Decoration Madness! (Oct. 27, 2011)

You know I like festive stuff. I’m an artist. I like decorating and personalizing and laughing and signs of enthusiasm. So it’s no surprise that lately I’ve become obsessed with Halloween.

I’ve been busy, hitting the streets, searching for the most imaginative and spooky Halloween decorations around. There are plenty of people who share my Halloween gusto and decorate their houses to show their spirit. And special props go to people who manage to decorate their apartments for Halloween, as they are dealing with the challenge of decorating a third-floor window or a small balcony, and they also have limited storage space in which to stash decorations the other eleven months of the year.

Why do I dig this holiday so much? I like carving pumpkin faces, creating costumes and of course, CANDY! But what seals the deal is that there’s such variety in how people interpret this holiday. Costumes can be scary, funny, political, cute…there are many options. (Christmas decorations I love, too, but with that holiday there’s a bit of a formula for how to celebrate it.) With Halloween, anything goes! It has a playful vibe, and is just fun. It’s strictly optional and the people who bother to decorate for it or get together a costume—well, I just appreciate their passion! Here are a few of my favorite decorations:

Packing a lot of punch in a small apartment patio space. Kudos!

Recently we visited a legendary pumpkin patch tucked into the countryside about an hour from here. The patch itself is huge. The pumpkins are huge. Sometimes the crowds are huge. This time was our seventh annual visit and despite its being too hot (89 degrees!) we had fun.

Some people visit the patch in costume and one woman pulled a wagon with a familiar figure in back: Sponge Bob! Her two daughters were wearing outfits made almost entirely of crochet. Of course, I had to stop her and ask if she’d made them (yes) and would it be okay if I took a photo of Bob (yes again). It must have taken a long time to crochet a whole dress for her pre-teen daughter, dressed as Alice in Wonderland. Her younger daughter was dressed as Sponge Bob and the boxy figure in the wagon was the upper half of her costume. I wish I’d taken a close-up of the costume but you’ll get the idea. So cool!

This one is not too scary but gets points for cuteness:

This one also scores high because of the sheer number of decorations:

These home-owners always go all out for holidays:

These next two photos are from a nearby street where several of the neighbors go all out and create a very scary environment, complete with haunted house.

However you celebrate, have a very fun and spooky Halloween!

Even Gardens need Accessories (Oct. 2, 2011)

Despite my professed commitment to downsize the amount of stuff I own, I do allow myself to browse the occasional garage sale. If I'm looking for something in particular, I rationalize that this is different from going and just loading up on other people's castoffs and treading too close to the Hoarding Zone.

With that in mind, I headed to a garage sale recently and found what I really wanted: a table I could makeover to house part of my giant plant and succulent collection. I knew I would put the table near our front door and that it needed to be a fun color. Seriously, happy colors are free therapy. Finding something that worked felt like a victory (because you never know at garage sales), and after handing over my five dollars, I schlepped my new-old table home for its color consultation. Did I want to go pink or red? Not sure. I just knew I wanted a cheerful, bright color to pop against our cheerful, bright yellow house. Several coats of red later, voila! I have a cheerful, bright table and it gives me a boost every time I walk by it. Mission accomplished.

One Hundred Trumpets, Please! (Oct. 1, 2011)

Drum roll, please. This is my one hundredth blog post.

I feel some duty to mark the occasion in a fitting way. But how? Now it feels like pressure to make this post extra interesting. Yikes.

I put off writing this piece for a few days so that I could post it on the first of October, the tenth month, as ten and one hundred share a special connection. Maybe I should have waited until the tenth day of the tenth month, because 10 x 10 = 100. But I can’t wait that long. I have a huge backlog of pieces to write and post.

In lieu of changing your life with this blog post Number One Hundred, I’ll just reminisce for a minute about these hundred posts. Nearly three years ago I started this blog with the goal of having a place to express myself. If I was the only one who read it, okay. If others found it amusing, great. I wasn’t seeking a following of thousands, just the freedom to write or post whatever I wanted. Maybe that is why a blog is so great: in life there are so many compromises, but with your own blog there are so many freedoms.

Why is one hundred (of anything) so significant? Since we were young children we have been aware that numbers have meaning and certain ones seem extra worthy of celebration. My great aunt Kay turned one hundred and one two months ago (and is still as sharp as a pin). Reaching her hundredth birthday was such an amazing accomplishment because it so rare. But reaching ninety-nine is rare, too. Why does our society like things in batches of one hundred? It comes up in our daily lives, with the dollar bill representing one hundred pennies. It also comes up in more unusual circumstances, like the celebration of a centennial. We use it in measurement: 100% is the top. There are acclaimed literary works and famous songs which use one hundred in their titles or lyrics. We celebrate kids’ one hundred days of school. We analyze the presidents first one hundred days in office. One hundred: it’s everywhere!

I went to Google to shed some light on why one hundred is so omnipresent, so much a part of our daily lives as well as a measurement for our goals. Not being into football, I didn’t realize that there are one hundred yards in an American football field (not including the end zone). I learned that one hundred is the sum of the first nine prime numbers (my dad, the mathematician, will love this reference!).

I guess I’ll sign off now. I have at least a hundred things to do before bed: a hundred things to pick up off the floor, hundreds of breaths to take and hundreds of snacks to make. Plus, there are at least another hundred things I need to blog about, so keep it here for the next batch!

Because it's Tuesday (Sept. 27, 2011)

Am I dressed up because I have an event to attend? No. So why the outfit? Because it Tuesday. Hey, polka dots are fun any day of the year. But the timing of this blog piece is no accident. I finished making this dress yesterday and thought I'd share my enthusiasm with the half-dozen people who read my stuff.

If you recall earlier posts from a few months ago, you know I finally dipped my toe into the world of sewing this summer. And it is awesome. Of course, sometimes it's not. I have been reduced to tears a few times, yes, because I so want to be good at it and sometimes the sewing machine doesn't understand what I want to do. But when the machine and I are able to work out our differences, it brings me a lot of joy.

Normal people use patterns to make dresses. But you know I have my own ideas about things. I conjured up this idea in my own cluttered brain, and it turned out pretty well. It's so fun for me to dream up an idea and turn it into reality/colorful wearable art. It's completely my creation and I dig it.

And yes, I do think bike riding in a dress and semi-high heels is a good idea!

Neighborhood (Sept. 22, 2011)

Neighborhood.

What does that word evoke for you?

Yesterday I found myself in a part of town I like, one filled with older houses and trees and a sense of community, and I pondered the concept of neighborhood. Sometimes, a neighborhood evolves not as a function of city planning but out of a hard-to-pinpoint, slow-developing something. I’m curious about what influences a neighborhood’s character. What is the connection between an area’s past and its current personality?

These days, planned communities are common. They have a cohesive feel, and oftentimes, Homes Owners’ Association rules and fees. The similarities among the houses and the landscaping contribute to that unified look. It does feel like a neighborhood, a collection of houses that goes together. On the other hand, individuality is limited by rules about which color your house can be, and whether you can drape towels over the balconies (I’ve heard this is a big no-no!).

But neighborhood goes far beyond how the surrounding buildings look. Is the neighborhood you choose to call home an extension of self, a reflection of who you are, or for some, who you want to become?

I felt a little nerdy checking the dictionary’s definition of “neighborhood,” but I often wonder if my interpretation of an idea matches its literal definition, or whether my feelings about a word have taken on a life of their own. Definitions include “region near” and “a section lived in by neighbors and usually having distinguishing characteristics.” Another source acknowledged two aspects of the word, its “specific geographic area (as well as its)…set of social networks.”

The very fact that the word includes “neighbor” means something, too. Yes, a neighbor is someone who lives near you. But the terms “neighborhood” seems to have an affectionate undertone. It implies a connection to the place, a sense of belonging.

This leads me to ponder further. Do we want to live near people we think are like us? For some, yes, although others seek diversity in where they want to live. When I was twenty-three I moved to a more urban neighborhood and I loved how unpretentious it was. There were laundromats on the corners, not fancy car dealerships. There was a higher crime rate but I felt safe and never had trouble there.

For the last eight years I’ve lived in an area of rather modest, mostly 1-story homes. There are things I like about my neighborhood as well as a few things I dislike, but the pros outweigh the cons. I like that it’s not pretentious. People are hard-working. Most of my neighbors cut their own grass and wash their own cars by choice. They aren’t too self-important to hang their own holiday lights. They lend things to neighbors. They meet at the park to talk with other parents or dog-owners. It’s not a place where your nearest neighbors (if you even know them) are far away. This isn’t an area where a team of gardeners manicures your acres, servants walk your dogs, and you lounge around managing your stock portfolio. This neighborhood is anchored in the real world. It’s a place where people care about their houses, do certain home repair themselves, plant their own gardens and then share tomatoes with their neighbors. People meet in the street and chit-chat. We make friends at nearby garage sales, and buy drinks from kids’ lemonade stands. I’m comfortable here and that’s important to me. Maybe some of my neighbors aren’t as fond of this area as I am. Maybe they aren’t here by choice. But there are those of us who love the normalcy, the lack of pretention. We are neither in competition with the Joneses nor are we afraid of who lives nearby. We are part of something. We care about the area. We want safety without showiness. For me, a down-to-earth neighborhood is not a consolation prize. It is the reward.

9-11 (Sept. 11, 2011)

Today I woke up and in some ways it was like any other day in Southern California. The sun came out after a while. I took a morning walk, washed dishes, cleaned up many messes, made phone calls. Normal stuff.

In many ways, though, today can never be just another day. It’s 9-11, and that date always will mean something to us. I grappled with the idea of doing something in remembrance of this day. Did I need to do something public? I wasn’t sure. I don’t believe that you have to participate in a public remembrance in order to recognize the significance of this date. You can remember privately, if that’s how you work.

On tv there was footage of people at the brand-new fountains at Ground Zero in Manhattan, where the names of those who died are etched into stone. The fountains pour into the ground, the void, as they call it because of the void left by their deaths. It was very moving. There was footage of people reading their family members’ names: moms, brothers, uncles. An almost ten-year-old boy read his father’s name. He never got to meet his dad, but he thanked him for the gift of life.

I put our big flag up outside, and then put up ten more: six medium ones and four tiny ones I’d made before July 4th. I wore a red t-shirt and put little two flags on the stroller before I set out for a walk. The footage from Manhattan and Washington, DC had impacted me. With my flags and clothing I was participating in a public way, and I felt good about the outward expression of what I was on my mind today. I decided to go to one of the local commemorations.

I went to the USS Midway Aircraft Carrier. I wasn’t sure what the event would involve but I wanted to show my respect. Nearly 3,000 people participated, which is a good-sized crowd in my book. I like the symbolism of this number’s nearly matching the number of people who died on Sept. 11, 2001. Names of those who died were read, followed by a bell’s toll. It was sobering to hear the names. The statistics are one thing. But it becomes so much more real when you hear victims’ names.

Various people spoke, including Mayor Jerry Sanders. Former military members gave brief speeches. Three planes flew overhead in a missing man formation. Some people were dressed in patriotic colors. There were girl- and boy-scout troops there, with their patch-covered vests. Many members of the military as well as police and fire fighters were there in dress uniform. A giant flag suspended from two fire engine’s aerial ladders moved in the breeze, the bright sun making its colors especially vibrant. Our flag is much more than a bunch of fabric. I know that, but I really felt it today.

I felt good about going today, making the time to show my appreciation for the freedoms we have here. The tone at the commemoration was that of respect and gratitude and I was glad to be there to express my appreciation for those who served us ten years ago, as well as today.

9-11. It’s a sad day and it always will be. But it was a day of pride and unity, too.

Power Restored (Sept. 9, 2011)

Yesterday’s eleven-hour power failure had me thinking about time in a different way. I thought about the passing hours every time I looked at a battery-powered clock and wondered when the electricity would be restored. Most days I have too little time. The clock races. Yesterday it trudged.

I never feel I have enough time. One could consider the power failure a gift of time, but I didn’t see it that way. When I say I need more free time, I’m talking about time that I choose to use as I please, where, when and how I want to spend it. When a power failure occurs, it’s not according to your timing preference. When there’s no electricity, there’s no possibility of using your newly “free” time to catch up on emails, download and label photos you’ve been intending to get to, or do many of the things on the to do list. Even if we don’t need electricity for every human activity, we need light to do lots of our daily chores (I wasn’t in the mood to see if I could separate clean laundry by candlelight).

Haven’t I yearned for a less frantic pace? Yes! But I wanted it on my own terms. I want to option out of things, not have things optioned away from me, without my choosing! When I’m in a waiting room, I don’t consider it found time, as I sit while the clock ticks, ticks, ticks. Who considers it gifted time in the endless DMV line? When I have the option to do a million things, I never have enough time. Yet when I suddenly have unexpected time due to a power failure, I want the option to do what I want. You can have one or the other, but not both. More time or more choice. An inverse relationship. But I want it all!

We’re so lucky to have conveniences like electricity. Of course, I am among those who get so used to having it, that when it’s suddenly snatched away with no warning, I feel the loss acutely. It doesn’t feel like a convenient luxury when you’re used to using it dozens of times a day. It feels as essential as oxygen or water!

At 2:22am the power came back on. It woke me up, and I gleaned a little extra delight in the timing. The symmetry of 2-2-2 seemed symbolic of a prize, like a perfect match on a slot machine. Jackpot! And when you feel the loss of electricity, having it restored really is a prize. I’m never very excited about electricity unless I’ve sat in the dark, awaiting its return.

With the return of electricity comes the return of my own power. I can choose to turn on lights, tv, microwave, oven or anything else when I want to. Or not. I can decide how to spend my time, rather than waiting to be granted choice again. Power restored, indeed.