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I watched the birds instead of the dreadful state of affairs in this country’s celebration of its slow sink into autocracy. There was a pair of these birds staring at each other with their mouths open by the pond out back. They were not the usual song sparrows who hang out but maybe juveniles of some kind. I like their spotty feathers. Almost like starlings. Maybe my daughter, the birder will know.

It is unbearably hot this week and I stayed inside most days. I tried to remember how I showed Australians this single needle Coptic using book cover pages as folios to hide the start and finishing. I found one by Barb Adams that she gave me after the lesson about ten years ago. And because the ends are buried inside the spine sections of the cover, I had a devil of a time figuring it out. Hers is the very neat one on the bottom. My first try is on the top.

It is like when you do something over and over and then depend on body memory to take over years later. It could be age issues, but I mostly forgot the secret of making this book so mysteriously tidy. I will try again another day. Anyway, I used what papers I had handy. Some lovely contact prints I did in Australia along with plain sketching paper for the inside folios and Rives BFK that I printed  years ago to layer the cover. One piece of board is inserted between the oversized cover folios to make it sturdier. I used leftover Rives BFK as a substitute. When the book is all stitched, the cover pages are pasted over the filler cover, left to dry and then trimmed. I called it a Gideon Bible cover because it reminded me of those little plastic bibles handed out in schools many years ago. The ones with the extended covers…usually green and left behind in the library….at least in my case they were.  Notice on Barb’s book the cover folios were trimmed far enough out so as to act as protection for the text block. Mine are trimmed shorter because the paper was too heavy to shape over.

I do need to make another one if only to tidy up my stitches. It does take a very long thread to make this book without having to tie on a new end.

The next story book page is starting to be drawn into. Not a clear direction yet. Diana from poetry helped me clean up the poem for the first one. If it weren’t so damnably hot, I’d have more energy for getting into thinking and doing. Now I just think a nap is effort enough. Back to those 8,000 steps tomorrow so I should fix myself a drink and then take a nap. Maybe a Turbo Tonic would be nice.

The cats have already started on their fourth nap of the day.

Til later….

 

How could I not add to the installations in the garage! The saga of the reflecting pool is the perfect visual definition of trump’s tenure as president of the US,

First gather the materials: A flag taped to my mailbox by the Property Association (I don’t have any desire to be associated with the US flag right now…maybe never!). And his edited inaugural speech.

Then the assembly begins on a mat cut to fit a cheap plastic shadow box…similar plastic to his gold painted chachka all over the White House.

Of course the flag is hung upside down…like Justice Alito’s wife’s flag while protesting gay rights. The “American Flag Blue” Reflecting Pool is full of algae and chips of paint floating loosely. One can make out a dulling Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument. Off to the right is the White House with its new wrestling arena proudly filling the front lawn and resulting in dead grass everywhere. Of course it is!

The title of the piece is:

Keep Out

Reflecting on the newly “shit-holed” United States of America.

The main title font is BF Tiny Hands developed back in 1916 by an observant calligrapher watching trump’s handwriting to make it available publicly.

Here are some details:

It is now installed in the garage where I had my usual solo opening reception. Refreshments included Reflecting Pool Cocktail (now a popular bar drink…but not so much here in town).

I usually raise the glass to my mother who was the only person I knew who supported Shirley Chisholm’s bid for president in 1972.  Both would be surprised to see how bigotry still thrives in their country.

I tried to get the peeled pieces of rolled up candy goo to float, but to no avail…each one sunk to the bottom. So sticking them to the sides had to do. The algae stuck on the pick sitting across the rim is the paired down gauze I recently made a shirt from.

The drink was a combination of rum, orange juice and blue curacao. It reminded me of mixed drinks I attempted as a teenager at a friends house  where such delights could be found deep in cupboards. These were the kinds of drinks that made you quite ill the following morning and you never mixed them up again! I have plenty of the sweet blue curacao left and will put it out of sight until I can celebrate the country coming together again…which is quite doubtful at this time.

And the empty glass!

It’s a bit early for a wine, so I will find some British program to watch and pet my cats.

Til later….

 

This past week I had my wellness check up with the doctor. First thing I did when he and I were alone was whip out my sheet of eleven statements on a sheet titled: Concerns, Worries, and Mental Disturbances of Sandy Webster – age 82. His first comment was that he wished more patients would do this. Then we addressed each one. Lots of interesting and humorous conversation over the list with three excellent hugs before he walked me to the front desk. He also told me to call him anytime I get concerned or down. I won’t because he just made me feel better by being there and assuring me he was not going to move away.

They will be building a new clinic in town to make room for all the changes made in the last thirty some years. So I took some pictures of how pleasant it is just to park and walk down into the front doors.

Also this week I began working on the contact printed book of Eucalyptus prints. First the cover…

Then opened to the first page…

Then a larger image of the first “story”…

So while looking closely at the image, here is the poem that will be on the back side of it.

A Neighborly Visit

Ralph pulls aside the broken gate

reminds himself to not be late

in getting home by half past eight.

 

Once inside his neighbor’s yard

he sees an old man standing guard

when he trips, stumbles, and falls down hard.

 

He wakes up later to find himself

sitting in a cage on the old man’s shelf

with a label attached saying, “Rascally Ralph”.

 

Next to him on the right-hand side

is a captured dragon with scaley hide

and bears the label, “Clumsy Clyde”.

 

Next are furry things trapped behind bars.

And some partially filled up specimen jars.

One holding a two-headed slug!  How very bizarre!

 

The old man opens a chest to take out some rum,

picks up an instrument and begins to hum

to an owl eating peaches…and can that be Ralph’s mum!!

 

Who slips her neighbor a five-pound note

as he unlocks Ralph’s cage and hands him his coat,

warning him next time he’ll be shipped off in a boat!

 

I have sent it off to my poetry friend who writes children’s poems and recently had another published in a children’s library magazine in Australia.

She is always good at helping me with rhyming and rhythm. So there might be some changes in the poem. Anyway there are 26 pages to work with in this book and I am going to enjoy the drawing that then encourages a story in rhyme to put on the back.

It lifts my spirits in this time of complete idiocy in our government brought on by the gullible fears of an incompetent population. The images now of our country’s capital is testament to exactly what they voted for….a total destruction of all we stood for as a nation.

One of my poet friends has a granddaughter who is being sent by her clothing company to Geelong in Australia. The company is called Cotton On and after looking it up, appears to be clothing for the younger, athletic person. Anyway, she is looking for recommendations on what to check out on her first trip down under. Is there anything going on in Geelong area or Melbourne that is fashion related. Too bad she is not going to stop by New Zealand to visit the World of Wearable Art! But I will suggest she take a detour. She will be going there around the ninth of July and staying three weeks, so if you think of anything interesting I can tell her, let me know soon. Thanks.

Better get back to writing and drawing…

Til later…

I had something different in mind for this week’s blog. But then what I was working on looks a bit weak to say the least! So I am going to write about what I really want to do. More drawing and more writing.

This week was a return to poetry meetings. It felt right. Here is the poem I wrote for the meeting. It is dedicated to Richard who wrote briefly about the last breath of a moth. It is also about coming to terms about my feelings about poetry. I think it was a good idea for me to take a few months away from the other poets.

For Richard       S. Webster

 

It used to matter

this need to be familiar

with the expectations of poetry

and my failure to understand.

 

It used to really matter.

 

Until I let it all go

stopped asking questions

so I could listen to the story

of a dying moth.

 

I am still writing, still working on my book about letters and getting a poem or two down on paper. But not having to worry whether I understand the words of others has made a difference. They understand their words and whether I do or not makes little difference.

Thinking about the other thing I need to get back to…drawing…brought me into the den to look through some of my favorite sketch books. Remember this one very long concertina book of creatures hidden in among the contact prints of Eucalyptus leaves? I thank the Australian student for her generosity in making me several to bring home….Lorraine O’Brien.

I used others for The Fairy Book and The Stoat Story among a few more. But today I found one more with lovely contact prints by Lorraine and it is just waiting for me to get busy and add my own imagination to. Look at these pages!

Maybe small poems tucked into the pockets at the bottom. It is the same size as the other book with all the animals, so there is quite a few pages to fill.

I also found on the shelf all the Haiku poetry sketchbooks that was instigated by friends in Australia as a way of still working together when we were so far apart. These were fun to do and made me think in syllables of Haiku based on the drawing subject. I kept going long after the others stopped so have many of these journals that I made for this project.

There are several of these Haiku books. Each one held two month’s worth of daily entries. I miss the routine of that. Something about the expectations I put on myself just to follow through with. I miss that. Now it seems all I expect of myself is to get 8,000 steps in five days a week. I need to do better than that. I need to sit with a pencil in hand filling up waiting pages of wonderful drawing paper.

Anyway those are my plans. I will let you know how it goes.

Til later…