I am just old enough to remember growing up in the aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement, and there was an aftermath. It’s not like the Civil Rights Act was signed into law, equality was achieved, and everything was hunky-dory. Institutional –as well as personal– racism doesn’t die that easily or quickly. The immense amount of hatred of “the other” took time to cool down. Time to be hidden away, though never entirely wiped out. Throughout my life, I have seen racism, bigotry, and hatred beginning to give up its grip on this country, slowly. We’re far from perfect, but things have been generally proceeding in the right direction.

Until now.

I am thoroughly disgusted by the behavior of the anti-mosque, anti-Islam (and anti-immigrant) mobs. Disgusted doesn’t even begin to cover it, really. Not by a long shot. I just can’t find a word to adequately convey how I feel about so many of my fellow Americans and their thoroughly revolting and anti-American views. Yes, anti-American. Un-American. If an American doesn’t agree that our founding documents and principles are worth abiding by, then they are anti-American. There’s some percentage of Americans right now who don’t agree with our founding documents and principles –or at least with some parts of them which grant some of our most profound freedoms. I am incapable of comprehending how they balance their supposed overwhelming love of The Constitution of The United States of America, which they also champion loudly as being perfect in all ways, with their attempts to thwart the very ideals for which it stands.

Seems to me, they don’t think our founding principles of freedom and equality for all are a good idea, or maybe they simply have never read the words upon which our country was founded and don’t know, for example, about the principles of separation of church and state and freedom of religion encoded in those very founding documents. They do seem to have a firm grasp of their First Amendment right of free speech and redress of grievances, so it’s odd they can’t seem to grasp the meaning of the rest of that particular amendment. Though I am glad they do get on their soapboxes and feel free to spout their hatred and bigotry loudly in the streets for all to hear and plaster it all over the TV, internet, and radio. Informs me who to be careful of and who to avoid, as well as informing me which businesses do not deserve my business. As far as I am concerned, they are the enemies of freedom and equality. They are a threat to my nation and its founding principles … as much as any terrorist could be. Perhaps more so.

I don’t see good things on the horizon. So many people fractured into so many groups, many of them filled with nothing but hate for the others others unlike them (though all the same Americans) … and willing to show it publicly … to the point of physical confrontation and violence … well, what can we expect that to spawn? Peace, equality, and unicorns farting rainbows and pots of gold? It won’t. Hate only begets more hate. Violence only begets more violence. America is on a course now I fear we won’t be getting off until something so ugly –so horrifying– happens that no one can believe it. Something so wrong and evil that everyone is sickened by it. We’ve come close to that point before during the Civil Rights Movement (more than once to be sure). Things improved, but at a high cost. People died. We’ve come to that point before and stuffed the hatred and ugliness back down, which has lead to it bursting forth again now. This isn’t new hatred. This is old hatred reignited and allowed outside for some sunshine and fresh air. And it will keep rearing its hideous head until we as a country face our issues and agree to live by the ideals we claim to hold up as right and good.

We’d do better to educate it away peacefully, but how to do that when the ones needing the education refuse to listen? How to do that when instead of words, they want to use fists and guns to prove their points correct? How to do that when those who hate have formed a mob and are reveling in the righteousness of group-think? Something ugly and horrifying has to happen to wake them up, I guess. I’d think a crowd of anti-mosque protesters mobbing a man for no other reason than he was there and had dark skin would be ugly and horrifying enough, but it won’t be. If this nightmare of full-moon-mad hatred and anger doesn’t subside –isn’t put away for good properly and peacefully– there can only be one outcome: something ugly and horrifying that no one will believe could happen in America in the 21st Century. Something worse than an angry mob threatening a man minding his own business.

I hope I am wrong, but if it doesn’t happen now, it’ll happen the next time the angry mob finds someone new to hate or revisits an old hatred from days past. History repeats itself over and over and over, sometimes with the same actors, sometimes with new participants. No one ever learns from it, at least not enough people to make any kind of real difference. America is a powder keg. It’s been a powder keg for a long time, and it wants to explode. As far as I am concerned, there are really only two options: follow our founding principles and the laws of our land and yank the fuse out of the bomb, or go ahead and explode. I’d prefer a peaceful resolution to America’s hateful woes, but … I will fight just as angrily as they do for The Constitution of the United States of America and for the guiding principles of right and wrong our country was (and is) built upon. I would never throw the first punch –I’m not much for starting fights– but I am for finishing them once someone else starts the brawl and the side of good can be identified.

Hope for peace, prepare for war.

That’s what Americans do, isn’t it? Fight for the rights and freedoms we have been granted. Maintain our rights and freedoms for future generations of Americans. We even fight for the right of others in foreign lands to enjoy our collective freedoms as we do. I would expect the vast majority of Americans to stand beside me in this regard … in my desire to see our constitutional rights upheld and for racism, bigotry, and hatred of “the other” to be wiped from our collective American consciousness. Freedom and equality for all, no matter their skin color, gender, religion (and for that matter, choice in mates). That’s what our country was built upon, and those are the ideals we should live by, if we want to be Americans.

Other defenders of the things that make America great would have us negotiate, back down, give in, avoid confrontation, appease the haters as much as possible, merely to bring about a somewhat peaceful resolution. I say NO. I will not back down. I will not avoid confrontation. I will not give in. I will not negotiate on the rights afforded all Americans by our founding documents. I will not allow the wrong-headed, the hateful, the racist, the bigoted, or the ignorant dictate to me or anyone else what our rights are or attempt to change those rights encoded into our system in either meaning or word. To do anything less would make me less American. I may never have joined the military and never taken an oath to protect The Constitution, but in my heart, I have. I feel lucky to have been born in this great nation, and I will do what is necessary –what is asked of me– to protect her, her citizens, and their rights from all threats, both foreign and domestic.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Those are things worth fighting for and protecting. I continue to hope this ugliness and hatred resolves itself peacefully, that people eventually open their eyes, are embarrassed by their own actions and words, and learn and grow from the experience, but even in my most optimistic of hearts, I fear the fuse on this powder keg has been burning too long and too hot, and that no one can stop whatever explosion of true horror is to come. If we as a country don’t fix this peacefully, it will eventually fix itself violently. Maybe not this week, or month, or year, but at some point in the future, that fuse will ignite the explosion of mind-bogglingly stupid hatred coursing through the veins of America. It’s happened before (many times), and I don’t doubt it can happen again. We’ve come a long way, but obviously not far enough. As a nation, we continue to forget the lessons we learned in the past and fail apply them to new situations … dooming us to continue repeating the nightmares of the past. The same tired hatred brought out, dusted off, and given a new fresh face. A new round of ugliness for the new generation to endure.

We’re back-sliding all the way back to the 50’s and 60’s (and earlier), having learned nothing at all from all the pain and suffering of the Civil Rights Movement … or any other dark period in our history. Are we ignorant barbarians, or are we modern freedom-loving Americans? I suppose time will tell, but I feel something wicked this way comes, and we will all be sorry when it arrives and fully reveals itself. I just hope we wake up before there are more than just ugly words and a fist or two being thrown around. Meanwhile, we are all stuck in this hell-pit of rancid bile being spewed by those who call themselves “Real Americans” while utterly ignoring what being an American means, what we stand for, what our national values have always been or at least aspired to be.

So I am disgusted … and weeping for my country and its citizens. May we one day find the strength and moral fiber to live up to the highest expectations of our founders. I’d always imagined this would happen in my lifetime –that we would truly be the shining city on the hill, a beacon of hope and and guiding light to freedom-loving people everywhere– but today it feels further away than ever. In fact, today it feels like we’ll never really achieve the freedom and equality for all we were promised by our forefathers. I hope there are more people who agree with me that the rights granted to all Americans are worth fighting for –tooth and nail, if necessary– than there are people who believe our rights are malleable, changeable on a whim, and only applicable as they would like to them to apply and to whom they wish to apply them. These are dark days though, full of anger and hatred, and the screaming throng of loud barbarians seem to be not only at the gate but everywhere.

But it doesn’t take a hoard of barbarians to bring down a great society, and from what I can tell, 20% or more of my fellow Americans believe rather strongly that our rights are malleable and should only apply as they see fit, and that’s more than enough barbarians to make America a living hellhole of a country. We cannot allow them to have their way. Not if we want to continue calling ourselves Americans with any amount of dignity or pride. So … no, I won’t back down, give in, negotiate, or appease this mindless mob who has declared themselves the arbiters of our rights, because they are wrong. They are anti-American. They are Un-American. They are expressing ideas which are in opposition to our founding principles. I am willing to fight them to the extent they are willing to take the fight, up to and including their “Second Amendment solutions”. I didn’t start this fight, and I won’t escalate it, but I will damn sure be a part of ending it. Some things truly are worth fighting for, and two of the ones at the top of my list are freedom and equality … for ALL.

To use their own vernacular, I am locked, loaded, and ready to roll.

Bring it on.

Want to copy something from a conversation over at Facebook over here, so everyone can read it. It’s about the form I have been working with the last few months (as seen in yesterday’s photo post):

Steve: I’m still curious about where the heck this thing came from. A nightmare? I’d be afraid if it eating my face in the middle of the night.

Julie: These things remind me of Pink Floyd for some reason. (The Wall)

Kenno: It’s a forelorn object, bereft of wings or arms, boobs or mouth, not un-wholey formed, only a child of a much lesser god with a vlulnerabilty that makes it both fleating and attractive. Lots of expression inthe negative sapce. This form has haunted you for some time.

Orb: Summer, 1984, American Literature class at university. Had just read The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. I was bored with my classmates’ discussions, and I doodled the first one in the margin of my notebook. Spent the next month sketching it over and over in a variety of permutations, which resulted in a single painting (which is in the back of my bedroom closet) and a full sketchbook.

Interestingly, I had just seen The Wall that summer as well, which pretty much blew my young just-out-of-the-country, mind. So maybe an influence as well.

So yes, it’s been with me a while. Pops up every so often, like whenever I really get back into doing artwork hardcore, though I’ve never really focused on it. Just a doodle, you know? Just a thing I scribbled when I didn’t have anything else to scribble. Until now. I’m focusing on it now.

Sexless, but definitely feminine (in my mind anyway). The problem I am having with the two figure combined form is that there never was a masculine figure before, and I have tried to create one. It doesn’t feel right though, and I think I have spent the last few weeks working on the masculine one for nothing. Might not use it. Might not even make it in the final materials. Taking the day to decide.

Nothing scary about the thing though. I alternately want to hug it or worship it. Comfort it or ask it the secrets of the universe. Not quite sure what it does mean yet, but I remember the moment it was born as clearly as it happened yesterday.

And that pretty much sums up the situation with The Project at the moment. The pattern for the masculine figure is ready to be done in the final materials, but I don’t want to do it. There never was a masculine figure in my mind. I’m not sure I want to use it, which means I’ve wasted some time working on it, and now I’ve got one lone figure I don’t know what to do with. I’m feeling I should have focused on the tree as the second form, and it’s not too late to do so. The tree, compared to the figures, is going to be easy to create (the pattern already being done). Since I am feeling wretched today from my allergies (one of my eyes is gooey and swollen somewhat shut, such joy), I’m going to take the day to do some housework, rest, and contemplate my next step on The Project. I can spare a day of work.

But first … more coffee and a couple of pills. If I am going to do anything today, I’ll need to be awake and able to breath (and see).

And if you’ve never read The Lottery before, read it. Don’t read anything about it first. Go in cold, and just read it. Worth reading, and it won’t take long.

Pardon me while I take a moment to complain. I had a bad day in the “studio” and 140 characters isn’t going to cover it.

None of the recent ideas on what to stuff the soft sculpture with are going to give me the effect I want. They’d all work, but they aren’t going to look or be what I want. I hate polyester fiberfill with a passion, because it also sucks for what I want to do. This leaves shredded foam, which I had not considered until this evening. I’ve never stuffed anything with shredded foam, so I have no idea what it’s like to work with.

So now, I need some shredded foam. Luckily, I have some ancient foam that could be used for prototyping, if I could figure out a quick and easy way to shred it. Or, you know, I could go buy a bag somewhere. Craft store, maybe? Ugh. More expenditure on prototyping and not on finished work!

And … furthermore … it’s July. The deadline for the art show is in two and a half weeks. I am beginning to feel some stress about that. It’s definitely time to begin working on Plan B in the background, because even if none of the new work gets done in time and entered, I will be entering five pieces. It’s not like I don’t have some art lying around the house gathering dust. They wouldn’t be the pieces I want to enter, but this thing only comes around every two years. It’s possible some of last year’s work didn’t completely suck, and the stuff I was doing right before I decided I hated painting wasn’t terrible. LOL!

But yeah, I am feeling some stress, and mostly it’s because I want to get these three or four sculptures birthed. I feel like I am letting them down by not being able to create them to be the way they desperately want to be. Like expecting to wake up in a beautiful android body and finding yourself in a Cylon, my attempts to make them look as they do in my head are all failing at this point. Dismal disappointments.

I am flailing in a sea of frustration.

Just after midnight Monday night, I was peacefully sitting at my desk closing up my browser tabs and preparing to shut down my computer for the night and go to bed. Without warning, the largest palmetto bug I have ever seen flew from somewhere behind me, bounced off the side of my head, ricocheted off my computer monitor, and fell onto my mousepad. I would have screamed and/or jumped back from my desk, but I was, in fact, frozen in horror until the thing ran under the monitor of my old PC. And thus began 24 hours of Flying Palmetto Bug Hell.

Once I’d regained my senses somewhat, I turned on the light in the den, attracted the attention of my bug-hunting cats, and began poking the monster from hell out of it’s hiding place. Much squealing and jumping around occurred (on my part). Eventually, it relented and zoomed out of its desk top hiding place and headed straight for one of the bookshelves. The cats, always interested in fast-moving objects, began their chase.

Alas, the nasty bug didn’t make a sound or come out of hiding again, so the cats lost interest. I’m not even entirely sure they ever actually saw the thing. It was definitely a “bogey fast mover” of the highest order. I believe they were merely reacting to me showing intense interest in that particular bookcase. Surely had they seen it, they would have never calmly gone to bed without digging it out of its hiding place and eating it, right? Anyway, the end result was that I had to go to bed and sleep knowing full well there was an extra occupant that night, and it did not make me happy.

The next morning, as Lin was sitting in the living room watching the morning news and having coffee, there came a scream of horror. I didn’t have to ask what the cause was, I recognized it as the scream of horror any human would have upon seeing such a large and obnoxious cockroach flying around a room. Lin made haste out of the living room with anything he deemed important enough to save from the invasion, and the cats and I moved in to do battle. Well, this thing was quite proficient at flying. In fact, it seemed to prefer flying to walking. Anytime I got within three feet of it, it took off bumbling around the room in mid-air the way these things do. They may fly, but they never fly well. They aren’t terribly aerodynamic. Very erratic flight paths!

After a whole lot of screaming, cursing, broom-waving, and other activity, the vicious bug flew into the kitchen and headed straight for the boxes of craft supplies under my art table. The cats followed close behind and started keeping watch waiting for some sign of where exactly it was. I retired to the bedroom with a book and my phone, because I had about enough of dodging a dive-bombing cockroach from hell for one morning. Unfortunately, the cats gave up shortly thereafter and demanded entrance into the safety of the bedroom. I let them in and then avoided the kitchen as much as possible for the rest of the day. Eeeew. It was still there somewhere!

Last night, shortly after dinner, I heard the cats thumping around in the kitchen. I went to investigate, knowing full well the damn bug had finally come out from under my art table. As I entered the hall to go to the kitchen, I stopped in my tracks when I saw all three cats sitting on the kitchen table staring at a spot over the doorway. They looked at me and meowed. I went around to the other entry to the kitchen … the one that had a light switch by it. Turning on the light, yes there it was just over the door to the hall. EEEK! I grabbed the broom and prepared to do battle and kill the thing.

But no, it did not want to die, and so we went another few rounds of flying around the room trying to smack me in the head again (and me screaming and squealing through the whole thing). The cats did their best to help, but it refused to get anywhere near cat or floor level. Eventually, it ended up in the glassware cabinet. Oh just perfect! I opened the cabinet doors, left the room, and waited. It’d come out again. It had to, right? OMG EEEEW! My glassware!

About an hour later, I heard the cats being active in the kitchen again, so I went to see what the horrible bug was up to now. Apparently, I had done it some damage when going at it with the broom, or maybe it was getting tired and just made a fatal mistake, but it had somehow ended up at floor level hiding behind the fire extinguisher. Ronin and Tora were lying in wait for it to come out. I assisted by making damn sure the nearby cabinet doors were fully closed, and then I moved the extinguisher. It ran right up the cabinet doors and wedged itself into the crevice between the kitchen counter and the lower cabinets. Well, there really wasn’t anywhere for it to go from there.

I tried to get it out with the broom, but it just wedged itself further into the crevice. Since that’s mostly at cat level, and the cats were on the job and ready to get at the thing, I moved their stool over there to give them better access, and went and sat at my desk to keep an eye on the activity. Myu lost interest quickly, but the one leg and one antenna that was visible (and moving) kept Tora and Ronin very interested. Now it probably could have stayed where it was until the cats lost interest, but for some stupid unknown big reason, it left its mostly secure hiding place and ran into the pile of plastic soda bottles for recycling.

Tora and Ronin jumped in bravely, and within short order, I saw the two of them scurry under the table, followed by the usual sounds and activities of cats playing with prey. Fighting over it really, because it would make a tasty cat snack (at least those two seem to think so). A few minutes later, all the cats were lounging in their usual locations, so I figured the ordeal was over, relaxed and went on with my life. I expected to wake up the next morning to find some leftover bug bits somewhere in the house as per the usual cat modus operandi. NOT!

As I headed to the bathroom to wash my face and get ready for bed, I noticed Ronin and Tora at the end of the hall doing something. At first, in the dark, I thought they were just clawing at the bedroom door (which I’d been keeping closed to protect at least one room from Flying Palmetto Bug Hell), but no … when I turned on the bathroom like, Tora’s hunting movements informed me quite clearly that the thing was not in fact dead and eaten. Before I could close the door to the bathroom to cut off it’s only path of escape, it dashed along the wall and slipped into the bathroom, Tora hot on it’s trail.

Unfortunately, the cats have finally been trained (mostly) to leave the bathroom trash can alone, and so once it was behind said trash can, they didn’t want to go after it anymore. That was fine my me, really. I grabbed my broom, carefully moved the trash can, and smashed the thing into the corner as hard as I possibly could. EEEEEEW … BUG GUTS! I wiped up the residue, flushed it down the toilet, and then the cats and I enjoyed a slice of turkey for a job well done. Tora got a point for the initial capture, Ronin got a point for maiming the thing, I got a point for the death blow, and I guess Myu got a point for being calm and collected under pressure … and for being cute.

I’m just glad the horrible thing from hell is dead and gone. Unless you have experienced these flying menaces, you can’t possibly know how awful they are. With our winter and spring being as mild and wet as they were, there is an overabundance of them too. We’re getting one invader a week, and with an old house like this one, there’s really no way to cut off all the possible access points without just rebuilding the whole house. Usually the cats are much more efficient at their bug killing, but I will give them some credit on this one, because it was, in fact, a very formidable opponent. Once it stopped zooming around the house dive-bombing my head, they made short work of it. Good kitties! Let’s hope it’s more than a week before I see another of these things in my house, and let’s also hope the next one isn’t as large and lively. I don’t think my heart can take another 24 hour Flying Palmetto Bug Hell.

That would be one of the multitude of huge, deep dog prints found in my garden beds this morning. Yes, at least one of the neighbors’ dogs has been over the fence again and stomping through my garden destroying stuff, and it wasn’t a chihuahua.

I am well beyond livid now, and I am tired of waiting for Lin to go “talk to them civilly” as he says we should. No, I will be handling it myself, and no one involved is going to be happy about it. I do my best to not give a damn what my neighbors do. I really don’t care. The only time I care is when what they are doing spills over onto my property, and generally, as long as there is no danger to me or mine and no property damage of any sort (and whatever it is doesn’t happen all the time), I still don’t give a damn. But I do give a damn about large dogs that have been aggressive toward me, have killed a possum (in my yard), and have attempted to claw through my kitchen window screen, and have stomped through my garden destroying things on numerable occasions being in my yard. Yes, I do have a problem with that, especially since I know they know the dogs are doing these things, and one would have to be completely lacking in brain cells to think it wouldn’t upset just about any neighbor.

Oh, so I hear something snuffling at the kitchen window just now and look … the damn dog is in the yard right now!

I’d call animal control right now, which is what I plan to do whenever I see of these dogs in my yard, but I do like to warn people I will be turning them in on a regular basis before actually doing so. I’m trying my best to be nice when what I would really like is be a raging shrew bitch from hell. I think I am entitled to be a raging shrew bitch from hell about this too, because truly, the situation has become completely untenable, and I am seriously not putting up with it anymore.

I’ll be getting together all the photos I have taken of the dogs destruction and the dogs in my yard that I have taken all this time, I will be having them printed at Walgreens, and I will be composing as polite a threatening letter as I am capable of composing informing them that I will be calling animal control whenever one or more of their dogs is in my yard, and if they don’t arrive quickly enough to satisfy me, I will simply be releasing the dog(s) out into the street (which is what Lin did that night the one was trying to get into the kitchen window). These neighbors are excessively lucky I love animals and can’t find it in my heart to blame the poor dumb dogs for their actions, because other people less inclined to not give a damn about dumb destructive dogs would no doubt handle the matter in significantly less ethical ways.^†

It’s a good thing today is bread baking day, because I need to relax, and baking bread is truly one of the most relaxing things I do. I think I will go do that right now.

Don’t know where the dog went. I checked, and it isn’t in my yard or theirs. I guess it jumped the fence at the side of the house and now is out on the street somewhere. None of them are apparently at home, seeing as the cars are all gone, their gate is open, and the yappy chihuahuas are nowhere to be seen.

1. † Though heaven forbid one of these dogs ever manages to kill one of the neighborhood stray cats I am trying to give a better life too, because I am not entirely certain what I would do in that situation. I imagine it would start with me stomping through their yard full of yappy aggressive chihuahuas carrying a dead cat, and then, well, me totally losing my cool in a most unpleasant way. If you’ve never seen me do that, all I can say is … I can make people wish they were dead with only my words. [↩]

I stopped pushing boundaries when I got comfortable. Who doesn’t like to be liked? I need to push boundaries again … in both art and life.

“Our children will be paying for this the rest of their lives!!!!!!!!!”

Whenever this particular reason to oppose health care reform is brought forth, I always want to respond with the following:

“Yes. Our children will be paying for this for the rest of their lives, and their children will also be paying for this the rest of their lives, onward into infinity. They will all be paying so everyone can have access to health care, because, after all health care isn’t free.

They will be paying for everyone to have health care forever and ever. Just like will also all pay for everyone to have a public school education by way of property taxes, for everyone to have roads by way of energy or gas taxes, for everyone to have cops to keep the order and firemen to put out fires by way of a variety of taxes, fees, and surcharges, and so many other things we all have been paying for and will continue to pay for in order to supply them to everyone. The list of things we do for each other for the public good is long. Health care is just one more public good that our children and our children’s children will be paying for for the rest of their lives.

Tangent: The right to a lawyer also comes to mind. I have the right to a lawyer if convicted of a crime and my freedom is threatened, even if I can’t afford to retain a lawyer, no matter how long or protracted the trial may be, and no matter how expensive to the state. Oddly, I do not have the right to be seen by a doctor and treated for a medical condition which may threaten my very life, unless I can afford it. I can even enjoy a long and slow death with no treatments at all, if I can’t afford them, and if I can afford it, they will take every last penny they can, leaving my family homeless and hungry … and still possibly quite dead. Pretty crazy, don’t you think?

I just got this Tweet –now that I am so trendy and interconnected with the larger universe– and it got me thinking about the garden. I’d already been sitting on the couch not paying attention to what was on the TV thinking about the garden. I have been having deep thoughts about the garden for the last few days.

The winter gardening experience was miserable. I can’t describe it any other way. I had hoped that having a winter garden would spark some appreciation for the colder segment of the year. I love being outside. I feel most alive when I am spending quality time outdoors puttering in “nature” –also known as my back yard. Alas, I can find no reason at all to be outside during winter. There is simply nothing at all to appreciate about winter. It’s just miserable. Even puttering around in “nature” can’t make me want to be outside during the winter.

There will be no future winter gardens. None. I may start some late-winter/early-spring things (like peas), but I am not fussing around outside in Texas mud in near freezing temperatures and high wind for any plant. I will occasionally pay a premium price for one organically and locally grown head of perfect^† for the privilege of not having to be outside and miserable during the winter. Or, I’ll buy the clone-like stuff at the grocery store. Or do without. What I will not do is spend another winter fretting over plants.

There. I said it.

Tomorrow, I may have things to say about the spring and summer garden too. Oh, there’s going to be one, because I have carefully selected seeds from carefully selected plants which were grown in my own yard that I have to plant in order to collect seeds from those plants ad infinitum. The Great Garden Experiment will go on. I’m just not certain about the scale of the thing, and that’s just one of the many decisions about the garden that I am currently contemplating.

And all that talk the other day about not bothering with a plan and just going all carefree about the nitty-gritty details of plants and growing things? Just ignore it. I started working on The Plan 2010 last night.

1. † And by “perfect” I do mean looking like an actual fresh vegetable grown in a natural environment and not a clone-like representation of what we think broccoli should look like – as one would see in most grocery store produce departments. [↩]

I am so tired of the cold. Tired of the wet too. The sun has been out lately, but I don’t think I’ve felt warm for days now, no matter how warm it actually is in the house. I’m ready for the seasons to begin to change. It’s usually much nicer than this by my birthday.

Oh, and there’s going to be cloudy, cold, wet weather this weekend too, just to set the mood for completing my forty-fifth year on this planet. I can’t wait! Break out the black balloons and tombstones, I am declaring myself officially middle-aged on Saturday night!

My glee … can you feel it?

Statistically speaking, I should have officially declared myself middle-aged some years ago. I feel confident stating that the larger portion of my life is now behind me. Not necessarily the better portion, but certainly the larger one. The years ahead of me are fewer than I have seen before, but I still think the best is yet to come … or it’s happening right now. This may be the best it gets, and you know what?

I’m cool with that.

Oh sure, being rich, famous, lauded, stunningly gorgeous, living in a mansion with a full staff including a driver, gardener, and cook wouldn’t be something I couldn’t adapt to in about a day and a half, but my life isn’t bad. It fits me like a worn pair of jeans fresh from the dryer. I may complain about the knees being out and hems being frayed, but I still love the jeans.

Anyway, the weather’s going to be gross for my birthday, which is just as well, because all I really want to do is eat candies and be introspective. Or mopey. It’s possible I will be mopey.

The scent of baking bread kept mysteriously wafting by my nose. I wasn’t baking bread, and the only thing I baked all day was corn fritters, and they smell like corn … not fresh and yeasty bread. Even having taken my allergy pills today, my nose was still so stuffed up, I couldn’t follow the scent to its source, but I knew I was smelling fresh baked bread. It’s a scent I’d know anywhere.

I discovered the source a few minutes ago when I went to stack the dinner dishes in the sink for washing tomorrow. I’d left the ziplock bag of bread from the freezer open. This is still some of the bread I made on Christmas Eve. It is, even in the world of bread stored properly in the freezer, probably beyond its “best by” date. Not inedible, but likely getting stale and dry. Or soggy, which is even worse. The kind of bread best served with stews, soups, and dishes with sauces. Generally, I would say that bread stored in the freezer, even for a short time, loses its wonderful bread smell. Yet, here I have a loaf of bread baked on Christmas Eve, carried on a 160 mile road trip in a ziplock bag, stacked with a bunch of other loaves in a tote bag, and then tossed into my freezer without being wrapped in plastic wrap or foil –it even had frozen veggies tossed on it at one point– and it smells as though I just made it today and is perfectly edible. It’s a wonderful thing.

I believe I will be mass baking our bread more often. It keeps much better than I expected. As much as I love baking bread, it is a pain in my butt due to my kitchen being completely non-user-friendly and inefficient. Spending a day baking bread every three or so weeks would be often enough to feed my need to knead, but not so often it would make me want to scream about my kitchen.

And now It’s time for a little smear of grape jelly on a thin slice of bread.

Mmmmm.

I need four large square canvases –stretched and not canvas boards. With gallery edges. I need them now. OK, I don’t need them right this minute, and probably not for a few weeks, but I will need them at some point soonish.

I also need an overhead photo of a slender nude woman curled up in a fetal position on a bed. Actually, I need an overhead photo of myself on my own bed, nude (of course). My need for this is a little more immediate. I want to start doing figure studies this weekend.

Last year was the year of spontaneous art. No planning. No real forethought. No sketches. No underpainting. When I felt like painting, I did. If I didn’t feel like painting, I didn’t. The end result of this year-long experiment has been fewer paintings finished, and I think every one of them is a great contender for the Worst Art I’ve Made award. Obviously, this means that long after I am dead, someone somewhere will be droning on about the significance of this one year period and claiming they are the best work of my entire art career.

I haven’t entirely decided what this year’s grand art experiment will be, but I suspect the word I would use to sum it up is LARGE. It’s also entirely possible I will be working in oils, though that does come with some difficulties. I’m getting sick of acrylics, I think.

Oh. I just had another idea to go with the idea I had that prompted this post. I wanted stretched and shaped canvases with gallery edges. That means I’ll have to build and stretch them myself. Ugh. I’ll have to ask my resident engineer/architect/master builder for guidance. I can stretch the canvas myself, but building a canvas with no corners might be a little beyond my building abilities. OK, it’s way beyond my building abilities. You’ve seen the things I build for my garden haven’t you? I wouldn’t let me build anything that needs to last longer than three months. Eh, probably too much work that would end in unsatisfactory results. I’ll look into it, but four large square canvases would be just fine too.

I should probably join Lin in bed now. We need to get up at 3 am to get him off to Houston for a ridiculously early meeting. Also, I’m doing lunch with a friend tomorrow. Good thing I suggested a late lunch, because there’s no way I will fall asleep until at least midnight or later, and having just found out I need to be up two and a half hours earlier than I am used to means I won’t get any sleep at all, until I get Lin out the door and go back to bed until moments before my lunch date.

And if I am not too fatigued after lunch, I think I’ll start doing sketches for the first painting of 2010, because I am eager to get started on it. I might even let people see this one.

It’s oddly warm outside. Well, it’s 54ºF, which feels oddly warm compared to the lower temperatures we have been having lately are the ones we are expecting soon. There’s a thick pea soup fog out there too. Always makes the back yard look so eerie. I like it.

I imagine the almost warm breeze barely blowing is every last bit of warmth from the more northern states being pushed down at us … right before the coldest air we’ve felt here in a long time blasts us into a frenzy, and Texans –at least the ones in my neighborhood– do seem to be working themselves into a frenzy about this cold front.

I would swear most of the mass of humanity crammed into my corner grocery store this afternoon were panic buying. I’ve been through hurricanes. I know when people are panic buying food and other essential provisions. The thing is … there’s no real reason to panic. It’s going to get cold. Very cold. But the weather isn’t supposed to be especially ugly. No rain or freezing rain or ice or snow. Sunny cold weather. I know I will regret not buying more things at the grocery store –I bought the ten most essential things, got through a quick check, and was in and out of the utter madness of the place in under 20 minutes, because I will likely have to leave the house when it is really, really cold, and this will suck. But I am fully capable and unhindered in my ability to leave my house and go buy or do anything I want just as if it was a totally normal non-freezing-cold day.

Austin will not be shut down. Life will be normal. The only true hardship will be some people will have burst pipes, there will be a couple of house fires caused by various heating methods, some schools or office buildings may close due to heating system breakdowns, it’s possible a few homeless and/or elderly people will die of hypothermia, and almost all of us will be freezing our butts off when outside, because very few of us own clothing designed to protect us from such frigid temperatures. Perhaps sales of appropriate cold weather clothing have risen as much as the sale of bottled water, soda, and canned foods. Seriously, people were stocking up on nonperishable foodstuffs as if there was a hurricane on the way and Austin had beachfront property.

The only sense of dread I feel about this upcoming cold spell concerns the fact this is our first really hard and long freeze in the house. Let’s just say I’m hoping we don’t get any horrible surprises or experience any house-related dramatic events in the next few days. Aside from that one concern, I’m actually glad it’s happening. Today I heard that when the weather warms up and it’s time to get to that spring and summer gardening, this cold spell will have diminished the supply of hungry bugs greatly. I can get through a few days of really cold weather knowing my future garden has a slightly better chance of being awesome, because it isn’t being eaten alive daily by the multitude of hungry, hungry bugs. I can always do with fewer bugs.

I’ve got to get to bed. It’s late, and I’m starting to babble. Where does the time (and energy) go?

I hate to do it, but I am closing comments on this one post for the night (or maybe longer). This one post is getting slammed by comment spammers from Russia, and I don’t have the time or patience to deal with it right now. I’ll open comments on it again tomorrow to see if it’s stopped, but enough is enough for now.

Well before my alarm was set to go off I was awakened by the dual sounds of metal chairs being rapidly set up in rows and a vocal group practicing on the giant PA system. I could have done without all the chair noises, but there are worse ways to wake up than hearing some excellent singers singing patriotic tunes. I quickly got dressed and went outside to roam around and investigate.

The weather had turned most foul. Very cold, windy and wet. Yuck. Still, there was plenty of activity to keep me entertained while I wandered around and shivered … like oodles of young people in spit-shined shoes and well-pressed uniforms setting up all those chairs.

They were really quick about getting all the chairs lined up, but unfortunately for them, someone with a lot of brass on his chest wasn’t pleased with the final result and gave them a dressing-down about it.

“When I say I want the chairs set up thirty-four inches apart, I do not mean thirty-four and a half, thirty-four and a quarter, or thirty-three and three-quarters! I mean thirty-four inches!”

I tried not to laugh while they were getting yelled at in a stereotypically booming military way, but I couldn’t help myself. Yardsticks magically appeared from somewhere, and the young military personnel set about making certain each chair was exactly thirty-four inches apart while I hustled back inside to stand in front of the gas heater in the living room and rid myself of an awful chill.

It wasn’t too long before Mom wanted to get out to our seats. I certainly could have waited a little longer, considering how vile the weather was out there, but she wanted to be sure we got good seats, so off we went at 8:30 am for a 9:30 am event. I grabbed the tickets, and we asked the first person we saw handing out programs where we should sit, even though I already knew what section we were in (having scoped that out while watching the earlier chair escapades). A very young and well-uniformed Navy boy escorted us to our section, and we found our seats up in the front. I was already feeling far too cold, because I was, of course, dressed nicely and not dressed properly for the weather.

And then we sat … and sat … and 9:30 am came and went … and we sat some more. Not wanting to take the chance of losing our prime seeing, hearing, and photographing seats, we sat there and suffered. Mom did make a quick trip back to the house to use the restroom and to grab a nice warm wool blanket for us to snuggle under about an hour earlier, for which I am eternally grateful. It was really, really getting cold and nasty. I spent the time alternately shivering uncontrollbly and taking photos of the crowd, like this one of the press box.

Finally everyone who was supposed to be up at the podium arrived^† most importantly, Number 41 and his wife, Barbara.

The show finally started at about 11 am. I was pretty much a popsicle by then. After some local bigwigs spoke, the Big Brass scheduled to speak got up and had his say.

I could get out my program and look up his name, but I can’t be bothered. His speech annoyed me. A great part of it was his disgust with how World War II is presented in school history books. His main complaints? There are only a few pages about it, and horror of horrors, there are some people who believe dropping nuclear bombs on the civilian populations of Nagasaki and Hiroshima shouldn’t be considered a good thing to do. I’m accustomed to high-level and older military people being really rah-rah about World War II and the dropping of large and deadly bombs on people, but this guy was over-the-top.

Considering there were a large number of elderly Japanese who were alive during the war (and the Japanese have been so wonderful to my hometown and the museum–not to mention being great friends of America now), it felt a little less than polite to stand up there and complain that some people think killing and maiming a bunch of civilians in Japan might not have been such a wonderful thing to do. In fact, I thought it was quite rude, as was the cheering, hooting, and general rah-rah attitude coming from some people in the crowd who weren’t old enough to be alive back then and likely have no clue what those bombs did to the people who had them dropped on them.^††

There was a little more speechifying, and then we finally got to the ribbon cutting. I was ever so grateful, because I was just about as cold and damp as I ever care to get, and I was beginning to feel sickish.

Mom and I took off for the house almost as soon as the ribbon dropped. While there was all manner of activity on the street afterward with the chairs being taken down and some bands playing and whatnot, we did not leave the house again. It was too warm indoors and too nasty outdoors, and we’d had just about enough of being out the cold and wet weather … so another evening of hot chocolate, good food, and sitting by heaters watching heartwarming TV programming for us!

Previous posts on this big weekend: Day of Arrival and Fun Day Sunday.

1. † Everyone except Kay Bailey Hutchinson. Her absence and the reasons for it deserves a post of its own and will get one soon. [↩]
2. †† And just so you know it was just little bleeding-heart me that thought his speech was way over the line, even my super right-wing, kill-them-all-let-god-sort-them-out mom was totally put off by this guy’s going on about how wrong it was for anyone to think dropping the bombs wasn’t something to be proud and happy about. [↩]

Though the cold wind was still blowing on Sunday morning, the sun was out, and it looked like it was going to be a lovely day. My plan was to drag Mom out to the airport to look at the World War II planes and take some photos. Our street wasn’t supposed to be blocked off until 4 pm, so we putz around the house a little and watched the people setting things up for a dedication ceremony later in the day. After lunch I stepped outside to check the weather, and lo and behold, they had blocked off our street early!

While I certainly could have convinced the nice policeman to let us in and out for a trip to the airport, it was just enough hassle to make me lose interest in doing so. Instead, we sat out on the porch drinking coffee and watching people moving around heavy equipment … until Mom decided her front sidewalk needed to be swept. Obviously, I could allow my elderly mother to sweep the front sidewalk while I lolly-gagged around on the porch drinking coffee while being young and fit, so I volunteered for duty.

As you can see behind me, they had begun to stack the chairs on the street for Monday’s big event, so I had an audience while I worked, one of whom –the nice policeman guarding the entrance to our street– came over to say hello. Naturally, my mother had to have a photo.

Once I finished chatting with Officer Castillo and sweeping the sidewalks, I noticed the dedication ceremony for the submarine in front of the museum was in full swing, so I toddled down there to see what was being said and who was there. The reenactment group that performs at the museums other complex just down the road was in attendance.

After the ceremony ended they went back to making the war come to life a few blocks away, something that usually only happens a couple times a day … except during big events like this one when it seems like it was non-stop bombs and gunfire. It’s loud too, and always sounds like we are in the middle of a war zone while sitting in Mom’s house.^†

Since the weather had become so pleasant, Mom and I wandered over to the courtyard again to listen to the band of the moment, mingle with the tourists, stroll along the memorial walkways, and watch the WWII planes doing flyovers.

I even managed to convince my mom to sit in front of my camera and let me take a photo! It’s a rare event, indeed!

By this time the sun was starting to set, the cold wind was picking up again and the activities were all winding down, so we made our way back to the house for dinner, hot chocolate, and more heartwarming seasonal programming to finish out our day.

1. † If you ever wonder why I don’t flinch when there’s something that sounds like a bomb or gun going off? Growing up with WWII battles happening just down the street makes the sounds of war seem commonplace and safe to ignore. This will probably get me killed some day. [↩]