I was also lazy as hell, and would rather read books or ride my bike instead of practicing scales.
I am determined to give it 15 minutes a day, and have practiced at least that daily for 10 days in a row now. I’ve mastered maybe the first two strings, and am getting a solid grip on 3-6. I’ve got a few songs I can play off my old rehearsal book like Kumbaya and Amazing Grace.
What am I trying to accomplish? Maybe like learn to skate back in 1998, just the basics and see where that takes me. There’s certainly no Adult Nationals for basic guitar. But like figure skating, just keep learning and exercising the old noodle to find a new skill.
So maybe I will suck at two sports and a musical instrument. But I will keep on trying. Hey, I learned how to make apple pie this year after all…
It was on my to-do list to make cloth bags this holiday break, until Cara came a-calling with gifts from her mom.
Mom Pam is a crafter and once she’s done crafting, needs a recipient for her creations. I was gifted with a dozen colorful storage bags, which I immediately put to use.
Pam’s a gift, and to be counted as one of her girls is an honor.
I became a huge fan of author Michael Perry after rereading his book Truck, followed by Coop and Population: 485. After that, I hit Amazon and bought the rest of his catalog. He is the "author in residence" at the Little House on the River.
As mentioned in the blog earlier this year, he's refreshingly accessible to the point I've had to actively NOT like or retweet him so as not to appear to be a groupie or a stalker. Whoa down on the quotes there, mama.
Still, I've had the pleasure of interacting with him directly via social media, and I was invited to a web lecture by the Wisconsin Public Library to hear him read from one of his books and talk about his creative process during the pandemic. Given the opportunity to ask questions via chat, he answered one of my questions (don't remember) and he sent me a tweet thanking me for coming and participating.
Fangirled OUT.
Long story short, I got scammed on Facebook Marketplace by an ad for dirt cheap deck furniture on closeout. No money was lost, just that feeling of frustration not getting what you wanted.
Feeling like I needed to be vindicated, I found a pillow-cut London topaz ring for $13 on Etsy. "We'll see," I thought as I placed my order. It's as amazing as I expected and is a cheerful bit of summer sky on my finger on a dull as dishwater night.
My mom sold the childhood home over the summer, so for the first time in 56 years, another family will be celebrating Christmas at the yellow house on Chester.
I’m satisfied with my last meal at the house. We were in the midst of cleaning one terribly hot June day when Candi and John ran to pick up chicken and burgers. In the meantime, some of the kids we grew up with caught wind we were there and stopped by to hang out. I hadn’t seen April, Randy, and Jason in so long!
So there we all were - mom, my sisters, our husbands and kids, and the old neighborhood kids - hanging out on the back deck, eating chicken and talking about old times. It was a nice goodbye.
This year saw not one but two amazing things from Macca. First was the song Find My Way from his album McCartney III, with the video reimagining him as a 20-something pop star navigating a psychedelic hotel. Strange twist, Paul was actually Beck!
Second was the long-awaited three part documentary Get Back, which is what the original Let it Be should have been. Credit to him for his work ethic and dedication to The Beatles, with a special shout out to Ringo for his patience and loyalty. He believed in the band and wanted to keep it together. Kudos to him also for recognizing he was an ass and didn’t give George enough room to shine; I wish they could have figured that out - in 1969!
And much love to the Beatle wives appearing in the film - there’s a little bit of Yoko, Linda, and Maureen in all of us. I’ve watched the documentary three times (admittedly more viewings of the rooftop concert), and hadn’t caught a glimpse of Patti. But without Olivia, George’s second wife, this wouldn’t have come to fruition, so thanks to her for this and Living in the Material World.
I see a marathon of all things Beatle in my future this holiday break.
It's not often these days when Dave and I can be just the two of us. So we took a week of vacation in August to do just that, and spend the week together while Will stayed up all hours of the night eating pizza and playing video games with his cousin.
We stayed at the cottage and did some minor repairs like installing a new faucet, patching the row boat, and painting the kitchen chairs and coffee table.
Then came the quest to have that bacon burger up north, get some cherries and corn on the cob in the UP. We decided to explore the last corner of the state where we haven't been and spend the night on Drummond Island.
Fun fact: you can OWN your own island up there, for less than you expect. Building a castle and calling yourself Lord and Lady should be a given.
We have our eye on our 25th wedding anniversary celebration, but it's unclear what we should do. I'm lucky enough that we celebrate each other on a routine basis as it is.
Again with the mixed bag. As noted earlier this year, mentally with skating I've been a mess this year.
But you know what? I did it anyway.
I made it to Adult Nationals and while I didn’t place well, I received the second-best presentation marks in my event and a level 2 for my spiral sequence. And huge props for being one of the best dressed skaters. And I got to share the moment with dear friend Sandra. And I was able to celebrate adult skater mom Arlene’s birthday.
And, and, and! This is a flip in attitude from June.
Speaking of June, I also competed at Masters Games, which was part of GRO. Because of judging right up to my event and covid shutting down the locker rooms, I was not well costumed or made up. But I had an enthusiastic audience made up of judges on break and parents from other clubs cheering me on. It was my first USFSA national gold medal (the others have either been ISI gold or silver-pewter).
My next big event is the annual Christmas show, and I will be doing Queen’s A Winter’s Tale. I choreographed it myself, rom the music to choosing the elements. It’s a fresh, easy program with room to stretch and embrace doing what I love to do.
I just found out Karen, a childhood friend of mine, died last year in September 2020.
I'm sad to realize she's been gone that long without knowing. Admittedly, I don't think I've seen her in at least 20 years and we weren't in touch on social media; when reviewing her facebook page, I was surprised to note none of us from grade school were in touch with her.
It is unclear how or why she passed, but that's none of my business; I lost the right to know her private details long ago. But what I did discover is the story of a woman who was strong in her battle with addiction, surrounding herself in prayer and positivity. People were there for her. The photos I found were of someone who loved sunshine and smiles, rock music and flowers, and most of all, her daughters and grand daughters.
She was loved.
I can offer this as way of a memorial that is far too late:
Wills has played baseball with the same group of kids for the last six years. One of the boys who struggled with a growth spurt didn’t get a hit until late into the season, one of those squibbers that died on the infield and the batter legs out to first from sheer determination.
It counts, but it's weak.
Into the playoffs, and this kid is still giving it 100%.
And then it happens.
He makes solid contact and the ball soars, flying free in the early Saturday morning mist, towards the deepest part of the field, over the centerfielder's head, and smacks into the chain link fence.
Confusion on the base path quickly turns into an aggressive trek towards home. It's a two-run double. Coffee, water, and gatorade is spilled as the collective fans cheer for the no-doubter. That was solid, Gio.
Take the sweetness of the Abby situation, then. Last year when the state figure skating high school championships were cancelled, I requested a list of graduating seniors to write congratulations letters. First was to Abby from Mt Pleasant FSC.
Fast forward a couple of months and Ginni, the pro at Mt Pleasant, asks if I know of any place for one of her students to live, as her school didn’t have dorms. Well, the minor league season was just cancelled, so why not us?
She was the daughter we didn’t know we were missing. We thoroughly enjoyed her time with us. We saw her blossom, try sushi for the first time, we went skating together, and was a shoulder to cry on. We ordered Chinese while watching Nationals, and completed a Special Olympics frozen 5k, above.
She moved out at the end of her year, and decided it was time to be on her own. She’s still coming over for dinner when there’s chicken and rice on the menu and boys to talk about.
Back in 2008 when I decided to start this blog as a creative outlet, I was going to do reviews of the old cassettes in the basement, as I still owned a car with a cassette deck.
Fitting that for the 500th post, I am talking about music, and going back to my cassettes, many of which are still in the basement, slowly dry-rotting from not being played.
That won't do. So I splurged on a tape-to-MP3 converter to see if I could rescue the recordings.
This experiment is a mixed bag. The fact is, the recording is only as good as your tape's quality. I tried first to record Paul McCartney's Unplugged, which features one of my favorite versions of Here, There, and Everywhere. It turned out pretty ok.
Next, I tried to convert his solo greatest hits album All The Best. Oh no. First, the tape is a long player, so 90 minute instead of 60. Old, so the playback draaaaaaaaaged. No one wants to hear "Baaaaaaand on the Rrrrrrrrrun...!" at super slow warp speed.
I moved on to J. Geils Band greatest hits. Screechy, tinny, noisy. Sigh.
I still have some rarities, so I will continue to revisit the old school format, and figure if they are worth saving or worth free cycling to someone who still has and loves their cassette deck.
I’m not much of a collector. But when I found an Old World glass ornament of a little basket of strawberries at the antique store, I decided then and there this would be my thing. Good thing was, I already had some in my possession to establish a collection.
She's like a rainbowwwww
So the pandemic is still a thing, my boy is on the edge of his teens, we live on top of a hill on a dead end street, and since we are all still working from home, no work Halloween party.
But it's still Halloween, dammit. I have to do something.
On Wednesday, we volunteered for the Ronald McDonald House trunk or treat. A branch of Young Professionals, sponsored by the United Way, held an event for patients and their families to come play games and score lots of treats, costumes encouraged.
I threw on as much striped gear as I could, called myself a rainbow, and we headed over.
And, it was kinda awkward. For one thing, I'm not a young professional. And the crowd of 20- and 30-somethings was not exactly welcoming. We decorated treat bags, then filled bags for families who were over at the NICU. Will and I, and then eventually Dave stuck it out for an hour.
The Young Professionals were extremely generous with the treats for the kids. Full sized board games, theatre boxes of candy, stuffed animals, balls of all kinds, dolls, army men, and more. As a parting gift, I got a box of Starburst, Dave Reeses Pieces, and Will got candy and a baseball.
Since the holiday is on a Sunday and we are in the West Michigan Bible Belt, I'm still not sure when trick or treating is happening in our community. In the past, it's been done on Saturday night. I'm seeing stuff for Saturday AND Sunday night posted. But that is contingent on if Will even wants to bother to go out. He's not too keen on it. I just remember dying to go out. The last time I trick or treated as a kid was when I was 14, and it was only tied to a slumber party at my friend Jill's. I was a flapper and we danced to David Bowie in her basement.
Wow, not a lot of cohesion to this post, more of a holiday ramble. It's dark out even this morning and it's been raining for days.
The worst part of the pandemic for me has been my skating identity crisis. Last year, I went months without skating, then even longer without a lesson. This year hasn't been much better. Add that to the "is it all worth it?" drama I put myself through in June and breaking in new boots.
Thankfully, competing the Detroit one miler really gave me a new lease on joy - do it because you want to!
And that really pulled my head into a new mind space in skating.
I'm still not getting lessons, so I'm not improving in move or dance. The skills I can do I have been able to do for years. I've been mapping out my own programs for a while now, and Michelle comes in to clean up what doesn't make sense later on.
So what would make me happy?
Last time I skated with the girls, I was playing around with elements I haven't done in a while, like a half toe walley and a mazurka. Next thing I knew, I cobbled together a choreographed step sequence.
I pulled out my dusty list of songs I've wanted to skate to but never have. One was The Girl That I Knew Somewhere by The Monkees. In all my time skating, I think I've only ever seen one person skate to them. Lob off the last 20 seconds, and I have a silver free skate.
I know, back in July I swore I wouldn't do another free skate since it wasn't working for me competitively. And honestly, with all the adult competitions on hiatus, I don't know the next time I will compete. This one is just for the love of skating.
Opening pose inspired by Julie Newmar as April Conquest from an episode of the show. Start with the ten fox solo dance steps to the three turn, then I do a flip/toe.
After combo, I stepped forward into an inside spread eagle, then do a layback.
After the spin, I do the silver MIF eight-step mohawk sequence to the left into a salchow.
After the sal comes the choreo steps: chasse - choctaw - toe turn pirouette - left outside 3 turn - half toe walley - left foot glide - right outside three to toe turns - left power three - two step cross wide - rocker - cross under - step forward - mohawk.
Steps into lutz.
Step forward to right inside spiral, toe loop.
Back spiral, mohawk to salchow/loop.
Glide to step up combo spin, which will include a sit spin and back corkscrew to finish.
It's fun, it's fast, it's a challenge. There's stuff that is not in my comfort zone, but that and music means I'm rocking something new and fresh, even at 52 years old. And I'm back in a happy place skating-wise.
Sometimes, I wonder if I'm ridiculous. I'm an overweight, near-sighted, flat-footed recreational skater and runner that likes to collect shiny prizes for the sake of being active, and admittedly, the boost it gives my fragile ego. Occasionally, I luck into actually winning something.
But before I start going too far down the imposter syndrome rabbit hole, it's good to take the advice of some larger than life characters:
Oooooo, shiny stuff!
I had a pretty busy October planned before a COVID panic derailed our plans. Unfortunately, I had committed to judging the same weekend as the Detroit Freep Marathon. Tempted by the shiny prizes, I regretted that I had a schedule conflict.
No problem, sez organizers: we have a virtual race option.
Well, sign me up.
Ugly apples make a delicious pie.
We ended up at the cottage this past weekend when we shouldn't have. One of Will's friends contracted COVID, and because Will was in close contact, he had to quarantine. And because I am Will's guardian and in close contact to him, that meant I had to quarantine as well.
No school.
No in-person work.
No vendor party.
No River Bank Run.
No wedding reception.
No skating.
No going out to dinner.
Harrumph.
As usual, we made the best of it, and cleaned up the yard in warmish sunshine. That meant picking up the apples that had fallen and making a nice big batch of apple pie filling with the rescued produce. I read two books. The boys watched college football. Naps were taken. Inventory on the freezer was taken and consumed.
And after all of our precautions, it ends up we both tested negative. I was pissed, and wondered if we did the right thing after all. I mean, there's scores of people in the world doing whatever they want to do even if they tested positive. Dave shut me down by saying what if I had done all of these things and were positive? I don't think I could live with the guilt of this either.
I'm still coming to terms with missing out on life events like Jess' wedding and the RBR. But a bad day at the cottage is still a day at the cottage.
I was supposed to start my last class towards my certificate today, Person and Profession. I received the syllabus on Sunday morning, and everything in my head told me "No."
No? Aren't I the bulldog that pushes through everything to make it happen?
When I first decided to enroll in the Leadership program, there was one class above all others I wanted to take: Creativity and Innovative Problem Solving. I wanted that to be my first class but locked out, I ended up in Leadership Dynamics. Then came the two required courses. I aced them all.
Facing the syllabus on Sunday morning, I was peeved. This was not my class. This was not at all what I wanted to study. I read through and could not find the gumption to care. Even when some of the required videos were comedies? Nope.
I gave it a day and thought maybe I was just in a mood and I should tackle the syllabus and readings one more time. The first assignment was an 800-page book in a pdf format. Then I took the syllabus quiz, which had a couple of gotcha questions. I hate gotcha questions.
The answer was still no.
So the question I had to ask is why I wanted to finish up so quickly. It wasn't a race. No one was going to applaud me if I finished in December instead of April. And this last elective was an opportunity to study what I wanted to study.
I logged on to my student account and found all the sections of the Creativity class for the winter semester. Of the five classes available, there were only seven open spots. I quickly claimed one of them. Then I switched to this semester's account and dropped the course. Instantly, I felt a weight lift from my shoulders AND my stomach.
So the journey towards completing this degree is taking a rest. The only loss is the dangling charm on my graduation tassel that says 2021. No big deal, I was able to remove it. The journey continues on March 14, and the party commences in April.
What was I expecting, Tales from the Crypt?
While staycationing at the little house, I braved ducking my head down into the crawl space under the house, and was relieved to see it was relatively clean down there. Dave asked if I was willing to go down under, and immediately my skin crawled and I said no way.
Fast forward to this past weekend. I had already baked the apple crumble and Will starts bugging me to go under the house. He has recently developed a taste for the creepy and was eager to see if our mini basement was creepy as well. Ok then...
I got the crawl space ladder out, put my shoes on, and we debated who would go down first. Suddenly, Will is a chicken. Fine, I'll go. It was a matter of taking a step and a half, and I was down there, my head poking above the trap door. I crouch to explore.
It was damp but dry. Because it was late afternoon, the sun was starting to stream into the windows, so while I needed a flashlight, I could see all four corners pretty clearly. Outside of a spider web, a rake, and a couple of extra pipes, there was absolutely nothing down there. I mean, nothing. The height was, at best, 3 feet, and I had to crouch the entire time. Will simply crawled around looking for some amazing discovery. There was none.
The space is too low and the trap door too small to use the space to store things like the deck chairs. I have plans to maybe get some storage shelves and some air-tight, water proof containers so i won't have to lug things like Christmas decorations back and forth, but then again, I'm thinking I'd rather not have to crawl down there when it's 3 degrees outside. And crawl I will have to do. Knowing we have the space in case we need it is nice, but maybe I will hold off on those plans until after Christmas, when the stuff is there.
"Can I sail through the changing ocean tides, can I handle the seasons of my life?"
