Can you belive it!?

 I can't tell you how glad I was when I found out that I could get my blog back after all.  Being absolutely stupid about the workings of cyberspace I thought that all was lost when my computer died.  I got this chromebook, but I had no idea I could get all my past posts by simply using the information I had on my old computer.  Go figure.  My daughter was visiting this week and the subject came up......she had underestimated my computer stupidity and never gave the situation any thought.  I guess she underestimated my ignorance, just as I did.  In any case, here I am.  The first thing I did was check to see if you were still there.  I am so happy to be in touch again..........hope you will be, too.  

Dog Walk Revisited

Well, I finally managed to figure out how to get pictures of my new place on my blog.  It turned out, though, that I couldn't really find images I liked enough.  This is hardly informative, but at least it's something.......one end of the living room.  Perhaps another time.....................

There has been no progress on dealing with Mike's death.  We wait for Amber, Mike's estranged daughter, to decide if she wants to be counted as a survivor and therefore sole beneficiary of his estate.  It's hard to absorb the fact that he is all ready to be buried (I identified the remains over the computer) but nothing else can be done until she decides what she wants to do.  His house and all his belongings sit untouched.  It seems to me that there must be a danger of people helping themselves to his considerable belongings.  Probably the police are in charge of that until some decision is made about his beneficiary.  

Meanwhile my life goes on.  I have begun a series of paintings of Eastport in the hope that I can have an exhibit at the end of the summer.  When I lived in Bangor I did a series of paintings called "Dog Walk" and every one of them(about 20 paintings) sold at a gallery that exhibited my work.  It was my one minute of fame, I guess, but I wish I still had them.  Money disappears, but paintings last forever. I had three dogs at the time and I called the exhibit "Dog Walk" because I painted scenes that I saw everyday as I walked the dogs in the streets of downtown. They were featured in all the paintings, walking ahead of the viewer at the end of their leashes in front of me, just as I saw them from the rear. If I get it together, I'll call the new paintings "Dog Walk 2".  Elliot will make a good model.

I an wavering a bit on my thought to let Amber have all Mike's inheritance.......just a bit though. I don't think I'm up for the furor.  I'd rather just let it go.

 

Unwelcome Developments

 Well. Life crawls along, for me at least.  I had forgotten, believe it or not, that my brother had a daughter, albeit an estranged, adopted one.  They haven't seen one another in over twenty years.  She graduated from high school and, unbeknownst to my brother, left home the next day.  She has never contacted him.  Somehow, he knew where she lived, though, so the police were able to track her down.  She is, therefore his sole heir.  When she was contacted she refused to deal with the situation, shocked as she was, right away.  So things are in limbo at this point.

How complicated things can become.  My brother had a lot of money and a valuable estate.  She is the sole heir.  I was tremendously relieved to think I wouldn't be involved in the disposition of his estate, but if she continues to   refuse it, I may still have to deal with it.  I will be the owner of a big luxurious house in Florida, complete with swimming pool and HUMMER vehicle.  I will have money like I never dreamed of, investments, property,.....he was saving to move back to Maine and had almost a hundred thousand dollars in the bank.

I am happy with my life right now, living in subsidized housing without a penny to my name.  I have always disliked money and what it does to people.  I am hoping against hope that his daughter will take everything.....she deserves it.  She had a terrible childhood and left home the morning after she graduated from high school, never to contact anybody in the family again.

Well, right now I feel very anxious.  When I found out that they had located his daughter I was relieved at first, thinking I could continue my life as it is.  But when she refused to claim her inheritance.............well, I may be able to refuse it, too.

In a way it must strike the officials dealing with this case that Amer and I, his only family at this point, do not want his money or any of his considerable estate.

What will happen?

New Life, lost life

 I feel as if I have started all over again, so different is my life from anything it has been before.  The biggest change, of course, is my environment.  I live in a beautiful apartment that seems so unlike anywhere I have lived before.  I am surrounded by people I don't know,  Many of whom are handicapped in various ways.  The other tenants, like me, are simply poor.  I ride an elevator to get to the ground floor and have learned the code that opens the door to the outside.  I go to the bank to get quarters to use in the laundry room, which is modern and clean.  A lot of the residents here are elderly and sick.  It's beginning to seem like a place where people go to die ................

Somehow I didn't finish my post, which got lost because I couldn't find my camera and I wanted to post pictures.  Well time has gone by and still I haven't found my camera.  I may have forgotten how to post pictures.  I hate to acknowledge that my brain suffered some cruel changes after the small stroke I had.  Still, I go on pretty much as always, trying to adapt.  Life here is easy, so my diminished brainpower hasn't cause me too much trouble.  Forgetfulness makes life stay pretty much in the present.  Slowly I make progress in putting things in context, though.  I doubt if anybody notices much difference.

The big news is that my brother had a heart attack and died yesterday.  When he didn't make his usual Sunday telephone call yesterday, I knew something was wrong.  He didn't answer the phone when I tried to call many times.  Finally I called the police and asked them to check on him.  They found him dead, sitting in front of the TV.  

There are so many consequences, emotional and practical, of the death of a person who has always been there and then is not.  I'm not going to try to describe them, and I 'm sure they are familiar to us all.  Mike lived in Florida.......he had a lot of money, compared to me,  He had a beautiful Florida house with a large pool, he had every material thing a person could want, all of which will have to be dealt with, presumably by me.  I have no idea how I will do this.  

Right now I have no more to say.

Whoops

 I thought I had finished my last post, but somehow I neglected to post it....not that I had much to say in the middle of my move.  I have been living here for over a month now, and  Carrie has visited twice....once because I had a mild heart attack the day of my move and again after I had recovered.  There's no need to describe that bump in the story of my life.  I am pretty much recovered and settled in.  This apartment is beautiful, spacious, and certainly one of the nicest places I have ever lived.  I am on the third floor (the top floor), surrounded by huge windows that look out over treetops and the street below.  It is so quiet here I hardly know there are other people in the world, let alone here in the building.  It was once an elementary school, which may account for the construction that creates the silence.  It is a little unsettling.

I was expecting and looking forward to having an acquaintance and fellow artist in the apartment next to mine, but I found out yesterday that she died a week ago while visiting her daughter in Portland.  Once her apartment has been cleaned and renovated someone new will be my neighbor.  The fact that this place will most likely be where I die is a little unsettling, but I expect to get over that.

Every morning and evening I have to take Elliot out for a walk, which is probably good for us both.  He used pee-pads in the house before, with one short walk a day when the weather was good.  Here we stroll around the neighborhood morning and evening, a routine I hope to get used to.  Right now it seems like an inconvenience, especially since I had to postpone my hip surgery again because of the heart attack.  I hobble along with my cane and am probably cause for gossip in the neighborhood.  Elliot is probably considered irksome because he strains and barks every time he sees another dog, which is too often.

So, I begin what is most likely the last chapter of my life.  I will post pictures once I figure out how to use my new camera, or my cellphone, whichever comes first.

Moving

I have been almost been overwhelmed by the amount of work moving necessitates.  I have mostly recovered from my heart attack despite the level of activity the move has necessitated.  Every day I make at least one trip to the old house to load up the car with the multitude of items still left there.   A few days ago I found a sleeping bag, bedding, a huge TV, and an empty pizza box next to the front door.  Apparently someone is either living there or plans to be.  Everything that I left there is still untouched, though, so I assume the new tenant plans to leave my things alone.  Just in case, though, I packed everything I could into Phyllis' tiny car, including my desk chair, many books of Indian flute music, and food from the cupboards and refrigerator.  The chair was a major problem both loading and unloading, but I managed it, in the pouring rain.  My printer sat on the sidewalk in a shopping bag for at least 45 minutes and I can only hope it wasn't ruined.

Anyway, though I still have some more things to get, they are things I can live without.  Of course I could live without most of my possessions, but I wouldn't really want to.

So much has happened...........

 So, I am now settled n a new apartment.  The time between my last post and this one has been full of upheaval, both good and bad.  The move from Water St to here is still not quite complete, but I will soon be fully HERE.  I've rarely lived in such pristine elegance.  The apartment was completely redone after the last tenant left, so every fingerprint from now on will be mine.  I will post some pictures in the near future, but the story of the move must take precedence.

I had been sorting and packing my belongings for weeks, exhausting myself to the point that I actually suffered a heart attack on moving day.  I ended up going to the hospital three different times, once overnight.  It's the first time I ever rode in an ambulance, and I hope to never repeat the experience.  So the process of moving ended up being quite a production.  Luckily my daughter arrived, planning to help with the move, and ended up doing a lot more than anticipated. I did not stay at the hospital, but certainly felt lousy, so most of my participation in settling in the new place was to order her around.  She was a willing slave and did my bidding expertly.  I am still recovering to some extent, but have forced myself, mostly unsuccessfully, to keep my activity to a minimum.   I still feel uncharacteristically tired and out of sorts, but expect to recover completely eventually. "Resting" is not ordinarily part of my repertoire and almost impossible.

So life has certainly had a number of changes, but none to compare with my blogger friend whose husband died during the same period of time.  I can't imagine how terrible she must feel, how much change she now has to face, how her whole life has turned upside down. My heart goes out to her.  I mention it here only because I could not write her a personal note.......I felt too sorry to put it into words.  Know I'm thinking of you, dear friend.

Post Christmas

*

 Well, Christmas was a big zero this year, thanks to the fact that I wasn't interested in doing anything in particular.  I did talk with Jesse (my son) and his wife via Zoom........what a trip that is!  My daughter didn't do much either, though we did talk.  We talk every week anyway, though.

My reason for posting now is that I have news about my living situation finally.  I had applied to several subsidized housing agencies (as I have in the past and then backed out) and finally reached the top of two very long waiting  lists here in Eastport.  I had thought of going back to Bangor, and I had actually applied there as well.  Still, I guess Eastport has become my home now and it appears it will remain so.  The situation has always been complicated by my insistence on having my pets wherever I go, but this time I managed to convince both places to allow me not only to have my dog and cat (and birds), but to have a two bedroom apartment (which ordinarily one person can not have).  I still don't know which place I will get because of another applicant having not made up her mind which apartment she will take, but both places are perfectly acceptable to me.  They are quite different, but either one will be fine with me.  Both are still in sight of the ocean.

Also, I have again changed doctors, and this one is actually ready to fix my hip.  Basically I decided to dismiss my rather obnoxious attitude that this area didn't have doctors I could trust , and made an appointment with one in Calais, just a half hour from here.  This will make everything so much easier, not to mention quicker.  So I am about to have some big changes.  I hate to leave this house, where I have lived since 1997, but I have to accept that I can not afford to stay here.  I've lived in apartments before, though, and never minded doing so......as long as I can have my babies and an extra bedroom for a studio where I can paint.

Otherwise, life goes on.  I don't know if I've mentioned that an old friend of mine died recently and left me her car.  This, too, is going to be a life changer for me.  The car I had did not run most of the time.  My friend Phyllis (age 98) died recently and left me her car, a Mini Cooper.  It's a great car and I am very happy to have one I can depend on.  I can drive even with my bad hip for short distances and I'm thrilled to have reliable transportation again.  Eastport is so far away from everywhere and has no public transportation, and I am absolutely neurotic about asking anyone for help of any kind, especially transportation.

That's the way it is at this point and things are looking up. (The painting I posted is one I did a year or so ago, but I never posted it and it's one I really am proud of...it's big.......maybe 30x40).  

In two days I will be 77.  Its hard to believe.

Latest paintings

 It has certainly been a long time since I posted anything............I think lethargy has overtaken me over the months, turning to a couple of years, that I have been basically housebound waiting to have hip replacement surgery.  My days are boring, though not unpleasant exactly.  Nevertheless, the days are boring in terms of activity worth writing about. (Although when did I need activity to write?)  Anyway, I am stuck in my routines, which are very limited and boring,  Lately I've been trying to find different housing again.  I simply can not afford this house and need to move into some assisted living kind of place where you pay depending on your income.  I have applied to three different places, but these things move very slowly and I wait.

Thinking about moving inspired me for awhile to move back to Bangor, where I lived most of my life.  I have since changed my mind, although I let my application to Capehart, a low income community, remain.  I have also applied to three places here in Eastport.  The wheels of bureaucracy (sp?) turn very slowly and I have heard nothing one way or the other.  During the weeks I was planning to move to Bangor I began a series of paintings of my surroundings here in Eastport to remember my life here.  Probably I won't need reminding now, and have only to look out the window.

Anyway, I am thankfully happy enough in my isolation (due to my hip, my lack of a car, and the relatively small number of friends I have here).  I have always liked being alone, and I have my dog and cat for company.  They are much more agreeable than people anyway and I enjoy my solitary life while I wait for surgery (if only I had the money to pay for more heat).  Actually even that is no longer a problem because one of my long-time affluent friends has offered to pay for my heat for a few months, and another friend who recently died at the age of 96 left her car to me.  It's a wonderful car...she was quite wealthy (and a famous scientist) and the car is really wonderful.  I can drive despite my hip (walking is my problem and I have to use a walker or two canes), so I can now get to the grocery store and my various doctors without bothering others to take me.

So life goes on in a diminished kind of way and I am content.

 This is the view I have as I'm having my breakfast. ( or any meal that I eat at the table, which is rare).  I have only to look at it and I feel lucky to be in such a place.  That is the Atlantic Ocean, the Bay of Fundy, which looks far away in the photo but is actually just down the hill.  I can walk there in three or four minutes.  The land in the background is Canada.  At the bottom of the street is a rocky cliff, impossible  to climb unless you sneak into the yard of the people (summer people) who  own  the last house on the street and have a long, steep set of stairs decorated with  "No Trespassing " signs.  Those people are rarely there, but the signs indicate that the place is booby trapped with alarms.  I imagine that the local police wouldn't bother to investigate if they were triggered, but I don't dare take the chance.  If it weren't for using a walker as I do I could climb down the cliff about twenty feet away.  I used to do it and hopefully will again.  The pebbly beach is  fairly narrow at high tide, but very wide when the tide is out  Eastport has some of the highest tides in the world.  The downtown has a huge wharf where cargo ships used to come in,   Old msotly abandoned factories line the waterfront just behind the downtown.  Lobster, Cod, and other sea creatures were the lifeblood of the town.  Even after I moved here there used to be cargo ships coming in, dwarfing the three and four story buildings along the waterfront.  Now the downtown is pretty shabby, trying to be a tourist attraction with boat excursions and various other tourist stuff, but Eastport is too far away from the mainland to attract most tourists, especially since there are no attractions either here of for hundreds of miles around.  If you aren't on your way to Canada, you don't come near Eastport........and even if you do  you would have to make an unrewarding seven mile detour through the reservation and beyond.

Well I didn't mean to go on about the town, but I do love it here.  My mind now is full of my various health issues.......not that I am nervous about them for that reason,  The huge problem facing me is getting doctors and dentists to do the things that are required before I can have surgery to replace my hip.  For over two years I have been trying to work out the logistics and trying to find dentists and doctors who will treat poor people such as I am.  Finally there seems to be some progress with a couple of things......

Well, that issue is tedious and since I began this post I have been to lunch with two friends, visited Diana in preparation for tomorrow's trip to the Dentist in Bangor, and given Elliot his supper.  One more step toward my fitness for surgery is to pull three teeth, which will happen Monday.

 It's been so long since I posted anything I know nothing about the changes to Blogger, but I will soldier on as long as I know how to click the "post" icon.  I haven't known how to post comments, either, so even though I have been reading the posts I follow I haven't commented on them.  My biggest joy was to find out that my blog friend in Michigan did not re-home her dog, as she was considering when she left the west.  I fairly leapt for joy when I read that the dog moved with her and her husband after all.  Not only that, but the dog is adjusting to his new environment reasonably well.  I'm sure he is much happier being with those he loves than he would have had he had to adjust to a new family.

As, for me, nothing has really changed other than the weather.  Maine is like two different countries, changing drastically from hot to cold and back again.  Because Eastport is an island, the water moderates the temperature.....that gigantic puddle called the Atlantic ocean.  It's like living on two different planets. It's not as hot as it is inland in the summer, and not as cold in the winter.  I once had a huge Chrysler (SP??) that had a thermometer above the dashboard.  As I turned off route one to take the causeway to Eastport I could watch the temperature drop by 8 0r 10 degrees as I passed through the Passamaquoddy reservation and on to Eastport.  For me, who really hates heat, it was a very welcome sight.  The water temperature is much too cold to swim, though every January there is a "Polar Dip" on the reservation.  Many people from town participate as well (basically people under thirty), stripping to bathing suits in temperatures hovering well below freezing (sometimes as cold as 0 or less).  There are ambulances standing by and medics to tend to the people who underestimate their tolerance for cold.  At the signal the crowd races into the water, splashes around for a minute or two, and then races back to the rocky shore.  The spectators applaud and yell encouragement. The faint of heart who stand on the shore wrap the swimmers in blankets (if they can still stand).  Ambulance drivers sometimes have to assist.  Once in awhile someone has to be taken into the ambulance., rarely to the hospital.  Meanwhile we spectators applaud and cheer.  It is a yearly ritual that is a rare friendly event that includes both the reservation people and the people who live in the town.

When I first moved to Eastport I was shocked by the prejudice against the Passamaquoddy tribe.  The longer I live here, the more amazed I am by it.  It is humanity at its worst, the details of which I wont bother to describe.  As people "from away" move here in greater numbers, I like to think that there will be a shift, but I see little evidence of it at this point.  Before I saw it for myself I would never have believed how much bad feeling there is between the native Americans and the whites.  We are accustomed to the terrible state of our relationship with the Black population, but our attitude toward native Americans is, if anything, even worse.  

Well, I don't want to belabor that point.  I am not a crusader.  I only look on in horror.

I am still waiting for my surgery, so I hobble around with my walker.  It's been two years (sigh).

All my news, such as it is.......

 

Well, it's been awhile since I wrote and I can't really say why.  Actually I have been doing nothing but painting and reading...mostly painting.  I gave up on Watercolor despite my fast fleeting interest and took up pastel again.  I was inspired by my monthly magazine, Pastel Journal.  It's something I return to over and over again, though I guess I return to every medium sooner or later.  I can't say why, other than thinking I will be better at something other than what I'm doing.  My enthusiasm is always temporary, though and I flit from one medium to another, always thinking I will be better at something other than what I'm doing.  

I have produced about ten new paintings over the last few weeks.  My studio is covered with pastel dust, as well as my clothes, my hands, the floor of my studio, and my dog.  As is always the case when I switch mediums my enthusiasm soars with each change.  I am partly convinced that it is the change I crave,  I am a person who constantly moves furniture, basking in the newness of where I sit in the living room, where I read, where I sleep, where I eat, what I eat.  My useless hip has not prevented me from tackling any piece of furniture (except the piano).  I seem to bask in the new arrangement for a few months, then start planning how things could be different (and better).  A few items are very hard to move, especially for one five-foot tall 76 year old woman using a walker, but it doesn't even cross my mind to leave well enough alone, or ask for help.  The TV is the worst thing.  I can't begin to lift it, so I line various pieces of furniture up between where it is and where I want it.   Then I transfer it one end, then the other, risking disaster the whole way. The couch is a huge thing, too, and don't even ask about bookcases.  Even the birdcage is not exempt, even the room where the birds live.  Right now they are in the living room having spent the last year or so in various places in my dining room-office. I have also recently moved every piece of furniture in my bedroom: bed, nightstand, two large chests of drawers, rug, two chairs.  The studio, of course is subject to continuous re-arrangement, about every week.

Well, so much for my wanderlust within this house.  I have begun to think about moving again. It seems to be the only thing I can do.  I simply do not have enough money to stay in this house.  The latest disaster involves my car repair.  I left it  at the garage in November, since I can't drive anyway.  It has been repaired now to the tune of 1700. dollars.  There is no way for me to pay that.  I only paid a thousand dollars for it, and I borrowed that from my brother.  If I move to Boynton Manor (a home for the old, poor, and decrepit)in the downtown area). Rent is based on income with all utilities included.  I will have very few of the expenses I have here....rent, heat, water, trash, plowing in the winter, etc. In fact, I haven't paid my rent for months, taking advantage of my SO WHAT? landlady who loves me.  She won't forgive me forever.  I was accepted at Boynton Manor a couple of years ago, but I decided I just couldn't leave here.  I love my house and its view of the ocean.  I will have two rooms and a bath, with a kitchen area off the living room.  The place is very nice, but so small compared with my spacious three bedroom house.

Well, I guess I caught up with the time I have spent since my last entry.  Missing is of course my troubles over getting my hip replaced.  I can't afford the several medical pre-requisites (dentistry among them) so it hasn't been scheduled.  It's been almost two years since my first surgery was planned.  Well, it's the least of my problems, I guess.  Luckily I roll with the punches.

I'll post a few of the pastel paintings I've done lately.  These are fairly big, 18 by 24 I think......all Eastport scenes.

Good-bye, Sarah

 I hardly know what to say about Sarah,adog I've loved even though I never met her..  Only today did I find out about her dying ,  even though it happened  a little while while ago.  How did I miss it?  I am just recovering from a prolonged  cry, partly of regret that I wasn't able to respond to the post by my blogger friend sooner and partly because I will miss Sarah myself.   It is certainly a mixed blessing to love an animal so much, since their little lives are so short compared with ours.  Not too long ago I read an article in some magazine....I can't remember which one......written by a man who had just lost his collie dog.  He described the event, telling us readers first of the joy of puppyhood, the years of companionship and love, then old age and loss.  His final sentence was "Getting a puppy is the first step to devastation."  How well I understand.  But we do it over and over again, knowing the devastation their loss will cause us.

Well, my dear Blogger friend, I am so sorry.  I hope I will soon be reading some happy post revolving around a new, wonderful puppy.  I so recently lost Patrick, but I thank him for giving me his long happy life, them leaving me to love  Elliot.  I see him as Patrick's farewell gift to me .

Now, if I can pull myself together, I will turn my thoughts to Christmas Cactus.  They are very easy to propagate.  Just cut of a few branches and stick them in a glass of tap water.  Before you know it little white threads will appear at the cut edge(and sometime on the side of the cuttings.  Once these little hairs are half an inch  long, or more (sometimes I have left them in water for weeks--sometimes just days).  They will live in water for a long time.  I've forgotten about them sometimes until the roots fill up the glass I put them in before I  think to put them in soil.   These guys live forever, which is why I have so many of them.  I still have the original from the seventies. One of my neighbors has one that fills her whole picture window.

Well, I will go and console myself with my puppy.   My heart goes out to you.

Christmas Cactus

 

I have several of these plants that all originally came from cuttings that I got from Roberta Belgarde.  She was my elderly neighbor when we lived in Newburgh in the early 70's.  Jesse was a baby, and Carrie was two years old.  She often invited me for lunch and babysat when I had to go to the doctor.  In front of her kitchen window was a dry sink bursting with Christmas cactus.  She gave me a cutting so I could start my own plant.  Over the many years since then (Jesse was born in 1974) I have continued to root cuttings from that plant and although the original doesn't bloom much anymore, its children thrive.  

I think fondly of Mrs. Belgarde (I always called her that) every time these plants blossom.  This year they are particularly prolific.  The mother hangs in the kitchen, and its offspring are scattered around in the dining room and living room.  This year they seem to think Christmas is coming early.  I can barely take my eyes off them.

Carrie has one of the offspring in her office in New Hampshire.  She has never been interested in plants, but I guess to humor me she consented a few years ago to take one  small cutting.  She named the plant Rhonda and has become quite fond of it. It happily blooms for her around Christmas every year.

You never know how you are going to be remembered after you die, and I'm quite sure Mrs. Belgarde never thought that she would live on in our minds and hearts because of these plants.  Another plant I have is a memorial to my aunt Faith, my father's sister who died many years ago.  Her daughter, my cousin, inherited the Begonia she had on her dining room table for years and years.  It was huge, and Beth divided it up among the cousins,  I have since divided mine so that I have Begonias  all over the house.  Faith lives in my memory because I never look at one of them without her crossing my mind.  

 

Time with Annie Dillard, May Sarton, and Elliot

 This is the latest attempt to regain my expertise in watercolor.  I'm getting there, I think.  This is from a photo I took down on the beach below my house....I don't remember when, but I was obviously walking under my own steam, so it was at least two years ago.  My hip surgery has been postponed yet again, so I guess I will be grounded for the foreseeable future.  I am not upset by this development, since having surgery during this pandemic is a risk I don't really want to take.  I am so used to using my walker that it hardly seems like a handicap anymore.

I watch the developments surrounding our presidential election with some trepidation, but I have some vague faith that all will work out in the end.  The only lasting consequence for me personally is my disbelief that the country could get into such a mess. I guess I could have anticipated that Trump would behave badly if he didn 't win the election, but not how badly.  The other depressing thought I have is that so many people supported him and, unbelievably, still do.

Meanwhile I go along with my reclusive life, pretty much unaffected by anything that goes on outside of this house.  I have my wonderful little dog to keep me company, my books and my paints to entertain me.  I ordered a new Kindle which came a few days ago.  I don't know what I'd do without it.  While I waited for it to come after my old one died, I amused myself by re-reading "An American Childhood" by Annie Dillard.  It is one of my favorite books of all time.  My Kindle died in the middle of May Sarton's journal at 80.  I look forward to returning to it where I left off, but I must say I find the woman a little unlikeable at times.  So what, though?

 So..........I'm picking up the accumulated clutter here in my dining room, office, bird sanctuary, and exhibition space and what should I find but a dog-eared copy of Loren Eisley's "Immense Journey."  It's a paperback with a torn blue cover and soft, yellowed, dog-eared pages.  Its copyright is 1946, a year after I was born.  This book was assigned reading for my freshman English class in 1963 and probably influenced me more than anything else I've ever read.  I still enjoy opening it up randomly and reading a page or two   Many of my paintings were inspired by those writings, but the biggest impact the book had on me was my view of the evolution of the earth and its inhabitants.  I always think, too, of Miss Fife, my professor, a fifty-ish prim and proper lady who obviously had a lot more going on in her head than one would think by looking at her.  I wonder what she would think if she knew how she affected my life...that shy, mousy, uncommunicative student slouching in the third row of desks, one of hundreds that no doubt passed through Miss Fife's classroom.

Well, when I saw the book this morning, I had to stop and read a few pages.  No doubt the science of that time has evolved way beyond what Eisley took as fact (though I know he realized that new information would eventually bury a lot of the "facts" of his day).  Still, basically it is his awe of nature and evolution that carries the book, along with his poetic writing.  

"I do not think, if someone finally twists the key successfully in the tiniest and most humble house of life, that many of these questions will be answered, or that the dark forces which create lights in the deep sea and living batteries in the tropical swamps, or the dead cycles of parasites, or the most noble workings of the human brain, will be much if at all revealed. ......rather, I would say that if "dead matter" has reared up this curious landscape of fiddling crickets, song sparrows, and wondering men it must be plain to even the most devoted naturalist that the matter of which he speaks contains amazing, if not dreadful powers..........."

"

Keeping up with Watercolor

 This is the latest watercolor I've done recently, an image I copied from photos of some draft horses in a nearby town (I'd name it but I can't remember what it was.......Pembroke I think).  I've been working in watercolor trying to get some interest in painting that I seem to have lost.  My paintings have been so uninspiring, looking like the work of talented high school students who haven't really learned yet what art is all about.  What joy I have found in returning to watercolor after so long.  One of my friends and patrons commented when I posted my first new watercolors on facebook, "The magic is back."  How wonderful to hear that.  Watercolor was always my medium until I lost my support system (other watercolorists who championed the medium).  When I went back to school to study art watercolor was barely mentioned.  Besides, it didn't allow the layers and layers of paint necessary for the kind of art I was doing then.  

There is such immediacy with watercolor that it doesn't lend itself to the layers and layers of paint that I found necessary to express myself at the time.  It is a statement......here it is. ........don't look beyond what you see.

Thinking about art

 Not much happens around here from day to day.  I go nowhere and do nothing.  Nevertheless, I am content.  I spend my days doing a little housework, painting, reading, doing puzzles, writing, etc....all with the companionship of my puppy.  Elliot is always in my sight, his life being so very small and confined, yet he amuses himself with toys and with Leah, the cat. While I read, he sleeps by my feet or in my lap. I have been reading my old journals off and on, amazingly entertained by the old me.  There I am......wife, mother, social worker, needlepoint designer, art teacher, Art Society president, photo retoucher, courtroom artist, portrait painter, probably more I won't bother to drag out of my memory bank right now.  For most of those many years I was also an art student at the University of Maine.  I had a degree in Modern Languages from when I was a traditional student, but in the early 70's I went back to the University to study art.  My husband had just moved out, I had two small children.  My life was in turmoil.......but hasn't my life always been in turmoil?........up until now of course.  The only real problem I have now is lack of money.  Money is a small thing and my poverty does not bother me in the least.

The years I have spent since my marriage ended were at first tumultuous .  As an art student I worked out all my demons with the help of a wonderful art teacher and mentor.  Yesterday I was reading some of the notebooks and journals I kept then (an activity I enjoy several times a year) and looking at pictures of the rather shocking and bizarre paintings, prints, and sculptures I produced then.  It's quite obvious that I was in great turmoil and used art to manage my emotions as best I could.   My paintings are calm now.....I strive for technique, composition, color, beauty.  Nevertheless, I think of these paintings as a craft more than an art.  I am a designer of canvas rectangles that remind viewers of something in their own psyches....a place they once visited, a pet they loved, an event in their own lives.  They evaluate them using their own values, their own ideas of beauty, their own emotions.  They steal my work.

I hear the voices of those who sneer at the phrase "art for art's sake."  But I also hear the applause of the abstract expressionists, searching for the meaning of art once the camera was invented.

another postponement

 Well, my surgery was postponed again, at the last minute.  Apparently I am still anemic.  Now there is no date set.  I took this with very little grace, I admit, but now I am wilted from accepting the news.  I am  in limbo with an appointment for an "infusion" pending.  So I keep limping along as best I can.

Friday is a bad day for me anyway since I have to put out the trash for collection.  Trying to maneuver large trashcans and many cardboard boxes while using a walker is a challenge.  Today I found strange full garbage cans in front of the house,,,,,some neighbor must have decided to take advantage of my contract with Moose Island Trash Removal....... likely some temporary tenants in the house next door.  It doesn't bother me.  I have a pretty big pile of trash myself anyway because I have to order my pet supplies, as well as my groceries.  They all come in gigantic cardboard boxes that then have to be disposed of.  I cringe at the amount of trash I generate.  I'm embarrassed by it.  I called the company and they offered to consolidate the shipments, but now the boxes are too big for me to handle without herculean strength.  (Try hauling a box four feet high full of canned dogfood, catfood, bird food, bags of dry food, puppy pads, cat litter, chicken feed (50 pounds) from the curb, down a cement walk, up over two steps, and through a doorway with a hysterically barking puppy and a cat trying to get through the door....all while using a walker.

Well it will all be over at some point........at least I have to believe it will be.  And all things considered I am patting myself on the back for being so independent and capable in the face of my temporary handicap. I've tried to figure out some way to take a picture of myself struggling with this, but I guess I will have to wait for some stranger to walk by while I'm doing it.  Instead, I'll take another picture of my little puppy, who keeps a smile on my face no matter what else happens.

Good-bye Girls

Yesterday I published an entry about losing my chickens, but it has disappeared somehow.  I'll try again with much less emotion since I have weathered the worst of it now.  More neighbor complaints finally forced me to re-home my beloved chickens.  Yesterday they left for their new home with Mercedes, a new friend who lives in a fairly close town.  She has a farm with all kinds of animals. including chickens. They probably thought they had been transported to heaven since she took them away with a huge piece of watermelon in the cage.  They never looked back.

I can't blame my neighbors for not wanting the infestation of rats that the chickens caused, but the way they handled it irritates me.  These are summer residents, here for two months, who apparently feel that the way to solve problems is to call in the authorities. These neighbors have never said a word to me about the chickens.  I only know them from their constant warnings to me to not let the dogs "shit on my lawn.."  I have never not picked up after my dogs, so their attitude was very irritating, especially since I rarely go by their house. 

Well, since this was the second complaint, the police told me (very nicely and sympathetically) that the chickens had to go.  Actually, they contacted my landlord first.  Apparently it isn't part of their protocol to deal with the offender first.  She was very understanding and I was the picture of cooperation. 

So this is the end of my chicken era.  They have been part of my identity for so long that I feel I have lost part of myself.  Ever since I came to Eastport  over twenty years ago and the landlord I had then asked if he could leave his chickens with me, I have been smitten.  Many chickens have come and gone, and I've loved them all.