THE MIND OF A BOOK

The Sky is the Limit

What is your favorite summertime reading? Reading for me is more than a pleasure. It gives me a chance to hold the mind of a writer in my hands. I look for lyrical, well-edited writing, but every book takes me into another world.

Mysteries carry me through the year and I'm always looking for good recommendations. I like the character development, the suspense, and the puzzle presented of a who-done-it. Two mystery series I enjoyed this past month:

Billy Boyle, a series about a rookie Boston police officer, who serves in the military during World War II as an investigator. The author James R. Benn puts the reader right in the middle of historical events as well as in interesting places like Tunisia and Sicily.

I've just finished Joe Country, part of Mick Herron's series about Slough House, the dumping place for British spies who have made mistakes and are no longer trusted by their government. Herron's writing reminds me of John LeCarre, with his painstaking minutiae of the life of has-been spies who somehow still get involved in solving crises.

In the last year, I have also been drawn to books about libraries and bookstores. This interest started with The Midnight Library by Matt Haig and The Library Book by Susan Orlean. I just finished The Echo of Old Books by Barbara Davis and The Librarian of Burned Books by Brianna Labuskes, which is especially parallel to what is happening at libraries and schools today. 

Two other recommendations:

Lady Bird Johnson, Hiding in Plain Sight by Julia Sweig, a fresh look at an important woman and

I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys, a novel portraying life in Romania under the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu.

My goal this year has been to complete a blog post each Friday in the midst of packing and moving. Each blog post becomes a way for me to find insight into day-to-day experiences. Though I haven't had as much time to spend working on each post, I find that having a chance to continue even while upturning our lives has been a respite for me as well as a way to understand how I feel each day.

Lighthouse at Santa Cruz

THANKS TO BIRDS AND BEES

Two hundred years ago, millions of birds took to the air flying in what is called a murmuration. In the fall, I occasionally see starlings take to the sky in twirling masses. A million, probably not. Those millions of birds are long gone used for food, plumage on hats, or poisoned by us because they were considered a nuisance. That is why the birds in our yard seem precious to us. We have had the chance to witness their lives as they fly from the feeders to the water fountain, tend babies, and chase each other around the yard. We've had quail, doves, goldfinches, and robin's nests in our yard over the years, and now we have another nest built within the leaves of a potted plant near our kitchen window. The newest birds, startled when I opened the window near them, haven't been back to tend to their perfectly constructed nest. They left behind one speckled egg.

At lunch, Bill and I watch for the two swallowtails, part of the generations of swallowtails that visit our yard every summer. They flit from one spot to another, hovering, but rarely landing on any plant. There are always two, not three or four, and their offspring come back each year.

Not having enough time lately to do much art, I've been sifting through my portfolio stored on my computer. I found drawings and watercolor sketches of the animals and insects that visit our yard. I also came across a diagram of what has lived on this property since the dinosaurs ventured out of these hills.

We are moving after 40 years in our home. When I think of the things I will miss, besides the friends who have become treasures, I think of the birds and other animals who populate our yard. I watched as one bird picked at some straw that I left out for them. The bird scattered the straw over the porch and bushes and took off with pieces in its beak. Yesterday a small rabbit wandered into our yard and this morning I startled a Jack rabbit who bounded up the hill. We are lucky to see rabbits once or twice a year. Like turkeys or voles they could be a problem; but, for now, these moments leave me with a sense of wonder.

We are moving temporarily to a beach community while we search for another home. The weather will be different from Danville, which just had its first heat wave of the summer. We may experience the morning fog that hugs the coast this time of year. We hope to find other birds and animals around us. We hope to stay connected with friends while we find that new, perfect place called home.

 

FINDING THE RIGHT PLACE

 We've sold our home, sold or donated many of our belongings and packed the rest, put a deposit on a rental house, and managed to still like each other most of the time. Neither of us has had time to pursue our artwork and photography lately, but we find temporary solace outside where we can talk at a table and listen to the birds. We continue our search for a new home.

My filled-to-the-rafters workspace

My workspace after staging

When we began looking for a new place to live, we set perimeters: no stairs, nice neighborhood with a sense of community, hood over stovetop, a small garden, no remodeling projects, room for a workspace for both of us, and character. Not too much to ask we thought. We scoured the internet starting in February. Real estate sales start online with photos of the properties for sale, inside and out. A new neighbor bought their house over the internet without a visit to the property, a complete virtual experience.

We've entered our name with a broker so we get notices of homes coming on the market. We've traipsed through open houses to find there is always something wrong that catches our eye including awkward division of room spaces, posts in the middle of a room, not enough sunlight, or we discover hidden problems after we read the disclosures. We've done all the right things, in between taking deep breaths, but we haven't found a new home yet. As we look on the internet, we begin to question our priorities: do we really need a single story, a hood over the stove (we could add one later?), workspace, how about a balcony instead of a garden?

We will find a home, but it may take longer than we thought.

We realized we needed to rent a place in the meantime, so, again, we scoured the internet in various cities and discovered there aren't a lot of furnished homes to rent in our area. We saw one in Marin County that looked enchanting with a great view of the San Francisco Bay from the deck. One sentence about stairs, but we decided to take a peek anyway. I drove to Marin and as I approached the street where the house was located, I started to laugh. The road was maybe one and a half cars wide with a series of switchbacks that reminded me of the hairpin turns we witnessed watching the Tour de France's cyclists climb in the Alps. We kept going because the leassor was waiting for us. The closer to the house I drove, the more both of us laughed. There was no way we could rent this place. Difficult parking, narrow road with cars dangling half on and half off the road. Then we saw the carport available down the hill from the house and stared up the two-story flight of stairs to the house. We continued to the address, we parked as directed in a neighbor's carport, walked on the uneven ground to the front door, and met the delightful owner. We thought, "If we were 20 or 30, we would jump at this chance, but one twist of an ankle and we'd be done for now." The view of the Bay was spectacular.

We stopped for lunch in Larkspur nearby, a favorite town of ours. We walked around the main street and noticed for the first time the number of stairs leading up the hills away from town. We stopped at a quiet park at the edge of town and decided to look for rentals near a beach (Flat Land!)

It was fitting this morning as posted my blog today, that the reCaptra image to click on was STAIRS.

MY FAVORITE HOLIDAY LINGERS

A reminder of what the flag means

Fourth of July, my favorite holiday, comes and goes quickly. Just a little time to think about the ideals of our Constitution and our complicated history of trying to achieve those goals. I wonder why we are the country we are, why we are admired and hated, and why so many people continue to want to come to this country.

We normally watch the PBS celebration just to see the fireworks. This year, though, I smiled at the thousands of people who crowded into the public space in front of the Capitol. What a glorious time they seemed to be having as they swayed, clapped, and sang to the music by a variety of performers such as Babyface, Renee Fleming, Boyz II Men, and Brenda Carlisle. It was good to see the Capitol grounds filled with happy people, together, waving flags, standing closely, or dancing with each other -- a stark contrast to January 6, 2020, when rioters filled the air with their ugly chants and swung bats and threw objects through the Capitol windows.

I saw just a few masks in the crowd this year. With COVID now more endemic than pandemic, I am mask-free, for the most part, at last. I still gasp at the thought of 1.13 million Americans who died from COVID. I continued to wear masks long after many people stopped and have avoided catching COVID though 3 faraway friends have come down with it in recent weeks. I am less and less cautious now. I stopped wearing masks in grocery stores and other less crowded places. Yesterday for the first time I walked into the pharmacy without one. I still keep them for the few times I've been to the airport and on flights and at the doctor's office. Bill and I went to the reverse boycott of the Oakland A's a couple of weeks ago along with about 40,000 other people and I even walked through the crowded food court aisles without a mask (fingers crossed). Yet we haven't come all the way back. I still see people wearing masks, I've noticed that stores don't carry all the products that used to be easily available, hotels and restaurants aren't staffed as thoroughly as they used to be, and there are still things missing from our lives like civility and responsibility.

I looked at the Fourth of July crowd with hope and marveled that for a brief period, so many different types of people could gather at the Capitol and celebrate their best selves. 

America is a land of contradictions too: July 4th and 5th are dates noted by the Gun Violence Archive for having the most mass shootings during the year. We have had enough this year already. We have more guns than people in this country. Enough already.

Check out the information posted at the Gun Violence Archive:

https://www.gunviolencearchive.org

AROMA MEMORIES

by Esther B. Heimdahl (my mom)

In a flower shop near our apartment in Paris, the owner had strewn heaps of rose petals all over the floor. As I walked in, the petals shuffled beneath my feet and filled the air with their aroma. I thought of that abundance of petals while bemoaning my lack of lemons and their heady scent. I had opened the refrigerator door to grab a couple of lemons forgetting for a moment that my usual supple of lemons was gone. A neighbor used to share lemons from her tree. She kept me and other neighbors in lemons all year long, but she moved away recently. The lemon bounty has stopped for now. Our friendship started over lemons but grew into a more caring one as time passed. Her move made me think of abundance and scarcity. We so often squander whatever we have in abundance and yearn for that abundance when something is scarce.

Lemons by Martha Heimdahl Slavin

A couple of friends talked of friends of theirs who had either moved recently or passed away. They had been friends who met for coffee, read books together, went on walks, or had the occasional dinner out. With each life change, their abundance of friends started to diminish, and they realized that social media, phone calls, and texts couldn't make up the difference of an in-person friendship that had been a part of their everyday lives. I listened to my friends mourn the loss and realized how much more meaningful my friends have become. When I was younger, we were all so engrossed in our own busy lives that I didn't always make the time to be with friends. Now I think of friends that I know and how we both know each other in ways that can't easily happen from a distance. I thought of my mother's statement when she and I were talking, "Some people take a long time to grow up." She was talking of someone else, but the idea has stuck with me. As I grow older, I continue to learn valuable life lessons.

by Esther B. Heimdahl

 

NOTHING TO WASTE

As the pandemic began to ease in spring 2021, Bill and I sat on the large patio of the Coop in Lafayette enjoying a glass of iced tea and a salad. We felt a little uncertain about being too close to other people, but the day was lovely and few people occupied other tables. The server came by with a small cup of paper-wrapped sweeteners and put the cup on the table. When we finished our meal, she began clearing the table. She grabbed the small cup, tossed it on her tray, and exclaimed, "We have so much waste here now. Everything we put on the table has to be thrown out." I wasn't quick enough to ask if the restaurant recycled or composted, nor did I take the sweeteners home, but I thought of how many small ways the pandemic changed us, especially long-held patterns of behavior. All of us became more aware of what we carried or threw away.

The pandemic cleared the skies for a while with carbon emissions down, but plastic bags and brown paper bags proliferated because customers were no longer allowed to bring in their own reusable bags. Unwilling to go out in public, we ordered online and created stacks of cardboard boxes used only once for home deliveries. The throwaway masks that we adopted could be found dropped on the street, clinging to bushes, or worse, caught in birds' claws or around their necks. Two years later, the pandemic for the most part is a thing of the past, masks have disappeared, and the lessons we learned along with them. Instead, we have come out of the pandemic often more angry and less civil with each other. I think of the cars that now race around others on the freeways, swerving either in back or in front of another vehicle, too close to stop if something unexpected happens.

In our return to hurried lives, I often wonder what I could do as one person to make changes in the way we live. I discovered two people, Gloria Majiga-Kamoto of Malawi and Sharon Lavigne of the United States, two winners of the 2021 Goldman Environmental Awards, who created movements against the use of disposable plastic products in their countries. Majiga-Kamoto works to ban the production, importation, distribution, and use of thin (one-use) plastics in Malawi. Lavigne stopped the construction of a plastics manufacturing plant near the Mississippi River in Louisiana.

They both showed me what one person can do. Even small actions at home, like making sure our recyclables bin is filled with recyclables and not trash, matter. As we have prepped our house for sale, we have found local businesses that help keep our usable stuff we no longer need out of landfills by either selling, donating, or taking articles apart for recycling. As an artist, I continue to repurpose materials that have been used in other places or are leftovers in my mixed media artwork. I am glad to see other people devise creative ways and new opportunities for those who continue to think of our longterm future.

Read about the Goldman Environmental Awards winners here:

https://www.goldmanprize.org/all-winners/

ALONG THE BEACH

 

Plein Aire painters spend time outdoors in all kinds of weather catching the right kind of light, the shadows that change as the day progresses, and the feel of the air, whether it's sunny, foggy, rainy, or windy. They try to capture both what they see and what they feel. I can sit in the shade on a patio for a while and draw in my sketchbook, but I haven't learned to sit for hours outside in all kinds of weather to become a Plein Aire painter. I prefer to take a photo and paint in my workroom without the distractions of passersby or the weather creating havoc with my painting tools.

Bill and I spent some time recently in Pacific Grove walking along the beach, watching the waves breaking against the rocks, and photographing the lighthouse that unlike most is far from shore. The Point Pinos lighthouse is one of seven along the California coast. It is still operational and worth a visit. The current lighthouse keeper is one of the three female keepers throughout its history. The lighthouse keeper no longer lives on the premises as the light is fully automated, but I was impressed to learn that the lighthouse had been tended by women in different eras.

This photo shows how far away the lighthouse is from shore.
Can you see it between the fence posts?

We come to this part of the coast often. It's a good place to photograph and discover interesting items that have washed up on the beach. I look for textures and take photos of the detritus strewn across the sand. In my photo file, I have a large collection of similar pictures from various places. I think they will make a good watercolor someday. Once I'm home, I realize the image doesn't have enough value contrast and the detail of the flotsam would be tiresome to draw. My attention span isn't long enough, and the photo turns out to be the best way to showcase what I saw. Somewhere in my work though, the textures I've gleaned from these images will appear in my paintings.

This time as we walked we came across small, round, flat, and transparent beings called velella velella scattered across the beach. Each one has a sail-like structure attached to a darker, flat disc. They normally sail around the ocean, but in spring or fall with a hard wind, end up on beaches along the coast. They are hydroid polyps, not jellyfish, but they still sting. They are beautiful too.

Pacific Grove on the Monterey peninsula is full of history. It is a small beach town that used to be a summer meeting place for church camps. Many of the small houses display plaques at their entrance to show who used to live there. Pacific Grove is also the resting place for monarch butterflies that migrate there from Mexico every year. We discovered Lucy's on Lighthouse, a new place for us, among the good restaurants and cafes in Pacific Grove. We loved their Affogato Milkshakes. Lucy's is a fun reminder of beach towns and surfing along the California coast. Though I've never been on a surfboard, I couldn't help humming "Let's Go Surfing Now, Everybody's Learning How...."

On the patio at Lucy's

More about the history of Pacific Grove:

https://www.pacificgrove.org/history-of-pacific-grove/

Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History:

https://www.pgmuseum.org/general-info

Transparent fish:

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/tiny-blue-sea-creatures-washing-california-beaches-17891130.php

https://pulptastic.com/transparent-fish/

Lucy's on Lighthouse:

https://www.lucyspg.com