This year Tim & I celebrated the summer solstice at home, just the two of us. I spent the day preparing side dishes, potato salad, cucumber salad, etc. Unusual for me as I’m not fond of cooking, but it can be fun once in a while, for something special. There was anticipation in the air because when I went to buy salmon in the morning, the fish guy (a butcher sells meat, who sells fish?) was excited because he had some rare wild white king salmon to offer me! His enthusiasm was contagious and so I bought it.
6.21.11 ~ Avery Point
When Tim came home from work we cooked our dinner together, poached salmon with dill sauce, drank some mead one of his coworkers brewed, and listened to my new summer solstice playlist. The salmon was very good!!! Then we were off to feed the kids’ fish and cat, and then we went to the beach to watch the sunset. Returned home and had some more mead while we watched the movie A Midsummer Night’s Dream by candlelight. ‘Twas a lovely evening!
After more than a week of concentrated and intense work on our family history and my garden, I sat down yesterday to catch up on this neglected blog and to visit the blogs of my friends. First I took my turns on Scrabble on Facebook, though, and while playing had my laptop attacked by another virus – apparently the same one (or similar to the one) that infected it when I was playing Scrabble back in March. In spite of my faithfully installing every virus protection update sent to me.
Tech Support (Tim) worked on the situation yesterday and more this morning and then decided to take my laptop to work with him. I’m using his computer for now, again with no access to my word or picture files! But I do have some quote/painting posts scheduled ahead of time that will appear now and then. Feeling a little lost and disconnected…
Typhoid fever! A school child in Connecticut has come down with typhoid fever. Wonder how he or she got it? Hope he or she will be all right…
There may be people who like centipedes… ~ William S. Burroughs (The Western Lands)
Bugs!! Shudder!!! Yesterday I was sitting on the couch for a few minutes taking a break when one of these creatures, which I think must be a house centipede, ran across the living room, lickety-split, and disappeared under the couch. Needless to say I have not sat in the living room since! And reading up on them has not made me feel any better. Much as I avoid chemicals, I think I’m in the mood to buy some “bug” spray!
I had never seen one of these things until the 1990s when I was coming out of the laundry room in the basement and one confronted me in the hallway. It was a good two inches long and an inch wide! I grabbed what was handy, a can of hair spray (good a getting ink stains out of clothing), and started doing battle with the alien. It actually charged at me after I zapped it once. It finally died after tons of spray and I left the scene, shaken. When the family came home and I told my tale and went to show them the remains of the bug, it had dried and shriveled up to almost nothing, and they seemed a little skeptical of my accounting of the enemy’s size and speed and aggressiveness.
Am I losing my mind?
Sometime during the 2000s I was walking on the treadmill, also in the basement, when one of these monsters raced out from under the treadmill and made a beeline for a big pile of storage boxes. I tried to pretend I had not seen what I had just seen, and to get on with my life.
And now yesterday, my third sighting. Why me??? Why do they not come out to terrorize the rest of the family? First two times in the basement, then this time of the first floor. I’ll be hysterical if I ever see one up here on the second floor!
I have learned that house centipedes are not native here, but have arrived somehow from the Mediterranean region. That would be why I had never encountered one before. The only positive spin I can put on this situation is that apparently they eat spiders and ants and can eat a few of them at a time. Still I don’t like the idea of something so big and so fast lurking around my home. I startle way too easily… I had a LOT of trouble falling asleep last night.
Has anyone else ever dealt with house centipedes???
It’s hard to keep up with our kids these days, who have always lived within 50 miles of us since they flew off from our nest over a decade ago! Big changes are afoot!
Larisa passed a licensure exam, granting her permission to practice social work in New York City, where she is planning to move to in July, fulfilling a childhood dream. Her boyfriend Dima already has an apartment lined up for them in the city. At the moment, however, the world adventurers are in Curaçao scuba diving. I wonder if Larisa & Dima will see creatures like the one pictured above as they dive into the sea.
Cumberland Island National Seashore
Nate & Shea have worked from home for a while, which means their home could be anywhere. And the adventure bug has now bitten them, too – they’re planning to move to St. Marys, Georgia this summer. This news really came out of the blue and I’m still trying to absorb it! Before they go, however, they will be taking a Disney cruise in June and I get to feed their fish and their cat, Sassy, while they are sailing around the Caribbean.
So happy for all of them, even if we will miss having them so close. St. Marys is next to Cumberland Island National Seashore so once they get settled I’ll be chafing at the bit to visit them in their new home by the sea.
Tim took a picture of my new tulips (above) yesterday. I suppose I might have planted them a little closer together…
Meems 5.2.11 ~ Woodbridge, Virginia
This sweet little cat is Meems. She used to be named Tibby, but after she gave birth to Tibette her family started calling her Mommy. (And Tibette became known as Baby.) But Mommy’s favorite human, our niece Erica, calls her Meems. She is a Munchkin (breed) who was born in Italy about fifteen years ago, if memory serves. She was a stray who adopted the family we just went to visit, and she was pregnant with Baby when the family moved from Italy back home to Virginia. Baby is not a Munchkin, however, and is larger than her mother!
So Meems is still sweet and petite but is now elderly and suffering with cataracts, it would seem. She dislikes cameras so the only way I could get her to hold her head up was to scratch her chin with one hand and hold the camera with the other. 🙂 She keeps pretty much to herself, so I was startled to find her eye looking like this because my sister Beverly’s cat, Bernie, has the same problem. And it is supposedly rare. But Meems’s vet thinks hers was caused by an injury, and Bernie’s vet thinks his are caused by a virus.
Bernie 7.29.10 ~ Storrs, Connecticut
Cataracts are not as common in cats as they are in dogs; in fact, they are very rare. Most cataracts in the cat develop secondary to inflammation within the eye, from trauma, or some other eye problem. Rarely, cataracts in the cat may be inherited, may arise with abnormal development of the lens, or may occur in association with nutritional abnormalities in the young cat. ~ PetDoc
It seems to me cats, like people, are living longer than they did when I was a child. Long enough to be plagued with more of the infirmities of old age.
Some keep the Sabbath going to Church – I keep it, staying at Home – With a Bobolink for a Chorister – And an Orchard, for a Dome –
Some keep the Sabbath in Surplice – I, just wear my Wings – And instead of tolling the Bell, for Church, Our little Sexton – sings.
God preaches, a noted Clergyman – And the sermon is never long, So instead of getting to Heaven, at last – I’m going, all along.
~ Emily Dickinson (The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #236)
“Home, Sweet Home” by Lizbeth Bullock Humphrey
Save your sermons for someone that’s afraid to love If you knew what I feel then you couldn’t be so sure I’ll be right here lying in the hands of God If you feel angels in your head Teardrop of joy runs down your face You will rise ~ Dave Matthews ♫ (Lying in the Hands of God) ♫
“My Friends, The Carpenter & The Painter” by Carl Larsson
Now that Tim is back at work it is time to roll up my sleeves and restart the massive home interior improvement project. It was just before Tim’s heart attack in 2007 when we started by scraping the “popcorn” ceiling treatment off of the mold prone bathroom ceiling, and painted the ceiling with smooth mold-resistant paint. And the project has not proceeded much since then, time being consumed with elder care and one medical crisis after another.
And then there was the traumatic selling of our grandparents’ Cape Cod houses: Tim’s grandparents’ home in Provincetown in 2009 and the Dennis Port home of my grandparents in 2010. From each house we inherited furniture, keepsakes, paperwork (including boxes of someone’s poetry) and a baby grand piano, all of which have been stuffed wherever I could put them in a hurry. And I’ve tried to get it all organized ever since!
A home is not a lifeless object but a living entity, and like everything that is alive it must obey the law of nature. ~ Carl Larsson (New Swedish Style)
I also have a vision of what I want this place to look like, and it involves the elements of Scandinavian style: light, simplicity and symmetry. One reason we bought this place is that we love the enchanting light here so close to so much water. Yesterday I spent some time with my paint color chip book and my collection of Scandinavian design books. When painting begins I now have chosen the colors for optimum reflection of light.
Simplicity and symmetry are proving more difficult to pull off, but I’m persistent if nothing else. Simplicity is getting there as I pare down – I’ve donated about ¾ of my books and many knick-knacks… I love de-cluttering, but it can be tiring as well as rewarding. Symmetry is getting there, too, although I think the kids may be tired of my calling them so often to help me move furniture up and down the stairs. If the furniture needs moving on the same floor I do it myself with those ingenious “moving men” disks. It’s not unlike a giant three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle!
FreeStyle is a no-cost design show where professional rearrangers de-clutter, reorganize and move furniture and accessories around a room to give homeowners a dramatic new look without spending a dime. ~ FreeStyle: Home & Garden Television
I love and used to watch FreeStyle when I got a chance and have adopted that philosophy while incorporating all these beloved antiques into our home. Especially since I’m blending them in with the contemporary pieces we already have. It’s been a challenge and an adventure and will continue to be as I keep at it! 🙂
Do you have a particular decorating style, or an eclectic one? What would you say is the mood of your home?
It’s spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you’ve got it, you want – oh, you don’t quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so! ~ Mark Twain (Tom Sawyer, Detective)
“Springtime in Giverny” by Claude Monet
We discover a new world every time we see the earth again after it has been covered for a season with snow. ~ Henry David Thoreau (Journal)
“Spring Princess” by Carl Larsson
My slowly growing pysanky collection…
3.18.11 ~ Groton, Connecticut
I made two of the (less prominent) Ukrainian Easter eggs myself several years ago when Aunt Delorma and I took a workshop. It’s NOT easy!!! Can you guess which ones?
The above picture was taken in the Connecticut College Arboretum a year ago today, a warm and bright sunny day. Tonight will be a full moon. Native Americans in this area called this full moon the Worm Moon. According to the Farmer’s Almanac, “as the temperature begins to warm and the ground begins to thaw, earthworm casts appear, heralding the return of the robins.” I have seen a lot of robins recently. And tomorrow will be Spring! We made it!
European robin with earthworm, photo by Rasbak
The period leading up to the spring equinox is … a time of great upheaval in nature: the first full moon of March usually heralds high tides and strong winds that enliven the long-dead period of late winter. The change of spring is one that we welcome with all our hearts, but we appreciate it warmly only because of what has gone before it. Our ability to cope with change will improve if we discover the art of living in the present moment, of being at home where and when we are. Caitlín Matthews (The Celtic Spirit: Daily Meditations for the Turning Year)
Poor Tim is working another weekend… The upheavals at his job have corresponded with the recent upheavals in nature. But he handles changes with a lot more grace than I can usually manage. As for me, I plan to go down to the beach this evening and take in the full moon and a little meditation and grounding. Perhaps there will be a high tide and a strong wind… Maybe something to photograph as I welcome spring.
