Story Start Part 4
December 1, 2008|Comments (22)
If you are new to this story, then you will want to start from the beginning. Click here to do so. And please, help me out with a title. I’m afraid I am clueless when it comes to these things. Let me know what you think:
Accidentally stolen ink pens and piles of crumpled receipts marked the distance between the discovery of the finger bone to the present. Time trickled, dripped, and tripped steadily onward yet Sue Ellen often found her mind wandering back to the events of that spring day while scrubbing a commode or struggling in and out of her Wellies on the stoops of the drab adobe houses of the Sheltering Arms Retirement Community.
As she left Barbara Goodlin’s house (which was piled with unopened UPS packages containing items ordered on countless credit cards from the Home Shopping Network) and turned to head home, she noticed a large chocolate lab bounding toward her just in time for the great muddy beast to place two huge paws on her shoulders and send her sprawling onto Mrs. Goodlin’s lawn. Her cleaning supplies launched into the air as if an M-80 had gone off in the bottom of the bucket. Sue Ellen lay in the wet grass unable to breathe, surrounded by damp rags, toilet brushes, and bottles of cleaning solutions. The dog, delighted to have found a new friend, lay across her chest and proceeded to lovingly lick her face with a broad pink tongue.
“Samson!”
Sue Ellen could just make out a man’s voice above the panting and slurping. The dog was suddenly lifted from her chest and hands grasped her shoulders to pull her upright. The hands belonged to a rather rumpled looking priest complete with a lopsided clerical collar.
“I am so sorry. Are you alright? Samson ducked out of his collar and took off.” The man looked down at her and blushed. “It appears that he’s done considerable damage to your clothing.”
It was only then that Sue Ellen became aware of her clothing. The dog’s paws had not only covered her in mud but had also torn her blouse. She grabbed at her coat in an attempt to cover herself which only seemed to make the priest even more embarrassed. His blush deepened and he looked away.
“I would drive you home but I don’t have a car. I took the bus here and then just walked.” He told her as he helped her to her feet. Samson looked up at her with such apologetic eyes that she very nearly forgave him for knocking the wind out of her. “I’ll help you collect and carry the cleaning stuff to your car. Okay?”
She smiled gratefully, “That would be lovely. I live just around the corner and don’t have a car either.”
He immediately began picking up the brushes, rags, and bottles while she patted the dog’s head and stroked his ears. Why was she allowing this man to help her? Had she really just agreed to let him walk her home? And why on earth was she standing in Barbara Goodlin’s yard with a ripped blouse petting a mud-caked beast while a man at least twenty years her senior wearing a clerical collar cheerfully tossed toilet brushes into her cleaning bucket?
“People don’t walk anymore. Our society is so completely motorized that they assume that a person walking alongside a road must be drunk or part of a prison roadside cleanup. You know?” He grinned as they strolled toward her condo with Samson leading the way. “I had to get a dog so people would stop locking their doors as the drove by me.”
They chatted all the way to her front door and even as she fished for her key. She heard herself invite him in the house for tea and felt a surge of happiness when he accepted. In just a few minutes, she’d changed clothes, the kettle was whistling while Samson lay on her kitchen floor with his tail thumping and the priest was seated at the table telling her how he’d adopted Samson after the dog had wandered down the center aisle during an Easter vigil and shook mud and fur all over the kneeling parishioners and visiting Bishop.
“I just realized that I don’t even know your name.” Sue Ellen said as she introduced herself.
“Neil Hammond,” he said and shook her hand. “Rector at St. Andrew’s Episcopal. I came to the area to visit a girl I dated before I left for Korea. I shipped off just after we decided to get married and I always wondered what happened to her. We lost touch during the war and when I finally returned, she’d gone to Canada to visit family and I was told she’d met someone else. I never had the guts to hunt her down.”
How sad, thought Sue Ellen. “I know all of the residents. Who were you looking for?”
“She may have a different last name now. Goodness knows that enough time has passed. I’ve never forgotten her though.” He stared into his cup of tea so intensely and with such a lonely far away look that Sue Ellen felt an overwhelming urge to just hug the poor man. “Recently, I was told that she returned from Canada after the War with a child. I have to know if that’s true. Don’t let the collar or age fool you — there’s a chance that I’m the father. Helen was something else.”
Apparently all roads lead to the mysterious Miss Helen Clifton.
Have a Handmade Holiday
November 19, 2008|Comments (33)
We decided not to buy anyone gifts this year — everyone will receive handmade items or canned/dried goods from our garden. This meant that I would be working overtime on dishcloths, homemade soap, and little rounds of fabric (with lace edging) to top canned goods like shower caps. Is it worth it? Absolutely.
First up: Basketweave Dishcloth
This sweet and easy to knit design was an adaptation of a scarf pattern that I came across and declared perfect for a dishcloth. You know how I love all things woven so this pattern really spoke to my inner pioneer. It also doesn’t contain any tricky knitting moves — all straight knitting and purling.
Second: Canning Jar Fabric Lid Covers
A classic way to make a gift of garden goodies a little more glamorous, these scrap fabric jar covers say: “gift” to me. I love the snazzy little bit o’ lace (not real lace… the cheapo stuff) on the edge and the bright festive colors.
Third: Barley Soup Mix
Just dried beans, veggies, and spices — this simple but useful gift may be decorated with the canning jar fabric lid covers or with a bow. I like to add an ornament and I dress up my labels (printed from the computer with cooking directions) with festive clip art.
Last but not least: Drawstring Soap Sack
Having made a small ton of soap this year, I have quite a few bars to give out to our friends and family. Wrapping soap seems like a very silly idea so a plush drawstring bag seems appropriate. Don’t you think? These are made with two fleecy washcloths sewn together with some string. So much better than wrapping paper… useful, too!
A Handmade Holiday is my favorite part of simple living. The act of trading costly gifts during the holidays may be open for debate but the act of giving gifts that are from the heart, full of love, and made by hand — there’s nothing trite or commercial in that. No one ever went into debt with a Handmade Holiday.
When the Past Knocks…
November 11, 2008|Comments (24)
This was my favorite house at Westville Village (where we spent Saturday afternoon). I could move in tomorrow if they promised to insulate the walls. Seriously — that would be the one request. Oh, and also a little thing called “internet.” The Harris Farmhouse spoke to my soul from the moment we rounded the corner and recognized the scent of sugar cane syrup cooking. There in the dappled light stood a dog-trot log home with an open breezeway linking the main house to the kitchen
On the back porch, dishes were set to soak in a slightly cracked earthenware kettle beside a folded dishcloth and a lye soap cake overlooking a garden and paddock with sheep. My heart began to sing. I confess to sitting on the steps and simply soaking it all in. Aside from internet, I truly believe that I was born in the wrong generation. As I sat on the splintered stairs, I watched Josh explore the chicken coop and offer reassuring pats to the sheep — I was overwhelmed by a sense of belonging.
Are we generationally displaced? Throwbacks to a forgotten time? As we wandered from house to house on narrow clay streets dotted with mule droppings and scarred with wagon wheel tracks, I can’t help but wonder why our civilization believes that we have progressed in comparison. In the pre-industrial age, there was no global warming or home owners associations to measure the length of your grass. People lived in communities and knew that each member of the town provided an important craft be it shoemaking or basket weaving. Those traditional skills linked the early settlers into more than just a subdivision — they were a family. Can our society really say that we have improved since then?
Of course, medical sciences and other advances have certainly impacted society for the better since those of us outside of the third world do not have to worry about contracting Yellow Fever or Tuberculosis. But the sense of community? Lost. How about truly closeknit families? Rare.
As Josh and I reflect on our time at Westville Village, we keep returning to the same phrase: “Let’s not let our children wander around such a town and mourn the lack of a closeknit family. Let’s make sure that they wander through such a place with confidence — knowing how to churn butter, make soap, weave, build tables and chairs, spin, quilt, garden, cook over a fire, and also knowing that they didn’t spend their childhood parked in front of a television but making memories.”
What are your favorite childhood memories? What memory do you think your children will recant to their children as a best-loved tale? Are you generationally displaced, too?
Read more about our trip to Westville Village in A Quiltin’ Man and check out homesteaders cattle in Irish Dexters: 4 Door Sedan Bovine. What’s up with all this homesteading talk? We’re wannabes. Plain and simple: wannabes.
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