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“Look after your laundry, and your soul will look after itself.”

November 28, 2017

Yesterday and this morning were busy times, busy enough to keep me in sloth mode for the rest of the week. Yesterday I had an appointment in Hyannis then I shopped for dog food, two bags full, heavy bags full so I left one bag in the car. A repair man came yesterday afternoon and fixed my washer. He also checked the dryer which strangely enough worked for him. Once he was done and gone, I started doing the laundry which was piled in giant heaps on the cellar floor. One heap was from a couple of weeks ago and another from last week. The final heap, the smallest, was the afghan and a couple of  blankets from a few weeks ago which had had no immediacy so I let them sit on the floor a while. Once each heap was washed and dried, I carried it upstairs to this floor thinking to save my back but that made no difference. I killed my back anyway. It was so bad, I could have played Igor in Young Frankenstein. The laundry still sits on the chair in the living room waiting to be brought upstairs. It will be a long wait.

This morning Gracie woke me up early. She was restless and moving around on the couch cushion so I figured it was time for her to go out. Maddie was meowing just for the joy of it. She needed nothing. She was just being a cat. Gracie and I went out, and after Gracie was done, I went to get my mail from the box across the street. Gracie followed me. All of a sudden the hair on her back went up and she was growling. A lady was walking her dog, and Gracie hates other dogs so she went after this one. My arms were filled with mail, but I still tried too grab her halter. Gracie was moving better than she has in weeks. The other dog kept trying to get Gracie, but the lady walking her dog was wonderful. As we were both grappling, I told her Gracie has trouble walking so she held her dog with one hand and grabbed Gracie with other then transferred Gracie to me. There I was carrying the mail in one hand and bending over to hold Gracie’s halter with the other. When I got inside the house, I immediately sat on the stairs as I couldn’t move any further because of my back. I sat there a while and Gracie, looking a bit bewildered, watched me sit.

Here I am now, a few aspirins later, with a better back for the meanwhile. I will lift nothing heavier than a cup of coffee. The laundry can sit. I have no guilt leaving it there. That I did three heaps of laundry in one day is a new record for me, one I am quite proud for achieving.

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“fuzzy black lines hiccuped across the screen.”

January 2, 2017

All the hoopla is over. It is time to put Christmas away, my project for the week. I also need to grocery shop. Alexa is keeping my list. I added coffee filters and trash bags this morning.

Tomorrow Gracie and I are going to the dump. It’s back to the mundane. All the anticipation is gone. January is a boring month.

Being stuck in the house was always a winter woe when I was little. It was either too cold or too wet or too snowy to go out. We’d play games until we got bored then we’d watch TV for a while. We’d play in the cellar. The bottom of the banister was a horse to me. I’d use old blankets to make a saddle to put over the wood. I’d concoct a story of me as the sheriff or the marshall, and I’d ride that horse until I’d captured the bad guy. I was every character, and I’d use different voices. My lowest voice was the bad guy’s. He always got caught.

My favorite way to spend time was lying in bed reading my new Christmas book. I was cozy under the blankets. The headboard lamp was warm. It lit the pages perfectly. I was by myself. I heard nothing. I had been captured by my book.

Even now, so many years later, I find books the best way to while away time. I don’t read in bed much anymore as I tend to fall asleep; instead, I get cozy here in the den on the couch with an afghan keeping me warm and Gracie asleep by my feet. It is always time well spent.

Today I watched Highway Patrol with Broderick Crawford who always wears a suit and his fedora. It is in black and white and dates from the mid-1950’s. In this episode, the Highway Patrol is hunting an escaped mental patient with homicidal tendencies and abnormally strong hands. He is a frustrated violin player whose hand jumps so he can no longer play. That is often what triggers his rage: any mention of his hand or music. He just killed a man who mentioned the shaking hand. 21-50 to headquarters. Body found! 10-4!

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“Hobbies take place in the cellar and smell of airplane glue.”

February 13, 2016

The sun was shining and the sky was blue but I blinked. When I looked again, the sky had turned grey, a white ominous grey, and the sun had escaped to warmer climes. I hyperventilated when I read today’s weather report. The high will be 24˚ and the low tonight will be 1˚. No, I didn’t forget a number. 1˚ is the prediction. Snow squalls are also predicted. The walkway and the car were covered in about an inch of snow when I went to get the paper. Tonight we’ll have flurries and another inch of snow. Tomorrow will be basking weather. It will be 16˚ during the day and 10˚ at night with more flurries to add to the excitement. The ocean is the warmest place around here at 40˚.

I don’t remember if my mother made us stay inside on really cold days. I know we usually walked uptown to the movie theater on Saturdays, but maybe, with single digit temperatures, my dad offered to drive us. He was going up town anyway. He had Saturday rituals. I know we always walked to and from school no matter the temperature. We could have adopted the unofficial postal creed minus the gloom of night part.

When I couldn’t go out, I’d play in the cellar. It was a big cellar divided by the stairs with a landing at the bottom. I remember being a cowgirl. The newel post was my horse. The bannister held the reins. I’d saddle my horse by putting old blankets on the newel post top and then I’d chase the bad guys. They were always caught. Bad guys had no chance with me riding Old Blue.

The sun shined through the small cellar windows high up on the concrete of the wall. I remember the rays sparkled. I’d learn later it was really just dust in the air highlighted by the light from those small windows. Sometimes the cellar was the only peaceful part of the house.

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“You’ve got bad eating habits if you use a grocery cart in 7-Eleven.”

January 12, 2016

We have a light snow shower which I doubt will amount to much. The flakes are tiny and susceptible to the wind. They keep changing direction. I’m staying close to hearth and home today. It’s dark and cold outside, unwelcoming.

I could do a wash, but I won’t. I could change the sheets on my bed, but I won’t do that either. According to Martha Stewart I could make my own pretzels sprinkled with my favorite toppings, but I’ll never do that. As you can tell I have no ambition today, and I’m just fine with that.

When I was a kid, it was difficult to find a place where I could be alone. The house always seemed filled with people. It was small, and there were six of us. I shared a bedroom so I couldn’t kick my sister out if she wanted in. Sometimes I’d go down the cellar and sit and read. The cellar was below ground and had those small windows high up on the walls. When the sun shined through them, I could see dust in the light. I didn’t care. I was a kid. Dust has no meaning to a kid.

In my mind’s eye, I can see that whole house. The kitchen was small. One side had the sink, the counter and the fridge. The other side had the stove and the kitchen table. The fridge saw the most action. We’d all open it and stand there looking. I always had the hope they’d be something delicious, but delicious disappeared really fast in my house. My mother always yelled for me to close the fridge,”Get what you want then close it!” I didn’t know what I wanted. It was usually an exploratory hunt.

My parents grocery shopped on Friday evenings. My dad had to take my mother as she didn’t drive. They’d carry the filled brown grocery bags into the house, and we’d empty them not as a help, but to find the Oreos, the go to cookie in our house. There were always Oreos but not for long.

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“A lawn is nature under totalitarian rule.”

October 18, 2013

Today was a break in routine, an out to breakfast morning. My friend and I decided to celebrate the Sox winning the game last night with breakfast. In the old days, I would have celebrated during the whole game and suffered for it this morning. I can remember going to work barely able to open my eyes and with a headache which made me think the top of my head had erupted. I was a whole lot younger then.

When I was in elementary school, my friend I walked to school together every day. She lived at the top of the hill facing the small rotary in the cul-de-sac. She lived on the same side of the duplex  where we once had lived. I remember that house really well. The kitchen was small, the spot for the table was by the window and there were only two bedrooms. The stairs were the best part as there was a small landing, and I used to arrange pillows and sit there and read. We moved from there when my sister was born as we needed more space. We moved down the hill to a bigger duplex apartment, one with three bedrooms.

They called where we lived the project. It was composed of wooden duplexes, either twelve or fourteen of them; I don’t remember which. We lived in the first set almost at the top of the hill. Ours was on a corner and angled to face the street. All the rest were square to the road. We had the biggest lawn in front which we shared with our neighbor. Their side of the duplex was the mirror image of ours. We also had a lawn on the side of the house which was sacred to my father. I remember it was always green and always well-trimmed. My father prided himself on his grass no matter where he lived. He swore by a hand lawn mower. He claimed it did the best job. I loved the sound of him mowing the lawn, the clicking of the blades as he moved up and down in the same pattern he always used. We weren’t ever allowed to mow the lawn. We didn’t follow the pattern right.

The cellar in that duplex was where we played a lot. The big toys were kept down there as were our bicycles in winter or summer rain. Next to the back wall was where the wringer washing machine stood next to a sink. Later on, my brother turned part of the cellar into his bedroom. He didn’t like rooming with my youngest sister. I understood that. One of the lures for our cooperation in moving down to the Cape was that he and I would each have our own bedroom. They were both on the first floor, and he used to sneak out his window late at night. I never did though I did sneak in a couple of times.

A few weeks ago my sister and I drove by our duplex. We both noticed how big the trees were but we especially noticed how awful the lawns looked, especially the one at our old house. My father would never have allowed that.

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