Housekeeping

Housekeeping

The theme for this summer is housekeeping. Marilyne Robinson figures in as a prophetic voice, in her novel and the movie based on it. I have been skipping some social dates and holing up in my camp here, getting a handle on housekeeping. Most of the year life is too busy to do more than barely keep the kitchen counter clean. Now there’s time for cleaning out cobwebs from corners, rats’ nests of stuff from counters, desktop, shelves. Maybe it’s a lifelong project for me. I never learned it when I should have. I never dusted, swept, scrubbed, organized stuff. I never made plans, kept calendars. What did I do all those years? I amused myself and kept out of trouble, mainly. Did my upbringing equip me for the adult world? Yes and no. It developed in me the inner resources to amuse myself almost endlessly. But it didn’t give me the “skills” needed to live a competent adult life in our culture.

So rather than psychotherapy, let’s try housekeeping. The month of June is your month. Turn off all alarms, take the phone off the hook, latch the door. Open only to insiders. Go to ball games and picnics, but mainly clean your house. You will be very happy all next year if you get this done! Make your own plans, and tell people, “I have plans, sorry.”

SUMMER PLASTICS: THE SEQUEL

When we last saw our summer plastics, the year was 2005, and hopes were high for many more brilliant images, captions, and whatnot. But the summer came and went, the school year happened, cameras fell apart, and there was no time to breathe. Now a fresh breeze of early June makes me feel I'm by Long Pond in Plymouth. The sun is warm, but indoors it would be nice to have the heat on, if I weren't so New England-thrifty. So I sit in my back porch study under an Icelandic wool blanket, ignore the dishes in the sink but attend to other housekeeping out here where I'm level with the tree branches and can hear the jays and the windchimes. Jays and titmice come eat off the windowsills, and the light is natural. It's the best of outdoor-indoors.

A GREAT place to sit and catalog all of my personal library online -- watch for my author tagcloud! And pictures of Iceland wool and notes on housekeeping.

On the left are fresh-from-Rodney's-farm-salad greens, radishes, bok choy, another Chinese green, and purple mustad greens. On the right are what I got yesterday at Dollar General and Ingles grocery store, my local chain. Guess which I ate this evening?

Saturday morning, a class day, still blackberry winter. Sunny and clear, cool but with a promise of warmth later on. In the afternoon I will be at LEAF, sitting on the sand reading while my grandchildren play in the water or on the beach. In front of Harris House, two mockingbirds fuss over a crow. Who is in whose territory? One bird chases the crow away. A small black curly coated dog trots across the scene and disappears. A worker on the new chapel roof calls out in Sapnish to another man. In the library, young boys are building a boat for the afternoon races on the school lake. They're using cardboard boxes and duct tape. All around me, kids are peeling oranges and eating snacks from bags donated by the parents. It's not a day to be inside. I'll go out and check on the plants I moved outdoors yesterday. It's Saturday.

Kate's old friend, Tina, came to visit and took this picture of Kate and me in the kitchen. Tina used to live here when Kate had the School of Fish, and she painted Caleb's room white and tan. I might paint my kitchen new colors this summer. Last summer Jake refinished the floor. It's now gleaming hardwood but doesn't show in this picture.