A Short Note to Certain Women Concerned About the State of my Underpants

A short note to certain women concerned about the state of my underpants--

It's been brought to my attention often in recent months by women both near to me and from afar on the internets that I need to "just get over it, and put on your big girl panties."

I just wanted to let everyone know that yes, I do have big girl panties. Several pairs, as a matter of fact.

I got my very first pair of junior big girl panties (very like a training bra, I suppose) for having divorced parents and growing up in a low-income single-parent family.

I'd estimate that I graduated to my first full on, total ass-coverage big girl panties when I was still a teenager, paying my way through college one part-time job paycheck at a time in exchange for a full load of university classes.

Over my lifetime, I've collected quite a few big girl panties in the drawer, and at middle age I can claim I've been wearing many of them longer than some of you have even walked this earth. Paying bills and cleaning up the messes. Jobs with long hours, low pay, and bad bosses. Mortgage payments. Taxes. Motherhood. Babies who were born. Babies who died before they were born. C-section scars. Post-partum depression. Children with disabilities. Divorce. Deaths of people I loved with my whole heart. Stuff that isn't even anybody's business.

Some of those panties fell to the bottom of the drawer and I don't have to wear' em much anymore. That's a good thing. Some of them just keep coming to the top of the pile, because, well, sometimes you gotta wear 'em till you wear 'em out. Some of these old worn out knickers I'm even proud of, because I know they mean I survived something worthwhile.

So given the fact I have so many, how in the fruit of anyone's loom did anybody think I'd leave the house without any on?

I didn't.

Now, I'm not talking about my underwear in a public place like a blog post just to show off. And definitely not to complain. Because I believe my entire collection of big girl panties is nothing special. My point is that we as women, all women, have 'em, because nobody's ass escapes living a life. I'd guess that my collection of big girl panties looks a lot like many other women's, but I also know that a lot of women's big girl panty wardrobes are different. Some have a lot more pairs, for one thing, and some of those underpants are definitely a lot more uncomfortable or even painful to wear than what I've had to deal with. Some women have big girl panties we wouldn't even guess they own, but they've got 'em, shoved down in a corner of the drawer where they won't be seen if anyone goes snooping. Every woman has big girl panties they bought all on their own, on purpose or by mistake, and they've had a few (or many) given to them that they had to put on whether they liked it or not. Not a single one of us escapes having a drawer of big girl panties, whether they came to us by choice or by chance.

So when approximately a million or so women (and a whole lotta men too) all over the country take the trouble and time out of their busy underwear-folding schedule--WHATEVER kind of underwear that happens to be--to exercise their First Amendment rights "peaceably to assemble, and petition the government for redress of grievances" (That's the foundation garment called the Constitution, y'all), you're gonna tell them it's time to put their big girl panties on? Well bless your heart and thanks for caring. How in the hell did you think they all got dressed that morning? Same as I did. Same as you did. Same as we all did. Big girl panties first. Which is why labeling another woman's experience as childish, at that event or at any other time, just in order to feel validated about the contents of your own and different pile of personal laundry, is very little girl itself. Very grade school pee-pee pants, indeed.

It should go without saying that my big girl panties have been on, sturdy, and hitched way up, this whole time, before anyone decided to make it their business. Unless it's really hot outside, and I'm just out lounging on the back patio. Then I'm probably going commando and drinking bourbon. Which maybe some folks should try sometime, instead of being all uptight about the state of someone else's underwear drawer that they've never seen anyhow.

Good day, ladies.

Return to April

I'm going to take liberties with the timeline, and toss the blog back to April. You can do that in blogger world. I wish you could do that in real life, too. Just a little, now and then.

I've had a lot of emotional adjustments to make this summer. Some were very good, and some were bad, and some were in between. But while I'm trying to make sense of them enough to write about them (and I need to write about them), I felt like April was a good, safe place on the calendar to visit.

In April, Tom and I went to Missouri to see my Dad. My sister Dyan came up from Atlanta, and we made a long weekend of it in the Ozarks.

This is the view from my Dad's place, which we call "The Hill." I wish this was a painting.

The Ozark hills in April are made up of tree bark and green mists and blue sky, mostly. But it also has dozens of tiny wonders you'll miss if you fail to pay attention. You need to get up close and personal with an Ozark spring to really know it like you should.

New oak leaves are as rosy and beautiful as any spring flower.

And mayflower is hidden under its own great green silk umbrella:

Blue-eyed grass. It should be the name of an Emmylou Harris album, shouldn't it? 

We visited Wilson's Creek National Battlefield. Ancestors fought in this battle (you can learn more here). We keep returning, partly because my Dad's a military history buff, partly because we ran a race as a family here (read about it here), and partly because it's just one of the most indescribably pretty pieces of land in southern Missouri--rolling hills and winding creek, oak savannah and tallgrass prairie. Below is the Ray farmstead. It is sobering to realize so many men sacrificed their lives in a place so beautiful, on a hot day in August 1861. 

Dad and Tom are in the photo, two of the men I love the most in this world. They met for the first time that weekend. They got on well. (Whew.) Then again, I sensed they would. Some things fall into place like they were meant to happen all along. 

I have a fascination for stone fireplaces. I'm not sure why, but I always come home with photos of them. 

The furnishings in the Ray farmstead museum are so simple it feels serene. 

Local volunteers and museum docents are dedicated to bringing history to life here. This gentleman told us about life on the battlefield for a Union soldier. 

I was fascinated by the design, angles, light and shadow of this split rail fence.

And the bark of this chestnut tree:

And sunlight filtered through sassafras leaves.

Sassafras light. Those are two words I've been playing with since I took that picture, bouncing around in my head. What do they mean? I don't know. Still, I like the sound of them, paired with the memory of that April weekend. It's a good alternative title for spring in the Ozarks. 

Housiversary Five

It seems millennia ago that I signed the papers on this place. But on June 10, 2011, this house, which I like to call Ruth (after its first owner) became mine. And I suppose I became hers, too.

We needed each other. She'd suffered about 20 years of neglect from former owners,  and was about to be relegated to a rental property when I scooped her off the market. As for me, I was about a year and a half post-divorce, only just past the Crazy with Emotion, Anger, and Remorse Stage. It was time to move on. It was time to start a new life in earnest. My four boys and I moved in with a lot of second-hand furniture, cleaning and paint supplies, and carpet-cutters.

It's probably pretty telling that I'm writing this post a day later than the actual housiversary, I'm taking periodic breaks to help my love maneuver drywall sheets up the stairs to the attic bonus room we're working on, I've got to make a trip to the hardware store before it closes tonight, and I'm thinking I need to get a fresh paint brush for the next project.

Meaning, I'm still in the thick of it. It's not giving me much time for reflection, no matter how much I'd like to write a post pondering the significance of this place to me, how it's sheltered my children, worked itself into the very marrow of my bones, how it's even framed the course of my new relationship. It's all been very much about love, but also self-doubt, hard work, bills, and taking out the trash again and again. Somewhere in there a relationship happened, but instead of with a person it is with a home and garden that seem to mean more to me with each passing year, despite the struggle. That makes it sound like a marriage. It sort of is.

Because it's the five-year mark and we've had some real whopper projects lately, I've been taking some time to look back so that I can fully appreciate what we've accomplished. It's easy to feel lost in the incremental gains and forget that they add up to something.

Before:

After:

Before:

After: 

Before: 

After (but not done): 

Before (or during) : 

After:

Before:

After: 

2011: 

2016: 

2017? Beyond? I can't wait to see what happens.

Battlefield and Homestead: October Trip

In my last blog post I mentioned that instead of confronting the end of the outdoor/exterior house work season head-on, I put my paintbrushes down and left town.

That I did. Twice. I was feeling restless and burnt out, and even though my time was running out, I knew things weren't going to go well if I kept plugging away at it without a break. The book festival weekend wasn't quite enough for me, so I also headed south to my Dad's house in Missouri to get some fall hiking in, and to honor an anniversary of sorts. My sister Dyan met us there so we could all get some family time in.

Last year, we'd run an inaugural 5-mile race hosted by Wilson's Creek National Battlefield, in Republic, Missouri. We were so proud to do it together. And finish!

On the one-year anniversary we returned, to do some hiking and appreciate the history of this place. It saw the first Civil War fighting west of the Mississippi, and the death during combat of the first Union general, Brigadier General Nathaniel Lyon. I even wore the same shoes:

Dyan, Dad and I have developed the tradition of always bringing my Grandad's (my Dad's father, who passed away in 1996) favorite candies on our hiking expeditions. These are the Official Walter Millsaps Memorial Chick O' Sticks: 

The battlefield is a quiet place, beautiful in autumn. It's hard to believe that 535 men gave their lives here over 150 years ago. And that the Ray family, whose farm is pictured below, turned their home into a field hospital to tend to the wounded and dying.

Another day, we visited the Nathan Boone Homestead, a Missouri State Historic Site. Nathaniel was the youngest son of Daniel Boone, and the cabin and barn are preserved in an attempt to give visitors an idea what life was like when Missouri was a frontier state in the 1830s. Every year, they have a festival encampment, which includes 19th century re-enactors dressed as frontiersman, tradesmen, and soldiers, and craft demonstrations.

For some reason I've always been fascinated by stone chimneys, and Nathan Boone Homestead's are beautiful. 

I loved the underside of the porch awning, as well. 

The beautiful frontier garden was wrapped up for the year: 

The long weekend also featured a fish-fry with okra and hush puppies, large mugs of coffee, reclining deep into the cushions of my dad's big leather sofa, and watching a John Wayne movie. In other words, it was nearly perfect.

Both trips were mental health imperatives. Now that my soul's been fed and my travel itch scratched, I'm beginning to take up some small indoor projects in advance of the holidays. I'll be back with a few of them soon!

House History: A Gift from the Past

Houses, I've always believed, are more than brick and lumber, shingles and windows. They are also spiritual. Now, if you don't believe in ghosts or presences or in places having souls, that's perfectly okay with me. And while I can't say I've ever seen a ghost, I do believe that places have....I don't know what to call it. Something that goes beyond the mere substance of its physical existence. 

I feel that way about this house, and have from the day I walked in the front door. It felt like home, immediately. It felt like it needed me. I felt like I needed it. And those feelings were beyond the financial considerations, the practicalities, and the smell of the funky old carpet. It was some intangible truth, and it grabbed me by the arm and dragged me into the rooms that I now occupy. My house even has a name: I call it Ruth. It always seemed to fit it, somehow. 

One of my goals this year was to delve more into the past of my house. I'd gotten some hints by reading the deed to the property when I first purchased it, but it was a lengthy document; I had a lot going on when we moved in (and still do), so I only skimmed: 

I also found this, most likely the lumber delivery label, at the bottom of a drawer in the upstairs linen closet: 

There were also some inadvertent clues from the man who inspected the house before purchase, who said after looking in the attic: "This house was framed by one person, perhaps with a helper or two. But it was clear the carpentry was planned and executed by one person, and he really knew what he was doing." 

It turns out he was right. Meet the builder of my house, Hans J. Hansen: 

This photo was taken in 1961, when he was almost 90 years old, and came to me courtesy of my local historical society. 

He was a master carpenter of barns and homes in the area, and was active in the community from about 1899. He was a Danish immigrant, at one time returning to his native country to attend a folks school to learn carpentry; then he returned. Between 1899 and 1940, he built over 50 barns and homes that have been attributed to him, perhaps more that are unknown. 

I found it astonishing that some of the homes he built in my hometown are ones that I have admired for a long time. When I was a teenager attending middle school, I often walked home past this Dutch Colonial and daydreamed about living in it. Mr. Hansen built it. 

He also built one of my favorite houses in my current neighborhood, just down the street and around the corner from my own. (These photos are courtesy of the county tax assessor). 

My house, the smaller and more modest Cape Cod, was built in 1939. It is possibly the last house he built. But it is also special for more reasons than just that.

He built my house for his daughter. Her name? It was Ruth.

Ruth Hansen Boast was married in 1936. Where she lived before she came to this crisp and tidy new little house in 1939 is unknown, but it is entirely possible that it was a wedding present from father to daughter and new son-in-law.

Of course, I already knew that there were children involved, and now I know more details, like their names: Richard, Charles, and Thomas. It seems no mistake that I, a mother of four boys, ended up with a house built by a grandfather to shelter his three grandsons.

It turns out that Ruth's name was always there, buried in the details of the lengthy deed (her husband's name was the only one on the purchase/transfer of property entry, and my eyes must have glossed over the rest). Did I internalize it somehow at the time I bought the house and read the deed, and that unconscious knowledge surfaced when I started calling the house Ruth? Entirely possible. Either way, I don't think it was an accident.

In the last three years, I've considered this house a gift in many ways. It was a place to find a future after my marriage failed. Room to create a home for myself and my sons. A challenge to meet. A part of my community's history for which to take responsibility. It's been the gift of a friend, in that intangible way that I spoke about houses having souls-- Ruth. Knowing that it may very well have been a gift from the very beginning makes it even more so. I only hope I'm able to live up to the grace it's shown me.

Lots of Bubbly Vintage Tile Love

These are so awesome it's hard not squee when I look at them. They are aggressively colorful with red, yellow, green, blue, and purple glass, white-glazed dimensional "bubbles," and a background that is gray with an overspray of gold crackle glaze.

Shut the front door, they've got everything.

The other thing they've got is my heart strings, because they came from my aunt's house. My aunt married in 1960, and she and my uncle built a little brick ranch home on a farm in Missouri. I've always called it "pink and pepper," though I don't really know the real name for the brick style.

This is the only photo I could find of the place as I remember it as a child; but perhaps it's just as well, because the foreground explains everything about the heartstrings part. I spent a great deal of my childhood running around that farm, barefoot, sweaty, dirty, picking green beans and cherries and sweet corn, and generally getting into trouble with pack of equally grubby cousins. I think the photo above is from 1976 or 1977, and shows (from left) my sister Dyan, my cousins Thea and Leah, me (with my glasses slipping down my nose, as always) and my cousin Anya, playing with (and hopefully not torturing too badly) a toad.

What I don't have is a picture of the bathroom in that house in all its former glory. Salmon pink field tile, blonde wood cabinetry, and these accent tiles. It was marvelous. One of my earliest memories as a child is sitting in the bathtub at my aunt's house, running my fingers over the smooth glass bubbles, enchanted by the color and the glamor. My own bathroom at home was very plain, and these were just too much for my child-like desires to bear. I was going to have something just as fabulous when I grew up.

While my aunt and uncle still live in the same house, about 10 years ago the bathroom got remodeled. Mid-century enthusiasts can be dismayed if they want, but the lady of the house had grown tired of salmon pink and 40 years of wear on a bathroom is more than enough. I was sorry to see the tiles go, but I understood.

A few weeks ago, my mom was helping my aunt clean her basement, and found these, eight of them, in a storage box. They'd been salvaged. They both remembered how much I loved them as a little girl, and my aunt gave them to me.

I have to admit, I have no idea what I'm going to do with them. My long range plans for the downstairs bathroom has always been an aqua and black tile bath. I know I am not interested in a salmon pink tile bath, but I do like the way these tiles look with a dove gray:

That's a paint chip of Woodsmoke by Eddie Bauer Home. And again, there are only eight of them. My wheels are turning. Perhaps a framed wall hanging instead? I do not know for sure, only that I'm deeply happy to have something from my childhood back in my life like this. It's the best kind of serendipity.

Darkroom Mystery

Admitting to my readers that there are parts of my house I'm not that familiar with makes it sound like I own a large creepy old mansion and that I keep finding undiscovered wings, like in some badly written gothic novel.

Trust me, my house isn't that big. And the only mad relative shut up behind these walls is, well, me. (Insert maniacal laughter from another room here.)

But it's true. Did I mention I have a darkroom? I do.

Or at least, one of the previous owners did. It's in the basement, an area of the house I haven't shown off to blog readers yet. "Shown off" might be the wrong term, since it's kind of basic down there, and that's being charitable.

The darkroom looks like this, in a corner of the basement under the kitchen:

In the corner opposite the sink is this old dilapidated cabinet, with drawers designed to hold film, negatives, and supplies:

The top right drawer held a mirror, a sample size of Aqua Velva, and a cheap 80's era point-and-shoot.

I am half in love with this drainboard sink:

It's been totally trashed by the amount of stop bath and fixer that's been thrown down it. Wouldn't it be grand re-enameled in some snazzy color? Red? or maybe Yellow?

I am also crushing on the faucet:

It's these vintage fixtures that have given me the (extremely long range) idea of creating a 3/4 bath down in this room, using them restored to their glory.

At this point I probably have about $7.52 saved toward that goal, which is why I say "extremely long range."

While my sister was visiting a few weeks ago, I was showing her the space and we were very surprised to find two photographs had been left on the drying racks (shown on the wall right of center in the first photo). I had assumed the racks were empty; I never bothered to look.

They are both wedding photos, but of two different weddings. The first is under-exposed, so much so that it's very difficult to see the face of the groom at all, and moisture has damaged the paper.

But I love some of the details-- The ruffle-front on the groom's tuxedo shirt, the lace details on the bride's dress. And since the wedding trend today is to outdo all previous ceremonies on weird/large/exotic floral arrangements, when was the last time you saw daisies in a bride's bouquet? It looks so sweetly simple.

The second couple's photo is in much better condition:

Here I love the beautiful neckline on the bride's gown and her traditional veil. The groom is rockin' a handsome beard. I even think I have an idea in which local church this photo was taken.

Who are they? Are they relatives of people who lived in this house? Are they wedding photos shot by a hobbyist who lived here? How long have those photos laid waiting to be found? Based on the hair and clothing, I'm guessing they were taken anywhere from mid-to-late 1970s, possibly early 1980s.

I am not, all gothic novel-like, discovering family curses and ancient manuscripts in this house. It would need to be built in 1539 rather than 1939 for that sort of thing to unfold. But the place is yielding, here and there, some mild and sweet mysteries, a few hints of its past. It keeps telling me its stories as we get to know each other better, like people who are going to be old friends in a matter of time.