Christmas Cheer, Unemployment, and the Recession

Posted on November 16, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Polish Pottery -- Original oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

I am a Pollyanna pessimist, which means that, although my natural tendency is to look at the negative aspects of life, I continuously train myself to look at the brighter side. I try not to be an irritating ass about this, spouting off shallow platitudes in an effort to coat brussels sprouts with fondant icing, but I also recognize that the same circumstances can look very very different, depending upon one’s way of looking at them.

That being said, I am feeling discouraged these days.

And that being said, it doesn’t mean that I’m being optimistic or pessimistic, but just honest.

I don’t know what the future holds — who does? — but right now it’s looking a bit murky up ahead, dense, with smog, and the path is not clearly marked.

The newspaper announces happily that the Recession is over — apparently it ended two, three years ago — but when your job has been eliminated, as the Norwegian Artist’s day job has — and the local newspaper’s Help Wanted section is shorter than the Freebies — well, let’s just say that, in our household, holiday spending levels will be on a Recessionary basis as opposed to a recovery one.

Which, for our household, won’t be much different than the spending habits in the best of years. While the newspapers reported people thronging through the doors of discount stores to buy boom boxes and X boxes and sock boxes and big-screen TV boxes, we kept it conservative, the Norwegian Artist and I and the four children each purchasing one reasonable gift for each member of the family, and devoting Christmas morning to the slow, leisurely opening of each wrapped box, one at a time, passing the revealed item around from member to member before the next gift was chosen for its unveiling.

Noontime Stroll -- Original Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

The morning itself is a yearly gift, one that provides lasting memories that require no batteries, replacement parts, or extended warranties.

So, even though the job prospects ahead look challenging, the spirit of Christmas remains unfazed, with six people plus two more, all with a vested interest and history and passion for one another, draped around the living room and exclaiming over the unwrapping of a ball of yarn (for me), a calendar (every year, for the Norwegian Artist), a sketchbook, a novel, a plastic Minotaur, a bag of coffee.

There is heat from the woodstove, food in the cupboards, and the pleasant feeling of being around people who genuinely like and love one another.

The circumstances haven’t changed. Just the point of view.

Sunday Morning -- original oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art. Now showing at Samarah Fine Art, Whitefish, MT.

Posted in Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, knitting, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Politics, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , | 12 Comments

The Dreaded German Meal Knocks Life Awry

Posted on November 10, 2010 by This Woman Writes

When we were children, my brothers and I developed the term “kootchie,” which means that everything is in its place, working well, without any bumps or dips. Our goal was to ensure that our lives glided smoothly on — our friends were true friends, schoolwork was manageable and resulted in high grades, our clothes were cool, and dinner was tasty.

Ruby -- Original Oil by Steve Henderson. Not a Tasty Dish, indeed.

The problem with worrying about everything being kootchie, however, is that so much of life is out of our control, and while the friend situation may be going okay for a while, a hostile social studies teacher may be making the hour before lunch unappetizing.

Or, speaking of unappetizing, dinner that day may have been the Dreaded German Meal. Someone gave my father (was it one of us kids? Which one?) a calendar highlighting recipes from around the world. Early spring was destroyed by March’s roster of vinegar-soaked beef with raisin gravy, lemon-butter drenched boiled potatoes, and red cabbage with brown sugar and — God help me — more raisins.

As a child, I surveyed this acid-indulgent fare with horror, wondering how I could possibly scoop it all into my napkin for later disposal without being found out.

Cocooned in my baby-of-the-family world, I assumed for years that I was the only one who wept upon returning from school and smelling that peculiar acrid smell, but at a family gathering once I mentioned the “German Meal” and was surprised to hear all four sibling groan.

“God, that was awful,” the Middle Brother said.

“I found any excuse to head to the library for extra studying, during dinner,” my Treasured Only Sister confessed. (How unfair — she could drive; her 8-year-old sister was trapped.)

“Ach! The German Meal,” Youngest Brother paled and greened.

My father, the Professorial One, was shocked. “Are you talking about that wonderful German Meal?” he asked.

So here we have a prime example of things being not kootchie, and if the German Meal occurred on the same day as the enforced boy/girl dance class in PE and the increasingly regular occurring blow-ups with one’s “best” friend, then life was tumultuous indeed.

Whitewater by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

But life is tumultuous, and while some aspects of it may proceed smoothly for a while — the dog scratches on the door to go out instead of plopping the pile in front of it; the car actually does start, after the second or third try; the computer hasn’t been making that funny buzzing noise for a good day now — it consists of many things that don’t work quite the way they should, relationships that are heading up or down, boring jobs that at least are jobs, mysterious tears in the upholstery, and too many obligations scheduled in for the time allotted.

One evening, when the Eldest, the BoyFriend, and the Toddler were visiting, the Extremely Tired Toddler Who No Longer Naps and Is Really Cranky and Obnoxious in the Early Evening was being really cranky and obnoxious in the early evening. It was collectively determined by every member of the household populace over the age of 12 that the Toddler needed to go to bed.

The Toddler disagreed, and loudly expressed this disapproval.

The tired adults, who would gladly have exchanged places with the Toddler in bed if any of us were short enough to fit in it, attempted to read the paper, do a crossword, knit, while in the background a furious, exhausted, determined Toddler expressed herself in the way that I wish I could have, years before, about the German Meal.

I dropped a stitch. The Eldest erased and erased and erased 23 Across. The BoyFriend calmly read the paper; looking over his shoulder I saw that it was an article about silk flower arrangements. I don’t think so.

Rugosa Rose, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

The Norwegian Artist glided over to the piano.

“Perhaps she needs a Goodnight Song,” he announced, and began playing. Initially, harmonious notes competed with the discordant concert from above, but after several minutes, the proportion of silence to weakly defiant yells increased until, a few moments later, only the piano music rippled the sound waves.

When the piano stopped, it was very silent indeed. Peaceful. The BoyFriend settled on a story about scaling Mount Everest.

The next day, the BoyFriend mentioned the incident to me.

“I thought it was an unusual and effective way to solve the problem,” he commented. “Instead of getting irritated, or leaving the room, or giving up and letting the Toddler control the situation, the Norwegian Artist found a creative way to relax himself, while at the same time providing a way for the Toddler to wind down and stop fighting sleep.”

Struck by this analysis, I realized that he was right.

Life is never kootchie, and it never will be. But we don’t have to get irritated, or leave the room, or give up.

We can find peace amidst the chaos, harmony amidst the cacophony, creativity even when we are tired.

Just so long as we don’t have to face that German Meal.

Polish Pottery -- original oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art. There was no category for Polish Food in the Professorial One's calendar of recipes.

Posted in Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, knitting, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Politics, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , | 5 Comments

We Are a Nation United in Our Divisions

Posted on November 2, 2010 by This Woman Writes

So close that they could kiss, Halloween and Election Day are similar in a significant way: they draw the attention of both The Far Right and The Far Left, who rarely, if ever, kiss.

Madonna and Toddler, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

 

On Election Day, the two camps are polarized, snarking and snarling at one another, but on Halloween, the two extremes unwittingly hop together in the same bed, with the conjoined goal of dismantling one of the most uniquely American of our holidays.

That’s right — not Thanksgiving.

Halloween.

Despite its legendary antecedents, Halloween has morphed and evolved into a Fun Day, free from religious or secular moral teaching, wrapped around both children and adults dressing up, the former to hit the streets, frequently with their parents, to knock upon the doors of the latter and demand, politely, candy.

In comtemporary politico-business-speak, it is one of those win-win situations: the adults giving out the candy smile as much as the children receiving it; the guardians standing proudly in the shadows wave at the homeowners; the children for a night are princesses and pirates and dinosaurs and pumpkins and bunny rabbits.

This is, however, in Middle America — which although it makes up the largest population of our country, seems to have the littlest impact upon it.

The Far Right hates Halloween because it is “of the devil,” a day encouraging young innocents to dabble and delve in the world of witches and warlocks and wizards. So, many religious institutions, in an effort to blunt this message, assemble youth group outings to corn mazes, where black clad youths with chainless chainsaws run after screaming teenaged girls (and boys).

In an additional effort to counteract the perceptions of moral turpitude, some less than popular households pass out  tracts in place of candy (this really softens the hearts of the recipients). My favorites are the families who shut off, not only the porch light that informally announces “Trick or Treaters welcome here!” but ALL of the lights, descending to the basement where they hope the blue flicker of their television doesn’t alert the rabble outside to their existence.

Moonlit Night by the Coppei, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

So much for, “This little light of mine/I’m going to let it shine.” Not on Halloween, kids. It’s all dark then.

The Far Left, while it has no qualms about  potential links to Darth Vader’s side, shrieks like the girls in the corn maze about Safety — the streets are dark, the houses are filled with strangers, the childrens’ masks affect their ability to see and their shoes might be untied — and does its best to corral wayward urchins into school gyms for the evening, playing innocuous games and eating “healthy” treats. Another school carnival. How exciting.

Speaking of health, the Left slaps down the obesity card, decrying Halloween for its impact upon children’s weight and the status of their teeth. Personally, I think high school football, involving still-growing, underaged young people smashing into one another under the eye of a coach who was initially hired as the German teacher (never having set foot in a German-speaking country) and who teaches Art and works with the cross-country track team on the side, has more to do with messed up teeth, and vertabrae, and skulls, and knees, than a collection of fun-sized candies.

Both sides, especially around Election Day, invoke the term “community,” citing the importance of us All Working Together for the Common Good, and yet it is on Halloween, this year two days before Election Day, that community is most evident — in the parents and children working together to create a costume; in the groups of children and adults walking, generally on the sidewalks from door to door in actual neighborhoods; in the people in the houses pretending to watch television or read a book while they’re really waiting for that doorbell to ring so that they can exclaim over the green chicken (or is it a very small Incredible Hulk?) and hold out the giant bowl of chocolate.

Morning Tea, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

 

Our own children, when they were little, spent hours preparing themselves for the big night, attacking the Norwegian Artist as soon as he stepped over the threshhold at 5 p.m., proudly marching  to the web-decorated door where they argued over who was responsible for knocking, and nudging the youngest to make sure that she said “Thank You!” loud enough, while the Norwegian and his Pole stood in the background, warm despite the cold.

I do not know whether the people giving out the candy are Republicans, Democrats, or Independents. They do not know how the parents of the children they exclaim over will vote a few days’ hence. We are united as children, parents, siblings, grandparents, neighbors and friends in the common goal of one side asking, the other side giving, and both sides receiving.

It’s give and take.

Maybe the Far Right and the Far Left could learn from Halloween, instead of trying to destroy it.

Cantata -- original oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Politics, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

The Jewel of All Dogs — Ruby Reigns Supreme

Posted on October 27, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Ruby -- Original Oil by Steve Henderson

When you live on acreage, you eventually find yourself with a number of animals. Some of them, like the goats, are eminently useful, providing milk for the tea and cheesemaking. Others, like the cats, are potentially useful, achieving great heights by leaving headless mouse bodies scattered about the property, and faltering when they stare at you, balefully, from the porch chair, where they rest, hour after hour after hour after hour.

There is one animal in our lives, however, that appears to have no use, function, purpose, or potential at all, and this is Ruby the Chihuahua/Dachshund blend, a three-pound composite of quivering sinew that barks at all of our friends, terrorizes the chickens, and dominates the food dish from the larger, real dog (That Damn Dog) who stands to the side, bewildered as to how something so tiny can wield so much power.

Ruby -- Tiny, and yet with much power

Neither the Norwegian Artist nor I are particularly fond of small, small dogs, reasoning that the micro-hybridization process that it takes to create them resulted in a number of less-than-desireable qualities being dumped into their gene pool: they are nervous, shaky, snappy, insecure, demanding, noisy, and destructive. This roster of qualities is not necessarily what a rational person looks for in the family dog.

Teenagers, however, are not rational persons, and when the College Girl was the High School Girl, she somehow — either through her winsome smile or blithe persistence — managed to convince the Norwegian Artist and me that a small dog would be a positive addition to the farmette.

(Yes, there is a theme here: the High School Girl was also responsible for Roxy, That Damn Dog; Mia the Too-Intelligent-Siamese who knows how to open, but not close, the front door; Cappuccino, the Slash and Dash Alley Bat Cat; and Georgianna, the White Rat of Eternal Life — if she hadn’t transitioned from High School Girl to College Girl, the Norwegian Artist would have had to build an addition to the house, simply so we would have someplace to live.)

But we were talking about Ruby.

Ruby -- who dominates this article and our household

Pretty much anything, in its infancy stage, is cute — the Son and Heir posted a photo of a baby tapir (it looks like an oversized rat with a long nose, something that College Girl would bring into the household) to my computer screen saver and, admittedly, the thing is cute in a homely fashion — and Ruby, as a pup the size of a teacup, was cute.

But as she grew and burgeoned in size to a package of English muffins, her cuteness was dimished by her personality, which is small, very small, indeed.

Ruby -- small, very small, indeed

She burrows. She secretes food scraps in odd places. She has scratched both entry doors with her sharp, curved talons. She is greasy and angular. She snuggles, aggressively; from the standpoint of the human being, this feels like sitting with the picked-over carcass of a roasted chicken. She smells like a little dog. She yips, snarls, whines, and moans. I will forgo mentioning the 3-year-long process of housebreaking her and the surprise piles, which were not Tootsie Rolls but certainly resembled them, that she desposited in every room, in every corner, and behind every piece of furniture.

High School girl promised that, when she became College Girl, she would take Ruby away, but we, knowing the peculiar rules of university dormitories, looked at one another an sighed.

This academic year, College Girl secured an apartment, the rules of which are chillingly similar to dorm rooms.

“I’ll get a house next year,” College Girl promises. Uh huh.

Ruby -- Reigning Supreme atop the Pedestal of Our Hearts

Somewhere in the back of my mind is the vague notion that small dogs live longer — much, much longer — than large dogs. Our Lab, Brandy, gave us 14 happy, obedient years before she curled up to sleep forever one night. Does this mean that, when the Norwegian Artist and I are sipping strong Greek coffee outside our whitewashed Mediterranean rental — 20 years from now — a small, cranky, decrepit, white-muzzled Ruby will be trembling between us, fixing us with those liquidy brown, cataract-encrusted, doleful eyes? (And where will College Girl — by then Personal Trainer Girl — be then? And what kind of stipulations will her housing situation have against pets?)

Despite our collective animus toward Ruby, however, a most alarming thing is happening: we are all, if not actively falling in love and fawning over her (there is a dignity issue here, after all), beginning to tolerate, and, dare I push it, in the initial stages of somewhat, remotely, expressing initial feelings of moderate, preliminary like toward her.

This has got to stop.

Ruby -- the Alpha and Omega of Dogs

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, knitting, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Happy Birthday to You, Me, and Tiny Tim

Posted on October 14, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Pamplona Plaza, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

Because we are a family of artists and intellectuals, we are selective about the shows we watch. With the exception of Tired of Being Youngest, who takes to the screen the way a tongue sticks to the frozen pole, we limit our time staring at the backlit rectangular shape and make sure that when we do sit for long periods of time absorbing mindless drivel, that it is quality mindless drivel.

My favorite show is Wipeout, the gigantic obstacle course that involves ordinary people jumping over, crawling under, and squeezing through assorted oversized balls, shapes, swings, and padded items, many of which incorporate foam and water. Yes, I shamelessly laugh at other people falling down.

In a recent show (“recent” in my vocabulary meaning something less than ten-years-old, such as our “recent” automobile), an exuberant contestant announced, “It’s my BIRTHDAY!”

Oh, I love this man — (He won, incidentally — Happy Birthday to You, Happy Man) — because another hallmark of our intellectually artistic family is that we get excited, really Really excited, about people’s birthdays.

This is not a Norwegian tradition but of Polish extraction, originating with my mother, the Venerable One, who treated my four siblings’ and my birthdays like the special days that they are. A spot on the fireplace ledge was reserved for gifts — properly wrapped in genuine birthday paper that was different for each child — and a homemade cake of the child’s choice — chocolate or vanilla — capped off the meal.

Two Pines, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

 

For the day, a truce was called in sibling rivalry, and each of us attempted to be nice to the honored one. Jealousy regarding gifts was never a problem, at least for me — my three older brothers’ impossibly complicated and boringly grey model battleship haul was only interesting when they shot the completed projects to pieces with their BB guns; my older sister’s posters of the Monkees and Bobby Sherman caught my eye ten years later, when I, too, was a teen — by which point I was enamored of Neil Diamond.

But the Birthday Tradition was firmly entrenched, and when I found myself married with four kids (actually, I didn’t just wake up one day and find myself in this situation, although some days it felt like it), I continued what my mother had started, with variations.

Take the  festive wrapping paper, for example. Generally, the newspaper, brown paper bags, white freezer paper, and plastic bags were called into service; when the Dollar Store arrived and I occasionally purchased real paper, it was cycled and recycled through the three May birthdays and into the July one. The September recipient occasionally found crumpled Christmas paper from nine months before, IF he were lucky.

The cakes remained, with the same choices, although depending upon a whim I would “decorate,” a well-remembered favorite being the dog park complete with plastic figurines and little raisins scattered about (this was before the days of  plastic poopy bags). The dinner meal of choice was instigated, and somehow, with extended family parties and friend parties and nuclear family parties the length of the birthday was extended as well, sometimes for as long as two weeks around the actual date.

Twilight Surf, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

 

Presents were and are supplied by not only the Norwegian Artist and his Polish Siren, but each sibling provides a gift as well, generously reaching into their allowance and babysitting funds — Tired of Being Youngest for years shopped the sales at the Dollar Store. The crowning point of the day is the hour — often a literal hour — in which the Birthday Person slowly opens the gifts, one by one, admiring and commenting on the selection, and thanking the giver. Giver and recipient both glow.

And I started a private tradition of my own, taking time through the day to reflect on the moment of the Birthday Person’s birth and special memories of our time together. Knowing that some people have had to live with the horrible words, uttered in anger or thoughtlessness, “I wish that you had never been born!” I determined that those I loved would not hear those words from me, ever, but rather the opposite, and sometime during the day I make a point of taking the BP aside and saying, “I am so glad that you were born.”

I recently celebrated my own birthday, physically surrounded by people dear to me and feted via Facebook, phone, or letter by other treasured ones unable to be in the same room. Chaos reigned as someone sautéed shrimp, another brewed tea, a third set the table while the Toddler unsettled it. Doors opened and closed and cats ran in, uninvited (when you own six of the things, this tends to happen). It was noisy, messy, tumultuous, exuberant, and full of joy.

And we hadn’t even got to the presents yet.

Into the Sun -- Original Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

I Do Know You, Don’t I?

Posted on October 7, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Reflections in the Sand, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

During an Art Walk festival thing, a pleasing horde of tourists was deposited at our studio doorstep, and I was being the gracious artist’s wife, introducing myself to the guests as they arrived.

“Hello,” I effused (this isn’t particularly difficult, because I really do like meeting new people), “I’m Carolyn, the Norwegian Artist’s wife.”

“I know,” one of the last arrivals replied. “I’m Stephanie, the bus driver, and we have met many times before at the office when you paid your daughter’s monthly bus fare while she was attending community college.”

Oops.

It is a besetting issue that, although I can remember names of obscure people whom we knew nominally 20 years ago, I cannot identify a person’s face out of context.

The Norwegian Artist, yes — I recognize him far away just by the way he walks and stands. Same with the kids. I do, after all, see them on a frequent basis.

My mother, I recognize. Dad, too. The brother across the continent might be a challenge if I spotted him in the grocery store.

Everybody else — well, if they’re not at the doctor’s office where they belong, or behind the counter at the bank, or AT THE BUS OFFICE, then I find myself either introducing myself to someone that I have been chit chatting with for years (in the case of the doctor, there’s been a bit more than chit chatting), or looking at them covertly from bent head position, as I pretend to be searching for something in my purse.

“Do I know that person?”

“Is that last week’s client?”

“That wouldn’t happen to be our neighbor of 12 years, would it?”

Where the River Bends, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

My Venerable Mother, who for years was known as — and is still known as — The Grocery Store Bakery Lady, deals with this all of the time. After 19 years of teasing shoppers over the intercom in her seductive voice — “Good Afternoon . . . Shoppers — (deep, slow, sultry intake of breath). Today (breath), we have (breath) Hot . . . Soft . . . Fresh . . . French (loooooooonnng breath) Buns,” she caused more people to salivate than Pavlov did with his dogs.

Needless to say, when you elevate the subject of rye bread with sesame seeds and pumpkin chips to the level of sensual sublimity, people make a point of finding out who you are.

So, some 15 years after she has retired from being the Grocery Store  Bakery Lady, the Venerable One is greeted wherever she goes by literally hundreds of pastry aficionados and doughnut dilettantes. It is simply impossible to recognize that many people.

But, as I tell my children and myself, I am not the Venerable One, and I do not have 19 years worth of whispering sweet cupcakeries in captive shoppers’ ears. So why, I wonder, is there such a large number of people who recognize me on the slimmest amount of acquaintance?

“Who was that person?” I whispered to Tired of Being Youngest once.

“She worked at the orthodontist’s office for a month three years ago,” TBY replied.

“So I met her once, three years ago?”

“Yeah.”

“And she remembers my name AND my face?”

“Yeah.”

Autumn Browsing, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

“Is there something about me that strikes people as so odd or unusual that they only have to meet me once to remember me forever?”

“Umm. . . I don’t feel comfortable answering that question.”

I find myself constantly chatting with people I assume are strangers who indicate during the conversation that we have communicated before, leading me to believe that A) I really am lousy with this face thing or B) there’s something about me that is distinctively memorable, and I have a feeling it leans toward the eccentric side. Sigh. Maybe I am more like the Venerable One than I thought.

Regardless, I take precautions, recognizing that it’s highly likely that I will be remembered, somehow, and I don’t want the memories triggered when people see my face again to be distressing ones. Years ago, I was dealing with an especially uncompromising individual in a public situation, and, rather than tell her what an officiously pompous unmitigated ass she was being, I clamped my mouth shut, wheeled about, and walked away in search of a reasonable human being with superior social and intellectual powers — or any of these attributes at all.

Good move, that. It being a small town and the woman being a public official, she was later promoted and moved to a different office, one that involved our seeing one another on a semi-annual basis.

I actually recognized her face for once, and she most certainly remembered me.

Country Roads -- Original Miniature Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, knitting, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

The Something Club

Posted on September 28, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Al Fresco, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

Not that I’d compare the Norwegian Artist to Solomon or anything, but he does come up with some savvy sayings on a regular basis.

One observation he has made is that our lives come in chapters, and that no one period, with all of its attendant problems and issues, lasts forever. Like a book chapter, it comes to an end, and a new aspect begins.

You know, times and seasons and Ecclesiastes and all that. Solomon said it first; but the Norwegian Artist updated it.

For the last five years, we’ve been in this overly adventurous and underly fun chapter involving interrelational drama such that this year’s job loss for the Norwegian Artist posted as anti-climatic.

“Oh. So the sole breadwinner is out after 17 years. Are those chocolate chip cookies in the oven?”

As we have for the last five years, we draw together closer as a family, a few, very few, close friends nearby for added support, and we do the things that need to be done that day. In an earlier chapter, we had a support network from a small club that we had been a part of for many years, but at the same time that the sushi hit the fan, the club underwent upheavals of its own in the way it was run, and we found ourselves being edged out onto the shoulder of the road, at just the time that we needed a shoulder to lean on.

Marie, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

And we went on to discover something that I’m convinced everyone learns at some point in their lives — usually a low one — and that is that the people you thought were your friends, aren’t; and that the support network that you thought you have, you don’t; and that the oddest help will come from the most unusual places.

For quite awhile we struggled to stay in the club, convinced that this was the place to get the help we needed — simply because we had been told for so long that it is within groups like this that we would find warmth and acceptance and love and care.

At weekly meetings we were pressured to join a plethora of new activities, promised that these were the way to stay connected and “real” to one another. When we balked, we were tut-tutted; when we expressed our views to club officers we were listened to with earnest expressions and wooden ears; when we found ourselves walking in the snow during a special activity time we weren’t interested in, we asked ourselves why we were staying in what was, in effect, an abusive situation.

So we left, but it took awhile to make the complete break. The Norwegian Artist, who was raised in a similar club environment, dropped out, cleanly, three years ago, but I showed up at occasional picnics and funfests with the kids, unwilling to admit that, not only was this not working, it wasn’t healthy. The final moment came at a potluck after a swim party, when, surrounded in the food line by people who had known me for a dozen years, I could find as my only conversational companion an 11-year-old girl, a friend of Tired of Being Youngest.

(She was an excellent conversationalist, by the way, being willing to discuss books and movies and favorite ice-cream cake flavors as opposed to droning on about what we was supposed to have been learned in the latest club activity.)

That picnic led to my making the final break, not so difficult after all, but different. Not one club member has asked why we no longer attend, yet when we declare that we are no longer attending, the response from each is unanimous: “You need to come to the club. That’s where you get the love and support you need.”

Maybe they do, but we don’t. And maybe they’re just satisfied with a substitute, but we’re not.

Ascension, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

And out here, outside of this particular club, we encounter a lot of people like us, who have tried similar clubs and been hurt; and others who have never walked through the door and never felt a need to. We speak both languages.

For some reason, as a national people, we interact heavily with one another through group situations, even defining the normalcy of a person by how many organizations he is a part of: school associations, office cliques, community sports teams, and yes, churches. While interacting as a group has its engaging and energetic moments — Ghost in the Graveyard is more fun with lots of people — relying upon community interaction as our primary means of connecting to one another lulls us into a false sense that our many acquaintanceships are actual friendships, that a weekly touching of bases will translate into all of our classmates being there during the long haul of chemotherapy sessions.

As Velveteen Rabbits, we are content with our sawdust stuffing, convinced that our many and myriad activities represent warm, pulsating flesh and blood.

Close of Day -- Original Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art. Close of Day is sold.

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Theater Rage

Posted on September 17, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Autumn Remembered, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

I do not need all of my fingers to count on both hands the number of times the Norwegian Artist and I have seen a movie, together, at a movie theater.

This is not to say that the man and I do not date — since we met, 28 years ago as wretchedly poor college students, we have dated by taking walks, long walks, and talking. As romantic as it would be to say that we hold hands during these walks, it gets a bit inconvenient after the first mile or so. (When we lived elsewhere 15 years ago there was a couple in their 80s who jogged holding hands — this was very sweet but uncomfortable looking.)

But back to the theater and our normal-looking date, complete with Chinese dinner beforehand and the requisite run to the hardware store to look for, and not find, all of the things we need for our ongoing house projects.

The room was what we consider packed, with some 30 people all within three seats or rows of where we were sitting and the remainder of the room empty. We felt like fishermen on a lake, apparently having snagged the prime two seats in the auditorium.

Now theaters are like highways — most of the people you encounter there are reasonably normal, but the odd ones — those who float along at 45 miles per hour in a 60 m.p.h. zone, only to accelerate to 75 just during the time that there is a passing lane — make you understand why the term “road rage” was coined. (I have not yet encountered an appropriate term for filmographic fury — “movie madness” sounds too much like a sale at the department store. Surely there must be a federal word czar who can address this situation?)

In theaters, these irritating people maintain a loud running commentary on what everyone in the room is seeing on the screen and what it means to the Commentator specifically (there must be a lot of people out there whose dates wear hearing aids), or they kick the back of your seat, or they chew with their mouth open and backwash their pop.

Mercifully, all 30 of our companions were quiet and chewed with their mouths closed.

A Peaceful Nibble, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

 

There was, however, one vexingly irritating fully grown male two rows in front of us who apparently was unable to read, because he ignored the “Please turn your cell phone off” announcement prior to the previews. At least he wasn’t talking — loudly — about his latest business scheme or that horrific blind date his sister set him up with.

He was, however, checking his Facebook account on his very, very bright blue LED lighted phone, and I can’t tell you how the blue of the LED clashed with the green of the “This Preview Has Been Approved for All Audiences” screen.

The beauty of previews is that they enhance your movie experience, allowing you to see, say, four additional movies for the price of your ticket, without the obligation of sitting through the entirety of any of them. In a 45-second sound bite, you get the heart-pounding, pulsating music; the explosions; the car chases; and just enough of the bedroom titillation to satisfy or sate.

But this man was driving 45 in a 60, a nightlight beacon in an otherwise dark room, and nobody needed the light to make it to the bathroom.

Dawn, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

 

My Tired-of-Being-Youngest progeny mentioned this similar behavior in a movie she recently watched (unlike me, she would need all of the tentacles on an octopus to chart the number of times she has been to the theater, this year). Several people in the room had paid $9.50 to sit in the dark and and text friends for the next two hours about how they were watching a movie.

Unlike the man in the theater, however, these people would not go 45 m.p.h. in a 60 m.p.h. zone, because none of them were yet of legal driving age, being, in effect, coddled and cosseted teenaged prima donnas with too much stuff and not enough manners. They will eventually grow up, one hopes. At least someday they will face a bill for something that they will have to pay, somehow, on their own.

But my bald, 30-something social networking outwardly fully developed adult was indulging in his pubescent side, perhaps not yet having faced the need to pay a bill on his own. Why his wifely companion or the fishermen immediately behind him did not knock the device out of his hand is beyond me, but some level of adulthood must have been activated in his brain because shortly after the movie began he had updated with all of his friends and mercifully turned the phone off.

Good call, guy.

Heading Home -- Original Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art. Heading Home is sold.

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, Life, Lifestyle, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Lions and Tigers are WHERE?

Posted on September 8, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Breakfast, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

Well, we all have to be obsessive about something. I suppose it’s part of being normal.

My obsession has to do with children’s wooden toys — the kind that you buy for toddlers to learn shapes and animals and colors, and, if you’re like me, present to the child months too early so that the kid loses all of the pieces before he is cognitively ready to actually learn from the thing, much less play with it in the way it was intended.

Now before the Safety Police barge down the door, allow me the caveat that the toy parts need to be larger than an adult elbow before they find their way into soft, fat, sweaty hands.

Are we okay now? Can we move on?

After raising four children, you’d think that I would have learned that, if there are more than three parts to a toy, two of them will be irrietrievably lost or relegated to doggie chew chews, but I haven’t.  I love wooden puzzles, and now that we’ve got the Toddler in our lives, I can start all over where I left off.

A few months ago, while I was traveling to set up an exhibit for the Norwegian Artist, I stumbled upon this magical store that sold dusty jelly beans and wooden puzzles, the latter HALF PRICE.

I’ve never been one for jelly beans, even clean ones, but the wooden puzzles unleashed in me a mania that had been buried since Tired of Being Youngest was 6 and I sadly packed away her bathtime toys (none of which matched, incidentally). Sweeping through the store (actually, it would have been nice if the owner had done this in a literal sense), I grasped puzzle after puzzle — thick, chunky African animals and thinnner, plastic handled domestic pet creatures, and Dressy Bessy Bears, and Shape-o-Ramas, and Fruitsi Blocks, and — eventually I had to stop. Even at half-price I had to keep enough in the bank account to pay for onions and dry bread.

So I narrowed my choices to eight, with the best intentions of saving some aside for birthdays and Christmas when the Toddler was older.

On the Verge, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

And I did, actually, only overwhelming the tyke with four of the wooden wonders at one time, one of which was a homely purple hippo pull toy that, mercifully for me, has no shapes to lose.

The other three puzzles, however, do — or did — have shapes, and the first week of the Toddler’s possession of them found me in the evenings crawling through the house, looking for possible places that a person under two-and-a-half-feet tall would have thrust or thrown a lavender circle (there were supposed to be two of them), dark blue hexagon (four of those), red square (five!), a smiling lion, and a thin, charmingly adorable kitten with a red plastic handle embedded in its chest.

Each day I replaced all of the pieces in the puzzles where they belonged  — I believe this confirms my cognitive abilities to be at least in the 2+ range — and neatly slotted the puzzles in the overfilled Toddler toy box. However, life prevails, and on a day so busy that I was unable to crawl about seeking the purple rhinocerous and sky blue hippo, I asked Tired of Being Youngest to put away the Toddler’s toys.

This, she did, indiscriminately scooping up the wooden zebra with ordinary blocks, mixing  the thin, handled iguana (this is a domestic pet?) in with the plastic teacups, tossing the colored shapes in amongst the general detritus of plastic toy-letries.

Result? Chaos, absolute disorder — a permanently lost chunky lion (is it smiling anymore?),  and, worst of all, a missing green rectangle that not only was supposed to teach the Toddler about the color green and the rectangular polygon, but also was the only one of its kind in the set, which means that it was supposed to impart the numerical concept of “one.”

How is this child ever going to learn to count if we have lost the number one?

And where is that damned lion?

And why do I do this to myself?

Captain's House -- Original Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

Posted in Animals, Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Food, Growth, Humor, Job, Life, Lifestyle, Motherhood, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

The Economics of “Stuff”

Posted on August 30, 2010 by This Woman Writes

Birch Pathway, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

In our college days, we frequented the yard sales, filling our rented hut with others’ cast offs that managed to light our living room, cover the stains on the carpet, and provide reading material for our imaginary free time. Not having a use for cute glass animals that used to hold cheap perfume, we passed on those. 

To get the good stuff, you had to arrive early, or else all that was left were the aforementioned penguins with party hats for lids. But even getting there early wasn’t enough sometimes, chiefly because of a beak-nosed, sharp-eyed old dame who swooped on anything decent like a hawk dives for a mouse. 

 This woman was scary. She was also the manager of  The Happy Pleasant Place, a little store on Main Street that raised money for the senior center. Apparently, LadyHawk wanted several grades up from dry chicken and canned peas for the senior lunch menu. Can’t say I blame her there, but her marketing techniques at The Happy Pleasant Place lead me to believe that she was aiming for filet mignon, tiramisu, and a nice white wine. 

Cascadia, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

Small, wiry, and wearing a perpetual scowl, the Queen of the Yard Sales finagled her way in early — sometimes hours early — to the best sales. Whether she cast a spell on the homeowners or simply relied upon the threat of her clawlike talons, she swept through the wares like a tropical storm, grasping and clutching at anything that wasn’t ticky tacky glassware. 

Each week’s haul she bore to The Happy Pleasant Place, which might have been more aptly named Dragon’s Lair, and trebled, quadrupled, and octupled the prices. For awhile this worked, and The Happy Pleasant Place thrived. 

But rumors fly in a small town, and it didn’t take long before people realized that the Wicked Witch of the West who was wrenching Dorothy’s shoes off her feet was the same person trying to sell the Ruby Slippers for four times their value at The Happy Pleasant Place. I don’t know, maybe some people didn’t like wandering into the shop and finding their first set of dishes, which they had marked significantly down because they thought it could go to some college student, selling for the same amount they paid for a new set at a high-end department store. 

 Over the next few months, fewer and fewer people frequented The Happy Pleasant Place, and eventually it closed its doors altogether. I do not know if the menu at the senior center plummeted to Scottish oatcakes and weak tea, and neither do I know if the Happy Pleasant Place’s manager melted when someone threw a bucket of water over her, but I do remember that the yard sales were safe places to attend again, and we were actually able to pick up a set of plastic dishes for a price that we could afford. 

(So excited were we about this find, that we started discussing the possibilities of tracking down food to serve on the plates.) 

Polish Pottery, by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson

Nowadays, our Ferocious Friendly Grande Dame wouldn’t bother with the storefront, opting, instead, to post everything online in auction format. I know individuals who do this, and for the most part, they are terrific people. 

But the same grasping attitude of buying good stuff cheaply and selling it dearly prevails, with the justification being, “If they dont’ know they’ve got a Van Gogh here, that’s just their problem.” 

Fine. I see that. Making a profit is the American Way. 

But so also is generosity, and in the past, many people set out their used items in yard sales at drastically reduced prices, with the tacit agreement between merchant and buyer: “I’m cleaning up my house; and you’re getting a good deal.” The merchant had the added bonus of knowing that he was helping out a fellow human being. 

Because we don’t like marking tiny red dots with prices like 10 cents or a quarter and sticking them to items that we no longer need, we tend to skip putting on yard sales altogether and simply box up the items to give away. Sure, we could use the extra cash, but like most Americans, we’ve got a lot of stuff, and it’s worth more than money to pass on what we don’t need to someone who is doing without. 

Life is tough; finances are tight; jobs are scarce. 

We need each other. 

Emergence -- Original Oil by the Norwegian Artist, Steve Henderson of Steve Henderson Fine Art

Posted in Art, Beauty, blogging, Business, Christian, Culture, Current Events, Daily Life, Economy, Encouragement, Family, Growth, Humor, Job, Life, Lifestyle, News, Personal, Random, Relationships, Uncategorized, Work | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment