Once upon a time I was maybe in third grade when Sister Eleanor hovered over my desk. The word “terror” applies. “Who taught you to write?” she asked (was that a tear in her voice?). Thank goodness that terror tied my tongue and I didn’t reply “You did, Sister.”
Penmanship. Woe. Those hideous circles and ovals — just what had they to do with real life?
My mother’s handwriting was beautiful. Did I inherit that gene? Not even close. I have mastered a hybrid, part print, part longhand, which I can (usually) read. I should give thanks for the keyboard, yes? No. There is something about handwriting which is a fragment of a real person.
Many of us have handwritten recipe cards. There’s a person there under the ancient splots. When we take out those cards — or, from my grandmothers’ kitchens, scraps of calendars — we hold a flesh-and-blood woman. A mom. A grandma. A voice. An ironed apron.
We all know that you don’t have to give birth to be a mother. And for all those women in our lives who have mothered us, with or without the ironed apron, we stop for a moment today. We salute them all.
Happy Mothers’ Day to all who mother and have mothered!
One day a very young me walked into my grandma’s simple kitchen and stopped dead, transfixed and wide-eyed. There, on the other side of her rolling floor, was the marvel of my life. It was a dollhouse made out of a tall cardboard box. A townhouse (not that I knew at the time what a townhouse was). I’d never seen the like.
Some of its contents were real honest-to-Woolworth’s store-bought dollhouse furniture, and maybe a plastic baby or two, but most of it was created out of scraps. Imagine custom curtains made from bits of the pink plastic ruffle thumb-tacked to the edge of pantry shelves (eat your heart out, Martha Stewart). Oh, it was wonderful, and I spent countless happy hours playing with that, living, of course, inside it. Pretending.
That is why it is Grandma’s fault that I look at homes like these and immediately start placing my furniture. Imagining living in rooms shaped like that. Imagining walking up those stairs and being elegant. Imagining curtains of vines and trees. Imagining such refuge from the wind-up world.
Pretending is the key that unlocks all doors, so I can go in and know just where the chocolate is.
I’ve been scratching my head for a while about this whole “Comments” thing. I used to be able to leave a comment just by leaving a comment. Then, for reasons mysterious, on some sites I had to log in before I could leave a comment. But I was already logged in. What sense did that make?
Now I find that on some sites I have to enter my name and email address before I’m allowed to leave a comment.
And Ginger, who has been a delightful source of commentary for a long time, is flagged as Not Approved. Who disapproved her?
Today I’m getting a message that something didn’t load. I read it. I know no more than I did before I read it.
So, dear reader, if you are kind enough to want to leave a comment on any of my posts and are asked for your name or a log-in or any other such thing, I can only apologize and assure you that I am not the one asking.
I had to make a hard decision, dear reader, one I’ve been dreading for a while: I had to have a big maple taken down. This hurts. I think the original owners planted it, and I think they were a young couple; I can picture them in their first home, so excited to plant this tree as part of their vision. After all, we plant trees for those who will follow us.
But sometimes people plant trees picturing only what’s aboveground. In a small yard, a small tree seems the perfect fit. Twenty years later, the yard is still small. The tree and its roots? Not so much.
Not only were the roots of this tree cozying up to the foundation of my house, but they were also wrapped around the trunk, choking the tree. The front yard is a veritable corduroy road with surface roots. Those poor roots had nowhere to go but up to find food.
And thus did I lose bountiful shade on the west-facing front of my home. Hot summer, anyone?
Will I plant another tree? Probably, some day. When/if I do, it will be from the roots up.
Also my argument that it’s not my fault when my photos are cattywampus; it’s my camera in cahoots with Emily Dickinson.
And, yes, dear reader, I sense the irony: Truth is stuck in this country’s throat right now. Is Emily’s notion of slowly revealed Truth the same as truth pried out like an abscessed tooth? (I guess I can’t help rhyming.)