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In Tune

I heard it in the wind last night,
It sounded like applause.
Did you get a round resounding for you
Way up here?
It seems like many dim years ago
Since I heard that face to face,
Or seen you face to face,
Though tonight I can feel you here.
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.............Excerpted from Joni Mitchell’s “For the Roses”

I picked up my dulcimer last night. Light shining into it through one of the heart-shaped sound-holes illuminated the penciled signature of its maker on the inside of the back piece: Dennis Dorogi Brockton NY March 14, 1972.
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I’ve played a number of dulcimers over the years, but none compares to mine’s rich, mellow tone. Dennis is/was a superb craftsman, and he built his dulcimers from old barn wood. The cherry in this instrument was already aged for perhaps a hundred years before Dennis worked with it in 1972. The one I bought was his cheapest model (all I could afford at that time), its lower price reflecting a lack of carved or inlaid ornamentation, not a lesser sound or structural quality. It also came unfinished. I had to do the finish sanding and apply a light oil to it myself.
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I strummed out a little of “Pack Up Your Sorrows” and “Carey”, then picked and sang the beginning of “Vincent” (Starry, Starry Night) – stopped by the realization that the diminished chord at “but on that starry, starry night, when no hope was left in sight” isn’t to be found on a dulcimer fret board. Joni Mitchell’s “California” didn’t sound half-bad despite my rusty voice. The chords I had once figured out and known so well came back to me with surprising ease.
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Encouraged, I opened my guitar case and pulled out the beautiful old Martin D18 (eat your hearts out, bluegrassers!). The softness of my once-calloused fingers was immediately evident. Damn. This would be painful. My right hand was stiff and awkward, so I strummed and sang the first two lines of John Prine’s

“I just found out yesterday that Linda goes to Mars
Every time I sit and look at pictures of used cars
She'll turn on her radio and sit down in her chair
And look at me across the room, as if I wasn't there
Oh My stars! My Linda's gone to Mars
Well I wish she wouldn't leave me here alone
Oh My stars! My Linda's gone to Mars
Well, I wonder if she'd bring me something home,”

but then bagged it and travis-picked my way through “Sound of Loneliness” instead (because there aren’t any high notes, and because I think my voice has about as much “lilt” these days as Prine with a Sunday morning hangover). Husband cheered me on, maybe enjoying his own memories of our early days together, a time when I sang fairly regularly in a downtown coffeehouse, maybe secretly gritting his teeth at the degeneration of my music but knowing how much it still means to me.
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I sang “Follow Me”, the voice and fingers cooperating enough to bring a smile to my face. There are a few songs that always remind me of my partner in music way back when, and “Follow Me” is definitely one of them. Mentally I turned back the clock and considered some of the Richard Farina songs we used to do, but I had put the dulcimer back in its case, so instead launched into “Lyin’ Eyes” (but had trouble remembering a chord progression in the chorus) and then another John Prine/Steve Goodman tune, “Souvenirs”, saying “Take it, Steve!” when I came to the break, and laughing at my clumsy picking.

I sang “Circle Game” and some of “Both Sides Now”, then bits and pieces of a Nanci Griffith tune, “There’s a Light Beyond These Woods”, squeezing my left hand hard against the guitar neck for the four-finger and bar chords, too often missing the frets’ sweet spot.

Finally, fingers sore and voice spent, I put the guitar back in its case. I entertained the thought of doing this much more often, of actually practicing. I thought of my musical old friend. We’ve kept in touch, and in fact, he’s about to take off for Ireland to teach a workshop in “American Fiddling Styles” to some folks who have bow rosin in their DNA. (If they were interested, he could also teach them a few things on the mandolin, banjo, guitar and autoharp). What would he think if he saw my stiff hands and heard my cracking voice? And what would he say if he saw the aging strings on my beautiful instruments? I winced.

“Between the soft fingers and the arthritis, this is quite a challenge,” I said as I snapped the clasps on the guitar case and set the dulcimer aside. Husband replied, “That was great – the best, well no, maybe the second best entertainment there is.” We laughed, turned out the lights and climbed the stairs to bed.
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Tied to a Post

Sweet memory images
of a voice recalled,
a touch remembered,
given blog voice,
and then I toss, sleepless,
reliving the warm
rose-colored view
of years ago,
the intensity
of those feelings
surprising
my
heart
with the strength
of their grasp.

Comments flatter and touch
as others dream back
their own memories buried.
We all steep in
my creation’s spell,
a universal heart
beating for passions past
or love lost,
until Today’s comfort,
Age’s mellowing
and Now’s love
hold sway,
and I write again,
a new post
releasing me
to resume
my life.
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......finspired by "As Time Goes By" posted 8/17/07 and several of you who left comments

Gimme Shelter

I recently visited two buildings.

The first photo shows a ceiling in the Great Hall of the Museum of Man in Gatineau (also known as Hull, the French side of Ottawa). Soaring, lofty, colorful, beautiful, and certainly not of the "everyday", this is a very wonderful place.



This second photo is of a place I stopped a day later in northern N.Y. Simple, functional, colorful and beautiful in its own way. Here is a home built in the style commonly seen in my part of the world, and this one happens to have been the boyhood home of "Farmer Boy", the husband of Laura Ingalls Wilder who wrote Little House on the Prairie.



I was alone here at the Wilder home because by the time I arrived the caretaker had gone home for the day. The late afternoon was quiet, lacking any sounds of civilization; moths and butterflies silently worked the wildflowers in the adjoining meadow. I walked down through the woods to the river, then returned to the house and peeked in the kitchen window at the dry sink, churn and other simple furnishings. Turning around, I spied a few cherries hanging red and shiny... and within reach... Eeeeewwwhh! Sour!!! (I guess that's what I deserve for pinching one of Almonzo's fruits).

Mankind is capable of some very nice work, and although I was awed by the beauty of the museum, I felt so very much at home at Almonzo's farm. Each building was carefully crafted, a monument to its era's artisans; the Wilder farmhouse has withstood the test of time, and I suspect that the museum's Great Hall will also.
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As Time Goes By

She noticed he was different that first night on the bus - smarter, she thought, because of the book - and it drew her to him. They exchanged formal smiles and nods almost as dance partners might do in acknowledgment of the pleasure of a minuet just ended. A week later they were lovers.

The compatibility of their bodies amazed them and passion consumed them until their breathing slowed again, their flesh released them to consider what the rest of the night had to offer. Sometimes they would wash away the time’s separation in the shower, his strong arms lifting her to him as the sides of the metal stall rumbled thunder and the steamy spraying water poured over them; on other nights they rolled in a cool ménage a trois with the spring breeze that stole softly in through the window above his mattress.

They were lovers, though love was never spoken of. They even made a point of saying, “I like you,” as they lay together, a joking reference to the respect each of them had for the seriousness of love.

He brought her to jazz, to the Wade in the Water of Oscar Petersen, the rich vocals of Lou Rawls. Rochester was a music town, and after formal concerts ended, traveling jazz greats of the day found their way to Doug Duke’s tiny club down at Charlotte beach. The place would start jumping around midnight, and he'd bring her there, as much being part of the scene as taking it in. Heads turned and old men smiled recognition as they made their way to a table near the stage so tiny that it felt as though Clark Terry or Marion McPartland or Coleman Hawkins might play just for them. Her own musical interests were baser. She sang him Pat Sky and Phil Ochs, vibrated his stereo speakers to Jefferson Airplane on those rare nights when they would just hang out at his place.

In the wee hours of the morning they would drive to Nick Tahou’s for the “garbage plate” or homefries. It was a tough neighborhood. There’d been murders there, so he’d go in while she waited in the old green station wagon he called “The Pickle.” Sometimes the weight of the food was more than the grease-soaked paper bag could hold, and it would lose its ketchup-laden load in the front seat as they laughed in greasy-chinned silliness. Then he’d drive her home, often as the night was giving way to sunrise.

The affair ended as suddenly as it began. They traded places, in a way, when he graduated and moved to Boston, and she left her job and enrolled in summer courses. He came back to visit a few weeks later, and things weren't the same.

They eventually loved and married well, though of course not each other, but for years each haunted the other’s dreams in the way a lover can. At times a song or an old photo still stirs the memories. They're good memories, memories of a searing yet tender affair, but when rational thought replaces the frivolous recall of fickle emotion, they both believe that it would not have been the right love, the love that sustains them now and has for so many years. It was a show in rehearsal, mis-cast, a film outdone by its sequel despite the enduring luster of its original players.

You must remember this,
A kiss is just a kiss,
A sigh is just a sigh.
The sentimental things apply
As times goes by.

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.......................................Here's lookin' at you, kid...

The Secret Lives of Animals...

This morning I was treated to a wonderful sight. In the corner of our freshly cut meadow, the white of a doe's tail caught my eye, flicking rapidly out of habit or perhaps necessity (although it seemed too early in the morning for the flies to be bothering her).

I went to the back porch for a better look, but the change in angle placed her out of my view, and instead, I spied her fawn in a bouncing game of "Herd the Turkeys!" Acting much like a border collie, this young Bambi was circling two dismayed gobblers, bouncing and dashing with a speed that had them completely befuddled and seemingly scared witless. Compared to their hysterical fits and starts and Keystone Kops collisions, the young deer was poetry in motion. I watched in amazed amusement.

After a minute or so, probably reacting to a call or signal from the doe, the fawn suddenly turned and bounded toward the corner of the meadow and then into the woods. Game over, the turkeys stood still as statues, apparently wondering what on earth they had just experienced.

And then life in the meadow returned to the normally peaceful quiet of an early summer morning.

August



Yesterday I pushed aside weeds grown too tall and pulled the largest of the beets. Sitting on the porch steps, I lopped off their green tops, setting the youngest and most delicate aside for the freezer. Next came lots of washing and then, while I prepared the "pickle", simmering. Once cooked, the skins rub off and the remaining tops fall away, and they're ready to slice and put in jars, top up with the cooked vinegar/sugar/cinnamon, allspice mixture, cover with lids and their screw-on bands, and put into the water-bath canner. As I write this, there are 15 pints of pickled beets waiting to be labeled and put on shelves in the cellar.

Today I pulled the garlic. It sits in the sun, drying, soon to be stored away.

The corn is ripening; there are a couple of red tomatoes, chard and kale are keeping us in fresh greens, new carrots are being enjoyed.

This is August in the North Country.
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Horse Crazy

I can’t remember when there weren’t horses in my life. I loved them always, from the time I could walk, and the evidence is still stuck to a pair of tiny brown and white leather saddle shoes my mother packed away with other souvenirs of my childhood. Most mothers would be loath to save horse manure, but my mother wasn’t like most.

In the evenings and on weekends, we would visit all the local stables, attend all the horse shows and come to know every local horse person - and horse - we encountered. I knew no fear of these big animals and lived for long Sunday afternoons when I’d sit on the hood of our old Chevy with its bumper up tight to some corral fence, watching the Pleasure Horse or Stock Horse classes and the Flag or Pick-up Race. I never tired of what someone once quipped was “a bunch of horses asses riding a bunch of horses asses” go around and around those rings.

When winter ended the outdoor riding season and darkness came early, our small family would eat dinner and then huddle close to the radio for episodes of Straight Arrow and his golden horse, Fury. My father read Red Ryder comics to me and then Will James’ book, Smoky the Cowhorse. We found two indoor riding rings to visit, quenching my thirst until spring.

By the time I was four, I had a “job” riding ponies. There was a circular, double-fenced enclosure about two miles from our house, and above its white painted gate a sign proclaimed PONY RIDES - 25¢. For a quarter (no small fee in those days), a kid could be put up on either Jingles or Trigger and - with the pony on a lead-rope - given three turns around the ring. My father took me there often, and we quickly endeared ourselves to the proprietor. At first I must have been led around, but soon I was off the lead and galloping. Kids passing by saw the commotion and begged their parents to stop their cars and let them ride, and when they did, I would have to relinquish my mount. Of course, the ponies walked sedately (and tiredly) with these “amateur” riders. When the crowds dwindled once again, I was lifted into the saddle, and with a hearty “heeawwww!” I took off with flying hooves and a wake of dust. The details of this activity were unknown to my mother who assumed that my tales of having to rein in “that ornery cayuse” had their root in a galloping imagination. One evening my father suggested that she come and watch me ride, and after nearly dropping the camera in her terrified shock, she documented my cowboy skills in Kodak home movies. The owner of the pony rides place knew good advertising when it galloped past him: my riding was free.

My own first horse was named Lady. She was a handsome bay mare (if you overlooked her stiff legs and slight limp) given to me by my mother’s childhood friend, Marion. Marion had a farm, but she and her husband had recently moved to the city, leaving Lady, but not the daily chore of feeding her. I was the answer: a horse-crazy kid whose parents had recently bought an old house and two acres of land. The amenities of that real estate included a small pasture and a shed containing a box stall, the perfect home for a sedate equine.

Lady was 13 – about twice my age. She had been a riding stable mount - a lousy life for any horse - until her legs gave out, and from there she was sent to a mink farm where she was destined to become sustenance for those poor animals on their way to giving up their hides to grace the shoulders of rich women. Somehow Marion had seen her there, and in exchange for a fin and the horse’s promise to safely entertain Marion’s children, Lady evaded the gun and the food bowl. Several years passed, and those children left the nest. On June 10, 1952, Lady was trucked to her new home at my house. I paid Marion my life’s savings of $6.00 for her, which probably covered the cost of the transportation.

How I loved that horse. She was my steed, my friend and confidant, and the passion of my young life.

The remarkable thing about this story is that my parents knew nothing about horses and had no interest in them. Perhaps on a Sunday drive we passed “El Rancho”, the stable where someone first plunked me on top of a horse, and it was love at first plunk, or maybe it was a picture in a book or a toy animal that first caused me to become horse crazy. Whatever it was, my parents supported my interest with countless hours of their time and with money they really didn’t have. In doing so, they gave me a gift beyond measure: I grew up believing that a passion was to be followed and that dreams could be realized.
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I guess I’ve written enough about this for now, so….. HEEAWWWW! C'mon, you ornery cayuse! Let's git to the ranch!
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One... Singular Sensation...

(Begin with the right foot) BRUSH-BACK-STEP,

(now the left) BRUSH-BACK-STEP,

(right) BRUSH-BACK-STEP-(now step on the left!) STEP,

(now right again!) BRUSH-BACK-STEP.

(REPEAT!)

Thus began my dancing lessons, red-haired Miss Byrne calling out the instructions, and an ancient, stooped woman named Sylvia pounding an old, out of tune upright piano.

....(Up a steep and very narrow stairway,
.....To the voice like a metronome,
.....Up a steep and very narrow stairway,
.....It wasn't paradise...
.....It wasn't paradise...
.....It wasn't paradise...
.....But it was home)

The place was the "Val Mates School of Dance," up a long and very narrow stairway above a storefront on East Avenue. I was a very pigeon-toed, skinny kid, and my parents were hoping that dancing lessons would straighten out my feet.

.....(Dance: ten; Looks: three...)

True, Val Mates wasn't paradise, but neither was it anything like my home. The man Val Mates, though seldom seen, looked like his painted portrait on the sign that hung in the window, albeit a bit older: an oddly (to me at the time) pretty fellow with very curly hair slightly longer than was the masculine style of that day. The rest of the faculty was made up of women unlike any of my friends' mothers. Except for Miss Byrne and the grumpy-looking old pianist, they were bleached blondes, noticeably made up and wearing fishnet stockings, low-cut leotards and very short dance skirts. As young as I was (probably about eight), the prevailing lack of wholesomeness made an impression. This was a fascinating place.

.....(Give me somebody to dance for,
.....Give me somebody to show.
.....Let me wake up in the morning to find
.....I have somewhere exciting to go).

There was a small lobby with a curved black sort of desk/counter where you paid your money. The lights there were dim, and it was where The Blondes hung out when they weren't teaching in one of the two maple floored, mirrored studios. It didn't seem to me that pretty, freckle-faced Miss Byrne fit in there, and I must have been right, because one day she was gone. I arrived for my lessons, and she had been replaced by one of The Blondes.

Sylvia disappeared too. Her piano pounding was replaced by a small record player, one of those old 78 rpm portable models that looked like a small suitcase, the top unlatching and opening to expose the turntable and needle arm. Perhaps in boredom, perhaps for the shock value, The Blonde put a vinyl disk in place, turned it on, and proceeded to play the record using her long, red fingernail instead of the needle!!!

.....(Play me the music!
.....Play me the music!
.....Give me a chance to come through!
.....All I ever needed was the music and the mirror
.....And a chance to dance-- )

Not long after that, Miss Byrne called my mother. She had opened her own dance studio in the basement of her home, or more likely, her parents' home. I left Val Mates and resumed tap, acrobatic and ballet lessons next to a furnace beneath a low ceiling and neon lights, eventually graduating to "toe" (nowadays known as "on point") and modern jazz. I thought I had talent, and maybe that was why I didn't feel I needed to practice. (If I’m honest here, I guess I would have to admit to having more laziness than perceived talent). I'd gradually learn the numbers as new steps were added week after week, eventually suffering through each lesson as poor Miss Byrne must have suffered in teaching a student with little motivation. One day she announced that she was going to get married, and her underground dancing school closed.

My mother sought out other studios, and after a nasty encounter with a teacher who used my ponytail to yank me into a back-bend, I gave up all but the tapping and took dance in the home of a young man who was the nephew of our local town druggist. I’d ride my horse to his house for lessons, transforming from Annie Oakley to Bo Jangles and back in the space of an hour.

And then came hormones, Jr. High, and the realization that even if I wanted to be (which I didn't), I would never be a dancer.
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.....(Hello twelve,
.....Hello thirteen,
.....Hello love! )
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It was time to let my tap and toe shoes gather dust.
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.....(Everything was beautiful at the ballet.
.....Graceful men lift lovely girls in white.
.....Yes, everything was beautiful at the ballet.)

Well, not really everything. I had seen that.

I quit.

There was no reason to continue. My pigeon toes (the reason my parents sent me to dancing lessons) had straightened out, maybe (as hoped) from those many weeks of forcing them into first, second, third, fourth and fifth position. Or maybe it just would have happened anyway as I grew.

The many “routines” I’d learned were soon forgotten, but I can still do the steps – and sometimes do. The beauty of having had all those dancing lessons is that to this day I can still punctuate a wise-crack with a shuffle-ball-change.
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.....(And I can't forget, don't regret, what I did for love pigeon toes).

Go Greased Lightning!

Living in the North Country, we’re more intimately connected to what the sky delivers than city folks are. A rainy day can spoil our picnic, but it can also make our garden lushly abundant; a rainy month can promote hoof rot and turn the basement into a pond. A hot day can be enjoyed at one of the many nearby lakes and rivers; a hot month can wither a crop and dry up a well.

This summer we have dodged quite a few bullets. The weather forecast has warned of thunderstorms with high winds and possible hail many times, but so far the storms have not materialized or they have passed around us.

Friday morning’s humidity and hot sun gave way to a dark mid-afternoon sky, followed in short order by white flashes to the west and the grumbling roll of thunder. Rain started to fall, carried by wind that quickly increased to a multi-directional frenzy, and soon torrents of sky-water and icy bullets were pelting the windows and bouncing off the patio and picnic table. Through it all I could see the corn and asparagus fronds swaying violently.

We were hit. The simultaneous CRACK/SNAP/BOOM told me so, but the power didn’t go out. Glad I had disconnected the computer and modem, I wondered if the horses were okay. They usually stand outside during a storm, maybe avoiding the deafening pounding of rain on the barn’s metal roof, or maybe just enjoying the shower. They weren’t in sight, although it was hard to see through the downpour.

And then, more suddenly than it had begun, the storm passed and the sun appeared: blue sky to the west; blackness moving away to the east. I picked up the telephone to make a call and realized it had been toasted. (How many times this has happened! Cordless phones and lightning just don’t mix well.)

In the barn, I found both horses peacefully munching hay in their stalls… and the electric fencer blown to smithereens.

The fencer is critical not because it keeps the horses in pasture (which it does), but because it keeps woodchucks and raccoons out of the garden. We have already lost this year’s soybean crop to a hungry chuck because the “coon fence” wasn’t electrified, and I certainly do not want the corn crop to meet a similar fate, so I headed to town to buy a new fencer. Upon returning home, I found that a second storm had blown through and knocked down about half of the corn crop I was attempting to protect.

Yesterday as my husband and I righted corn and constructed baling twine supports for it, we quipped that it’s a good thing we aren’t trying to feed Europe. A favorite old joke came to mind: It’s a good life if only we don’t weaken.



"No shoes, no shirt, no service"



The charred remains




Take that, you coons!




Why gardeners cry




After a couple of hours of lifting, straightening, tamping and stringing

Addendum: Today is beautifully sunny and still. The corn has a good chance of digging its roots deeper and standing tall without prolonged help, and - surprise - you can still buy a phone that has a cord!