Nine down, Eight to go

Here is the next block for my Hawaiian Album quilt. The lauhala mat that the fruit is sitting on is really woven! Just in case you cannot tell from the picture, starting with the pineapple and going clockwise next there is breadfruit, mango, grapes, lilikoi, papaya, bananas and finally two coconuts one in the husk and one out. Looking at this block I am reminded of the bananas that grew in our front yard. While we were there a stalk of them ripened and we harvested them, cutting off the stalk and bringing the whole big thing into the house to the tune of Harry Belafonte's "Hey mister tally man tally me bananas..."It was all fun and cute till the gecko jumped out and ran through our kitchen...thats when we learned to be careful about what we dragged into the house. What we did not realize then was that geckos in the house are part of life in Hawaii. That was just one of a long string of gecko encounters. I actually grew to like them because they ate the bugs and kept to themselves, and as lizards go, are actually kind of cute. I think I may have to add a gecko to my Hawaiian album quilt, maybe sitting on the lauhala mat by the bananas...

My favorite picture ever

I have managed to check off a number of bucket list line items in the past few years what with the poison ivy identification and the climbing of a lighthouse and now this. Seeing my favorite picture of all times live and in person at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. Its a self portrait of Judith Leyster. My love affair with her began way back when we lived in the Netherlands. One of our favorite castles to visit was called Muiderslot. It was on the outskirts of Amsterdam and it had all the requisite features of a castle, crenelations, towers a moat...everything. It is what I see when I think of a castle. During the 1600's salons were hosted there for the local movers and shakers, almost exclusively men, except for one daring young woman, Judith Leyster. She was ahead of her time and was successful in a mans world at a mans trade. Whats more, it was as if she was welcomed into it, and was treated as an equal. Thats when I first learned of her, and thought she must have been extraordinary. I think I saw a still life that she painted hanging in the castle. It was not till as a going away present that our Dutch friends gave us a book on the Dutch golden age of painting that I first saw Judith's self portrait. Remembering her from the Castle I was tickled to see her looking back at me and I could instantly see why she was welcomed in the Salon. She has that quality about her that makes you want to know her better.

Seeing the picture in person just made me love it all the more. It was as if I had stopped by her studio for a visit and she was talking and painting at the same time, and stopped just for a moment to turn and give full attention to me. I think one reason I love it is because I know that moment, have lived that moment dozens of times. Usually sitting around with a group of women, maybe we are quilting, or working on miniatures or decorating cakes...whatever work is at hand and the chatter is flowing, but somebody says something that warrants full attention so work halts just for a moment and then resumes again almost before it had completely stopped and the moment is so natural its hardly noticed. That is what Judith captures in her picture and I never really recognized that until I saw it on the wall in the gallery!

Rose and Maile lei

Here is the next block in my Aloha Album. I finished it 1 and a half blocks ago, that is to say I have finished another block and am more than half way through finishing a second block. Why its taken me so long to post a picture of it, I cannot say....Well thats not entirely honest. I think I can say. I have been busy, it's true. I have been out of town twice since I finished this block, in bed sick for a week and then out making " Nice Nice" for a solid uninterrupted week with Steve's work...and I could claim any or all of that for the reason its taken me so long, but it really boils down to the new computer. I am still on shaky ground with it in some respects, uploading pictures being one of them, and as is the tradition in my family passed on to me by my mother, and her mother before her, if its no fun ignore it...Its a good strategy actually except for its fatal flaw, eventually we must all face what we hide from and the longer we put it off, the worse it usually gets, so I am trying to face my computer downloading issues head on...A small matter for most, but for me and others like me, its a true profile in courage!

What had happened was....

I have done enough traveling to know that when I am on the road, I am most likely off my bathroom cycle, if you get what I mean...so in an attempt to keep things as they should, I poured a good dose of benefiber into a ziploc baggy to take on the road with me.

Fiber is not the only thing in short supply when I am traveling, coffee creamer is also hard to come by especially when I am relying the the little complimentary coffee station in my hotel room with its single 1/2 teaspoon packet of solidified powdered non dairy creamer. So I have been taking extra creamer with me too for years now.

On our first trip to Washington this April I left my little baggy of benefiber behind sitting on the counter at home and drove off without it. As you may recall from an earlier post, that is the same trip I was on when I succumbed to the flu. After the LONGGGG car ride home I crept upstairs and into bed and did not come down for two days. Steve did all the unpacking and putting things away, for which I am ever grateful. When I finally made it downstairs I remembered my baggy of benefiber and thought I should get it and pour the stuff back in the jar, but it was nowhere to be found. It slipped my mind for another few days until I finally remembered to ask Steve if he had seen it anywhere. His response to me was "you mean that was fiber?" " Yea, it was fiber....what did you do with it?" He mistook it for the coffeemate I have also been know to travel with and poured it all into the creamer dish. Well, that sure explained a lot... Now I knew why my coffee tasted so very strong; so strong that I would go back and put in another spoonful or two of "coffeemate" which would then account for my other "irregularities"

At least now I know the importance of clearly labeling things!

Remembering Gerry

I just got back from Washington where I attended the "In Memory" day celebration at the VietNam Memorial Wall. I went because Daddy was one of the new inductees to the In Memory Honor Roll and he was being honored there that day. There were all kinds of people there to honor their loved ones, mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, wives, husbands and children, even friends and fellow soldiers. Some of the loved ones were recently lost while others, like my Dad had been gone for decades. It did not seem to matter though, everyone still felt their loss.

My friend June knows a thing or two about that. She is learning to live with a new normal that is life without her husband and best friend Gerry. She tells me that part of what makes it hard is that life seems to have filled up the space where Gerry used to be and its like people have forgotten him. But I want her to know that I have not forgotten him. In fact he is on my mind a lot. I remember the things about him that I loved. He had the best smile. It lit up his whole face and then spread through the room like a golden glow. He also had a knack for telling the most inappropriate medical stories with the clinical detachment you would expect of the good doctor that he was, but most of us not being in the medical field could hardly believe what we were hearing. He hardly seemed to notice the stunned looks on our faces. Steve and I would laugh and laugh because it was almost guaranteed that a day spent with Gerry would mean another medical marvel for us add to our growing collection of Gerry stories. I remember that he was a chow hound and would eat anything that did not move! And I remember that Gerry was as wise and gentle and accepting a soul as I have ever met. He was nonjudgemental and willing to look at something from every and all perspectives and give value and respect to ideas and beliefs that were not his own.

June does not have to worry that Gerry will be forgotten because I know he is remembered by more people than she can imagine. His work in the emergency rooms of all the hospitals that relied on him brought him into peoples lives at times when they needed not only his skill as a physician, but his grace as a human being the most. I know he touched their lives in ways that he probably did not even know but in ways they will never forget. All those people may not be shouting Gerry's name from the roof tops, but they carry him in their hearts and they will remember him just like we do because a man like Gerry is simply unforgettable.

a little South Carolina Aloha

The State flower of SouthCarolina is the Jessamine. Its easy to see why too. The vines cover most everything in the wild places of the state. They go un noticed most of the time, but in the early spring they start to catch your eye. Little yellow buds appear and in a matter of days the vines are bursting with yellow trumpet shaped flowers that smell somewhat like pez candy muddled with cheap perfume; a little sweet but not in an unpleasant way. Our backyard wilderness is covered in jessamine vines and when I looked out over them this spring I could not help it, I had to have a go at stringing a lei. So I went out in the weeds and collected the blossoms. Even though I must have picked over 100 flowers I hardly left a dent in this years crop. It turned out rather nice if I do say so myself. The only thing is that while it seems the most natural thing in the world to wear a lei in Hawaii, its is a little strange and uncomfortable to wear one in South Carolina. So I wore it for an hour or so, and then gave it to my neighbor Barbara who probably thought I had lost my mind. Still It was fun for a while, and if I have another bumper crop of jessamine next year I may do it all over again, we'll see...

Cherry Blossom Festival

Many years ago I was given stacks and stacks of old National Geographic magazines. What a treasure trove it was! Every night for my bedtime reading I would pick a new magazine to peruse. One magazine featured the Cherry Blossoms in Washington DC. It was from around the 1950's and the pictures had that Kodachrome cartoony colorized feel. I was enchanted,

....A desire to see the cherry blossoms for myself was planted then and I have quietly kept it all these years. It was one of those things that was not a burning all consuming desire, but one of the sorts that sits quietly in the back of your mind as one of those "wouldn't it be nice..." kind of desires. As luck would have it, we were in DC for a friends retirement ceremony. Steve was on TDY for it as a participant and I tagged along and got to stroll around the tidal basin and view the Cherry blossoms with my own two eyes and well, it was nice! and perfectly timed too! At least as far as the blossoms were concerned. They were in full bloom just days before they were to start losing petals. Timing was less spectacular for me. I knew I was under the weather, but had no idea I was on the threshold of a full blown case of the flu. Looking back now at the pictures Steve took of me that day I can see it in my face. I should have been home in bed. Oh well, that's where I am now and glad to be too. At first I felt bad for being out and about in a busy urban environment harboring the flu... I kept to myself and wore gloves most of the time, so hopefully there will not be a spike in flu stats that is attributable to me. But on reflection and considering the crap the folks in Washington are currently putting us through, I kinda of like the idea putting them through a little crap myself...I'm just saying...