December 27, 2010 — Bobby has a rap sheet

So, when something wrong goes down in the canine world, the dog is not the only one to lose his independence. After a very pleasant post Christmas leg of lamb dinner with good friends, we were about to retire to the one room in this house that has wi fi downstairs. At least I thought we were all coming in here to see Elena's brand new movie production featuring her new pet goose, Frances. We actually were watching the crazy people running into the north sea waters on the coast of England where some of our children were congregated. We identified Leah and Mira on a YouTube feature and had switched back to the slow, tentative movements of the lovely new goose. Then, all of a sudden a terrible ruckus took place in the kitchen. Sylvia answered a gesture by Bobby to pet him. I'm afraid she touched an injury on his back and he lashed out violenty at her. In no time she had three wicked puncture wounds on the inside of her elbow. We did everything we were equipped to do for her, but soon determined that because of the swelling which was increasing by the minute, she should head out for the ER. Sad way to end the evening for everyone, especially Sylvia, then Bobby and then all of us. They kindly granted my request to have them phone us when they got home. Sylvia was loaded with antibiotics and thoroughly washed with saline solution and bandaged. By morning when I called, she said she was feeling better. Whew!

It might have been ten minutes before I then received a phone call from the county animal control police. A very nice man named George. He questioned me pretty carefully to make sure our stories agreed and then proceeded to take my vital statistics for what he said would be a permanent record. He already had Bobby's info well in hand including when his shots would expire. After telling him my birthdate, weight, height, the color of my hair and my eyes and whether or not I was still driving with a current license, he moved on to tell me that Bobby would have to be quarantined for a ten day period. My heart sank. Then he clarified that frightening statement by telling me that this could be accomplished by home imprisonment if I would agree to not let anyone pet him or let him leave the confines of our property. Whew again! I think I have Sylvia to thank for this so called leniency. Evidently she could have insisted that he be shipped over to the county seat but didn't. Thank you Sylvia.

Bobby has been subdued since last night's event. Kathy was in the Kitchen when the action took place and she didn't refrain from giving him a serious and evidently loud dressing down for his behavior. He was seen slinking by himself into the living room to nestle in his blanky on the love seat. Over the afternoon he has seemed to get a little spirit back. Kathy and family left early in the afternoon to visit their other Grandma in the Bay Area for a few days. They will be missed for sure by the culprit because he considers that whole family to be his coyotes who brought him out of Mexico several years ago. He had been mawled by a couple of big dogs on the beach in Yelapa and the local vet we took him to asked us to please help him escape. He turned out to be a bit of a "nipper" during his first year here in the north country. But with careful attention and socializing, we thought he was completely over that.

I guess we will have to consider ourselves a half way house. He is out on parole but will be carefully watched. He is such a great little guy and a perfect companion to everyone in our family. I hope we can convince him to curb his enthusiasm in the future. He was a familiar sight driving through the streets of Fort Bragg with Skip in the red pickup. What a pair. I think both dogs are still missing Skip. I hope he can help give them some guidance and help them cope with a life that is missing his steady presence.

AFTERTHOUGHT: By the time I made a second set of corrections to the above text, I was about to publish the post for good when up pops a Google ad for dogbite attorney services out of Seattle or nearby. They don't miss a beat. Surely hope I don't need to follow their lead.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010 — Weather still rules

It's still raining cats and dogs and I'm cozy in the little family room, watching channel 9 which is describing the unbelievable construction of the Brooklyn bridge. What a story. Washington Roebling's father first envisioned it and designed it. A tragic accident took the life of the father before the bridge was hardly under way and Washinton Roebling was left to calculate the final plans and and lead the way in the construction. Mishaps abounded. The history of this project is well worth reading about or following. The caissons were incredibly costly to life and limb. Finally Roebling was the only one who would stay underwater as the chief engineer causing him terrible loss of health through experiencing the bends. Fraud by suppliers of the critical wire forming the cables caused no end of furor. Finally, a beautiful finished bridge and all ended happily with parties and celebrations. Im listening to now time commentators describing their exhiliarating walks taken on the center walkway of this monumental structure. I'd like to take that walk.

Back to the weather. Every step taken makes shoes more soggy and mudstained. The temperature is stunningly cold even though we hear that rain makes things warm up. There's always an exception. Announcements from Europe reveal totally unusual weather conditions. Our Steve's family, currently living in Turin, plans to meet Mike and Jenny and Leah in England for Christmas. Their flight has just been cancelled and we are told that England's airports are completely shut down. I have a friend hoping to fly to New York today. I hope he was able to get there. Mike called me from the San Francisco airport saying he had gone through security and was being told that his flight to London would take off in two hours. Lots of conflicting information. I'll feel better when all the answers are there and things have calmed down. No groundwater problems for this year.

I should have turned the TV off. How often do we feel that? I don't watch it for a week and then when I turn it on, I allow myself to be lured from one program to another. It's easy when the quality is high. A truly thought provoking program about responding to one's calling featured a group of earnest young men and women about to embark on a life in the ministry. The hurdles, questions of clarity and integrity are examined with touching honesty.

I was ready to finally turn off the box when up comes Charlie Rose which means it's midnight. He's hosting a member of the cast and the director, of The Merchant of Venice, now showing on Broadway. Lily rabe and Al Paccino evidently offer an enthralling work of art each night. I can't quite turn this program off even though I'm more than ready for bed. He has now said goodbye to this duo and is finishing up with a penetrating conversation with Matt Damon and the Coen brothers about their new version of True Grit. I enjoy a Charlie Rose conversation most when art forms are involved as opposed to his nights when it's all politics. I have become overly irritated by what I perceive as his persistant leaning to the right, often supported by obvious friendships with powerful "members of the inner circle." No doubt about it. This is a good way to end the evening. It's a great night for Charlie.

Sunday, December 19, 2010 — Sun plus Frost?

Those two words figure largely in my life this week. Thank goodness my wonderful helper, Carlos put an old defunct patio umbrella over my scant blanket covering of our poor old lemon tree. I awoke to one of the coldest frosts I can remember at the beginning of the week. The elements rule the land at this moment. We were ready to move our two portable buildings from Dana Gray School to Pacific Textile Arts last Thursday but the mover took one look at the soil in the back yard and pronounced it unfit for receiving the goods. It would have bogged down the semi and of course none of us wanted that. Then more rains came. Then the frost came. Suddenly, Thursday of this week, I arrived at Alger Street to see men pounding pipes in the ground through pressure treated boards. The project was on again. At six o'clock the next morning they began removing the single wide from the elementary school and transported it to the other side of town in no time. By the time I arrived, the library building (the single wide) was in place as was the first half of the double wide. I took photos and mini-movies of the second half being jockeyed into place by an amazingly skilled fork lift driver. Back and forth, back and forth, in very tight space. Eventually the two halves were side by side with just a small see-through gap between them. I had to leave to try to hunt down keys to the smaller building which no one seemed to have. By the time I returned, the second building was tightly secured with both halves snugged up to each other as if they had never parted. All this is very exciting news to those of us who have been fund raising for the last six months to bring about this move.

Hopefully, some of our members will work on painting the insides and repairing those things that fall apart during such a move. I will be leaving for my yearly tapestry trip to Mexico mid-January and returning at the beginning of March. Then Stefan and I will install a Baltic Birch floor similar to what we put in the gallery and kitchen of the old house which serves as our headquarters. The birch plywood floor will help spread the weight of all our books and the looms which are destined for the larger building. So, one would have to consider that real progress has been made in this department. As many of you know, we were hit with an edict to install fire sprinkler systems in each building. This order reached us five days after we already had permits in our hands, so we're still reeling a bit with the additional burden of 11K to cover this unexpected cost. If there is still anyone out there who hasn't contributed to this cause and would like a tax receipt to apply to the upcoming income tax trauma, please keep us in mind. We are a 501(c)3 nonprofit educational organization and your donations are completely tax deductible. Donations may be sent to Pacific Textile Arts, 450 Alger Street, Fort Bragg, CA 95437. You also can always find us at www.pacifictextilearts.org where there are some great pictures of the youthful weavers we plan on serving with these two additional buildings to our little campus. Soon we'll have some pictures of the buildings on our website also. We should be completely moved into the new buildings by the end of March. Do come visit us.

Sun and frost have other current connotations for me at the moment. While I was living in Santa Rosa to be near Skip in the hospital, I returned once a week to do the bills and check on the house. My good friend Sandra was living here and watching the dogs for me. Upon returning toward the end of this period, I was welcomed by a two page note telling me all the things that were wrong with my refrigerator, a seventeen year old Sub Zero which, at the time of first moving into our kitchen, was the only one which would fit into the space we had provided. In fact, I had chosen an Amana, which was already delivered to our kitchen and which upon very close inspection, offered one eighth inch too much volume to allow our dishwasher to open and receive dishes. Big shock. Amana sent back, catalogue referred to and realization that the smallest Sub Zero would just make it. Sub Zero bought and installed. Never worked great. Just a lot of little things. Back to Sandra. She had bought us a thermometer the previous year and made worried comments about the SZ's performance. In anticipation of Sandra moving in with the dogs during my Mexico trip, I called at least three appliance people to see what they could do about our less than perfect dishwasher and refrigerator. Dishwasher got a little better and supposedly the frig did also. Last week a snow storm brewed in the freezer one day. The next day I could hardly open the door and now there is water coming out from under the whole thing. I give up. Kathy had told me about the Sun Frost refrigerators which are built just three hours north of us in Arcata. They are reputed to be some of the most efficient on the planet. I'm told the Red Cross uses them because of their reliability and efficiency. Last week it appeared to me that I had two choices. A new SZ or plunge into this green land of simplicity and efficiency. I chose the Sun Frost and Kathy, Danny and the kids are going to carry it down here in their van later this week. Wish me luck. It will actually be reassuring not to have an ice maker or other things that can go wrong while I'm gone. And Sandra won't have to be upset about the refrigerator running day and night. Wish US luck. I'll keep you posted.

Obviously, weather conditions, the long awaited moving of our portable buildings for Pacific Textile Arts and the big decision made about moving to Sun Frost from my snowy freezer have provided diversion from things that lately have caused me to be preoccupied. Couple that with what holiday events I can't avoid or wish to be at and my need to meet several self-imposed deadlines before I leave for Mexico in January and you can see that I really don't have any time to feel sorry for myself. I look forward to talking to some of our family on Skype and being with the others at the end of the week. All in all, lots to look forward to. Greetings and much love to those of you who have sent cards and emailed me. I so appreciate you all for checking in. Have a loving holiday.

December 15, 2010 — Joan Didion revisited

I had read The Year of Magical Thinking several years ago and then passed it on to a Pacific Textile Arts rummage sale because I didn't anticipate reading it a second time. Just a bit dark was my first overall impression. Several days ago a group of friends suggested I read it and even when I told them I'd already read it, they kept up their enthusiastic pressure. I rethought the issue and placed a copy of the book on my Kindle. I reread it in a day and a half in spare moments and still marvel at how different my reaction was this second time around. I'm amazed at how much faster one reads an E-book than a conventional volume, probably because the font size can be enlarged and page turning is so instant. Every word resonated this time. It is a perfect example of what a difference context plays in your reception to a book. All the "key" words are there. Didion's usual cool is blanketed in candid descriptions of the waves of realization that come on one so unexpectedly. She spoke of self pity and all it's negative connotations with deeply felt introspection, describing it with all the right words. I'm so glad I listened to my friends and took a second look at this valuable search for the answers to the evolving questions that surfaced over the year following her husband's sudden death.

I had just finished Mark Vonnegut's second book, examining his life in a free form fashion. Perhaps because of my reading and listening, last week was filled with elevated awareness and stimulating experience. The radio provided a running collection of Dave Brubeck reviews and celebrations of his 90th birthday. So many memories came to the surface as narrators discussed Brubeck with many of his fellow players and contemporaries. It brought back those evenings at the Blackhawk, watching and listening to him when we were undergraduates. It was impossible not to renew one's appreciation for his brilliance as a player, composer and producer of gorgeous music.

I think I was affected by music more than usual this last week. I drove down Sherwood Road one morning listening to violins in a moving piece that I can't even name at this moment. Violins can bring me to tears and cause me to dwell upon thoughts of my changed life. They can also be so soothing. In the space of just minutes I'm crying and then smiling. I can't think of anything that can cause an instant mood change more quickly than a beautifully composed string movement. We're hugely fortunate to have such high calibre programmers giving their time to KZYX, our local Mendocino public radio station. It really doesn't matter whether they're playing jazz or classical music, they make my life richer and more filled with appreciation for the moment at hand.

Sunday, December 5, 2010 — Crazy?

A while back I wrote a bit about my feelings that serious grieving involved elements strongly resembling aspects of a bipolar condition. Because I have more time to myself these days, I actually read more. That also has to do with the fact that I read a lot on my Kindle. When you hear a compelling interview on the radio you are free to dial it up on the E-book and have it in your hands within minutes. That's definitely had an effect on my reading habits. I heard Mark Vonnegut several weeks ago on the radio, discussing sanity and the medical profession. He is a practicing pediatrician and was a thoroughly rational sounding man in the context of this interview. I wrote down the name of his first book and soon had it on my handy little device.

Eden Express is an amazingly candid, nonfiction description of Vonnegut's life in his early twenties. He decided to escape life's horrors and the world situation by traveling with his girlfriend and other fellow Swarthmore graduates to the deep lakes and forests of British Columbia. This is a good read even if you were only concentrating on such a classic hippie escape to a commune established by young east coast preppies. But what soon becomes the overpowering part of the story is young Mark's graphic description of his own descent into schizophrenic/bipolar behavior and ultimately, the roll of genetics and chemistry in our individual life journeys. About half way through this book he finds himself in a mental hospital three times before getting a longer term grip on his condition. In Eden Express, Vonnegut walks you through his experience in such a way as to put you fully in his shoes. That can be scary. It walks such a fine line between totally tragic and horribly funny. I found myself bursting out laughing and immediately wondering if I should be crying instead of laughing. Mark Vonnegut is every bit as good a writer if not better than his famous father.

Eden Express is beautifully formed and paced and reads at time as poetry. The second book, written by Vonnegut many years later is of a much looser or free association construction. It's like wandering in the head of a very bright and creative man. I am only half way through it and the poor man, who has amazingly gone to medical school, begun a practice, has a wife and two children and is about to jump deeply into another mental crash. I should really have waited to write about it until I have finished reading this volume but it's so completely on my mind I can't restrain myself. I would definitely recommend reading Eden Express first and at this minute I can't even give you the correct name of the second book. It's always being listed by the first few words in the title and dot, dot, dotting the rest beyond your vision. Something to do with "Just like someone without mental illness?" I'll get the real title to you in my next entry. Promise. In the mean time, if you are at all interested in the subject, I find Eden Express to be a sterling, honest, candid tale of what it is like to lose control over your emotions and your mental processes and the relationship between the two. Thank you, dear son of Kurt.