Salty like hot dogs (and tears). Sweet like marmalade (and life).
Come sit with me on this rocky ledge
And gaze into the bay
Water greengrayblueandwhite
Splash-splash-crash and spray
I had read to watch for seals that frolic in Horseshoe Bay at Whytecliffe Park near Vancouver, British Columbia. Still, it was a pleasant surprise.
Even without the frolicking seal, I could have sat by the water all day.
Part of my morning quiet time includes a creed — to remind myself of those things I believe to be true. It started with the basic Apostles’ Creed, but has grown. One part that I added is this:
I believe that the trials in my life are ultimately God’s good for me. They are like the grains of sand in an oyster that God uses to produce pearls.
The world is an unkind place. It’s full of people who thumb their noses and stick out their tongues.
Yesterday, in the checkout at the grocery store, the young woman behind me, obviously upset by something that had happened, said to her companion, “I just want to punch her in the face.”
With violent words, we betray the frustrations in our hearts.
This past Sunday, I was especially frustrated by a situation I knew that my father would encounter, where he would be excluded and pushed aside. The mama-bear in me raised her hackles and lashed out with words — words I didn’t entirely regret but wish I had said with a little more kindness.
When I put together this collage, I wasn’t entirely sure what it was saying, but when looking for a “K” collage, I paused on it. Yes, I think I know now. It’s about right responses. It’s about kindness. So timely for me today.
The one boy is obviously the bully. He’s not nice. He’s not being nice.
The man is ready to rush in and give him a good smack.
But the other boy, he’s still extending the ping-pong paddle.
In kindness.
“Come and play,” he seems to be saying.
It’s Jesus. He constantly says, “There, there. I see. I know. Come unto me, you weary, heavy-laden, frustrated, overwhelmed child. I still love you. I still want to play ping-pong with you.”
And as I yield to Him, He adds another layer to the grit in my life, working to create a pearl.
Background from The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams, illustrated by Megan Lloyd
Man from My Dad’s Job by Peter Glassman, illustrated by Timothy Bush
Ping-pong paddle boy from My Fun With Words by James Ertel, illustrated by Geoffrey Brittingham, Seymour Fleishman, Vernon McKissack
Bully from Wheels on the Bus (a Raffi Song to Read book) illustrated by Sylvie Kantorovitz Wickstrom
“I ran away once and you didn’t even notice,” one of my children told me accusingly.
It brought back a flood of memories.
I ran away once. Slighted once too often by my siblings, unappreciated by my parents — I knew it was the only thing I could do. So I put a loaf of bread in my backpack, along with a flashlight, a jacket, and a pack of matches, and headed up the hill behind our house.
The first bit was steep and prickly with wild raspberry bushes. I huffed with exertion and didn’t stop to enjoy a single berry.
I hiked past the little spring-house that had been the source of water for the house before my parents dug a well.
Finally I reached a grassy knoll and sat down to rest.
I waited for someone to come looking for me. Surely someone would notice I was gone.
I waited, imagining the shock and the worry. My mother would ask each sibling, “Have you seen Sally?” and the worry would grow.
They would look all around the house and the barns. She’d probably make Peter or Jimmy climb into the hayloft to see if I was there.
But they wouldn’t find me.
The tall grass on the hill was perfect for putting between my thumbs and whistling — but I stopped myself. Someone would hear it. Then they would know where I was.
The grassy knoll, it turned out, was also an ant hill so I moved to a little mossy spot near a tree.
I pulled out my loaf of bread and ate a slice — not because I was hungry, but because I was bored. Plain bread is also boring, I discovered. I wished I had brought a jar of peanut butter. I put the bread away because I knew it would have to last me at least a week.
As I started to stretch out in the moss for a little rest, I nearly placed my hand in a pile of animal droppings. Abruptly I sat up again. Hugging my knees, I started to cry. Surely I was the most unloved child ever.
But down the hill was my house.
And my family.
And my dog.
And our passel of cats.
I climbed to my feet and headed back.
My mother was working in the garden, picking beans or peas.
“I ran away,” I announced to her as I got closer, “and you didn’t even notice.”
She straightened up and looked at me. “You need to be gone more than 20 minutes if you want me to notice,” she said.
And she went back to work.
All that passed through my mind when my own child told me about running away.
I bit my tongue so I wouldn’t repeat my mother’s words.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
Child with suitcase and backpack from Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah! by Allan Sherman and Lou Busch, illustrated by Jack E. Davis
Plants from a broken pop-up book
If you’re here for a post about insects, sorry. This is more about creating and failing.
And yes, I know that a spider is an arachnid, but the bee is an insect, so I used it.
Last fall I went to a collage art workshop in Nashville taught by Wayne Brezinka. His artwork is stunningly beautiful and thought-provoking. I had been dabbling in my little cards and thought it might be interesting to see how such an acclaimed artist tackled collage.
First, we all had to introduce ourselves, telling why we were there. Immediately I was intimidated. The others in the class were artists, museum curators, people who were somebody. Mary and I sat on the far side of the circle. When it was our turn, it was another instance of I’m-with-her, as we both slouched in our folding chairs wishing we could disappear.
Wayne had planned several projects. First everyone made a picture of either a coffee cup or an apple. Some turned out gorgeous. Mine turned out odd at best.
After lunch, we spent most of the afternoon working on our own project. With you-don’t-belong-here you-don’t-belong-here throbbing through my mind, I stared at my canvas and wished I could leave. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that Mary was there, I may have made some excuse and headed for the door.
But I didn’t.
I made this, a piece I still don’t really like. A house is adrift on stormy seas. A man in a row-boat is about to be swallowed by a wave or a fish or a giant snake. The Mr. Peanut sun doesn’t shed much light.
It’s probably reflective of how I was feeling. Overwhelmed. Sinking.
When I got home from Nashville, I wasn’t invigorated to do collage. I felt so inadequate.
I really enjoy making collages though, so, good or not, I continued.
Teddy Roosevelt said, “Comparison is the thief of joy.”
’tis so true.
And Tim Gunn said, “Life is not a solo act. It’s a huge collaboration.”
My collages now bear a little influence from Wayne Brezinka. I had to realize that I will never make art like Wayne because I am not Wayne.
I’m just me, and what I do is mine.
This insect card bears his influence though.
Wayne uses a variety of materials in his collages — found items, sticks, rocks, as well as the obvious paper. Our Christmas cyclamen was dropping its blossoms whole, so I pressed a few to see how they would dry. One appears on this card — a fragile white blossom for the spider to sit on.
Wayne adds physical depth to his work by layering and using cardboard to “pop” parts out. I popped the spider with a little cardboard behind.
I was frustrated that the child’s hand somehow got damaged, Mary said, “It’s okay. Nothing’s perfect.”
And she’s right. I kept the card because of Mary’s influence.
Now to unravel the rest of the (unwitting) collaborators — The background is from Ezra Jack Keats’ Over in the Meadow. The child is from The Silly Sheepdog by Heather Amery and Stephen Cartwright. The bee (and maybe the spider, but I’m not sure) is(are) from A Trip to the Yard, pictures by Marjorie Hartwell and Rachel Dixon.
Laurel sat next to me on the couch last night when I started this post by writing the title and inserting the picture I planned to use.
“Are you going to write about me?” she asked. “I help.”
Indeed she does. Laurel is an outstanding sous chef. She is often with me in the kitchen at dinner time helping with meal prep. She scours the internet for healthy recipes and sometimes volunteers to make dinner, on which occasions I am her sous chef. I think that’s pretty remarkable for a 13-year-old.
Mary helps, too, in her own way. She empties the dishwasher, unasked and often unseen. She brings my father his nightly beer. She makes sure he has the baseball game or Wheel of Fortune on after dinner. She has fixed him lunch on days when I’m not available. My father will say, “Mary is solid,” which I think may be cringe-worthy words for a 17-year-old to hear, but by which he means that he can count on her, a high compliment.
And the truth is, all my kids are great helpers. They have acted as gardeners and landscapers around my parents’ property, mowing the lawn, weeding the myrtle, cleaning up sticks and debris. They have chauffeured, accompanied, and assisted, attending to their elderly grandparents in so many ways.
Lately, some of my adult children have been caregivers, staying with my father over weekends when I need to be away. It’s a huge help to me.
I’m quite sure they inherited the helping gene from their father. Bud is one of the hardest-working, most generous people I know.
So thank you to all my helpers. You know who you are. I see what you’re doing and I appreciate it.
This picture is very early in my whole cutting-up-books-to-make-cards adventure.
The tree is from Garth Williams’ beautiful book, The Rabbits’ Wedding, the book that started it all. I picked it up at a yard sale, a gorgeous oversized picture book that had sat in the rain. It was starting to mold and smell — but the illustrations were so beautiful that I couldn’t stand the thought of it going to the dump. So, blindly, I paid a ridiculous amount of money for a soggy moldy book — 50¢ — and brought it home not knowing what I would do with it.
The girl is from Sarah’s Unicorn by Bruce and Katherine Coville. The illustrations in the book were all black-and-white, so I watercolored her, as well as the background.
I don’t know where the bird and nest are from.
The other day I stopped by the thrift store again.
I have a routine. When I drop my father at the nursing home where my mother had been — he likes to visit some of the employees — I make a quick trip to the thrift store. One is just down the road from the other.
I headed for the bookshelves where I found a worker was pulling books off and tossing them into a box.
“Are you getting rid of those?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied. “Who would want them?” She picked up a paperback novel that had obviously either sat in the rain or been dropped in the toilet and held it out to me.
“I might like some of these picture books,” I said, pulling one out of the box.
I hit the mother lode that day.
Bedraggled, colored-in, torn, falling apart books are my favorite. I have no guilt cutting them up. I feel as though I’m giving them a new life.
When I made Laurel a coupon book for her 13th birthday, I cut up our personal copy of Tikki Tikki Tembo (author – Arlene Mosel, illustrator – Blair Lent). The book about the younger brother with a short name and the older brother with a very long name was a favorite with my children.
Chang is tenacious about getting help for his brother, the title character.
I think that’s what I love about the story. Brother looking out for brother.
For Laurel, my youngest daughter, a girl with seven older siblings, she has a lot of people to look out for — and a lot of people who look out for her. I thought it was okay to use that book. A good reminder.
Because that’s what family is all about — life/love in brokenness and care for one another.
Here’s what I see in this collage: The rabbit is giggling because it sees the bigger picture. The man is so annoyed at the rabbit, probably because it had wreaked havoc his garden, that he is unaware of the wolf on his roof.
I can remember watching a bunny nibble all the pansy blossoms in my garden and I was helpless to do anything because I was nursing a baby. If I got up and shooed the rabbit away, I would have disturbed the baby. So I just watched as the rabbit hopped, lippity-lippity, from plant to plant, nibbling away my pretties.
Sometimes, though, we can be so distracted by the little problem that we miss a bigger one — like the wolf preparing to head down the chimney.
The bunny thinks it’s funny.
The man can’t get over his annoyance — and that makes him clueless.
Lord,
help me to keep little things in proper perspective
so that I can be aware of what’s most expedient.
Background from Mother Night by Denys Cazet
House and wolf from The Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf illustrated by Keiko Motoyama
Man in the window from A Boy Who Wants a Dinosaur by Hiawyn Oram and Satoshi Kitamura
Rabbit and bushes are from two different books, but I don’t remember which ones.
The background is from Mother Night by Denys Cazet.
The family is from Wheels on the Bus (a Raffi Song to Read book) illustrated by Sylvie Kantorovitz Wickstrom.
I love the way this picture turned out. The family is the point of light in a dark world.
The question is, are they coming or going? Are they refugees fleeing a greater darkness? Or are they arriving home after a long journey?
Whichever it is, I see them pausing to look at their house.
In statistics, an outlier is an observation point that is distant from other observations.
I don’t think of my little family as outliers, though. I think of them as looking at home.
For a couple of years, my father kept saying, “I need one of those things,” and he would mimic someone holding a device in their hand and tapping on the screen.
We tried to convince him that an iPad would work well for him — it’s bigger and does a lot of the same things — but no dice. He was sure he needed a smart phone.
Last summer one of my sons upgraded from a iPod Touch to an iPhone, so we gave his iPod to my father. We could connect it to wi-fi in the house and it would function in basically the same way as a phone. My son set up an iTunes account for him, and I had my sister send him his one and only message.
At 87, this is one new trick the old dog can’t learn.
It sits on his tray table. I charge it about once a week for him. The one time I forgot, he told me that we needed to buy new batteries for it. Modern technology is hard for an older person to understand — even the basics of recharging a device.
But every day, he picks it up and pushes the home button. I put a picture of my mother on his lock screen.
“Good morning, Elinor,” he says, and then he sets it down.
I think he finds some security in seeing her face each day.
He found a use for the iPod I wouldn’t have guessed.
Jennifer Trafton Peterson, author of The Rise and Fall of Mount Majestic and her brand-new book, Henry and the Chalk Dragon, explained her writing process something like this — “I think of a picture that makes me laugh, something funny, and I write to it.”
When she read aloud a portion of Henry and the Chalk Dragon last fall at Hutchmoot, the annual gathering of Rabbit Room peeps, it was the funniest thing I had heard in a long time. Of course, I immediately pre-ordered the book.
It arrived the other day. Every time I see it — and I set it in a place I would see it often — it gives me impetus to finish the book I’m currently reading so I can dive headlong into Henry’s adventure. Yes, it was written for 3rd grade boys, but I can’t tell you about a time that I’ve been more excited to read a book.
Henry and the Chalk Dragon has absolutely nothing to do with my “E” collage, except that I used the Jennifer Trafton method of creating. I sat one day with a pile of pictures spread out before me and thought about which ones would be funny together.
One of the results was this one — a butterfly chasing a pig.
It made me think of Monty Python’s Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog, when the knights were in denial of the danger, but it quickly turned to “Run away! Run away!”
My picture depicts a narrow escape from the Bloodcurdling Butterfly of Baoithein.
Fence and bunny from Catch Me, Catch Me! A Thomas the Tank Engine Story illustrated by Owain Bell
Fleeing pig from The Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf illustrated by Keiko Motoyama
Butterfly from — I’m so sorry, dear illustrator, I don’t remember!
Hot Dogs and Marmalade 