A change in direction

I am changing the nature of this blog a little bit. From now on it will just be a personal blog that I will update occasionally with family and quilting news.  I have established a new blog to handle my writing efforts:


writersstudioattheboxfactory.BlogSpot.com


Writers Studio at the Box Factory
This is a program I've been running at the Box Factory for the Arts in St. Joseph, Michigan and this year, 2014, marks its 10th anniversary. I'm trying to make it a little more active, a little more vibrant and a little more relevant ... this new blog is the first step, so check it out!

First peach of the season

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I just got back from a quick trip to North Carolina to help my daughter drive back to Michigan for the summer. I flew down Friday evening and we drove back on Sunday (13 hours).

But I had one day in Raleigh and we packed in a lot. First a flea market where I bought a bag of the freshest salt-water-taffy I have ever eaten (and with the exception of a couple pieces shared with others, I ate it all!). I also bought a Vera Bradley cover for my phone and for Tom's Father's Day present, a watercolor painting from the 1980's of a mid-century modern building with a certificate of provenance taped to the back.

After the flea market we went to the farmers market and I bought some peaches with the idea that I would bring them home and make a small pie similar to this picture - but they were so good, and tasted so much like actual peaches - I ate all of those too.

We went to a place for lunch where we could have chicken and waffles - and that was delicious.  After that we went to the History Museum - and after that I was ready to rest for a bit.

We're home now and back to being busy with summer projects, not the least of which is making preliminary plans for my daughter's wedding, which will take place a year from now. It should be a fun summer - it's almost time for the summer solstice - the longest day of the year.

Six Months Later

I last posted in this blog almost exactly six months ago when the winter was in the process of kicking the stuffin's out of me. I thought I would update with the same view out the same window in my office - this time with no ice and lots of greenery. The boats have returned to their docks and sometimes I can see fishermen walking around down there with their catches after a day on the lake. 

But beyond living through this hard winter, I've gone through a lot of other things in my life too. Nothing too dramatic or upsetting ... but life-changing nonetheless.

 

I finished my first year of teaching English Composition at the local college, and I like it well enough to do it again for another year, and perhaps take on more classes. I finally feel like a real, honest-to-goodness teacher.

 

I have finally extracted myself from a difficult and increasingly distressing volunteer situation, that was taking too much of my time and making me feel way too miserable.  I decided I could answer the door to "nasty" knocking on the other side only so many times, and I reached my limit. I feel better than I have in a long time.

 

I went to a writing conference, sponsored by the University of Michigan, and came away feeling renewed about my writing. I immediately came up with a top 10 list of goals for the next 18 months - some harder to accomplish than others - but it feels good to have something to aim toward.

 

And, my daughter became engaged.  She's getting married next summer. I have had such a hard time coming to grips with her moving so far away, and now I have to come to grips with this too.  But I feel okay about it. She'll be home for most of the summer working a summer teaching job, and that will probably be the last time she spends any amount of time here. But now I know I can enjoy her while she's here, and take the rest of the stuff one day at a time.

 

So, all in all it has been a productive first half of the year when it comes to all those internal things a person has to do to get her mind straight... now let's see if I can apply this new found peace of mind and get some writing done.  Before winter comes again!

 

 

 

 

 

Winter with a Vengeance

Winter has come on this year with a vengeance, starting in November with lots of snow, and continuing on from there.

Lately we have been living through bitterly cold negative-number temperatures as we deal with this Polar Vortex that's been hovering over pretty much the whole country.

It's only the first part of January - how do I face the notion of getting through at least two more months after this one?

This is the view from my third floor studio at the Box Factory for the Arts in St. Joseph, Michigan. It's looking over a river and a marina that's completely devoid of boats.  The black specks in the sky is a flock of birds that took flight just as I snapped the picture.

It's hard to whip up enthusiasm for things this time of year in Michigan.  But we are planning trips for the summer and trying to get involved in new projects - and somehow we'll get through, just like we do each year.

The Empty Room

The other day I was sitting in my living room with my two friends, Judy and Sue, who make up my writing trio.  We take turns meeting at each other's house for dinner once a month and this month it was my turn.  I made salad with pears, walnuts, blue cheese and mustard vinaigrette. Then I served spaghetti. Then for dessert, we had cherry cobbler with vanilla ice cream.

Comfort food eaten in front of the fireplace on a cold, dark, autumn night when we all needed a little comfort.

I told them a little bit about how over-whelmed I was feeling. How I had way too many obligations to do things I simply didn't want to do. How I had no time to work on my writing, which was the whole point of rearranging my life and maintaining a writing studio.

My friend Judy suggested this:

Think of my life as a room.  Imagine taking everything out until it is completely empty. Then, after much consideration, start letting things back in - but only things I truly love and feel passionate about - nothing can come in if "obligation" is the only thing it has going for it.

Later, after they left, I did quite a bit of thinking about this.  What exactly would I let back into my "room?" Family, of course, writing and managing writing programs at my studio, teaching at the local college and occasional volunteer work.

What didn't make the cut?  Committee or board work of any kind. Intense sewing to deadlines. Freelance work for somebody else. Projects or events that require me to do the planning.

Tom and I have about cornered the market on being helpful over the years - we want to have a period of time when no one counts on us for anything (except our family).  No one should plan on us attending any function or managing any problem. I don't want commitments or deadlines.

We just want to work on our own art and plan our lives around that.  Once I got that figured out in my head - it truly felt like there was a light at the end of the tunnel and I should be able to make it to next summer, when the timeline for our commitments comes to an end.

Things are looking up!

Restless

I'm feeling restless.

Suddenly all the things I've loved to do for years are just too annoying to continue.

I'm tired of quilting, I'm tired of all my writing projects, I'm tired of volunteering. I'm tired of my hair, my clothes, my shoes, my house. I'm tired of this place I have spent my whole life and will likely spend the rest of it until they put my boring, adventure-less body into the ground.

I want to never go to another meeting. I want no one to count on me for anything. I want to throw caution to the wind and buy a whole new wardrobe. I want to get in my car and drive without worry about where I'm going and if I'll have enough money when I get there.

 I want to buy beautiful expensive shoes and not have them hurt my feet. Perhaps they would even look like the ones I show here. These are the shoes of a baby who will never be boring or invisible. She will dance through life and travel the world. She will never be stuck in the same place, following some pre-determined life path. I have never owned a pair of shoes that could do that for me.

I know that half the secret of being happy and content with life is to make the conscious decision to be that way. But what happens if the time times when, no matter how optimistic a person tries to be, it just ain't cutting it?

I had such high hopes for accomplishing so much with this life I have - I felt sure I was on that path - but right now I feel in serious danger of going out with a whimper and barely a sign that I was here.

And if I feel that way now, in November, what's it going to be like in February in the dead of winter when it really feels like life will never be interesting again?

I think I'm in attitude trouble.

typewriter update

I  realized that I had not updated the wish I made for a typewriter for my birthday last May.

We looked around for the little black Royal typewriter that the company still makes, but it could only be special ordered and I couldn't see it in person.  I was a little concerned because the new typewriter was all made of plastic.

Then, I remembered something that was sitting on my bookshelf in the office among the Hemingway books.  It was a typewriter someone found for me years ago at a garage sale.  At the time I just wanted it for decoration, so I put it on the shelf and sort of forgot about it - especially after Tom propped one of his photographs in front of it and was using it as an easel.

But when I remembered it, I pulled it down and took a look.  It is a metal portable typewriter, just like I was looking for.  It was kind of grungy, but Tom cleaned it up for me and we ordered a new ribbon on-line for a few dollars and there it is!

Tom looked up the model number and found out it was made in the 1940's and this model was one of Hemingway's favorite typewriters.

Although it has a very "soft" touch, it's still difficult for these fingers who have only used electric typewriters and computer keyboards to push down hard enough to get a good strike.  But I use it for what I had originally thought I would do, type an occasional poem that I want to look old-fashioned and aged.

Slow writing is a great thing.

Family First

Sloan, heading off for her last year of college

I talked with my daughter, Sloan, yesterday and we discussed my feelings about her moving away. This wasn't new to her, but perhaps she didn't quite know how deeply I felt.

She told me that she would always keep in mind the idea of returning home and she wouldn't put herself in a situation where that simply wasn't an option.

That made me feel much better, but so did acknowledging to myself that I had the right to feel the way I do.

I talk to other women and it seems that everyone has some story about how their children moved away and they were just fine with it because, of course, they "only wanted them to be happy." They imply that I don't want that for her and, because my other two children live nearby, I should somehow be satisfied and stop whining about missing the third one.

Nope. Doesn't work that way with me.

There are many things I love and appreciate in this life, but my family is the only thing about which I am passionate.  I worked very hard; emotionally, financially and physically, to pull this little family of ours together and will continue to work at it until the day I die.  If I lost every other friend in this world, as long as I had my family, I would be just fine. They are the people I most want to spend time with. It is "us against the world."

So, I give myself permission to feel like this. I give myself permission to miss my daughter, dote on my grandchildren, prefer the company of my husband, and put all of them above and before anything else in my life.

Now, I feel happier.

Lost?

Sloan

On August 2 we moved our beautiful daughter to North Carolina where she had taken a job as a special education teacher.

It has been two full months now and during that time I have kept myself extremely busy and tried very hard not to think about it too much. But, last night I was driving home from my writing group with a dear friend, Judy, who is kind and spiritual and understanding and I began telling her a few things.

I haven't wanted to talk about it, and I certainly haven't wanted to write about it. It just felt like, if I let down my guard, it would be like opening a vein and the hemorrhaging would begin.

I know that lots of people's children move away and they cope just fine and I should just grow up and stop being so dramatic about it.  But the fact is, I'm not like a lot of other people and,  although I'm not really a dramatic person, I have very deep feelings when it comes to my family.

For one thing, our family doesn't move away. They just don't. Grandparents, parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins - alive or dead - they are all still here in Michigan. Why does it have to be my daughter who decides she must leave?

I have an acquaintance who constantly complains about how her daughters are scattered all over the country and I always think to myself "Good Lord! If you were my mother, I'd move as far away as I could get too!"  Is this my punishment for thinking such unkind thoughts?

Now that my mother has passed away, I am surrounded by males: husband, sons, grandsons, brothers. I have two daughters-in-law, but they are busy with their work and families and they have their own mothers to dote on. I feel like I have no "soft place to fall."

I wanted a daughter so badly when Sloan was born and I delighted in raising her, but always felt it wasn't enough time. I am greedy for more. I was looking forward to relating to her as an adult, and certainly I know that I can do that to some degree even though she's far away. But there will be no casual drop-ins, no last minute lunches, no shopping trips just for fun. And when she has a family, I won't be the grandma the kids want to spend time with.

I know she felt she needed to find her own way in the world, and I was determined that I would not be the one to clip her wings. But, time is on her side and it's not on mine. I'm afraid that I will never again be able to spend any significant amount of time with her, that our visits together will be superficial at best, and time constricted at worst.

My heart hurts and I feel I have lost something irreplaceable. And this is why I haven't been able to write about it. For now I'll put on a tourniquet and think about it later when I'm stronger.
    

Time - the Speed Racer

Coach Max holding Weston at the soccer game

The other day I was babysitting two of my grandsons, Nolan (3 years) and Weston (8 months), who are my #2 son's children, when my oldest son, Caleb,  stopped by with his baby, Huxley (5 months). Max came to get the boys a short time later and I was in the unusual position of sitting there watching my "baby boys" sitting on the floor and playing with their baby boys.

This picture is of Max holding Weston while he coaches Nolan's soccer team. Tom used to do that identical thing with Max himself - hold him while he ran up and down the sidelines coaching Caleb's team. Sometimes when I cuddle one of the babies I find myself thinking that I was doing the same to my own babies only a couple of weeks ago ..... wasn't it?  But, when reality hits I know that, since the kids are 33, 27 and 23, it's been a bit longer than that.

I have reached an age when time has collapsed in on itself and is in a race to speed along much faster than I can stop and pay attention to it. It's really kind of scary and I look for the emergency brake handle to pull so it will slow down - but there is no brake to be had.

 

What, me worry?

Nolan in his green and white "Michigan State" shirt



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A couple of days ago, I picked up my 3-year-old grandson, Nolan, from day care and took him back to my house for a while until his Dad could come get him.

As we pulled into my driveway he asked me if Aunt Sunny (our daughter Sloan) was there. I had tried to explain to him in the past that Sunny moved to North Carolina a few weeks ago, but he's used to her being away to college and coming home to visit on a fairly regular basis. It's hard for him to understand that she is not going to be around much any more.

I told him that, no Sunny wasn't there, she moved far, far away and we would only get to see her once in a while from now on.

"It makes Grandma very sad," I said.
"I'm not sad," he said, which surprised me. Sunny is definitely one of his favorite people in the world - when she's around, the rest of us are invisible.
"You're not? I thought you really liked hanging out with Sunny."

I came around to his side of the car and began unbuckling his car seat.
"Oh, I love her," he said. "I'm just not going to worry about it."

Such wisdom from the mouth of babes!

Autumnal Equinox

It's officially autumn today and soon the trees around here in Michigan will ease into color.  It's my favorite time of year, one I look forward to, but one that goes too quickly. It's hard to believe that September is almost gone.

Each fall I do a couple things to try to celebrate it, capture it and slow it down.

One thing is, I get out my fall/Halloween quilt projects and work on them at least until the end of October.  They are a couple of projects I have been picking away at for a few years now, and I won't finish them this year either, but it's fun to sew on them while the season is in gear.

The second thing is, I get out my "October Notebook" and I write about autumn things. I like to write up a few simple memoir essays about Halloween from when the kids where small. I also have a character I write short stories about (set only in the fall, with a creepy undercurrent) and each year I write another short story in that series.

And lastly, each year I re-read Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked This Way Comes." It's absolutely one of the best books set in October ever written - and creepy too.

A Little Piece of my Heart

Last weekend we moved our daughter, Sloan, to North Carolina so she can start her job as a special education teacher.  This is the photo she posted with her boyfriend, Joey, and her car packed to the roof.  Our car was just ahead of her and also packed just as full.

I've been saying all along, that this was the day I was dreading for years - ever since she went away to college and made it abundantly clear that she would not be living in Michigan when she finished. Or if she did, it would have to be somewhere a whole lot cooler than our little town.

Secretly I was hoping she would go off to Michigan State University and fall in love with some fellow Michigander who had every intention of staying in-state. But, no! She had to go fall for some guy who lives in North Carolina, who really had no interest in leaving his state. (It helps a little that he's a really good guy.) So, off she went to NC this spring for job interviews and she got the first one she interviewed with! She needed a roommate, and found one through her Young Life channels - and it was someone who was already down there, so the roommate did all the hard work of finding an apartment.  Everything just seemed to fall easily into place.  Even the mattress store, where we needed to buy her a new bed, was simply across the road from her apartment complex and we didn't have to go driving up and down the highway with a mattress strapped to the top of the car.

I'm a big believer in signs, and maybe because all of this fell so easily into place, it really was meant to be. I'm trying hard to reconcile that with my feelings of losing my daughter to a state that's 14 hours away! And now North Carolina holds a little piece of my heart.

Home from Yosemite

Tom and I are home from our long-awaited trip to Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California. This is a photo (not mine) of the giant sequoia trees that are part of that area. They are simply impossible to take a photograph of - a person just has to see them in person to get an idea of what they are like.

One of the things that effected me the most on this trip - and something that kind of surprised me too - was the narrow, winding, twisting, HELLISH roads throughout the parks. They just really dominated the day since that was the only way to get to and around the parks.  It was the only thing I've been inspired to write about from that trip so far.

But, I'm sure than once I've been home for a while, unpack, and settle into my regular schedule, I'll think about the things we saw and be able to be a little more creative. This is to be the summer I push and finish the National Park book of essays I've been working on for five years.  It should be a fun project to work on during these "easier" summer days.

My Three (Grand) Sons

Nolan (left) and Weston looking at Huxley
(not sure what Max is doing to his arm in the background.)

With the birth of my latest grandson on May 9 we are set with three little boys in the family.
Nolan John Thomas - 3 years
Weston Max - 4 months
Huxley Don - 14 days

There honestly was a time when I didn't think I would ever have grandchildren. I don't believe in rushing my children to have children of their own.... but I was wondering if I would be too decrepit to even enjoy little ones once it finally happened.

But, now they're here, and they all live nearby. And I can do all the "Grandma" things I like to do - make them quilts, write poetry about them, take lots of pictures, buy too many toys, and add them to my blog whenever possible.

It was always my goal to have my grandchildren love the idea of coming to grandma and grandpa's house. When they walk in the door, I want them to know they are the best thing I've seen all day. I remember that look from my own grandmothers - and I want my boys to feel the same way.

After a long time spent raising my own children, it feels good for that to be the only goal I need to have with this set of kids.

Birthday Wish

My birthday is coming up in about 10 days and I know what I want - a Royal manual typewriter!

The one I show here is a vintage one, but I want a new one - yes - Royal actually still makes one model of a manual typewriter.

My husband says, "why would you want something like that?" And it's true that anything I write on it would have to be taken to the computer and transcribed.

But I'm intrigued with the notion of "slow writing." Not producing things as fast as you can, but taking time to think about them. I already write a lot by hand - I just think it would be fun to go back to my roots when I first started writing seriously and manuals were the standard issue (yes, I'm that old - although I did have a little portable electric typewriter I took away to college.)

I also collect old typewriters, none of which would be in working order without some reconditioning. Why not just start with a brand new one? It even comes with a case. And I could pretend I was one of the writers I so admire from the past who packed up their typewriter and went off to war, or off to California, or off to a remote cabin somewhere and that little black typewriter in a case was the portal to magical things!

I want to Write about Yosemite

We've made our plans for the summer! We're heading out west again and this time going all the way to the west coast to visit Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. After taking a break from traveling in the west all last year to give me a chance to build up my strength after two knee surgeries, it will feel wonderful to be back out there again among the mountains, canyons and waters of the National Parks.

I'm winding up the last of my essays and poems about traveling in the west and will include pieces about our trip this year to California.

 

Can't hardly wait - and it's coming along faster than I thought it would.

 

 

 

 

A Birthday Remembrance

A Birthday Remembrance

(Written April 8, 2013 in honor of my mother)

By Denise Kalin Tackett

 I visited two graveyards today.

I was thinking of the women in my family.
Theresa Ann, born March, 1950 and died at two weeks.

Delores May, born April, 1931 and died at seventy-nine.

Mother and daughter buried in separate graveyards,
three miles apart.

There are three women in my immediate family –

a devoted mother I knew for fifty-seven years,
a beloved daughter at the height of her youth
and determined to move away,
and an older sister I didn’t know at all.

Today, I think of the possibilities that are not to be:

Growing up with a sister to help blunt the blow

of all the masculinity of four brothers,
to pave the way with our parents,
to shoulder some of the weight of family.

A mother who lived to very old age,

a confidant, an advisor, a friend,
someone I could take care of,
who would finally let down her guard,
and let me be the strong one.

Spending days with my daughter,

fully grown and finally educated,
living nearby with her own family.
Friends at last, without having to be a role model,
but a friend who knows her better than any living soul.

If none of this can happen,
I must think on the future that could be.

I want to spend my remaining years,
playing the role of quirky, lovable family matriarch.
With a heart that holds both aching memories
and the joyful potential for the future.

Even Day Poems

 

 

 

For the last several years I have chosen one month out of the year to concentrate on writing poetry. This year I have chosen April, which is National Poetry Month, and will write a poem on every "even" day. I'm not a trained or educated poet and, in fact, one of the reasons I think I enjoy poetry is because I don't know enough about it to know how bad I am!

 

I ordered the poetry literary magazine shown above for my NightWriters group, courtesy of the Poetry Foundation, to give us some inspiration.  We are also going to have a Michigan poet, Alison Swan, come to the Box Factory to do a four-part (once a season) "poetry intensive" workshop. The first one is in May. All this should help me ready my own poems on the National Parks, which I plan to self-publish this fall. 

 

I enjoy doing "even day" poems no matter how bad they are because it makes me produce work on a regular basis and makes me pay accute attention to what's going on around me, so I'll have something to write about. Now, true, I usually end up writing about the weather and one or two poems about my cats, but at least I'm paying attention and not rushing through my days trying to get a long and endless list of tasks done that includes everything except being creative.

 

 

 

"Up and Over the Mountains"

"Newspaper Rock" in Colorado - subject of one of my poems

In addition to the essays I'm writing about the National Park trips we have made, I have also written some poems.  Originally they were in the same project, but late last year I decided to break out the poetry into a separate book, tentatively titled, "Up and Over the Mountains."

There will be 25 poems in the collection - to represent the 25 years we have spent travelling to the parks.

I'm going to publish this small chapbook myself in a limited edition - and may even do it by hand - sewing the pages together with some kind of special cord and picking out paper that I think would suit it.

This is the creative part of writing that I'm free to do when I don't have to worry about "getting published" by an outside publisher. It lets me celebrate not only my love of writing, but the textural feel of paper and thread and the patient hand-work of sewing each page together. I also plan to hand-insert photographs taken by my talented husband, with tissue paper to protect each image.

This should be another fun project that the two of us can tackle this summer.