.  You may also want to add a shovel or three of good looking dirt into your bin.  Use some real dirt that has some life in it.  If you find worms,  that's good soil!  That will kick up the life in your compost more quickly.

You need to stir that compost up.  You want to make sure the soggy cucumber gets mixed in with the leaf mulch and the llama poopy.  How often you'll do this is equal to your desire for great compost.  Every 3.6 weeks should do it if you're lazy.  The easiest way I've found to do this is to lift the bin right up off the lawn and move it over a space then sort of reload it randomly with your pitch fork.  

YES!  Composters get to use pitchforks!

You'll want to keep a eye on what's happening in your compost.  Does it look happy?  Is it well mixed?  Is it moist but not runny?  When you stir is a good time to remove things such as corn cobs or avocado pits from the mix, or anything big like that that you thought might, but actually isn't breaking down.  You will notice that your compost is hot or warm.  That's good.  It should be. There's a lot of stuff going on in there. 

When will it be done?  I'm glad you asked that, Timmy.  It will be done when you're ready to use it, actually.  You are your own compost king, so that stuff will be done when you say it's done.  One day you'll be stirring your compost and you'll notice that the stuff on the bottom is looking like dirt.  That's because it is dirt, so use it.

However, it will be optimum when it looks like beautiful, black loam.  You can get as anal about this as you want.  You can buy a fancy schmancy sifter if your excess money is causing you to lose sleep at night. Or you can just sort of pull out the bits that aren't beautiful, black loam yet.  Or you can just till it all into your garden, what the heck, it'll breakdown eventually.  

You can find all sorts of recipes about ratios of brown to green to manure, blah, blah, blahhhhh.  Like I said, you can make composting as crazy as you'd like.  I don't believe in recipes.  They slow me down, but if you actually measure your flour when you bake bread and stuff, you might want to read one of the more OCD guides to composting as well.

I hope you'll all remember that though at first, composting may seem a little dirty or nasty, Mother Nature created composted to be a beautiful activity between gardeners and their gardens.  There is nothing shameful or sinful about composting.

So get out there and shovel that good shit.  You'll be glad you did.

* answer:    because they can't eat big ones.

Almost Home

Recently I was trying to think where "Home" is for me. I've lived in some great places. Northside of Chicago, in an apartment I'm sure I could never afford now, way UpNort where no one bothers to consider "wind chill," Milwaukee ya betcha, in a cabin on a ridge in Appalachia, a farmette in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, and now in SC. I grew up in Mayberry Carthage, Illinois and raised my kids in the belly button of Illinois. I just couldn't quite put my finger on where Home is.
I loved the never ending excitement and collection of cultures of Chicago. The food and music of Milwaukee were great. I love thinking of our first crooked apartment while at University. Ha! Plaid flannel curtains. Just thinking about the sunsets over the lake and the calm of canoeing the Eau Claire UpNort does something fluttery to my heart. Remembering my hometown - the safety, the neighborhood kids, climbing trees and riding horses - it's like a warm quilt on a winter night. Oh, and the way the fog filled the New River Valley and looked like snow from my cabin in Appalachia - took my breath away. Holding the new lambs in Virginia, collecting eggs from all my named hens, mmmmm. All of these places come with memories that touch my soul. But they don't fit with "Home." They fit with Almost Home

I know I felt a pull when in Southern Illinois a couple of days ago I could look straight ahead and see the sky over the tall corn. Sort of like there was a giant magnet out there and my solar plexus was made of very light iron. I just dunno exactly where "out there" is. 
I felt that same sort of pull in the southwest of England on one lane roads winding through meadows of bluebells. And I felt it sitting in the Bush in Australia conversing with kangaroos. I certainly feel it sitting on huge granite boulders around my sister's house. I even felt it in the markets in China a bit. It felt like I belonged - or more like I could belong.  
Maybe I'll find Home yet. Or maybe my home is this beautiful blue planet. I know that I grow more heart whenever I leave part of it behind. And maybe the composite of Almost Homes IS my home. And maybe I just think too much. Ya reckon?
I'm grateful.

Holding Water in My Hands

July 28, 2016

Those of you who know me know that I am a bit of a freak when it comes to water conservation.  I have rain barrels cluttering up my back yard.  I save my bathwater to flush.  I lecture people on water conservation.

Last night I left the house on after watering the flower pots in the front yard.  It ran all night.  My husband found it this afternoon.  I'm crying.  It's not only for the waste of one of our most precious resources (can't drink oil) but because I forgot.  Again.

It's not the first time, either, though it's the first time for this long.  Once I found water overflowing from one sink to the other in the kitchen.  I couldn't even imagine why I was running water in the sink in the first place.

I was driving across town and my GPS dinged to inform me that I was entering a school zone.  I couldn't remember if school was in session.  What season were we in?  What month was this.  Of course, I eventually figured out it was summer.  It was about 98 degrees that day, after all.

James rarely lets me cook, and he says it's because he likes to cook, though we used to share that job. I have had to look in drawer after drawer in the kitchen to find the flatware.  Luckily, there aren't that many drawers, but that's something that used to be automatic.  Same goes for drinking glasses.  More than a few times I've opened the wrong bottom cabinet door and tossed in garbage.

I think about James, what he's going through, what he's going to be going through if this keeps up.  There is nothing fair about this.  He didn't sign up for this.  I think about my mother and how quickly she went from leaving the stove on to not remembering who I was.  This is what scares me.

I have a small aneurism, which they say has nothing to do with this dementia.  I would much rather have a big aneurism that would just burst as I was dancing or kissing or playing fetch with Margaret or holding my grand babies tightly.  It would be so  much more preferable to fading slowly away.

If I remember, I'll try to continue to post here as I go along.  If the worst happens, Devin, or Patrick or   JaGo (I've decided that's James' hip name) can publish it and perhaps it will help others understand how this feels.

Something that bothers me lately is my mood is a bit uncontrollably nasty.  I get meaner as the day wears on.  I want to think this is a normal reaction to having a bunch of yuckiness hanging over my head - you know - a normal reaction.  I'm afraid it's sundowning.

It's embarrassing to admit to all these failings of my brain, though I don't think it should be.  I mean if I had terminal toe cooties, I probably wouldn't be ashamed of it.  This disease is not my fault.  It's not.

On a lighter note, my hair is sort of grown back.  I had a hair person trim it up yesterday, so though it doesn't look good, at least it looks like it's this way on purpose.  The hair loss had nothing to do with anything except probably stress from watching my mother slide down hill and die.  

This whole situation is peppered with irony.  Not just dementia, but an aneurism that may be too small to kill me, but big enough to make me stupider.  A bit of redundancy don't you think?  My brain, my ability to think has always been my strong suit by a long shot.  Did I get face cancer?  pfffhththt. . . no, I get dementia.  Take away my strength, eh?  And now that my hair is growing back, what do you want to bet that surgeon (should he ever actually call me) wants to do a craniotomy and shave my head!

I'm feeling a bit sorry for my family and I'm pissed as hell, but mostly I am grateful.

The Outing

The Outing

Okay, now that my fam has all been informed, I see no reason not to put it out there (although many of my fam and friends think it's indiscrete or whatever, I reckon I can use all the support I can muster.)

The thing is my neurologist called me this a.m. and wanted to see me today. I said no can do, because I'd have to drive back and if a neurologist wants to see you today, it's probably not to give you an early birthday lava lamp. So I said, "Spill it."

For a neurologist, this person is very human. Very apologetic and sorry to tell me the news, which really sort of scared me for a second. But the good news is my heart is relatively strong and my carotids are clear. Bad news is that I have an aneurism (maybe two) in my brain. The badder news is that this hadn't anything to do with my other symptoms, most of all, memory loss. THAT is due to some dementia, probably early Alzheimer's.

Now isn't that a bitch?

I'm waiting on a call from a neurosurgeon for a consult. Think about that. First of all I've surely seen the only neurologist in the United States with a personality. I've never dated a surgeon with one. So what will a neurosurgeon be like? Not that I plan to date him or her. Just saying.

So I remember discussing with various friends at various times of my life, what would be the preferred way to die. Since adulthood my choices have always been the same: 1. Major heart attack while making love to Eric Clapton. 2. Being struck by lightening while making love to Eric Clapton. 3. Big ol' fat ass brain aneurism. . . . .
NEVER have I thought that dementia would be a great way to go, especially after watching Mom forget me, having her ask me what my name is, etc. I pretty much ruled out Alzheimer's as a preferred COD.

I've never been a great beauty, or a graceful dancer, or Betty Crocker or anything like that. But, I've always been really smart. So the thought of becoming less smart until I stupid my way to death is quite unappealing to me. MUCH less appealing than a big ass aneurism blowing. 

Evidently, Eric Clapton isn't reading in, dammit. (But if you are. . . well, call me)

So tonight I had a party of sorts. I invited a few friends to come over after work and be here as my husband got home from O Canada. I filled in the hubs, and then we had some company and Margaret took center stage getting to know her new Auntie Jonnie and Uncle Monty and remembering her Auntie Jan. Poor James had seconds before people got here to let things soak in. That was probably a poor decision on my part, but dang it, I needed to celebrate.

If I try to think of people I have known who've had more adventures, who've loved better, felt more deeply, or have just lucked out more than I when it comes to fam and friends, I can think of no one. I've had the life most people dream of. 

James cares for me and Margaret. We are such a blessed family. My grands, Bell and Bump are perfect and I love them more than I ever thought possible. My children - in spite of less than perfect mothering - have grown to be far ends of the perfection spectrum. I have friends - I'm talking real friends - around the planet and they will support me and love me through whatever comes. What more could a person ask? 

I continue to make plans and don't intend to let others opinions deter me from bliss, regardless of what initials they have behind their names. I am blessed beyond all reason. I am grateful.

Waiting as a Coping Mechanism

So I waited for a couple of weeks to hear from the neurosurgeon to whom my neurologist referred me. My sister kept saying, call them, call them. I said, that I though no news meant I was uninteresting and thus good news.

I finally called my neurologists's office and found that there had been "glitch" and my referral hadn't actually been sent yet. Okay this happens. But this is also the office that forgot to send me my test results and forgot to tel me about tests that were scheduled and I therefore missed. I'm thinking . . . .. . hmmmmmmm. Weak link there. 

So yeah. Maybe that's why I keep getting more and more unpleasant as the day goes on.

It's just that my friends Helen, and Edith., from a previous life (yes that would be Helen, Edith, and Phyllis) and I had already sort of planned that when we lost it, we'd have adjoining rooms in a nursing home. I mean, surely our names are already on the doors somewhere. We even had our roles planed out. Helen, who is about 6'1" was going to be the one who ripped off her clothes in the middle of the mall during outings. I was going to be the one who terrorized the young orderlies, pinching their behinds. I can't remember exactly what Edith was going to do, but as I recall it has something to do with breaking into the med room and making some interesting switcheroos. But unless Edith gets onto her assigned task soon, I'm going to be the one who gets kicked out for being a pain in everyone's behind.

It's not nice at all to have forgotten really important things. Not only things like what one should do first in the shower, or where the flatware is kept, but really precious things such as the first time I help Bump, and my mother's surprise 85th (I think it was) birthday party. What do you think memories such as those are worth? The more I think about it the angrier I get. Sometimes life presents some suckwad crap to each of us. 

But mostly I think it life has presented me with rope swings under blooming lilac trees, offices in cherry trees from which we could spit the pits at the inhibitors of other cherry tree offices. It's presented me with excellent music, amazing love, creme brûlée that made my eyes roll back in my head. I've held triplet lambs, trying to feed them all with two bottles and a finger, and I've reached under the surreal warmth and softness of a hen to collect uber fresh eggs. 

I've experienced the miracle of feeding my babies with milk made especially for them by my body - the very body that somehow grew those babies inside of it. Think about that! It will blow your mind.

If it pleases you, Mother of All, I would so very much like to hold on to those and a zillion other memories of miracles you've given me. Fireflies with aspirations of becoming stars. Books that have take me to other lives and other worlds, the love of my babies and my babies' babies. 

If it can't be, it can't be. I'll trust you you to know best what lessons I still have to learn. But oh, it's been so good. So amazing. Who could complain if this is all there is? Please forgive my greed for wanting even more in a world were I've had so many times more than my share of bliss. And please, Mother, help my friends understand that iI am fearless in the face of death. It's just another door. But to stay here and forget all your gifts. . . Oh, that would be so very sad. 

I trust you. And I am grateful and I know that it is arrogant of me to ask anything of One who has provided everything. But I am not wise yet. I ask for patience and continued Grace. 

Let it be. Amen. I am grateful.

Dear Therapist

I just read a beautiful blog "Bury" Onwritingbetweenthelines, by Angela Hart.  She shared her feelings around the green burial of her mother, my friend, Christiane.   It said so much.

It said so much about the death of a mother that I wish I felt.  I just don't.  I am really pissed at myself because I don't feel the appropriate things.  Chris was just a few years older than I and my mom was 93, but I say that more as a weak excuse than a legitimate reason for the difference.

Don't get me wrong, I have crying spells and times when I really want to punch a wall.  I remember when Papa died, about 20 years ago, I did punch walls.  I knocked a couple of good holes in the bathroom wall and when I found the stud, I broke a little something in my hand.  But I also felt differently when Papa died, than I do about Mom's death.  Age difference again?  Ninety-three seems a more respectable age to die than seventy-eight.

I loved my mother.  I admired her strength, her fiercely independent spirit, her creativity and talent.  She and my father loved each other in a way I've seen very few couples do.  AND, there were many things about my mother that I did not admire.  Those are the traits of hers that perhaps I've too much inherited.  I loved her, but I didn't  necessarily like her all the time and I feel like a real shit for that.

My sleep, when it comes, is haunted with angry dreams.  Mean dreams.  When I tell people about my having too many losses in too short a time.  Mom, then Bean, then Chris died.  But there were lots more losses, too.  Most of them I caused by acting like a crazy, angry person, and let's face it.  That's what I've been.

Then people support me, tell me to take care of myself, they say that I was a good daughter and that I must be happy I spent so much time with her in the past year.  But see, they don't understand that I was not a good daughter.  I did not feel the way I should have.  I didn't happily give up my time to stay with her as my sister did.  There is some comfort in the fact that she often told me things like, "You can leave now and you don't need to come back."  But there is also pain in that because those statements were always associated with "When will Nancy be back?"

Papa died a little at a time physically.  It took him years.  Was it a blessing or curse that his mind was sharp right to the end?  It was awful.  But Mom, well, she died differently.  She went through an ileostomy and a broken hip within eighteen months or so of her death and recovered well from both.  But her memories, her mind, died a little at a time for a couple of years.  And though the cause of her death was bleeding out after a stomach bug - something it would seem she'd have no control over - she  planned to die as soon as my sister returned from a vacation and that's just what she did.  I wasn't there.

This probably makes very little sense to any reader.  How could it?  It makes no sense to me.  The very sad fact is that I'm grieving not so much the loss of my mother, but the fact that I was a shit daughter.  I have never been good at this family stuff, which is weird because I come from a Family with a capital F.  So this confession may disappoint (and by the way, disappoint is the worst thing you can do to Family) my family and extended family.

I tried so hard to do things differently with my children that I made big mistakes there, too.  I love, love, love my children and grandchildren.  I am amazed at how perfect they are in spite of me. I like them.  I like being around them.  In order to disappoint me they would have to become satanic Nazi animal abusing serial killers, and I don't see that happening.  And I wonder.

And I wonder if coming from a Family with a ban on disappointing is really such a good thing.  It has made me a very good pretender.  It has encouraged me to accomplish things like collecting degrees and publishing books and travel.  But I will never accomplish enough. I will always dread disappointing my family more than the loss of a limb.  I fear holidays and special days because they are such ripe occasions for disappointing my family.  Graduations, weddings, birthdays.  I screw them up.

Oh, I'm remembering as I type how my mother bragged to the doctors at at hospital where Papa was being treated, about how I was affiliate staff at three hospitals, and how my name was on some big deal test that psychologists used there.  She bragged to people (in front of me) about how I expanded the clinic I ran, and later how I'd had books and journal articles, and columns published.  She didn't tell me directly, but bragging to others in front of me is just as good, isn't it?  She loved little things I made for her.  My God, she loved me every bit as much as I love my children.  Why did I never understand that before?

In recent years Mom and I always remembered to tell the other "I love you," until Mom sometimes didn't know who I was.  But after a while, when she didn't know who people were, she took to asking about their families and saying how much she loved them.  She was a good pretender, too. She was so smart!  Even with dementia, she was smart.

Oh, Mom, I am missing you now.  I'm so sorry I didn't call  you every day.  I'm so sorry I didn't visit you more.  I'm so sorry it was often so hard for us to be around each other.  So honestly, now, Mama, please always be with me.  I think I'm beginning to understand.

Dig a little deeper

Yesterday I was working on my pond area.  I've only been working on it for six years.  The back yard slopes rather steeply away from the house, so when we moved here I thought it would be a perfect place to put the little pond I've always wanted.  I don't want you to think that I begin projects like this without planning.  It's just that my plans change 84 ways from Sunday along the way.

I began by building a wall of concrete block and then covering it with rocks that seem to grow around here.  It looks really good.  What I meant to do was build a retraining wall on the low side of the pond, but I did it backward.  I made the pretty part of the wall face the front.  I continued the concrete block wall around and very close to the pond and filled in with dirt.  The pond was perfectly level at that moment.  

Since the yard also sloped to the side, I decided to expand the pond area as a garden.  My friend, Brian, from England,was here. We decided that some of the larger bits of 2.5' x 2' logs left from the tree that had fallen over in the front yard would make a great back retaining wall.  So we two senior citizens rolled logs down the hill, with very little control where they stopped, and somehow got a row of them set up to form the very back wall of a garden that would gently slope down from the top of the pond toward the center of the yard.

We went to Pet Smart and bought three feeder gold fish.  These are fish destined to be fed to some other critter.  He named them Marilyn, Diana, and, of course, Brian.  I asked the Pet Smart lady how to tell male from female goldfish and how to get them to breed.  She didn't know how to tell gender and said that I would never get them to breed because it takes very specific, special conditions.  But the fish seemed very happy to be out of their tiny aquarium waiting to be something's dinner, and swimming around in their new pond.  They didn't seem to care that the area around it looked ridiculous.

I began filling in the area that would be garden with sticks, smaller logs, leafs, wood mulch, and continued that for six years.  I wasn't really in a hurry (obviously) and I really love how Nature turns this mulchy filler stuff into dirt.  More than a few times my husband suggested I order a truck of dirt.  He didn't get it. Living in an oak forest, we have lots of sticks and leaves and stuff to use as fill that would eventually turn into dirt.  Every now and then I'd dump a bag of lime on it.

Of course, the big logs also had a tendency to turn into dirt, so I built a retaining wall with concrete blocks and wine bottles around a larger area, reinforcing the big logs, I encouraged some of the plentiful English Ivy to grow up the concrete blocks.

So back to yesterday. . . I decided that the mulchy stuff had more than filled the area that would be the garden.  I went to Lowes and got 5 bags of top soil and 4 bags of sand and a bag of lime and because I had to - four plants.  (The sand will be for the patio area - another curve in the "master plan.")  I began stomping down the mulch stuff and making it as even as I could, then spreading the lime and the store-bought dirt over the top.

It quickly became apparent that I was going to need more top soil.   A big ol' bunch of top soil.  Then I understood it.  Sometimes the top is on the bottom.

I'd been piling wood chips, sticks, leaves, weeds,  and all sorts of organic mass onto that space for size years.  So I moved the newer mulchy stuff from the bottom of the garden area and found the most beautiful black dirt ever.  I did the dance of the happy dirt then began shoveling it to the top of the garden space.

While digging for the black gold, I also found two small copperheads.  They were babies, but not tiny babies.  I did as my B.I.L., Chip, insists (I don't usually listen to directions, but I almost always listen to Chip and Nan, my sister.)  I killed them with a long handled shovel (not my hand trowel) and asked their forgiveness.

I planted a bit of pampas grass on the south side of the pond to give it some shade to keep the algae at bay.  Then I planted the three pretty flowing grassy things around the back of the pond and moved the thyme to nearer the patio-to-be.

There is a moral to this story.  Probably more than one.  The next time I build a pond, which will probably not be in this lifetime, I'll have a better idea about how to go about it.  Sometimes you have to dig a little to find the best stuff.  I know the dirt will settle as the mulchy stuff becomes dirt.  I can live with that. I'll put more on top.  The thing about gardening is that it's never done.

Oh. . . . and the Pet Smart people greatly underestimated Brian.  He, Marilyn and Diana have two tiny fish and one small fish.  I reckon when they have babies they eat most of them, but some have survived.  And the older fish have beautiful, long flowing tails.  They seem to have thrived on the past year of neglect.  But now they are big and happy in clean water and regular fish food in addition to the mosquito larva borgaschmord they get all season.

I really hope the patio and the terrace don't take another 6 years, but I'm not promising anything.  A full day's work for me is only a few hours these days.  But if it does, it does.  By then I may have begun my hen house.

A few days ago.

                                     

Yesterday

The plastic bags the dirt came in, will go under the pavers.  No, I don't have the pavers yet, except for some I've made, but I will go forth to Lowes today and return with some pavers.  

I'm grateful.

                                       

To Klutz, Or Not to Klutz

My friend from high school, Jacque, used to tell me I was a klutz.  It's true.  I have always had a tendency to trip if there is something in the way of my feet.  I spilled a Pepsi on her parents' brand new carpet in their brand new house.  Once, in P.E. I actually made a basket.  Unfortunately, it was on the wrong end of the court, so, even though I was a track girl, and a bat girl (more on that later) I think it's safe to say, I've never been athletic.

In my early thirties, my doctor sent me to the Mayo Clinic to figure out why I had daily migraines, visual disturbances and my own personal earthquakes, etc. We wanted to know why my klutziness seemed to be increasing.

So the uberneurologists did many tests.  They stuck me in a tube that sounded much like being in a washing machine.  I found it strangely relaxing.  They told me to hold completely still, while a thingamabob circled my head making noises I've never heard outside an alien space ship.  They put me in a completely dark room, told me to keep my eyes open and then turned on lights strobing at various frequencies.  Ha!  I'll bet they regretted that one.  I thought that was was going to be my least favorite one, but nooooooooo, there were even less fun tests to come.

They did one absolutely essential test which involved them sticking needles in various muscles and sticking receptors so many inches away from the needle, then they shot electricity through the needle and a machine measured how long it took me to scream.  No kidding!  I couldn't make this stuff up!

And spinal taps.  Yes, plural.  Gotta love those.

Back in those days I had hair on my head.  But somehow or other they stuck somewhere around 127 electrodes to my scalp and then did all sorts of things to me.  Sometimes, they even wanted me to sleep with those wires all over my head and three people staring at me through a window.

By the time I was done answering thousands of questions, demonstrating my walking ability - heal to toe, sideways, backwards, etc., being stuck in tubes, stuck with needles, and generally stuck, I was eager to get the results.

They told me I had neuropathy which is sort of like saying "You have headaches and are a klutz who doesn't see very well."   Oh, and I had several dispersed white spots on my brain indicative of MS.

Well, shit.

Jacque said, "Well, you've always been a klutz."

The treatment options weren't all that fun.  I took steroids for a while which made me look nine months pregnant and evil.  The other available options didn't sound any more fun.

I decided to not mention the diagnosis, because frankly, I didn't like it.

Since then, I've been to a few other neurologists.  They repeated the same tests and strangely came up with varying diagnoses.  Yes you do, no you don't, maybe you do.  "You can take this drug that might slow the course of the disease, but the side effects can be a bit disconcerting. . . . "   They recommended I have my brain scanned now and again again to see how many new spots they can see.  

How ridiculous is that?  Why do I care how many spots or where they are? If they can't make the symptoms go away without replacing them with worse symptoms, I see no reason to frequent their establishments
.
But lately the falling swarms seem to come more often and last longer. And falling isn't nearly as funny as it used to be.  My arms jerk about in their own spontaneous dances more often and lately I've been having those visual things that start with a little squiggly that grows until everything is squiggly and you can't see what you're looking at, only stuff on the sides of what you're looking at.  I didn't say it well, but it's a common enough thing.  It's just that it's been happening 3 or so times per week and lasting an hour or so
.
Oh, and then there's there is this memory thing.  Mine has big holes.  Year sized holes and little tiny holes.
 
Anyway, I'm to the point where I'm considering actually seeing if there is such a thing as a neurologist with a personality who isn't addicted to cruel and unusual tests.  Maybe.  We'll see.

Circle

Six years ago, a very big old oak tree in my front yard fell over.  I came home from work on Friday and the tree was lying between our house and our next door neighbor's house.  It fell in exactly the place where it would do the least harm.

My husband's new car was parked under the big branches of the tree, and at first glance we figured the car was a goner.  The only damage to things other than the tree itself were the very corner of the overhang of our garage roof and a plastic pond that was awaiting installation.  After taking pictures from every angle and having the insurance agent do the same, some branches were cut and gently lifted off the car, which had not one scratch.  The branches fell and gently kissed the car, but didn't harm it in any way.

I loved that tree. I mourned the shade it had given my house and the homes it gave to gazillions of other lives. I cried for days.  Most people didn't understand, but that tree was a friend of mine.  It was the Eastern corner of my four cornered shade bed.

The tree people came and cleaned up the driveway, surveyed the other minimal damage, and while I sat on the lateral trunk of the tree, crying, I gave these big, emotionless men with chainsaws specific instructions.  I really couldn't have cared any less that they thought I was crazy.

I told them I wanted the trunk and large branches cut into two foot sections, that I wanted the mulch piled on the side of my lot, and that I wanted the rootball left as it was.  It took several tellings.  I considered drawing pictures for them, but eventually they did as I instructed.

The corner of the garage overhang was easily fixed, the pond was replaced, and I actually think the insurance company was happy.  Go figure.

Brian, a friend visiting from England, and I rolled some of the larger bits of trunk down the hill to the back yard to begin building the wall for the pond area.  It was quite a sight, I'm sure watching the two of us "mature" people trying to keep control of big rolling logs.

Some of the smaller logs became Faerie Henge.

Others became a wall to begin to level out a shade bed and the mulch had more uses than pickle jars at Heinz.

I chipped away on several of the biggest pieces - the ones too big for me to move - as they softened with the help of beetles, ants, and weather, using the resulting mulch in various gardens.  I hollowed out a few logs one year and planted petunias in them.  As the logs became lighter and smaller, I moved them around, arranged them in shapes that pleased me (and I think them) and gave the neighbors with green velvet lawns something to discuss over dinner.

But the root ball, which became the Eastern corner of the shade bed stayed in place.  A couple of years it held a birdbath.  It often was home to chipmunks and a favorite perch for squirrels who would sit and stare at my front door demanding that I refill the bird feeders.

This spring I leaned against it and found that it was very soft in places.  I brought out my hatchet and spade, expecting to get some buckets of mulch for my newly created paths.  And I did get lots of mulch.  I also got a huge bonus!  I got buckets of black, fine, moist, fructuous dirt.  It was the most beautiful dirt I've seen since I left Illinois.

All the while I was chopping and digging around the root ball, I was thinking of Shel Silverstein's book The Giving Tree and thinking about what he got wrong - or at least what I had always interpreted wrongly.

This tree, at first glance appears to be down to a knobby bit of root ball and some whittled away, rotten branches making exotic yard art and temporary borders for paths in the gardens.  And if that's all it was, it would be far more than enough.

But this tree has done more to turn this pre-brick, orange clay that passes for dirt here, into something gorgeous to this Illinois transplant.  There is now some dirt in which earthworms thrive and plants grow.  I'm not saying they grow as well as in Illinois dirt, but you know, this tree and I aren't done yet.

I don't look like I did when I was 17. All my cells have been replaced.  And when I "die" I will still be.  Just like the tree.  We really never go away.  We are severed from what we were, but we don't disappear.

  

Adventures, adventures, adventures.  It's turtles all the way down.  I'm so very sad.  And I am grateful.