her able hands

We all landed at home around 5:30 Monday night and hit the lawns running (with mowers and wheelbarrows and for me, a pocket full of tissues). Chris knocked down the grass at our house with the ride-on and got so caught up in it that he forgot to go to his guitar lesson. Oops. Tyler used the push mower with the bagger attachment to cut the grass next door at Chris’ mother’s house. I had him fill the wheelbarrow, and I layered in loads of leaves that I raked out of the ivy beds at the edge of the woods. Oh, lordy the leaves were much too thick in there — suffocating the ivy and blanching the hosta shoots all the way to the tips, pure white. The whole edge line looks like a gourmet endive patch (if you ignore the rotting leaves and oh, crap, poison ivy that’s taking over).

I had to focus on the small acts of completion over and over again even though my attention kept wandering outward to the bigger picture. My mother in-law joined us in the back and I felt so overwhelmed with the need for care that is racing forward in her as her short-term memory simply disappears. I keep having the thought that I need to be here every day so I can help her with the property, but she could also pay for a lawn service (easily). I get the impression that she just doesn’t believe in paying someone to do work that family should do. Regardless of the fact that all of the members of her family work full-time and also have children and properties of their own to care for…and she doesn’t come out and say that, but she also doesn’t take action. It’s a generational thing maybe. I’m trying not to judge it. I mean, miles in her shoes and all that. I was raised in the time when the service industry blasted off, and while we rarely hire outside help because we’re DIY freaks, I also see it as a reasonable answer when we just can’t manage it on our own. We may have to call someone in for her, before the property falls into that defeated decline of decay and disrepair that happens when left unattended. It needs way more than mowing and we can barely handle that these days.

Anyway, so I took those wheelbarrow loads over to the lasagna bed I’m building along the back of the deck. It’s about 4 feet deep and now after last night’s work, about 16″ high. I’ll add some manure and then next week when we mow again, will do some more layers of grass and leaves to bring it up to 2 feet. I have one giant bale of peat moss left from last year, so will do a nice layer of that in between.

Each trip back for another load, she showed me a thick piece of glass she picked out of one of the garden beds (the soil is loaded with glass back there because 50+ years ago, it was used to dump trash. She showed me that piece of glass ten times as if it was a new discovery. I’m really worried that things are going to slide downhill with her faster and faster. I’m upset with myself when I feel the thread of resentment tightening around my heart. How can I let that go? I don’t know how to rise above my own needs to meet these massive needs of a woman I don’t have a very close relationship with and who only opens minimally to her grandchildren. To do it gracefully feels a herculean task. I blew it, but hard, when I helped her after the shoulder surgery. Just didn’t handle the intimacy at all well and let my annoyance at the brothers come out with sarcastic comments about sponge baths and well…it’s a damned good thing I didn’t want to be a nurse. I’m still so ashamed that I said what I said, so much so that I won’t repeat it here. I’m even more ashamed that I meant it. That I didn’t feel good about helping, that it felt like a burden and brought up tremendous fear in me. Jeesh. Being human means carrying such a huge load of bullshit around with you everywhere you go, you know?

I keep imagining the future and it’s me having to go daily to hand her the pills she takes and watching her swallow them — morning and evening. Right now she’s taking everything in the morning, and some are supposed to be nighttime only because they make you drowsy. I don’t want to be that person. I want her sons to step up and handle that (which they will, it’s just my imagination running willy-nilly because I feel overwhelmed and tapped out and helpless around the situation). Probably exacerbated by the fact that I don’t have much of a relationship with her or with any of Chris’ siblings. I resent that we don’t live close to my mother who is an involved grandparent and misses her grandchildren so much that I know it’s a constant ache for her (as it is for me). That I don’t get to raise my children with my sister and her sweet family nearby. That all feels so unfair on so many levels.

So I build garden beds and plant food to feed my family and try to stay in the moment. It’s so easy to project myself into some nightmare future. Not so easy to send myself out into a future that’s clear and bright and filled with meaningful work and intimate connections in the community. Not without seeing the difficulties. When did I become so negative? I think it settled into me more deeply when Chris’ dad got so sick and I was working so much and it felt like everything fell apart. And another whole year has gone by and we’re not much farther ahead and in some ways have slid back more than we even realized.

But I will NOT complain about working full-time. Especially in light of the fact that I am seriously contemplating changing to an even more full-time position in a restaurant. Oh, there is so much to reconcile in my mind. As I hauled loads to the garden bed and spread the materials out in thick layers, I weighed the pros and cons in my mind yet again. It would be amazing to be working to create a business model that builds relationships with local suppliers and brings wholesome foods to the community. Feeding people is one of my very favorite things in the world to do with my time. Could I actually make a viable living doing so?

Also, I love seeing the downtown improving and think our idea will add to the integrity and sustainability of the downtown businesses. Maybe help balance out the ridiculous number of tattoo parlors? I have always wanted to learn how to do a business plan, so I’m diving in right now and doing just that, so we have something on paper to work with as we talk to the venture capitalists and to property owners who are involved in the Main St. initiative.

Oh my Maude, the hours. I know the hours are going to be ungodly. I know this. Yet I’m drawn to it. I keep coming back to a very calm yes, again and again. I have not felt a strong no at all as I’ve explored the ideas, just questions of doubt arise and I write them down and look for practical responses. Can I work 80 hour weeks? No. How can I make sure that does not happen? Close Sunday and Monday, do only lunch and dinner, find good, solid help (we already have several people who are interested who we know have terrific work ethics and are flexible).

Here’s an interesting thing: Cheril went to a meeting at the University about connecting the KSU students with the Downtown Main St., building work relationships with kids in a way that will make them want to stay here in Kent after they finish school. There were a lot of great ideas on the table and it gives me hope that we could find good, reliable employees. The program will be set up so that it’s part of their degree and they will have to work with an adviser and will be screened for responsibility and reliability. Interesting things happening in town. If this is my home, which it apparently is, then I’d like to be more involved.

Meanwhile, I’m watching my neighbor go from 0 to 150 on his sandwich shop in just a couple of days. He got the keys last Monday and already has most of his distributors lined up, has the menu and logo nearly finished, lined Cheril and I up for cookies and cupcakes, and is working on line processes. He plans to open the doors to his sandwich shop on June 1 and I’m not going to be at all surprised to see it happen. Granted, it’s a turnkey operation for a sandwich shop, so he’s ahead of the game with equipment and setups. But it’s good to see this all in action, to see that he’s a guy who gets things done.

My work with the grass clippings sent me into sinus hell over the next couple of days and I stayed home from work yesterday so I could do the Neti Pot every hour, warm salt water washes through the sinus are beyond bizarre, but it seems to have worked. I broke a massive sweaty fever last night and this morning can breathe through my nose a good 50% better. During the day I did take care of a few tasks around here like trimming out the double-seedlings in my lettuce starts and feeding everything with liquid kelp fertilizer. Then I moved Lila’s play kitchen into the alcove in the living room where the piano used to sit (it’s in the dining room now) to make space for an extra table for cupcake making. In a few weeks I’m going to be a baking maniac. Hope my oven holds up for a few months — it’s been acting a little wonky and is 12 years old. If we have to replace it, I’m going to sacrifice a cabinet and put in something wider.

I have a giant leap I will need to make soon — whether into the abyss of the unknown life of a restaurant manger, or into a financially risky venture working from home. The latter feels less and less enticing the more I plot and plan this other possibility. Every day more is revealed and I let myself float along in the tugging current of this river of life. I can hear the rapids up ahead and my habit is to want to start to swim the other way, but I’ve done that too many times. I’m ready to see where life is truly leading me now so I’m just going to relax into it and let it carry me. I’m tired of fighting.

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Where the frack did that weekend go? My body is so bone tired I can hardly type right now and am thinking that the cup of coffee I have in front of me isn’t nearly strong enough.

We never had any of that predicted rain over the weekend, just a few sprinkles and then nothing but sunshine and warm breezes. I mostly stayed off of the computer and focused on work outside, balanced with a bit of laundry (hung out to dry), some salad assembly, and a bit of seedling transplanting. I haven’t once picked up my camera, so the promised photos don’t exist. Ah well. Here’s what I did knock down over the past two days:

• Raked out beds around the house and weeded out the overgrown alpine strawberries and heal-all that’s taking over (love my scuffle hoe). Visited the wood mulch pile from last year’s visit with the wood chipper about 50 times with a shovel and a wheelbarrow. The pile is about twenty times bigger than in the photo on that post, minus 50 loads. Oh, my aching body.

• Yoga class. Again, with the ow.

• Mowed and mulched lasagna beds with grass clippings, and started the new lasagna bed along the driveway that I’ll add a layer of topsoil to next month.

• That’s because I got $80 worth of manure dumped last night. One by the driveway for that bed (shared with neighbors) and the other by the gardens next door at the in-laws’ house. I shoveled a lot of that last night, too. Have I mentioned my sore torso? My aching shoulders? My hands that feel like they got stepped on?

• Raked out ivy along side of driveway (not all of it, just about 300′ of the 200′ bed) for more lasagna bed materials.

• Transplanted Bee Balm and Rudbeckia into a little bed I made a year ago with rabbit bedding, right behind the playground set.

• Dug out a bunch of overgrown bedding plants in the front, some of which became compost, and some transplanted to bare spots. This to make room for fruit trees, which I should order this week.

• Planted a dozen fingerling potatoes and thought about doing more, but the manure hadn’t been delivered yet and the beds next door really could use a good run with the rototiller (which I’ll have to borrow). Plus, I promised a friend I’d dry some violets for her, so I need to run over there and dig those up first.

It felt so good to see the property looking cared for after such a long winter, and to feel the earth under my feet, a shovel in my hands. The kids played and I shoveled and raked and dug. I let my thoughts wander but kept bringing them back to my body, to my breath.

I know I did more than that, but that’s all I have time for. Now I need to wake up the kids and get us all out the door. Tyler won’t be riding his bike this morning because it’s raining and cold. It’s meant to drop down to 31º and snow tonight. Hard to believe that when it was in the 80s on Friday, but okay. Spring in the Northeast/Midwest is never predictable.

Monday. Back to it, eh?

Tonight I play catchup on my freelance work.

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I don’t think I’ve ever been a very good listener, particularly with new people. My brain always has one ear turned to how it can latch on to some detail and then noodle it in a thousand ways, waiting for that inevitable pause into which I can thrust my own related (hopefully) thoughts. I doubt anybody I’ve met at a social gathering has walked away thinking, now that Kelly, she’s a really good listener. But I’m pretty sure more people than I (and they) care to recall have walked away knowing useless bits of my history like the time I waited on Judd Nelson, or the time the entire wait staff stampeded one another in the mad rush to get outside to pick Kate Hepburn up off of the sidewalk. Or that Fire Stix Jolly Ranchers and Mountain Dew were my favorite foods when I was 12. And that I was in labor with child the first for a month week.

I think I’m sick of myself. I wonder how people reinvent themselves? Do they start with something on the outside? Because I’m thinking that could be kind of fun. Would my thus far unsatisfied fascination with knit skirts and Frye boots be a step in the right direction?

Maybe if I feel absolutely confident in my body and convinced of myself I can learn how to be with people in a more genuine and present way. People like you. And you. And yes, definitely you. To learn how to not rush into connections in a bluster of me, to not just puncture a vein and spurt the story all over you in a river of images and feelings with no reference, no history. Hi, I’m Kelly and I’m a talkaholic. Maybe I can worry less that while you’re talking to me, my facial expressions are running away with themselves and revealing my inner insecure me. Is it weird that I want to discover the earnest listener inside of me? The one who hears all of the little details and instead of constructing her own story out of those pieces, stores them away as the pixels that redraw you in blooming color in her mind’s eye when you’re no longer there. I want to be the one who sits easy in her chair with soft arms and hands, eyebrows low and relaxed, mouth soft, not waiting or wanting for anything. Just being with you. Being easy with you.

But here…this is her counterpart, with arms crossed tensely across her belly. She’s not angry or holding or trying to block you out, she’s just trying to hide that protuberant tummy so her eyes don’t stray to it every five seconds. She hasn’t felt comfortable in her own skin for a bunch of years and she knows that fact creates a wall that not much passes through, not all the way. Maybe she worries there’s not enough room in there for you both. Even still, yes, she is listening—and no, not only so she can tell you what your storytelling has triggered inside of her own speeding mind. Though, as I think we’ve established…there is that.

When I first started blogging at Baggage Carousel back in 1998, it was for the love of stories—to be part of this burgeoning world of words and pictures, slices of past, present and future that people were sharing. I can’t believe it’s even true, but I feel like I’ve run out of stories, or have come up against the wall that has that sign on it that says: Do Not Enter. Or maybe it says: Enter At Your Own Risk. But there’s no disclaimer to indicate just what the risk might be and I don’t do well with that kind of uncertainty. All I know for certain is that I feel frustrated because I’m not expressing myself the way I want to anymore.

I love garden blogging and writing about food and my misadventures in the kitchen and in the soil. I don’t want to write much about the kids anymore because it just doesn’t feel like my story to tell and there are only so many ways I can be self-referential while recounting their escapades. And these things are only a part of me, not the whole of me and dammit all, it was a very long winter with no gardening whatsoever. I got in a serious rut with my cooking (pizza, pasta, beef stew, pizza, chicken soup, stir-fry, curry, grilled cheese, pizza, pasta, chicken soup, pizza). Hell, we even had frozen fish sticks one night. Yuck. I’m also in a rut with my writing—not just on the blog, but all across the spectrum. I guess I’m just burned out and so I’m looking at ways I can shake things up without walking away because I don’t want to not blog. I just want to find my way back to the stories.

I’m thinking about the reason I titled my blog Her Able Hands in the first place — because I was buried in my novel (no, I haven’t touched it in the last year) that I had given a working title Able Hands and because I was doing a lot of cooking and handwork and raising kids and noticing that my hands were always working on something and how good that felt. I was looking for a new outlet online because I was so tired of the baggage that went along with the first blog. Now here I am again with old stories looking for a new framework, knowing that I don’t want to go changing the whole damblam thing again. So stay tuned, I’m cooking up a little project that I’ll announce in another day or two, as soon as I can get a decent photo to go with it, and I sincerely hope you’ll all participate. That’s right…you. And you. And yes, you too.

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So, happy Tuesday! The past five days have been a bit of a blur so I’ll just recap in bullets:

• Thursday Tyler=strep, missed four midterm exams.
• Thursday evening, Lila fever of 106. Trip to urgent care. Strep, double ear infection.
• Friday worked at home, both kids home sick. Ty stayed in his room and slept. Lila moaned on the couch, fever hanging out around 101 even with Motrin.
• Saturday afternoon, Lila’s fever back up to 105. Trip to ER. The Zithromax she was on apparently not covering the hidden, undiagnosed pneumonia in her right lung.
• Sunday afternoon, massive allergic reaction to the new antibiotics. Benadryl helps the swelling, but the red dye makes her certifiable.
• Sunday night, mama drinks a big goblet of cheap wine and goes to bed with massive headache, then stays awake all night for the third night in a row, listening to the water bubbler sound of Lila breathing. But she’s breathing, so we’ll take that with thanks.
• Monday trip to pediatrician reveals that first prescription for Zithromax was at a 50% dose given over ten days, rather than the 100% dose over five. Thus the non-coverage for the developing pneumonia. So back on Zithromax at correct dosage and lesson learned: even though urgent care is only three minutes away and the co-pay is $50 instead of $100, it’s better to pay the extra and drive farther in order to get to the ER at Children’s Hospital where they know what they’re doing for little ones.
• Tuesday—hey! It’s Tuesday! And yes, I’m still attempting to work a little bit from home while Lila hangs out on the couch watching movies, reading, drawing maps and coughing. Oh, the coughing. I’d like to be able to bring her back to school tomorrow, but I’m just not sure. Fever’s gone, but this cough when it hits—it just knocks her out.

So my two boxes of seeds are still sitting on the dining room table, waiting for my attention and I’m thinking I’ll just dive in and do that today. Make a list of what I have, then compare that to what I want to order.

Is it too late to start a few cartons of winter sown perennials out on the porch? We’ll still have at least one more deep freeze here in Ohio, right?

Also thinking a lot about this Victory Garden Drive that’s the hot new garden challenge with an excellent mission. I had vowed to myself that I would not sign on for any blogging challenges this year, and instead just focus on my own little path, explore the topics that I want to write about in relation to my city acre and my goals for building a more self-sufficient life. But this Victory Garden Drive is such a great idea. I’ll have to sit with it some more to see if/how I want to be involved blogwise. But I’ll be planting my Victory Garden, as always.

Interesting to note that the area down the length of the driveway where Chris piled all of the mulched fall leaves has melted off first. The area with leaves is big, but not very deep, maybe four or five inches. So I don’t think it’s composting heat that’s melting the snow. Across the driveway where we didn’t manage to get any leaves piled is also melted. I think it’s more sun, so I’m very hopeful that this is just the right area for my sun-loving vegetables.

Oh! And I had a vision! Sorry, I know that sounds hokey. But it’s true. While browsing through the Fedco Tree Catalog, trying to decide on what Pear varieties to grow, I saw them espaliered—one tree on either side of the front steps. They’ll get plenty of sun and good drainage, be protected from some of the winds, and in several years we’ll have a living wall along the front of the house. I can see how magical the front porch will become when it’s in bloom. The fragrance of blossoms, and then the rich, fermented ripening pears hanging right there in front of us while we eat a late summer supper. I’m very excited about this! I’ll transplant all of the Evening Primrose to another bed and plant a half-ring of Comfrey around the drip line to help pull up nutrients and loosen the clay on the outer edges.

Gosh, it’s almost 50 degrees out there today! I want to get out and start right this minute.

But no, first things first. Seed inventory! Winter sowing! Clean off the light table and finish mounting the lights so I can start my onions, and shallots inside.

Spring is well and truly on her way, people. Which means some of these nasty-asty germs we’ve been burdened with will begin to die off, right?

Please?

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My gardening to-do list is starting to grow again and I’m attempting to look at it with quiet enthusiasm and to pay attention to the pulse of trepidation that beats just one layer down. That thump, thump, thump is my Overload Radarâ„¢ (Angelina, this trademark’s for you…and you’re welcome to use it anytime you like) and it doesn’t take very much to set it off these days. I’ve come to understand that a wise and healthy woman keeps an eye on the Overload Radarâ„¢ and lets the to-do list languish when necessary. It isn’t going anywhere.

This weekend I intend* to do a thorough seed inventory so I can figure out what I need to buy. I’m thinking it’s mostly salad greens and some Roma beans. Thanks again everyone for your helpful comments about the beans. I have a package of Fava (Broad) beans from last year and will plant them early in the spot where I had the carrots last summer. It gets plenty of sun before the leaves are all on the trees, and the beans will give the soil a little nitrogen boost to make it ready for whatever I plant there late spring.

After seed inventory comes winter sowing. Hopefully I also manage to clean out my iPhoto, so I can photoblog the process. Right now I can’t even get my Christmas pictures uploaded, it’s that jammed up with images dating back to April 2007.

Meanwhile, it appears that Big Bad Bastard Bronchial Infection is tapping at my lungy doors again. I’m fighting, throwing everything in my arsenal at it, and so far (4 days in) it seems to be holding steady at a sinus nastiness and an upper respiratory coughing situation. Let’s not go full-blown this time, shall we? Everyone tells me that the preschool years are the worst on a mother’s immune system. I’ve had ten different women tell me that they spent an entire winter sick with one thing after another when their kids were in preschool. That right there just might be one of the best arguments I’ve heard for homeschooling.

One last bit…a request for some Bloggy Mojo in the direction of the young couple who looked at our house last weekend. They seemed very interested and mentioned looking to secure a bridge loan so they can buy our house at the same time they put theirs on the market. I feel the winds of change swirling. Thank you so much!

*I’m giving intention a try again, in an effort to reign in the chaos. I’m doing it at home and at work. At work it’s particularly beneficial. I set the intention of accomplishing my work without participating in the daily, minute-by-minute fire drill that goes on even though I had no idea of how to make that happen. After I made that choice, the answer presented itself: don’t deal with requests immediately. Pretty simple right? Well, not so easy to implement when everyone in the company expects that you’ll turn requests around same day, if not same hour. But unless the requester can show me a true need for instant results, I reply, “I’m adding it to my schedule now (which is just an ongoing list, but helps keep things almost clear) and can have that to you by _______.” Generally that’s two to three days out, sometimes a full week. I’ve only been doing this since the new year, and it’s reduced my physical and mental anxiety at work tenfold.

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