Rain Blessings

This is where Maurice has spent most of this rainy day. And yes, the rain did finally show up and it has arrived in torrents and in sheets and in great toad-strangling downpours. The worst of it, I think, was when I was driving home from town after I picked up my HORMONES! 
It started just as I was leaving Tallahassee and I crawled all the way to Lloyd, slowly and carefully because I could barely see fifteen feet in front of me. Nobody was going very fast, not even the usual assholes who believe they have super powers of visual perception even in a blinding rain and who pass you, throwing up huge floods of water which temporarily and absolutely blind you for a few seconds.
And I made it, safe and sound. I did NOT take the interstate, believe me, but one of the back roads and that served me well.  

That was hours ago and it looks like it might rain all night and well into tomorrow. 
Drink up, you Ancient Oaks! The rain anoints your leaves and branches as your great spreading roots revel in the holy water soaking through the purifying leaf mulch and dirt so that you may drink it.
Okay. That was a bit overblown. 
I really do feel like that though.

Before it started to rain this morning I made my daily pass through the garden. That really is one of my favorite things to do. The field peas are blooming and soon we'll be picking and shelling those. The zinnias are really coming to full blooming life and the butterflies are noticing. The few tomato plants we have are looking pretty good and I'm not seeing any of the usual diseases that can take them over and so far we haven't seen any of the usual pests that bother them either. This could possibly be due to the recent drier conditions and if so, we can expect this good fortune to come to an end. 
I did see this pest on the bean vines though.

Yep. The Georgia Thumpers have reached full maturity and that's what they look like. See the green bean in the picture? Those bugs don't even look real, do they? 

Same critter. He's probably about two and a half inches long and I thought about swatting him to the ground and stomping him but I swear- I just could not. It's too big for me to murder. As you can see, they eat the leaves, not necessarily the beans which I suppose is good but if they eat all the leaves, there will be no beans so there is that too. 
It's a rather fascinating creature, isn't it? Actually beautiful in its way. 

Of course while I was in the garden I had to pick some beans and although I'd just picked yesterday, I got another good half basket full and that was just a casual picking. 

My white eggplant is coming along.

Looks like the Thumpers have visited them, too. 

I really need to give some support to the peppers. I doubt I'll do that tomorrow as I have pottery and as we all know, I can only really handle one activity a day. 

The Seminole pumpkins I planted are absolutely thriving. 

And I didn't plant that many of them. A few vines have escaped the garden fence and are snaking along the ground outside. I do love a good native heirloom. They seem so very happy to be given the chance at life. Glen asked the other day what we're going to do with these Seminole pumpkins. I said, "I have no idea. Pumpkin stuff, I guess." 
I'm thinking soups and pies. Possibly casseroles. So of course I just looked it up and there are many recipes featuring them including crumbles, pumpkin bread and other baked goods. 
And they'll last a year if stored in a cool dark place so...
I'm excited. 

My whole plan for today was to get to town to get the hormones and then zoom back home and get right to work on the hibiscus. 
Well. That didn't exactly happen. I got the hormones, and then I went by the Credit Union for a little bit of banking and then I ran into Publix because I forget to get eggs yesterday and also, I was starving so I wanted something to eat and somehow this all took forever, not to mention the fact that I didn't get out of Lloyd until much later than I'd planned (gotta pick those beans, y'all!) but I did finally sit down and slow down and had a very good time mixing glazes and using them to paint this thing that I've been working on since Jesus was a titty baby. 

And it's still not done. 

The glaze is still drying in some places there. I am SO curious to see how the colors turn out. 

Hopefully, and with any luck, I'll get it ready for the kiln tomorrow. Whatever happens, I'll be happy to see my pottery ladies. 

Mr. Moon has an annual with Dr. Zorn on Thursday morning so he'll be back tomorrow. I've enjoyed my quiet time although I don't feel as if I've done nearly as many things as I had hoped I would. This is how it always turns out though. I never have time to be lonely and I'm never bored. And Maurice has done a good job of taking care of me. She slept cuddled up and quiet all night last night and this morning, when I came out onto the porch I found a perfectly intact and absolutely dead little mousie. I know she left it right there on purpose, knowing that's exactly where I'd walk and would find it. I feel that when she brings me an entire critter that she has not even nibbled on, that it's definitely a gift. Now how she manages to kill a mouse without leaving a mark on it is beyond me. Mr. Moon and I have discussed this before. I suggested that she simply scares them to death. 
Whatever and however, it's somehow touching. And as Glen said, "She's like no other cat we've ever had." 
He is right. 

Suddenly I am inspired to post a Springsteen video. The song is "Mary's Place" and I know I've posted a video (or two) of this song before but I don't think I've even ever seen this video of him and the E-Street Band doing it in Barcelona. 
As always, I have no expectations of anyone actually watching this video but if you'd like to have just the tiniest, most molecular idea of what seeing Springsteen live is like, this is not a bad video to watch. Also, The Big Man, Clarence Clemons was still alive and still bringing his presence to the stage and I feel so fortunate that I got to see him play the two times I saw the E Street Band live. I've written a lot about him and what he's meant to me before but here's a post I always return to.  

Oh, Bruce. As I said in that post, music can put a healin' on ya. 

We need that now more than ever and Bruce has stepped up to do just that, powerfully expressing his feelings about Donald Trump and what he has done and is doing to our country. 

This video, however, is Bruce doing yet another song he's written about me, or at least someone named Mary and yes, he was raised Catholic so there you go but if I want to believe they are my songs, what's the harm? 

Mary's Place

Let it rain, let it rain, let it rain, let it rain. 

Love...Ms. Moon

So I Bought Two Tee Shirts At Walmart

Random picture of Maurice under a zinnia. 

I called my compounding pharmacy this morning to see if by any miracle my hormones were ready to pick up. 
Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
They had not received a renewal of my prescription from the doctor's office. 
Exactly what I was expecting. 
They said they'd send another request and I said I'd call their office too. Which I did. The woman who answered the phone, after researching the situation, insisted that they had not gotten a request. 
I made her repeat this statement. 
And then, my lack of hormones kicked in and I said, and not in a pleasant tone of voice, "Well. That would be a first."
And I only said that because I didn't feel I could call the woman a fucking liar. That really might hold things up on their end. 

And then later, Mr. Moon told me that he had a meeting this afternoon with a guy about a situation which Glen has briefly informed me of, a situation that would be the start of ANOTHER PROJECT and I lost my shit entirely. I did not even pause to take a breath. It was like I opened my mouth and a flaming gorgon burst forth. A gorgon that I had no idea resided within me. 
And she was not using her inside voice. I'm not sure the gorgon was even using MY voice.
I believe that I was as shocked as Mr. Moon. 

It was a real good example of, "Tell us how you really feel, Mary."

Ooh boy.

Now whether that had anything to do with my depleted hormones, I cannot say. But when the pharmacy called me a few hours later to tell me that they had gotten the refill order and the prescription would be ready by tomorrow, I was vastly relieved. 
And I have to say that if I was living in Victorian times and had no access to hormone therapy after menopause, I probably would have been put into an insane asylum with all of the rest of the women who were neither being sweet nor calm nor silent. In short, the women who also had gorgons living inside of them. 

So that was that story but the part of my day which was truly important involved this woman.

The one and only Liz Sparks. 
That woman will not let me disappear completely into the ether, mouldering away here at home in Lloyd. She texts me and says, "Can you go to lunch on..." and lists a day as if she was making an appointment and if you can't make it on that day, another one will be found and that is that. 

And I always go because there is nothing better than spending a few hours with that woman. She's about to leave for her annual get-out-of-Tallahassee-for-the-unbearable-summer and head north to gentler climes and excellent adventures. She's going to be a camp nurse for a week somewhere in the Smokey Mountains, (yes, she's an RN) and then she has people to meet and things to do in Maine and Connecticut and who knows where all? 
She is that sort of woman. So it was even more necessary for me to see her before she begins her journey and I am so grateful she does not forget me, she does not let me disappear into the mist and might of anxiety. She calls me forth and I answer. 

She brought me a birthday present because she always brings something. Her mother was British and Liz got good home training from her. She claims the birthday present was meant for last year and I received it as gracefully as I could, knowing that all I'd brought her was a bag of rattlesnake beans. 
Sigh.

On her last summer's trip, she had driven some of the Blues Trail in Mississippi because of course she did. And also, because of course she did, she stopped off in Indianola, the town where my daddy, B.B. King was born. 
I call him my daddy because not having had a daddy, I figured I got to pick whoever I wanted to represent that person in my life and I picked B.B. King. It didn't hurt that at the end of all his concerts (and I think I saw at least three), he would ask, "Who's your daddy?" and honey, you know damn well that I would say, "You are! You are, B.B.!" 

I do believe I chose wisely. 

So Liz got me a few souvenirs at the museum, including that fan, because indeed it is a fan, the same kind you could find and still can find at churches and funerals and gatherings of many kinds in the south, both in the Black and white communities. Many of those fans have advertisements for funeral homes or pictures of Jesus on them.
This, however, is the best one I've ever seen and the best one ever made, I am sure. I have written about Mr. King before and how his autobiography, "Blues All Around Me," is a book that should be taught in all American schools. It holds a proud place of honor in my library, same shelf as Keith Richards' and Bruce Springsteen's memoirs. 
I think one of the best things I ever did as a mother was to take Hank and May to see B.B. play in Tallahassee and somehow we got second or third row seats and all of us, including Mr. Moon, ended up dancing in the aisle while the people who had scored front row seats sat motionless which I did not know was even possible for a person to do when at a B.B. King concert, and need I say they were white?

No. No I do not. 

I remember I was wearing a red dress and I like to think that Mr. King may have noticed me and that when he said, "Who's your daddy?" and I said, "You are, B.B.!" he saw and he agreed to my one-sided contract. 
And best of all, we got to shake his hand. We got to shake B.B. King's hand. 

Well, so Liz who obviously knows me so well, brought me that fan and a little Christmas ornament of B.B.'s guitar, Lucille, and also a key ring which doubles as a bottle opener which also says Lucille. 
Lucille was his guitar. 
Whichever guitar he was playing, that was Lucille.

Lord. I did not mean to go off on that. I doubt Liz would mind. She knows me. She and I talked about so many things today. We sort of caught up and told each other some of our woes and we laughed and we laughed and when it was time to leave, I hugged her so hard. 
"Have a wonderful summer," I said. "And be safe."
She reassured me she would. 

After we parted I went to the dreaded Walmart where I got so stressed out that my right foot and my left hand both fell asleep while I was up and walking around. I went to buy a canning kettle and an umbrella and the only canning kettle they had was not like any canning kettle I've ever seen and I did not want it. 
And I forgot the umbrella.
It has been raining in Tallahassee off and on all day. We got a small amount here in Lloyd. Barely enough to register in the garden-cart rain gauge. But oh my! It's just started raining again and the weather widget on my phone says we're going to get heavy precipitation for the next hour. 
Promises, promises. Thunderstorms are also predicted but no sign of those yet. 

Mr. Moon has finally made an escape from the care-taking, power of attorneying, health care surrogating meetings and also, crazed gorgon wife, up to the cabin. I know he'll be so glad to be there. 
And I'm good here. Because I wanted something homey and comforting and nurturing, I am roasting a little chicken stuffed with lemon and (our) sage and (our) garlic. It is sitting in a skillet atop (our) carrots and surrounded by (our) potatoes.
Did you know that if you roast carrots with garlic they become incredibly sweet? 
Well, they do. 

It is thundering a little bit. It is still raining although not what I would call heavily. I just found two green beans in my pocket. 

Here's a video of Mr. B. B. King, King of the Blues, giving a master class on how to change a string on a guitar mid-concert while wringing his heart out asking the eternal question, "How Blue Can You Get?"

You want to know a secret? 
I wish he really was my daddy. So, so much. 

Love...Ms. Moon

No Rain Here, Sad To Say

This is what the sky looked like about half an hour ago and Glen and I and the frogs too were all chanting, "Rain, rain, come on, RAIN!" and the thunder was rumbling and it surely did seem as if the skies would open up and release some of that precious sky water but no. It did not. 

Sigh.

The storm skirted us, once again. 

Hell, I even watered the garden in the superstitious hope that it would increase the odds of it raining but if it did, the odds were still stacked against us. 

I'm going to make this short. I don't really have the desire to bitch the way I did yesterday and I am, in fact, a little calmer. I managed to get some canning done- eight quarts and three pints of beans. 

And yes you DO have to see every damn jar of whatever I can this summer, just as you've had to see every damn jar of everything I've canned in the last however many years I've been writing this blog. 
A bunch of years. A bunch of jars. 
Also, yes, some of the liquid from the jars did leak out due to what I have read is rapid fluctuation of the temperature in the canner. These things happen. And the jars have all sealed so they're good. I need to regulate the dang temperature which is funny because Mr. Moon is always complaining about not being able to regulate HIS temperature, especially while in bed. He gets cold and covers up and then he's too hot and throws off the covers and then he gets cold again and...
Well. Proper temperature regulation is obviously important for both canners and people. 

So it's been a pretty good day, mostly because I got something done. It would very much seem that I have to feel as if I've been a least a little bit productive in order to feel okay about myself and how my day has gone. I started my puzzle in that I'm sorting out the edges which is how I always begin. Do you? If you do puzzles, that is. I feel like it's a good way to begin knowing the picture as well as forming the borders. I am a very non-visual person in some ways and jig-saw puzzles are especially difficult for me because I can't just look at the picture on the box and get an idea of the image in my head. It takes a whole lotta studying. 

And a whole lotta time. 
But it was a good thing to do while I had different steps of the canning going on, timing this and timing that and waiting for pressure to rise and waiting for pressure to go down. The actual filling of the jars when I'm doing plain old green beans is easy once they're snapped. But I suppose I need to work on my temperature fluctuations, don't I?

Mr. Moon dealt with more of Tom's situation today. This is not easy, people. It involves legality and rationality and reality. And a lot more. Some of it you do not even want to know and I don't even need to tell you. And yet the man, the Mr. Moon man, takes it all on with calmness and gentleness and kindness and the determination to do the right thing. 
Right things. 
It's all a lot. 

Are you going to watch grown men beat each other to bloody pulps on the White House lawn on your Tee Vee tonight? What kind of a person celebrates his eightieth birthday cheering for such base and cruel entertainers? 
You know. 
I could puke just thinking about it. No need for me to see the bloody bashing. Simply knowing it's going on is once again proof to me that there is no depth to which this man will sink. 

I could go into a whole other string of curses and cusses and profane observations but I won't. You already know what I think and what I'd say and how I'd say it. 

That's all. 

Love...Ms. Moon

 

Look. The Language Here Tonight Reflects My Mood. You Have Been Warned

 

The wild phlox has started blooming and that's always a happy sight for me but I seem to have a powdery mildew situation going on here in my yard. It started a few years ago with some plants I'd bought at a very well-regarded nursery that I'd potted up and put on the porch and it seems to have spread to whatever is vulnerable to it, the phlox being one of those things. It's sort of crept up on me and is now doing what every invasive thing in this yard does which is to quickly get beyond my control. I realize I should prune back everything that has it and also spray the leaves (both sides!) with a mixture of something like baking soda, Dawn dish soap, and neem oil but Lord have mercy- that would be a lot of work. And I'm sure that one application of the preparation would not get the job done. I'm really not seeing any on the porch plants now which is good but it's going pretty strong in the little kitchen garden area, that area you see above which is next to the kitchen garden, and also along the fence in front of the house where it's showing up on the phlox I've planted there along with the fire spike I've also planted. 

And really, it's too damn hot outside to do any sort of yard work as far as I'm concerned. I spent another hour in the garden picking beans and once again, I wasn't sure I was going to make it. Turned out I really needed a second basket but the thought of walking ALL THE WAY back to the house which is really not far at all was simply too much and I started stashing beans in my pockets. I was hoping I'd get whatever I picked today and what was in the refrigerator canned this afternoon but by the time I'd snapped the new guys, it was too late to start that project. In my opinion, at least. I have about eight pounds of snapped beans to pressure can and I think that'll probably just about equate to another seven quarts or so. 
While I snapped, I finished watching a movie I started yesterday which I've been meaning to see since it came out in 2018, "Green Book" which is a story based on true facts about a Black pianist named Don Shirley and his driver and body guard, an Italian American bouncer named Frank Tony-Lip Vallelonga when Shirley did a concert tour in the deep south in 1962. The movie won a lot of awards including the Academy Award for Best Picture. I don't know why I'd never watched it. "The Green Book" refers to a publication called The Negro Motorist Green Book which was published from the 1930's through the 1960's when segregation was still very much in force and was full of information regarding where Black travelers could find overnight accommodations as well as places to eat. And so forth. 
The movie was not bad although I felt there were a lot of tropes happening but supposedly, it was written based on interviews with Shirley and Vallelonga who became friends on the road and remained lifelong friends, literally until their deaths. It gave a very good picture of what it was like for a Black person to try and just survive on the road in the south and a few of the things that could and did happen during such a trip. And I cried at the very end. Not a whole lot, but I did cry, sitting there on the couch with a bowl of green beans in my lap. 
The truth is, people flat out died just trying to get a meal or taking a piss if their color was the wrong one in certain areas of the country and I can't help but think of how the very same things are happening now, especially with immigrants who fit the profile of being "illegal" or "criminals" or "drug mules."
Whatever. 
Fuck ICE. Fuck racial prejudice. Fuck ignorance and hatred and the inability to feel the least bit of empathy. 
I could go on all night. 
I won't. 

I've been in a bit of a mood today anyway and a little while ago I was contemplating this and wondering why and thought to myself that it almost feels like being premenstrual although I will never be anything but post, post, post menstrual for the rest of my life and then I remembered that due to the fact that the doctor's office which prescribes my hormones is once again being incompetent when it comes to renewing my prescription, I've been taking half my regular dosage so as not to run out entirely before they get their shit together and that may explain things.
Or, I could just be in a bitchy mood for no apparent reason. 
But I'm also absolutely ready to get rid of half, at least, of the stuff in my house from books to tchotchkes, whether on shelves or hanging on walls or in closets. I feel weighed down and burdened by all of it and all of it needs cleaning and dusting and I have no desire to do any of that. Even though I did a bit of a weeding in the library within the last year (or so, to be honest), I still have books in there I've never read and am never going to read or have read and will never read again and not all of the children's books are books that have any real emotional meaning to me or any sort of real value in any way and they're just sitting there, collecting dust and all of the words within them are not doing me a bit of good. There's just clutter everywhere and why is it so damn hard for me to let it go? 
I guess I need to read that book about Swedish death cleaning or something. Look- I have things stashed away that I really have no idea where they came from or how I got them. Or why in hell I kept them. Did someone make me this scratchy shawl? Surely I did not buy it. It must have some meaning, some history which once was important to me but fuck if I can remember what that was. 

But it's all so overwhelming. 
I do not think I'm a hoarder but I know I have some of a hoarder's traits. I hold on to things that there is no way I'll ever need or use again. I do not like this aspect of my personality and I do not like living with the results of it. And let us not forget that my husband is even worse than I am in some ways, happily acquiring things all the time that he dreams he will be using in future projects while there are enough unfinished projects in that garage to last a lifetime. And what the hell is a lifetime at this point in our lives? 

And this is where I am today. Despairing over powdery mildew and the lack of rain and the heat and the mess and the clutter and the weird pain in my left leg and my seeming inability to make myself exercise in any sort of regular way and the mildew which is not powdery and on plants but is in my house (and please do not go into a a treatise about how dangerous mold and mildew are, just don't) and how badly my refrigerator needs cleaning out and how I hardly have a leg to stand on when it comes to mentioning Mr. Moon not finishing projects because I am probably five times worse than he is when it comes to that and...oh yeah, also things like the East Wing on the White House being reduced to rubble and fucking cage fighting (whatever the fuck that really is) on the White House lawn with ads for various products stamped all over that horrid, trashy cage thing and millions being spent on gilding horses (not to be confused with gelding horses) and the 39 times Trump has insisted that we are THAT close to signing an agreement with Iran and people dying in what are essentially concentration camps with no visible hope of any sort of legal resolution and Elon Musk becoming a trillionaire and the lies and deceit and outright theft from the American people while the richest bastards in the world get their tax rates lowered and yet groceries and gas are unaffordable to the masses and let's not even talk about health care. 

Hormones or just trying to shift my fears and anxieties and rage from what's going on in this country to something I actually do have some control over like all the shit hanging on my walls? 
Theoretically.

Meanwhile, Mr. Moon is on his way home. From what I gather it wasn't the best day of fishing but at least he was out on the sea with his line in the water rather than being in a rehab facility trying to make a friend understand why he needs to be there. Or here at home with a wife who is just this side of irrational. 

Or maybe just that side. 
Who knows? 
Not me. 

I do know, however, that this picture makes me happy.

Mama and son at the library. 
Okay. I'm all right. That much of the world, at least, is good.

Love...Ms. Moon

 

Word And Picture Splatter

Here's Magnolia eating her fish and macaroni and cheese dinner. It all turned out quite well, including all the vegetables I cut up to go with it. Raw vegetables with ranch dressing seem to be the young ones' favorite vegetable side dish and that's fine with me. Sometimes I do the same for Glen and me when I become weary of the same five green vegetables and/or salads. Glen's as happy with it as the kids are and I really don't care one way or another. Raw cucumbers and carrots and cherry tomatoes or steamed broccoli? 
Pass the raw vegetables, please. I think if we call that a deconstructed salad it will get more respect. 
And by the way, those items of clothing on the old chest behind her were on the back of a dining room chair waiting for some mending assistance. That chest is sort of a catch-all for projects in process and art supplies and god knows what else. 

Maggie was a very, very good houseguest. After supper Boppy made her a purple cow which she enjoyed and then she took a bath in the big old clawfoot tub in my bathroom. After she was all cleaned and pajamaed and liberally patted down with my Caswell-Massey Elixir of Love dusting powder, she got into the bed and allowed me to read her two books. We read "The Owl and the Pussycat" in tribute to her mama's new tattoo and then we read "The Relatives Came" which she says I've never read to her before and I suppose she's right but Lord, I have failed her. 
She turned off her light at eleven which is early for her and she got up around 8:45 which is also early for her. The Hartmann's are taking summer vacation seriously. I think Owen stays up all night and sleeps most of the day but he's a teenager and that's what teenagers tend to do when they can get away with it. 
This morning Maggie wanted her pancakes and bacon and a cheesy omelet which I had first told her I wasn't going to make because pancakes and scrambled eggs should be enough, along with the bacon but of course I caved and made her a cheesy omelet which she did not like because it was TOO CHEESY. 
Sigh.
Mr. Moon finished it up for her. He's thoughtful and helpful like that. 

I washed the sheets and towels while she was still here and hung them on the line. I asked her if she wanted to help me hang laundry but shockingly, she said "No thanks." 
While I was doing that though, she got out some of the old toys and I was so happy when I found her in the Glen Den, playing with Lincoln logs and the little forest animals AND the Fisher Price farm. 

I had asked her if she still played with her dolls and she said "No, not really," which about broke my heart. 
I guess it's a lot to ask of a ten year old to still want to play with dolls. 
However, when I found that she had done this, I was more than a little thrilled.

She'd found Babar and Zippy and put them both in the high chair and I swear, I could cry. I don't know if she's still pretending or not and I know that if she is, it's not anything like the deep pretending she used to do where she'd get so involved with her doll and animal characters that I would think she was talking to me and when I'd ask, "What, honey?" she'd say, "Nothing. I'm just playing.

Playing. What could be more beautiful to a grandmother? To know that the child is capable of creating and living in different worlds, populated by stuffed animals and dolls has been one of the best parts of my life at this stage for sure and for certain. Is it any wonder that I am so very, very loathe to pass on the toys and the high chair? 
And the books! I was in the library today and while I was waiting to self check-out, a mother with three children was checking their books out and one of the books was "Danny and the Dinosaur." I have a copy of that book in my library and all of my kids and some of my grandkids have loved it. It was published in 1958 so it's hardly a new book and I was flabbergasted that not only did the library have a copy, but that someone was checking it out to read to her children. 
So how can I get rid of the children's books? 

Well. Eventually. Eventually I will have the strength and wisdom to pass on at least the toys. As for the books and the high chair- well, maybe not. Perhaps by the time I die, one of the grands will be having children of their own and they will want these things. 

Or is this just a grandmother's martini-fueled fever dream? 

I took Magnolia home and got to see Lauren and Gibson. Owen? Yeah, still in bed. Oh well. I've seen him this week and gotten some hugs so I'm good. Then I went by Hank and Rachel's to drop off Hank's birthday card and the "flat gift" within it. "Flat gift" is what we call money folded into an envelope. Or gift cards. You know. I didn't give it to him on Wednesday, the actual birthday, because somehow, between home and the restaurant I could not find it which caused a small amount of panic. I found it later underneath the front seat, safe and sound. 

I went to the library, I came home, I snapped more beans, I went out to the garden and took a few pictures. 

One of the candy-cane zinnias I planted is blooming and I could not be more delighted. I could, however, be more delighted with my old phone camera. I think I'm going to put this new one on ice and switch back to the old one. It is possible to take extreme closeups with this new one but it takes so much fiddling AND two hands and who has time for that mess? I do like the shadows of the open disk florets. I had to look that up. I would have just called them those little flowers within the flower. 

Oh, Zinnias! What joy you bring me. 

A not-too bad shot of a cucumber vine creating a cucumber flower. 
I think that's what it's doing. It could be trying to trap garden fairies and eat them for all I know. Whatever it truly is, it's pretty gnarly, isn't it? 

And another photo of a cucumber blossom. 

I got the sheets off the line, I made up the bed. I folded another load of laundry I'd put in the dryer and put that away. 
And I admired my new puzzle which got delivered today.

I cannot wait to get started and yet, at the same time, I want to work on my hibiscus. What an abundance of riches! 

I did have patching Mr. Moon's oldest overalls on the agenda but after studying them more closely, I have decided that no, they are done. There is no reason to attach good fabric onto completely worn out fabric. At this point it's no longer just one tear or rip, it's every square inch of the dear old things that are either holey already or trembling on the verge. 

Hell. The patches need patches. 
RIP you good and faithful servant. I shall cut off the hardware and then I do believe we should give these overalls a fine cremation on the burn pile pyre. 

Happy Friday, y'all. Mr. Moon's at the coast to spend the night with his buddy Alan so they can get an early morning start for a day of fishing on the Gulf. And so, alas, I have had to make my own martini. 
Luckily, it's not that hard.

Love...Ms. Moon

Here, Honey. Let Me Show You How To Snap Beans

 

Ms. Magnolia June is spending the night and her requested supper is her usual ask which is fish and macaroni and cheese. I have the fish thawing on the back porch and as you can see, Maurice is guarding it carefully. 
For breakfast tomorrow, she has requested pancakes, bacon, and perhaps a cheese omelet. We shall see. 
She also asked for chocolate chips in the pancakes which every grandchild always requests for their sleepover breakfasts although I have never in my life made a pancake with so much as one chocolate chip in it and never will unless someone's life depends on it. And I told Maggie that. 
"Okay," she said.
It reminded me of when the kids were little and would ask me to buy some sort of horrid (delicious) sugary cereal as if there was a chance in hell and I would always say, "Do you think I've lost my MIND?!" 
I probably did buy them some fruit loops or something at some point but it certainly was not a regular thing. Oh, I was so cruel. And I still am. Although when Maggie and I went to the store after I picked her up, I did get rainbow sherbet and grape juice for her after dinner purple cow. I mean, I am a grandmother. 

And as such, I figured I'd have her help me snap some beans today to help me get ready to can them tomorrow. I had two gallon sized bags in the refrigerator already and picked again this morning at which time I almost passed out from the heat. 
My GOD it's hot and the humidity is only 48% and yet somehow, it seemed absolutely unbearable when I was out there. I honestly wondered if I was going to pass out for the first time in my life. 
I did not. But I will say I was definitely having a fine old lady case of the vapors. 
All of that aside, Maggie did help me snap beans and we got managed to do all the ones I'd picked earlier today.

She did a good job, too! I have this fantasy that I'm going to teach my grandchildren about the joys of growing and preserving food but I'm not sure that's going to happen. Trust me when I say that none of them would have tolerated the picking of them. At least I don't think so. But sitting on the sofa in the AC, watching Shaun the Sheep and snapping them isn't that horrible of an activity. And who knows? Maybe at some point in some of their lives, the growing/gardening/preserving gene will kick in and they will have some visceral memory of watching Mer doing these things and they will feel as if these are things they want to do. 
I would be very pleased to know this had happened. Of course I'll be dead by then so I'm not sure why I care but the grandmother-passing-along-of-the-knowledge-to-her-grandchildren urge has definitely kicked in for me and I feel as if I must do these things. August and Levon's other grandmother is a master gardener and preserver, putting me firmly into the dilettante category so perhaps they at least will feel the pull to plant at some point. Their mama grows things too and actually, Lily and Lauren also have some things growing so they do have examples to look to. 

Mr. Moon has just gotten home from getting Tom settled into a rehab place. He did not have another stroke but did have a UTI which as many of us know, can cause severe delusional thinking and action and that's what had happened. The hospital was insistent that he needed to go into another facility before being allowed to go home which was absolutely the right thing to do, and Glen figured all of that out and transported him there and had to explain to him why he needed to be there and so on and so forth and now we shall see what happens next. I seriously doubt he's going to be deemed able to take care of himself but he hasn't really been able to take care of himself for a long time and yet, here we are. 

Well, Ms. Magnolia has informed me that it is after six o'clock and I am pretty sure she thinks I need to be starting supper and I guess she's right. Off I go to cook fish and macaroni and cheese and cut up some vegetables. She has agreed that she is finally ready to sleep in the guest room by herself instead of in the bed with me so this is a big step. She says she has already done that once before and she may be right. 
I don't know. I don't really know much of anything these days. 
Except that I do know how to grow, pick, snap, and can beans. 

May all be well with you and with all of us as Donald Trump melts down into complete and utter insanity and dementia while those who should be handling this situation seem to have no idea what to do. 
Scary times. Horrific times.

Let us seek peace and comfort where and how we may. 

Love...Ms. Moon

Birthday, Birth Day

Well, let's get that out of the way. My leaf platter was out of the kiln and that is how it turned out. I kind of like it. Some parts more than others. Pottery was good today. I took a bag of green beans in to share and that was fun. I mean, it was fun to share. And I worked on my hibiscus and got to chat with Lizzie and the other folks and I just really, really enjoy that part of my week. I am so damn slow, doing this glaze painting but I really enjoy every minute of it. 

You can't tell but there are three gradients of color there, going from center out. I really wish the colors were more true to what they'll look like when they come out of the kiln but they just aren't and I'm not experienced enough to be able to get a very accurate idea so I am just playing and hoping and seeing what happens. 

I ended up giving the leaf platter to Hank for his birthday because why not? And he seemed to like it fine, probably mostly because his mama made it. 

Oh, it was a fine birthday luncheon! When I walked into the restaurant, I was so thrilled to see that Billy had come. I have not seen Billy in over a year and by god, my heart just leapt at the sight of him. For those of you who have heard about Billy many, many times but don't really know who he is, here's a picture.

Do I look happy? 
Yes. Yes I do. And behind me you can see Owen who is carrying the cake in the new cake box for Hank and Rachel to take home and my leftovers which I would have totally forgotten if he hadn't picked them up for me. 
I have so many sweet fellas in my life. 

And here I am with my sweet birthday boy, the baby who made me a mother, the first true love of my life. 

All day I've been thinking of how it was indeed fifty years ago that I birthed this child and how every bit of what I went through to do it was suddenly made not insignificant in the least, but absolutely appropriate to what I felt holding him when he finally got here. Since he was my first baby, I was stunned beyond words at what my labor felt like. I had no idea that it would hurt the way it did. I know that some women do not experience labor as being so painful but I think the general consensus is that it is indeed a powerfully mind and body altering experience and I have to tell you that anyone who labors without asking for pain relief of one kind or another in a situation where such relief is available is a stronger woman than I am. If I had had the option for something to help ease what I was feeling, I would have gotten on my knees and begged for it. 
And quite honestly, I felt that way during every labor. 
With Hank, I labored at home in our little apartment for 24 hours with my three friends who had aspirations of being midwives, one who had had two babies at home already, delivered by her husband, and one whom the local paper had written an article about because she had used the LaMaze method (in the hospital) to have her baby without pain relief which was such an unbelievable thing in that day and time that it was indeed newsworthy. 
And we had all read "Spiritual Midwifery" by Ina May Gaskin from cover to cover at least fifty times and there we were. None of us quite sure what we were doing and one of us quite sure that she would never, ever, no matter what, go through this again. 
Now I have to point out that the hospital was only about ten blocks away so I could easily have asked to be taken there and yes, I did have an OB whom I had gone to for all of my prenatal care although I had not even hinted at the fact that I was planning on having a home birth. He would have kicked me out of his practice in a red hot second if I had. 
But I hung in there for all those hours, through a day, through a night, and into the next day before I finally said, "I cannot do this any more," and my then-husband drove us to the hospital by which time I was so actively pushing that the nurse in L&D, laughing, told me that if I didn't get up on that bed I was going to have the baby on the floor because yes, I was squatting on the floor and I told her that I did not care if the baby was born on the floor. And I did not. 
And very, very soon, he was there, although not born on the floor. 

I have spent a lot of time in my life pondering about why labor has to be so painful. I mean- it seems insane that we have evolved so that it happens like this and yes, yes, I know. Human babies have big heads and human mothers' pelvises have a hard time accommodating them but come on! 
And what I have come up with is that the pain has its own purpose. Anything that takes so much effort and which can be so agonizing has to be of great value. At least that's what it seems like to me. And also, when I was in labor the idea that a real baby was involved in this whole experience completely left my mind. Oh sure, intellectually I knew that was the hoped for result but honestly? 
I was far too deep into beast mode to consciously understand what that meant. 
And then- the very, very second my baby was born and held up for me to see, the pain was gone. Completely. And for me, the sight and the reality of the presence of the child was so deeply associated with the cessation of pain that it was almost as if the baby had saved my life. Had restored me to living. In his birth, I was reborn. 

And if that's not a damn good way to begin a lifetime of maternal love and devotion, I don't know what is. 
So. That's what I have come up with. It's a one of my theories and honestly, I think it's a good one. 

I'm sure I've written about all of this many times. But that's okay. It's important stuff and after fifty years I am still processing it all. The pain, the work, the knowledge I gained about the strength of my body which I had no awareness of at all, and then the absolute unexpected melting into a new sort of love, a new sort of relationship- I am as in wonder at it now as I was then. 

And by the way, there was no "rooming-in" in those days. Babies went to the nursery and mothers only got to see and hold them for feeding and I was NOT HAVING THAT and we signed out against medical advice and went home that afternoon and being home with my baby, in my own bed, able to hold and nurse and gaze at my child as long and as closely as I wanted without regard for sterile procedures (they were big on that then) and hospital schedules was the most heavenly thing I could ever have imagined and I swear to you that when friends came over, that very night, to meet our baby, the two little girls of the family tickled baby Hank and cooed at him and smiled at him and he laughed. 
He laughed the night he was born. 
I am not making this up. 

So. There you go. Fifty years ago and obviously, so much of that day is still so very present in my mind and in my heart and I have no doubt it will always be so until the day I die. 

Of course I haven't even begun to discuss what sort of a child Hank was, or how he has grown to be the the amazing man he is although I have talked about those things many, many times. I think that Rachel said it best though, on her Facebook post this morning. 

The world had no idea how lucky it was the day you were born. You are the light of my life, and you light the path for all those around you. You radiate Queer Joy in the most beautiful way possible. You are a loyal, kind, caring, generous partner, son, brother, uncle, friend, community member, person. You are one of the best of us. I love you with all my heart and all my me! Happy happy birthday, my love!

Thank you, Rachel.

Here's a few more pictures from today.

Brothers since forever. 

The cake! 

The family. Or, at least a lot of us. That's Lindsey on the right, there. She's another one of our tribe. Mr. Moon wasn't in the picture because he'd already left to go back to the hospital to do more attending to Tom's situation. And of course, we so miss the Weatherfords but they will be back to celebrate all of the birthdays in September of which there are many. 

Happy Birthday, Hank My Love, my amazing darling boy. Thank you for being born to me. I think we were a match made in heaven. 

Mama