Volleyball, Dear Jane and stash love
Plus bacteria that love your gut
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I came up with a long list of words. They were important to me and I wanted to share them with you. But they were too many, so I pared them down to three.
Forgiveness
Trust
Intention
Please take a moment to think about these three words. Polish them like stones in the sand of a river. Keep them under your pillow, wear them close to your heart.
Forgiveness.
Trust.
Intention.
Next week, new words.
Ant
David Molko, the mindfulness guru who visits us each week here at my assisted living, has a genius for evoking memories and patterns in our lives. I gain a lot of inspiration from his questions and insights.
Recently, he asked us what inspired awe.
Folks had ready answers:
The Grand Canyon!
The Columbia Gorge!
Niagara Falls!
Venice!
The Colorado Rockies!
Yet when I thought about awe, all I could think of was the valiant little ant on my kitchen countertop. So far away from its colony, with no hope of returning with food, yet still exploring, still hoping.
Volleyball
~A small synchronicity~
Vollyball is a game I never liked. You whack that ball and it thuds. Hurts your hand and doesn’t go very far. Everyone else is better ’n you.
So I don’t think about volleyball much.
Until it was in the news, with lyin’ New York Rep. George Santos claiming to be a volleyball star at a college he never attended. That would be Baruch College in Manhattan,* part of the City University of New York (CUNY) system.
*Baruch College is on Lexington Avenue, which I can never not think of as “Mexican Avenue” after seeing a semi-inebriated librarian played by Katherine Hepburn chortle over the name in Desk Set (1957). What a movie!
So that was the first volleyball mention. The other was in a book about the “Dear Jane” quilt, a Civil War-era creation by Jane A. Stickle. In her book Dear Jane: The Two Hundred Twenty-Five Patterns from the 1863 Jane A. Stickle Quilt (1996), Brenda Manges Papadakis came up with her own names for many of the patterns.
I couldn’t resist “Rick’s Volleyball Net.” Here’s how it made up.
The thing about “volleyball net” is that the game hadn’t been invented when Jane Stickle was working on her quilt in 1863. The quilt is in the collection of a museum in Bennington, Vt., where it is exhibited only briefly each year to protect the fabric.
Volleyball, on the other hand, was first played in 1895, a long time after Jane finished her masterpiece. The anachronism is delicious.
Dear Jane has become its own fad since the publication of Papadakis’s book. Countless quilters have reproduced all the blocks.
Stash
My sister, Catherine Sanborn, the Irish quilter, says she suffers from SABLE syndrome: Stash Accumulated Beyond Life Expectancy.
Quilters are obsessed with their stash—all the fabric, from yardage to scraps, they have hoarded over the years and can’t bear to part with.
So, you make a scrappy quilt, and you need just a bit of fabric to make a pattern perfect, and while you’re in the quilt shop you find another design that you just have to have, and you end up with more fabric than you started with.
I haven’t bought any fabric since I started writing Becoming. I even gave away a big chunk of my stash when I decided that writing would come before quilting. I still have SABLE.
To paraphrase Ratty, there is nothing half so much worth doing as simply messing about with little pieces of fabric. Though messing about with words is close. Trust me.
More about quilting
My friend and former colleague at The Oregonian, Jerry Boone, has taken up wood carving in retirement. He spent weeks working on this fine piece, shown recently in Mesa, Ariz., at a judged competition.
Jerry writes:
What I enjoyed most was being able to stand a few feet away from the carving and listen to people voice their interpretation of what they were looking at. Everyone looks at the same piece, but each one sees something different.
It is made from two pieces of basswood, the wood of choice for most American carvers. It is all done with hand tools, a variety of knives, gouges and chisels.
When a gouge that is sharp enough to shave with slices through the wood, there is a visceral feel that just can't be duplicated with any other sort of tool. I like to think it is the same sensation that has been shared by craftsmen down through the centuries.
For those of us who still carve exclusively by hand, it is a connection to the past. My collection of tools includes some that have passed through the hands of a number of highly talented carvers. I often wonder, when I pick one of them up, what artwork they helped create in the past and whether I'm a worthy caretaker.
Jerry’s insights are familiar to all creators:
Much like life itself, to be a successful carver you have to work with what you have been given. Sometimes it yields to the caress of the blade; other times the wood is resistant and needs to be coaxed into compliance. And, on occasion, it wins, and you have to make the best of the situation.
More about patterns
Last week, I included the old carpet pattern from Rose Schnitzer Manor. Now I see that the new rug that replaced it has its own hidden charms.
Dale Schwartz lives in the farthest wing in our assisted living facility from everything else. Farthest from the front desk, the first-floor dining room, the fitness center. She pushes herself in a manual wheelchair, using her feet to help propel her.
I count my steps to various landmarks. But mostly, I stare down at the patterns in the rug. I don't know if anyone else does, but I see all kinds of things—people, animals. If you have not tried it you should.
She’s right. There are all sorts of mystical patterns in that carpet: birds, hearts, butterflies, flowers, acorns, shamrocks . . .
And one two more
I bought four purple tie-dyed napkins from the woman who made them back in the ’70s. My then-husband hated them. I’m not fond of tie dye, either, but I think I kept them because they helped me remember the woman’s home, set amid a dense stand of huge Douglas fir. I wanted to live in that forest, even when, later, I realized it would mean living without much daylight.
Today I looked at the design, really saw it for the first time in decades.
Finally, one more stab at Rick’s Volleyball Net. No the best choice of colors. It will probably become a coaster.
Ferment, ferment, ferment
~Even in a micro-kitchen, you can work on your gut health~
A while ago—with age comes a certain je ne sais quoi about exact timing—I decided that gut health was really important to me, especially because of the multiple sclerosis. There is a school of thought that candida overgrowth and the leaky gut that can result from it might contribute to inflammation and thus be a factor in autoimmune diseases such as MS.
To build up my gut bacteria, I started slowly, swallowing over-the-counter capsules and swilling probiotic yogurt. Eventually I migrated to making probiotic foods myself. Even in my tiny apartment kitchen, which is just a counter mostly taken up by a microwave and a toaster oven, I've been able to make things like kombucha, sauerkraut and kimchi.
Today, kombucha. I’ll get to sauerkraut and kimchi later. Maybe sourdough, too.
Kombucha
The easiest is kombucha. You can buy the SCOBY (symbiotic culture of bacteria and yeast, also called a mother) at a natural food store like People’s Co-op, or from a kombucha shop. That’s the slimy starter we used to refer to as a “mushroom” when kombucha was a novelty in the 90s and nobody knew what to make of it.
Then it’s just a matter of brewing some tea, regular or decaf, adding sugar, letting it cool, and plopping in the SCOBY. The SCOBY eats the sugar, transforming it into acid. If you let it ferment long enough, it’s vinegar. Anyway, it takes 3-4 weeks on the counter or in a dark cupboard to get to the strength I like—pretty vinegary, as I try to avoid sugar. Then I pour it into smaller jars and store it in the fridge.
Coffee variation
I recently split the SCOBY—they grow, so you need to do this regularly—and used the second one to make coffee kombucha. Sounds gross, but it’s really quite nice, especially with cream. I tone it down with sparkling water, too.
Use cold-brew coffee, regular or decaf, and sugar. I use 1/4 cup of sugar for 6 cups of coffee. Sugar substitutes won’t work, as the SCOBY can’t eat them.
For some reason, coffee kombucha ferments quickly, in less than a week.
Recipe
I seldom drink the tea kombucha straight, as it’s pretty acidic. One way is to dilute it with water, cold tea or seltzer. Another is to make a drink.
Strong brewed tea
Kombucha
A packet of stevia (the acid of the other ingredients tempers its bitterness), or some honey
Lemon or lime juice
Ginger juice (bottled or squeezed from grated ginger)
1/2 teaspoon or so orange Emergen-C powder (adds a little kick)
Tiny amount of CBD: a few drops of elixir or a splash of blood orange CBD seltzer
Add plain seltzer, water (Portland tap water is excellent, right off the mountain), or mineral water to achieve the desired balance. About 50 percent water, though I’ve never measured it.
Meditations
~A long poem broken into palatable pieces. An easy read. Really.~
Meditation I This is a prayer. A blanket, dense, gray Woven of yearning Splashed with memory Lashed by tears Torn and tattered A frayed tallit. In a torn place Stars shine through. This is how to forgive: Mend a rent with red thread. Close a star hole. Sew up a memory . . . And another appears. Steady as raindrops. Raindrops fill a black pool That eats reflections. Righteousness, Memory, Reflections— All disappear. That is forgiveness. Meditation II This is why I write: Spirit says so. Birth an idea Born of ego, A thought, an idea. Then an oblique arrow Runs athwart of What I wrote before. Ruins it. But . . . then . . . The shards reform, Leaner, stronger, A better idea. See, Spirit dictates. I’m just an amanuensis. Meditation III Let’s take one creation: cactus jam. A mild hallucinogen, eating it brings Hard memories, sharp Fishhooks in the skin. The only way out is forgiveness. When you eat cactus jam, time shifts Consciousness gives an inch. Expands, Contracts. You hear the universal heartbeat You feel it You live it. The Universe sets you down Under a cloud In a place you know not And that knows not you. You kiss the garment of the other The hem rough against your lips. Lying in dust, Looking at the stars. Each of them a memory, a sin You must forgive. All of this. Meditation IV You push that stone up a mountain And every day the stone returns Wet with rain. You walk along the shore Tide pools, anemones, Starfish pulse with your heartbeat. Singing: Forgive, forgive. Let the Universe whisper In its language of love I love you, small one I smell you, I taste you Thank you. You are whole. Love is infinite. You swim in it forever Your body awash, Cleansed. Learning to love Yearning to love There is no cause Nothing to forgive. A lemonade landscape Palm fronds waved by handmaidens Each of them So beloved, so vital. Is it finally over? My pen has stopped moving Now to keep, to keep— The paper runs out The ink runs dry My eyes are dry Tears are gone, shed on the beach. Saltwater pools. The anemones unfurl Putting on your thoughts . . . Tears? Reflections. Rest now, beloved Close your eyes Forget Salt water makes you . . . I’m out of ink. But I have more I’m out of thoughts But I have more I’m out of paper But I have more I am never out of love. Meditation V Ink. Thoughts that curl like smoke From my nib to God’s ear Deep listening. The scarab beetle skitters across the page. A new chance. Death to life. Life to . . .what? Forgive. A teardrop. Rain, gentle, warm The gray blanket, the fog The softness Comfort me, Universe The sun has risen and warmed the air Breathed into your being, Pushed you out alive A new brat, howling with life. Embrace it now. It’s vital, living, clawing. Pull yourself into the world Claw through the star hole. Eat the lotus, the cactus jam. Be alive. Be. Epilogue I cut my hand making kimchi So? That’s what Band-aids are for. Bandage your finger, your heart. Your breath remembers. A squared circle A triangle in a box Breathed in winter— That landscape! Snow, fences, deer, foxes The trembling hare.
Check out
I haven’t been talking about writing much these last few weeks, other than to encourage you to keep up the practice. Never tell yourself you can’t write, because it isn’t true. But if life is chasing you, and you can’t write or don’t write, let it be.
Forgive yourself.
But make a resolution to write. It’s in your soul, it’s in your fingers. It will make you cry. In a good way.
—30—
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Nice to see your churn dash quilt again and that woodworking piece is very evocative. Great post!
I have long been a Dear Jane fan. I very much enjoyed the poem/meditations.