Category: Seasons

Aging into Spring

Aging into Spring

by Kelly (of rituals) ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

I’ve always been annoyed with those who wear winter gear in late spring or worse yet– light their woodstove!

It is particularly important in Vermont that we hold the season accountable.

For me this has always meant, a light spring-like wardrobe, including opened toed shoes, as well as open windows. If it’s really cold, put on a heavy sweatshirt but by no means where a winter hat or coat. Use a space heater. No smoke!

Was it especially cold this year or have I suddenly joined the ranks of the aged?

I suspect the latter but hope for the former.

A post from May 10th:

The windows are up. The heater is on. I’m wearing a hat & a fleece vest. My fingers are cold. And so, when I pass a flowering tree, it’s more like ooooh, aaaaah, Christmas-light happy, instead of that rapturous, unleashing into the sweet caress of SpRing.

And also this confession:

The weekend before last, I went to the movies in my winter jacket wearing wool socks and closed toe shoes, and I wouldn’t let my husband break down the woodstove.

Winter wins.

Maiden, Mother, Biker

Maiden, Mother, Biker

by Kelly (of rituals) ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

It’s still chilly in the mountains, but spring has tiptoed into our hearts at this most feminine time of year… the delicate unfolding of leaf, the first flowering, the bird song. The Maiden.

Meanwhile, on this Mothers Day weekend, I find myself fuming about how much space men take up. The motorcycles without mufflers. The gunshot. The music blaring from the truck. Toplessness! Callous conversation!

How much space do men need?
Does it not occur to them to share?

“I’ve downloaded the Mueller Report,” one announces from the table next to mine. I look up from my book. He and his friends are dressed in leather, sipping coffees.

“He’s a grown child,” the man continues, referencing #45. “He’s never had to work with anyone. It’s always been his way.”

“And he’s used to getting it any way he can,” I might have added, but they weren’t talking to me.

The topic shifted to the Vermont countryside and the route they might or might not take next. “100 or 8,” one suggested.

“It’s a pretty area,” the woman agreed, “but I get to do more sightseeing then you two do.”

“Relaxed attention,” the other man said.

“It’s true,” said the one with the Mueller Report. “I can’t look around much during the week either when I’m driving the truck.”

“It’s the same for me and the bus,” said the other man. “All those little kids on it.”

The Last Snow(s)

The Last Snow(s)

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MARCH

I had to give it to it. It sure was pretty.

And still, I would have left town if I wasn’t leading a retreat that night–guiding women (and let’s face it–myself) from the turning point of Autumn, sparse & bare, the darkness unending, to the certainty of Spring, not on the calendar but on the land–and upon waking somewhere south of these mountains, I would have missed the beauty, the soft, soothing motion, the outline of branch and stone and fencepost.

I want to reach back in time and offer this to Virginia Woolf, who filled her pockets with stones and headed toward the river.

No decision should be finalized in March.

~

APRIL

An April snow. Mild to moderate despair. And one more day for the more introverted among us to retreat before the joy & productivity of SpRinG forces us, like a bulb, to open into the world, giddy, with delight.

~

APRIL, again

Turkeys kept being on sale after the holidays, and so each month I was forced to buy another to offset the cost of that original local, organic splurge which I justified on account of my mother’s Christmas birthday.

In the New Year, we roasted a second turkey and ate it every day for an entire week. Turkey stew. Turkey curry. Turkey pot pie. Turkey soup with rice. Turkey sandwiches and salad. In February, another for my sister and her family when they were visiting from the shore. In March, one last twenty-five pounder with my son and his girlfriend. Twice, this winter we sent them back to Burlington with leftovers.

And still, the freezer grew crowded with tubs of broth and bags of meat, until we said, despite the sale continuing into April: No more!

But today, while looking out at another April snow, I defrosted ingredients for soup, and once the pot was warming over the stove, the aroma overtook me, like a time machine, standing beside my mother as she dropped egg noodles into the broth.

Maybe I’ll set out an extra bowl.

New Year Outtakes

New Year Outtakes

by Kelly (of rituals) ♥ 0 Leave a Comment
Welcome Center, Tennessee

EPIPHANY

Like a dog, at my feet, beneath the table, my mind begs, shamelessly, after each & every meal, even breakfast:

“No dessert?”

After a display of disgust, I pat it on the head, and say:

“Let’s go see what we have.”

~

MID-JANUARY

To say nothing seems wrong. To say something, just to say something, seems trite.

What I felt as I drove through a snowstorm in the Blue Ridge Mountains was shock.

“Mary Oliver has died,” said the announcer on NPR, without asking if we were all sitting down.

And just like that a window shut, a door slammed, a page turned, a poem…

Her words came at a time when I was finding myself, and like she did for so many, her way of seeing lit the way, and made it softer and sweeter and whole.

~

MLK WEEKEND

“Friday is the Day of Detachment. Today we tell our children: Enjoy the journey.”

Another dreary day of winter weather, blocking my view & my mood. But after two full days of driving, I am waking up in a place I’ve never been before, to the sound of a bird I don’t know, in a stranger’s bed in Knoxville, Tennessee where my youngest and I have journeyed to celebrate the most powerful thing in the world.

Love.

~

VERMONT BOUND

The Smokies were covered today and we extended our stay to avoid the weather up ahead.

As the sun set in the west and the full moon rose in the east, we drove through the Tennessee town in which Dolly Parton was born, on this very weekend, 73 years ago.

What struck me most about this time in the “South,” almost immediately, was the pause people take, even when passing by, even when brushing shoulders with strangers, to say something kind or to smile, which we’re happy to reciprocate only we didn’t know and so we kept on going or kept it short or turned away too soon, respecting individuation & time instead of the gentility of connection. (I wonder if the North is more heavily populated by introverts.)

“Southern women are nice to your face and then talk behind your back,” our Airbnb host said.

The anomalies & attributes of another person or place are easier to see than one’s own, and so here’s what else we noticed:

Cheap gas! We filled up for $1.89 today (almost makes us want to stay and drive around some more.)

70 mph speed limit. With signs that tell you to stay in the right lane if you’re going less than 70.

BILLBOARDS. (Thank you for banning those Vermont!)

GOD: in the bathroom, on the coffee table and everywhere else along with GUNS & SEX (aka. “Adult” establishments), the bedfellows of PATRIARCHY & OPPRESSION, partnered with fireworks, bbq, knives, moonshine, distilleries & and a string of extravagant Christmas-lawn ornament light stores.

Other EXCESSES: Pedicures & sundaes–at the same time. (I was tempted.) A hunk of cornbread & 2 huge biscuits with your small order of chicken & dumplings. “You won’t starve here,” the waiter said. Price: $5.95

Loads of Arby’s & Hardy’s & Chick Fill A (as well as Waffle Houses & Krispy Kremes.)

Angular mountain ranges & ridges.

“Yes, ma’am.”

~

IN-SERVICE

Today my husband, a highschool social studies teacher, spent his half-day in-service learning how to stop the bleeding. Legs & arms mainly because apparently there’s less success with torso wounds in the classroom.

 

First Storm

First Storm

by Kelly (of rituals) ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

We lost the ”Grandfather” tree soon after we built the house which was quite a blow to all of us, but the “Grandmother” Pine, so named for being almost as tall as the seed tree just beyond her, is still with us, a dozen years later, though we fear not for long.

Still, this morning when trees fell across this mountain town–upon houses and roadways and cars–She, Ever-Wise, sacrificed an upper branch which in its tumbling cleared the lower branches of their burden of heavy snow so that she remains, sturdy, high above the canopy, facing West.

I can’t help thinking this some kind of Wisdom Teaching—about aging and letting go and most of all provision—but I’ll wait to ponder that until I’ve had supper and a shower, hoping electricity & running water will be restored soon.

(November 2018)