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Covid Pasttimes

My spot facing the back garden from which I eat fresh vegetables daily.

My Mother used to say “She’s not a gusher…” to describe me when I opened a gift and was not raving outwardly about it. Then she’d laugh nervously as she always did when she was describing me.

Of course I didn’t have a name for me then, (flat affect, autism, dysthymia) there’s many names I’d acquire over time:

Anyway

She never told me I couldn’t fly- I flapped my arms all over the yard and if my paper bag wings ripped, she suggested a different size and color and “maybe that would work…” (The white Rex-All drugstore bags she suggested.)

I still have that little bathing suit. She didn’t throw things away. There was no away.

When my parents retired and relocated to another state I’d visit for a week now and again, always managing to get a ride there somehow after my spouse died, my youngest kid(s) along with me. One thing I always did was travel with my dog. I’d rise early at their place and walk the dog up the gravel road as far as the cemetery, then linger there to read tombstones and then I’d head back, my arm full of Vermont wildflowers like Queen Anne’s Lace (my FAVORITE), Daisies, Black-eyed Susans and many colorful varieties from the Aster and Buttercup families.

A few weeks before she died (I didn’t see it coming) it was winter and I’d returned for a short stay. The same bouquet I’d placed in a vase on the table 4 months previously, was still there on the table, withered and dusty, brown and shriveled. A summer relic she couldn’t part with. This was completely expected. I grew up this way. Is it any wonder I cry at every episode of Hoarders? My mother never saw an episode and I wonder what she’d have made of it? Certainly any reaction from her, if we’d been able to see the show together, would’ve been an insight for me.

My father, now 88, widowed since 2007, told me a story recently – he stepped outside and stood on the porch, a wobbly few concrete steps with an even more wobbly rail. And there was a bear a few feet away near the pine with the branches that scrape the roof. He said he started talking to it and “it raised its head up and looked right at me.”

I asked what he did. He said “ I’m not afraid of no bear. I’ll put a saddle on it if I feel like it!”

But what. Did. You. Do. I asked.

He said just then his friend, who’d been inside, came to the door and said “who the hell are you talking to out there?”

Hearing the guy’s voice the bear ran off.

Wow. That’s all I could say. Then my father said “if I’d had a piece of bread I could’ve fed it.”

My father is a cat lady sort of guy and I suspect the bear was attracted by pie tins of cat food.

I’ve probably told this before but eh Let’s Make a Deal is a repeat like everything else so here goes. We got the encyclopedia set from World Book when I was in grade school. My mother loved a persuasive door to door salesman. I was so excited. Encyclopedias were my equivalent to getting internet. Once my mother responded to a cold call from a vacuum cleaner salesman.

The offer was that we’d get a free Carpet cleaning with no pressure to buy a vacuum. I saw the guy pull into the gravel driveway. He lugged an enormous amount of equipment into the kitchen. His face was like that emoji where the eyes are surprised like saucers. I stood back from the action, watching from a distance my mother’s wide welcoming smile, her nervous laughing as she directed him to a path around piles.

The couch itself had carpet beetles in it. The carpet was thin, third hand and commercial grade, quite full of detritus. The living room was not bad actually. The tall standing lamp had a normal posture of tipping sideways but it worked. Torn screens were patched with duct tape and the stand up ashtray needed an emptying as it was developing a Mt. Everest of butts look to it. Overall though she had taken pains to be sure there was an area of about 6’ x 6’ (okay perhaps a little bigger than that) where he could use the carpet cleaner.

I saw him introduce himself, actually stuttering and then he suddenly remembered something he had to retrieve from the car. I watched him lug all the stuff with him as he let himself out, maneuvering around cats, (there were 20 then (ok probably more than that), saying he’d be just a moment.

I watched from the window as he loaded back up the car with the vacuum/cleaner machine. Then he peeled out of the long driveway so fast. We never heard from him again. My mother said something to the effect (giggling) well I guess we scared him away.

I’d like to prove my mother wrong. I do gush, I do rave. I get ecstatic even if it’s not outwardly shown. During work downtime while this heatwave demands staying indoors with AC no one can truly afford because electricity rates are ridiculously astronomical- I peruse art!

Mondrian has such range. What a pleasure.

Today I’m going to recreate a famous painting. My son Silas is going to do so as well. You’ve seen the trending pandemic pastime posts where people recreate paintings, right? Here’s an example below. ( from here: Recreations )

I am not sure which painting I’m recreating but I have some ideas. My son will probably do this one: (from Picasso’s blue period)

My elder cat Po of 20 yrs., died Jan this year. Here is a kitten I acquired from a woman off Craig’s list. This kitten had two parasites, one gotten from being exposed to goose poops. It’s been a long road getting Simon healthy. He was smeared in brown slime when I got him. He’s looking so much better. I’m ecstatic to be his mother. he must be separated from the other cat until he’s healthy this the leash. Besides he hasn’t developed confidence and trust yet. He hides when loose. He is very sweet though.

This has been a scattered post but then that’s my mindset today. I look forward to Arting soon. Here is a recent collage I did. All paper. No paint.

KimberlyGerryTucker Art.

If you’ve read this far thanks. My mother never told me I couldn’t fly so that’s what I do inside my head. I think about her a lot. I wish she could’ve met this little one. She loves those Covid commercials. I always ask her if they play that Covid music down at the Baby Club.

Here’s a random thought. MeghanMarkle says this about her sister in law KateMiddleton: “We rolled out the Red Carpet for her.”

So. In my opinion: this is probably the only time that phrase was not intended metaphorically. They probably did literally roll out a red carpet. I love when people unintentionally say something that ends up having a literal meaning.

So that’s it. I’ll post our painting recreations sometime.



This post first appeared on Ravenambition's Aspergers Blog | Life's Idiosyncra, please read the originial post: here

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Covid Pasttimes

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