These (very) mini-daffodils grew from bulbs we salvaged from a pot we bought at the supermarket to add some color to the kitchen winter before last.
Join us for Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/04/19/one-liner-wednesday-a-battle-to-the-finish/
The aftermath of Pi Day.
Join us for Linda’s One-Liner Wednesday! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/03/15/one-liner-wednesday-what-day-is-it-anyway/
The US tends to have a lot of whimsical “holidays” in honor of just about any food, activity, relationship, etc. imaginable. March 14 is celebrated as “Pi Day” because Pi is 3.14…
The celebration entails eating pie. While Brent often bakes for Pi Day, this year I bought a suitably dedicated cherry pie from Wegmans.
Wishing an equally delicious pie to all those celebrating!
We went on a classic week-off-from-school outing with our granddaughters as part of our visit to their home in London. We navigated a series of bus and Tube routes to tour the Cutty Sark, a clipper ship built in 1869 to carry tea from China to London as quickly as possible.
While it was built to carry tea, it also carried lots of other cargo, exports from Britain and imports, including wool from Australia. (A reminder that jumpers are called sweaters in the US.)
The Cutty Sark is not afloat these days, but still takes lots of maintenance. It’s hard to see, but there is a person near the top of this mast.
This lifeboat was getting a fresh coat of paint.
February is LGBT+ History Month in the UK and the Cutty Sark was participating by flying the Pride flag.
After lunch in a nearby pub, we went to the National Maritime Museum. I was interested to see how some of the exhibits were bringing in indigenous perspectives, such as this map showing language groups from the colonial period in the current US and Canada.
We finished our Greenwich tour by walking up to the Royal Observatory, through which the Prime Meridian runs. It’s the reason we have Greenwich Mean Time.
Before we started our trek back downhill and onto the bus, we enjoyed the view of London from the heights!
Spouse B, Daughter T, and I are in London, UK, visiting Daughter E, Son-in-law L, and Granddaughters ABC and JG. Yesterday, we made a trip to the Battersea Power Station.
Having grown up around power stations, I am geeky about them and would like to tour them, but the Battersea Power Station after decades of use as a coal-fired power station, designation as a historic landmark, and decades of disuse and deterioration, has been transformed into a shopping mall, apartments, offices, restaurant, and entertainment complex. The mall only opened a few months ago and more shops will be opening later this year.
On our way to the main entrance, we passed this sign. Of course, I had to take a photo of it as a shoutout to my friends of the Boiler House Poets Collective!
The main part of the old Art Deco-style power station that has been transformed into shops and restaurants is massive. Here is a view as you look down one of the main galleries that once housed multiple turbines:
The amount of detail that went into the restoration is staggering. Here you can see some of the Art Deco elements and part of one of the old control room through the windows.
There are lots of fun elements that play off the power station theme, such as the Control Room B cocktail bar, which features lots of dials and gauges as part of the decor.
I loved seeing the remnant of this safety helmet sign. When we used to go to the hydro stations with Paco, this would have been termed a “hard hat area.” (Yes, I am just that geeky about these things, as anyone who has heard me going on about the industrial roots of the MASS MoCA complex will know.)
There are, of course, many distinctly modern features. For example, one of the old smokestacks now houses an elevator to take people up to the top to look out over London and the Thames. Not being particular fans of heights, although it is glass encased at the top, we did not go up in Lift 109, so called because the top of the stack is 109 meters from the ground, but it’s there for those with the inclination and pounds to do so.
At the moment, there are a number of light installations scattered around the complex. JG was especially taken with these hearts and kept hopping from one to another, while saying “another heart” over and over in an enthusiastic, two-year-old voice. I suppose it’s possible that this was more of a valentine feature than part of the light installations, but it was fun, none the less.
So, Happy Valentine’s Day from London for those celebrating!
My granddaughters after a rare snowfall in London, UK – excited 5-year-old ABC who remembers snow from living with us in upstate NY when she was little and 2-year-old JG who had never experienced snow.
Join us for Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2022/12/14/one-liner-wednesday-the-lost-days/
I’m managing to do more Christmas preparation than I have in the last several years.
I have over half my holiday cards sent.
Yesterday, B and I went to the tree farm to buy our Christmas tree and wreath. Today, along with daughter T, we decorated the tree.
I love our Christmas ornament collection. There are ornaments that belonged to our parents. Ones we have bought on our travels over the years. Ones we received as gifts. Home-made ones by my grandmother, B’s mom, B as a child, our children. Handcrafted ones made by artists on four continents, including my friend Yvonne Lucia. Ornaments made of cloth, yarn, wood, birch bark, wax, corn husks, glass, paper, teasels, metal, ceramic, plastic, even eggshell. The angel on top of the tree is one I made from a kit with the help of a friend shortly after B and I married. The latch-hooked tree skirt featuring candy canes was made by my mother.
If our home suffered a disaster and our ornament collection was lost, it would be impossible to re-create.
Still, during the years when I was caring for my parents and in the immediate aftermath of their passing, as much as I cherish these ornaments, I couldn’t being myself to unwrap them, touch them, place them on the tree. Even when others had done so, I could only manage a few glances at them.
Dealing with grief and loss is an individual and unpredictable endeavor. Last Christmas, our first since the death of my father, known here as Paco, we traveled to visit daughter E and her family in London, so we didn’t have our usual Christmas decorations. I really wasn’t sure how much of the usual Christmas routine I would be able to resume this year, so I am grateful that I felt up to participating in some decorating.
Granted, Christmas this year will be quieter than usual. It will be just B, T, and I celebrating at home. I will be going to church on my own. There will be stockings and some presents to open. (I admit my Christmas enthusiasm has not yet extended to shopping.) We will have a nice dinner and dessert although we haven’t settled on the menu yet. We have decided not to make our usual number of cookies, most years dozens of cookies in at least a half dozen varieties. It just doesn’t make sense for three people.
I think one of the factors in my feeling some Christmas spirit this year was singing Lessons and Carols with the Madrigal Choir of Binghamton last weekend. Given that I spent so many years doing liturgy planning and music in Catholic churches, I’m not accustomed to singing Christmas music publicly during Advent, but I think this year doing so boosted my anticipation for Christmas and helped me to feel up to helping with decorating.
If I’m lucky, it will carry me through finishing the cards next week.
If not, I will try to remember to take the advice that I offer to others who are dealing with loss: Be gentle with yourself.
Maybe the fragrance of the Canaan fir, the rainbow-hued lights, the meaningful ornaments will help lift my spirit if it flags.
Christmas trees are beautiful, even through misty eyes.
On September 17th, I returned to my hometown, Monroe, Massachusetts, for their bicentennial celebration.
The day began with a presentation from State Representative Paul Mark of a framed copy of the restoration of the original town charter. In his remarks, he noted that, unlike most Massachusetts charters, Monroe’s does not have any mention of an English king. The town was incorporated from parts of other towns and named for President James Monroe, who was president of the United States at the time.
When I was growing up there in the 1960s-70s, the town had about 200 residents. In the 2020 census, there were 118 residents, making it the smallest town by population on the mainland of Massachusetts.
The festivities centered around the Town Community Center, which was the school back in my day. (Also, in the days of my father and his siblings, when it was built by the Works Progress Administration in the 1930s.) The building still houses the town offices and library. What had been the classroom for grades 1-4 when I attended is now a community meeting room where many of the indoor activities were housed. The rest of the building is now used as offices by the power company that is the successor to New England Power, for which my father worked for over forty years.
I was able to make some contributions to the memory board and books. I sent some poems and was surprised to find one of them on display with a vintage newspaper photo of me when I graduated from high school.
Many of us were feeling nostalgic about the post office. There were two postal employees there to hand-cancel envelopes with a bicentennial commemorative postmark, even though the Monroe Bridge post office closed years ago to be replaced by this:
Not nearly as distinctive looking as this mail slot which was salvaged from the old post office and is now in the Monroe Historical Society’s collection.
For an explanation of why it was the Monroe Bridge post office and why I often refer to my hometown as Monroe Bridge, you can read my poem “Monroe Bridge Mail” published by Wilderness House Literary Review here. (It’s the final poem in a set of five.)
I spent quite a lot of time in the Historical Society, looking at the artifacts and photos. It was nice to see that the murals that had been painted by a WPA artist for our classroom had been moved there:
There was memorabilia from the Town’s sesquicentennial (150th anniversary) which I remembered as a very exciting time when I was in grammar school.
It was fun to get to reminisce with people who had been in town when my family lived there. Some are still residents or folks who have stayed local, while a few, like me, had travelled from further afield. I especially appreciated the time that Lucy spent with me, pointing out family connections among the memorabilia on display or in the Historical Society. I was touched by all the kind words about my parents and the expressions of sympathy on their passing. The celebration was just a few days after the first anniversary of my father’s death; he and my mother were among the founding members of the Monroe Historical Society.
There was Bicentennial swag available! One of my purchases was the Bicentennial History Book. I was honored that my poem “Playground” was chosen to be on the back cover. It reads:
Our WPA-built school housed
two classrooms, eight grades,
two teachers, twenty-some students,
old textbooks, reams of assignments
designed to keep us quiet at our desks.
Morning and afternoon recess
and the remainder of lunch hour,
we jumped off swings,
attempted running up the two-story slide,
sent the spinning merry-go-round swaying
to crash with a satisfying clang
into the metal pole from which it hung.
Dodge ball, monkey-in-the-middle,
a dozen variations of tag,
where the tap of a classmate’s hand
thawed you from your frozen state
or freed you from jungle-gym-jail.
Jump rope chants
“Not last night, but the night before,
a lemon and a pickle
came a-knockin’ at my door.”
Upper-grade boys against girls
in Wiffle ball or kick ball.
Despite our skirts, the girls,
already becoming young women,
usually won.
*****
Of course, as promised, there was cake!
It was a great celebration for a little town! Even though I’ve lived out-of-state for forty years now, a part of me is still at home there.
And even if you have never visited, there are now new signs to welcome you. This is the one you will see if you cross the state line from Whitingham, Vermont into Monroe.
On Saturday, September 17, 2022, I went back to my hometown, Monroe, Massachusetts, for their bicentennial celebration. There will eventually be a proper post about the fun and meaningful day I had there but I wanted to give a little shout-out today.
These welcome signs are new. This is the one at the Massachusetts/Vermont state line about half a mile from where our house was back in the day.
Remembering my father on the first anniversary of his death.
*****
Join us for Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2022/09/14/one-liner-wednesday-he-was-a-fun-guy/
Joanne Corey 