R

Riding.... Motorcycles in the Hill Country

Trails riding is my only athletic feat to date.  Between the years of 1968 and 1973, I was a pretty kick-ass biker if I do say so myself.

(which I just did)

Here I am on my 250 Bultaco, back when we lived in Helotes.  This is the smooth track, but what was really fun was riding on rough rocks, down ravines, up hills.....

Q

Queen

Continuing in the royalty theme....

There were not all that many things in which to excel in Cochran High School.  You could either play basketball (I have not a single sports bone in my body now, nor did I then); be a cheerleader (I tried in seventh grade, didn't make the squad, gave up, and anyway don't like to yell even from the sidelines); or be a majorette (my best friend was the star twirler, I was the baton fumbler and didn't make that squad either.)

What was left?  Playing the piano?  I did that but not to the point of excellence.  Being an officer of a club? I did that, too, but our clubs never did much beyond electing officers.

Much to my surprise, two years in a row, I got to be one of the two girls on the homecoming court.  That meant I got to get an evening dress and the whole family went to Macon to pick it out.  And you got to stand on the football field at halftime (oblivious to the score or the moves by the players before or after) and smile.  That I can do.  (Remember those long gloves and teased hair?)

We moved from Cochran to Lawrenceville my junior year.  Although I was happy to move and meet new friends, I knew I'd have to give up on my one excellent thing!  But my boyfriend was in grad school in Athens, an hour away, and I'd see him lots more often, which was--I thought at the time--a good thing.

Senior Picture at Central Gwinnett High School
1966

Nobody was more surprised than I when I, the new girl, got picked in the new school to be on the homecoming court. We rode out onto the field on the back of convertibles with our escorts (mine was my boyfriend and future husband) in the passenger seat. Then we stood in a row under the lights waiting for--drumroll!--the announcement of homecoming queen.

When I heard my name, I thought,  This must be the best day of my life!

My best day lasted for about five minutes.  I was the queen!

As we got into the convertible, my escort/boyfriend/future husband declared his intention to "get out of there, skip the dance," and that--I'm sorry to say is what the queen did.  I don't remember what we did or where we went, just that I wondered for a long time what a homecoming dance might be like.

Nobody told me that the queen should be in attendance, never mind what her escort said.  Nobody told me that as queen I should enjoy a little royal attention and the chance to override the choice of the man.  So--I hate to admit it--I simply deferred to him and missed the dance.  I've always regretted that because actually, in real life, there aren't too many opportunities to be queen.  

P

Princesses

As an old-hippie mama, hearing my daughter called a princess would have evoked fighting words--or as close to fighting as hippie mamas went.  But nobody called anybody's daughters princesses back then.

Princess, in our parlance, meant entitlement, a certain self-conscious glamour, and riches, all of which were eschewed in those early feminist hippie 70s when we had our girl babies.  We wanted our girl babies to surpass us, as our mothers wanted us to do, as all mothers probably do.  We wanted our girl babies to break the molds of what girls could do and extend themselves into any profession they chose--not to but into frilly girl labels and limitations. We wanted our girls to grow into empowered women, not entitled ones.

Maybe I was one of the more strident ones.  I didn't want my daughter to have dolls, but gender neutral toys, so as not to program her for wife and mother roles exclusively.   I never bought her a baby doll or a Barbie and inwardly protested when someone gave Day a Barbie doll for a birthday present.   (It was, of course, her favorite present that year.)  I would be less strident on the doll issue today, but I'd still protest the anatomically impossible Barbie.

Motherhood was one of my favorite things to be, as it now is my daughter's, but it was the idea of programming that we young feminists regarded as suspect.  If girls were dressed as princesses or given dolls, we figured, it would limit their choices to girl-only roles.

Now, princesses are everywhere.  The tide has turned and I don't say a word against them to Elena--as she is part of the princess-loving generation--but you won't see me taking her to the Disney store to buy princess regalia.  Hippie moms turn into hippie grandmothers.

O

Ooh-La-La

After school I took Elena to La Cantera.  The plan was to buy myself a swim suit (I hadn't bought one in so long that I had sticker shock and decided not to get one), but we wound up getting one for the little bathing beauty instead:

She "forgot" to mention that her mom had told her she couldn't get a two-piece this year, but when Mom saw it she said okay.

We spent hours at La Cantera, then had dinner with Veronica at Nordstrums.  It was a beautiful day to walk around the outdoor mall and watch Elena make new friends at the playground.

N

Neighbors

Elena loves to come to my house in part because she has two great friends next door, Sebastien and Makken.  She loves having next-door neighbors, and we have the best ones right here on Ogden Lane!

Makken, 5

Tricycling Through the House

A boy, a girl, and a bear
on a tricycle

The little drummer boy

Sebastien playing the recorder

Elena and Makken

M

Mothers

I used to call Carlene "Mother" but my brother and I started calling her by her first name as a joke when I was 18, he 15.  It stuck.  I don't think she minds, especially now that we are 68 and 91.

From the start, she's been as much friend as mother--always listening to me for hours while she cooked and sewed and drove the car from place to place.  She never seemed impatient or preoccupied as I told her every detail of my life in those childhood days; she still never does.  Carlene has an extraordinary talent for listening.

Go to a party with her and she'll know everyone's name, their spouses, their birthdays, their stories, and even the names of their grandchildren and great-grandchildren.  Her memory is incredible!

She loves it when people say, "Ninety one!??  Impossible!"--which they do every time she tells them her age.  I just stand back and listen as she tells them her "secrets"--gratitude and good organic food growing up on a farm and eating an orange every day.

Mary Carlene Ogletree Harris, born August 24, 1925, is one classy lady!

October in Georgia

With her friend, Mary, Marlene, and Margaret
(Three Ms!) 

At her church, October

Wrapping her hair for the night--in toilet paper!
My house, February
She'll love that I posted this picture, I'm sure! 

Helping Elena and Veronica put together my sewing table

With Joy in Castroville, February

“My mother... she is beautiful, softened at the edges and tempered with a spine of steel. I want to grow old and be like her.”
― Jodi Picoult

“When your mother asks, "Do you want a piece of advice?" it's a mere formality. It doesn't matter if you answer yes or no. You're going to get it anyway.”
― Erma Bombeck

“Beauty is not who you are on the outside, it is the wisdom and time you gave away to save another struggling soul like you.”
― Shannon L. Alder

L

       Four  friends named Linda (Kot, Kaufman, Jordon, Quintera), one Lea, one Lorraine--such Lovely "L"s in my life who read this random blog of mine and whom I love....

       And Lemons--my favorite fruit, good on almost anything....

       And LOSS--which I'm thinking of today because a friend of mine--a year older than me--has temporarily lost so many words and chunks of memory.

       Yesterday, Cecelia and I visited our friend who's suffered a minor stroke. She was sitting up in her hospital bed smiling when we walked in, apologizing that she couldn't remember our names.  Her body works fine, her arms and legs, though she isn't allowed to walk without assistance.  As we talked, she spoke very slowly and haltingly and was frustrated by her inability to find the words she wanted.  Or she'd start telling us something, and trail off, saying, "I lost it...."

       To lose memories, names, or words must be terrifying. One minute you can shape a sentence, the next minute you can't.  You mean to say "flowers" and you say "games" instead. You want to make a phone call and can't quite remember how.  A stroke snaps the threads you've always counted on to connect one thing to another.

       When someone loses something, it's human nature to want to give them something else, anything, to fill the void if only for a minute.

       "Are you hungry for anything in particular?" we ask.  "Ice cream?"

       "I've lost my ability to taste," she replies.  Then she laughs, "Maybe I'll lose some weight at least!  That would be a good thing."

K

This alphabet exercise, if nothing else, makes me look (like Dick and Jane actually) for a particular letter every day.  It seems some universal law that what we look for we see, even if it's been there all the time unseen.  Try this with letters, or the color red, or a particular shape--and notice what shows up.

These are the words that occurred me to today driving from the rheumatologist to check on my CREST thing to the nursery to the post office to the VW service to check on a crazy-making beep that was fixed quickly:

Kick, knees, knob, kid, kidney, kind, kinetic, knotty, key, keyhole, knock

I'm not particularly inspired to write about any of them at the moment, but I give them to you, gratis, in case you are.

Boring as they might have been, those Dick and Jane books did advocate a good thing: Looking is worthy of any moment.  Looking around, looking within, looking at other people.

Marga made an excellent point yesterday.  Instead of "going out in search of something," we should "go find...."

I took that to mean that what we search for is not always what we find.  We go out, looking, open to whatever shows up--which is so often not what we thought we were seeking at all but just as good, maybe better.

Wonderful Old Women

     Nine of the women featured in the book were present at today's library book signing--along with those who came to hear them speak.

     Each event is better than the one before, I think--and today was really something special.  A young woman came up to me after the event and was clearly moved by the women and their stories.  She said, "People my age rarely get to meet women of this generation and I am so inspired by every one of them.  They are so positive and full of life and such great speakers!"

     When they stand up to talk, they have the audience's complete attention though their life stories, their humor, and their advice for living a full life.

     Marie said, "My daddy always said, 'Marie, you can do anything you set your mind to!' and that's been the voice in my head for everything I've ever done."  She's helped her husband in his medical practice, owned a store, gotten a Ph.D (started when she was 68), reared four daughters, and written a book about the history of St. Phillips College.  "I've loved everything I've ever done," she said.  "I only do things I love!"

     Lea told us about three circles of love in her life--from living with Mama (her grandmother) all during her childhood, then marrying young, then her years of working in government.  "My top priority is God, my second priority is family, and my third is my country," she said.  Lea is a terrific story teller and has published two memoirs, Some Glad Morning and Many Faces of Love.

Lea's Birthday is May 13th
"And don't you forget it!"

She and Deb Field, the co-author of the book,
have the same birthday. 

     Marga (a Jungian therapist) told us that one of her greatest literary inspirations is the book, The Little Prince.  Like the Little Prince, she said, we should all have "something to water" every morning.  As a German woman born in the 30s, she talked about the impact of the war on her life and her lifelong hope for a united Europe.  "Behind every line of every story told today, there is so much more.  I am fascinated by these women and their stories and have read the book several times."

     Nareida  said, "I grew up in tenements with no windows, just a row of beds.  So when we moved to the projects, we thought we were living in Disneyland!  We had two windows!"  She left an abusive marriage with her children ("my best friends"), then started college and earned her Masters degree in her seventies--a woman who lights up any room with her joyous energy.

     Betty Ann, a 90-year-old therapist, recently retired, is moving from her pretty house across the street from Bonnie to the Forum.  "It's so much fun!" she said.  "I get to enjoy seeing what my children and grandchildren want of my things!  Fun and gratitude--that's what it's all about."

     Fun: that seems to be a common denominator in the talks I heard today.  These are women who believe that happiness is a choice and they are committed to finding some every day.

     Mary Esther, mother and wife of Congressman Joe Bernal--played the organ for the San Fernando Cathedral for many years and has enjoyed working in politics with her husband. She loves the memory of traveling to Rome and meeting the Pope personally.

Anita is an artist whose work (made with recycled objects) is now on exhibit at the Mercado. 

At barely 80, she is the youngest member of the group.

     Muna is a soft-spoken poet from Iraq--and loves wearing classy hats.  She's the one who--on picture day--served Bonnie and me the most beautiful and delicious brunch I've ever had--each dish like a painting made of fruits and vegetables and pastries.

       Diana has spent her life traveling and working all over the world--what a character she is!  "I haven't been a mother or a grandmother, but I have done all the things I set out to do," she said.  "I've had a French boyfriend, been in a movie, and written a book!"  (And she has a German husband--who was there today.) Her house is a veritable museum of art and crafts from her travels.

      And here's Bonnie--whose idea this was--my dear friend since my days in graduate school 36 years ago when she was my professor.  She set out to smash the stereotype of "little old women" and she did it, along with her co-author Deb Field--in ways that honor these women and all women.  I'm so happy to have been a part of this project!

      Thanks to Lorraine and her iPhone--I have a picture of the back of me doing what I love doing--photographing people:

J

Jane

Most of us baby boomers learned to read with the Dick and Jane readers--stories featuring brother Dick, Sister Jane, Baby Sally, and Mother and Father.

These stories were not strong on plot or character development.  For those who want a quick trip down memory lane, here's our Jane, doing not much but "looking."

I have great pride in taking Dick and Jane out of most school libraries. That is my greatest satisfaction

— Dr. Seuss

Poppies

Interrupting this alphabet program for a word from our sponsors:
The poppies in Castroville are in full bloom and probably will be for another week....

A Poppy Walk is scheduled for April 1st.

Linda Kaufman

I

Ice

For five years, I had a very nice Minnesota man-friend named Bob.  We sailed on Lake Harriet in warm and chilly weather; we went to France and Mexico together; he bought us matching bikes and we rode the Mission Trail when he was in San Antonio; we even took a tour of Georgia including my hometown Cochran where there was nothing much to see.

Once we drove to International Falls, the "icebox of the nation," to visit his sister.  Wearing his sister's thick real-winter clothes, I loved snowmobiling on the frozen lake--a throwback to my motorcycle days, just with ice instead of rocks underneath.  I was fascinated by the little fishing huts all over the lake from which men iced fished for the entire day.  One night we drove over the border into a town in Ontario and I learned about a sport called curling.

I think of Bob fondly, especially this time of year.  He was a wine aficionado and planted a single grape vine in my yard.  It's never produced a single grape, but it comes up stubbornly in the rosemary every year.  

H

Hair

"Prettiest thing I have ever seen! It was hat day at school but someone is a little unconventional.  Not sure how many bows she fit into her hair."  (Text from Will this morning)

G

Greatness

"Make America great again" was a powerful and persuasive motto.  It landed Trump and his cronies and family in the White House.

We've grown up on advertising that shows the power of the word, great.  We buy everything from soap to shoes if the claim (however unfounded) includes superlatives like "great" and "best."  But what is greatness?

The most unpopular president in the history of America seems to get his "facts" (or should I say "alternative facts"?) from Fox News which is about as "fair and balanced" as Trump himself.  "The media is the enemy of the people" echoes Nixon, and we all know how that story played out.

Under this administration, the arts are at risk, NPR is at risk, health care is at risk, women's rights are at risk, the environment is at risk, but the military complex and big money for the Top Tiny percent are thriving.  Driven by fear, America is setting out to build our fighting power by billions of dollars (at the expense of everything else) to scare off the "bad guys" who are "out to get us." This mentality is making us look like anything but great to the rest of the world.

If I were to travel abroad right now, I'd want to apologize to everyone I meet for being an American under the banner of "America First"--an arrogant nationalism that is insulting to our allies and friends all over the world.

No country can be "great" that discounts education and health care for its own people and looks upon immigrants and other nationalities and religions with scorn and distrust.  If wealth is measured only in monetary riches, there can be no greatness, only an increasingly lopsided view of what matters.  What about the wealth of brilliant minds?  What about the wealth of a superior education and health care system for all?  What about the wealth of truth-telling and supporting claims with facts?

Great men and women don't go around flouting their greatness.  Greatness is evident in wisdom, compassion and generosity--not constantly advertising oneself (or one's nation) as great, terrific, the biggest, the best.

Another F

Today is Pam's decade-birthday--though I will refrain from saying which decade because I want to let her pass for the earlier one as long as she can.

What she wanted was what we did--drove through Stone Oak traffic past 1604 to get facials at Aveda together--and it was totally worth it.

When asked what she wanted from said facial (on one of the two Forms we had to Fill out for the Facial) she replied, "To leave 10 years here!"

We ran into another friend of Pam's there who said, "Yes, I come here all the time because I'm worth it!"

So I got to enjoy two hours of pampering, waxing, oiling and steaming along with the Birthday Girl and it was a wonderful way to celebrate a birthday.

Lunch at Simi's with Pam and Alison

Pre-Facial Pam

After the facial, Pam looked ten years younger, but we were in a hurry so I didn't get a picture.  You'll just have to take my word for it!

Freda's sister, Laura

Sadly, Freda's beloved sister, Laura, died last Monday in New York at the age of 64.  She was the mother of twin daughters (Fanny and Molly) and sister to Freda and Alice.

An accomplished musician, mother, friend and sister, Laura obviously left her musical mark on countless students throughout her career.  Even late into her illness, she often performed and hosted parties.

In honor of Laura, friends are planning some living memorials--starting today with a small sweet olive tree.

Here's Freda beside the baby sweet olive.  The sign in Freda's yard says Choose Live Be Compassion--which strikes me (from Freda's stories) of how Laura lived her life.

Poems by Mary Oliver for Freda and Alice, Fanny and Molly:

           Love Sorrow

Love sorrow. She is yours now, and you must
take care of what has been
given. Brush her hair, help her
into her little coat, hold her hand,
especially when crossing a street. For, think,

what if you should lose her? Then you would be
sorrow yourself; her drawn face, her sleeplessness
would be yours. Take care, touch
her forehead that she feel herself not so

utterly alone. And smile, that she does not
altogether forget the world before the lesson.
Have patience in abundance. And do not
ever lie or ever leave her even for a moment

by herself, which is to say, possibly, again,
abandoned. She is strange, mute, difficult,
sometimes unmanageable but, remember, she is a child.
And amazing things can happen. And you may see,

as the two of you go
walking together in the morning light, how
little by little she relaxes; she looks about her;
she begins to grow.”

           When Death Comes 

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,
tending, as all music does, toward silence,

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

When it's over, I want to say all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.

I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

F

"The F word," we used to say.

I saw it first scrawled in graffiti on a wall in Chattanooga while we were out trick-or-treating.  When we came back, I asked the assembled  parents in Tuttie's living room, "What does f-u-c-k mean?" and nobody answered.  The adults looked at each other a bit nervously, as I recall.

Then I noticed years later, that the word with an "ing" at the end was being used as an adjective, but I couldn't bear to say it for a long, long time.

Parts of speech matter.

When Will was in 8th grade, he wanted me to stop dancing in the Volvo because the kids in the school bus ahead of us might see.  He was big that year on trying to maintain a reputation as 8th grade boys are, and a dancing mother didn't enhance the image he wanted to project.

He meant to use the F-word as an adjective (to shock me) but he used it as a verb--as in "Mom!  My friends are f****ing on the school bus!" He meant for the word to precede school bus, I'm pretty sure!

The F-word is a powerful adjective, I know now, and I use it every time it's called for--which I have to say is fairly often.  But I still have to pause before writing it, as you can see!

E

East of Eden

That's the book I was reading when I was pregnant with Day.  I sat for hours on the screened porch of our little stone cabin on Beckmann Hill, reading and listening to Willie Nelson (just a young unknown dude at the time) singing "Georgia On My Mind" and feeling homesick.  We couldn't afford the tickets to hear him perform live but Floore's was only a couple of miles away, easy to hear from our cabin on the hill.

I went into labor on my 23rd birthday--but Daisy waited until after midnight so she'd have her very own birthday.

D

Day

One of the smartest her daddy ever did was to come up with her name, Day--1971.

I was going to name her Jennifer--after Ali McGraw's character, Jennifer, in Love Story that year.  Lots of mothers did.  Day had lots of classmates named Jennifer.  But in all these years, we never met another Day. Her name fits her perfectly, a great big ray of sunshine.

When she told someone her name for the first time, they always said, "Day?  Like the opposite of night?"

After a while, she got so used to the question that she answered before they could ask: "My name is Day, like the opposite of night!"

So I've just booked a flight to Washington to see my girl--to see Jackson play lacrosse which he loves better than anything next to cars.

I'll stay a week and get to see two home games and while they are all working or at school, I'll read and write and explore and take pictures.  I'm so excited!

C

Conflict


       Victoria just called to say that she'd heard this on the Moth podcast:  All you really need to write a story is a person, a place, and a problem.

        That is much more alliterative than the usual formation: a character, a setting, and a conflict.

        Conflicts (aka problems) drive all literature.  But we have to care about the character to care about his or her conflicts, don't we?

         One night, I started a Netflix show called The Girl I Loved.  It's a Turkish series that I thought had eight episodes.  It was sort of like a Turkish soap opera really, but better than the usual soap opera in that the photography is interesting and the conflict so, well, Turkish.

          At the end of episode 8, I could tell the episode was winding down without resolving the conflict, so I took another look at the episode list and saw that there are 79 episodes!  Over and over the conflict could have been avoided: if the pregnant girl's sister hadn't hidden the note from the boyfriend; if she hadn't missed his plane by five seconds at the airport; if she'd been able to tell him about her pregnancy before his wealthy parents (who did know) scuttled him off to America on a  trumped-up story; if the girl's parents could just get over themselves and not care so much what everyone thinks.

          I care about the girl who gets pregnant and whose boyfriend leaves for America.  I care about her family who is devastated by her pregnancy even more than American parents would have been 50 years ago.  But the question is: do I care enough to watch scores of episodes?  Are the parents ever going to stop crying and whining and wringing their hands with shame?

         As my friend Lea (in her 80s) says, "I don't have that many shopping days left."

         I think I'll have to just imagine the outcome of this endless conflict.  I don't believe I have quite enough shopping days left for 69 more episodes!

       

Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life

In this book, the late Amy Rosenthal writes about her life, arranged in alphabetical nuggets.  Some chunks are long, some are short, some include drawings and photographs. It's sort of like my blog--a totally random collection of musings and memories.

I'm going to try doing what she does on my blog for a few days, see how it goes. Please try it with me!  It's amazing how the alphabet gives a whole new architecture to memories you might not have thought about without the guiding letter.  Just free-style it and see what comes up!

A

             Art.

Married for a long time to an art professor, I was shy about talking about Art--the one with the capital A.  Art was, in his book, Serious (and Elitist, I think), only something the very few could make or appreciate.  Anyone who made things for the fun and exploratory joy of it was called a "dilettante" or a "Sunday painter"--someone who merely painted as a hobby.  I now know that Art with a capital A is available to all of us and should be part of every good day.

            Amateur

The word, amateur, literally means "to love to do."  I introduced myself at the book signing by saying I was an "amateur" photographer--then realized that sounded self-deprecating.  While I'm not a professional photographer by any stretch, I love doing few things as much as aiming my camera at people, old barns, rusty trucks,  and natural wonders

B

           Best Friends

You can buy a charm at any jewelry store that says "Best Friend" in silver or gold.  But I shy away from that phrase because more than one person can be "best" at the same time for different reasons.

Betty and I started calling ourselves best friends in about the third grade, though she was always there since kindergarten, the one I'd choose to sit beside and write notes to and invite to do things with.  She was the one who sat in the car with me after revivals and concluded, with me, that there must be a Plan B for people who were born in China and India and didn't have Jesus in their hearts.  At an early age, we vehemently questioned the words of the visiting preacher who told us that Hell was the destination for those folks.

Best friends are the people who say, "I've already eaten but I'll come sit with you while you eat."  Best friends are the ones who hear your same sorry story over and over and over (ad nauseum) while you try to figure out what to do--and tell you their  stories back.  Best friends are trustworthy and honest.  Best friends call and check on each other and make soup as needed and offer to pick you up at the airport.  Best friends protect each other's secrets.  Best friends know that what you say may not be the final word on the subject.



         


         

Asking the wrong people

Will and family arrived back in San Antonio today from their Colorado ski trip.   I haven't seen them yet, but Will called to report an overheard conversation between Nathan and Elena:

Nathan and Elena had asked their parents, in vain apparently, to buy something they wanted.

Elena, ever precocious and pragmatic, took her brother aside and said, "We're asking the wrong people, Nathan.  It's Yenna and Papi who buy us the really cool stuff."

My Jigsaw Month of March

Some months are for doing large and expansive things--like traveling, walking on the beach, and taking in large landscapes.  March has been my jigsaw puzzle month.

Today I completed the third one in a week--all but a couple of dozen pieces I'm waiting to click in when the sun is up and I can see it in natural light. Sunday's puzzle is a grid of squares of old cars, six squares across, eight squares up and down.  Each VW bug, Mini Cooper and Fiat is brightly colored, but you don't pick up on the subtle differences between two reds, two yellows, two greens, until you sit with it for a day.  Each car is parked in front of a building with various signs and trees and plants.

I love jigsaw puzzles when I'm figuring out what to do next.  Today, I've needed mostly silence and space and a puzzle of cars was perfect for my Sunday mood. First, I do the border--which is sort of like the border of a life--what it can contain and where the edges are.

Then I focus on parts--the signs are most fun because of the lettering.  Slowly the cars emerge, all little cars of every color in my Crayola palette.   They remind me of my Mini Cooper trips, of cars in car shows, and cars I grew up in, always riding around, looking, looking at the world through car windows and rear view mirrors.

The most challenging parts are the places where the pieces connect, just like in real life.  What goes next to what?  How does one thing or person relate to all other pieces and people?  There's real pleasure in hearing the click: this all fits together into one big picture.

March 19, 1922

On March 19, 1922, Rose Harris gave birth to her fourth baby, Lloyd, a boy who would grow up to be, among other things, my daddy.  Rose and Jim were parents of Gladys, Jimmie, Lyle, Lloyd, and Betty June.

They lived those Depression years in a house down in the "holler" around Chattanooga, so poor that one day Jim sold Rose's piano and little-boy Lloyd stuck out his tongue at the men who came to pick it up.  Another day Jim plowed up Rose's flowers to make room to plant vegetables.  Jim smoked cigarettes and drove wild; when I knew Rose she wore socks and was sickly.  She had framed pictures of her children on the walls and under the glass of her coffee table.

All three boys served in the Navy during World War II, and Rose kept fringed satin Navy pillows they'd sent her on the divan--what they called sofas in Chattanooga.

When I was a little girl, I had the good fortune to live in a happy house. My parents loved each other and us so much that there was never a teeny tiny question mark.  There was no fighting--my daddy was clear about that from the start; he was as conflict-averse as I am, but a way nicer person overall.

I never heard him yell or use profanity.  He was clean, so clean, always smelling of after-shave and soap and toothpaste except when he hauled home a load of smelly fish.  He was a joke-telling and hugging man, handsome as all get-out, and everyone loved him; some of the younger women at church adopted him as their daddy.

Lloyd Harris wanted very little for himself--a fishing pole, bait, just the basics.  He never collected anything or bought anything extravagant. We got a new car every few years and traded in the old one.   Having worn hand-me-down clothes and shoes as a child, all he wanted was for his children to have everything they needed for a happy life.

I used to have a penchant for chocolate chip cookie dough and if I asked, he'd stop what he was doing and go to the store and get me one of those slice and bake rolls.  We'd eat some raw dough and cook the rest.  He could make a sound just like a baby chicken and the cashiers at the grocery store laughed when they say him coming.

When we watched Miss America (the Super Bowl at our house every September), he'd make popcorn balls with popcorn and bubbling sorghum syrup in a cast iron skillet.  I liked to help him shape them into balls, then return to the sofa to predict the winners.  "Southern girls are always the prettiest," he'd say.

The few times I ever saw him angry had to do with anyone doing or saying anything to hurt the people he loved--or even potentially hurting another person by driving drunk or too fast. During our last visit he got on a bit of a tirade about teenaged drivers--when he spotted one speeding in a red convertible.

I never left home that he didn't walk out to the car with me, give me a hug, make sure all the doors were locked, and give me a bit of driving advice.  "Always look out for the other guy," he'd say.  "Because he isn't going to be looking out for you."

I sometimes wonder what he thought about when he sat in his boat or on the side of a lake or pond.  I suspect he wasn't thinking about lofty philosophical questions, just being in the moment, watching the still surface of the water for a tug on the line.

He was that kind of man--practical and present and kind.   Other men come and go, but a man like that never goes far from the hearts of the people who remember him.  He was not a thing-person, but a people-person, and when he left us, the church was packed with people.  Even now, when I visit their church, I hear over and over again, "You look so much like your daddy,"  then a story about something funny he said or did.

If giving up something would do it, I'd give anything to be able to make him a banana pudding or pound cake today and thank him for the millionth time for being as close to perfect as a man can be.

I wish I'd sent Carlene 95 somethings--candles or roses, anything, to mark  the day--because as far as she's concerned, he's still here, still around her every day.  How true their love song of the Forties, the one they sang together in the car whenever we took road trips!  "I'll be loving you, Always...."

I miss him every single day!

Wonderful Old Women

Today we had the second book-signing for the book, Wonderful Old Women, at La Cantera's Barnes and Nobles.

It was extraordinary, truly magical, to listen to six of the women featured in the book tell their stories and what being a part of Bonnie's brainchild project meant to them.

Their stories are fascinating!  Two came with their husbands of sixty-two years; another brought her husband of fewer years; two were widowed; one divorced--and every one of them seemed excited about their past, present and future lives.

I was so inspired that it occurred to me that we could make a documentary--if we can find a videographer.

Lea has been a dear friend of mine for two decades, the funniest and most glamorous of the women.  She told the story of her happy 39 year marriage, then said that right around their anniversary he "decided he'd be happy with someone else."  And yet, Lea--who has published two memoirs--is having a very fine life without him, writing, being in a book group, and driving to Whataburger and calling into the speaker, "This is Lea.  You know what I want!" and getting a sundae almost every day at McDonald's.

Some have children, others don't.  One grew up on the wrong side of the integration line, yet married her doctor husband and reared four children, then started on her PhD when she was 68.  One of her children called her one day and said, "Mom, you've always wanted that PhD; now come to college with me."  And she did.

Some are widely traveled--like the woman who started traveling after her husband died, like the one whose life's work took her all over the world.  She's planning to have us all over to her house for dinner one night and cook Indian food.

All have experienced hardships and tragedies, but today's talks were about their successes and joys, families and friends.  They were positive and upbeat and full of life.  Each shared some of her life philosophy with us.

The one who grew up black and poor (and whose parents never graduated high school, one even elementary school) said that she never knew they were poor because they had so many books and magazines and because her daddy taught her that "education is the most important thing in life."

Another has been married for 62 years to a retired senator (who was right there with her at 90) and she played the organ at San Fernando Cathedral for 30 years.  She was proud to have met two popes.

Two are well-respected therapists in San Antonio, one (who grew up in Germany) still practicing, the other recently retired at 90.

One of my favorite comments of the day was this:  "Being a part of this project has taken my down many corridors of my life and I am so grateful!"

I'm seriously wishing I had the video skills to turn this project into a film.  These women are articulate and funny and inspiring--and I'd love to see it extend outside of San Antonio and into the world.

We have one signing yet to do--next Sunday at 3:00 at the San Antonio Library.

Amy Krouse Rosenthal Lives Until 51

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/13/style/amy-krouse-rosenthal-dies-modern-love.html

Day sent me a text this morning: "Read Encyclopedia of An Ordinary Life--and recommend it to your writing friends."

I downloaded the book right away.  That and another of her quirky "memoirs" along with 28 children's books, her Ted Talk, and a link to her essay in "Modern Love" reveal a lively and vital writer who died this week at the age of 51.

You can also find videos on You Tube, including one that is called "Always Trust Magic."

Images of this week

On Thursday, I decided to go to the Chinese massage place on San Pedro.  They call it a foot massage, but actually it's an all-over massage that really helps when you're feeling stuffy or have to get out of your house that's vibrating like the jack hammer robot on the street for an entire week.

I spotted a number of funny misspellings on their poster--most alarmingly, that it helps you "relive" stress--but I went for it anyway and left feeling better.

Then Freda and I had dinner that night at Adalante's, our comfort food place, infused with all the colors I love!

Then I got this wonderful canvas bag in the mail just now from Bella Grace, the magazine Carlene has subscribed to for me!

The sentiment on the bag is perfect for any day:  What if I fall?  Oh, my darling, what if you fly?

Because I have a cold I'm going to fly right now into the covers of my comfy bed and relax with comics on Netflix, starting with Chelsea and moving on to Samantha Bee and Trevor Noah.  These folks do a great job of helping "relieve" stress instead of reliving it!