Something Beautiful and Some Book Ideas

Posted on by Sandy Webster

Have you ever seen anything so beautiful as this leaf. Barbara comes on Thursdays when she can to have lunch with Lee and me. She brought the other ones that I tied into a stack so as to see how they would push against each other as they dried. This leaf that has a waxy feel had fallen off the plant and into a protected place where it became this.

Right away I photographed it with a paddle made from Tasmanian Sassafras and purchased at the Salamanca Market in Hobart some years ago for Lee.

I tucked it away with this curling stack.

And the drawings a day.

A hat from many

bought in airport shops for Lee.

Here is New Zealand.

 

Hawaiian straw hat

A bit rumpled and crumpled

But can do the job.

 

Leather moccasins

Lee’s favorite any time

he is in the house.

 

Shoes that Lee will wear

if he is in the right mood

to fit his feet in.

 

And some more journal writings:

 

Recipes…

My Savoury Muffins when away

Approx.

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

Mix above together.

Stir in approx.

½ cup chopped sundried tomatoes

½ cup chopped sliced ham

2 slices cheddar cheese cut up

½ cup shredded parmesan

1 ½ tsp chopped chives

Dash of hot sauce.

Mix in

2 eggs with one egg’s worth of milk

Mix til just moist.

Shape in flat balls and bake 200 degrees celsius  (375 Farenheit) for 20 to 25 minutes.

 

From a bartender at the International Club in Stanthorpe, Queensland.

Whiskey Mac

Equal parts Stones Ginger wine and scotch whiskey.

 

The latest poem for the Tether Book:

The Sun Is Shining

The sun is shining

and he wants to be outside.

Back at work in the yard

lining up rocks

or raking leaves into rows.

 

But when clouds come

and put his day in shadow,

his mind will follow.

He drops the rake

and wanders into darkness.

 

All I can do is call him back

with hot chocolate,

a funny story,

or point to a bird out the window

still singing.

 

I will start working on drawing the tether line while our son is here. I can go back in the studio then. I don’t think the soft graphite will do…it needs to be a simple black pen tether line that morphs through the pages below the poetry. Illustrations are supposed to be in service to the text, not distract from it.

I just need to remember to pick it up where it left off on the previous page. Easy.

Speaking of books and making them fit the content, I still have this one left from an idea I had years ago. The idea was that these blank journals were to be used as diaries. And how could I get this across without the old lock and key. I came up with this plan of having to wrap and unwrap it to access the pages. They all had wooden covers that I could drill a ¾” in. Then larks head on a long cord to be braided with a weight on the end…sometimes a large bead, sometimes a coin. After you wrote your secrets, you were meant to wrap the cord over the top and keeping it loose, go inside the front cover, out the hole and pull the bead tight. Then reverse those steps to “unlock” the diary. It seemed simple to me but I had to make a drawing of the steps to place inside each one I sold. Something about pulling that bead down tight made everything inside seem so private.

I also made them with thick book board but must have sold those.

That should do it for now.

Stay safe.

Some More Thoughts and Images

Posted on by Sandy Webster

First off I will get the drawings a day over with….

I pieced together

scraps of colored silk fabrics

making a long scarf.

 

Cotton grey and white

patterned scarf is very soft

and loosely woven.

 

SuziBJ cut

the bottom part of a skirt

for this pleated scarf.

 

My drawer is so full

of these Mahdi Chandler scarves

made from bits of gauze.

 

Then a switch back to travel journals….. starting in France where my daughter took this picture of me wandering the streets of a small village.

And drawings from the journal I took along.

And some more random journal entries…

Travel:

It is the journal that is indispensable when traveling. Not the camera or even the companions. The camera gives too much information and the companions will not see nor remember it the way I do. But the journal with quick marks of local color, wines, foods, and notes bring the entire trip back each time I refer to it. I see the place and smell the food. I taste the wine again and hear those sounds of being in the country, in the hotel, at an art opening, alone in an unfinished building with the soft sound of cane toad feet dragging across the floor toward my bed.  My journals are filled with a shorthand and economy of marks that preserve it all, and I can return anytime I want to.

Young Patrick is waiting in the pub somewhere in New South Wales to shout me another beer while I wait to be found. The Poets in Pubs group that meets monthly in Broken Hill are still seated around the table in the back room listening to me read their favorite American poet in an appropriate accent. I can smell the worn leather case belonging to an elderly former boxer as he removes an old black and white photo of himself “in the day” and the poem he wrote earlier that week.

There are travel journals from Japan, China, Bali, France and Italy but the outback towns of Australia is where I prefer to spend most of my return voyages. Our shoulders touch, our eyes meet and we raise our Toohey’s Old and Stone’s Ginger Wine in remembrance.

And one of the reasons I so love Australia….

Notes from 2007 on Teaching in Australia

“Fourteen of them are here and I interview them all to find their personal direction and get them to contain their passions to a small place that has lids, doors, pages, covers, bags and baskets – how much of all this do they want to conceal or reveal. Some of those working with the personal stay quiet and have the materials needed. Others might ask my input on materials and form. Then they, too, go quiet and leave me out of their next decision. Now I am only the direction sign.

I envy them at these moments of discovery, adjusting, learning and note-taking.  So I busy myself with making another sample, drawing and writing on the board, and try not to hover too close to them.

Later I will make the rounds again, one by one, to see if I am needed or not. If I am, it is usually a technical problem, easily solved while they let me handle their work and materials.  They will also share why their work is taking a particular form. How it all fits around some thing that matters to them.

This is the gift they give to me – letting me in to help make the spaces and places for things that matter.

 

The other day two friends came a long ways to lift my spirits. Kent, a student of mine who took private white line printmaking classes with me here until a year ago, and his wife, Catherine, a well known textile artist, showed up with these gifts.

Kent brought the single malt scotch for me and the assortment of dark beers for Lee. Catherine brought Madeleines and a fresh baked loaf of sour dough bread. She has taught in Australia and it was wonderful to share our thoughts on teaching in that country. They said they will return and bring me some sour dough starter. I am so happy they came and are thinking of coming back. Kent has kept in touch this past year by sending hand drawn images on postcards for Lee and I. Such a thoughtful couple. Thank you!

And speaking of Lee, I found this poem I wrote six years ago…..

 

Untitled

 

She travels

He prefers to stay home

 

She is vegetarian

He needs red meat

 

She will talk to anyone

He is selective or silent

 

Her glass is half full

He is on the way to empty

 

How does this work?

 

After forty-seven years of one floating

And the other sinking

 

They simply trust the tether line

S. Webster.

 

Til later…

 

 

 

Getting Some Control

Posted on by Sandy Webster

We have a friend who comes once a week to share her lunch with us. We keep our distance at the table. She listens to my apprehensions, worries, exhaustions…and then offer suggestions. The leaves above were a gift from her this week. I tied them together with string just to keep control over something and love how they dry and curl in this bundle.

After lunch I get Lee set up to be outside doing something while I vent to Barbara. Here are some of her ideas:

Start using the dishwasher again! Don’t rush through the meal and wash up while Lee is still eating…put the dishes for the day in the washer and even if it is no where near full, turn it on after dinner! It works!

Add another hour to the caregivers time and get five hours of free time. I talked to the caregiver and her employer and that idea goes into effect starting Monday. This way when I have toi do the shopping it does take up half my time, just some of it.

Use the apartment more to remove myself from listening to what is going on with Lee and the caregiver. What a great idea! I only used it once to write the text to construct books around before.

Speaking of which this is what I wrote the day before Barbara came that put me in a frazzle when she was here.

In Just Two Hours

 

In just two hours:

Left to do the grocery shopping,

had a car to car visit with neighbors

on the way back to my house.

Like everyone else when they see me,

I am told they think of us.

Can they visit Lee?

I tell them he may not know who they are.

We go our separate ways.

 

Groceries are unpacked and put away,

so is my coat and purse,

I am sweating.

The cold wine called,

I couldn’t just carry the bottle downstairs

past the hall where they would see me,

the caregiver and Lee.

 

And now I am here in the studio,

writing and holding the water glass.

Trying to make it last.

 

So yes the apartment works fine. I do not get internet there but the house phone can be carried over so the ringing will not upset Lee.

There are two trunks full of old memories I needed to look into and toss some out. Under a couple of trash bags I took over a bottle of wine. Yesterday I wanted to be ready to retreat here as soon as the caregiver came.

The first thing I did was fix a spot of herbal tea in my old favorite pot with the cup down below. Used a little of coffee raspberry flavoring to sweeten it.

Then I set up my pads, sketchbooks, laptop, etc on a table Lee made using sewing machine legs that is by the window and near the loom he made me in 1982.

The apartment also has old oil paintings I did in the mid 80s.

The door into the apartment and the counter tops Lee made.

And those two trunks stacked at the bedroom end.

And after facing the trunks, filling a large garbage bag, sorting letters and old photos for the kids to deal with, I treated myself. Wine in a glass that Lee frosted.

In looking at old photos of myself with the intention of just throwing them out, I was caught in a childhood I had forgotten about. Since I am the only surviving one of six children, there has been no one to say, “Remember when…?” The result is, you simply forget. I looked at an old photo book of me from 2 to 23. Then I met Lee and less than a year later our daughter was born. Those photos from that time  on were packed up weeks ago to push off on the kids. My childhood, their report cards and drawings all kept in one of the trunks are now ready to go off with them. They get to throw them away. I just could not do it.

The last four days drawings of scarves.

Antique silk scraps

pieced together randomly –

irresistible!

 

Very drapey mesh

of rayon strings loosely knit

and knotted at ends.

 

A knitted tie dyed

loop of a nice colorful

band in pinks and blues.

 

Multiple knit loops

gathered and knotted

from Laughing Squid.

*Note: I tried contacting Laughing Squid this morning to order another one of these fun neck pieces that wrap three times around. They must be out of business now. It was an Etsy shop. I wish I had bought more at the time.

More journals….

 

2007

Is there anything like a belly full of extraordinary food and wine – then locked up in a single cabin first class on the Ghan swaying your way into the Northern Territory and listening to the anti war version of Waltzing Matilda” I think not!

I am washed, lotioned and propped up in a space that is pie shaped, 24” at the pillow end and six feet down it is panning to 48”. My door to the hall is across from my daughter Amy’s cabin. A wash basin folds up not six inches from my right foot. All I need is here in this space.

A wonderful dinner with Aussies – full of politics, wineries and family talks and a promise to meet at breakfast. Then there is the window- more than a metre and open to the outback of Australia. What is out there in the dark? I know it is wild, mysterious and beautiful – nothing less. I will sleep through some of this and be sorry that I did. But I am older now than the last time and can trust Australia to be hre when I wake. Good night.

And Anzac cookies made this week.

Til later….Lee just broke the leaf blower again….I will just buy another one on Monday. There could be another leaf somewhere.

A Bit of Brightness

Posted on by Sandy Webster

Looking out my front door we see a late look at the beauty of the trees left with leaves. A sudden brightness from what was quite dull last week. Here are some more.

And after Lee runs down two batteries blowing them off the driveway, he just can’t stop.

He simply gets out his broom and continues.

Right now I have him vacuuming fern droppings on the porch. He is focused!

I have talked to two homes that care for those with dementia and he is now on a list for when a room becomes available. There is no reason for him to go now or in the near future as far as I can see. Our doctor and I will make that decision when the time comes. Both places that I called were very helpful in what to look for when the time gets near. It is a relief that both places are close to home and he is on a list that I can turn down when they call, if he is not ready. We simply move further down. Private rooms are hard to come by in these facilities but a shared room can be used by only one if the costs are met. So far all seems possible. Now I wait and watch. Their only precaution was that I look to my own health needs as well because caregiving can take a toll. For now the three afternoons a week for relief seem enough and we are settling into a routine of one caregiver keeping an eye on him instead of an assortment. He doesn’t mind the extra company in these isolated times and I like the bit of freedom of going to the store without leaving him in the car, having time to talk on the phone, work in the studio, etc.

Speaking of which….I finished the first sketchbook for 2021.

I like to hammer over my corners to make book more inviting to the touch. It gives it a worn feel.

I will continue to make blank journals for next year and beyond. I need to use up materials instead of hoping that I will have private students again. Then I will need to pack some of it up to give away.

It is sort of like how many wine glasses do you need when the dinner parties have stopped.

Here are some more scarves.

The conclusion is—-

drawing an eco printed

scarf – impossible!

 

Resist dyed large scarf

made by  textile artist and

teacher from Africa.

 

Nuno felted scarf

that I rolled up to make it

easier to draw.

 

Two shades of blue knit

scarf with lots of overlock

stitches in between.

And a bit more journal entries.

 

Nov 1, 2003 Gympie, Queensland

My last teaching obligation of nine in six weeks. I am on the deck of a apartment type room on the country side of town. The drive here from Bundaberg last night was horrendous – wind and rain in the dark on the only road – a fallen tree left traffic backed up for miles.

It can be very dark here in the country or “outback”. So dark you want the terrifying lightening to strike so you can see if you are still on the road.

This place is connected to a bottle shop/hotel/casino/bistro. Ordered two Toohey’s Old Stout before I even sat down to a meal of corned beef (the only thing left as it was closing time. The meat came smothered in white sauce and filled the plate – served ourselves the vegetables and salads from the counter. Over salads hung a lace table cloth to keep the flies away while the hot starchy vegetables were not covered – no flies seemed interested anyway. Interesting dish with sweet potatoes and coriander (cilantro)  – tasty. A very Australian country experience in hostelry. We return here tonight and I look forward to seeing what else is offered – hopefully wine and seafood.

 

“In my view, the best art is vulnerable. It is when the artist has given something of himself to the world. Perhaps what is most personal is also the most universal. In a classroom setting where student are set up to compete against one another and where the instructor inadvertently acts as judge over them, they are less likely to chances, to risk acceptance, to expose their vulnerability, and to deal with personal issues in their work.”     Agniewszka Matejko, Canadian artist and teacher

Til later…