The Bedroom Story, Part One

Well, here's the hole that started it all. It all began with the bed actually, but right now it is just a big brown uninteresting box. So the hole will get top billing for now. The hole and the termites that ate the hole, nice square job they did eh? (That was really Dirt's handi-work.)

This is the type of stuff that freaks out my silly over-reactive nodes, they're so much like me, over-reactive that is.

Boards just hanging out, being bored, waiting to be reused and used. Not everything got hauled out as planned but the girls appreciated the stereo being left in the room.

It kept them entertained while they pulled the wall paper off the wall to expose more paper. I'm a corner cutter, and would have just plastered over the wall paper but when I heard it peeled easily I figured they should peel it and I'll plaster on the paper I used to decrease the paneling lines on the upper part of the wall over twenty years ago.

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I know, everyone is going to say that I should strip things and do this and do that, butcha know, I was told that the wallpaper and even the paint wouldn't adhere to the paneling twenty years ago. I would have had a different color scheme years ago if it would have only peeled or flaked or something. So for a person who loves change, I like to live dangerously.

Here's the original window with the window taken out. A nice typical bedroom sized window.

Anna helped her dad measure and draw the cutting lines for the new window. A new window could be extravagant, but I found it on Craig's list for a relative song, it is a really nice Penguin window, and will afford quite a view of the yard and gardens from the bed. No need to pull up a chair, the head of the bed is a mere eleven feet from the window. The foot of the bed, just inches.

Dirt will be installing a baseboard heater just under the window. I like baseboard heat. I don't care for the blowy noisy-ness of most force air heaters or furnaces. And with my asthma issues (and now obviously my lymph seems to want to complain a little too) one of the worst triggers is house dust and mites (uck) and forced air heat is a contributor to the problem.

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Besides that, our furnace never worked well into other parts of the house and Dirt had to crawl under the house and redo the soft duct work. Our cats were often blamed, but I'm thinking that the possums that Martin has pulled out from under the house also liked to rip into the ducting and enjoy the heat, not to mention the mice and other rodentia that crawl under my house with abandon ( I hear them all the time, skritch, skritch, skritch).

Ah, here is the new window! And even better, here is the help to put in the window! Our friends from up north have impeccable timing to show up for work and for that Dirt and I are incredibly thankful.

It took the three Coulter men, Dirt and a bit of help from Bet on the inside to put the window in the hole. I have no idea how Dirt, sicky me, Anna and Bet would have gotten that hurkin' thing in.

It pays to have tall friends, and friends willing to play huggy to rose bushes (I told them they could cut it down), you can't really see Trevor in behind the rose arbor or Mark being eaten by the climbing clinging rose, that's Justin on the ladder getting tapped on the arm by the rose, and looky there, Dirt, and no rose thorns in his side!

And here are the spectators. Becky and I sittin' on the Lilac Bench watching the window installment. (I'm the one in the mask.) I appreciate good company sittin' on my favorite bench with me on a bright sunny day. We are both happy to have the chance to soak up some pre-winter sun.

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This all went down on Sunday and now it is Tuesday evening, I still wear the mask most of the time, even when I am not in that end of the house. It helps with the asthma, I forget how much more comfortable I am with them on than without them wheezing most of the time.

After lunch break and a little football, we took our precious company out back to Dale's pond to see how the mountain was getting along. It looked pretty in soft pink and all snowy. Anna was ready to head to the mountain and play in the snow. Daddy better have his big truck ready for some Saturday afternoons in the snow.

I should have packed the tripod with me as the light level was low enough that it was hard to hold still for nice crisp shots. But I enjoyed being out shooting pictures again.

One of my favorite things about autumn is the evening, with the fog that forms on the ponds and the way the sunset catches it. After taking in all the pretty sky we could, we all headed back to the house for Anna's Green Tomato Spice cake from the last of this year's green tomatoes. We topped off the cake with our homemade caramel sauce and some delightful home made hazel nut whipped cream, had a little bit of coffee, watched some of the Philly's and NY game and then reluctantly said good bye to our northern friends, those positively amazing Coulters.

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I hope you had a good weekend and are in the middle of a terrific week, Dear Reader. Things are just looking plain old terrific here at Victory Farm and Gardens because as a very dear friend shared with us this week:

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The Lord your God is in your midst,

a mighty one who will save;

he will rejoice over you with gladness;

he will quiet you by his love;

he will exult over you with loud singing.

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Zephaniah 3:17:

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It matters not who you are or what you situation is God is in your midst.

Who'da Thunk It

Who would have guessed that drinking a smoothie would be near impossible? Not me. But guess who knows that drinking a smoothie can hurt like all get out. Me.

It isn't because my throat is on fire. I don't have a sore throat but I can't swallow. Any one remember having mumps? That would perhaps be what this is like. My entire left-side facial lymph system is freaking out and swollen to great proportions.


It all started with wanting a better bed. That's all, just a better bed. I wake up feeling a hundred years old when I sleep in my bed. I know it doesn't have to be that way because when I sleep on a three inch mattress in my trailer I bounce out of bed as if I was... at least thirty-two again, lets make that thiry-one shall we, I was pregnant when I was thirty-two, no bouncing out of bed that year, so thirty-one it is.

So after a summer of sleeping in the trailer on a three inch mattress on a plank and then two nights back in the house on our big fat giant bed, Dirt woke up saying that we needed a new mattress.

"Say what? I thought you liked our mattress? I thought a new bed was unnecessary?" I say, working hard at keeping three-or-more-years-in-the-making snark out of my voice.

"My limbs are dead in the morning when we sleep in here (the house)."

So not only has Dirt conceded that we need a new mattress he also has conceded that a queen size bed is a better size than the king we have always had. The first house we lived in only a twin mattress could fit up the stairs to the bedroom, so Dirt built a boxed in frame and we put two twins together, two twins sort of equal a king. And we have been doing the king thing ever since.

The big hurdle to go queen is that years and years ago, when we moved downstairs here at the farm and let the Steph and Michelle have the upstairs two rooms, one for play the other for sleeping, Dirt built me this fantastic bed out of barn boards and logs.

My brother had been by when we were building it and told us of the Greek tragedy where the hero had built the marriage bed incorporating the main post in the house as a bed post. Wow. That totally fit Dirt's and my understanding of the marriage bed and marriage and the building of the household. Even though our bed was not an integral part of the construction of our house, it became symbolic of how we see our marriage bed, honored and set apart, not common.

So for Dirt to consider a smaller mattress is huge, because now he has to remodel our bed. He has had to modify it over the years to accommodate a deeper mattress and box spring, so it isn't that he can't touch it at all, it is that he will have to decide which six inches of the barn board head and foot boards gets cut out.

He's funny, Dirt is, I never took him for being overly sentimental or deeply tied to symbolism. But apparently he is on marriage things. A few years back, when I had to have an MRI to rule out MS, I had to have Mike cut my ring off (he is a jeweler) and afterwards I asked him to take my wedding ring (which is just a band, by unregretted choice) and my mom's wedding ring and make me a new ring. When it came down to Mike needing to discuss what the design should look like, Dirt put a kibosh on the whole thing, Mike resized my original ring and that was the last of that.

So now he is going to have to cut into our bed, this could be a big thing for him. Bigger than letting me have a bigger window in my bedroom.

Because I have the threat of MS hanging over my head, I always wonder what it would be like to be bedridden, and how a once active outdoor person remains in decent spirits when it happens to them. So when I was looking at moving my bedroom around a bit (which isn't a big thinking project, not many ways to arrange a twelve by eleven foot bedroom really) I thought it would be great to have a bigger window so that while lying in bed (invalid or not) I could see my whole Lilac Bench Garden. Some of my favorite gardens can be viewed from my bedroom window and it even has a view of half of the pasture area.

With a window that goes down to just fifteen inches off the floor and is five feet wide I will be able to take in so much more than I can out the existing window. Lying in bed, looking out the existing window I can see the top of the barn roof and tree tops. Which is better than nothing or a brick wall but....

I found a perfect window on Craig's list, eighty bucks and right by where Dirt works, he went and picked it up on Thursday. But I really feel bad, not because I am making him do more work, but because I can't help him.

On Tuesday I began taking everything out of my room, Wednesday found me pulling the existing closet built-in out. I didn't have a mask on even though I know that even regular old house dust can stir up my asthma sumpin' fierce. With all the clothes out and the rods, I stepped to the back corner of the closet to take the rod holder off of the wall. As I turned the screw driver I felt the floor mush a little, one more twisting reef on the driver and then my foot went clear through the floor and into the crawl space below. Shoot Fire!

As I pulled my feet from out of the hole that they had both managed to fall into, a zillion thoughts raced through my lil' ol' head. Not the first of which was how mad Dirt was going to be with the extra work. What didn't cross my mind all that greatly was what the stirring of all that old bug dust was going to do to my lungs, let alone any other body systems.

That evening when we took a break from our work to relax, Dirt having accepted the news with a, "oh that soft spot finally broke through," I notice my jaw hurt like I had been leaning on it while watching T.V.. But I didn't remember leaning on it. Well it had been a long crazy day and I probably just forgot. I moved it around a little to loosen it up, but that didn't seem to help. Brushing my teeth later it really seemed to hurt worse. Out at the trailer, I went to lie back in bed, and I couldn't believe how bad it hurt. Wow.

In the morning when I woke up I knew something else was going on besides leaning on my jaw while watching T.V.. But by that evening I could not believe the pain and the amount of swelling that had occured. Now every lymph node on the left-side of my face, in front of my ear, below my jaw, up by my cheek, behind my ear, down my neck, are all swollen to very large portions, some the size of walnuts and all are freaking tender.

By Thurday evening I couldn't chew, anything. Swallowing felt like I was spraining something in my mouth or jaw. Yesterday, Friday, I spent the day on the couch while the girls finished up the room. I knew Dirt needed to really get going on busting up the wall for the window, making the hole in the closet bigger because now he is using it as access to run electricity under the window to put in some baseboard heat. Yay, no more having to leave my door open to make sure I don't have a cold clammy room.

But this project is growning huge. And I can't help. Even with a mask on, walking into the room to tell Dirt the final placement of the window, I can feel my body revolt. Not to mention getting up and moving around causes more pain and sometimes a little fever comes of the movement. I'm ready for a catheter and a feeding tube.

On that cheery note, I bid you a good afternoon in your world, Dear Reader. (I will have more on the room including pics the girls took of the process.) In spite of the complaining and whining it really is a good day here, the sun is shining, family is working and playing (costumes you know), friends call and one drops over with a present, life is sweet. Life is always sweet because our life here at Victory Farm and Gardens belongs to Christ Jesus.

Grab Your Running Shoes, We Are Covering Some Ground

I have a lot of favorite blogs to read, if I let it get away from me like a day or two, I can actually have Goggle Reader telling me I have something like 400 to 500 items (posts on blogs) to read, yikes.

Sometimes that is a little daunting to wake up to, ya know what I mean? But then it is easy to dispatch because I can read most all of them off of my reader and not have to click over to their actual blog, unless they are one of those folks that "make" you come to their blog by only letting GR show a snippet of each post. If it catches my interest I'll pop over and finish reading it, but sometimes I wish folks didn't do that. It causes me to want to read their stuff less not more, but what the hay I'm not one to try and make a buck off how many times my blog has been viewed so, yeah, I get it, umm, I understand it but I actually may fail in "getting it".

I've dispensed with a lot of other reading that I used to do that I don't anymore 'cause I have blogs to read. I don't "do" magazines any more. Well I would like to subscribe to one in particular, well two actually, they are farming magazines. No, not country fu fu living magazines but Stockman Grass Farmer and Small Farmer's Journal, they have solid, actual farming articles that spur me on, one I pick up often from the local library and the other I discovered through the editor's book on pastures and I sent for a copy of the newsletter, oops off track here. Suffice it to say I have given up some of my other types of reading for the delight of reading blogs. Real life by real people. Not fluffed up nonsense and darn near lies by "professional writers". But I am bordering on complaining so I'll stop and continue with what I was really going to say.

One of my favorite blogs to read, Farside_of_Fifty, had some great posts that I read today (the other day now, as this is a delayed post). One was about her dog, nice darn dog, great breed; another on historical markers and a social studies teacher, and another about larch trees or Tamaracks. They were great. All her posts are great, even when she is storming about silly self-absorbed neighbors. The pieces, like usual, were windows into her life and they brought up thoughts and memories of mine, like a good piece of writing ought.

We don't see larch on our side of the Cascades but it is a tree that is cemented in my blood from childhood. My father grew up in the land of larch, and he taught me about them and most all of the trees in Washington including ones he came to know as an adult living on the wetter Westside.

Farside spoke of a social studies teacher in a post just before or just after, I forget which, her post on larch. She spoke of her social studies teacher as the only teacher in their local education district as one she would give more than two cents for, or something to that effect. Someone who actually taught. Those sort of teachers are rare, whether in Minnesota or Washington, in the sixties or now. It was the mention of social studies that caught me not so much the good teacher. But that played a part.

When we took Stephie, now nearly twenty-eight, out of second grade and became her primary source of education, the janitor at the elementary school gave us a slew of sample text books. That was the day that signed the death warrant for "text" books in my brain. I shuffled through them and decided on a few to keep.

We, Steph and I cracked open a social studies book meant for third graders and settled in for some fun and interesting facts. We learned a lot about Hawaii in that first chapter. Wow, who knew. The chapter spurred us on to learn even more things from other sources. But eventually it was time to move on to the next chapter. Washington! My favorite state!

We snuggle on the couch with Baby Bert and crack the big impressive book open to Chapter Two, Washington State. And I began reading; "Washington state is also called the Evergreen state" But then come the words; "A conifer tree is an evergreen and a broadleaf is deciduous." You know the sound Dear Reader, the needle scraping on the vinyl record. I read further to myself to see if they correct their gross generalization, but no, they left it there. Misinformation.

There is a lot of misinformation out there. This misinformation in particular is rampant in the world of information dispensers. The number one example of misinformation in the arbor world to me is equating evergreen with conifer or broadleaf with deciduous. The similar and related problem is when we think of evergreen and broadleaf as opposites.

Enter two of my father's favorite trees, the larch and the madrone. The larch is a conifer, needles for leaves and cone-bearing yet, deciduous, its needles turning a beautiful burnished yellow/gold in the fall and dropping leaving the tree naked until spring. The madrone, a broadleaved evergreen tree, the only thing it regularly sheds is its outer bark. Not just a broadleaved bush that is evergreen like rhododendron or salal or kinikinic or Oregon grape, but a tree.

Teachers, aren't always where we think we find teachers, my father, and my mother for instance, I think, no, I know, I learned more from these two people than any other institute of learning. I learned things I needed to learn. Mom and Dad, imparted to me everything I now hold as necessary to a good and thoughtful life. Yes, I learned from others, but all that, I do believe, was secondary and would not have made a hill of beans without the teachings of my parents.

Well, suffice it to say that the book slammed shut and went to the garbage. Not to mention we wondered what misinformation we just swallowed about Hawaii that we had no idea about. Oh we will never know the horrible mistakes we could be perpetuating to this day because we read that first chapter.

What is the point of my story? Don't believe everything you read. Think about it. Why would evergreen be synonymous with conifer, or broadleaf's antonym? Think about the words being used. Think about the words being used in the situation before you? Words matter. Origin of words, not just their common use, matters.

The other point? Don't be too hard on people who don't seem to know stuff that they talk about, they were probably educated with text books. Actually there are plenty of places to pick up misinformation. So if you feel the need to correct, correct in gentleness knowing that you may very well be the next corrected.

Mispronunciation bugs me a lot less than improper usage, spelling bugs me even less than that. No body cut down a tree because they couldn't pronounce or spell its name but I am betting there are many a Tamarack that were cut down in January when folks went out to start doing a little early landscaping and saw that the tree the nursery sold them last year is now dead.

I know my mom's neighbor would have. Every year for at least three of the last years that my mom lived there, he would tell my brother or I that my mom's tree by his fence was dead and that while we were out there taking care of her place we should cut it down. I guess he would always forget that he saw it lovely and green each summer, this fellow wasn't old enough to suffer dementia. It became a family joke. But seriously how many Tamaracks have been cut down because we people are lazy and think that conifer is synonymous with evergreen?

Okay, I Give In

I have often said since November that I think Facebook is ridiculous. I've said if it is not completely ridiculous, it is at least a major waste of people's time or it is a blatant display of how much time people waste. Something like those type of complaints have ushered from my lips or at least rolled around in my grey matter.

But I give in. I have to declare Facebook as being a nifty tool. Someone got a facebook account just so she could find me. Me. Little ol' grumpy-pants,-yell-at-the-world,-sack-cloth-and-ashes,-we-are-screwed-up" me. And because I have a Facebook account and I am actually attempting to use it, even though it requires that I say no more than a sentence or two (that is torturous quite frankly), she did indeed find me.

So for about a month and a half now, an old friend (clear back to seventh grade folks!) and I have had a couple of conversations, visited in person and on Facebook. And today she is coming for another visit to Vicktory Farm and Gardens so I won't tarry here long so that I can run the girls into little town this morning, return a movie to BB and books to the library and be back to greet her with a fire in the woodstove, a cup of something warm and some little toasty things to nibble on.

And I suppose I would have to say that some of last weekend's basking in an old friendship with a family we don't see but once a year, accidentally at the Fair, would also have to be attributed to stupid Facebook. It is just too easy to say, "hi, come on over for dinner" when you "see" a person on Facebook often.

And not to mention Facebook is going to be instrumental in the girls and I getting to know the sister of a good friend just a little better than seeing her occasionally at said friend's house for events that we would both be there, like wedding and house warming and moving days. Because she is going to come and make applesauce donuts with us next week! Just because of some silly little banter on Facebook, and because another Facebookian who knows both of us in real life, a reluctant and grumpy sort (kinda like me only far more pessimistic) who doubted the accuracy of our being able to say we are friends said, "oh, yeah and you guys are going to be real friends and actually talk?" or something to that effect. Well Bucky, this is Facebook Throwdown with Lanny.

So there it is, I cave, I cave to Facebook. But I admit I am not sure how some people can have 450 "friends". I just have 45 and I run to keep up with them. Yes, only 45 Facebook friends, isn't that like way sad?

Hey, is sad the only word these days that is still used in it's original manner or did I just say that it is actually cool that I have only 45 Facebook friend or something equally weird?

Have an awesome day Sweet Listener and Brave Converser. I'd have included a picture here but you can just see Facebook for yourself on your own computer. Maybe, just maybe, I will have some illustrations for you tomorrow. Oh wait, I will be without computer tomorrow, so you will not be hearing from me 'til at the very least Sunday. Because, yes, I am trying to get back to posting nearly every day. We'll see how that goal works.

Tute ta lue

I've Met the "Boys, Will Be..." Myth Busters

And you are going to meet them too.

I don't usually keep my blog promises, but I'm pretty sure that, unless I am run over by a bus, I'll be keeping this one.

I had some great photos to go with this but I lost them in a cup of coffee last fall, so I will get some more for future posts in this series. But for now you are just going to have to close your eyes and imagine... oh wait, this isn't in Braille, open up and keep reading and just let your mind wander off and imagine these lovely folks that I hope will:

Knock your socks off.

Encourage you to a knowing that you can have amazing sons like they do. And that you do not have to live through terrible twos, horrid adolescence and wait for them to be thirty to see decent character lived out in their lives.

Oh and a side note, and perhaps a separate series, that you can be in business or work for family, and with and for people that are nearly like family, and do it for longer than a month or two. They have been doing it for years.

Suffice it to say, I'm in love, we both are, Dirt and I, yes with each other but also with some new found friends. And yes, actually I've been holding out and keeping them mostly to my self, well we have shared them with the Bowermans a bit, but I haven't told ya'll about them much.

And forgive me if my gushing may sting, trust me I love all of you too, really I do, so maybe love isn't the right word for the special feeling I feel towards these people. Maybe astounded, or relieved is what I feel.

I knew that with my daughters, rearing them was not a crap shoot. It was not a case of "do my best" and hope for something less than a disaster. I knew that I did not have to despise my child at two, or sixteen. That none of them needed, like the world thinks they need, to go through a horrid rebellious stage. I knew that I did not need to beat them down and strip away their humanity to get there either. Actually I knew I couldn't take that approach if I wanted them to continue, on into adulthood, how they were as young people in my home.

(I'm writing "I" and "me" a lot, but please, see that "I" and "me's" are really "we's", Dirt and I, it is just that the convolution of making sure that every time I mention us, I mention us, it gets to be rather halting for me.)

The problem with having only one gender for your offspring is that people can continue to deny that the same result can be reached with the gender (opposite from yours of course) they have. And yes, of course those who birthed and are raising both will still have an out because they are having to deal with a "mixed" household, and we have only girls and they (this family you will be introduced to over the next few months) have only boys. But if you just want to look for excuses as to why you are going to insist on having what most everyone else has, a crap shoot and eventually nice twenty-five or thirty-year olds, then by all means excuse away. I'll have a funny post up about something innocuous in a few days for you.


And I certainly do not wish to give the impression that my girls are anywhere near perfect or that I did it on my own, or with some amazing program that I'm going to tell you to buy at the end of this post.

Sorry girls, but yes, my girls could be better. I could have had my head out of my... well I could have not been in residual lingering rebellion during the first five years of my marriage, that could have helped. I could have not been over come by neurotic anxiety in the ten years following that and then I could have not gone through crushing, immobilizing depression that had me in bed for over twelve to fifteen hours in a day, or twenty-four if I had no outside appointments, for the next five. So yeah, I could have done a little better job and then maybe I could say my girls are pretty close to perfect.

As it is, I didn't experience: rolling eyes, stomping feet, snotty attitudes, incredibly dishonoring words from their mouths, run aways, blatant disobedience, laziness, rudeness to my friends, slamming doors... .

What I have experienced consistently from all of my girls, now ages twenty-seven, twenty-three, eighteen and sixteen, is: tender hearts, open minds, sweet dispositions, loyalty. Obedience in stuff like: pleasantly working hard, like grown men in many instances, daily; not getting to go everywhere or just anywhere with just anyone; not a lot of material goods and faddish clothes; not dating; not pretending not to date; not moving out on their own, being "independent" and having daddy pay for the "independence"; being corrected when they were off base, and willingly changing.

But this series isn't about me, it is about them. And I can't wait to tell you all about them from my perspective and include little snippets of interviews that I am going to force them and me, us, to do, just for you.

But now the sun is up, well I am assuming it is, because I can see the leaves and grass out my window, which means that I need to get my rain gear on and get out-of-doors and pretend to be the farmer I think I want to grow up to be.

Question

What color is your kool-aid?

It is a quote from a friend today when we had heard some disturbing news and wondered why some folks are okay with nonsense. Unfortunately, I suppose, most nonsense is the type that slowly, ever so slowly, nearly non-detectably comes to a rolling boil and you find your sad little self in it.

Don't understand the question? You don't get the "kool-aid" reference?

The year: 1978

The man: Jim Jones, founder and leader

The place: Jamestown, Guyana

The beginning: 1950's Indiana as Methodist student pastor, then his own church, which eventually became Peoples Temple Christian Church, Full Gospel.

The unforeseeable tragedy: 909 people died after drinking cyanide laced Kool-aid at the direction of their Pastor Jim Jones. 909 people.

Yes, they were way off base. Way off. Not even the same planet really. But they had followed a personality.


Here are some interesting things said and seen at the scene:

To encourage others to participate in the mass suicide after the Temple folks murdered a senator and his delegation at the airport one temple member states "the ones that they take captured, they're gonna just let them grow up and be dummies."

In the one photo of the dead bodies on the pavillion is a sign above Jim Jones' chair it reads: "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it."


Huh, really.

Ahh I See.

So the consensus is..... No pictures please!

No, I know, it really was more like, "No bloody pictures of raccoons!" Or more accurately, "No pictures of bloody raccoons!" So then that means no pictures. Not that I took any anyway over the weekend. On a bad roll here.

Been writing a lot today, none of it publishable at the moment. I'll tidy it up and get back to you on that. But for now I have to take advantage of the last few rays of day light. And do something that is a whole lot more resemblant of work than what I have accomplished today, so far.

Short, sweet and not even a tidbit or nugget really, sorry Faithful Stalkers, I will try to be better tomorrow. The kitchen is clean though and there is a vacant chair to sit on while I cook or trim some cuttings so you can always stop by and force me to talk.