windthread

friends, even if you aren't sure how.

so i think i said that i'd brought Goldie to the Way Back Goat Gate ...to Tay,  who watches there as i feed,  that i brought Goldie to her and she snorted, nicely, on him

and i brought him again,  last eve and they touched faces,  or rather mouths/nose,  mutually,  both wanting to and how this second time she was very still and just "tasted him" with the tip of her tongue, so carefully

and i came home today from town and usually she is right at the gate but she wasn't and i came in to see her just over there,  lying under the wild rose bush,  her attention caught tight to the slat in the wood fencing where she watches the Feral Family.  Their world is just on the other side.  

I've known she watches them there all along,  but today there was a difference...she was magnetized and i stood and watched as Goldie stick either his paw or his very face through a place where the wood is a little broken out.  

 

 

the place where he puts his face or paw through so Tay can taste him.

so what does this SAY?  Goldie really wants to be someone's cat.  He accompanies me now for everything....close,  right at my foot.  While i fill the Goats Water Tub he rubs on my ankles,  the hose,  the rock,  purring.  He doesn't resist when i pick him up and carry him the long way to the gate to touch faces with Tay and he just purrs through it all.  He is fearless and Willing.

Wheat,  who i think is his sister,  female,  remains distant,  like her mother.  Feral.

so am thinking...unless something happens,  which it can,  i will get Goldie neutered and somehow find him a home.  

What would be great is if i could bring him IN...as into the house.  This would be great for Tay in helping her know things about small fast moving Others...which will be chicks on the Hill.  Will help her understand how to "know" them.  She innately is this way...just wanting to know...and this is HUGE...in that big new picture she will find herSelf a part of.  But i don't think i should...bring him in.  They are wild and who knows what they "carry".  That in itself,  but then,  just in respect for Tazmeena.  She has her PLACE here.  She earned her PLACE.  she is old.  She should not need to deal with something energetic and new.  Just that she has to share the underneath of the house is enough.

so all this.  I think.  hmmmm.

reassurance

so it's just fine.  All these are pieces of clothing,  from Thrift shop....cotton, linen,  commercial cloth.  Except the light colored piece just under the images which is muslin with very little mark from plant dye.  oh,  and then,  the "sky scrap"...deb Lacativa's pants waistband.    and then,  i used the ink pen just slightly for the eye...?....so maybe i would take that too.  Pencil and ink.

but cloth making can Go on.  

 

 

you are on your own

it's just now over.  Repeat of yesterday but not quite so much intense.    And this time,  i'd covered the Alfalfa.  

i watch the feeds about Texas.  it's ok,  because it's what is Real in Real Time.  and what always has me on my knees is the animals.  There was one pic of a man in chest  deep water,  walking his blow up mattress,  his Raft,  walking it along and on it was a cat carrier and a dog crate.  i guess a back pack.  His world.  Them and him.

today,  just another Storm.  A BIG storm,  but nothing like that,  6 days now,  but it  brings me into that zone of Empathy.  How it feels to be wet and muddy,  no reprieve.  defenseless.  at the Mercy of.

 

i put these scraps here.  They are nothing special.  scraps of clothing from Thrift Shop,  the pieces from Deb...thrift shop.  Nothing beauty Full or Grand,  just scraps and i thought about that,  how way back in the beginning of Spirit Cloth,  Jude Hill,  i was so ecstatic that just  "nothing cloth" could Become anything.  So i was driven today to find a way for these scraps of nothing much really.  

and watching the people in Texas,  i remembered the Bug Out Bag.  This was before i found Spirit Cloth and i was adrift and i found Sharon Astyk,   Depletion and Abundance.  Sustainability.  The first  "blog"   i ever

knew.   Now she is i guess The Chatelaine's Keys,  but i went there to look and she's not blogging with regularity.

Her book:  Depletion and Abundance....Life on the New Home Front.  One Woman's  Solutions to Finding Abundance for your Family while Coming to Terms with Peak Oil, Climate Change and Hard Times.

so bug out bag.  Talk of that then,  2008,  talk of that now.  What would you take?????

I couldn't take my baskets of cloth,  or my pyrex collection.  I would need to rely on Tay being able to hold her own.  Tazmeena,  not so much....she's old.  What about the Goats?  They don't swim.

but,  paring it down,  down to me,  what i might take?

 

in this moment,  i would take my spool of silk thread....a light camel....color...neutral that works with the invisible baste of Everything.  a needle or two.  a pencil.  graphite.  2B  and i would take Deb's dirty thread.   From there,  i could Go.  

 

 

surprise again....maybe it's just a life of Surprise?

i check national weather service.  They are reliable.  Today said 20% thunder showers.  ok.  but i got easy and went off to work Away without covering the alfalfa after the morning feed.  I like to leave it open to air out as much as possible.  Came home and lay on the futon for the afternoon nap,  everything just ok and nothing in the wind.  But then out of the blue,  like literally OUT OF THE BLUE  blue sky.....

STORM.

from the East....maybe kin to Harvey.....but a STORM.  probably the second biggest storm in the 20 some years i've lived here and being from the East,  causing trouble.  The open ends of all the Goat shelters face east because weather rarely comes from that direction.  Everyone pretty much got wet.

The Albatros,  where the grass hay is stored...a lot got wet.  The alfalfa bale,  uncovered,  got wet.  A lot of loss in feed.    Bummer.  But even though there was HAIL,  there we all were,  when SUN broke through and there was a double Rainbow and Gideon was mumbling as he does.

Compared to Texas,  nothing.  Compared to here,  a LOT.  

Sunday, almost the end of August, here and There.

went to dog trainer Jan's today to help construct two Goat shelters in her new and improved configuration.  These were simple arches made by curving cattle panel against t-posts and covering with "tarps"...tied down.  The interesting thing was she had found someone who does billboards,  like along the freeway and these are made with tarp like material.  They are very large and heavy  weave.  These were used.  It's a great shelter.  Can be modified in many ways as need changes and the best  thing, can be taken apart and used differently or elsewhere.  

I visited her new batch of chicks,  some of which were "complimentary" bantum...beautyfully colored. Just babies.

AND just before i left,  i milked two of her does that she's drying up... almost  1/2 gallon of milk.  I've improved.  and the does were kind.  I'll make cheese tomorrow.

through all this,  morning till early afternoon,  a Crow was just overhead in one of her huge Cottonwoods,  close enough to see the glint of her eye.   She talked either to us or just to her self,  i think commenting on our doings.

 

so not a lot of stitching.  just a few more leaves.  but enough to stay In Touch

and UNEXPECTED SURPRISE news from the Hill.  When they were there today,  the 3 young boys who will live someday across and down the road,  (maybe,  their mother doesn't like country)   who only come with their father on weekends to the land they have there,   came to ask Jenny if it is ok that they continue to play in the Rooster Swamp.  Conversation ensued and they said they like to catch crayfish there....it is no longer a swamp in August,  but continues to be a pool.   and they went on to say that there aren't any big crayfish anymore but just little ones .......because......  THERE ARE BEAVERS!  They said the Beavers come through,  all along the canal,  and eat all the big crayfish then move on,  down the canal toward where it enters the Feather river.   But,  in another circle of season,  will return and repeat.

BEAVERS!!!!!!     BEAVERS!   who'dve Guessed??????  or Imagined?   How just so really Great!

 

 

 

 

the smallest things

the branches from yesterday.   I don't ever like to use dark threads for things.  Never black,  unless it's for the 7 black/white/black white thread beads....but never black.  It's heavy.  And i don't really feel ok with a very dark brown....even when what i am looking for is a dark brown.   So, stitching some things for me is a dilemma.    Here,  i just used a brown that took on light for the branches.  Much like the marks that were on the cloth.  This was ok.  and good, even.

 

BUT!!!!    Look!, Here!

this is from a single strand of Deb Lacativa's   "dirty thread".  Single strand meaning,  separating one strand of thread from the 6thread embroidery floss strand....i want to be clear about this.  Embroidery floss is composed of 6 separate thread strands.  I Always use only one of the 6 at a time.  If i want a strong, dense line,  i simply go over and over,  back and forth until it's "right".    But ALWAYS,  just a single strand.  one.

i looked at those branches and they were "flat".  Why not try some dirty thread?  and Lo and Behold, the branches came alive!  I LOVE this,  like beyond Love.  Dirty coming from the fact that the varigation  is quick....fast....and for small stitching,  what is needed to create dark and light....

so this is ONE single strand of 6 of Deb's embroidery floss.  Added to the branches.  Only one.  and

To me,  this is just so beyond Great.  Such happiness in it..... 

 

comfortable for Just Going

looking out the back window

 

Goldie,  at the big stump.  I get the camera.   Telephoto.

 

mother cat at the water bowl,  Wheat is coming.

 

Goldie goes through

 

Wheat

 

Wheat goes through

 

mother

 

she looks

 

but heads off for the corridor.   Cat mother.  It's nearing dusk.  Hunting.  Hunted.

 

there are leaves,  maybe.

there is talk of more maybe.  talk of maybe getting a donkey.   Donkeys alert to trespassers.  Having had the experience of the livestock guardian dog,  Kadir,  having fully understood about livestock guardian dogs,  and having watched how it is near the Hill,  Jenny,  and not really wanting to do the livestock guardian dog again,  she's thinking, maybe a donkey.  We consider this.  I also am wondering if Tay will choose to stay Outside with the Goats.  It's possible.  She has not slept inside now for a long time, feeling the need to keep an eye on these feral cats.  It Goes.

 

even more Joy

all invisibly stitched down

 

now branches.  just some today,  but many.  Maybe double click will work?

and peanut work in the Buck yards.   salted peanuts in the shell.  a delicacy.  I work to get Jack Flash to come to his name.  It's tricky because Sunny Ray is all in his business and there is a lot of spinning and turning...me,  them,  but we made progress.  Nogal and Tenzen know the program.  Working into it,  just once in a while now,  but more as September comes along.  Readying for the Trip.

Joy

over there,  to the right,  in the sidebar is Frazey Ford,  singing...I'm done.   there are these words

"my joy,  my joy takes nothin from you"  

the song,  if can be called a song,  but really is an anthem,  applies to so many things for women,  but today applies for me to this scrap and the Cloth that wants to come in the midst of so much shit.  From the President of these united? states....blah blah blah,  but....Joy.

this scrap from Deb Lacativa.  a wasteband and some from a pair of pants that didn't work out but for me,  such a teaching in COLOR....and in such small scraps,  smaller than a postage stamp but so so thrilling in their smallness.  will be the last to add here....to the Joy

ok.  Ready.  this is Energy and Blood and well,  we'll see.  But i love it very much.  

a Tuesday, that ordinarily is work away

but he forgot,  because he went to Wyoming to see the Eclipse.  Hoped there was no inconvenience.

And Tina said in a comment yesterday...."nothing i can put my finger on".   Yes.  just a,  uhhhh, moodiness, for me.  easily sorted through and defined,  yet,  not.  

Dakotah told this today on her blog....junewildflower.wordpress.com.....

the Navajo teaching of  "stay inside and do not observe the eclipse,  out of reverence for what they say is an intimate event between the earth, moon and sun."   I knew this.  i'd forgotten how i Knew this and am so grateful to her for helping the memory.   

so there are things.  and Eclipse when so many donned spectacles to what they deemed a spectacle.  And yet one more day when ratboyEssence is NOT here and i watched this morning just before Light;    the Mother cat and Wheat and Goldie coming through that small space in the Way Back Gate place,  the same space where that Rabbit used to come through until they took up residence under the house....coming "home" from hunting.  She's teaching them to hunt.  There is an OWL that lives near enough by.  S/he would be out there,  calling h/ir night sounds when the rabbit was there.   An owl can take a good sized cat.

and i thought all day about making a cheery post.  That maybe that might be a mission,  to make cheery posts,  or at least neutral ones?????    But here i am.  Just sayin.

and when feeding early,  because i wanted to support this evenings Farmer's Market in town,  when feeding early,  behind me in the Middle Oasis,  where the Raft is and where the Mirror on the Chair is,  there was a rushing of Sound of Wings of a Large Bird and i spun to see but could see nothing,  but the sound of it was real.......

and my dreams have dramatically changed in the last weeks,  maybe last night an example of how it is now,  it's all about DOING...on the brink of it....no more is it about where the doing might take place.  That is inconsequential now...

Last night,  "they" were coming,  would arrive any minute and they were beings i "knew" but hadn't seen in so long that i couldn't know what they were like now,  and i didn't know how to tell anything about them,  but then suddenly they arrived and it was a tall woman of color,  maybe Alyssia's color,  and maybe Emrie's features,  that are not mixed black and european,  but more of her father's that is sharper featured...El Salvadoran,  I saw her face,  clearly.  She is/was mid life Woman and her hair was in rasta braided antlers,  stiff and rising from her head,  tall and branched.  Her clothing colorful and she had a woven braided leather bag around her shoulders that was cut through in one "scene",

that was noted,  but things went on,  so i don't know anymore about that

she had brought children.  Two girl children,  maybe 3 years,  4,  who were independent of her as were at least 2 boy children.  There was a baby,  in a carry thing,  that i was most involved with.  There was water on the floor,  but of no importance and in that water there were lizards moving about and i worried some about the lizards,  but the two little girls did not.  and the lizards did not.

 

and these things fell into place