Betwixt and Between

 Rte 91 northbound to Vermont

I have been away - away in body, away in mind, away in spirit.

Years and years ago my then husband, our four children, and I moved to the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont. We were part of the massive back-to-the-land movement of the early-mid 70s, a migration from city to rural life that caught us up and swept us northward until we found a piece of land we could afford. There we built a log cabin from scratch, raised pigs and chickens for meat, planted and harvested a large garden, went without running water and electricity for a few years, and generally lived the life of pioneers, though we did it without a covered wagon and we went north instead of west.

 with my mother at our unfinished log cabin circa 1978

That was in the past, in my former life as wife and helpmeet. A few years into the adventure I became a single mother, then an empty nester, then an ex-Vermonter, moving back to Massachusetts and the town in which I'd grown up. Still, every year since then, I've returned to Vermont to visit old friends. One in particular just turned 102 and I spent the last few days helping her celebrate (albeit sedately).

with my friend Lora two years ago on her 100th birthday

The trip to Vermont is always an emotional one. Thirty-five years ago, I fell in love with the sky-piercing mountains, the wind-ruffled pines, the sight of field upon field of corn or cows or upland hay. I gave my heart to the hilltop where our cabin stood, to the trees that were sacrificed for log walls, to the fierce winter winds, the spiraling hawks and the foraging bear. Going back is like moving through time

The trip up is one of recognition, and of registering the changes. I still get excited when I pass the Welcome to Vermont sign even though I have hours of driving ahead of me. When I visit in the springtime like this the clock spins backwards - I leave leafing trees and forsythia bushes the color of butter behind me. Each mile lessens the amount of bloom until I am two weeks behind myself and the trees still hold ink sketch branches against the sky. The fields show only a hint of green under last year's brown, dead grass and the air is noticeably chillier.

Once I reach the town we lived in and stop for gas, I begin looking for familiar places. Where's that little restaurant we used to have lunch in sometimes? Oh, there's the school the kids attended, there's the museum with the lions guarding the entrance, there's the store I worked at in town. Most often I drive clear to Barton to visit my oldest friend. I spend a few days with her and we go gadding about, or sit talking, talking as though we were word-starved. Going to Vermont is anticipatory and welcoming

Leaving Vermont is different. I cannot do it without being reminded of the reasons why I left in the first place. I pass the restaurant where I saw my husband with another woman, the courthouse where my divorce was declared final, the turn off to our old homestead. My throat starts to ache and I blink back tears. All the years between have merely eased but not erased the sorrow of giving up a dream, of having to sell the kids' childhood home, of leaving behind a beloved place. I drive for 100 miles before I register the budding leaves on the trees and the gentling of the mountains. Another 150 miles and I am home again, home among familiar landmarks and the space I've made for myself here.

In a day or two I will wake to find all traces of sadness and guilt lifted. I will be back in the here and now amid the blossoming trees and the greening grass. I will have remembered my previous lessons of impermanence and the futility of mourning forever something once loved and lost. I will be back.

the patio I built myself for myself

The Art of Zen

Reya posted a marvelous piece called Just Passin' Through that reminded me of my Zen (or Buddha) Board, a small paper drawing board, square and framed, made of magic stuff. There is a tapered Chinese paintbrush near it and a shallow bowl that holds water. When you dip the brush and pull it slowly over the paper, the lines appear almost black. They gradually fade to grey and then disappear altogether. No matter what you paint there–a mistake or a masterpiece–the lines become paler and vanish. Nothing stays, no matter how unsatisfactory, no matter how perfect.

It’s a concept I struggle with, that of inevitable change. I don’t mind when the flawed pictures I make fade out of existence. In fact, the lines disappear so slowly that often I become impatient. When I create a thing of beauty, however, I am loath to see it recede. I am using the Zen Board to teach myself to let go of both with equal ease.

As beautiful as spring is, with its green days and fragrant flowers, or summer with its symphony of bird song and riotous colors, they too will pass away. Winter will draw new lines, starker ones, and paint the landscape in shades of grey, of deep purple and sable brown. Then, even as we watch, the dark marks made by the winter months will in turn fade and spring will take up the brush to paint the leaves and flowers anew.

If we let it, nature can show us that impermanence is not bad in and of itself. Knowing that something is fleeting can ease an intolerable situation and give us hope of respite. We may yearn for what has gone or wish for more time to savor what we don’t want to lose but we are also shown that we can treasure the moment. We can look around us and realize that now is the time to appreciate and that now includes the past and the future as well as the present.

Endings teach us about beginnings. Beginnings teach us that all things come to a close. As we cycle in and out of all our life stages, the lines we drew so darkly at first (as though they were permanent self-borders) become hazy, making way for new perspectives, new horizons. We find that our very lives are Zen Boards and the brush strokes that trace our thoughts will fade and be drawn again, over and over.

Picky Fwadoos

Spring more than 40 years ago, and a small hand tugs at my sleeve. “Picky Fwadoos, Mommy,” begs my firstborn and we go out into the spring morning to see what we can see. I remember this as I rake last year’s leaf mulch from the garden beds. Daffodils and narcissus bloom in the front yard and bluebells blossom amid the purple and white violets out back. Picky fwadoos. I pluck some of each for the cobalt vase.

As a child, I named every flower I saw, never guessing that someone else had done so before me. Daffodils and narcissus were kings’ trumpets, tulips were queens’ cups, violets I called shys and lily of the valley were fairy bells. The bright orange flower and the springy seedpod of the jewelweed became orange poppers. I remember picking samplings of all the flowers I could find and taking them home to my mother. Spreading them out before her, I’d name every one. Ever the schoolteacher, she would fetch the big yellow flower book from the shelf and pronounce the Latin names for each of my specimens. I refused to learn them, preferring the names I’d chosen over something like galanthus nivalis, viola odorata, or tussilago fragrans. My toddler had the same independent spirit. When I told him what to call the blooming forsythia he asked, “If Cynthia has a flower, is there a for-Brendan one?” I never see one of those bushes without remembering my son.

Now, when the first flowers are pushing their way out of the cold earth, when the snowdrops and crocus bloom, when the pale green spears of the day lily and the round, raggedy-edged violet leaves promise sweet blossoms, I go out to picky fwadoos in memory of the little boy who reopened my eyes to the wonders of the season. He’s a grown man and living far away but I know somewhere in that tall, lanky form there lurks a small boy who will pick flowers in the spring and think of me, too.

Spring Evening Walk

My first evening meal on the patio. The air was balmy and the sun warm. I dined to the background music of robins, a cardinal, and several crows.

First forsythia blossoms...

and the first day lily shoots of the season.

The grape vines calligrapher indecipherable words along a fenceline

and the sun silvers last year's roadside weeds.

The small pond where the peppers have their nightly concerts holds a mirror image of the newly budding trees. I always feel this is a fey place and slow down as I walk past it, hoping for a glimpse of a hobbit or perhaps a wood gnome or two. It's a charming spot.

There are five swans on the larger pond across the road. They were too far from shore for my little camera to capture them. Earlier, three of them flew over the cottage. Their huge wings whistled as they cut through the air. They did not call out as the geese do, but their wings sang songs of wanderlust.

While we're on the subject...

Doubt and Faith

A month ago there were patches of

stubborn snow under the blackberry bushes

and the grass was still last year’s,

dead and brown. Now, though, oh now!

Every bare branch is budded, every

blade of grass new green, every breeze

a sigh from heaven. How could I have

doubted spring? The blackberry’s faith

is greater than mine.

Spring Is Springing

 The snow is receding from my patio...

Listen
Nothing says spring louder
than the sound of ice melt,
unless it's the hopeful little two-note song
of the chickadee, that drops like liquid song
into the silence.

Snowdrops bloom in a sheltered spot.











Goodbye winter!



chickadee photo credit:  animal.discovery.com

Those Who Can't, Teach...

I am responsible for helping a class of second graders understand two digit subtraction. When I was a child, the process of transferring an amount from the tens column to the ones column was called borrowing. Now it's called regrouping and the initial lesson for visual learners begins with a paper divided in half on which wooden pieces of various lengths are laid. One half of the paper is labeled TENS, the other half, ONES. A single rod marked into ten squares is a ten rod. Small single squares are ones cubes.

"Show me the number 23," I instruct a small girl with owlish glasses who, after three days of general class instruction, still does not understand the concept. She peers at me, then reaches for the rods and cubes and organizes two ten rods and three ones cubes. So far, so good.

"Now," I say, "I want you to take away 18. Can you show me how?"

She peers at me again and reaches for a ten rod. I nod. She lays the rod aside. "How much is that?" I ask.

"Ten," she murmurs and lets her hands hover over the ones cubes. I wait, she hovers. Finally she says, "I can't do that."

Teaching moment. "What about the ten rod you have left?" I ask. "Can you make that into ten ones and borrow them?" She looks at me. A long time. Finally she sighs and says, "No."

"Because?" I prompt.

"Because," she says, obviously puzzled by my stupidity (I am the teacher, after all), "they're all glued together." She pauses. "And I can't put a whole stick on the side with cubes."

Ah, the literal mind. "How about if you trade the ten rod for ten cubes and put them on the ONES side?" I suggest.

She dutifully removes the remaining ten rod, picks up ten cubes, and deposits them on on the ONES side. She waits, staring alternately at them and at me. "Now, how many ones do you need to take away?" I ask her.

"I just put them on there," she says. I bite my tongue. I begin again.

"You started with 23. I wanted you to subtract 18. You took away one 10 rod and borrowed the other ten rod. Then you regrouped the ones. Now you need to take away how many ones?"

"Two?" she guesses.

"Why just two?" I ask. I can hear the echo of her puzzlement in my own voice.

"Because," she tells me with teacherly patience, "I took away two rods." She holds up her two index fingers. "One and one are two, see?"

*************

I must confess, numbers baffle me, too. They’re mysterious. They multiply and divide with impunity, they add up to something else or take themselves away. When they are called statistics, they lie. When they are angled, they get obtuse. And when they are money, they disappear. Put them on a form with words in fine print and they scare me to death.

I also have trouble making numbers do as I ask. For instance, I can write the number 56 but when I am not looking, the five and the six sometimes change places. That happens a lot in my checkbook. I have difficulty with zeroes, too. I was told in first grade that a zero represented nothing. Then I was asked to subtract 9 from 10. You can see my dilemma.

As a child, I was an embarrassment to my mother who could add whole columns of figures in her head and do long division without crying. I was the last one in sixth grade to earn a gold seal for learning the multiplication tables and the only one to continue using my fingers (and toes) for adding and subtracting long after calculators were introduced to the modern world.

In high school I dreaded math class. I had enough trouble with numbers I could see. When they became letters such as X and Y, I was lost. And when they got all mixed up in word problems – well, I ask you, if a train traveling at X miles an hour passes Chicago at 2:00 p.m. and a car traveling Y miles an hour leaves Des Moines two hours later, who cares where the conductor and the driver of the car meet for lunch?

As for fractions, they make me fractious. They are conveniently marked on the sides of a measuring cup; if I have to do other than cook with fractions, I leave the problem alone. Fortunately, for people like me, the ruler was invented. I am perfectly capable of counting the little lines between the big ones and the only numbers I have to deal with are the ones I am most familiar with (1-12).

*********

I reach over and remove eight ones cubes from my student's paper. She watches me with indifference. "How much is left on your paper?" I ask her. She counts the remaining cubes.

"Five," she sighs.

I write 18 + 5 = ____  on a piece of paper. "Can you add those numbers?" I ask. She takes a pencil, chews on the eraser for a moment, does some magic with her fingers and says, "Twenty-three."

"That's the number we started with," I gloat, trying to rouse some enthusiasm in the small, pained face before me. "Good job! Shall we try another problem?"

My pupil looks at me with a sigh of resignation. "I'd rather go to the nurse, please."

You Think?

I walked down by the river

 

through the covered bridge

past the newly fuzzy yellow willow tree

 

and the reddening osier withes.

The first of the returning red-winged blackbirds

 

sang amongst the budding branches.

Is it spring, do you think?

An overnight snowstorm thwarted travel plans.

 

By 11 a.m. the sky showed signs of clearing.

 

An hour later the clouds boiled up over the hill

and down came the snow!

The birds, however, are not fooled. Today I saw a flock of fat, orange-breasted robins, their feathers fluffed against the cold. The winter birds - the juncos and nuthatches and chickadees - chirped from the feeders but the robins picked frantically at a bit of exposed ground, looking for something more substantial than seeds. Not finding anything, they lifted and flew awkwardly into the wind.

I thought of them often during the day, wondering what drove them to come back before the snows of March had melted, before the ground released sleepy worms, before bugs swarmed and grubs hatched. What drives any of us to go forward before conditions are favorable? Partly it’s genetic inheritance, and in the case of birds, factors such as food supply and a safe place to nest. Come to think of it, that applies to humans, too. We can’t always explain our own journeyings. We respond to some inner urging that makes us flee safety and head into the perilous unknown.

We all come to times in our lives when we have to make some small obeisance to bravery. We face a loss or a challenge and off we go into the unknown with our thimbleful of faith, trusting that whatever we believe in will sustain us along the way.

I cannot know what those robins were thinking as they hurried north into unexpected snow and ice, or what survival plans they made as they shivered together at the edge of the meadow. I hope they find sustenance in some sheltered part of the woods, that food and a place to sleep are close at hand. For my part, I will look for them again tomorrow. I have cleared a space beneath a large pine, a place where the snow was already beginning to melt. Perhaps they will find food there among the rotted leaves and the twining roots. Perhaps, unwittingly, I am a contributor to their thimbleful of faith.

Spring Break

Snowflakes and raindrops and

no school, oh my!

 

We're getting a dose of winter. The roads are treacherous, the wet, heavy snow is threatening to down tree limbs and power lines, and the school where I work is closed for the day.  My neighbor's house, though only a few hundred feet away, is nearly obscured by a curtain of wafting flakes. The storm is beautiful and inconvenient, dangerous and flamboyant, and will be followed by yet another that is swirling into position off the Atlantic coastline. By Saturday, though, the weather will have settled, the snow will again start its slow withdrawal, and we will be a few days closer to spring.

Addendum

I succumbed to the lure of the outdoors and took a long walk. A mile from home the snow turned to rain and I turned reluctantly. It isn't cold - the temperature is hovering right around 35 degrees - and I could have happily stayed outside for hours. I made a little snow companion in the seat of my outdoor swing. He looks a little more wistful than his brother of a few months ago, pictured below Little Snow Dude II.

Wistful Little Snow Dude II

 

Happy Little Snow Dude I

 

 Dawn and the promise of sunshine

 

that splashes on the floor through a window prism.

I soaked my bare toes in color

for luck...

and as luck would have it

one of these, a red shouldered hawk,

balanced precariously on the fence post

just outside my window.

I could not reach my camera but found this image

(see below). 

Often small birds - juncoes, sparrows, chickadees - 

will spend a moment preening on the post. 

Once or twice a squirrel has made it

a lookout point.

The hawk was a surprise - I can still feel

my jaw dropping.

The sun and wind were irresistible. I bundled up

and went out looking for signs of spring. The wind is

cold but not bitter, the pond's edges are beginning to melt,

skunk cabbage whorls are visible in the snow,

and I startled a flock of robins into windy flight.

In a mere month spring will be declared, rain will wash away 

the last of the grimy snow,

and I won't have to go looking for signs.

I will be surrounded by the season.

And so the great wheel keeps turning.

*hawk photo from: birdsasart.com

At The Cobble On Sunday

 

The sun dances on the river

under hand-holding trees

 

while tumbled rocks pull snow quilts

over their shoulders and sleep

Out of the mouths...

I made Valentines for my two grandchildren early in the week and sent them off in the mail. I was on the phone with my son when the cards arrived. "Here," he told the two of them as they hovered near the phone. "Memere sent you cards."

I heard a rip, an exclamation, silence. Then the small voice of my six year old grandson. "This says I stole Memere's heart! I don't have her heart! I didn't steal it!" Then, with growing consternation, "Did I?"

He's big into policemen ("I'm a COP!" he announces as he approaches with plastic handcuffs. "You're under arrest!"). He loves the thrill of the chase and there's usually jail time involved in their big leather armchair. I thought he'd get a kick out of thinking he stole my heart. Apparently not.

"I'll let you go," I told my son. "And I'll let you explain." I hung up hastily.

I haven't spoken to them since Wednesday. I hope I don't have to do jail time on my next visit.

One Bright Spot

Years ago when I was homesteading in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont with my then husband and our four children, I met a man who introduced himself, saying, “I’m Bill. I author for a living.” He was standing in the cellar hole of our unfinished log cabin, admiring the way we were making ourselves snug there for the coming winter. “I’m just up the road,” he said. “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask.”

As it turned out, I had occasion to ask often. Our hand dug well went dry before Christmas. He helped us haul water. When he bought himself a new refrigerator, he gave us his old one and though we had no electricity, we used it as an ice box, filling the top shelf with jugs of frozen water and storing our food on the shelves below.

When, one after another the children came down with chicken pox, he took pity on me. For two months I’d nursed the older three. Now the fourth and youngest was ill. One cold day in March he drove down the hill to fetch us, made a bed for my daughter in front of his fireplace, drew a steaming hot bath, filled it with scented soap bubbles, and left us to enjoy his house for the day.

He constantly issued invitations to come watch the ballet or the Olympics or the news on his television. He would call and say, “Come. I need you to read this.” I’d hike the mile to his house to find one of his manuscripts on a table, a red pen beside it. He’d have poured coffee, set out a bowl of nuts and disappeared into another part of the house. I’d sit for an hour in the sunny room, reading and making comments in the margins. He’d amble in after awhile and we’d talk. He called me the Queen of East Hill and loved to tell stories about his adventures in the Navy or his latest writing project. I never left without a hug and a borrowed book or two under my arm from the hundreds and hundreds he owned.

On the day my divorce was final, he wrapped his arms around me and let me sob until I had no tears left. Then he bundled me into his car and drove me to a cemetery where we parked overlooking the rising hills that jostled each other on their way to Canada. We wandered among the gravestones. “These people all had problems,” he told me, “and someday you’ll be here, too. Try not to waste too much of your living time in regret and sorrow.”

My memories of the years that immediately followed my divorce are shadowed, though as in all hard times, there were bright spots. Bill was one of them. He gave my sons jobs around his house so they could earn pocket money. He paid me to clean, to iron his shirts, to edit his writing. He dropped off melons and strawberries out of season, let me spend a weekend in his summerhouse when my kids were with their dad, loaned me his car when mine was in the shop.

Once the three oldest kids were off to college, I sold the log cabin and made my way back to my old home in Massachusetts. Bill and I kept in touch for a while but like many long distance relationships, ours was reduced to a card at Christmas and then to no correspondence at all. Last week I learned he died this past December. Now there’s a hole in my heart where he dwelt but in my memory he is still a beautiful, bright spot.

His obituary is here. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/14/arts/14lederer.html

Counting Blessings

desk where I do my bookwork

Checking my bank balance after writing the monthly bills, I've ruefully decided I will never be rich. As I was mentally reviewing my financial woes before going to sleep last night, it occurred to me that though I may not have millions or even hundreds in the bank, I am rich beyond measure in the things that really count.

I have my health. All my faculties work. Some better than others, it’s true. I can see a sunrise bathe the morning in gold or watch dusk cloak the landscape in royal purple. And with my glasses on I can see clear across the room. I can hear birdsong and laughter and music, and if they don’t mumble, I can hear other people when they talk to me. I can smell freshly baked loaves of bread and the soup bubbling on the back of the stove. I can also smell snow in the air (and danger there, too when I wax poetic about snow to the wrong people). I revel in the cuddly touch of polar fleece and the puffy softness of my down quilt. I like the satin smoothness of bread dough under my kneading fingers and the stickiness of cookie dough that must be licked from the spoon.

I have a place to come home to, a beautiful little cottage with lots of windows to let in the light. There’s room (if I rearrange all the furniture) to toss a mattress on the floor for whatever wandering guest, child, or welcomed grandchild is here for a sleepover. Not everyone is as lucky as I.

My happiness knows no bounds. If I started to count the things that made me happy I’d be up all night. I have four children that have grown into marvelous adults and they still love me. I have two grandchildren and a daughter-in-law that have caused my heart to grow at least three sizes. I have friends with whom to share my greatest joys and my deepest sorrows (and all the paltry stuff in between). I have food in the pantry and clothes in the closet and a cat that prefers my lap to all others.

My bankbook may be a lot thinner than my waistline but it is by no means the measure of my wealth. That's a good thing to know.

A Day In The Life Of...

 

The setting moon

 

the rising sun

 

the frozen pond

 

the day begun

 

a snow filled nest

 

some wings of white

 

the sinking sun

 

and so, goodnight.