Bab-O eyes

Dad has taken a new step down his end-of-life staircase.  It is increasingly difficult for him to eat, drink, or clear secretions from his throat.  He holds his skeletal limbs in rigid poses to avoid the discomfort of movement.  His eyes look off into the far distant reaches of the galaxy.  His eyes... yes, it is the ... hmmm.  What is it exactly that is signalling the change?  Dad's eyes look just like my playmate's Tiny Tears doll's eyes after she scrubbed them with Bab-O.

Nurturing is so very out of style.  Kids of either gender do not rock or cuddle baby dolls.  Their parents are too young to remember a time of gritty cleaning products without tiny squirting dancing foam globules on t.v. ads.

"My mom is better than your mom" my playmate taunted.  "My mom uses Bab-O, NOT Comet!"

My playmate was jealous of the bright eyes on my Tiny Tears doll.  She had given her Tiny Tears a good scrubbing with Bab-O, and her dolly had weird gray unfocused eyes ever after unhappily.

Dad has those same weird gray unfocused Bab-O eyes.

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Waiter, there's a fly in my ointment.

Vanna is wearing a turquoise chiffon gown with shirred empire halter bodice, front slit, train, and Aurora rhinestone trim around waist.  So am I.  No, wait. Not quite, but I am sort of dressed up by my standards.  I'm attired in a knit top with 3/4 sleeves, shirred shoulders, and a draped neckline that shows a bit of actual cleavage.  Shh!  Don't tell.  I have on slacks, too.  I'm headed to the theater.

Except not.  Dad, the Great Minimizer, is reporting pain in his leg.  His pain is not relieved by Tylenol. Dad never reports pain, so this is significant.  It minimizes the annoyance of the malfunctional t.v. in his new shared room.

The t.v. is on.  The t.v. is off.  The t.v. is possessed. Gremlins.  Yup.

The t.v. stays on through a marathon of Judge Judy and Nightly News with clips of Newt chittering like a chunky middle-school hamster after a dozen Pixie Stix.  [I have the sound down realllll low.] Then, inexplicably, right when I'm ready to solve the lip-reading puzzle on Wheel and win a trip to tropical paradise, the t.v. is off.

I'm blurting out "A PRIVATE EYE SEARCHING FOR FLIES", then all dark.  Ten minutes later the t.v. is back on in the middle of "A KETTLE OF SEAFOOD GUMBO".

CLUES.  Not FLIES.  Well, duh. PRIVATE EYES IN GUMBO???

Some of Dad's discomfort may come from enraged eczema.  Thus the ointment is needed in his stew.

fly in my soup  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1C8nl8eBoq0


fly in the ointment

Fig. a small, unpleasant matter that spoils something; a drawback. We enjoyed the play, but the fly in the ointment was not being able to find my hat afterward. It sounds like a good idea, but there must be a fly in the ointment somewhere.

Yesterday I rescued a June bug from the lunch room and "returned it to the wild!" I've been hanging out in preschool so long I can't even stomp on a overturned June bug with creepy wiggling legs, or at least not in front of the kiddies.  Soon I won't be able to flush a cockroach in private.

Dad is out of pain on a narcotic.  The x-rays showed no fracture or dislocation.  The soup is in the crockpot. My life has too much drama and too little theater.

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Forced to eat chocolate ice cream

Dad did not want to awaken from his nap to eat the dip of ice cream, so I had to keep it from going to waste.  Sitting on the uncomfy chair in the corner reading about the Cherokees and the Trail of Tears, I licked the plastic spoon.

Good to get out of the condo with the dripping bathtub faucet after working through an online training course about recognizing child abuse. Dripping faucets are bad.  Catching drips = good.  Using caught drips to refill toilet tank or water houseplants is not such a bad thing.

Child abuse is bad.  Getting credit for doing free online training is good, especially while wearing my jammies and polar bear slippers.  Nuking the leftover spaghetti and meat sauce for breakfast is neither good nor bad.  It is just easy and comforting on the day off from school honoring Martin Luther King.

Moral or immoral? Legal or illegal?  Black/white clarity seems just the stuff of  fabric arrangements for my grandbaby play mat.

In 1977 we considered the world far too doomed to bring a child into.  We fretted about the demise of small towns in the Walmart invasion, acid rain, the inequality in our economic system, the dang military-industrial complex, quality of life issues, whether using a crockpot to make lentil soup was selling out, and the inherent evil of polyester double-knit. We put henna rinses in our hair, grew alfalfa sprouts on the window sill, and gagged down carob chips.  We read Wendell Berry poems.

Carob chips will never be chocolate.  Few puzzles have the answers on the back page.  Being an adult was not what we expected.  It was soooo gray and blurry!

Being a parent was unexpectedly wonderful.  Maybe being a grandparent will be as well.

I'm into cole slaw.  Cabbage.  Down to basics.  Stone Soup!  No frills, except:

Dad eventually awoke to swallow his afternoon meds and drink a 4 oz. protein shake.  His new roommate groaned about cold lotion being applied to his itchy diaper region.

"Be joyful

though you have considered all the facts."

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

Wendell Berry (1973)

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Resting places

Cutting and sewing like a mad fiend, I let go of Dad's transition issues.  Dad will have to adjust to having a roommate, and I already feel a bit sorry for the roommate. We had to shoot Dad with a tiny tranquilizer dart Saturday. First time I ever saw Dad tear his hair out for real. The move had him very agitated and aggressive, hitting his aide. When he calmed down he was able to ask me a question with himself in the third person,"What does this mean for Howard?"  It means for Howard that he is still in Texas, still has the same caregivers, and will still be visited daily by that annoying woman who claims to be his daughter!

And so, I sew 2.5" strips around 9" squares. Spray with diluted starch and press seams open. Arrange squares on the living room carpet.  The project is a black/white grandbaby play mat. I have such wonderful memories of my tiny sons doing their first push-ups to better see the pattern of a blanket.  Getting things in focus and tracking movement are big incentives for an infant's development of neck strength and head movement. Yes, babies are looking for faces, but they are building more nuanced visual perception almost from birth. They are imprinting their parents' faces, but also the high contrast patterns around them.

My first square fabric blocks have plenty of pattern and contrast. From a composition standpoint, the layout needs more quiet, solid visual resting places, chances to stand still in the snow and listen to the wind in the pines before following the footprints.  And then my sister texts me reminding it is the seventh anniversary of our mom's death.

What does this mean for CollageMama? Well, she should probably clean and oil her sewing machine. Then she should spend some time in her quiet resting place...


© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

A Three Hour Tour

Darting away from school at three-thirty, I headed to the nature preserve for a walk in the woods.  Without the leaves I'm more aware of the land.  The trails on each side of the creek have seemed so far from the other.  Now I can see how close they are, and spot landmarks on the other side.

This has been a year for learning about decline and decay and approaching death.  Out of the loss I am trying to see the transformation of vital energy into a new form.  I can't express it very well, but in the forest for that hour it made sense.

This barely clothed leaf is a Venus de Milo.  How can humans transform stone into art of classic beauty?  Mushrooms descend a staircase like Duchamp's nude as they dance of the living out of the dead.

Transforming
Transitory
Ballet

Movement
Short trip

By six-thirty we had moved Dad into a shared room three doors down the hall.  I have upset his tiny island world again.  Gilligan and the Skipper will have to make him comfortable and secure again.

On a lighter note I offer these Tammy Faye mushrooms in the haunted Muppet forest.

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Mud thoughts

No, not musing on ugly campaign tactics, walking under the freeway.  Wednesday was so beautiful I made another trek  under Over World.  And there was joy in Mudville when mighty CollageMama looked up.

With color on hiatus, texture is much more visible.  The many installations of mud tubes on the concrete support columns and beams under the freeway ramps impressed me with their structural precision and beauty.  Thanks to a former teacher/365photographer in Tennessee, I've learned they are made by organ pipe mud dauber wasps.  [No, that was not Mork's wife.]  Male mud dauber wasps guard the nest while the females go hunting for orb spiders to stuff into the pipes to feed the little ones.  Okay, I'm not going to make the manicotti for supper tonight...

There are many mud bird nests under the freeway access ramps, but not any under the main lanes of US 75.  Too much noise and vibration?  Or maybe to far a first flight to open sky?  There is a shortage of graffiti, too.  Will the birds and spray paint artists return to nest in the spring?  What can I learn about teaching clay projects for children from the birds, the wasps, and the tire tracks?

Heading back toward the trailhead, a word that sounds ridiculous in this urban setting, I annoyed a great blue heron in the creek on beyond the graffiti column.  The heron flew away against the traffic.

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

The hero or the goat

You blog long enough and you eventually write about goats.  Yesterday on a whim I pinned my mother's silver goat pin on my shirt, just thinking the preschoolers might like it.  Plus, teaching preschool is a whole lot like herding goats or cats or turtles on a rainy Monday.

The children were entirely too busy smearing snozz on every surface to notice my goat pin.  By naptime I was sooo glad to sit in the dark room and listen to the gurgles and snurgles of wee noses accompanied by one of our favorite/effective nap cds.  Gather Round is a Starbucks recording that includes Willie Nelson singing "I'm My Own Grandpa".  Trying to sort out the family relations in this song always makes my brain drowsy.

Speaking of family relations, I am still trying to make the decision to move my dad into a double room.  "Good grief! How did I ever get into this?"  I ask this question every time I have to deal with Dad's finances, feeling like Charlie Brown standing out on the pitching mound in the downpour.  Will I be the hero or the goat?  I'd be glad just to not be the troll under the bridge.


But back to goats, I've temporarily lost my copy of Gregory the Terrible Eater.  Gregory is an average goat except he doesn't like to eat tin cans.  Gregory would be a model recycler.  He could even advise the condo complex residents about proper recycling practices.

Spell Check has been giving me grief about my spelling of "advisor".  My eldest son has been a college adviser/advisor for several years, and he explains that institutions of higher learning make their own spelling rules for this matter.  My Big Red Dictionary reminds me that advice is a noun and advise is a verb.  Good grief!  It seems to be a vulgar transitory desiderative with past participles:

Go placidly amid the noise and haste and remember these items should not be placed in your condo recycling carts:

• paint cans
• rubber welcome mats
• greasy Kentucky Fried Chicken leftovers.  Ewwww!
• Styrofoam cups, egg cartons, and packing "peanuts"
• dirty furnace filters
• moldy, disintegrating carpet padding
• ugly chandeliers
• pet poop
• light bulbs
• curtain rods
• documents that included credit card and Social Security numbers.  Oops!
• clothes and toys
• wire hangers
• dead houseplants
• bamboo wind chimes
• hundred dollar bills

Let the goat eat them instead.  (And that goat is a classic Provensen illustration for The Color Kittens. It convinced me for a dozen years of childhood that goats really ate tin cans and ONLY tin cans.)

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Calendar challenged on the train

It's time to play What's Wrong With This Picture?, boys and girls! Got a calendar for Dad's room at the nursing home.  Last year he was stuck with a bees 'n' butterflies perky calendar that we both grew to detest, staring at it through each evening's supper.

Now we are staring at this more graphic design.  It wasn't until I punched out the circle for January fifth that I understood the problem.  Just when we think life is too short and the weeks are too long, it turns out to be the other way around.

Dad's weeks are not a whirlwind of parties, meetings, campaign appearances, and doctor appointments.  It won't matter to him that the weeks have only six days.  Sunday won't be on the left.  Saturday won't be on the right.  For Dad it's pretty much all the same day anyway.  And so, I am having a Janis Joplin "Ball and Chain" moment. *Beware a curse word below.

Dad's vision is poor, and his depth perception is way off. Maybe the high contrast calendar will be a cheering image for him.  Looking ahead, I have a grandchild arriving just a few months from now. What can newborns see?  I bet a baby would like this calendar, and not care much about the short week.**

*"I don't understand how come you're gone, man. I don't understand why half the world is still crying, man, when the other half of the world is still crying too, man, and it can't get it together. I mean, if you got a cat for one day, man - I mean, if you, say, say, maybe you want a cat for 365 days, right - You ain't got him for 365 days, you got him for one day, man. Well I tell you that one day, man, better be your life. Because, you know, you can say, oh man, you can cry about the other 364, man, but you're gonna lose that one day, man, and that's all you've got. You gotta call that love, man. That's what it is, man. If you got it today you don't want it tomorrow, man, 'cause you don't need it, 'cause as a matter of fact, as we discovered on the train, tomorrow never happens, man. It's all the same fucking day, man."



**A newborn infant can easily see many of the things most important to him or her: your eyes, your lips and smile, your nose, and his or her own hands, fingers, feet and toes...Infants reflexively prefer to look at high-contrast edges and patterns. Large black and white patterns present the highest possible contrast (100%) to the eye and thus are the most visible and attractive to babies. 


© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

It's a bird! It's a plane!

No!  It's ornamental kale in a pot on my patio.  Nature is just so very cool.  The photos at that link to Princeton's "Art and Science 2011" competition are extremely fab, groovy, and cool. Happily, the January weather isn't. We are loving letting the preschoolers out on the playground to run in the sun.

The sunset had an odd stratification of clouds with a striking prismatic accent as I swooped over the high ramp from 75 to 190 West.  Not a safe moment to whip out the camera, but awesome with Francis Poulenc's "Gloria" for soprano playing on WRR 101.1 FM to commemorate the composer's 113th birthday.  Hours later I've got "Dialogues des Carmelites" is in the cd player.

In another portent of a rosy moment, a bizarre airplane seemed to hang in the sky above Coit Boulevard as I drove to visit Dad.  The airplane had untamed nose hairs, just like my father!!

I'm hoping my walking bud/bra pusher's aircraft aficionado son can identify the plane this evening so I don't have to worry myself into nose hair nightmares.

a·fi·ci·o·na·do/əˌfiSH(ē)əˈnädō/

Noun:

A person who is very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about an activity, subject, or pastime.

The nicest part of this memorable Pink Letter Day was a brief convergence of minds, hearts, and speech.  When I got to Dad's room he made a few false starts, but then managed to say, "I want to talk to you."  It took him many more minutes, but then he said, "I think you're very nice." The effort wore him out.  It was a moment I'll cherish.  At least he knew for that one moment that I'm on his side in this long last battle.


© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Llama giraffe amaryllis

Please meet my new pet amaryllis. LLama is its name, although it llooks more llike a giraffe.  LLama is the tallest amaryllis I ever forced.  LLama is forcing me to llearn to spell.  LLama llooks llovelly in my mama's red Dansk bowl next to the Woolly Mammoth's volcano clay vase.

I've llooked up "amaryllis" in the Big Red Dictionary at lleast five times in the llast month.  I'll probably llook it up another dozen times before the two stalks finish blooming. In the meantime, LLama will help me remember calyx, sepal, stamen, pistil, and corolla.

Not that corolla!  The brown 1980 two-door Toyota Corolla still holds a fond corner in my heart.  It was the first car with my name on the lloan papers.  The truest thing my ex ever said was, "If we'd bought two of those Corollas we would still have one running."  It was a great little car, although llacking air conditioning.

Back in 1980 I was very torn about buying a foreign-made auto which would seem unpatriotic to my dad, seem a tiny deathtrap to my mom, and require me to learn to drive a stick shift.  For some reason I dreamed last night that I would have to drive a manual transmission vehicle to "save the day" and get us to the airport in time for the LLas Vegas flight.  I couldn't remember how to shift gears.  I couldn't hook the U-Haul trailer onto the car. Worse, I had misspelled all the names and numbers in my cell phone contacts list so I couldn't phone a friend for help.

We didn't have A/C in the '80 Corolla, but we were blessedly lacking cell phone technology.  My mother has become a frequent character actress in my recent dream movies.  So far, she rarely plays herself.



 © 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Alternative news flash

Extra! Extra! Read all about it!  Art teacher discovers petrified giant squid and the Loch Ness monster on the same afternoon hike in Texas.

Evidence that north Texas was once a great ocean inhabited by creatures with sophisticated nervous systems and complex brains astounds current observers.  This petrified and fossilized giant squid specimen was discovered on the Caddo Trail at Oak Point Nature Preserve.  CollageMama has been studying giant squid illustrations since she was just a wee paleontologist wannabe.

The World We Live In, by the editorial staff of LIFE, 1955 was my next favorite as a kid to the book about chairs.  I loved the fold-out illustrations of dinosaurs, Ice Age mammals, and scary deep sea bio luminescent creatures.  Inside the front cover there's a dibbies sticker with my initials:   

Calling dibs is an informal convention to declare a specific right to something that no individual otherwise has any clearly recognized right. Such a declaration is often recognized in certain cultures, or sub-cultures, as a means to avoid arguments over relatively trivial issues.

There are many colloquialisms associated with this concept, and with specific instances of this concept. For example, an individual planning to ride as a passenger in a car may call shotgun as a means to assert the right to ride in the front passenger seat instead of the back seat.

Emerging from the woods with both Yeti and the Abdominal Snowman chasing her, this intrepid art teacher next found evidence that the Loch Ness monster has survived in the pond at the nature preserve. Okay, just squint a little bit, folks...

We are sick and tired of hearing about Iowa and seeing Republican candidates wearing jeans and barn jackets.  Every four years the nation is hit over the head with a cast iron skillet known as the Iowa caucus, and then that state slips from our consciousness.  This is sad, because Iowa is not that horrible a place, yet we all loathe it down to its very folksy mom-and-pop cafes.  We want to drop anvils and pianos on all  the reporters and commentators and anchors.  Not that we totally approve of cartoon violence, of course.  We are Peace-niks.

Yes, peace on Nebraska.  Peace on Iowa.  It's over there to the right.  Choose E:  None of the above.  Get back to normal life.  

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Fewaffu

Resolution #7 : To refrain from refilling the birdfeeder.  Sorry birds, but the sight of a rat pigging out at the feeder is giving me nightmares.  And, no, I probably won't listen to "The Nutcracker" for quite awhile.

Fewaffu is today's security word, which sets off all sorts of inner pinballs.  It so sounds like a quicki-ethnic counter in a failing shopping mall's fast food court.  Part loofah and part Luby LuAnn platter perhaps.

Falafel became so popular that McDonald's now serves a "McFalafel" in some countries. I get falafel mixed up with injera, that spongy Ethiopian flatbread.


I written elsewhere about the year we had our Thanksgiving at a Waffle House in Oklahoma.  Ooh.  I fee waffu sorry for you.  This feline waffle is borrowed from link.

Resolution #8 : To actually read the tales of E. T. A Hoffmann for free [frewaffu] on my Kindle.  But for now just put the opera dvd in the player for Neil Shicoff and Bryn Terfel.


Resolution # 9 : Learn to make pie crust.  Apropos of nothing except maybe a potpie with pretty slits on the golden brown crust would be fewaffu satisfying on a chilly evening.

apropos of nothing

1. Without reference to anything.
2. Without any apparent reason or purpose.

Fewaffu it up to warf speed, Whoopi!


© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Private parts / Further resolutions

I'm missing something here.  My walking buddy and I walk side by side.  In my neighborhood we walk a clockwise route, and I am usually on the left.  In her neighborhood we walk a counterclockwise route, and I am often on the right.  

We do not walk abreast.  We do not walk a-boob.  Sometimes we walk a-earmuffs.  While we walk clad in stylish t-shirts, or fleece jackets we discuss current events.  This has been a good year, as my buddy finally quit wearing her blood donor t-shirt.  It was more info than necessary, and all too familiar.

Definition of AU COURANT

1.  a : fully informed : up-to-date

     b : fashionable, stylish

2.     : fully familiar : conversant

We are fully conversant the whole time we walk, sometimes even three times around the neighborhood.  Often we have leftover conversants and have to go for brunch at Corner Bakery to finish getting up-to-date and completely vented.  It's healthy and perky and almost Katie Couric-esque, which would be au couric. 

In the middle of a toasty panini combo lunch my walking/brunching bud announces she is becoming a bra pusher!  Where are the cops when you need them?  You think you know somebody.  You assume you have walked alongside long enough to attain a certain awareness, and then your best buddy goes underwire-less! 




Resolution #5  : To keep my household expenditure journal up to date.  


Resolution #6 : To change the vacuum bag, actually vacuum the condo, and maybe attack those cobwebs hanging low wobbling to and fro. 


And after these resolutions I visit my dad and find him again askew in bed and busy ripping off his diaper.  Avert mine eyes, Ms. Couric.  Sheesh!  I'm descended from a fruitcake nudist who slaps me away when I try to feed him supper.

Sending you uplifting thoughts that allegedly won't cut into your shoulders.

Definition of A-BREAST    [uh-brest]  

adverb, adjective

1.  side by side : beside each other in a line : They walked two abreast down the street.

2.  equal to or alongside in progress, attainment, or awareness (usually followed by of  or with) : to keep abreast of scientific developments; keeping abreast with the times.

Two's company.

Three's a crowd.

Four on the sidewalk

is never allowed.

Do they wobble to and fro?

Can you tie them in a knot?

Can you tie them in a bow?

Can you throw them o'er your shoulder

like a continental soldier?

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

"Your blog is too wide."

Only a true friend would say that to your face.  Does this template make me look fat?  Please let me know if you can't fit my blog on your screen.

"Your hair is too scary.  You look like an electrified Chia pet."  At the staff holiday white elephant gift exchange I received a Prussian blue (old Crayola color) comfy-huggie-snuglee-cuddly blanket-with-sleeves.  The fabric is amazing.  It does NOT breathe.

I fell asleep on the couch watching "Midnight in Paris" under the blanket-with-sleeves.  What happened to Owen Wilson's nose? I need to spend more time in waiting rooms with old People magazines so I know what's what. As a person with deviated septum issues, I kept fixating on the nose.  Also, he walked like a guy I had a crush on once.  Sigh.

There were some great costumes and cars, but the movie was sadly ordinary.  Never thought I'd see the day when some input from Rodney Dangerfield could improve a Woody Allen movie. I pulled the comfy-huggie-snuglee-cuddly up over my head.

Woke up in 2012.  Maybe it will be a new Belle Époque.  More likely just it's another era of Chia pet hair.

Praise be.  It's 2012.

Resolution #4--Stay more informed about pop culture.  

© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder

Resolution #3

You may wonder what happened to 2. It is in the comments to Resolution #1, and the bean soup is on the stove.

Resolution #3 is to sew some placemats that coordinate with  my new plates and the dining area "graph paper" wallpaper.  I am so excited to have a real set of turquoise Fiesta Ware.

"You must be a grown-up," said my longtime walking buddy.  "You have plates that match."  When she said it I knew she must be a friend.  She would probably sew a button on my overalls, just like Lisa did for Corduroy.

"I like you the way you are," she said "but you'll be more comfortable with your shoulder strap fastened." "You must be a friend," said Corduroy, "I've always wanted a friend." "Me too!" said Lisa, and she gave him a big hug.

I have a few cups and saucers in very old Fiesta Ware colors.  They won't commune with the new place-settings except for historic occasions.

Sending all of you a big New Year's hug. Wishing that everyone everywhere had nutritious food, clean water, adequate sewage disposal, and the opportunity to grow up and find sustaining work.  Is it so much to wish that every child born on Earth could be loved, read aloud to, and learn to read?




© 2011 Nancy L. Ruder