Low spirits

I hate to admit it, but I am a little downhearted tonight. Why, I don't know. Maybe it is the approaching holiday coming so soon, and all of the people out there who will have a stressful time, trying to buy presents. I remember the feeling well. It was a long time ago, it is true, but it still comes back to haunt me. I must try to find a present or two for the "Toys for Tots" program, that is the least I can do.
I particularly remember Christmases when I worked for the Postal Service and we worked long hours for weeks trying to get the mail through. Since I worked from midnight until eight in the morning, I was always sleepy anyway. Sometimes I would fall asleep at the sorting machine and the letters would fall out on the floor and pile up, unsorted. We all tried to help each other, and the single mothers were especially stressed out with home duties, small children and no money. those were the days I would like to forget.
But to cheer myself up, I have taken a handful of chocolate chips and a few walnuts and I am having a forbidden snack here at my computer. My husband is watching an old movie, "White Christmas" which we have seen many times in past years and I can miss cheerfully.
We hope to get to keep our little dog Kaya in a week or two (we think of her as ours) and that will cheer us both up. Until then, take care and keep in touch.

Has the moment come?

I saw a commercial today which caused me much merriment, not to mention puzzlement. It concerned Viagara, that much touted enhancement drug without which men are not supposed to be able to function. There they were, the romantic couple, sitting side by side in bathtubs, out on the end of a pier. I could imagine the conversation that ensued:
Wife: "Are you almost ready? Has the moment come? I'm freezing out here. We're right out on the edge of the water and I'm ready to go home right now."
Husband: "I'm sorry. I'm not all that comfortable myself. Do you think we'll be able to do it in that tub anyway? I hope I don't fall in the water climbing in there with you. Let me check for a minute. No, the moment hasn't come."
They sit silently for a few moments. Wife tries to warm up by rubbing her hands up and down her legs, but to no avail. The sun is going down and it is getting downright chilly.
Wife: "Where are our clothes? We could at least get dressed. You can do it with clothes on, can't you?
Husband: " We left them back at the other end of the pier."
Wife: "I didn't want to come out here to these tubs anyway. Even if we could both get into one tub, how could we relax for the part I like best afterward? I like to be warm and cuddled up when I relax. I don't think I want to do it out here. I want to go home."
As they climb out and hurry back to their clothes, husband cheers up. The moment has come. They can do it in the back of the car. If he can talk her into it.

My most unpleasant task

My intrepid writing teacher assigned us the title "An Unpleasant Task" for our next class, and I plunged enthusiastically into the following essay, which is as true today as it was a couple of years ago.
An Unpleasant Task

Let’s see. What do I consider an unpleasant task? That is a little bit of a challenge because I don’t usually do unpleasant. If it is the job of cleaning up a disgusting mess, which I will not name at the moment, I make my husband do it. I leave it to the reader to imagine what the mess might be.
There is however, one task which I, and I alone, can do. That is a task which all of us must do once a year, and that time is coming closer and closer. I am referring of course to April 15, the dreaded income tax day. Need I say more?
I used to prepare myself for this most odious of jobs by procuring a bottle of sherry, a box of chocolate candy, and a pot of coffee. Since in days gone by I struggled with capital gains taxes, rental property, retirement checks, social security payments, and minimum alternative taxes, I needed all the help I could get. Many a time I struggled with all of the facets of the many pages and attachments I had to fill out, and thought in my innocence that I was done, only to find out that I had forgotten some vital item and had to do the whole thing over. One year I worked all night, and found to my surprise that while I had been struggling, my poor little cat had been waiting outside in the cold all night. As soon as I let her in, she promptly went into labor and produced two lovely kittens on the sofa. Her ordeal was probably more painful than mine, but the results were more enjoyable.
The job is easier now. I can take standard deductions, I have no rental property anymore and my husband and I can qualify for an expanded exemption total. Does that mean that I can enjoy the process? Not really. My intake of sherry and chocolate candy has been curbed, and all I have to comfort me is a cup of coffee and some nondescript cookies. I still run into unanswered questions which must be researched and unraveled. My husband still hovers over me, anxiously awaiting the final result. Do we have money coming back? Do we still owe more? This year I am pretty sure I will owe, as I cannot take a credit for my grandson’s tuition this year. That will mean that I failed to send in enough estimated taxes and will come up short. Oh well. Ces La Vie.
Why, you may ask, do we not secure the assistance of a tax preparer? Never! I reply. They charge hundred of dollars for the simplest of forms. If I make a mistake, the IRS will tell me. And I have made mistakes! One year I got back $30.00. One year I owed 36 cents. They spent the price of a stamp snd the enclosed letter to tell me that I owed the money, but that since it was less than a dollar, I didn’t have to pay. Go figure.
This year, I will brew a pot of coffee, prepare a plate of organic oatmeal cookies, spread my papers out all over the table, and plunge in. I expect to take all evening, and will fill out the forms in ink and send them in by mail. I will not use the internet. I will not agonize over my math, or worry about whether I need to attach the 1099 forms or triple check everything. I have been doing this since 1948 and can say without hesitation that though this is the most unpleasant experience I can fathom, I am equal to the task. Eventually, I might even learn to enjoy it. Only kidding.

The flu shot

This being the time to get flu shots, down we went to the local Pharmacy, where they were giving away free flu shots. We had expected a long line of people waiting their turn, but there was no one there but us. It was a painless procedure, and we have felt no side effects whatsoever, so it is nice to have it over for this year. They usually charge $25.00, so we don't know why it was free.
Today was a lovely, warm day and we enjoyed the ride down and back. The trees are turning red and yellow, and the river was a pretty blue. We saw many buzzard hawks sitting on wires, waiting for a road kill. Ugly as they are, they fill a useful function.
We think the hummingbirds have gone away. We watched the feeder all day, and saw none feeding at all. We were wondering when we should take down the feeder, and I think they have given us a hint. It will be stored away until next summer. Not much to write about today. Take care. Good Night.

An Adventure to Remember

When I attended my writing class, my teacher was always asking me to write about how I "felt" about events and people and so on. So i tried to reveal my sentiments about a rather dramatic event that took place at my daughter's house.


The Day We Tore the Ceiling Down

We had noticed a large number of carpenter ants wandering through the rooms of our daughter’s house. From the bedrooms to the family room, they were everywhere. They bit us on our feet and jammed in a pile under the hot water heater. Closer inspection revealed that they were nesting under the insulation on the ceiling of the laundry room.
What to do? Being desperate, my son-in-law George decided to take decisive action. Stationing me in the center of the room, holding open a large black garbage bag, he began pulling down the ceiling tiles and revealing the nesting space underneath. The ants and eggs cascaded down in great clumps, missing the open garbage bag and landing on George and me with disastrous results. They attacked us with a fury, biting and tearing off small shreds of skin and drawing blood. Throwing modesty to the winds, we fled into the back yard and tore off our outer garments and sprayed each other with the garden hose.
Now what? Wrapped in bed sheets, peering out through the folds, we hit upon a plan. The fire extinguisher was close at hand, and it was the work of a moment to activate the thing. “Stand back!” George cried, and began covering the ants, eggs and debris with foam. The ants tried desperately to rescue the eggs, running around in a frenzy but finally collapsing in death when the foam took effect. We scooped them up with a shovel and filled two garbage bags with ants, eggs, foam and whatever else happened to be enclosed in the fast hardening
foam. The ceiling still contained thousands of eggs and we scraped them off as best we could. We had done our best. Subsequently the house was tented and ants, termites, and mice were eliminated. Not a life-threatening event but one we well remember.
How did I feel about that? What kind of question is that? We did what we had to do. I have never regretted it. I look back upon the whole episode as a kind of adventure. I still look around for the things when I am in my daughter’s house but I never see any. I have had many adventures in my long life, but this was one of the funniest.

A haunting poem

This poem was written by a dear friend who passed away recently, but will forever be in my heart.

The River's Lure.

Before the springtime of my children it enticed me
Seductively
Tall redwoods cast their shade.
Along the bank dandelions called, then
Keeping their appointment with the wind
Blew themselves away
River otters showed me
The joyful path of water

Now when summer's over
Swallows ask me where is spring?
And for me
Moonlight sketches shadow poems
That crickets and frogs may sing
At midnight from the small island
Ancient crones send wisdom to me,
Time and sunlight bleach my hair white
Remember
The river's lure

I have never been a fan of this form of poetry, and confess that Emily Dickinson leaves me cold, but the images evoked by "The River's Lure" haunt me whenever I read it. I have several of her poems which I will share in future.
To other things, we got our shipment of wood today, and will have a cozy fire on the next cold night. Today was very warm so a fire is hardly appropriate, bur cold days will come. Night all, and keep in touch.

Thanks for the memories

As I sit before my computer, a paraphrase of a plaintive old song winds itself through my mind. "Thanks for the memories, of candlelight and roses, of colds and runny noses."
Ah, yes. Who can forget the pleasure of winter colds? Or any other colds, for that matter. With six children in the family, and all living in the confines of a small house, we had plenty of opportunity to experience colds and runny noses.
How did my mother ever cope with the demand for handkerchiefs?- Kleenex hadn't been invented and we had never heard of paper towels. Toilet paper was still in the future for farm families like ours and I am sure we couldn't have afforded it if it had been available. What did we do?
We did have handkerchiefs. Mostly old, worn white handkerchiefs which we shared with one another. Many a time my mother washed out a whole tub-ful of handkerchiefs and spread them out on top of the big wood-burning stove to steam and dry. We were not averse to grabbing a clean diaper and using that. My grandmother made use of her apron for everything from wiping a toddler's runny nose to wiping up spills and drying her hands. Necessity is the mother of invention.
We did have a whole list of remedies for colds. When the first sore throat appeared, my mother would burn creosote over the chimney of the old kerosene lamp, causing the pungent odor of tar to waft through the rooms. Why we didn't all end up with cancer I will never know. A wet sock placed around the neck of the sufferer was another old remedy. I can't see the merit of that old trick from any point of view, but that is what they did in those days. We never were excused from our chores or from attending school, but went on with life as though we were in the pink of health. Only an abscessed ear or severe chest pain gave one the excuse to stay in bed. Sometimes every student in the schoolroom was coughing and blowing his or her nose.
I took the opportunity of looking up old-fashioned remedies for colds, and found the one most effective and still useful to be chicken soup. A whiskey toddy was recommended as well and a glass of hot lemonade was advanced with approval There are any number of medical potions on the market, but in the end, there is only one remedy that really works, and that is the passage of time. In the meantime, the poor patient can only wait and suffer.

Lefties unite

We have been observing my little great-granddaughter with interest, to see if she is going to be left-handed. It does run in my family, I myself being a lefty. I went into my file of essays and found this little offering, which I wrote for my writing class. So I offer it here.


Lefties

Left-handed people (lefties) unite! Rise up against the tyranny of the vast multitude of right-handed people! Who are they to dominate us, lording it over us with their right-handed tools and implements?
It’s true that only one person in ten is left-handed. Does that not make us unique? Are we not entitled to consideration and admiration for the way we have learned how to get along with a handicap that is inborn in us, and cannot be changed? Just let a right-handed person try cutting with a left-handed scissors or some other implement designed for lefties. They will know what trouble is.
The list of objects hard for lefties to use is endless. Doorknobs, screwdrivers and screws, telephones, adding machines, computers, letter sorting machines, buttons and buttonholes, vacuum machines, the list goes on and on!
We are especially handicapped because there are so few of us. For the lefties of my generation, it is too late. We have done our reproducing and though we have probably produced our share of lefties, the coming generations can do more. So to any lefty who has not yet married or cohabited , I say this: Only reproduce with other left-handed people. In this way, the balance of power can be shifted. In the next fifty or so generations, we will perhaps have caught up. How does that grab you?`
Though this was written in jest, and I have always been proud of my left-handedness, I know in my heart that the disadvantages do exist. Still, I can't help harboring a secret hope that I have a left-handed little great-granddaughter.

What next, we wonder.

It is Friday, mid-afternoon. Obama has given his speech, my husband is out in his work shed, puttering around, I am cooking a pot of split pea soup, and all is well. I was pleased with the speech, and if Obama can pull it off, bringing prosperity back to our economy, I will applaud him. I think it will be a while, though. For retirees like my husband and myself, the problem of money is not that troublesome. For the younger families and recent graduates, it is pretty hard.
My husband has been listening to a book tape which has given me much thought, and I am pondering once again if I have failed him all of these years. The book purports to relate various (and frequent) sexual encounters between the main female character and members of the opposite sex. The descriptions are vivid and cause us much merriment as we listen to what is supposedly normal sexual behavior. Quivering thighs, heaving bosoms, throbbing unmentionable body parts and moaning and groaning. I can say without hesitation that neither of us ever behaved thusly. To us, sex was an expression of affection and respect. But did we miss out on what the book seems to say would have been ecstasy of the highest order? It is made more vivid by being read aloud by an accomplished reader, giving it the dramatic emphasis that cannot be reached by simply reading the book silently. But no, I don't think we missed out. I think the book has sold the listener a bill of goods, with increased sales being the main concern. i hope no one thinks this is normal behavior. One could get a dislocated disc with such goings-on.
One series of books that we have enjoyed, simply because of the absurdity of the tales, has been the Mountain Man series. The Mountain Man (Smoke Jensen) kills his enemies with every conceivable weapon and against great numbers. In one chapter, he took on eleven, and single-handedly brought them down. The descriptions of the storms, scenery, wild rivers and herds of animals are fun to listen to. The books come almost every day and are of every type, from historical novels to biographies and war stories.
Well, time marches on, and life continues to be interesting and varied. The little boxer dog is back at my granddaughter's house, and we miss her, but will get her back soon. In the meantime, we are spoiling our old cat, and looking forward to each new day, wondering what will happen next. Take care, and keep in touch.

Our pet termite

I had expected this day to be somewhat of a letdown after the excitement of Tuesday, but it has proved to be a nice relaxing interlude, not at all unpleasant. My husband is listening to a book tape, and I am simmering a beef stew on the stove, one of the few dishes I actually enjoy cooking. I always make a large pot so we can have leftovers the following day. This is a good time to blog.
I came across a story i wrote a few years ago, that I would like to share. It is a true story and it happened in our little vacation cabin on the top of Starret Hill in Monte Rio. Every word in it is true, or it is as I remember it.

MY PET TERMITE

I must warn my readers that the material contained in this story is both graphic and disgusting. So you must read at your own peril. My story goes as follows:
"What do you think this is?" asked my husband as he came into the cabin. He was carrying something on a small piece of plywood, and seemed to be somewhat afraid of dropping the thing.
From where I was standing by the sink, it looked like a freshly dropped turd, and I hurriedly demanded that he flush it down the drain and throw the piece of plywood into the fire.
"I can't do that," he responded, coming a little closer, and then I saw that the thing was alive. Not only was it alive, it was surrounded and partly covered with tiny squirming worms. Now I knew what it was! Just what we had always wanted - termites. The large creature, a queen was a dirty white. She was about five inches long, and seemed to pulsate. The little whitish ones, now trying to cover the queen, were the workers.
"Those are termites." I informed him, "And I don't know how to kill them. I suppose we could spray them with something and kill them that way."
"Good idea," he responded and sprayed them with mosquito repellent, which caused the little workers to curl up immediately and fall lifeless onto the piece of plywood. The queen remained placidly pulsating and opening and closing her mouth. She had no eyes and seemed not in the least uncomfortable in her new surroundings. In fact, she began to open and close the aperture from which the eggs would emerge, and we were at a loss to know what to do with her.
"Let's put her in a jar and keep her for a couple of days," suggested my husband. "We could think of her as a pet."
It was not an unreasonable idea. Over the course of many years, we had had not only the usual dogs and cats, but a turtle, a hermit crab, an ant farm, fish, a bird, and a pet snake. So why not a queen termite?
"Or," suggested my husband, who is exceptionally practical, "We could eat it. I have the barbecue out on the deck. We could barbecue it."
Why not? We have always been adventurous eaters. In the course of my long life, I have eaten and enjoyed frogs legs, pigs brains, blood sausage, head cheese, pigs feet, snails, oysters, shrimp, crawdads, and so on. I have even eaten ants and grubs in sour cream dip, and once, I tasted crow and had several feasts of eels. What could be so horrible about a queen termite? We could even pan fry her. But alive? We couldn't figure out how to kill her.
In the end we kept her for several days in a jar, and watched with interest as she placidly lay there, waiting for help from her workers, who never came. There seemed only one thing to do - we tossed her into the wood burner while a good fire was going, and cremated her, still alive.
Were we monsters or humanitarians? Since the termites had already eaten up a good part of the cabin, we considered that we had gotten even, and had the cabin tented and fumigated, and eliminated the whole bunch. If there was only one queen, that is, We will never know. In the end, I think the termites will win.

A momentous event

Well, A momentous evening. We didn't even clear away all of the dinner dishes, but plunked ourselves down in front of the television, awaiting the results of the election. Finally, at 9:35 Pacific time, it finally played itself out. McCain gave a remarkably gracious concession speech and Obama gave one of his usual rousing orations. I admit to being relieved that it is all over and we can go back to the even tenor of our lives. Do I expect great changes in the economy or our country's conduct of the conflicts here and there in the world? No, I can't say I do. But life will go on, and other exciting things will happen again. I am glad I was here to witness tonight's event, anyway.
Take care and keep in touch.

A fond memory

why this memory floated up in my mind I don't know. But I thought I would share it.


The School Play
It was l933 and times were hard. Not as hard as they would become later, but hard enough. One thing we had, however, was a good school. It was large enough to seat thirty pupils, and had done so in the past, but when I went there only twelve students sat in the wood desks. Our teacher was strict but thorough, and we had a good education there.
One of the main features of our experience there was the annual Christmas program. Every year, before Christmas vacation, the school put on a play and sang Christmas carols. As the old saying goes, the play is the thing.
One year, we “put on” an excerpt from the book “Mrs. Wigs and the Cabbage Patch” which was perfect because it allowed each student to have a part. My cousin Ruth, being the oldest, played the part of Mrs. Webster, the rich lady with the little sick girl. My sister, next in line, was Mrs. Wigs, with a large family of children, and my cousin Joyce was the oldest child. I was sassy Kitty, always being scolded by Mrs. Wigs. We were well placed and studied hard and practiced diligently.

The story line was simple. Little Evangeline, the little sick girl, was lonely and wanted to have the Wigs children over to her house for Christmas dinner. Mrs. Webster tendered an invitation and Mrs. Wigs scrubbed up her brood and dressed them in their Sunday clothes, and sent them over. Mrs. Webster ushered them into the dining room where a lavish feast was spread before them. The Wigs children oohed and aahed, suitably impressed. I had one line. When Mrs. Webster asked me if I wanted dark or light meat I replied “A little of both, if you please.”
A chorus of “shame, shame,” greeted my remark and a couple of the children pointed their fingers at me. I was supposed to bow my head in shame and put my hands over my face as though I were shedding a tear or two. Mrs. Webster corrected the situation with a polite remark. “That was very genteel. A little of both will be fine.”
It was an ambitious play, and I can’t remember now how it ended. I read the book and enjoyed it very much, and I must say it was ideal for our little group of students. Everyone got a part even if it was only one line
I loved the programs, but failed to shine in the singing of the carols. My voice was deemed too shrill and I was told to just move my lips as though I was singing. To this day I have never learned how to sing melodiously.
bye for now. Keep in touch.