Failing Revolutions, Earthquakes, Tsunamis, and More Rain

Is this Armageddon?  Today's news reports certainly suggest so.

Kenya was anxious all night because of the high winds ... and as a result I was too.  Twice I crept downstairs to make sure that the wet snow was not forming a river ready to invade my house.  The last time it was caused by a tree felled across the stream.  The winds are shaking the biggest trees here.

I gave Leonard a container of the beans yesterday.  They taste like candy.  Today Peter will be helping me get the staircase ready for painting, and I will package his food and send it home with him.  I will likely tuck in a helping of pasta with meat sauce for Leonard as his luck needs a boost these days.

But ... on the bright side, the little box is coming along and I am liking what it is evolving to.  I was asked to make a jewelery box for a baby.  It's not that easy to think of ideas for a grown-up present for a baby, so it has taken me a long time to figure out what to do with the jewelry box I found last summer at a garage sale in Wakefield.  I took it apart and sanded and primed the exterior ages ago but was hesitant about how to proceed.  I think it will be whimsical enough for a baby but grown up enough to last till she is older.

And here is what Robert Genn says about painting and art in general  ... he says it well ...

Art establishes and makes tangible a time, a place, a thought, an idea.
Art, properly made, enhances and enriches the lives of others.
Art gives an opportunity to endow new life and new meaning into the ordinary.
Art gives an opportunity to design your own world, and, as in your children, create a significant immortality.
Art is hard-earned work that is its own reward and has a degree of permanence.
Art, because it's so easy to do, and yet so difficult to do well, encourages humility in the human soul.
Art is an apprenticeship that can be stretched into a lifelong education.
Art thrives on democratic ideals, freedom of expression and rugged individualism.
Art permits you to step out of the labyrinth and into a quiet corner of your own private joy.
 

Grey Days ... No Thoughts

Today I am starting with a tabula rasa ... a blank screen and an equally blank mind.

I need to do a Costco run today some time.  Kenya must be walked. I have some last minute lesson planning left to do because I will be out all day tomorrow .I should get more paint on the chair pieces.

I am finding it a pain in the butt to work on the pieces rather than a whole chair that can be moved as one item and on which I can see the effect of colours side by side..  It will be easier to do the design work ... maybe ... but the basic painting is much slower and trickier.  You can place a chair on a drop cloth or a newspaper, but pieces have to be laid out carefully on my table, and, even with care they end up blotchier than they would be if I were painting the whole thing.  I try to speed up the process by painting more than one surface and then have nowhere to to dry the piece without damage that will need to be scraped or sanded back.

Next time I will know better.

I wonder if my lassitude is the result of boredom, frustration or just plain laziness and a desire to get back to my current book.  I am reading a lot more lately.  I bought a raft of good books for the winter, and here it is, not even December, and I have gobbled up a few and am eating my way ravenously through Room. 

Room is a  strange book.  The writer has limited herself to a particularly focused point of view and setting which could have resulted in an absolutely claustrophobic read, but her skill has lifted it beyond the narrow confines she set for herself.  It was up for (and may have won) the Man Booker prize this year. 

Annabel and Light Lifting were both finalists for the Giller. 

Annabel has made me reflect on things I seldom consider.  It is a sensitively written story of a hermaphroditic child born in a time and place where the condition was misunderstood and  hidden so that the results were more tragic than they should have been.  Love, however, makes this ultimately a redemptive novel.

I am giving Light Lifting to a friend for Christmas.  It is a very male book.  Well written ... but masculine in a way books that appeal mainly to women are not.  It is about physicality rather than feelings; action rather than contemplation. Strong detail throughout and all the other positives associated with excellent writing ... but I am more interested in the softer more amorphous things that go on within a person than I am in how accurately the writer is able to convey physical sensations. 

I think any athlete with a penchant for reading would love this book which captures a runner's pain, exhaustion and exultation; the physical details of a father dealing with recurrent infestations of lice; and, most often, the pain inflicted on men by other men or by themselves.  Because he handles sensory detail so well, the writing is powerful.    It is not that other good writers (women more often than men) get at feelings by emoting about them; it's that Alexander MacLeod's focus is on the physical ... and on men and their perspective.

I haven't finished reading all the stories yet, partly because it is so very male, but also partly because I prefer novels to short fiction. I will write a proper review of this one when I have finished it, because I know I have not done it justice.  I may have given the incorrect impression that the stories are just about physical pain endured by men ... and the ones I have read are more than that ... they illuminate truth just as all fine fiction does.

So ... on with my day ... hope you have a good one ...

This Post Brought to You by the Letter P

I'd hoped to tell you all about an upcoming gig pig-sitting ... but alas, it is not to be. 

The first meeting was not a success. Kenya desperately wanted to play with her, but Olive, the potbellied piglet, rooted about in her crate scream-grunting imprecations at Kenya. 

They both started out just sniffing the air and then Kenya tentatively stretched her long nose toward the wire separating the flattened piggy snout from her own moist, black one.  As Olive became more and more upset about the intruder near her space, Kenya became increasingly excited about the prospect of really playing with her.

I have seen the same behaviour with cats.  Cats that are perfectly comfortable with dogs either in a friendly or dominant way seem to keep Kenya calm.  Cats that are fearful excite her.  She never fails to chase the feral cats on the lake, but she is perfectly comfortable with Oberon and other cats she has lived with.

When it became plain that these two animals were not likely to relax with each other any time soon, I said I thought we could not pig-sit; that three days of running interference would be just too harrowing for me ... to say nothing of the emotional well being of the animals involved.

So Kenya went out to the car and I had lunch with Olive's human. 

While we ate, Olive rooted around under the table, cleaning up crumbs and nibbling on my toes.  She is a dear little piglet ... black with wiry hair, a wagging tail, squashed up snout, and delicately sculpted feet.  Have you ever seen live  pigs'  feet?  They are lovely ... and incongruous on such a rotund little animal.  Reminded me of Petunia Pig and her high heeled pumps.

Right now Olive is about the size of two footballs, but she will double in size by the time she is full grown.  She is litter trained (most of the time) and is a vegetarian.  I guess the most endearing thing about her is that she is always in motion, always close to human activity,  and always vocal.  I like animals that talk to me ... and she is even more communicative than Kenya is.

Later in the day, good friends arrived with dinner ... pasta and salad with a Christmas stollen for dessert.  Yummy.  They had a bit of a time getting up my road ... started to slide off the road and were saved by Peter, my friend, neighbour and carpenter.  They parked about ½ kilometre from the house and walked (or skated) the rest of the way.

Leonard who does my plowing had called earlier to ask if he should sand the road.  I said blithely that it wasn't necessary; that I had got out and in  that morning with no trouble once I spent 3/4 hour scraping the windows.  Big mistake.  And then when I tried later to reach him I discovered that the number I had was not correct.  So my first job today will be finding Leonard and straightening everything out.

My second will be painting the Muskoka chair. I  have decided to play with rainbow colours and publishers' logos.  Photos will follow when the work begins to progress.  It has been long enough since I last painted that I am a little fearful; have to keep reminding myself that nothing is ever permanent ... neither glory days nor screw-ups.

And my third job will be to plan for next Wednesday's class with Pauline, Azra and Diane.  I am finding myself looking forward to these classes because I like being with these women.  We spend as much time laughing as we do working.

These Lazy Hazy Days ...

Whew! What a weekend. Kenya and I spent almost all of it in and on the water. She just keeps on swimming and swimming even when I stop and pull the kayak up on shore or climb the ladder and dry off.

Last night she had a special treat. Erin and Aidan dropped in and so she had a BOY ... and not only a boy but a boy who is really a FISH and not only a boy who is really a fish but a BOY who is really a FISH who speaks DOG to play with.

Earlier in the day my nice neighbours who have two husky friends for Kenya to visit returned to the city leaving their cottage occupied by friends. I was painting a base coat of primer on a piece of furniture when I heard a woman's voice: "There's a big black bear under the deck. Oh, it's a dog. It's wagging its tail."

I went outside, paint brush in hand and called over, "Her name's Kenya. Just tell her to go home." They did and she did.

Even the raucous neighbours on the other side finally chilled out and calmed down after two solid days of partying. Yesterday they floated quietly around on air mattresses instead of shouting and drinking, shattering the tranquillity, and transforming the lake into a bar scene.

I am finally enjoying playing with the second cat chair ... that is because the dreary work is finished and I am applying decorative touches. The little crib has been fun to work with because all the surfaces are flat. When Tamarak and Carlos were here on Saturday I mentioned that it had been much easier to paint the small canvas for my business card than to paint the furniture, and Tamarak said (laconically), "Well, yeah. It's a flat surface." She refrained from saying, "DUH." Thank you Tammy!

I just read about a movie that sounds as if I would like it: Julia and Julie ... about Julia Child and a blogger called Julie. I have decided that I will go to town on the next day that is not wonderfully warm, or the first day I tire of the lake, and I will watch movies all afternoon. First Julia and Julie ... then The Time Traveler's Wife ... a whole afternoon of chick flicks. I haven't done that for a long time.

a few words in between chores

When I say good bye to animals and their people after a stay there is always the bitter sweetness of the empty house. Kenya makes no bones about how she feels ... she mopes around in a semi-depressed state. She sleeps a lot. Maybe she is partly relieved that she is no longer on duty 24/7, but I think she also misses the other dogs ... and this time the cats as well, especially the cats.

I am too busy cleaning to feel deprived. That will come tomorrow, maybe. Or maybe not, because this time, the dogs slept downstairs. Usually boarding dogs share my bedroom with Kenya and me, but I thought that Kenya might resent two dogs in my bed. She never minds Remi sleeping with me, but these two usually sleep with their people ... in two beds ... and there is only one of me to go around ... and Kenya made it clear that while she can share toys and brushes and treats and petting, she was keeping the upstairs part of the house free of the interlopers. I never witnessed a confrontation over this but neither Chelsea nor Olive seemed inclined to come upstairs when Kenya was around.

So far today I have mopped, swept and washed the bathroom and laundry room floors and found the missing kitty toys in various hidey-holes, done a huge laundry (3 rainy days with 3 dogs that love to swim creates a lot of dirty linen), swept and mopped the rest of the upstairs, cooked up a batch of beets from the market, started a stew in the slow cooker, put a final coat of base colour on the ugly little rocker, a lazy susan and the second stool. The rest of the work will be picky and fun.

I doubt if I can make this poor little rocker beautiful, but I can make it much happier than it was wearing its flecked and peeling fluorescent orange paint. I am trying to decide on a theme. All the lines on the chair are plain and straight. The colours are turquoise with small amounts of the dark blue purple, gold, warm brick red, celery green and deep pink. I will use other colours on the joint areas and to create the images.

Some possibilities: frog sitting on the seat and other creatures like fish and butterflies elsewhere

a circus theme ... balloons, cotton candy, striped tent top ... not sure what to do with the seat ... maybe the rings?

The other problem I am facing is how to tone down an unfortunate colour choice. On the card it looked like a lighter mossy green. In reality it is an acidic Koolade lime green that I hate. I have tried a wash of darker green but it just puddles. I think I will have to mix my own colour and paint it on top. Please let me know if you can think of a simple solution.