her able hands

The Laura Ingalls Wilder Book I mentioned isn’t one of the wonderful children’s novels. It’s called Little House in the Ozarks: A Laura Ingalls Wilder Sampler: The Rediscovered Writings. It’s a collection of incredible articles she wrote for Farmer’s Week about her life on the farm and her social and political thoughts and inspirations.

Sandra IM’d me a link to it with the thought that Laura’s writings on domestic life might help trigger some essay topics for me. Of course, I never bought it and then one day it showed up in the mail.

Every time I look at the book, I feel this wonderful support for my writing life coming to me all the way from Coloransas.

My idea when I read the first few pieces was to start a conversation with Laura on my blog, to do a series of essays in response to her writing and put them in the category Little House in Ohio. Well, in searching through my archives, I see that it was almost exactly one year ago that I posted the one and only piece—not really an essay, just some thoughts.

I’ve categorized 27 other posts under Little House in Ohio but have totally neglected my idea, life intervenes and suddenly a year goes by. But no more, I intend to get back to this writing. This writing and my novel. It’s time.

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I never did show you the pictures of the big snow and the paths Chris cut through the yard to the animal shelters. This one is from the back deck to the chicken tractor in the woods.

and the big fun it made for Lila. We had a bit of a warm spell the week after the storm, turning the pure, icy powder into ice castle building snow.

We got home from work and she was so excited getting dressed for outside, excited yet aggravated with her mother who kept asking her to stand still for just one more picture, please.

So Daddy built this awesome structure using empty kitty litter buckets as scoops. I know; she’s not wearing boots. It was a fight not worth having and 43 degrees out too. Besides, she needed her climbing shoes.

It’s still standing even after the driving rain we got a couple of days later. That just shrank it a bit and froze it solid when the temperature dropped again. Then this Sunday it rained ice for ten hours, so I suspect she’ll get to climb all over it straight through till spring.

And here was the view out the front of the house that night.

Also a few shots of the full moon from earlier that week. One thing I do miss about the old house is the night sky. Here it’s too bright, and the tallest building in Kent (the University library) is an orange-lit protuberance in our view. But we make concessions for the life we most need to live.

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I had such big plans for today, but man, I was drained. I even almost put the butter and cream cheese back in the fridge after I softened it for cupcakes. But I made myself power through the fatigue to make them, disastrous as all hell, but fine. They’re made.

I tried a Devil’s Food Cake chocolate cupcake with Vanilla Cream Cheese frosting. Filled the cups too high so they overshot the tops and spread out across the pan and the tops are a bit dry from the extra baking time.

My big plan was to work out a graphic element in red to look like crewelwork on top of the white icing, but my track record for the day was shite so I went with a mixed stars in two colors kind of thing. I like the way they look better on the cakes I didn’t give a white base.

What I probably should have done was put the butter and cream cheese back in the fridge and enjoyed my clean kitchen for the afternoon from afar (like up on the 2nd floor at my pretty writing table, or even better from the window seat with a good book). But no, I’m too stubborn.

Naturally, I got heavy-handed with the gel coloring so the rich orange and pink (like madras shorts) I was going for turned into a more garish version. Circus anyone? I do like the two colors together and will try again with one dip of the toothpick instead of five. I’ll also skip the cream cheese; it’s just a bit too much.

After licking my fingers clean the inside of my mouth tastes sour and I’m so thirsty I’ve had three tall glasses of water with little relief.

Maybe I don’t want to make cupcakes for a living after all.

Now I just threw some roasted Butternut squash together with fresh Sage, cream (half and half) and Romano cheese for a sauce over kale and gnocchi. It tastes like ass. Maybe I’m coming down with something (please no, I’ve had enough thank you).

Methinks it’s time for a hot bath and some tea. Or tequila. No. Tea. Definitely tea.

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I wish I had thought to take a before picture, because the after is lovely but the context is missing.

This is what I spent a good part of my Saturday afternoon working on. In order to get the corner writing desk to this state of order I had to move six boxes of paperwork and old bills that have been stacked there since we moved in. The bottom box was a hodge podge of old AC adptors, license plates, CD cleaners, a cassette tape for learning Greek (!), dozens of concert tickets, a Ross Perot for President button, the reciept and other pieces of paperwork from the purchase of my first car. This, however, was not my box. This was a box Chris has apparently moved with him everywhere he’s ever gone since we left California in 1989 and split up. That was the car he bought me when we lived out there, a sweet red 5-speed Escort GT. Everything in the box was vintage ’80s. And smelled like it.

The small things I put in a cigar box with similar slips of paper, notes, tickets stubs and reciepts. The rest? Shhhhh.

So now I have this lovely spot to sit at the laptop without internet distraction, my Moleskines (one for garden writing, one for goals and such) and the books I use most often. See the Laura Ingalls Wilder? That’s the one Sandra gave me for inspiration. I read it often and have a ton of notes for response essays I want to write, but the notes pile up, the days fly by and alas, I’m way behind. But now it’s right there and the writing will come. I’m ready.

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How did it get to Friday again so quickly? Chris and I were talking last night about how pooped we are at the end of the day, how he was listening to a talk radio program about how that’s true for so many people. They work all day, get home and have nothing left. I know it’s true for Chris–his is more physical exhaustion than anything, from lifting huge pieces of steel all day, standing on his feet on a 100+ year old cement floor. For me it’s more spiritual exhaustion, due to the polyester cubicle, fluorescent lights, corporate think, pass-the-buck nature of the work I’m in, paired with the strong desire I have to be at home accomplishing things for me and my family beyond earning money.

But priorities prevail. We thought we had a buyer for the house, but the guy was a fast-talker, pushy and insisting on renting for a month before he took posession. Chris said he’d consider it, did a quick Google search and found the guy has an IRS lien against him and the house he claims to be selling doesn’t even belong to him. Needless to say we’re not too interested in letting him in the house before his cash is in our bank account, cleared and ready for takeoff. If he calls when he’s ready to buy, well that’s a different story.

Meanwhile I’m gearing up for the spring when I’m hoping we’ll get a little more action on it. The basement here needs a serious purge to make room for the last couple of loads in the garage over there. I also need to get our cold frame and rain barrels brought over and set up.

This weekend I’m calling a family meeting to present a master list of things I want to see happen in the next couple of months and asking that we each spend at least 30 minutes at the end of every day doing one of those things. I have to stop being so resentful that I’m the only one who notices that we’re still not unpacked. Apparently, they could live like this forever. I can’t do it alone, so we need a plan and a commitment. Every night we each need to take a half hour to do something towards this goal. More on the weekends. Sort through another box. Gather items for the Big Brothers and Big Sisters Thrift Store. Recirculate books. Clean out a drawer or closet. Deal with unused clothing. My goal is for us to be completely unpacked and organized in this house by the beginning of summer so we can enjoy what little free time we have doing things that make us happy (Tyler–riding his bike with his friend Tracey, Lila playing in her sandbox and swimming in her pool, Chris working in his garage, me with my elbows in the dirt).

Speaking of dirt, my 50# bag of potting soil arrived! Now we just have to get some lights set up in the basement. But first I have to make a space for the shelf. See? I could so stay home and work on that today. And I know I’ll be a husk by the time I walk in at 5:45 and will use up the faint shadow of energy to make dinner and clean up, then it’s the rocking chair and a movie then bed. But! It’s the weekend when I wake up next. And I’m on the path now, stepping slowly towards the place in my life where I work for myself and earn an excellent wage. I taste it on the wind.

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