To everything...turn, turn, turn...

(This song is #134 on my playlist.   I have autoplay turned off again, but if you want to listen to it while you read this, just scroll all the way down to the bottom of my blog, select song 134, and hit the forward arrow)

There is a season

turn, turn, turn

And a time to every purpose under heaven.

It took me a long time to find a purpose for the heart numbing loss I felt when I moved away from my old farmstead.

I threw away calendar after calendar trying to make sense of all those years of pain. I carried my anguish with me so constantly that the passage of years began to not matter. The only thing that mattered was the isolation the torment of my memories created.

I lost my joy…and in the process I put aside many things I loved to focus on survival...to focus on trying not to feel anything. Allowing myself to feel meant I allowed myself to be open to pain.

turn, turn, turn

I didn’t paint. I didn’t write. I didn’t garden. My guitar gathered dust along with friendships that were once important. I feared that all the creativity and happiness inside me had withered and died. I feared that doing things I once loved with people I once cared about would make me feel even worse.

So I hid inside myself in panic of being diminished into even more broken and brittle pieces…

…certain in the contest of life suffering, I would at least be awarded a bronze medal.

I lamented where I felt forced to live.

Green trees to cactus…lush gardens to arid landscaping…fireflies to nights devoid of any flicker of bliss.

Until I finally grew so weary of and so sick of my own misery that it at last became time to gather my stones together…

… to make a garden. My season of grief was finally coming to an end.

I planted seeds and watched them wither and die in the intense desert heat.

My gardens failed.

I planted again.

And felt myself turn, turn, turning toward despair.

How could I live in a place with no cleansing summer rains? With heat so awful it melted my shoes? With so many people everywhere that there was no air left for me to breathe?

turn, turn, turn

I forced myself to ask for help and learned how to plant seeds in the desert.

A time to build up

A time to break down

A time to dance

A time to mourn

A time to cast away stones

A time to gather stones together.

In spite of advice to the contrary, I tried planting all the things I loved and missed from my Ohio gardens…the lilacs, the larkspur, and the peonies. They withered and died.

Finally, with little hope of success I threw a packet of zinnia seeds into my little garden.

I watered them and they sprouted.

Ironically, I had always tried to grow zinnias in Ohio, but after their first bloom they would become sickly and the plants would die.

I had little hope for my tender zinnia seedlings, but I continued to water and fertilize them until one glorious day they burst into technicolor bloom.

I cut them and they bloomed again. And again!

I filled old pottery jugs with their bounty. To me there is nothing happier than a big bouquet of crayon colored zinnias.

As time passed, I learned to grow other things in the desert…luscious tomatoes and sweet, sweet onions, spires of hollyhock and tender-faced pansies, but always a large part of every garden was devoted to the cheerful brightness of zinnias.

To everything…

turn, turn, turn

There is a season

turn, turn, turn

And a time to every purpose under heaven.

There is no expiration date on grief…

No timetable to finding our purpose again.

And when grief and sadness come to visit next, as they surely will, I will remind my heart that one day I will be able to gather zinnia blossoms again into a bright bouquet of delight.

And I will, again…

Turn, turn, turn…

This is my final post in the Farmstead series for Alphabe-Thursday.  

Z is for Zinnias.   To read other Z posts, just click here.

I've often written that the telling begins the healing.  Writing this little series really helped me focus on how far I've come since those years.  I still miss that glorious house...but someday I will live in a place like that again.  "Stories don't mean anything, if you've got no-one to tell them to..."   Thank you for indulging my little sentimental journey here. 

 

...

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Farmstead Memories

Miranda Lambert tells us so plaintively in her poignant song, The House That Built Me, that 'you can't go home again'.

I rarely listen to these lyrics, because the truth of them hurts so profoundly...

...and even thought I am happy and content with my life now, that song can take me back instantly.

The years I lived at the old farmstead were ones of extreme contrast...the peace and beauty of history, gardens and wavy old glass turned rosy by sunset juxtoposed against the ugliness of cruel words and destructive anger.

I left there both running from and searching for a path to save a destructive marriage that had filled my entire soul with self-doubt and self-hatred.  

I left there too stubborn to realize that sometimes vows have to be broken in order to survive...

...and too proud to let anyone know how totally and completely beaten down I had become.

It is not a new story.   We all have relationships with people determined to bolster their own lack of self worth by making us feel like less than we are.

Somehow, within the constraints of those destructive relationships, our lives become a made-for-TV movie.    We tolerate ugliness  because of fear or love or pride or just sheer stubborness that the focus of our wills can change things. We tell the stories of our lives through brightly clenched teeth and glittery eyes...edited to protect our egos and fictioned up to protect our hearts.  We turn around and around in dizzy circles unsure of how we arrived at that point in time...and even more uncertain how to change things.

It took me years after I moved from my beloved old farm to gather the courage to return.

When I finally felt I could manage it, I drove there alone and walked to where the lilacs marched along the property boundary.  It was mid-summer and the heart-shaped leaves shielded me from view.

'I thought if I could touch this place or feel it

This brokenness inside me might start healing

Out here it’s like I’m someone else

I thought that maybe I could find myself...'

I can't write this even now without remember the anguish I felt on that sticky July day. It makes my heart ache still...after all this time. I stood there and cried until my eyes hurt and my nose burned and my chest heaved and it was still not enough to exorcise the painful memories.  

I made myself sick with sorrow until finally I said, "Enough.  Just enough."  I walked away not really healed but fortified with the knowledge that I could and would survive my past and could and would allow myself to have joy and peace in my present life. 

The visit began the long, arduous process of healing, even though I buried a part of my heart in the gardens at the farm... a piece of me that has never grown back.

Since then I have learned confidence and self trust.  I have learned to forgive, although I have not yet mastered the art of forgetting.    

You can never, ever really go home again...but sometimes you have to start the next part of your journey by going back to where the pain began.

'If I could just come in I swear I'll leave

Won't take nothing but a memory

From the house that built me...'

"You can't go home again." I know this. And I know that home is here and home is now, but...

...There is a part of me that aches to live in that glorious beauty again...without the pain...

Or perhaps it was the pain that made that time especially beautiful.

This post is written for Alphabe-Thursday's letter "Y".   Y is for you can't go home again.

To read other Y posts, just click here. 

  

Memory of a Farmstead

The first spring at the farm was a season filled with wonder.

I had purchased the old property in the early fall when the leaves were donning their rich, lovely party clothes of ruby, russet, amber and saffron.  Much of the ground around the old trees was already covered with the crunchy brown disarray of their discards. 

Little time was spent raking or tidying around the trunks of the trees...after all...three children needed to be settled into school, drafty windows and doors needed repaired before serious winter set in, and the chaos and clutter of boxes and furniture that didn't quite fit needed to be managed.

Shivering our way through the first winter with a furnace that didn't quite work and doors and windows that hadn't been quite sealed, we all rejoiced in the mud and magic as a sunny spring began.

After the children had scattered to school, I found myself wandering through the yard in the morning with a steaming cup of tea.

The warmth of the stoneware mug offered cozy comfort from the sharp morning chill of the air.

Seeing a tender green shoot emerging from a leaf covered patch of ground, I would carefully take a muddy boot or chilly fingers and scrape away some of the protective covering of leaves.  The tender green shoots would shiver along with me and I would carefully cover them back up.

I waited.

And wondered.

When would I finally discover the treasures those fragile harbingers of spring taunted me with?

One definition of the word treasure is 'a concentration of riches, often one which is considered lost or forgotten until being rediscovered'. As the snow melted away, the forgotten riches of texture, color and scent awaited my daily discovery. 

Gardeners before me had planted a concentration of riches that I didn't even know existed when I purchased the farmstead.

Some the flowers I already knew...snowdrops, crocus, hyacinth, daffodils...

Some flowers required research to discover their identity.   In the days before google, I found myself making small bouquets to take to the local garden center.  The patient clerks easily solved my small mysteries.  "Oh, this one is a scilla!   This color of blue is so distinctive!" or "Fritillaria.  One of my favorites!" 

Forsythia and phlox.  Pussy willow and lenten rose.  Vinca and magnolia.  Violets and lilacs.

The farmhouse was always filled with flowers...from tiny, fragile bouquets in teacups to primitive crocks bursting with jewel-flowered branches.  

 

And my memories of those years is still filled with the wonder of discovery.

The first spring in the farmhouse is something I hold clearly in my memories.  Discovering the bounty the previous owners had left was and remains to this day one of my favorite treasures. 

I can easily imagine people living in the house finding the treasures I left for them...

...my personal concentration of riches that will never, ever be forgotten.

'Who plants a seed beneath the sod and waits to see...believes in God.'

This post is written for Alphabe-Thursday's letter 'W'.   W is for wonder.

To read other W posts, just click here.   

Farmstead Memories - Letter V

The years at the old farmstead were confusing. I was living in the house of my dreams, but my personal life was a nightmare. I have such mixed feelings when I look back at that time.

I started to write about the views from the old windows, but my heart insisted it wanted to say something else.

This does fit into my little farmstead series, but leans toward the dark side of those years.

Outside the window
every hue
of blue and green and brown,
the view!

Reflections of the time of year,
the time of day, my state of mind.
The view is poignant, bittersweet
comprised of colored mosaics sublime.

I watched the years rush by the panes.
Beyond my cold imprint on glass
I watched the view in sun and rain,
praying that the pain would pass.

Outside the windows
I once knew,
the years spun past so fast.
The view!

This little memory is written for Alphabe-Thursday's letter "V".

To read other "V" posts, just click here.

Understanding an old house...

...requires realistic expectations...

Level floors and plumb walls are sometimes a possibility...but rarely a reality...


The number of electrical outlets doesn’t equal the number of things you can plug into them without blowing a fuse...

Something will forever, forever need fixed...

The size of the tree equals the amount of the leaves needing raked...


The amount of your income tax refund will always be a tiny bit less than the cost of something major needing repairs...

Doors don’t always close...windows don’t always open...

Extra blankets, roofing nails, buckets and ladders and duct tape are mandatory...never optional...

Understanding an old house requires dreams and imagination in disproportionate ratio to the sheer and unending volume of work required...

...but the rewards reaped from understanding the quirks and eccentricities can be amazing...

" He who loves an old house
will never love in vain;
For how can any old house
Used to sun and rain
To lilac and to Larkspur
And arching trees above,
Fail to give its answer
To the heart that gives it's love."

I have known and loved this poem for years but it is attributed to various authors so I am unable to list who wrote it for sure.

This little memory is written for Alphabe-Thursday's letter "U".

To read other "U" posts, just click here.

Treasures and Time Capsules

Over the years in the old farmstead we found many treasures and time capsules...from the road signs used randomly in construction and repair, to little notes written with fading pencil on the back of a board removed for home repairs.

The house was built with lathe and horse hair plaster walls and ceilings, and any foray into tearing some of it out for a project, no matter how small, resulted in a dusty mess consisting of a big pile of debris.

My latent archeology genes kicked in every time I saw my husband approach a project with a hammer and a crowbar!

“Remember...” I would begin...and he would roll his eyes and finish my sentence, “...keep everything from the wall! I know! I know!”

Over the years, I carefully sifted through many piles of that rubble. Sometimes the treasure was found on the back of a board removed in the project. Often the faint pencil marks were just dimensions from a handyman in years past trying to measure twice and cut once. Sometimes a random date would be written: November 12 or April or 1952. A few boards had messages. ‘Still kicking’ was one such communication from the past; another was quite firmly inscribed, ‘FINALLY!’

Before my husband replaced the board, I often tried to add my own message...excited about the prospect of someone, someday reading my words added to the previous ones. On a board from a door frame I wrote an entire little biography of my young family and what I knew of the house. In my mind I can still imagine someone’s excitement when they pulled that board away from the wall. I can envision hearing them say, “Oh, look, look! This was written in 1986! Did you know...?”

The gold coin filled walls I fantasized about never materialized in the old farmstead, but once in awhile I would catch a glint or gleam of something metal in the pile of plaster and rescue a random dime or penny. The most money I ever found was a quarter...just one and rubbed almost smooth from years of use. A small silver ring with yearning, empty prongs was discovered another day. Perhaps it had been a perfect diamond or ruby. Or perhaps it had sparkled with a cheap rhinestone. The stone was never found. I rescued a baby shoe. Just one. And in excellent repair. I can picture a young mother frantically searching to find the missing shoe to dress her child. A small stash of old amber glass whiskey bottles was discovered under a loose floor board in the attic...maybe the carpenter who had been nagged enough to complete a project and had penciled that triumphant ‘FINALLY!’, celebrated privately with a long pull of burning liquid while leaning against the wall in the smoke-scented, dust-moted quiet attic air.


We found a postcard or two and the cover of a book. There was an old, crumbled up tobacco pouch and several shredded letters.

I put all the treasures and time capsules into a wooden box I had found in the rafters of the barn. I wrote where and how we had found them in a little journal that I placed in the box as well. It was quite a collection.

When we moved, I debated...leave the box or take the box.

Part of me wanted to cling to all the memories they contained both from history and personally.

I left the box.

On the day I said goodbye to the house, I took out the quarter, and the baby shoe, the naked, sad little ring and one glinting, amber whiskey bottle. I looked at the objects for a while and then finally put them back in the box. They weren’t really mine after all.

At the last second before I wedged the box in under the eaves, I changed my mind and pulled out the whiskey bottle. I wrapped it up in a rag and stuffed into the top of a box in the back of the U-Haul truck in my driveway.

...
...

It has taken me a long time to make peace with the circumstances and life changes that caused me to leave my beloved farmstead.

It has taken me a long time to be able to write about those days.

But now that I finally can, I touch the smooth amber surface of that whiskey bottle and I think to myself, ‘FINALLY!’

FINALLY! I have found a way to hang on to all the treasures and time capsules of a place that captured my heart.

This little memory is written in honor of the letter "T" for Alphabe-Thursday. T is for treasures and time capsules.

To read other 'T' offerings, just click here

A memory of a farmhouse

I really enjoyed sipping tea and chatting with you.

I know you have lots to do today and so do I, but would you like to see the upstairs before you leave?

We'll hurry so I have time to package up some of the left-over cookies and superb lemon angel food cake cupcakes for you to take home. It is funny to think of baking angel food into cupcakes and I’m still surprised it works so well.

Now here. Be careful on the stairs. They are much steeper and narrower than what you're used to. These bottom two wedge shaped steps are easy to slip on.

You should have seen us trying to get furniture to the second floor. With the little landing only two steps up and then this right angle into the narrow, narrow stairwell, it was almost impossible. We ended up having to take a window frame out to get a full-sized mattress into our bedroom.

Do you like this painted carpet runner on the stairs? When we first moved in we put carpet down but it was too slippery and we all fell. I mixed a little sand in with the paint when I painted my ‘fake’ carpet, though, and it works a lot better.

I have always liked this big landing at the top of the stairs. This is the old-fashioned iron register that I told you about. Not only is it the only heat we have upstairs, it’s a great form of entertainment for my kids.

This narrow doorway with the iron-latch is another stairway leading up to the attic. I don’t think we’ll have time to go up there today, but peak into this door. This is my room. I love how the transom above the doors lets light into the landing and I like the blue glass in the windows. There is a certain time of day when the sun shines through all that glass and turns the room into a magical place.

This small bedroom is my son’s room...and it’s a mess. As usual. My husband made this built in toy box and shelves for him to display all his baseball trophies. My daughters share this larger room next to it. They each have a little built in bookshelf beside the window which keeps them from bickering. I like the pink and orange bedspreads with the white painted woodwork. I think the colors work well with the wide old floorboards, too.

Gosh. Look at the time. I know you need to leave.


Let me just show you my neat clawfoot bathtub and then we’ll head back downstairs. Next time maybe we’ll have time to go into the attic and into the small house that’s attached to this one.


Isn’t the glass in this low window pretty? The deep windowsill is perfect to hold shampoos and bubble bath. I even like the old faded linoleum in here. Someday I may try to rip it up and put tile down, but for now I think it looks cute with the curtains on the window and under the sink. I bet you haven’t seen a toilet with a raised tank like this in years. It’s definitely noisy when you flush it, but it still works wonderfully well.

I see you glancing at your watch, but please be careful coming back down the stairs.

Let me find a little plate to put some cupcakes and cookies on.

I had a splendid time showing you around. I hope you’ll come back again!

And here’s a copy of the cupcake recipe if you want to try it!

Lemon Angelfood Cupcakes:

1/2 cup cake flour

3/4 cup powdered sugar

3/4 cup room temperature egg whites (about 5 large eggs)

1/8 teaspoon salt

3/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 teaspoons grated lemon rind

Lemon Frosting:

1/4 cup melted butter

2 cups powdered sugar

1 tablespoon milk

2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 teaspoon grated lemond rind

Preheat oven to 350°. Place 16 paper muffin cup liners in muffin cups. Set aside. Lightly spoon cake flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Sift together flour and 3/4 cup powdered sugar into a medium bowl; repeat the procedure 2 times. Beat egg whites and salt with a mixer at high speed until frothy (about 1 minute). Add cream of tartar, and beat until soft peaks form. Add 1/2 cup granulated sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time, beating until stiff peaks form. Sprinkle flour mixture over egg white mixture, 1/4 cup at a time; fold in after each addition. Stir in vanilla and lemon rind. Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin cups. Bake at 350° for 18 minutes or until lightly browned. Remove from pan; let cool in a draft-free place on a wire rack. To prepare frosting, beat all frosting ingredients together until blended. Beat until light and fluffy. If the frosting is too thick add a bit more lemon juice or milk until desired consistency is reached. Spread 2 tablespoons lemon frosting over each cupcake.

Yield: 16 cupcakes

I’m sorry we’re in such a rush today but let me give you a big hug and we’ll see other soon!

Thank you so much for stopping by!

This little memory is written in honor of the letter "S" for Alphabe-Thursday. S is for stairs and splendid lemon angel food cupcakes.

To read other 'S' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

It was always cold on the second floor of the old farmhouse.

The only passive source of heat was through an iron register cut into the second story hallway connecting it to the large dining room below.

Transoms above the bedroom doors were supposed to help pull the warm air up, but it was a chilly proposition at best. The only augmentary heat on that floor was a space heater used to warm the bathroom on the morning before school.

In winter, baths were always hurried affairs...shivering little bodies rushing to get dressed and escape to warmth and sustenance down the steep flight of stairs. I told my children to think of themselves as pioneers...I don't think that idealization ever really worked with them.

On days when the temperatures weren't quite as frigid upstairs, the register was a great source of amusement and entertainment for my children.

Often you would see a string dangling down from the high ceiling with a rolled up note. Sometimes the notes said, "Can we have cookies?" and sometimes they were written in secret code and I received an irritated "Mo-ooomm!!! That wasn't for you!" for my nosiness.

Sometimes little ears would gather around the opening to eavesdrop on adult conversation.

And any time the children were playing upstairs and there was a knock at the porch door, you could be certain that three pairs of eyes would be peering through the metal of the register to see what was happening.

Twice each year the register would be a gathering place for three little tow heads trying to discern if Santa or the Easter Bunny had stopped yet.

It was during those years, that I would leave clues directly below the register...a trail of a few bright colored plastic eggs along with some leaves and grass from the yard...a bootprint or a sprig of pine to show that Santa had already visited.

On holiday mornings it was my custom to get up quite early to prepare a special breakfast to start the day. The house would be filled with contented quiet...the sound that only occurs when things feel right in our own private worlds.

Soon after breakfast preparations began, the quiet would be punctuated with excited whisper and giggles. I would stand at the bottom of the steep stairs going up and listen.

"Look, look! He was here!" More giggling and excited rustling around. "Do you think Mom is up? I smell something? I'm sure Mom is up! Let's go downstairs!"

I would quickly return to my little kitchen and continue preparations for our special meal.

In they would burst...voices rising in an excited crescendo of suprise! "Mom, Mom! He came! Did you see the grass on the floor? (or the muddy boot prints?) Are you mad he made a mess, Mom?"

The quiet of the expectant morning would be broken...unlikely to return for the rest of the day.

Treasures needed to be exclaimed over.

Children, tired and wired from too much excitement, needed to be calmed and quieted.

...

After the days events were over and the last story read and the last glass of water fetched...

The house would grow quiet and still...

And I would peak through the register before I went downstairs...

Another year.

Another memory.

Another page for the quietly lovely scrapbook of family memories I hold in my heart.

This little memory is written in honor of the letter "Q". Q is for Quiet.

To read other 'Q' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

Let me show you something.

Let's walk out the front door of the old farmhouse.

No, no. Do not stop to linger looking at the wavy, old glass or the beautiful honey gold graining of the wide plank old floor.

Grab your mug of coffee and come along!

I want to show you something before the sun gets too high.

Let's go right here. Be careful to walk on these flat stones set down into the grass. Your feet will stay dry that way, but hurry. The sun is going to be too high soon and I don't want you to miss this.

Let's walk past the next little porch that leads to the addition on the farmhouse. I know it looks fun with the checkerboard painted door and the hollyhocks painted on the clapboards there. I know you want to sit on the old stone steps and sip the fragrant, steaming mug of morning in your hand but come along, please.

No, we are not stopping to explore the smokehouse. It is such an intriquing little building, isn't it? Okay, we'll stop just for a second so you can open the door and smell the fragrance of all the bacon and ham that have been prepared here over the past decades. Yes, it makes me hungry, too, but come along please. We'll go back into the house in a little bit and I will make you toast thickly cut from my loaf of yeasty homemade bread spread with black raspberry jelly made from berries picked over in that treeline.

Come along.

I see you looking at that enormous tree by the smokehouse. It is a Buckeye tree. Right now I can't remember the latin name for it but can you tell it is one of the biggest in the area? Do you see that huge branch with the rope swing? I have a story to tell you about that rope swing, but first we need to walk
just a tiny bit further. You can swing later.

Yes. I promise.

Now close your eyes and let me lead you down this little slope. Be careful. It can be slippery. Just hold tightly onto my hand and I won't let you fall.

Okay.

Now stop.

Open your eyes.

...

...


This is my peony garden. Isn't it amazing? See how the early sun makes the dew sparkle like forgotten stars on the petals and leaves? Look! It is a spiderweb totally outlined in old glass glitter.

I see you are astonished. Have you ever seen so many old varieties of peonies in one place like this?

This is the most amazing time of day to come here and see them.


Where did I get that primitive stone pedestal in the center? I found that along a back road lying in a ditch. I about killed myself loading it into my truck and then rolling it down the hill to the garden. It looks perfect, doesn't it?

What is that garden up the hill you wonder? It is my vegetable garden.

And that plowed plot down the hill? That's where I will be planting my mum slips.

Have I told you the story of how I got all the peony bushes? Yes, I'm sure I did. Remember it was some time back, though. I'll tell you about it later, or you can click here to remind yourself of the story.

Well come back in the house. We'll have toast and hot cofee and I'll tell you all about it. And if we have enough time I'll tell you about the ghostly girl in a white dress who swings high through the air from the very branch where my children's swing is now.

Oh. Of course you can pick a huge bouquet of peonies before you go home. Then you can look at them massed in that old brown crock of yours and think of this little bit of time we spent together.

Thank you for coming to share this magic with me. Now take my hand, okay? It is a bit slippery walking back to the house.


...

This little memory is written in honor of the letter "P". "P" is for peony.

To read other 'P' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

It took me years to figure out why there were so many piles of old bricks on the old farmstead. Tucked behind sheds, stacked up in the tree rows, laid three and four deep on parts of the barn floor their existence remained a mystery.

It wasn't until we started tearing down a small, dilapidated shed that I developed a theory which was later verified as a truth.

The frame of the rickety little shed was covered almost entirely in old street signs, stop signs and road construction signs. Some were almost pristine while others were dented and rusted almost beyond recognition.

The construction material caused me to wonder if the man who owned the property worked for the small town, or if he had perhaps been a garbage collector.

A random visit shortly after the demolition from another old gentleman in the area confirmed that the owner of the house had worked for the city for many, many years and often hauled home salvage and discards and job excess.

The signs and bricks were relics from the time this thrify man saved everything with any value.

And although there was never enough of any one material to make an entire project from the red, orange and yellow bricks...

Their sturdy testiment to time let us create a lot of different projects.

Sometimes it feels like the years on the farmstead were a magical time...like following the yellow brick road to Oz.




This little memory is written in honor of the letter "O" for Alphabe-Thursday. "O" is for yellow brick road to Oz.

To read other 'O' offerings, just click here!

A Memory of a Farmhouse

In the years I lived on the old farmstead, I was married to a coal miner.


Seriously.

And when you are married to a coal miner you become EXTREMELY protective of your claw-foot bathtub!

You do NOT want that black film anywhere near the ancient porcelain surface of your beloved bathing vessel.

Fortunately the ancient, old farmhouse came with both an outside cellar door and a rigged up shower in the basement.

An old shower-head was attached to one of the pipes in the middle of the floor. Rigged up with hot and cold faucets, a drain and a circular aluminum shower curtain rod, it was perfect.

At least I thought so.

My then-husband did not.

He would come home from work covered in grit and black dust and slam those outside cellar doors open.

I, being the always thoughtful wife, would have left clean clothes and his slippers on a chair just outside his cleansing domain. An old bath mat and a plastic lined laundry basket for his heavily grimed work gear completed his deluxe accommodations.

He would grumble and mutter along with the grumble and mutter of old, copper plumbing, and eventually emerge up the narrow basement steps looking for dinner.

Thankfully my tiny laundry room was tucked into a little porch off the kitchen upstairs so I never had to stay in the old, spooky basement very long.

I only stayed long enough to leave clothes and slippers for a coal-miner forced to clean up each night after work in a nasty shower.

This little memory is written in honor of the letter "N" is written in honor of Alphabe-Thursday. "N" is for nasty shower.

To read other 'N' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

It was my own little world. A place to dream. A place to create. A place to just ‘be’.

At some point after the original farmhouse was built, an extension was added on to the west side of the structure. It was quite old and built with the same beams and stones of the original construction, but no doorways attached the two living areas.

While the original farmhouse was fairly large, the addition was not. It consisted of two stories with a long, narrow living room, a small kitchen with an attached porch and a narrow stairway going up to reveal two small bedrooms and a clawfoot tub accessorized small bathroom. A narrow door in the kitchen led down steep, treacherous steps to a dingy basement. Although the addition had a separate furnace, the basement foundation had been removed in a narrow section toward the ceiling so that both sides of the house could share the coal bin.


The downstairs of the addition became my studio and my over-flow kitchen. The upstairs became a place for children’s sleep-overs and house guests.

The entire addition was layered with lumpy wallpaper covering both walls and ceilings and since my paints and brushes were all handy in the kitchen cabinets, I began painting on the walls. I painted simulated mortar and bricks going upstairs. The only windows in the addition were on the north and south sides, so I added a small painted window to the stairwell. Regardless of the season, the painted panes looked out over verdant gardens and a bright blue sky with summery clouds.


I painted the walls in the first bedroom at the top of the stairs into our family life story. Children and visitors were always allowed to add their own touches to the walls and often my visiting nephews would disappear for hours at a time. The excited ‘reveals’ of their artistic additions made my heart sing. An excited boy would run into the main house, eyes shining in excitement, “Aunt Jenny, Aunt Jenny! Come see the squirrels I painted in the trees!”

Because our finances were always strained the addition (and to be honest, most of the main house) was furnished in repurposed, discarded furniture from open trash days and surplus treasures given to us from friends.

The repurposed furniture in the addition was painted fancifully. Tables had my favorite quotes painted in a continuous spiral. Dizzy reading, indeed, for anyone brave enough to undertake the task. Chairs were painted in different colors, some adorned with painted cats and painted rag mats. The clawfoot tub was painted in flowers and then polka dots and eventually ended up clad in plaid.

My then-husband rolled his eyes at my endeavors. He was not enamored of painted surfaces or of pretend windows looking down on pretend gardens.

I stubbornly resisted his pleas to ‘paint the walls like normal people’ and continued to paint on any surface I could.

I have pictures somewhere of this place of magical murals. Unfortunately, everything in my home is boxed up getting ready to move so I cannot share them here.

But I invite you to close your eyes and paint your own murals on the bare walls that surround you.

What will you paint? A tree with carved initials? The first house you lived in as a newlywed? Your Grandmother’s little dog named, and not cleverly, Tiny?

What will you paint on the murals of your mind?

I was so fortunate because in those years, I painted whatever I wanted.

Because I had my own little world. A place to dream. A place to create. A place to just ‘be’.



This little memory is written in honor of the letter “M” for Alphabe-Thursday. M is for Murals!


To read other 'M' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

I was not armed with the correct implements of excavation, but I didn’t know that.

So I began anyway.

In a corner. Where I could experiment.

I pulled the couch away from the wall. It slid easily along the wide, highly polished floor boards.

The first layer was securely attached. I slid my paint scraper under the edge of gaudiness and nothing happened.

I worked my palette knife between the woodwork and the wallpaper.

Nothing happened.

Rocking back on my heels, I surveyed the expanse of the wall. It was huge. And tall. The ceilings were almost ten feet high which meant there was a daunting expanse of hideously printed wallpaper to remove.

I’m sure someone hadn’t thought it hideous when they hung it so many years ago.

I’m sure someone thought huge cabbage roses in the colors of citrus would look great on a dining room wall.

Unfortunately, that someone wasn’t me.

I shuddered to think how bright the colors would have been originally, when the wallpaper was first hung. Oh my.

I wondered if the farmwife had sought to bring sunshine into the gray and dreary Ohio winters…if she had clapped her hands in delight when the job was completed and twirled in a happy dance in the middle of the room.

I did not feel like clapping my hands in delight OR twirling when I looked at the wallpaper so I attempted its removal again. Perhaps if I started removing the wallpaper from a loose spot the job would be easier. After carefully surveying all the edges up to the molding and finding no bubbles or pieced pulled away, I discarded that idea. Someone really hung that wallpaper to stay forever.

I was stumped. So I did what many of us do in these situations…I called my Dad.

“Wellll…” he said thoughtfully, “Try wetting a section of the wall down with a wet rag and letting it set a few minutes. That might loosen up that wallpaper paste some. Are you sure you want to take that off? That’s a big job.”

Sure? Of course I was sure. It was unsightly. It was dreadful.

Besides, I had found the perfect color of green paint for the dining room walls…darker than the shade of the asparagus spears in the large garden to the east of the house, lighter than the shade of unfurling lillie-of-the-valley spears hidden on the west side of the house…I was sure. With the white painted woodwork and the shiny maple floors, I was positive that particular shade of green would look amazing in the large high-ceilinged room.


I got a rag.

I soaked the wall.

My Dad was right. The layer of wallpaper started pulling away easily. I dampened and carefully scraped and dampened and carefully scraped and ended up with 12” free of the orange and lemon roses.


But…

The next layer of wallpaper was even worse. Pink and purple peony-like flowers with a narrow yellow line grid came into view.

I dampened and carefully scraped and dampened and carefully scraped, coming next to a wide striped pattern in dismal browns, grey’s and flesh-tones.

I shuddered. I could not imagine a housewife spinning around in delight when that particular transformation was completed.

I couldn’t imagine a woman with sight even picking that pattern at all.

Three more layers of faded and ugly wallapers peeled away, finally exposing a 12” square of pitted horse-hair plaster wall. The surface felt crumbly and brittle.


I felt my plan for fresh green paint slipping away. I suspected that it was all those layers of wallpaper that had kept the fragile plaster from disintegrating in the long years since it was first applied.

Shoving the couch back into place, I cleaned up the mess of the paper and headed to the wallpaper store.

I looked at pattern after pattern…waiting for the ‘a-ha’ moment that was surely felt by the other farmwives as they discovered citrus cabbage roses and strange, fanciful peonies.

It took awhile.

But then I found it.

The perfect, perfect wallpaper.

When it was delivered a few weeks later, I took it home with me and over the next month hung it carefully, strip by strip.

When my layer of wallpaper in the old dining room was complete, I twirled in the center of the room in delight. How perfect it was! How happy! How me!

I clapped my hands in delight…

…and I swear to you, I think the ghosts of all the past farmwives spun in joy with me…celebrating their own layers of perceived loveliness.

Even the farmwife who picked the brown, gray and flesh-tone stripes.

Perhaps, she was the most joyous of all.

I will never know how a future farmwife will look at my layer of wallpaper when she undertakes her own wallpaper excavation.

Perhaps she will start in another corner and carefully scrape away layer after layer of history…finally coming to mine.

Will she softly breathe, “Oh my…I hope I can find new wallpaper JUST like this” or will she shudder and move on through the layers?

I hope she finds my layer worth twirling over.

But even if she doesn’t…I did.

And it makes me smile to have been part of a long line of farmwives trying to layer our nests with grace and beauty for our families.


This little memory is written in honor of the letter “L” for Alphabe-Thursday. L is for Layers!


To read other 'L' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

It took a brave heart to attempt culinary endeavors in the small farmhouse kitchen.

It wasn’t just because there was only about four feet of 1940’s linoleum covered countertops or a giant, single chipped-up porcelain sink.

It wasn’t just because there were only six cupboards in the room or because the four drawers sticked unmercilessly requiring herculean strength to open.

And it certainly wasn’t just because the two exposed outlets would short circuit amidst a shower of festive sparks each time you tried using something more powerful than a pathetic hand mixer.

The brave heart was required because of the old gas range left in the kitchen when we bought the house.

When I first laid eyes on it, I was enchanted. Sure, the white enameled surface was chipped and scratched. Sure, the biggest oven box was the size of a large casserole dish.

(Trust me. This is not a picture of my old stove. It looked a bit like this but in much, much worse shape!)

But it was cool. And old. And I pictured myself wearing an apron and taking hearty old fashioned dishes from the black speckled interior.

My then husband, a man always motivated by massive quantities of home-cooked food, told me he would remodel the kitchen right away.

“Sure, go ahead,” I said, “But I want to keep the old stove, just leave it alone.”

He raised his eyebrows at me, but agreed.

The first week of cooking I learned that lighting stove-top pilot lights every single time you wanted to cook is a bit annoying. And a little frightening. When the tiny little flame from the match came in contact with the gas, the subsequent ‘whoosh’ and excited flames always made me jump back. I also quickly learned that when you re-lit the pilot lights inside the small ovens, you needed to duck and jump back simultaneously to avoid hitting your head and/or catching your hair on fire.


I perservered, though. Did I tell you that the range was cool. And old. And I pictured myself wearing an apron and taking hearty old fashioned dishes from the black speckled interior.

The range remained old, but rapidly became less cool as I learned that old gas ranges are not super reliable and that oven temperatures are usually more of a suggestion than a reality.

I persevered, though. I still pictured myself wearing an apron and taking hearty NON BURNT old-fashioned dishes from the black speckled interior.

I persevered right up until the day I forgot to duck my head and jump back simultaneously when I lit the bottom oven pilot light.

A goose egg on the top of my head and burned off bangs, eyebrows and eyelashes finally convinced me that having an old gas range that didn’t work right was most definitely NOT cool. And I finally figured out I could still wear an apron and take hearty old-fashioned dishes from the interior of a nice, newer gas range.

When I think back on my years on the old farmstead I remember so much of it fondly.

However, the eccentricities of a cool, old gas range in my decrepit little kitchen are not among those memories that I hold most dear.


This little memory is written in honor of the letter “K” for Alphabe-Thursday. K is for Kitchen!


To read other 'K' offerings, just click here.

A Memory of a Farmhouse

Busy with unpacking and trying to organize a family of five into a home with no closets, I had very little time to explore the ragged hedgerow of neglected, gangly tall bushes and high grass surrounding two sides of the property.

Fall and winter passed and it was not until the following spring that I realized there were treasures hidden in the grass beneath the overgrown pen and ink rendering of criss-crossed branches.

The gift of a slightly crumpled bouquet of tiny violet and yellow flowers from a slightly grubby child's hand, elicited my question, "Where, oh where, did you find these?"

My daughter chattered in excitement as we walked across the yard, her warm little hand cradled in mine.

Nestled in the grass were hundreds of the minute jewel-toned blossoms. Their slight, sweet fragrance surrounded them with gentle, perfumed scent.


I crouched down and touched them reverently. "Oh look, look," I told my daughter. "My grandmother called these little wild violets 'Johny-jump-ups'! Isn't that a funny name?" I tickled the tender underside of her chin with a little velvetty blossom as she giggled in delight.

I told her stories of my Grandmother who had adored gardens and all growing things. I told her how my Grandmother had also called these little flowers by the name 'Hearts Ease'. I told her that it DID ease my heart to know my Grandmother was still with me in the memory of the flowers...even though she had been gone for a long time.


My daughter was more delighted with the name than hearing the stories. "Johny-jump-up? Johny-jump-up! What a funny name!"

As the spring progressed the hedgerow continued to surprise and delight us with daffodils, forsythia and white and purple lilacs.

But none of their beautiful blooms touched my heart as much as that first little gift of Johny-jump-ups.

This little memory is written in honor of the letter “J” for Alphabe-Thursday. J is for Johny Jump Ups!


To read other 'J' offerings, just click here.