I came in to work yesterday morning to find a surprisingly heavy envelope on my desk. Turns out it's from my friend and co-worker Amy, who has been joyously hammering her way back into being an artist again.
Aren't those just the coolest bookmarks ever? I love 'em!
This morning, one of my oldest, dearest friends is taking her daughter in for another round of surgery. Little Lia just turned one. Her diaphragm is half paralyzed, she has a compromised immune system, and yet, miracle, by miracle, day after day, she's one now. I'm staring out my back window into the gray afternoon, thinking about her.
* * *
It's on days like this that I realize how much I suck at being a friend. Yes, I'm entertaining. I can tell stories and jokes, and be interesting. Sympathy? Fail. Knowing what to say? Fail. Knowing when to shut up? Well, you get the picture.
I'm not even entirely sure how to be friends with someone. All my efforts seem to have the reverse effect — and the people I am friends with, seem to be so in spite of me. I remember Deborah asking me how one becomes friends a while back, and I really didn't have a good answer. She also told me a tale of her, back in junior high or high school, having decided to be friends with someone... by following them around until they gave in and were friends back! Sure, it's not the greatest method, but then... what is?
* * *
A number of years ago, I used to get comments on my annual reviews at work that I was "prickly." I've never completely figured this out. I'm aware of one co-worker who is utterly terrified of me. Nonsense. I'm a big teddy bear. (Who, granted, wears black, rides a motorcycle, and shaves once a week whether he needs it or not. Perhaps her mother warned her about such guys.) But it's not the first time I've gotten comments like that. One friend in high school used to tell me that all I had to do was walk into the room to weird people out. How can I be friends with you if I'm somehow broadcasting from across the room that I won't? It'd be nice to know what the heck I'm doing, so that I can stop doing it.
I count myself amazed and fortunate for the friends I do have. They're amazing people. all of them. It still leaves me wondering, though.
How do you become friends with someone?
Today, after nearly three months in the NICU, Lia is home. And I don't mean that in a euphemism for the end of pain and suffering — she's home home, with the rest of her lovely family.
Thanks God, for this little life.
My first year of college, I got adopted by a family in my church. It wasn't something any of us intended — I just needed a ride, as it would be nearly another year until I had my driver's license, and mountain biking in the snow while keeping warm was a stretch in my still-adapting wardrobe. So I rode with them. Problem is, they liked to stay and chat after church for a long time, until well after the cafeteria at Grace had closed. So they took me home for lunch. Those Sunday afternoons at their house were something I treasured then, and now. The kids — the oldest was, 10, I think — thought I was fun and cool (as much as I could tell) and the parents were wonderful to talk to and learn from. They became one of my first resources on figuring out how life on my own worked.
Now, I tell you that story, to tell you this one.
A few years later, when Deborah and I were "going out" — as much as one can "go out" when normally separated by a thousand miles — Deborah came down to visit me for Spring Break. Now, I didn't really have anyplace to go — my nearest relatives were well over a hundred miles away — and I certainly didn't have anyplace to put Deborah, so I asked if I could stay with them for the week. And, oh, can my girlfriend come, too?
Turns out we could.
The second or third day she was there, Deborah bounded out in her spritely way, and announced that she'd like to make candy. Resistance was slim, so she set to making up a big batch of coconut balls. This involved a large amount of powdered sugar, and Deborah, concerned that the kids would be... well, kids, dramatically emphasized that there was to be no added moisture to the mixture, lest the candies be reduced to balls of goo. If you sprayed when you spoke, you were banned during the first part — this was NO SPIT CANDY. She actually had me stand guard at the doors to the kitchen, which, in addition to making it more fun, made the candy nearly irresistible. It didn't hurt that they tasted really, really good, too.
Years later, when we were married, they invited us to join them for Thanksgiving. When we asked what we should bring, the answer was immediate and unanimous: NO SPIT CANDY! I think they were all gone before the meal was even served...
And now, year later than that, I see a renewed, plaintive plea in the comments on this blog, asking for the recipe for No-Spit Candy. So, here it is, guys. Enjoy.
Mix:Mix the ingredients together and form into 1" balls. Place in the freezer until ready for dipping. Melt the paraffin (you can get this wherever they sell canning supplies) and the chocolate together in a double-boiler (or, as we did, in two nested pans with water in the bottom of one.) Dip the balls with toothpicks, and cover the hole with drizzle from a spoon. Enjoy!
Paul and Deborah demonstrate the dipping technique.
It was the weirdest idea for a party I'd ever heard of. Our friends wanted to know why we were doing it. Was it someone's birthday? Some event? Why gingerbread houses in June? We did it... just for the fun of it.
And fun it was, although there was a lot of work too. Case in point: If we invite 20 families, and 16 accept, we need materials for 16 gingerbread houses. There are 6 pieces per house, for a total of 96 pieces. That's a lot of gingerbread, folks. I went out and got larger bowls so we could make them three batches at a time, rather than one.
We cleared off the counters completely and set up five stations: two places to roll and cut dough; one to bake, one to cool, and one to store the finished pieces.
Now, the original plan was a cheery summer afternoon in the back yard, with drinks and tiki torches, and kids running around in the grass whenever they got a little too hyper on candy.
Hah.
That plan was scuttled by a thunderstorm the size of Iowa. Then, our supplier of large folding tables called to say he didn't think it was a good idea to bring them over in the rain, as he'd have to put them on an open trailer. Oh. Now what? So... we improvised. A few phone calls netted us promises of four card tables, and we'd just do it all inside. No problem! The slightly worrisome part there is that we'd invited upwards of 40 people. I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but... our house isn't all that big. But we're all friends, right? It'll be cozy!
The adults were having a good time...
Fiona was helping Grandma Kerr...
...but the other kids didn't seem to be having as good a time as I thought they would.
I thought the kids would be all over the candy and the houses, but they were mostly milling about aimlessly, unsure of what they could do.
It was a time for drastic action.
It was time to break out THE KID ENTERTAINER OF DOOM!!!! BWA HAHAHHAHA...
No, wait, that's not right. I meant, the Cart, a.k.a. "Santa's Summer Sleigh."
Man, this thing is great for picking up girls! I had one under each arm for what seemed like an hour or two, just cruising around the island. They were laughing and screaming whenever I rolled up to the door and having a great time.
Eventually, though, my posterior, and the batteries that sit underneath said posterior, were reaching their limit. (I've discovered that you can tell how the battery is doing by checking to see if you can accelerate and use the turn signal at the same time. If you can't blink, you're low.) My passengers weren't too concerned about such things. We had "one last ride" several times, and then "OK, these will have to be short," and then, "really, last time." None of us cared — we were all having fun — but electricity really was in short supply.
"Can we have ONE MORE ride?"
"Well, I don't know. The invisible reindeer are getting pretty tired."
They just looked at me.
"It's almost out of juice."
They wanted to know what kind of juice it needed.
I tried again. "The batteries are low and it needs to recharge."
"So where's the charger? Can we have one more ride?"
"Will you help push when it stops moving?"
That, they understood.
They still excitedly clambered in for the slow, hundred-foot crawl back to the carport to plug in, though.
With the cart exhausted, they set out to answer another question I hadn't thought to ask: How many kids can you fit on a porch swing?
Start with, oh, five or so.
(Every now and then, you snap a photo, and look at it later, and you somehow realize, "This is going to be important later..." — perhaps as a sign of things to come, perhaps important for some other reason. This is one of those photos. It gives me hope and joy about the years ahead.)
He's not heavy, he's my brother... well, yeah, actually, he's heavy. Oof, get off!
Can you spot all eight kids?
Meanwhile, back inside, marvelous creations were taking shape:
Lots of creativity going on.
Maybe once the party is over, Deborah and I can make one, too!
I've often joked that I am an artist who likes to play car mechanic on weekends. I'm sure that somewhere else, not terribly far away, there is a mechanic who spends his days off painting. So, what do you do if you spend five days a week managing systems for military avionics?
Well, if you're my friend Mike Carl, you build a forge in your garage, and hammer out knives.
Mike, being a ham. I convinced him to put the cup down so it wouldn't look like he was drinking while playing with fire.
This is a homemade forge, using firebrick, a small blower, and a casing built from a section of a torched-off oxygen tank. The remaining tank makes a lovely bell sound.
One iron in the fire.
Hot.
Stop! Hammer Time! Mike says you don't have very long to work the metal once it's out of the fire — I'm sure that anvil absorbs a lot of heat — so you have to plan ahead, know what you plan to do, and, ahem, strike while the iron is hot.
It seems hard to believe that just a few weeks ago, I was reading daily updates from the Art Department at Grace about Prof. Art Davis going in for surgery, and the optimism about making a full recovery from his cancer. I smiled when I heard that it had been successful, and that he was back at home recovering, and grading senior portfolios with his wife on the couch. Then, suddenly, the cancer spread, fast and vicious, to his spine and liver, and he was back in the hospital again, going downhill fast. He was only there a few days, and died April 30.
I didn't go to the memorial service, as we had company over, but I talked to people who had gone, and was surprised to hear the tales of steady prodding and encouragement — usually, the best I had gotten out of him in class when my pieces came up for discussion was, "OK, that works," before moving on to the next piece. Twenty years of being told you were a good artist didn't count for much here. If nothing else, it was grim practice for the unappreciation of my first (and very nearly last) job as a graphic designer. The guy just about had me convinced I was mediocre, and that the best I could hope for was to not have my work criticized publicly.
Near the end of my penultimate semester, as I was getting ready to go get married, and get a job, I was sitting in his office, when his phone rang. He took the call.
"This is Art Davis." (pause)
"Of course. One of the most talented and creative individuals ever to come through our program."
My jaw just about fell off my face as he proceeded to give the most amazing reference I've ever heard. Whoever it was, I wanted to meet them, just to know who it was Prof. thought so highly of.
"Wow," I said, once he'd hung up, "what I'd do to get a reference like that!"
Prof. looked at me with a quizzical, pained expression.
"That was for you."
Thanks, Prof. Davis. Thank you.
For some time now, I've been looking at the weathered, peeling paint on my house and shed, and dreading the day I'd have to do something about it. Well, that day came, but I had help. Professional help, no less, in the form of Joel and Paul, who both work for Matthew's Painting Company. Joel rented a pressure washer for the weekend, and came over to do our house first. (Joel is trying to sell his own house, and, now that he's graduated from seminary, move somewhere and go be a pastor. If you want a new pastor...)
The first order of the day was to bleach the whole house. This is necessary to kill off any mold or mildew that's living on the house and would ruin the paint, I'm told. So I went ahead of Joel, using a "spray ranger" that mixes the bleach and water to get an even mix. Then Joel came behind me with the power washer, to rinse off the bleach and remove anything loose. (Loose items can include outdoor thermometers, peony bushes, fingers... gotta be careful with this thing!)
Paul takes a turn with the pressure washer on the shed. You couldn't see this with the naked eye — it just looked like a fog coming out the tip — but the camera caught the rotating nozzle here. Apparently, the idea with this tip is to have an extremely high pressure stream, but rotate it so fast that it won't do (much) damage.
Joel's wearing shorts. Can you tell? Apparently a lot of the stuff that comes off the wall comes straight back at the person holding the wand.
Joel let me try it out on the shed, where the paint was the worst. I laughed out loud as the old, peeling paint practically leaped off the wood. It was enormously satisfying, especially since I knew how long it would have taken by hand with a scraper.
(I've since gotten my water bill. It was 5,000 gallons higher than normal. Small price to pay...)
Later, once the flood waters had abated, and the wood was dry again, Paul came over and showed me how to finish preparing the wood. There was still some work to be done with a scraper and wire brush, but it wasn't anywhere near as bad as I had imagined.
We finished up the trim on the house on Saturday, and we'll be tackling the shed soon.
There's something to be said for familiarity. You could say quite a lot, actually. It breeds contentment, contempt, or, maybe, that it clutters up your fridge.
The latter is the case here. Exhibit A, one lump of goat cheese. At this point, it's more useful as a building material than it is as a foodstuff. Food really shouldn't go "clunk" on your plate.
So why do I still have it?
Memories, really. Goat cheese, in this house, used to be known as "Arthur Bait," the one substance known to invoke an appearance by the Arthur twins — Alison and Andrea — by it's mere mention. We used to go through a lot of goat cheese. But then, the twins graduated, and moved away. And here is the cheese, years later, reminding me of fun times we had with them here.
In all honesty, though, I don't have much use for a lump of semi-petrified cheese at the back of my fridge. So I'm chronicling it here, and then, I'm going to throw it away. And so, perhaps, one day, either Alison or Andrea will come across this, and say, "We need to go visit Andy and Deborah!"
And if that happens, I will go and buy a new block of cheese.
