Concerning Correspondence

They are taking bets in Middle Earth. Will I really be able to go a week without e-mail on my trip? I say yes, confidently. A couple of skeptics say no way. I hark back to those days when I thought computers were for people out in Research Triangle Park calculating the fish levels at Falls Lake. I didn't know about e-mail. After I learned how, the first person I e-mailed was my neighbor who after two days, slipped the address of his brother, (who might be able to keep up with my volume), under my door. Pretty soon, Second Best was giving homework assignments to keep Moi busy and telling her to breathe into a paper bag as she was hyperventilating. Not that I wasn't busy. I was taking care of children, volunteering at the library, assisting an art teacher with grades k-4, dog walking, cat sitting, driving people to doctor visits, and working on that novel which I still claim to be working on. However, there was always a teeny bit of time (thank you, U!)for checking e-mail. It was recommended after Douglas died that I get grief therapy. I called a hypnotherapist and talked to him for 45 minutes about my plight. "My daughter thinks I need help." He said, "You can make an appointment if you like but really you have marvelous coping mechanisms." Yeah, e-mail. I e-mailed him to thank him and received an e-mail reply with a quote from Einstein, natch. E-mailing from Eureka was particularly nice b/c I could "stay up" for the nightowls on the East Coast. Middle Earth today had a perplexed look when I said I was training the cabinet door to stay closed. You see, I have a Theory of Inanimate Objects which includes a kindness clause. Be kinde to the cabinet door and it will be kinde to ye. On that note, I figured it would be impolite to send an e-mail while yawning but in Eureka if I cut off at 11:00 p.m. Eureka time I was still tres Emily Post. I was like my friend, Scott, who never talked on the phone without brushing her teeth first. Her husband had been the "inventor" of the line, "Promise her anything but give her Arpege." As a remembrance of those two fine people, one of the things I do before e-mailing is give myself a good squirt of L'Occitane's Myrrh and Incense so that Recipients will receive something beautiful with echoes of Tunisia. You can tell, can't you? The Blob will be on holiday next week. You might be sent a postcard with whiffs of New York but don't expect the North Carolina e-mail truck. It will be parked in the shade of the dogwood at Bag End waiting for my return.
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.....may the blessings of beautiful things be yours today and through the night, beautiful things like letters and postcards and instant aromatic telepathic messages....

A Rose

peace rose............................>

A rose by any other name is still a rose. Well, maybe, but I have a penchant for renaming which was handed down by a friend of my mother's in 1937. Leo (Eleanor) did not like my mother's name, Della. Leo didn't think it perky enough for my naturally curly red-haired mother who had once been offered a job with the Ogilvy company because of her incredible hair. So Della became Judy, a good combo for Janz. She was Judy Janz until 1991 when I started taking her to the doctor and she would have to fill out forms using her legal name. I noticed a withering going on and it struck Moi that I should tell the doctor that she was Judy. What a difference. It took twenty years off her age. When my friend Sherry Boone was writing her stories she wanted to know what I'd like to be called. Out of spite, to irritate someone named Claudia, I asked for Claudia as my character name. Sherry said no. "It has to have the ring of the cash register...like Christieeeeen does." I had never thought of myself as a cash cow but I enjoyed the years I was Claudine. For the '70s writing class, I chose the pen name, Zeppha (feminine for Joseph, dreamer of dreams) and Wilder for the writer of Our Town. After a year of classes, a ritzy friend, Scott, said I had to have a 3rd part to my name if I were ever going to make it big on The New York Times Bestseller List. I chose,'Neuf" which is #9 in French and, yes, there is a story that goes with that! Zeppha Wilder Neuf. How likely would you be to read her book? Scott became attached to referring to Moi as Neuf. I even received snail mail at the house addressed to Neuf. The mail carrier was very understanding. My latest incarnation as Moi I find touching. I like being Moi so much I may cease and desist the Renaming Game...unless it's part of a longer appellation. Christine (ding ding) Mimsica Moi.
Comments are welcome with the warning; they can be modified.
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may the blessings of remembering who you are at even the darkest times be yours whatever you call yourself on any given day.....

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A Fair and Dear Colleen

It wouldn't be St. Patrick's Day without a tribute to my sweet mother, the singingest nonsinger in all the world. To hear her tell it, there was no place like Ireland which, unfortunately, I never got to see except in the imagination of her stories. She and her best friend, Cassie Main, would walk the prams to the park when my brother was a baby and I believe there was never as peaceful a time as those days for my mother. "It was so good for my complexion!" painted an odd picture: my mother without freckles? I don't know if it was because her mother was a Leahy or because of natural gravitation but John McCormack would bring forth 5 star commentaries. My mother didn't sing around other people but since I made no judgments on her tunelessness, she sang constantly to Moi. I would try to figure out what the tune might be. She often sang, "Lulla, lulla, lulla,lulla bye bye. Does you want the moon to play with or the stars to run away with? Hush now don't you cry." I managed to piece together the tune by trying different notes. She would shake her head until I hit a correct one. She could hear a tune, just not sing it. My family was full of Irishisms as a consequence of the six years in Belfast before I was born. For instance, my father was never referred to by name or Pop, Daddy, Papa, or Father. He was, "The Daddy." If one wanted something in particular at a meal, one would ask, for instance,"Would you like a biscuit?" The other person was supposed to answer, "No, thank you but could I offer you a biscuit?" and then would come the real agenda, "Don't mind if I do." It was considered impolite to come out with a request directly. I hope I can embed The Wearing of the Green which is sung lightheartedly in taverns round the world on this day but my mother knew the history and she was proud of John McCormack. It was a highly charged political song that lost him many fans but he stuck by it and if I embed it correctly, you will see with what passion he rendered it. It is a reminder of what Patrick himself said, "What is more, let anyone laugh and taunt if he so wishes,
I am not keeping silent, nor am I hiding the signs and wonders
that were shown to me." Patrick of Armagh
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A poem by The Daddy
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COUNTY DONEGAL
There's a wind that blows with an eerie trill
As it follows the road up a rocky hill,
And passes along by the small thatched hut,
Where the wintry blast finds the stout door shut.

For the wind is loud and the wind is cold,
And it brings weird tales that were best not told.
So the place to stay when the fiends conspire
Is close by the warmth of the old turf fire.


But at night when the work of a hard day's done,
When the pig is fed, when the sheep are tun,
Then the menfolk meet in a sheltered lane
To play a jig with a lilting strain.

For the night is cold but the night is clear
And the wind stops still so it too can hear,
And the harsh, hard life of a Donegal day
Turns as soft as dusk in warmth of May.

Then the whole night long while the village sleeps
The silence hangs on the barren sweeps,
Till the sun comes up through the chilly dawn,
And the mist that clings to the hill drifts on.


For the wind has come and the wind comes fast,
And it scatters the mist while the clouds whip past,
And it gathers force for a new bleak day,
Where the fields are green but the skies are gray.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X0mHDs6DcY&feature=channel_page

....may the Irish blessing of the road, the one rising to meet ye, be with you and the green you wear be full o' the meaning of doing the bold & right thing....

The Dumpster Folkhorse

Circa '92, my husby came home with a broken Wonder Horse. He knew it was the best present he could have given and he found it at the dumpster. You see, I have this affection for inanimate objects and as Gwen said, "You can't stand the killing of furniture." The handles were missing but I was able to thread a long wooden spoon through the holes. Ellen said Goop would secure it and so it did. Then began the decorating: beads, a straw hat with a sunflower, fat ribbons, glitter, ivy garlands, and necklace strands transformed the prancing pony with a loveliness she had never known. Children made her their destination. Eventually, when the springs became unsafe, I freed her from her cage prison and propped her up to become a piece of Folk Art. Years later, I printed a photo of her on what Randy/Joel called a "defective" printer. Why defective? The printer was supposed to print in black and white but a big yellow splotch appeared ON THE SUNFLOWER. I felt it was a miracle and a sign of sunny days ahead. When I looked for a design for my memoir, I thought of her and fiddled on Photo Shop to make the just right "cover." She had become a symbol. She incorporated my favorites--stars, Native American tales, found treasure, botanicals, trust, and love. When it came to creating a profile pic, I couldn't think of anything more like Moi. She had my aura to a T. I called her the Folkhorse and when I left Roanoke, I gave her to a Jennifer, a reader of books anyone would love to borrow (and I did),to ride from the ceiling beams of a delightful house. For the dedication of this never-to-be-gotten-around-to-autobiography, I wrote: to the Keeper of the Universe who, like a gentle breeze, sets the merry-go-round in motion.
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....may your days be filled with the music of the painted ponies and the light of sunflowers...

The Pleasure of Thy Company

The Shire is not a B&B, unless you want to think of it as Beautiful and Bustling. Breakfast is not served but rummaging in the pantry is fine and recommended if you are up before elevenses. Posters for Carrboro's Open Eye Cafe are prominently displayed, hint, hint. There are beds of a sort, each with its own idiosyncrasies, with multiple handmade quilts showcasing good fortune patterns and ladders. It takes an adventurous person, to put it euphemistically, to visit but adventure is what life is about, no? First, there is the problem of location. Mapquest cheerfully winds one around the Chapo Heeel Public Library assuming all the while you are not in a hurry. Then, there's the technicality of arbitrary name changing streets and don't forget the sudden, disorienting, "You are now entering" of townships when you didn't know you'd even left. North Carolina's most common welcome sign features a pineapple. There is a story to that but I don't recall what it is. I can tell you one thing, though, I'm sure the pine is for, "I pine and balsam, too," when guests leave. However, the Longleaf Pine being the North Carolina tree of note I feel entitled to go and commune with the pines and my guestbook and do a little bawling to get the toxins out. The Shire has been honored to have as its guests Voloydimir, the Ukrainian engineer specializing in indoor sprinkler systems and philosophy, and this week: singer/songwriter/memoirist/humanitarian/comic/ and commentator, Micah "Meatjacket" Evans. See photo (used without his permission) of when he looked good. The other Distinguished Avocado is Randy Walker who has not been a guest but I borrowed the pic b/c I didn't have one of Voloydimir. The pleasure of guests was all ours, "ours" being The Ditsy Chics of the Blue Mountains, Middle Earth, and The Shire--Dixie's very own enchanted realm. I'm hoping for a 5 star rating but I'll take a half o' one. I would think the plastic chickens out in the front yard would rate at least two. Y'all come down and see Moi sometime.
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....may the blessings of good company and provisions be yours...