The Style of Dignity

 Human dignity was her compass.

Silly, but I'm fascinated by this garment. There was something so unique about her style. I have a feeling that she made these very personal choices for herself. 

I'm listening to Rachel Maddow interviewing Hilary Clinton about RBG while I live in a state where one of the GOP representatives all but cheered at her passing. It was disgusting and infuriating that his sole concern was overturning Roe V. Wade and taking away a woman's choice over her very life, for it will come to that. 

What am I doing? 100% of any thread, cloth or art purchases from today until the election will be donated equally between the Jon Ossoff and Biden/Harris campaigns.

Her passing gives new meaning to the word "ruthless".  Makes me want to sharpen my machete.

RBG

 How do we honor her?

Gratitude

 

This was so beautiful to see this morning. Grace's Hill and the plant people, still standing. Knowing she and the herd are safe.

We are under the cloud shield dancing out ahead of hurricane Sally. Coolish but far from sweater time. For now, just a damp grayness, still for the most part. Every now and then the trees shiver a bit, not quite tossing. It will be like this for a week or more. Remains to be seen how much wind and rain we'll actually get this far inland.

Just cleaned and refilled the hummingbird feeder. I've caught them eyeing the minuscule flowers on the Spanish Flag vines, barely a sip there. 

I want to sit and build a storm flag, but Sweetie has the sewing chair at the moment. In her old age, I refuse to deny her any small comfort. Could be she knows what I'm supposed to be doing.

 

some peaceful

 

Are you in? Are you ALL in?

"Blue Wave 2020"     12x34    


I'm raffling off this piece to benefit the BIDEN/HARRIS presidential campaign. Here are the rules:

 I know the whole world is watching and we appreciate the support, but I'll have to restrict entries to the US only because of shipping, taxes, customs - all that bureaucratic bs.

Email me - deborah at lacativa dot com -  any receipt for your donation to the BIDEN/HARRIS campaign dating from to 9/1 up to the deadline of 9/24. Put BLUEWAVE in the subject line.

 I only want to see your name, the date, and the amount. Black out anything else.

There will be ONE entry for every TEN dollars donated to the BIDEN/HARRIS presidential campaign. I will round up by fives. If you gave 25, you'll get three chances.

There will be a video of the drawing on Thursday, September 24. Good luck!


Are you in?  Questions? Email me.

some detail shots

The Next to the Last Waltz

 As long as I've been doing this you would think there wouldn't be so much trial and error. It took a refresher course at Paula Burch's venerable website to get my mind right about the importance of optimal temperatures.

It's a little gray out right now, but if the sun breaks through, I'll get these shot and posted. There might be one more batch this year if the heat holds. Stand by if Dirty Thread winds your watch.

fall feels like a cliff

There's no smell to it here. No leaves burning. No back to school sweaters or shoes. The stench of cinnamon brooms in the foyers of all the grocery stores isn't cutting it. I haven't yet dipped a toe in the pumpkin spice river. Anticipation for the coming holidays seems inappropriate. I even missed smelling the moonflowers blooming on the deck last night. It was the first time I've had a full night's sleep in a week. I'll try again tonight.

I'm making stuff mindlessly. There will be regrets. There will be a lot of dyed thread and cloth too.

I'm supposed to writing. The best I could do is come up with a fresh look at an old short story, A Taste of Justice. Please feel free to comment there.

Justice seems to be so out of reach these days that I spend way too much time entertaining really ugly thoughts about getting it by myself. 

He knew and he didn't act. He lied, his fools bought into his bullshit, and there will be over two hundred thousand dead by the end of the year. 

All I can think about are the thousands of people walking around with the never-ending nightmare of having watched and listened to a loved one die alone in an ICU, a phone or tablet held by a PPE swathed nurse their only connection. I would not have survived that.

My sorrow and fury turn, in a flash, to a wave of anger that I'm sure will lead to cancer if I keep letting it roll. The minutes tick by and I check the news praying that someone close to him will pump his jacket full of lighter fluid and strike a match. Stab a fork deep into his eye. Shove him into a jet engine. The list goes on. 

But the real horror? The people who think he's what our country needs. Those fucking boat paraders,  bikers of Sturgis, and all the shadowy scumbags of Washington frantically checking their net worth. Knowing how many of them there are makes it seem like he's what our country deserves. 

Will they ever have the courage to ask themselves "why" five times and give completely honest answers each time. Can they face their truth? Their fears. Then what? For them, for our country. 

I've taken a few slow drives through my neighborhood. There are no political signs of any color out on the lawns. In this red state, I'm taking some heart that the Blues are keeping their cards close to the vest and some of the Reds might be starting to realize how deeply they've been played by this terrible, self-serving con man and everyone who supports him.

As soon as I can get some decent pictures, Blue Wave will be raffled off. ALL proceeds divided between BIDEN/HARRIS and the BLUE campaigns here in Georgia. Details in a few days when I figure it out.

Blue Wave wrap-up

Sometimes a piece just takes you over. Makes demands.

You don't fall in love with it. It never charms you. Every moment you handle it there's a risk of it getting tossed into the UFO box or worse.

Back somewhere around Y2K, one of the first pieces I ever sold, Parking Magic, came within minutes of getting fed into an industrial shredder at AT&T where I was working because I was sick of fooling with it.

The ones you fall in love with can become problematic. I've got too many of those and need to adjust my attitude. Clean house. Update the gallery and get things gone.

This one was wise to stop talking to me a while ago. We got along well enough to reach a satisfactory conclusion. I backed it with that lovely vintage silk jacquard and even stitched it with the last of Jude's silk/cotton thread. The few yards that didn't get cat damaged or dyed.

All that's left for Blue Wave is to add my mark, like the one below.  Title, year, etc. I'll wait to attach it until it's sold because I'm going to let the new owner choose which orientation they prefer. I can't decide.

And that new owner business? Stand by for an announcement.

backlit

 

the shift is on

 

An unexpected week away from daily care, plus a few days of heavy rain, and this is what Fall looks like in Georgia. 

If the sun is strong enough and I have the time, I'll get into the soup and see if I can set things blue one last time. It's mostly manual labor and a little kitchen table chemistry, pH balancing, etc. I'm holding onto summer as long as I can amid a degree of personal chaos.

The reason for the chaos? COVID, of course. Charlie's school resumed in-person sessions last Wednesday and the kids were sent home from school on Monday due to someone they had contact with turning up positive. So, back to virtual school. 

They were all testy the first day back. Charlie gotten a taste of the real thing and had made a friend. Now we are back to square one. Everyone remains well.

That's me with the bat on her head trying to keep the class in line. As if. 

That reference to "One Last Time"? We've started watching "Hamilton" together in bits and pieces. Much of it way beyond him getting.

 He loved King George and the cabinet meeting battle between Jefferson and Hamilton. These kids understand the mic drop! 

He was enjoying the music and the stage work, but he's always interested in the motivations of the characters. "Are they fighting? What was the fight about? What's HIS problem?" and "That's not George Washington!" 

I paused it and set up the scene for him with a brief recap on the American Revolution. No easy task to boil down, I gave explanations about what was happening in this scene. George Washington's farewell.  He was intensely focused on the actors faces and gestures. 

At the end of Christopher Jackson's astonishing performance Charlie was standing within a foot of the giant screen. He zeroed in on the catch in Jackson's voice like a shark to blood. "He's crying!' He turned to me for an explanation and caught me in middle of the same complex set of feelings that can only be expressed through tears. 

"Nana. Why are you all crying? He was anxious, solicitous, clutching my arm, trying to perceive my pain. I could only say, "It's feeling all feelings at the same time. Happiness, sadness and others all at once. I'm okay. Don't worry. Happiness wins this one." 

I lied, sort of. I wonder if he will catch me in that lie someday? I also reminded him that the star of the show, Alexander Hamilton, was a writer. 

the blues came on strong

Sunday morning started out with two tired old crones bemoaning what looked like a shitty weather day while waiting for the coffee to come down.  

Then, the sun broke through the gloom and an impromptu dyefest took off. I wasn't ready. Stuff was scattered all over. Colors chosen with squinted eyes from a low inventory. It got hotter and brighter by the minute. By the time I hit the deck, it was 94 and my hat for shade was a joke.

Still, I didn't hurry. I did have to stop and come inside for a cool down and waited for the sun to go over the trees before finishing. Clean up? Not likely.  

It's going to be days before any of this dries out.

I've been missing blue.

the Traveler

 I'm just so glad that it wasn't lost. Two round trips from GA to CA later, the Traveler is home.

Blue Wave

 

What else could I call it? Never intentional, but now, inescapeable. It doesn't even matter which way you turn it. Still a work in progress.

Perle investigations and shopkeeping

I'm not thrilled so far.

The white, plucked straight from the hank, has a glaze or sizing on it that tends to make it grabby, catching on itself and being snarlish.

Did you know it can be untwisted down to four single strands? Why would anyone do that when there's DMC? Just being nosy.

Next pass, I'll use the natural but I'll give it a stroke of Thread Heaven to grease the way. It's what friends do, right? 

I'm thinking that the coating is a lot about how Perle cotton is intended to be used - tatting, crocheting - those sorts of three-dimensional manipulations and not the tortures of the damned that stitchers are likely to put it through.

 Still, it works up fast and fat if you need to make a loud embroidered statement. Looking forward to running a few lines with the blue. I had to bring the hank inside for drying. Might be a day or so.

 

And speaking of thread, Friday is shipping day. If you've ordered Dirty Threads and/or Fat Baggies they will be heading out before noon on Friday. 

Please email me when they arrive. We have to keep our eye on these bastards.

blues investigations

 

Looking like turquoise, peacock and robin's egg are going to be up first. I used too much of the others to be sure.  Reruns are fun too.

the Blues

 

Not that kind, although it would be easy enough to assume.

I have a couple of thread commissions to get to. 

Blues and their close cousins. Swinging in blues country, border to border. From the cool sky seen through the treetops to the purple down a morning glory's throat.

Tomorrow, I'll get out all the blues I have and make some test stains on this, that, and some thread, some of that Perle cotton I've never dyed before. 

If all goes well, everything will get rain rinsed. With the skirts of two hurricanes dragging over us, it's going to be a while before we catch another sunny day. Still warm enough to get the job done.

Don't tell the other colors, but blue is my favorite...today.

 It's a lot like garlic. A little can go a long way. 

.

But every so often, I go off the very deep end with it. Freefalling.

How could we not? It's everywhere we look, if we just open our eyes.

 How blue are you?

addendum

The streetlights and the traffic light over the intersection stuttered once and failed when the truck glanced off the power pole at the crest of Main Street at the top of the quarter-mile glide down into town.

Engine dead, headlights blind, inertia carried it forward and gravity gave it wings. 

The sky's blue hour pulled the last purple edge behind it and, with the glare of the streetlights gone, Bea looked up at the sweeping arc of stars aligned in the blackness over her head. 

In the moments after the lights went out, there was a three-count before the fireflies and crickets struck up a round of applause and then fell back to the serious business of finding husbands and wives before dawn.

from "The Monkeytown Murders"

the silent roar of chaos

 

.

I can't think of the expression, something about the hubris of making plans, having some kind of order to build one's life around. 

There was a time when we could count on the seasons, man-made holidays and traditions to set our thinking on an orderly path. Now we wander.

I have piles of potential on the floor around the stitching chair as if keeping it all in view will have some effect on my mood. It has not. Shortly, I'm going to scoop it all up and shove it onto a shelf in the closet. 

Worry is a pest. I only worry about things I can't control. Did I really write the word "only"??

And worry is as much a waste of emotional energy as guilt, giving or taking. Which path to follow?

Thinking about my friends in Florida. Elders that I'm too chicken to call because each time, my "How are you?" is answered by a 45-minute litany of medical gyrations. 

Thinking of a dear friend battling cancer, Distant friends in fire danger's path. In the path of dementia, vile beast. 

And my biggest fail. The past week has proven to me that I cannot do both. Work full time at night and be Charlie's copilot in virtual first grade by day. But that will be out of my hands shortly. His school opens on Wednesday.

 I stand down. 

Until I'm needed again.