parenting

Around and around, no exit yet

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Every Friday morning on our call, my therapist W. asks me, “Have you tried to do any writing?” We are speaking, of course, about the pandemic.

“Not really,” I say. “Some lists.”

—

This week I went to the old Sears location at the Natick Mall.

I had an appointment. Though I read the instructions three times before I went, and I looked at the map, as I got closer to the mall I saw that my efforts had been unnecessary.

The signage was profuse and helpful. Sandwich boards with arrows directed me to parking, even when I was still on the main access road. More of them told me to wait in my car until no more than 10 minutes before my appointed time. Other signs directed me from parking and funneled me into the main entrance.

I went from designated person to designated person, a chain of steps leaving nothing to user (mis)interpretation.

Finally, at my station, I rolled up my left sleeve (short, nothing confining); I answered a few questions; I winced at the sudden stinging pain in my shoulder cap. I breathed out.

As I sat in the post-waiting area for my allotted 15 minutes, I marveled at the calm order and the comfort of a protocol that’s going exactly as it was planned. I looked around at people, trying to gauge ages and co-morbidities. Blank.

“This is about not dying,” I suddenly thought. Usually, when I get my annual flu shot, I think about my contribution to public health along with protections to my own health. I had never before dwelled on dying or not dying.

It occurred to me that this is what the entire last year has been: trying not to sink down into thoughts about dying and not dying.

Two nights later, when my left arm hurt like hell and I had an unprecedented headache as well as fatigue and a very low mood, I texted my youngest sibling, who had preceded me in the vaccine quest. “How did you feel?”

His symptoms had been similar. He added, “Low mood/fatigue sure but I get that lately anyways so hard to tell if it was from vaccine.”

—

Have you also been embarrassed lately by your lack of happiness? Really, I am fine, and this should be enough in the pandemic context. I have a job with benefits and a place to live. My workplace (though virtual) is positive or at least benign. I have food and love, and no one whom I love has died in the last year. Almost every day I get exercise. I try to salute the sun when I am outside.

Yet the facts of my life cannot overcome tedium, worry, and an empty tank.

In our weekly meeting, I check in with my boss, B., how’s it going. He asks me the same. Last Tuesday I sang a little, “The long and winding road….” Every week we look for metaphors and cultural references to capture this hell that’s not really hell for us. He asked, “Did you ever see European Vacation? He can’t get used to driving on the opposite side of the road, and there’s a long scene where they spend eight hours driving around and around inside a rotary, not able to get out.”

Here we are, in a rotary, around and around. No exit yet.

I don’t even know if I have the desire in me anymore to miss anything. The hunger has become deadened. If you forced me, though, in some icebreaker activity to say what I miss I could come up with something: sitting at a bar having a drink and a snack, my family the Kokes, going to a live show with my three adult children.

I feel as though we’ve crossed an ocean in a boat and can’t go back. We can write letters and send them, and who knows how long it will take for the letters to reach their destination or if a letter will come back. We are like travelers to a new land, forced out of the old one.

We left home, and yet here we are, in the same place.

—

There have been birthdays. Two weeks ago my youngest child, Grace, celebrated her 21st birthday. Though I also have a 28 year old and 25 year old, suddenly I am the parent of three adult children. My life is in a new stage. If you are a parent, you’ll know when you get there. This is the end of the innocence (theirs and yours), which has been a long time coming.

How will we get out of this period we are all going through? For a long long time I’ve been feeling as though we’re living through the End of Days, but now I’m imagining it as just a winter period, a hibernation, or an Ice Age of sorts. Life is coming back, for those of us who are still alive.

I am so so sorry for people who have lost a loved one or dear colleague or dear student to the coronavirus. You are like civilians on the front lines of a battle, and you were made vulnerable. There was nothing you could do. I imagine you are looking back all the time and wondering, “What could we have done?” You wish desperately that you could have saved your loved one by some personal intervention or action of your own.

It’s very hard to realize and accept we are not that powerful. I offer you compassion and I hope you will forgive yourself.

—

Looking through my phone for any pictures I’ve taken that could illustrate this time (and this blog post), I see I’ve hardly taken any photos beyond ones of my dog. I have taken screenshots of clothing in online catalogs that I haven’t bought. Aspirational? “Oh, I’ll wear this someday.”

Meanwhile, I have my uniform. And I sit at my desk that overlooks the neighbors’ yard. There is also the shed and the woods. Over my desk I’ve hung a calendar to cross off days as they pass. It helps me orient myself to the actual day and date as it’s happening.

I have so much work to do, and I’m doing it. Every day I wonder: What is it for?

There is this photo of Grace, taking a turn driving on January 29 on our way to Bronxville to bring her back to college. In the fall, she lived in a solitary room in an Airbnb run by retired faculty members. She wanted to be as close to campus as possible, though campus wasn’t really open and there wasn’t a room for her there. This semester, she got a dorm room. (Long, side story: she moved out a couple of weeks later, into a rooming house, when infections on campus surged.)

I am proud that all three of my children are safe, competent drivers. The feeling, honestly, is akin to the one I felt when all three of them could read, as though they were junior citizens in a world they could now participate in. (I mean, reading is SO MUCH.) Actors, with agency.

Here’s Grace, driving herself and me into some piercing, late afternoon winter sun. She was also the DJ, and a song by Ida Maria seemed fitting at the moment.

We went in the direction of the place that Grace wanted to be, though she understood that only in small ways would it be what she wanted, and what she had first hoped when she planned her college journey. It’s also not what I had envisioned for my child, when I saw the future opening up in front of her, as I did for Lydia and Eli too.

Life always intervenes. It thwarts and blinds us. If we can, we adjust. We drive on. Eventually, we get to a place. We stay there for a while and look for our people, our comforts.

This has been a narrow year, with experiences winnowed to their smallest amounts: one visit, one friend, one meal, one walk, one book, one day or one week. It has also been a year of lessons, the biggest one maybe something you come to understand when you’re past the middle of your life: there is no big destination, no place where you have it all or come to understand you’ve made it.

In our family chat, my sister Emily recently texted something like this: “Hey, we all made it through a day. And we’ll wake up tomorrow and have another one.”

You too, everyone. You too.

Ghost Road

/ jelizabeth / 6 Comments

Note: At the beginning of May, I joined a 30-day writing course designed by Megan Devine, founder of Refuge in Grief.  Every day we get a writing prompt, and there is a secret Facebook group to post to and share writing with other members. There are losses of all sorts, mostly deaths, and some losses are recent and some, like mine, more in the past. There is something special about the group — I joined for the writing, and I’ve gotten much more. Find more info about signing up for the next group here: link. My post for Day #19, unedited, is below.

bubbles

Image credit: Belmont Public Library

“You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget.”

Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Last night when I got home I asked Grace what she had done with her day. She is newly home from her first year of college. She told me that she and Elena (cousin) had gone to Ghost Road, off of Chickatawbut Road in Milton, to take Winston for a walk around a secret pond.

“I remember the day we later found out that Dad had died, Sally had taken us for a walk earlier that day around that secret pond in Chestnut Hill,” she told me.

“What? What?” I ask, confused. “You went on a walk the day Dad died? Who went?”

“Sally took me, Eli, Lydia, and Sara,” replied Grace. “Then later the police officer came and told us Dad died.”

It was one of those moments when I realized there was something I had forgotten, or never knew, from that confusing, consuming time that Jimmy died. In the days preceding July 25, 2016, when all we knew is that he had run away and no one could find or reach him, we swung between huddling together and trying to solve the mystery — Where is Jimmy? — to carrying on as usual with grocery shopping, dog walking, and (me) working. It was summer school time, and I was teaching a class.

So, I learned or was reminded, on the day we found out, in the afternoon, that Jimmy had been found dead in a hotel room, —

Wow, I had to pause there after I wrote that. I have a life, I had a life, in which the man I was married to, was estranged from, would run away and go to a hotel room and die of an overdose.

I don’t always think of that. The facts of that day. All I can picture is the moment the police detective, Matthew Something, drove up and got out of his car in a Red Sox shirt thrown over his uniform. I can never forget that and I never want to: the vivid Red Sox shirt, all white with the red trim and lettering, over the dark uniform and against the darkness of his car. He walked over to me standing there outside. He had called ahead. After days of searching for Jimmy, I knew what he would say before he said it. Sally was standing outside with me, on the driveway. He walked over. He told us, “Mrs. Kokernak” (no one calls me that), “I am sorry to tell you that your husband’s body has been found.” And then, the details of the finding. The questions about the name of his doctor, and his psychiatrist. They would investigate. There was likely no crime. He could not tell me the cause of death. Then the kids come outside, Eli, Lydia, Grace. One of them ask from the front porch — Sally and I still in the driveway — “Mom?” as if my name and the question mark ask everything.

“Dad has died,” I say. “He is found.” Continue reading →

To anyone who has a heart

/ jelizabeth / 6 Comments

On profound occasions, a person like me feels the pressure to come up with some profound words to mark the moment. I have none ready-made.

Today was the last meeting with my physical trainer, Kim Gomez, because we are moving. For the last year-and-a-half, with almost no breaks in our schedule, I lifted, stretched, lunged, and hinged two times per week. This has been one of my most important new relationships in the two years since Jimmy died, and we didn’t talk that much. I’m not a small talker, and neither is she. Of course, we talked. More significantly, she believed in me and she pushed me, and as my body got stronger my mind did too. It’s hard to come back after a trauma. If you ever have to do something like that yourself, reader, make your body do something. The mind doesn’t always lead the way. Often, the body does.

We both knew it was the last day, and I wondered how I would mark the occasion, though I didn’t plan it out as I usually plan things out. I actually hurt my back mid-lift, and instead of maxing out on lifts and lunges, Kim led me through stretches and extensions until I was okay again.

I couldn’t look at her in the last few minutes. I looked away, steadying my voice, and said, “It’s hard to put into spoken words what I want to say. I’m going to write it down and leave it for you.” She embraced me. Maybe she said my name – I love when my name is called. I hugged her back, and in the air next to her head I said, “Kim, you have been a great friend to me, in the work you do and the way you do it. I’m strong again. I’ll never forget you.” She responded, “I’m proud of you. Email me anytime if you have questions.” We parted. I stopped to look out a window.

Today is also the two-year anniversary or yahrzeit of Jimmy’s death from suicide. Here is his obituary: link. This event in our lives was truly “unexpected.” And yet, like so many stunning events, it also made sense to us as we reflected on it. The fragments fit together.

Just that something makes sense doesn’t mean that we feel any loving kindness toward this truth, any deep peace. Recently, talking about love, Eli said to me, “Mom, I have a feeling that for the rest of our lives all four of us will be experiencing everything through this layer of trauma.”  I thought this: “… even if that layer thins over time.” Continue reading →

Un-haunting the house

/ jelizabeth / 13 Comments

5879240245_362379e396_o-1With Eli, your oldest offspring, you are texting about weekend activities.

Eli sends a photo of a new, craigslisted desk in the bedroom in the apartment in Queens.  Their comment, “definitely using redoing/reorganizing my apt as a coping mechanism now.”

You text back, “I’m cleaning out my closet as coping mechanism.”

A long time ago Eli said this, “Mom, you keep your clothes too long. When they get old and tattered, throw them out.” (And this from the child who introduced you to thrift-store shopping.) You tried to explain your sentimental attachment to things your body has worn, yet over time you realized that Eli speaks the truth. So now you find yourself throwing out these old and tattered clothes easily, or at least deliberately.

Eli, in a later text message, types a phrase, “making the house less haunted.” You don’t need a complete sentence to understand what is meant.

The conversation makes you think about what you, and the kids too, have been doing to un-haunt the house and the lives lived in it. Jimmy Guterman — husband, and father of Eli, Lydia, and Grace — died unexpectedly and traumatically on July 25.

What do you do when this happens? You shatter; you grieve; you proceed.

In the first weeks, surrounded by family, every night before bed you all watch re-runs of The Office, which you’ve seen through once entirely when it was broadcast. Now you watch it again, making friends with the characters. You ask Lydia, “If Michael Scott has so many boundary issues, and can be inappropriate so often, why do we come to like him as a character?”  Lydia replied: “Because he is so earnest.”  Lydia’s insight and that word become favorites for a while, and as you go about the business of grief and getting back to okay, your mind can’t help working on what interests it, and you study that word, “earnest,” and you look for that quality in others.

You forget about eating, until one day you realize it’s 4PM and you’re eating lunch. You decide you have to start eating lunch at lunch time, and the next day you do.

After two weeks you tell the kids, “This is the week we start eating vegetables and fruits again. We will also exercise every day.” Even walking the dog counts as exercise.

You listen when different people — visitors from the Samaritans, your child’s therapist, your wonderful friends, your own doctor — tell you that “you are alive, and you have to live.” It is an encouraging message, not at all one that promotes a grin-and-bear-it approach. You start to recognize this: “I am alive.” This, really, is good. Continue reading →

Mother and matrix are from the same root, but martyr is not

/ jelizabeth / 4 Comments

For a long time, I thought the word “martyr” was somehow related to mother. Perhaps the few letters in common between it and the Latin “mater.” Yet the root of “martyr” is witness, or one who sees something happen.

Don’t we often, though, think of mothers as ones who martyr themselves? This evokes images of a woman stabbing herself in her own throat or heart for the good of others. Indeed, martyrs were historically people who were killed or suffered greatly for a principle or cause.

Today, on Facebook (where else?), a friend posts a philosophical question after she overhears a conversation between two divorced women who are mothers. One tells the other she is going to a music festival for four days at the end of the summer, right as the new school year begins for her young child. The question arises: is this okay, acceptably, motherly? In the comments, there is much debate. Most of the respondents are women; none want to judge; some say that self care is okay, and others say that mothers must be there.

I did not post a comment but I found myself a little on the side of the woman going to the music festival. I wondered about the rest of the circumstances, including the age and disposition of the child, and if the father or other parent could help the child get settled in school. I also recognized that I might not make this choice myself, realizing that music festivals happen year after year after year, and not everything has to happen now. Philosophically, I thought the woman should go, simply because she wants to and it’s okay, even though I probably wouldn’t have. She shouldn’t martyr herself or suffer unduly, although staying home from a music festival is not suffering.

IMG_0021 (2)

in front of a church in Brooklyn, March 19, 2016

The absence of a desired experience is not akin to suffering. And yet as I write that I realize we, at this moment in history, may think of it that way. Missing out (or FOMO, as the kids say) is suffering. Continue reading →

One dollar thrift shop dress

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dress_hem_JaneMy three children, who are no longer actually children, like to shop in thrift stores: Boomerangs, Goodwill, and Savers in particular. They have led me down this path, too. I like a good price and the thrill of out-smarting mainstream retail. (Take that, Gap!) Until I wore them out, one of my favorite pairs of pants was a pre-worn, five-dollar tan pair with an Ann Taylor label bought at Savers.

Inevitably, one of the kids’ purchases of used clothing requires some mending or tailoring by the only person in our house who has practiced sewing skills. That person is me. Sometimes a button is needed, sometimes a new zipper. I have yet to take anything apart and put it back together again — although I do have an Eileen Fisher black silk sleeveless dress in my closet bought for $20 that needs the shoulder straps and armholes raised — but some repairs have been more complex.

A few days before she headed off to college, Lydia brought home a long, granny-like dress from Boomerangs in Jamaica Plain (the best of the four locations, according to Eli) in her staple black & white. She asked me to hem it, and I promised I would before she left. Of course, we waited and waited and waited, as if that day of leaving would never come. Finally, with the prick of a deadline* to motivate me, I got out the sewing machine, pins, measuring tape, steam iron, and a makeshift ironing board (i.e. clean towel on the kitchen counter).

dress_hem_measure

The price tag showed a markdown from $8 to $1, and surely the low price gave me permission to do a rush job: cut the extra length, fold the cut edge, avoid pins and hold it in place, and sew a quick row of fastening stitches. But why not do these things with care, if I’m going to do them at all? So I measured, cut, sewed on a length of hem tape to the cut edge, measured the hem and ironed and pinned it, and sewed the hem by hand using a hemstitch.

As I was sewing, I was thinking, and not just about the task. I recognized the ultimate inefficiency, really, of buying an inexpensive, pre-owned, not-quite-right piece of clothing and then getting someone (i.e., your mother) to spend 90 minutes of labor improving it. True, I volunteered for the task, but I can still put a price on my labor, which is worth more probably than the original price of the dress when new. Even if Lydia had hired the seamstress at the dry cleaner’s to do it, the fee would have boosted the net price of the dress to $21.

As I sewed, I mused longer on how this intimate labor is an act of love and therefore without cost or price. And, if my labor is an act of love, then that dress carries my love with it as it hangs now in Lydia’s closet or is worn by her.

dress_hem

At least a year ago, I bought a pre-worn Banana Republic sweater from an on-line consignment store. I loved the sweater on the website, and I loved it when it came out of the package, not only for how it looked but for its smell: there was a whiff, which stayed until I first dry-cleaned the sweater, of the perfume or deoderant or detergent used by the woman who previously owned it. As I wore this lovely cardigan, I smelled this other person and imagined her: my physical size, having a different life somewhere else, and yet transferring some trace of her in the anonymous selling of her sweater. We endow these objects with ourselves when we wear them.

So, too, I endow the thrift-shop clothing my children buy when I alter or repair it. There’s some essence of me in Lydia’s dress, Eli’s shirt, or Grace’s jacket. (And I suppose the previous owners of the clothing are with them too.)

dress_LydiaThis may be the detail that I have imaginatively focused on the most in helping Lydia prepare for school and getting her there. We did a lot of shopping, and new clothes and bedding and supplies were purchased. We packed. We tidied. All of this getting ready is so quotidian — the sheets, new towels, a box of pencils, extension cord, under-the-bed storage bin — to the point of boredom, really, and not narratable.

But the hemming of the dress… that felt to me almost epic, even if another person, looking at me from the outside, would have seen only a woman in her reading glasses bent over a piece of black and white checked fabric, crumpled in her hand, being pricked with yellow-headed pins. This moment, this dress and its hem: every moment I have ever loved my daughter, which is all moments that have passed and all of them that will come, I felt them with every stitch my hand and needle and thread made, piercing layers of fabric as delicately as I could, over and over and over until where I ended met the place where I started.

*Note: The phrase “prick of a deadline” is one I picked up from my friend Lisette Bordes, who once admitted how useful a deadline is to writing. It is a prick, an act of piercing something with a fine, sharp point, according to the dictionary.

Do nothing, and results will follow

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It was breezy and overcast, but we headed anyway to the kayak and paddleboard rental place on Nauset Marsh in Orleans on Cape Cod. Why hadn’t we thought to call ahead? When we got there — there were 12 people in our family group — we learned that the breeze and tide made it too difficult to paddle back in. Rentals were closed.

Nearby was Nickerson State Park, with lots of wooded camping and a boat rental place on a pond. We drove there in our three vehicles, and split up even further into an assortment of single and double kayaks, a peddle boat, and, for Lydia, a stand-up paddle board.

across the pond, August 30, 2013

across the pond, August 30, 2013

Last summer she tried the SUP board on a cool day with high winds, managing the standing part but finding the navigation part challenging. A goal for this summer was to use the board to actually go somewhere.

The kayakers and Lydia headed out across the pond, after getting some advice on the wind and current from the young guy manning the rental business. Jimmy and I peddled behind. The squared-off peddle boat goes so slow. Even though legs are more powerful than arms, the kayaks and SUP board were more streamlined. They and their passengers seemed to go quickly and reached the other side of the pond while we felt stalled permanently in the middle.

accidental photo of me, peddling, August 30, 2013

accidental photo of me, peddling, August 30, 2013

We saw them head back, their faces to the wind and the prows of their boats into the current. The kayakers seemed okay, but even far away Lydia, who never fell, seemed to be working very hard. Emily and David hovered in their boat near her.

Jimmy and I changed direction and attempted to predict their path and intercept them. Emily and David traveled on. As we got within shouting distance of Lydia, I asked if she wanted a ride.

She shouted back, “I don’t need help. I just want some company.”

So for the rest of the way back to shore we stayed within about 50 feet of her, hardly interacting (beyond the occasional photo taking). She rowed hard and made it.

As parents and teachers — and in my family this broadens to include lots of loving adult figures — we don’t always have to step in and do something. We can be nearby and offer our silent presence: not advice, not physical help, not even encouragement. Young people already have some skill and often great determination and strength. Also, although mistakes are one possible outcome, it’s unlikely that they will be disasters. For example, I know Lydia can swim well, and the worst that could have happened was a dunking and a challenging climb back onto the board.

When we are in a teaching/helping/nurturing/leading role, the impulse is often to intervene. The danger in the intervention, however, is that the outcome becomes ours. The person helped loses her agency.

I feel this myself, too. When I am faced with a challenge, I like the pleasure of working it out myself or, if I can tell that I need it, asking for very specific help. It gets my back up when someone offers to take over for me. And yet when I am doing something difficult or grueling, it can be wonderful to have a trusted person nearby, perhaps involved in their own parallel challenge, whether physical or intellectual.

To help most, therefore, it sometimes takes great self-restraint, an ability to have a thought and not speak it, to perceive a solution and not implement it, or to sense uncertainty and not resolve it.

Teachers, for the semester ahead, let’s remind ourselves of the value of our presence and the power of nonintervention. This is not to discount the value of our active teaching — that’s important, too — but simply to remember that we have more than one way of being and doing.

Animal rescue league

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Jimmy asked, “How was your day?” We are sitting in the living room. I get the couch, the best seat, and he the green chair.

Our usual weekday subjects are work and kids.  The conversation is always better if there’s an anecdote.

“Grace called me twice this afternoon. She found a cat in the yard without a collar, and she wanted to talk it through with me.”

wild thing, you make me stalk you (june 2013)

wild thing, you make me stalk you (june 2013)

I described the stream of texts she sent, her eagerness to locate the owner, and desire for me to come home and help. It was late afternoon, and I was wrapping up anyway. By the time I pulled into the driveway, Grace had already called an adult friend for cat-catching advice, posted a photo on Instagram, searched craigslist for “lost cat,” and speculated as to who in our neighborhood might own the cat.

cat_textShe and I stalked the collarless cat for a little while, trying to herd it back to our yard where we believed we could think and plan better. After we tip-toed into the fourth neighbor’s yard, I said to Grace, “I’m going home to get a laundry basket so we can try catching it.”

The cat eluded catching with the laundry basket. Grace finally said, “I sense this cat is smart enough to survive and find her way home. And I think I know whose cat it is.” We abandoned pursuit.

Later, she took our dog Winston for a walk and rang the bell of some new neighbors. Indeed, the cat belongs to them. The woman told Grace, “She lost her collar and we haven’t replaced it yet. But we know she’ll come home when she’s hungry.”

I told Jimmy that I hoped we weren’t going to become those kind of people, always on the lookout for strays. Continue reading →

Return of the sunflower folly, with modifications

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homemade seed marker

homemade seed marker

In the spring of 2009, I planted a sunflower folly in half of the front yard: link. It was a dramatic success. For me, it had been an experiment as well as a therapeutic act after I had experienced a major disappointment. In September, the growing season done, I was content with the results of my folly, documented them, and set the idea aside.

A month ago, as she watched me start the spring clean up, Lydia asked, “Can you do the sunflowers again? I loved that.” So here I go again, although on a smaller scale.

This time, instead of planting half the front lawn, we tilled up the barren strips that lie between the road and the town sidewalk. Sunflowers can grow anywhere, and the poor quality of this soil will not deter them. The flowers’ appearance will also delight passers-by and provide us with a visual screen.

Mail-order seed packets

Mail-order seed packets

Seeds were purchased from Burpee and Gurney’s. Because the planted area would be smaller, I only ordered six packages total, in a variety of colors and heights:

  • Elf: yellow, 14″ to 16″ stems (Burpee)
  • Sunspot: yellow, 2′ stems (Gurney’s)
  • Chianti Hybrid: burgundy with gold, 4′ to 5′ stems (Burpee)
  • Hybrid Double Shine: fuzzy orange, not many seeds, 5′ stemps (Gurney’s)
  • Coconut Ice Hybrid: white, 5′ to 6′ stems (Burpee)
  • Solar Flare: flame red, 5′ to 6′ stems (Burpee)

After tilling (thank you, Jimmy), Lydia raked and smoothed the dirt. I sprinkled on some foul-smelling fertilizer, and we used the eraser ends of pencils to make 1″ holes for planting the seeds.

Lydia plants her batch

Lydia plants her batch

Lydia came up with the planting scheme: tallest flowers in the sight line from our front windows, with shorter ones surrounding them. Her first proposal was that we “throw them down and let nature take its course,” but that was not enough of a scheme for me.

supplies: landscaper's cloth, staples, fertilizer, and espresso

supplies: landscaper’s cloth, staples, fertilizer, and espresso

This was quick work. After planting, I watered the dirt lightly, put down some landscaper’s cloth with big staples (I used black cloth this time because I could grab it at Home Depot, but wish I had the white that I mail-ordered and used for my first folly). I made some improvisatory seed markers with the seed envelopes, some gardening sticks, and binder clips. See above.

I drank espresso. Winston kept us company.

Winston, good company for gardeners

Winston, good company for gardeners

Official planting date: Monday, May 20. Stay tuned for progress reports.

—–

Previous posts on the Sunflower Folly of 2009, in chronological order:

  1. Sunflower folly: link (with full instructions)
  2. Sprouts: link (first sprouts, 13 days after planting seeds)
  3. First sunflower: link (first sunflower, 73 days after planting seeds)
  4. Habitat: link (folly as habitat for a wild rabbit)
  5. Harvest: link (sunflower harvest, four months after planting)

Cinderella goes to the ball

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Cinderella is Grace, and the ball is a Bat Mitzvah.

Today our house was a scene of cottage industry. I altered the dress I bought for Grace in the women’s department. The style and fabric were exactly what she wanted, but it was too drop-waisted, too long for a 5′ 1″ girl. Out came the sewing machine and ironing board.

sew dress 500

Meanwhile, Jimmy drove Cinderella to Target to buy some tights. He was shooed away by his daughter from the Intimates section of the store. I asked him where he lingered while waiting.  “Electronics,” he replied, with a tone that conveyed, “Where else?”

Later, I assisted with nail polish and jewelry selection and fastening. The black cardigan sweater, bunched up since the last occasion, needed some sprucing up with a damp cloth.

A check was written and greeting card found. Cinderella did her own makeup, and she is good at it.

wear dress 500

Purse, phone, hairbrush, and coat were gathered. Black slippers were slipped on.

I took some pictures.

Her carriage arrived. She went.

The ball, at a hotel in the adjacent town, ends at 11:30pm. Cinderella will be home around the stroke of midnight, in her customized dress, not-glass slippers, and pink tights from Target.