Month: September 2011

Words I like to say

/ Sheila / 6 Comments

Haboob. Tittabawassee. Titicaca. Plethora. Williwaw. Superfluity.

Go ahead. Look ’em up. They’re all legitimate words or place names.

Try saying these words yourself. They roll off your tongue, and you may find yourself repeating them for the sheer fun of it.

Even better than just saying them to yourself, try working them into casual conversation. Try working all of them into a conversation with the same person. I’m starting to giggle thinking about that one.

Can you tell it was a long cool summer here?

Fall is in the air

/ Sheila / 9 Comments

What’s magic about this season? Many people say this is their favorite time of year, and that’s true for me too. I always think the calendar should begin with September. It seems like the true start to the year, forever tied in my mind to the beginning of a new school cycle. From my own years as a student, through the years of my children’s education, that rhythm was permanently ingrained. Even without a tie to the school calendar now, so many rituals focus on back-to-school events that I can’t escape the reality that summer has ended, a new season has begun. And although summer traditionally brings luxurious down time and a more relaxed pace of life, it feels good to get back to a schedule, a routine, a defined expectation of the week after summer vacations end.

Aside from the back-to-school sales, the beginning of football season, and early advertisements for Halloween (already there are masses of bags filled with bite-sized candy bars beckoning in the grocery aisles), temperatures announce that change is in the air. The sun in September has a different quality in its warmth, a different brightness in its light. By October, mornings and evenings are crisp, and by November, some days there is frost on the steps outside my front door. The familiar ritual, pulling out sweaters and boots, gloves and coats, moving the summer wear out and the winter wear in, signals that turtleneck season, stretching from September to May in Alaska, has arrived.

When my kids were little, we made annual visits to apple orchards to buy apples and cider, and to pumpkin patch farms to pick pumpkins. It was fun to have exposure to the harvest season as we weren’t connected with these experiences in other ways. It was good to see my kids learn a little about harvest time and enjoy a taste of fruit bought from the source rather than a grocery store. There is just something completely heartwarming about drinking fresh pressed cider and riding on a tractor trailer pulling excited pre-schoolers around a farm.

I like pumpkins; they’re my favorite choice for fall decorating. I add a few brightly colored leaves and nuts, some seasonal berries and cinnamon scented candles, and decorating is done from September to November. I think you get more bang for the buck from fall decorating than in any other season. And the best part: so much of what you use is available in a natural form, right from the grocery store or farmer’s market. The produce section alone offers enough variety to dress up your look for any party you host from Labor Day to Thanksgiving.

The best part of fall has to be the food: iconic comfort food like soups, chili, stews; and sweets made with apples, nuts, raisins, pumpkin and all the familiar spices. Even the beverages are unique to the time of year…apple cider and spiced teas and coffees seem just right in October and November. I never think of drinking a cinnamon flavored coffee in July…why is that? But this time of year I’m focused on warm luxury in my beverages, and topping off a spiced coffee with a little sweetened whipped cream is a perfect start to the day or end to the evening. Sampling a pumkin cobbler or apple cranberry pie is a frequent pleasure. I bake more this time of year, and I appreciate the comfort of homey aromas coming from the kitchen when I open the door after work and remember that I put a stew in the crockpot before I left for the day.

Anticipation is key; I know what happens next, and I love it. We’re all getting ready to spend more time indoors, gear up for the Christmas season, celebrate once again the Thanksgiving holiday that reminds us of the importance of family, friends, good times, good food, and the traditions that bind it all together. So here’s to Fall, the magical (and real) start to a new year, a new cycle, and the best of comfort, home, and harvest.

If two are alike, one is unnecessary

/ Sheila / Leave a comment

I’m drawn to the same things over and over again in my choice of style…in dress, in home decor, in color scheme. Clear glass vases, decanters, serving pieces call to me. Always have, always will. I love the crispness of khaki and white and cranberry. You could follow a paint trail from Michigan to Colorado to Alaska and find similar color swatches in all my homes. I’ve been known to buy a second pair of shoes that I love, to have as back up, and…just because I love the first pair so much.

But you know, when I do that, I end up saving my spare pair because it’s my spare. If I use them, I won’t have them. Ok, at the risk of exposing my craziness, I’ll bet I’m not the only woman who does this. I’ll bet a lot of women paint the same colors as they move from house to house, or find themselves buying another piece of (fill in the blank here) because they just couldn’t resist.

But as I sort my stuff, prepare for a move, I have to be honest here. I don’t need duplicates of wine decanters or cake stands.

So what’s the point of this, other than a little self-examination and personal pledge to buy less, (or at least buy different!)?

I had a conversation recently about what’s better for relationships: having a lot in common, or bringing very different personalities together? You know, the idea that opposites attract versus the reality that common interests draw people together. I heard, “If two are alike, one is unnecessary.” I thought of my multiples of possessions. Then I thought about the couples I know. True, some seem to have a lot in common. But most seem very different, in personalitiy, in interests, in likes and dislikes.

A successful partnership draws on the strengths of everyone involved. The goals of the partnership are shared, but the talents had better be unique to each person on the team. You don’t need multiple people who have the same skills (stay with me here, this is a small partnership, I’m not talking about corporate giants). You need diversity, flexiblity, and the insights that each person can share with others, based on a unique point of view, a unique skill set, unique tastes.

So it is with personal relationships, I believe. Yes, you must have interests that draw you, and common goals if you are in a marriage, a family, a friendship. None of these relationships work without cooperation or shared desires and values. But I go back to the thought that two things (or people) who are alike make one of them unnecessary. I like the point this drives home. It reminds me to celebrate the individual gifts and talents in my own relationship, to acknowledge that my husband is good at things I am not. And my strong points stand out because they are different from his.

So next time I’m tempted to buy yet another vase, or decanter, next time I’m in the paint department at the hardware store, I’m going to do it. I’ll choose something different, a new color. Because if two are alike, one is unnecessary.

My own little lake

/ Sheila / 2 Comments

Rain again this past weekend. When I say it rained, I don’t mean we had a shower. No, we had a deluge. AGAIN. For all those people in Texas who need rain…believe me, I would send you days of the stuff if I could.
 
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I have a small lake in my basement. This isn’t a new thing. The house was built in 1920 and has been remodeled over the years, so this problem has been addressed before, by others. But never fixed, apparently. When we have heavy rain, we get seeping ground water that comes up through fine cracks in the concrete floor. Not really a problem, doesn’t seem to do any harm. But I’m tired of sweeping out the lake on a regular basis, and I keep wondering what would happen if we had a potential buyer checking us out on a day that the basement floor is liquid. Not an easy thing, I’m thinking, to reassure someone that the water only rises to a certain point and then recedes.
 
Saturday we had a contractor come over to give us ideas about effective treatment. Install a sump pump, redirect one of the downspouts behind the house, put a drain in the basement floor with a collection box…oh, all can be done for the small sum of about $2,000. And it is a small sum, as these types of repairs go. But you never know WHAT you may run into when you begin these things, so we are to understand that $2,000 is the least we’re looking at. Could be higher. Much higher.
 
I’m thinking these days of how I can turn anything and everything to income. Maybe I can write about the perils of owning a house that’s almost 100 years old. Maybe I can give advice to other basement/lake owners. Maybe I can become an expert on sump pumps. I don’t know. All I know is that I’m coming to a cliff in a few months, one that I’m willingly walking toward, and I’m jumping off without reliable income. AND I have this little basement issue. What to do, what to do!
 
Fortunately Rob will pay for the basement. In our universe, he usually covers these types of things. The bigger bills don’t typically come my way. But it does make me think a bit.
 
Really, I expect to be ok. I’m having fun learning about portable and alternative income sources. I’ve already committed to relief work at the hospital, and I’m thinking about entrepreneurial options, everything from baking to editing to whatever else I stumble on. I’m excited to try my wings, and if I grow them on the way down, as the saying goes, that just makes it all the more fun.
 
So this week, I’m going to become an expert on basement drainage. I think the contractor’s coming over tomorrow to get started, and if you see a post or two about the intricacies of pipes, collection boxes and drains, you’ll know why. At least my lake should soon be gone.
 
 

Goodbye white shoes, I hardly wore you

/ Sheila / 5 Comments

September, Labor Day weekend, and my Southern upbringing has kicked in. I wouldn’t be caught dead from now until next Memorial Day in white shoes. Just.not.done. At least for my generation. (Maybe this is more about my age than where I was raised…or both? I’ll have to get back to you on that.)

Mind you, I have no idea where this fashion dictum came from, or how it became so firmly impressed on my young self. All I know is that to violate this rule was taboo in my youth, and whether or not it matters to the fashion police now (if it ever did), I’m obligated to live with this for the rest of my life. You’d think it was important or something. But if it is, I don’t know why.

But not knowing didn’t stop me from passing the white shoes rule on to my daughter. Really I expand this to summer clothes in general…the only possible exception being a tropical location where it’s always acceptable to wear white, whatever the season. (And who decided that? Another fashion mystery!)

Perhaps it’s fortunate for me that I live in a climate that actually encourages me to return to my September-to-May uniform of turtlenecks and heeled pumps. The summer slides are put away. They didn’t get too much wear-time this year anyway. Miserable summer season here. But the weather, at this point, is not the point: I couldn’t violate the calendar. Just can’t do it. My roots are showing!

There are things you leave behind when you move from one side of the country to another: regional produce, local customs, favorite eateries. Without any effort on my part, my Southern accent has mostly faded away from long years of disuse (although it revives a bit when I go back for a visit). But some things…the white shoes rule, for instance…follow me about from place to place, a passenger in my head, mostly forgotten, but somehow silently monitoring the calendar, and then, ca-ching, like my oven timer, a bell goes off internally to remind me of The Rule. The same thing will happen Memorial Day…my Southern self will wake up, reminding me, nudging me. Change of seasons, change of shoes.