where art thou?

Today I actually went, alone, to a Sunday movie matinee: Letters to Juliet. A nice feel-good movie with a mere five people in the theatre with me. All those scenes of driving through northern Italy (sigh!) in small cars - vineyards, stone houses, cafes, food, wine, love (sigh!). It reminded me of when we drove around Tuscany six years or so ago in a small car. As I watched this movie it brought tears to my eyes - because I'd like to be doing it again (even though at the time, as my husband drove admirably and fearlessly, I had white knuckles most of the way, couldn't translate the signs and got frustrated. Road signs were simply not in my phrase book and most of them had important looking exclamation points! Attenzione! appeared often). Strangely, I was often moved to tears throughout this film. Beneath the scenery and the love stories and the attractive actors, there was a poignancy - loss, love, age. I adore Italy and Vanessa Redgrave (in spite of (or because of) her controversial political positions and activism) and was curious to see what Franco Nero (her real life husband) looked like now (oh, those blue eyes!). I don't think I've seen him in any movie since they were in Camelot together - back when we were all young and attractive and had lovers. One aspect of this movie - seeking out a former lover after 50 years - sort of fits what I wrote about a few days ago - the anticipation and fear of an actual possible meeting decades later!
     Another element I liked was the respect paid to older men and women in the sense that they were treated as fully alive, fully living beings, not relics whose passions have faded or nuisances to be discarded - all those wrinkles and gray hair rendering them less than detritus. Obvious, too, is the distinct difference between the way older women are viewed in Italy (and France) and the way they are viewed in the U.S. - and this is not just in the movies. It's real. As an older woman (beyond a certain age) I appreciate that someone recognizes that we are passionate, interested and interesting, spirited - not terribly different from younger people - we just look different and have been around longer. And in some cultures we are not invisible. Of course we don't all look the way Vanessa Redgrave looks at 72 - tall and slim and beautiful. Bravo to the director and the screenwriters for going all the way.
     This story was based on a book of the same name that recounted the actual tale of the letters that are continually being written to Shakespeare's Juliet by people all over the world for the last 70 years. Those letters are answered by the Juliet Club in Verona which is, in recent years supported by the government, in a building with a plaque that reads Lettres a Juliet.
     Still desiring more, I ordered the book (same title) written by Ceil and Lise Friedman which I will bring with me on my journey east  later in the week.

Giuseppe de Lampedusa said:  
all lovers play the parts of Romeo and Juliet 
as though the facts of the poison and 
the tomb had been concealed from them.

keeping sane in the rain

Deep shadows after rain. Monsoons are coming early this year - or maybe it's not monsoons at all - just plain old rain. Daily thunder, lightening, brief heavy showers in evenings after warm sunny days. The landscape lush green. Lovely. Except the lilacs are sparse, disappointing - even in town where certain areas have old magnificent lilac trees that usually send intoxicating scents out in all directions for about a week each year. A low wall of lilacs along our shared dirt road has only a half dozen blooms. I guess this winter/early spring really was as harsh as we all thought. My entire harvest of lilacs amounted to this puny bouquet. They're skinny, the scent is faint and the color is darker than usual.

Last year there was a vast overgrown field on the way to Taos Pueblo that was absolutely white with wild plum blossoms - like fragrant snow. Just the way Mabel Dodge Luhan wrote about them in Winter in Taos early in the last century. Not this year when they exuded a sort of brownish petal haze. What's going on? Ancient Japanese haiku poets wrote thousands of poems about plum blossoms. Is anyone reading this?
     Spent entire day at computer writing up interview, downloading photographs, emailing, having book meetings and calls. It's coming together at last - we have sporting chance of meeting deadline! (It helps that the deadline is later this year than in previous years). Just a couple more details on artwork and the ms. can go to the proofreader.
     This morning as I drank tea in my PJs at the kitchen table and listened to details about artist husband's latest work and the task (difficult, he said) of photographing them well enough for museum/gallery mailings, to keep my sanity and get my own To Do Today list straight in my mind, I finished a pair of baby socks guaranteed to stay on tiny moving feet. Or so I've been told. Personally, I have no first hand experience with these particular socks, although I've made them several times and given them away, but it seems logical - they fit snugly and go halfway up the leg. But there was that time a few years ago when I made them for newborn twins whose mother said that one of the babies simply inched her way to the top of the crib, leaving the empty socks behind like a vapor trail. I found the mimeographed (yes, that's what I said) pattern somewhere many years ago - I'd give credit where it's due except I don't quite know where it's due. So I hope I don't get sued for copyright infringement.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I should start counting the ways in which knitting has kept me sane. Start now. This morning at breakfast...



Monsoon rain in May
and a dearth of plum blossoms
Why expect so much?

quel drame!

Summer already? Earlier when I passed the bank the temperature read 84 degrees - yet there was a chill in the air behind the warmth. Just the way I like it. But now, in the evening, it's cool, with large heavy drops of ice cold rain falling (I know this because I ran outside to close the car windows) and thunder. Rain at this altitude is always cold - even in summer. Like ice water falling from the sky. Someone once referred to mountain rain as the cold wet breath of the highest peaks where the snow never melts. Obviously, since this blog began, weather informs my entries.
     On another subject: I'm sorta lost knittingwise since I finished the lace shawl. It was so all-absorbing. I'm tempted to get more of the yarn in a different color and start another. As a serial knitter I tend to do this sort of thing often - hence, enough hand knitted items to clothe a village. In lieu of the drastic move of buying yet more yarn, I rummaged in a basket and unearthed a leftover ball of a soft yarn (label gone) that made a great pair of socks some time ago. I stared at it while I drank a late lunch latte - it was sort of the same color. Maybe I'll start a sock tonight. It's all I can manage at the moment as publication deadline looms very large and oppressive. Two full days of editing - if you don't count my brief trek up to the Ski Valley last evening where I walked and it was chilly and crisp and my bare feet (looking so very Zen) were cold. Or this morning at the Teapot with two friends, cookies, and mint tea, where it was warm.

I'm getting calls and text messages from the folks back east in anticipation of my arrival next week. Plans are being made for get-togethers, backyard barbeques, morning lattes on the beach, serious talks and walks, and who knows what else. There won't be time for everything of course, but it's the thought that counts. Last time I was there in another June we planned a backyard feast and as soon as the grill was fired up, one of southern New England's famous quick and violent thunderstorms struck. The cooks (my adult son and daughter) carried on stubbornly. In pouring rain with umbrellas sheltering the food but not them, and amidst uncontrollable nervous laughter because four of us inside the house kept issuing warnings out the kitchen window that a metal grill might be a lightening conductor - which only made them laugh harder because they said we look so silly - four heads bumping together in one small window shouting words they couldn't hear - they managed to recover and serve forth delicious sausages, peppers, and onions (indoors) after they'd changed into dry clothes. When I was not helping the emergency window warning crew, I attempted to take pictures through another window. The result was a hodgepodge of gray umbrella-shaped smears with legs. Maybe I should buy an underwater case for my new camera before I leave.

In summer rain's shadow
they didn't notice my bare feet
on the wet grass

blue, blue, my world is blue

Today is all about sky and wind, lilacs and birds. Magpies, those legendary thieves, are flying  around with sticks, string, cottonwood puffs in their beaks and who knows what else. One spring they stole all the seashells I'd put around a plant in a terracotta pot on the deck. Over some weeks I wondered what was happening as I noticed them disappearing. Wind? The dog? Then one day I actually saw the culprit. He swooped down and flew off with a small scallop shell in his beak. Somewhere high in a tree in New Mexico there must have been a nest lined with salty seashells. What an image!
     Magpies are big strong birds and can be quite aggressive when protecting their nests. Seconds after I snapped his picture this one turned around and flew at me threateningly. I didn't linger but continued walking home. I'd been to a meeting with the book designer who just happens to live at the other end of my dirt road. My head was so full of photographic images and the lovely way the book is shaping up that I saw everything around me as if through a lens - albeit a tilted one. I was sort of in that mood. A little off center.

So few days are mediocre in Taos. What with the weather and the wildlife. And now the lilacs are out up here too - a bit less showy than last year's super abundance - probably due to the harsh winter and late spring. But so welcome. I call this cascade of blurry purple Judith's Garden because these belong to my neighbor and nearly stuck me down with a heady intoxication as I strolled by.

The photographer I interviewed this morning (more about that in future posts) talked about "the truth of the moment" which is pretty much what my head has been filled with for a week. He is not a fan (nor am I) of altered images - although we both agreed that it's necessary for certain subjects - fashion and advertising.  And fiction!

Time for yarns of blue
Airing on the windy clothesline
They blend into sky

double trouble

The door is closed. No one at the cafe would dare to open it! Oh, did I say the wind is back? I know I promised not to mention it again, however, it is difficult to keep that promise since the wind is a huge presence that can't be ignored and wherever I go, everyone seems to be talking about nothing else!
     The cafe today was bustling, busy, the music too loud and fast. My salad wasn't very good (some ingredients left out) and the pesto dressing was more oil than pesto. Still, I found a cozy spot at a small round red table next to the Buddha and the gurgling water. Nothing's perfect and today was an off day for me and the cafe. And when I tried to take pictures of the gorgeous deep purple irises, two things happened. The wind whipped them up into a frenzied blur and the color was more cobalt than purple. Nix the iris pictures. They're history now.                                                 
     Lace Shawl is dry and unpinned. The cashmere yarn blocked beautifully. But now I find that the seam does show. I draped it over a brown shirt I was wearing and it was evident. Scrunched up or over a lighter color it doesn't show. Stretched to it's full size over something dark...boo hoo! So now I have to face it. Do I unpick all the sewn stitches, unravel one by one a total of 170, pick up again and graft it? Or do I just wear it, shut up, and hope no one notices? At the moment (because I'm lazy and feel that when something is done it's done) I choose the latter course. I will bring it to NYC and CT and see how it feels. I may face it again when some distance is between us and I'm stronger. How far is it to Paris?

.

"...the wind moves the day,
nothing remains
within your motionless soul."
                        Pablo Neruda


   

knocking them off one by one

It's one of those Sunday mornings in May when the weather is perfect. So perfect that it makes me edgy and restless. Shouldn't I be going somewhere? (my bags are always packed). Or taking a walk in the park? At least opening the windows and doors wide? It's still early and who knows where I'll go. Meanwhile I make myself finish editing the introduction I wrote for the anthology, email it to the designer, and prepare interview questions for the cover artist. But immediately after, my desk still a mess of papers with red markings all over them, I snap a picture first and then block the cashmere lace shawl. Yes! it's finished! (and I'm in love with the scalloped edges!).
     My low level equation of inches per day got speeded up when I put all other knitting on hold. As soon as I noticed how far I'd come a few days ago, I couldn't stop. I'm a little obsessive when it comes to knitting something that I think I'll like a lot. Besides I'm still imagining myself wearing it on that chilly night beach  in a couple of weeks. I must also confess (perhaps to the horror of more accomplished lace knitters) that I totally avoided the kitchener stitch. Right there on the instructions, it was suggested that an alternative method was possible for bringing the two halves together. Sew it! Why didn't I consider that?  I loosely bound off and carefully stitched. Did I say that I hate sewing? Under ordinary circumstances (those skirt and jeans hems, sweater seams, mending). But this was different. A slight connection shows but I'm not a perfectionist and unless someone gets very close when I'm wearing it and also has a magnifying glass, it's not likely to become a topic of conversation or criticism. Should anyone be reading this blog and be interested in the details, I used two skeins of Sarah's Yarns 2-ply Mongolian cashmere (sumptuous!), size 3.75mm 24" Addi Turbo Lace circular needles and the Lace Shawl pattern (free download from Interweave Knits Pattern Library) by Alice Halbeisen. The blocked size is approximately 15" x 78". Perfect for my 5'1" height. (Remember that song by Randy Newman? Short People. That's me. But I've got a reason to live).

 
In my camera the moon
Stars and a yellow flower
Carried in a drawstring pouch
Strange to be landlocked
And at sea at the same time
Watching the dry silent tide

a doll's life

This baby-sized doll has been in my family for nearly 70 years. She has never grown up but she's aging. I keep her out on top of a bookcase in a safe corner. Numerous girls and boys over three generations have pushed her in a doll stroller, bandaged her up with a doctor's kit, changed her clothes, read her to sleep, scolded and taken tea with her. Her eyes still open and close but the voice is gone (she used to say mama if you turned her a certain way). The doll's body is made of cloth but I recently noticed that limbs and face (made of something else) are crazed and cracking. This dry climate and high altitude are hell on skin and hair - real or otherwise - and a  lot of us are crazed and cracking up these days in the sun and constant wind. This one doesn't need an intervention yet, nor can she go for a facial. At some point I'll check out doll hospitals, but before I send her away I want to finish that pair of booties I'm knitting, and try them on the doll's feet (that are real-baby size) before giving them away. OMG! I'm becoming my mother! She used to knit little doll sweaters and hats and change its clothes seasonally! I'm not talking about when she was a girl either. This happened during the years after I left home as a young adult when she was 59 and before she died at 84! After her death I gently removed the doll from a dormer corner in a Bronx attic, took it home and put my daughter's christening dress and hat on it.

Even in the spring wind
no grit gets in her eyes
- a small girl's old doll

Buddha's cafe nook

Cartier-Bresson said: we deal in things that are continually vanishing and when they have vanished, there is no contrivance on earth that can make them come back again...what has gone is gone forever.

He was so right. Last evening, I wanted to write about the nearly-perfect day I had.The weather was sublime (75 degrees, light breeze, blue cloudless sky). I had my hair cut and rejuvenated. A pedicure (first in months and only the fifth in my whole life), met up with an artist friend and a book designer at a photographer's studio to choose something for the cover the of the SOMOS anthology I'm editing. After that meeting (more later about the photographer and his photos) Lesley and I were high on art and needed to keep talking, so we went out to the nearby Wired cafe that's been around for ages and everyone talks about and I had never been to. I love it! It's funky, fun, very Taos, and I plan to go there every day forever. After lunch, alone, I roamed around in the casual Zen garden nooks and took pictures. I planned to include one or two in yesterday's post, until I discovered that my memory card is high capacity and my computer is not! So today I went to the dreaded Walmart, bought a new old low capacity memory card and went back to the cafe. But yesterday at 3:30 was quite different from today at noon. Can one ever recreate a perfect moment? Light and ambiance? what has gone is gone forever...
     ...and by the way, I mentioned a couple of posts ago, C-B's definitive moment. I've since discovered that he called it the decisive moment. There's a fine line between the two words and I'll accept either one - although he may not have.

Under a shade tree
Buddha's statue is indifferent
to the flowers

the definitive moment

Yes, I love yarn and knitting and color and texture. But today I'm excited because I received my new camera, a Canon S90. I'm a camera nut. And this one has so much in it's little body. It can go totally manual (remember 35mm aperture and shutter speeds?) or levels of automatic. Canon is so clever. They know that there are many digital camera lovers out there who fondly remember (and even now and then long for) last century's 35mm technology.  The feel of gently turning the lens to focus, the anarchistic ability to create your own settings against all photography rules. Of course, most of us do not lament the expense of shooting dozens of pictures and perhaps finding, after they've been developed, that only one or two are marginally noteworthy. I love the instantaneous nature of digital and the ability to edit and delete right in the camera! While this S90 is not exactly a DSLR, it comes awfully close. And for those of us who do not, or cannot, spend $3,000 plus and want a compact camera that does it all (me) this one fits the bill. I look forward to always having it with me and in the style of Cartier-Bresson, catching the definitive moment.
     I tried to channel Henri last year in Paris for a few days. I sat in the Jardin Luxembourg, near the sailboat pond on a Sunday morning that just happened to be the first day of summer and simply snapped picture after picture in black and white. A boy in a striped shirt kept appearing. At first he ran around the pond on foot then sped by often on  his bicycle. He was caught in frame after frame - sometimes entering, sometimes leaving.

There was an attractive older couple who strolled back and forth - she wore designer print stockings and her legs were veritable abstract expressionist canvases (very cool). At some point, she sat at the edge of the pond and asked her companion to take her picture. As he set up the camera, she burst into song, her arms outstretched in a gesture of joie de vivre. Maybe they were only American tourists like us - amazed to be in Paris that day, but that brief moment became a part of my witnessing. Certainly a definitive moment in time. Time that has passed as the second first day of summer since then closes in on me and my camera.

This quote from Paul Valery seems appropriate at this point.
The folly of mistaking a paradox for a discovery, 
a metaphor for proof, a torrent of verbiage 
for a spring of capital truths, 
and oneself for an orator, 
is inborn in us.

clouds got in the way

Taking a journey through old photographs is quite a thing to do. One's whole long life zips by in image-bites. There was the cute Brit who said he'd always fancied me, hadn't I noticed? The guy I fell for at 17 who was my best friend's boyfriend! We married other people and circled around each other for decades until we finally had a long clandestine affair. We didn't have the courage to leave our families and with universal words of love and loss separated permanently. I remarried many years ago.
     Recently, because he'd written a book, I saw a picture of that other man I loved for so long. He'd changed. I hardly recognized him until I noticed the familiar smile around his lips, memory of easy laughter, irreverent quips. I showed the picture to my husband who had lately been talking about the girl he left in New York when he was 18. We marvel at how old we all are and how scary it might be to meet again. Who knows what the cute girlfriend with the red Corvette is like now. Or what life did to the young guy in the leather jacket. So. It seems that the best way to handle these unexpected vintage romantic blips in one's life is to let them flow, enjoy the memories, and henceforth ignore them.

And speaking of pictures, I came across my very first aht photograph, circa 1950s. Taken with the Brownie on a November day in upstate New York on a dairy farm that my sister-in-law's Italian aunt owned. My older brother and his wife invited me (a teen) to accompany them for a couple of days. I was totally thrilled. I'd never been away from my parents house in the Bronx and certainly never to the country where eggs came directly from a hen house and not Safeway. I took the picture while they picked apples. The tree looked forlorn and interesting in a Zen sort of way (altho I'm sure I'd never even heard the word). I felt like an artist after I pressed that shutter.
     I still vividly recall the sound of roosters crowing at dawn and the dormer room I slept in. The smell of bacon, biscuits, coffee wafting upstairs from the big old-fashioned kitchen where huge meals were prepared every day for workers and family. In other photos from that trip I wore a white cowl neck ribbed pullover. I have no memory of owning that attractive sweater. But maybe I will recreate it someday with yarn and needles and pick apples in another place and time. We may all look different but that's only on the outside.

Blown by many winds
Apple blossoms drift like snow.
How many more clouds
Will plunder my memories?

shadow of worlds

At Cafe Loka with my knitting and mug of jasmine green tea my yarn was briefly infused with a rainbow smudge. Color ovoids suddenly appeared on the floor and tables as light briefly shown precisely through the small glass prism hanging in a window. I knitted with air-rainbow yarn until the sun changed position and I was left with my pretty but now dull project. At home, I saw on my kitchen table, the bottle of olive oil I'd forgotten to put away. The sun was working magic on that ordinary object. Thinking I'd better pay attention (maybe I was tuning into messages from the 11th dimension) I watched as the sun climbed higher and made its way around to the west. No messages were forthcoming - just everyday shadows.

It seems my life is made up of all sorts of shadows these days. Today I've been browsing through a huge plastic storage box of old photographs looking for pictures of the friend who passed away seven weeks ago. First let me state that I've been taking pictures since I was nine years old when I convinced my father to buy me a Brownie Hawkeye camera - so there are a lot of pictures! I was the only kid in the 4th grade at P.S. 97 to tote her camera on field trips. Still have that b&w picture of our teacher Miss Bopp at the Bronx Zoo. White gloves, small felt hat, sturdy handbag on wrist. I've carried one camera or another with me ever since.
      Today's photo search is the first stage in preparing for the trip I'm taking back east in a couple of weeks. There I will meet up with a group of women I haven't seen in many years but my friend stayed in contact with long after we'd both moved to Taos. For a time in the 1970s we all lived in a small Connecticut town near the water. A river ran alongside. The wild and gray Atlantic Ocean lay just beyond the strip of land we could see from our beach that was (and still is) Long Island. We were young mothers with husbands and children. On most summer days we gathered our sand chairs in a circle in the sun as our dozen children scampered around and did whatever children do at beaches. We talked about jobs, dreams, gripes, hairdos, tans, books, affairs (we were having or wanted to have), husbands. Before Gayle died she made me promise that I'd go back and gather with them for her. They still live there.
     Much has changed since those days. Our children are middle aged. There have been divorces, remarriages, illnesses, deaths, important anniversaries. Grandchildren. Widowhood. One of us is going to be a great grandmother. There were five women, now there are four. Pictures create echoes. Shadows of times lived...wasn't it only yesterday? There was that emerald green bathing suit that looked so great with a deep tan. The day my kid passed the swimming test so she could swim out to the float unsupervised. Fourth of July when we, who considered ourselves rather sophisticated, felt an unaccustomed excitement all day until the night when we brought down to the beach, brie and good wine, hot dogs and cookies. 

   We said goodbye
at Bailey Beach's pavilion
   In summer rain

what we want to save

Webster's dictionary describes hail as "frozen raindrops falling during a thunderstorm". For a violent ten minutes today it looked like thousands of moth balls were dropping from the thunder-crashing sky. The horses were wild within their fenced area . Running, doubling back, circling, running forward again as if their motion would make it all stop. And maybe it worked. Mists that huddled around the mountains began to lift the moment the last hailstone fell, revealing new snow drifting down from the peaks like thick sprinkled powdered sugar.

I can't help thinking about blossoms when this happens, but then remind myself that this landscape has been here long before me, will be here long after and worrying about it won't change anything. The mountains will reign. Blossoms and flowers will either make it or not. Most of what grows around here is tenacious and hardy. Natural selection winnows out the weaklings.

Manuel at 95
walks ancient pastures
in green Wellies
carries a shovel and notices again
that nearly ineffable change
in the slant of light

lace and an apple

In spite of the wind I keep writing about (I'll stop now), cold nights and mornings, blossoms have managed to survive and the sky is bluest blue - a perfect backdrop for everything. These blossoms were snapped before noon when the air was still. Before I'd finished, the wind had picked up and the last batch of pics were just a pretty blur. So I went home to work on the anthology and knit one pattern repeat of the Lace Shawl. I couldn't resist. The cashmere from Sarah's Yarns is sooo soft and the color reminds me of the underside of aspen leaves - sort of a pale silvery green. I'm not even sure if the aspens have begun to unfurl yet up on the mountains where it's colder, but they soon will.

The pattern is by Alice Halbeisen and available as a free download from Interweave Knits. I've only completed 9" of the first of two 34" pieces so there's lots of knitting. The pattern is easy and makes me look like an accomplished lace knitter. This is good because I have little patience for complicated lace patterns (a subjective measurement) and unabashedly claim simple as my mantra. I'm planning a trip back east in early June and since I'll probably still be working on it I'll bring it along. I will walk from where I'll be staying to the little park overlooking the harbor where the oyster boats come in off of Long Island Sound to unload. I'll knit and write and take pictures. I haven't been back in two years and that's what I did then.

Last winter's snowmelt
Makes rivers this spring run high
A kid drops his apple

madness of the winds

After a meeting this morning with the designer of the annual literary anthology I'm editing (Chokecherries: A SOMOS Retrospective Anthology) I decided to spend an hour or so at Taos Cow in Arroyo Seco, before getting down to work at my desk. The sun was shining and it looked like a nice spring day had begun. I ordered a green tea and a scone and went to an outside table with my notebook. My plan was to do some writing practice which I have been sadly neglecting due to this blog and too much dawdling and knitting and worrying about various things I should probably let go of. I also wanted to finish rereading Julia Child's memoir My Life in France. The moment I sat down the wind started up. We're not talking gentle breeze here. Rather more like 50 mph gusts. They last all day and I think I may go mad since this is the third or so day of these not-unusual winds. My two-story house invites eerie wind sounds - squealings, whistlings, moanings. It makes me believe in the voices of the ancestors (as the Indians do) except that they aren't my ancestors. Mine are in Italy. Still, I've heard that people go crazy in France when the mistral comes and although I don't know if Taos spring winds have a name I think the effect is the same. Murder by southwest mistral perhaps? My dog hides out under the bed most of the day since his ears are more sensitive than mine and sometimes I feel like hiding out under the bed too until it passes. As I write, the apricot tree outside my window is tossing madly, the narrow space between the window frame and the closed pane in the living room is causing a high frequency buzzing sound, the dog is hiding, the garbage pail outside behind the adobe wall is careening around the yard wildly, and the new cashmere yarn that I started knitting a lace shawl with yesterday is calling to me.

blossoms on the trees
no gentle wind caresses
- coffeeshop abstract

eggs, vin, and a rooster

A year or so ago our next door neighbors built a sturdy blue and magenta chicken coop, brought in a rooster and some hens. We thought it would be disturbing - all that cackling and crowing - but it was nice. The rooster, not knowing he was only supposed to crow in the mornings and in the evenings, called out randomly throughout the days and it felt so Sunnybrook Farm! A few months later he was gone. The hens stayed. This spring our neighbor's young daughters are in the egg business! We signed on as regular weekly customers and received our first dozen. The eggs come in colors! They are pale green, ivory, brown, palest blue. We're told that the color of the eggs is due to the color of the hens' ears. Eh, did I hear right? hens ears? I must find out more about this phenomenon. But meanwhile I think I'll make a nice omelet for dinner tonight (he'll want to add minced garlic), a half bottle of Pinot Grigio, blueberries for dessert.

And what is this mysterious small knitted thing? Let's just say it's all about hope and the future and old age and time marching on. There will be more to tell as the wee thing grows. But not today as I have to cram for my last French class/final exam tomorrow and it's making me nervous because I was a distracted student all semester.

The flame turned up high
garlic tossed in sizzling butter
     grandma's spirit pleased

the noise of silence

Just returned from a brisk walk through the woods on the way to the Taos Ski  Valley. The Rio Pueblo is tumbling and loud at this time of year - pushing against its banks, through the trees. Strong winds today (55 mph gusts) are not only noisy but tossing trees limbs to and fro -  wild enough to cause a bold dog to hide under a picnic table. That is after he waded into the river, got soaking wet in the rushing snow melt that hasn't traveled south far enough yet to warm up.  Spike has a thick double coat and we were both energized by the scent of pine trees and damp old leaves underfoot. The hot sun warmed us. All of my senses were assailed - smell, sound, touch. I love taking pictures of forest floors (go figure) and the way rocks and leaves look under shimmering water - so that's what I did while he sniffed every nook and cranny in eager doggie bliss.

We came upon a tree decorated as a memorial to someone who had passed on. I don't know the story, or why the sparkly pink Christmas garlands and rainbow ornaments were hanging from and wound around that particular tree in that particular part of the forest nestled in a sunny mountain canyon. There was a lengthy typewritten note enclosed in clear plastic attached to the tree but I didn't read it. What repelled me? I don't know. Something did though and I followed where my dog led me instead.

 River rushes by
green and blue noisy silence
- my dog's ear is warm

we'll always have Paris

70 degrees! Late afternoon walk in the park sans jacket and scarf. The breeze feels like it's blowing in from an ocean. Millions of years ago this land of the southwest was a vast sea. Shells are still found. In my garden is a large rock with the remains of a nautilus shell embedded in it. It was brought down from Truchas Peak by someone who climbed mountains decades ago. Today it was easy to believe that the spirit of the ocean still surrounds us.

     Did somebody call?
Looking over my shoulder:
     Massive spring mountains.
                                      (Richard Wright)

I'm reading "Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette" by Judith Thurman. It runs for almost 600 pages and took her 9 years to research and write. Thurman is a great biographer. I loved her biography of Isak Dinesen and read it many times. But Colette's life was not quite as "simple" as Karen Blixen's. So many people appeared and intersected in Colette's life that keeping track of them is giving me a headache. Not Thurman's fault - merely my own penchant these days to relax and not concretize. Whenever there is a day or days between my freelance deadlines and the business of everyday living, I turn to whatever I love that isn't too taxing. I've been knitting socks and working on the dark olive green lace shawl. Except that I put it aside yesterday and ordered two skeins of lace weight cashmere in pale sage. It fits the season and my mood as we move past the recent snow that turned all the blossoms up here brown - and wait as patiently as possible for the inevitable glorious late spring when the air will be suffused with lilac scent. It's coming. I'm done with dark colors and alpaca for now.

I love what Thurman said in her acknowledgments - about the three people she lived with while involved in the Colette project - her son, her husband, and "aunt Charlotte who moved to Paris at the age of eighty without a word of French to care for a household and a little boy." Information like that is inspiring and inspiriting. Especially since I recently learned that I'm going to be a great-grandmother by late fall. (I've already ordered yarn for sweater and booties!). More about that later - I'm still in recovery. I'm nowhere near 80, but it's nice to know that Paris awaits at any age.

  

spring forward, spring back

It's a bit too chilly
to be standing naked in
this cold spring storm

Basho

The last few days have been rife with cold, wind, blowing snow (horizontally!). The horses, always patient and single-minded (eating) just turn their backs to the wind and continue to forage for new grasses as the snow accumulates on their rumps. As a result of winter's temporary return (today dawned sunny, but cold), I'm thinking pink and rose - the colors I vaguely remember from last year's flowering crab apple trees in the park. So. I put aside all other projects and picked up the sock I'd started to knit and ripped out a month ago, because the yarn is the color I'm hungry for. If it can't be the warm breeze yet, it helps to at least have warm spring colors passing through one's fingers.