COLLEGE TOWN, CABIN FEVER

Next month Spruce Pine votes on a referendum allowing liquor to be sold in this stolid Christian “dry” community. The ruckus over this is unpleasant. Everything’s on my nerves. I’m still peeved about the way the local Republican party bombarded us -- registered Democrats -- with junk mail every day preceding the election (including a right wing propaganda DVD) and flooded the answering machine with ugly phone calls. My husband is an outspoken supporter of the pro-alcohol campaign who vents his opinions as editorials in the local paper. His volley of letters with Ruby, an elderly Baptist local who is anti-drink and anti-Obama, has escalated into a mini-war. An example of one of her headlines: “Obama is a Communist and so was MLK.” Now Ruby’s writing us directly. Her recent letter, on pretty bluebird paper, enlightened us with the 'fact' that the president is by-sexual!

I got fed up last week. On Thursday I drove the four hours to Chapel Hill and reveled in the psychic oxygen of culture, good food, and the company of my adult kids and educated, funny, articulate friends. For the last three of the eighteen years I lived in Chapel Hill, I complained about the town’s ubiquitous and often posed political correctness, the encroachment of the upper class, and the compulsive drive toward development and greed: rising rents driving local businesses to bankruptcy. Now I’ve swapped those social tensions for those of Spruce Pine, these ills don’t seem so bad, especially when a distracting riot of films, restaurants, coffee bars, shopping, and museums offer their charms.

It’s been difficult this week re-adjusting to small town mountain life. I am home, but simultaneously longing for home. My heart is in two places. How many homes do we have in a lifetime? What is this concept of ‘home?’ Every place, every thing is flawed; I know this, but I’m still confused. The crippled real estate market makes relocating implausible right now, so I've got to learn to be happy where I am. The Toe River rolls along in deep green currents, clean and fresh, but the cold wind makes my face raw while I’m walking there. My friend the kingfisher chirrups from his hollow on the river bank, but he’s not showing his face.

St. Brigid's Day Poem

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IMBOLC, AT THE WELL

Water soothe my burning head; fire

stream o’er the rocks, through crevices

of my frozen will.

Bark and lichen

silt and earth,

steady the pilgrim way.

Water, receive these weary feet.

Bless this brow, these eyes,

these cheeks.

Laurel and pine

hide my grief

in the weft of bough and leaf.

Weave me a new fabric

Whisper to me of tomorrow.

(copyright Cathy Larson Sky 2/02/2009)

Baby Boomer Fashion Phobia

Why, WHY? Now that Michelle Obama is the officially declared “new Jackie-O,” the First Lady of Fashion as well as the White House, WHY does her first big trend setter have to be the sleeveless sheath dress? It’s too cruel. The female news commentators covering the inauguration on TV – already sheath clad -- made me remember what it was to risk hypothermia for fashion.

In the ‘60s, I had two sheaths: one in emerald green, a knit, and the second in royal blue wool. I had a starry sun with pointed beams, a junk jewelry accessory, that I pinned in the center of the bodice. In those sheaths I shivered through Christmas parties, dances and dinners. No one ever wore jackets or little sweaters. You might gently drape your coat over your shoulders, sitting down, but you were careful not the ruin the line of the sheath. It was a simplicity thing. I remember observing pimply goose bumps on my arms when I was fixing my face in the merciless ladies’ room mirror.

But the cold isn’t the worst thing. Now I’m sixty, why, oh WHY is the new must-have body part a set of well-toned upper arms? Just when I’d resigned myself to my genetic heritage, turkey arms? They wibble, they wobble. My grandmothers had them, my mother had them. They made soft places to cuddle a grandbaby’s head. When I was small, I found those arms so comforting, so REAL. In my fifties I gave up my free weights, gym machines, aerobics, step aerobics – trading them for yoga. For walking. Exercise for the body AND soul, fitting for a slowed-down metabolism like mine. Jimi Hendriks’ Foxy Lady just isn’t my theme song any more; it’s more like Love is All I Have to Give, I'm Built for Comfort, Not For Speed, or, seasonally, My Funny Valentine.

But now . . . I am starting to panic. Spring is just a few months away. I only have a short time to get the mini-barbells from the bathroom closet, where they share a shelf with a bottle of toilet bowl cleaner. Hillary never would have done this to us. Never!

Small IS Beautiful (isn't it?)

GIVING, CHRISTMAS 2008 

My personal gifting budget was about one third its pre-retirement size, so I struggled this holiday season with the concept of “small.” Small is beautiful: I believe that. It’s a phrase from the title of the 1973 book by E.F. Schumacher, followed by “Economics as if People Mattered,” a supposedly influential philosophy that disappeared into the ozone layer, as as far as I can tell, after having lived through the advent of SUVs, millionaire consciousness, and the substitution of manipulation for integrity on the part of our government. At least Schumacher’s book changed me and the way I try to live.

Now the acid test. Come the second week in December, it was time to put my beliefs about humble spending into action. My gifts came from local Spruce Pine thrift and book stores, artist hideaway boutiques, Walmart, the grocery store, and my own closet.Still, certain bogus equations and axioms hissed in my head, like an evil sotto-voce, as I doled out my modest funds. 

Here’s one: Love equals big-ticket item Christmas gifts. Absurd flashes from pop movies filled my head, for instance, parents leading the college-bound child down the driveway, cautioning "don't peek!" (The denouement: a brand new car with a gigantic red ribbon around it. Fade out as hugs, tears, and smiles continue.)

Another: The greater the cost, the bigger the love. The year’s hot items, like brand new Ipods, laptops, and Blackberries, were beyond me. Being honest with myself I wanted to light up my loved one’s faces with joy: the particular joy of having Big Stuff. I itched to take out my credit card and commit myself to huge monthly payments I couldn't make.

The other meaning of the word “small” -- stingy, ungenerous, mean- spirited – apparently haunted me as I apologized for presents as I handed them over. “It’s nothing much,” I heard myself say, even though I had picked each item with thought and care.

This year I have more post-holiday blues and fatigue than ever. This confrontation with the force of consumerism has rocked my world, made me realize how insidious are its roots.  

WHEN I AM DANCING

When I am dancing

I see the faces of people I’ve loved

Feel them close by

The ones who betrayed me

The ones I lost when our paths parted

The ones on the other side

Who visit me in dreams.

As I dance, you are with me

You and you and you

My bones lose their gravity

They’re smooth as pearl,

As full of light

Dancing, I remember

The love story of being;

The tip of the stamen,

The tender whorl of the petal.

Immortal unswerving liquefied shimmering

Sunflower

Starlight

Dance.

(Dedicated to the music of Van Morrison, whose music helps me clean the kitchen late at night. My favorites: Brown Eyed Girl, Crazy Love, Domino, Wild Night, Jackie Wilson Said, Moondance. Picture is of me and my friend Beanie Odell, a fellow Irish fiddle woman, rocking out to reels and jigs.)

Friday morning was one where I just couldn’t see why I should get out of bed. Hey, I know my anxiety is not unique. So many Americans are worried about money, about losing their children to an ambiguous foreign campaign, about getting sick without insurance to cover them. All of us are carrying burdens as the holiday season approaches. It will not be a typical Christmas. What will it be? In times like these, we must live day to day, without having answers. A bright white light shone through the slats of the Venetian blinds in my room. Snow, it advertised. Snow had fallen during the night. I shambled into the living room to find that magic had touched the holly bushes in our back yard. The holly berries are abundant this year. Now the sliding doors framed a scene of pure enchantment just within my reach. I pulled on my boots and waded out in the snow to take this snap. I just wanted to share the beauty. Let your hearts be light.

Cosmic Metronome

I had this thought today during music practice with my husband: why doesn't the universe provide us with a metronome to solve world problems?

For years my husband and I have quarreled over our music. At times it's been so intense we've had to put down the pipes and fiddle until the ugly feelings went away. "You're speeding up. No, you are. You're missing a beat. No, you're just playing the wrong version." On and on.

Now, in retirement, we have committed ourselves to playing every day for at least an hour. We've brought in an old friend, the metronome. We wired it to some speakers so it's loud and assertive. Gradually, the steady beat guides our attention away from the old complaints and focuses our attention on our own music-making. Slowly a new and harmonious partnering is possible as the steady beat becomes our guide and natural arbitrator.

Where on earth/in human nature is the cosmic metronome that would steady the pulse of human relations; that would channel the energy of blame and argument and disperse it into self-examination and self-correction, with the aim toward achieving harmony? I don't know. I'm just wondering.