Basically Betty

After about 10 days of relatively frantic preparation, living through and recovering from a 5 day workshop I hosted at my Seattle studio, all the visiting teachers are gone, I'm halfway through the mountains of laundry my 3 houseguests generated, my fridge is empty and I seem to be rather sluggish.  I'm tired.  Or at least I was until I took a nap which was surprisingly soon after having wakened this morning.  I guess some days I need to sleep in successive shifts.

The magnolias are in bloom in Seattle.  The apple and cherry trees, too.  Daffodils have come and gone and we're still heavy into tulips.  The city looks so gorgeous with so much color.  I think we appreciate it more than folks who live in places with a more balanced climate.  After such long dark and dreary winters, the color of spring blossoms seems almost like neon, almost unreal.  

The windows are open all night now, we have in fact survived another winter and although John's still snow skiing, it's supposed to be a beautiful spring down here at sea level.  

My own garden, such as it is, is coming to life and I'm especially excited about having two quite opposite climates in which to work, both on my tiny postage stamp piece of land.  

The kitchen garden is shady, really small but with a steep slope, sort of private and intimate.  I'm not sure I have enough sunlight there to grow herbs but I imagine myself harvesting basil, then dashing into the kitchen mere steps away to mix up some pesto.  There's room for a table for one and a super small umbrella.  

The roof top garden is much bigger, it sits on top of the master bedroom and the thing really heats up even though you would think that Seattle wouldn't be able to muster a true, southern-style bake.  No trees provide shade or a wind break and the deck material is a rolled on membrane that doesn't feel hot under your bare feet but sure does provide a sort of warming-tray effect.  I've got a teak bench and table, a fancy chaise, a fabulous French metal Deauville chair and a 10 foot offset umbrella, brand name Southern Butterfly.  So far, that's all I've got going on the roof.  

As budget provides, I'll get one of those propane heaters so I can be out there a few of the non-summer months of the year. 

Mom didn't really garden in any formal, daily up keep, weekly weeding type of way.  I think the best attempt she ever mounted was when she lived at Five Towns and had that perfectly-sized screened in back porch.  We'd made her planters for either her birthday or Mother's Day and filled them up with something pretty with a long bloom cycle.  She also was a genius at pothos, the plant that is irresistably attractive to all gardening under-achievers.  

Mom loved Ivy and for as long as I can remember, she had a couple little 4 or 6 inch pots of it stashed around the house.  Varigated, solid, small leafed and big.  She was a big fan of Ivy and they always did really well for her.  

When Mom moved to North Carolina, she was amazed at the difference in color, the different flowers and shrubs that she was seeing there that hadn't been in Florida.  She had an appreciation for these types of characteristics unique to a place and because she hardly went anywhere, everything about someplace new seemed to hold an exaggerated significance.  Mom was downright thrilled by the simple visit of a bird to the feeder right outside her door.  

I think it's good to be moved by the simple.  Wonder abounds but hardly anybody takes the time to notice.  Mom did, though.  I loved that about her.

I wonder what Pooge has done with the ones Mom had up until she died.  I have some chicks and hens from my friend Kristin's garden.  We search for connections and find them in all sorts of ways.

I don't know how I came by my interest in gardening and, believe me, Jimmy and Heidi are none too thrilled when maintenance falls to them when I travel.  In the heat of the summer, which for us is August, daily watering is required. I'll be gone for the last half of August and the first week of September.  I expect a revolt.  

But for now, I'm excited to see so many big beautiful blossoms all along my walks thru town.  I'm off for one now, I'm meeting Jimmy at the studio so we can watch the Blazers on my big 9' x 14' screen.  

Love and Prayers From Here to There.

In their opening series Mom's Rays took 2 of 3 from those evil Red Sox but beyond that, I'm not too sure what's going on in this very new baseball season.  I had hoped to go to the Mariner's opening day yesterday but somehow let it slip by.

Next week, the Rays are in Seattle for a 3 game stand and you'd think I'd have tickets but I don't.

I definitely have a motivation problem where baseball is concerned and I know exactly what's causing it.

Basketball season is just getting good.

If Mom was Baseball Betty, I'm Basketball Becky.

I think basketball was just too fast and too physical of a sport for Mom to embrace.  Mom and I watched the winter Olympics together one year and during the ski jump competition, Mom would actually scream as the skiiers would leave the jump and become airborne.  They'd do flips and twists in the air and she'd be screaming the whole time.  I'd say, "Mom, they're supposed to be doing that, they're trying to do that" but something inside her just couldn't prepare for the sight of it.  A human being airborne.  I think that has a lot to do with why Mom never really got into Basketball - it's brutally rough wth lots of unexpected physcal feats - but it's always been my favorite. 

I have a voice mail message saved from Mom, she'd been channel surfing late one night, not ready to go to bed but her baseball game as over and she was flipping through the numbers looking for something to pass the time.  She clicked across a Sonics game, we were playing New Jersey and she was, as usual, a riot.  She said "boy, those New Jersey guys are good, they almost never miss!"  She also said that she didn't even like basketball but she was going to watch the game just for me.  She asked if perhaps I was at the game; I had season tickets for years.

Well here we are in this cross-over time of year, with Baseball under way but Basketball playoffs just about to begin. 

Right now, as I type, I'm being bashed about on Amtrak (we're speeding, trying to make up lost time and the ride is really rough!) on my way to Portland to see a Blazer game tonight.  On Monday, I drove to Portland for a game and drove right back home after it was over.  It's 3 hours, one way.  I would have stayed in Portland in between but I had a mammogram yesterday in Seattle so that messed everything up.

I have a lump that needs to come out, I've had two others out and both were nothing but because my breast tissue is so "dense" they can't see it well enough to be sure it's nothing so they take it out as a precaution.  Just to be sure.

I'm sure my sister could handle this minor procedure but she's not here and I'm not there so I'll have to go to a proper surgeon and I did make sure to schedule it for after Basketball playoffs have ended in mid-June.  I don't want anything to mess up my viewing schedule!

On Saturday, teachers begin flying in to work with me in my Seattle studio next week and I'm pretty sure I'm going to be working every night next week while the Rays are here.  I'm taking them all into the cadaver lab for a 5 hour anatomy class at a local medical school on Wednesday, I think that's going to wipe them out such that hopefully I can sneak away Wednesday night for the Rays game and they won't even miss me.  I've got my eye on 3rd baseline seats.  I'm also in workshop when the Rays are back here in August - what awful timing - but at least I know I'll see them down in St. Pete a couple times this season and that's what's really important. 

I do have Mom's Rays cowbell and I will surely take it with me if I go next Wednesday.  I'll be ringing it just like she did during that magical run up to the World Series last year.  And I'll be singing and stomping and yelling enough for her and for me. 

I miss her terribly but what can I do.  Everything marches forward, nothing goes backward and we only have what's real to deal with. 

All in all, life is good in Seattle, on the train, on the way to a game.

Love and Prayers From Here to There.

Just before I left March 25th for the north of England to teach for a week, I received another couple of boxes of Mom's stuff from Pooge.  Packing for the England trip while unpacking a bunch more Mom stuff was a bit confusing because although I was excited to go to York, an ancient and beautifully preserved walled town, I also wanted to stay put here in Seattle and have the time to go slowly through all the treasures newly arrived.

Among the goodies were scarves she knitted, the mink stole - feet, head and tail still on - that either triggers derision, revulsion or delight (delight), some of Mom's everyday dishes that she loved eating from right up until her last meal, candles, jumble/brain teaser books, her high school class ring which slipped easily onto my middle finger and went with me, and some shorty nighties.

There was also a small pillow Mom made from tea towels, it features hydrangeas and the word "Alaska" so I'm assuming the hydrangea is Alaska's state flower but that's a guess.

Pooge sent Mom's bed pillow a while back, the one her head was on when she died, and it's been on my bed ever since.  I keep it in a special pillow case with psychedellic colors and wild patterns and it's on my bed, day and night.  I've now added this little tea towel pillow to the mix. 

My first night back, Wednesday night April 1st, was the first time I slept with both on my bed.

I stack them up, little on top of big, on the edge of the bed and I didn't think much about it until I returned to bed in the middle of the night after a visit to the potty and realized that I've arranged Mom's pillows so that it looks like she might be sleeping in the bed with me, right by my side, but has gotten up for her own middle of the night venture to the bathroom, kitchen or to stargaze. 

Mom and I shared many traits and one of them was our love of sleep.  We not only loved to sleep and never considered it a waste of time but we loved to take naps at any point during the day and when we were together, we loved to take naps at the same time.  We loved to sleep in until the whole morning was gone and we both loved beds, couches, Lazy Boys, divans, sofas, chaises, lounges, ottomans and anything else you could push together, rearrange or somehow lay down on. 

I was with Mom on her birthday last August and I loved it, absolutely loved it, that the morning of the day she turned 86 (87 really, because, you know, we don't count One until One is gone - we're really older than we think!) we both slept in, we both woke up at the same time (almost noon) and we had a lovely day together. 

With this 2-stack of pillows, I feel like I'm still sleeping with Mom and it feels good. 

Love and Prayers From Here to There.