self portrait saturday

I just can't get it together today. I have a doctor's appt Monday morning so I scheduled the day off. I have a three day weekend. I should be psyched but all I want to do is sleep. It is supposed to be really hot today. Like over a 100 degrees hot. Listening to David Bowie sing about Modern Love. I love the opening line, "I know when to go out, I know when to stay in, get things done" in that accent...
I have an art group dinner tonight. Yeah! I am bringing a salad from Ina Garten's book, Barefoot Contessa at Home. I am thinking either the pesto pea salad or the guacamole salad. Maybe both...so glad I don't have to turn the oven on.
Feeling much more settled today than I did all week. Ohhh, Thursdays are clogging night. Guess what song we put on? Come on Eileen by Dexy's Midnight Runners. I know, D-O-R-K! I am ok with that. Oh, that song just makes me a grinning idiot. It is perfect for clogging to. Click below to see some clogging http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghPtn26gAA0

It's all about perspective

This week's drawing class was about perspective. You know, the artist holding up his/her thumb in front of whatever it is they are drawing? Always wondered why...now I know. In class we actually used bamboo skewers, (The kind used to ummm...skewer things, like veggies, to make shish kebabs. Yes, I know other stuff is skewered on them but not in my world.), to serve as a unit of measurement. I did not like this class one bit. My arm hurt after an hour or so of holding it out, putting it down, forgetting the measurement, doing it again, putting it down, double checking... in front of a bunch of boxes stacked on top of each other. It didn't seem artistic at all, it seemed like math to me. When you start in one place you need stay in that place because if you move it changes your perspective. I got frustrated and felt a bit rebellious so I sketched what I saw without using the skewer. When the instructor came around to critique and offer words of wisdom, she paused in front of my easel and pointed at the free hand sketch. "That is what I am talking about, good angles, nice placement, good perspective," she said. (I said thanks and chuckled to myself.)

Last Sunday I was checking my gmail account. It is one that I don't check regularly. I was scanning through and noticed two emails from a name from my distant past. This wasn't someone I expected to hear from ever, so I honestly thought it was a mistake. I opened the more recent one first. It was from the person that I knew oh, 23 or so years ago. Someone, that while not looking for me, found me because of the title of my blog. Unbeknownst to me the song by Donovan Catch the Wind had been associated with me in this person's mind at one time. We never listened to it or talked about it and the association was made after we had parted ways. Apologies of past behaviour were made. Apologies for what? I wondered. Given the years of non-contact and my age at the time (young) and his age, young (but older by, ahem, some years) I had a pretty tight lid on that period in my life. Thoughts of him had dwindled to the random, I wonder what he's doing these days? Explanations and apologies were provided in subsequent emails and filled in some of the blank holes but strangely, instead of feeling settled I feel angry. Would it have made a difference knowing that I had actually mattered to this person? I've always treated that time in a rather cavalier fashion because it hurt too much to treat it with the importance it deserved. I chalked it all up to something in me that was lacking or wrong. To find out that I was special and cherished while at the same time being pushed away for reasons unknown to me (at the time) is gratifying to a point. I have been given a new perspective on a pivotal time of my life. It is requiring some changes in how I view my past and present. This shift has been unsettling to say the least. Ultimately I think it is a positive thing and I am grateful to this person for taking the time to make contact. (Although the bouts of random tears are growing tiresome.)

Random Garden Pictures

Guitar hero and lyric writing god...

I have been playing guitar again after 20+ years. I was never very good, probably because I didn't practice. I started taking lessons this week after a couple of weeks of working on chord transitions on my own. I was really blown away by what I remembered from my lessons almost 30 years ago! I am still in the beginning stages but find myself picking up the guitar and running through some arpeggios just for fun. If you would have said 6 months ago, "Tonia, you are going to start playing the guitar again and you are going to practice for hours at a time." I would have laughed at you and asked you what you had been smoking. I mean really, one more thing to add to the list of things to do. Now it is bumping some things off the list. I am borrowing the guitar from my brother who is very, very good.
I have many things to thank an ex-boyfriend for but introducing me to the music of this man
is at the top of the list. Here is a link to a youtube video of him and his son, Teddy, If you get a chance and are at all curious, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3DS6xglAfQ&feature=PlayList&p=949B816F6EA4314B&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=28
They are performing one of my favorite songs, the video is lame but the performance is excellent.

You know where you can put your fireworks...

I detest the 4th of July. ABSOLUTELY DETEST IT. The amount of money that is spent on fireworks, legal and illegal is appalling. The noise is upsetting to animals and snarly old bitties like me. My neighbor, (the lame one that doesn't control his dog) and his normally nice girlfriend are setting off some really loud ones. No pansy assed sparklers for them. Nope, they have chosen some stuff from Mexico. They are going with ones that you feel in the pit of your stomach when they go off. I am not sure what is being celebrated? Are we celebrating our independence from a nationalized health care system, the civilized custom of tea and some of the sexiest accents in the world? Sorry, I can think of other things that I would rather be free from. Things like monster trucks, red neck yahoos that drive monster trucks and really inconsiderate neighbors. I would gladly celebrate freedom from those things.

Summer Breeze and a tale of woe from long ago...

"Sweet days of summer, the jasmine's in bloom. July is dressed up and playing her tune..." One of my essential summertime albums is Seals and Crofts' greatest hits. Yeah, I am a dork. While I am at it I may as well tell you that "Rocky Mountain High" is one of my favorite songs. John Denver, Seals and Crofts, Led Zeppelin and the Grateful Dead got me through one particularly horrible summer about 20 years ago. I was working three jobs trying to save money to get to England. I was slowly coming out of my Deadhead phase and had spent some time over in Bend, Oregon with some friends from UO. These Bend boys were the cream of the Deadhead crop. Mountain biking, hiking, rock climbing and partying. I came back home from my own personal nirvana to my parents fighting and all sorts of ugly words like adultery being slung around. My little brother hated me because I had deserted him. (He was 16 at the time.) I was living at home in what felt like a war zone. I managed to somehow work in a deli/coffee shop, work at Agripac (one of the levels of Hell) and work in the concession stands at the Lane County Convention Center during the weekends and some evenings before my graveyard shift in Hell. Essentially I would get home from the graveyard shift at Agripac for a couple of hours of sleep before going off to the deli job till sometime in the evening and then a few more hours of sleep and laundry and playing marriage counselor to my Mom. Good times. Anyway while standing at the conveyor belt at 2 a.m., sorting ears of corn and trying to not fall onto the belt as the never ending river of vegetable matter hypnotized me, it was important to stay coherent. The cannery, as the ancient ones still working there called it, was the taker of many a finger or hand or occassionally more from those who let their attention slip. To ward off the loopiness I would sing out loud to myself. I worked my way through Seals and Crofts, John Denver-especially Rocky Mountain High, the Dead, Zep-you name it, I sang it. Normally I do not let anyone hear me sing, I can't hold a tune even if it is handed to me. At Agripac there was no worry of anyone hearing me. If you have never worked or been in a cannery, count yourself lucky. The smells alone are not for the faint of heart (or stomach.) What really got me was the noise. Hissing steam, ca-thunk, ca-thunk of the seamers (the machines that seal the cans), the constant rolling thunder sound of the conveyor belts. I wore a hard hat and hair net and earplugs. The first week or so I felt shell shocked from all the noise. Then I got used to it, to a point. It started to become familiar and almost comforting. When a conveyor belt went down-broken or for maintenance, the noise level dropped dramatically and I remember feeling panic as new lesser heard sounds were able to thump or clank their way into my consciousness. Anyway I would look up once in awhile and every person on the conveyor belt line would all be singing to themselves. It was kind of like the opposite of karaoke. You could sing to your heart's content in public but no one could hear you.
Anyway I did get to England, my parents did divorce (albeit several years later), my brother and I are close and I still like Seals and Crofts and John Denver and the rest.

I sit down to write something on the blog and all my incredibly witty, thoughtful and insightful comments go on holiday.
So I guess it will be the less than scintillating, mundane stuff. I have been busy working on the backyard. This is the year that all remaining lawn will be gone. Last weekend I worked for hours each day removing the grass from the part closest to the house and then slowly during the week I carved away at the bits closest to the studio, which is at the back end of the yard. Just a bit more to go and then to have it hauled away. In place of the grass there will be wider raised areas and more paths and more raised beds. I don't do regular rectangular raised beds, in fact I removed the ones that were here as soon as I got settled in 7 years ago. (They were the worse for wear and needed replacing anyway.)
Where the large rocks are on the left hand side of the picture, to the left of those will be filled in with soil, making the tomato and basil bed bigger. To the right will be either bark or something else for the path.

Patio pots

Front porch plants.

Back patio again.

Buffy (reddish one) and Betsy (black and red one), I am having a hard time getting a picture of Buffy's feathery pantaloons.

Another picture looking towards the back of the house. Where there is dirt, there used to be grass. You will notice the larger pile of sod piled up waiting to be hauled off. This picture is taken from about a third of the way back from the house.
Front yard path.
Other than working on yard and the day job, not too much has been going on. Hope you all are enjoying your summer!