The Anecdotal Life Part. 68

"Have been gadding about" as my mom would have said. Had great fun in the gadding, too. Thursday night was spent at the Officer and Faculty Club on the Naval Academy base. Such a sense of history and time assaults you as you enter the building. I am always honored to be there. Dinner with the Annapolis Sail and Power Squadron is at the least, usually pleasant. An editor of the Chesapeake Bay Magazine gave a presentation, sat, ate and chatted next to me. We both have cats and he, more than I. Five to be exact. "That's a lot of litter boxes, " I said. He concurred. He was good company , being in the writing world as he was. One of our agreed upon approved authors was Dave Barry. Anybody who mentions a good writer , that is also funny, is a friend of mine.

On Friday the opening of my collage group's show at the Academy of the Arts Museum in Easton, Maryland was fully attended. I had gotten three trays of tea sandwiches, which were actually rather fulsome, plus sandwich wraps. I figured I had way overdone it, and I hadn't intended to. The sandwich-maker in the deli section of the grocery delivered the huge pyramid of sandwiches (I couldn't even carry it) into my grocery basket with an apology that she had gotten carried away and made an entire extra tray before she caught herself up. "no extra charge to you, " she whispered. Well! Lucky me. They were much needed as it turned out. Malcolm Forbes said," people who never get carried away , should be." I certainly agree. It was lucky me all day long. I got 99% of the sandwiches all safely to Easton after a two hour drive in the heat, saw my work ensconced in a terrific place and saw that all the disclaimers by my fellow artists were really baloney. Four weeks before the opening they all claimed they'd never make it, didn't have a thing, shouldn't even be considered a collage artist.....blah, blah, blah. Their presentations were all highly professional and each one had a several works that were tip top as to quality. The director stopped to deliver an incredibly sincere monologue to me as to the intent of the museum and ( after I confessed that there were times there was only one or two of us using the studio) reassured me that it was totally o.k. He looked me straight in the eye when he said that and healed years of my being chased out of studios for not meeting the hours. As a single mother and teacher, it had been hard to do so.

My next day saw me with my son and his partner, sneaking in at the last second to the exhibit and then having a picnic in the burgeoning sculpture garden outside the museum. We went from there to the Old Third Haven Meeting House built by the Quakers in 1684-( my ancestors perhaps) . It had a "peaceful easy feeling" and time slips away when you enter the hand-hewn wooden and rather long building. In this dark and cool place you could envision the elders or patriarchs of the group sitting in the higher rows like the best seats or boxes in the opera. I looked for the family name of Hance in the graveyard, but as my son kept telling me," wrong date, wrong place, they wouldn't have been here". I tromped all over trying to prove him wrong, but no dice. He won. He often does in matters of historic fact. Very annoying habit of his. But I was happy with his coming because he was totally unaware of what I had created art-wise over what was a crippling winter for our family. I told him it all kept me from going crazy. Or that's my opinion anyway.

Copyright: September 10, 2007

The Anecdotal Life Part. 67

On Friday I went to Goose Harbor to see if a boating lesson was on. It wasn't. They were readying for a cruise to the Inner Harbor in Baltimore. I really couldn't attempt it since all my money had gone and goes for lessons with captains and for repairs to boat or house and I am simply not skilled enough yet. The worst of needed repairs may be for completed now for the boat ( Dear Lord, hear this boater's prayer) and some of the most desperate repairs still need to be done for the house. Case in point, my computer, which was finally driving me crazy. Therefore, I raced back home to begin the process of installing Earthlink's DSL for $21.95 a month. I knew in my heart what I was in for. I'd already failed in the attempt to try Verizon, which thankfully wasn't my fault. I had once installed a Microsoft Webtv and that took five days and a lot of beer at the end of each day. I even wrote Bill Gates (who refused to answer) that a Chinese philosopher invented that contraption, but it did well for several years til the worker across the road, driving a backhoe, took out the little electric tower in front of my house. My insurance refused to cover it. That company was soon dismissed. So fool that I am , there I was trying for another complicated installation. For two long days, after receiving a big box of stuff and having to run to Office Depot for another box of stuff to make the first box of stuff work , and after talking to every tech in Earthlink ( all of whom had a great Indian accent since, of course, that is who does all our work for us of any complexity) and after hauling all the computer equipment into the middle of my bed because the DSL cord was too short and the tech swore nothing could be substituted, I finally reached my last Indian- improbably named was Walsh (for some reason he wouldn't let me call him sir) and he got me there. Amazingly, the d--- thing worked. I had no idea how I would sleep with the computer in the middle of my bed along with two cats, but I didn't care anymore. My printer was on the other side of the room , my back was out of alignment, I had burnt all my left brain synapses, which couldn't have been too much, and seemingly all that because I wanted to download a funny card my new daughter-in-law sent me. The next day, oh how incredibly lucky for me, the handyman I found for $20.00 an hour came to fix the front door which had suffered from a previous insane handyman's work when I first moved in. This dude fixed it all, computer, wiring, tub, bathroom shelves, door and all for $273.00. The door took 8 hours. No, I refuse to give out his name.
Copyright: September 2, 2007.