The farm on Daysville Road

 In May we sold our summer home in Lakeside, Ohio, after owning it for 34 years. Part of the sale contract was we would stay until Labor Day, so we did get to enjoy one last summer. That's just a little longer than we owned our home on Abington Road where we raised our family. We bought it in 1988 and I still was suffering from a bad case of "empty nest." I remember how much fun it was to decorate it--we were starting from scratch because everything needed to be refreshed, remodeled, or replaced. In May 1989 Bob and his friend Ron changed the paint color from white to mauve, which it remained through summer 2022, our last year.  Some knick knacks and mementos made the trip from Columbus to Lake Erie, although I didn't want it to look like our home in Columbus.  I shopped in Sandusky for things like sheets and towels, and I believe the wall paper (all the rage then) in cream, mauve, rose and blue, came from a Columbus store. 

One of my own paintings seem to fit the theme of the master bedroom--sort of rural and folksy with maple furniture from the 1940s, so it made the trip to the summer home and stayed for 34 years.  This is an acrylic painting I'd done around 1978 from a photo I'd taken in around 1974 of the field of soybeans and neighboring farm at my mother's family farm near Franklin Grove.  I believe at the time I was told that was the --------- place, and it may have even been a distant relative, but I've forgotten the name. If I had the Lee County History book, I could perhaps look it up.  

I doubt that I painted the buildings accurately because it was the sky, particularly the clouds, that caught my eye that hot day. The sun was high in the sky and the fluffy clouds created a shadow on the fields.  The farm land in that part of Lee County is very flat, so when you're outside, you have a feeling that it's all sky--maybe like Montana which is called "big sky." A story that was told to me, I think by my father, is that this area was all marsh in the 1800s when the white settlers arrived. It was near Inlet Swamp.  I'd heard from my grandmother that her father had tiled the land to drain the water. He got the land very cheap, maybe $1.00 an acre because it was swampy and wet--considered worthless for farming.  If I could see what's west of that farm on Daysville Road in the painting I think it would be Old Mill Road and Franklin Creek Park.  

 So this painting hung in the Lakeside house for 34 years, and is now in the bathroom off my office.

Nap study mentioned by John Ed Mathison, Got a Minute

 Association of napping with incident cardiovascular events in a prospective cohort study - PubMed (nih.gov)

This study was mentioned in John Ed Mathison's "Got a Minute," 325 daily meditations. He's a retired Methodist pastor who was at Lakeside in 2021, and I attended his morning sermons. I bought this little book and have been using it for the opening meditations at the Lakeside Women's Club which meets at 1:30 on Tuesday.  I try to pick something that's appropriate for the day's program.  Any program about Lakeside would good for a study on napping.  I see a lot of it-- on the hotel porch, on park benches, on towels in the sun and I have a nap almost every day.  

John Ed says on p. 326, "a brief nap is healthy in releasing stress.  The Bible teaches about stress, anxiety, and good health.  I challenge you to put a 5 minute nap together with a reflection on what the Bible teaches.  It might be off the chart how much healthier you could be!"

John Ed usually doesn't give complete citations--after all, these meditations are on phone apps or radio announcements, and I like to think they are reaching people that churches don't, or someone who maybe has a church family but needs a little boost.  That's what librarians are for--we are finders so you can be keepers. That's why I give you the link to the research. And a copy of a painting I did years ago of a napper on the porch of Hotel Lakeside.

The Wedding at Cana, John 2:1-11

 

A happy accident. Sometimes that's an unplanned baby who becomes mom's caregiver in her old age; sometimes it's a splash of color on an almost finished painting that becomes an award winner; and sometimes it's something you read right after you read or saw something related that brings it all together.

Our lesson for Sunday is John 2:1-11, Jesus' first miracle at the wedding at Cana. It can be read literally or as theology or as an allegory or a prophecy, but John says Jesus revealed his glory (see Exodus 19:11). Why Cana? Why is Mary in charge of a wedding? Why 6 jars? What is the significance of the first of seven signs. On and on. There are entire sermons and articles on the details. But here's what happened to me.

I use a little journal (5 x 7) "Magnificat" in my morning devotions, and besides several hymns and Bible selections for morning and evening, and the story of a saint, each issue has two articles on Christian art, the cover art and another one which may be connected to other content. It's like taking an art appreciation class. I wait a bit and savor it after a week or two, so I didn't read the essays for January until today. In all the years I've been using this journal, I may have only recognized a few, probably if they were on the little Sunday School bulletins children in the 40s and 50s received. The cover art for January was a small (about 8 x 6) altar piece painted by Juan de Flandes, the official painter of Queen Isabella who with her husband Ferdinand unified Spain and financed Columbus' voyages to the New World. She had commissioned 47 of these paintings illustrating the life of Christ, but only 25 of them are still extant.

 
So, what is the cover story art? The wedding at Cana, and we see Jesus and Mary and the wedding couple (whose names John didn't include, nor do we know what their relationship was to Jesus). Their image in the painting is the likeness of Ferdinand and Isabella's son Prince John of Aragon and his bride Margaret of Austria, who married in 1497. They were 19 and 17 when they married and deeply in love, but sadly John died only 6 months after the wedding. So, he is also memorialized in a painting that lauds the sacredness of marriage.

"The moral of this small, private devotional painting is clear: at the intercession of the Virgin Mary, Christian spouses are invited by Jesus to fill-to the brim--their life of human love that, through the sacrament of Marriage, the love that unites them may be raised to the level of divine love." (Pierre-Marie Dumont on the cover art)

When lie dresses like truth

The Lie said to the Truth, "Let's take a bath together, the well water is very nice. The Truth, still suspicious, tested the water and found out it really was nice. So they got naked and bathed. But suddenly, the Lie leapt out of the water and fled, wearing the clothes of the Truth.

The Truth, furious, climbed out of the well to get her clothes back. But the World, upon seeing the naked Truth, looked away, with anger and contempt. Poor Truth returned to the well and disappeared forever, hiding her shame. Since then, the Lie runs around the world, dressed as the Truth, and society is very happy...

Because the world has no desire to know the naked Truth.

Painting: Truth Coming Out Of The Well, Jean-Léon Gérome, 1896.

Monday Memories—saying “I used to. . .”

"Lately I'm saying 'I used to’ a lot," my friend said while we were having coffee to catch up after our trip to Spain.  I'd heard her say it before, but I think it is profound. It made me think.  Yes, I say that frequently. At my age, there are many.

Here are some of my “used to” thoughts in no particular order.

I used to run. I think about that often now—didn’t occur to me before age 40 that someday I wouldn’t.  Oh yes, I knew I wouldn’t run when I was 80, but the need or desire just went away.  As a child I ran all the time, even when I didn’t need to.

I used to skip or take two at a time on the stairs. Sometimes I would run up stairs on all fours.  I know I was an adult because I was doing it on Abington Road where we lived for 34 years. And until December 2013, I would even walk up and down stairs for exercise at our Mill Run church.  Perhaps that’s why I have bursitis now. Even one stair is painful.

I used to go out every morning to a coffee shop. That habit started when I was a teen and ended in early 2014.  I knew I couldn’t have caffeine anymore, and drinking Panera’s decaf was like hot water, so I gave it up and learned to make decaf at home.  I began putting $2/day into the piggy bank for our trip to Spain.  I didn’t always remember to do it, but had about $600 when September 2015 rolled around. Favorite haunts in addition to Panera’s the last decade were Chef-O-Nette, Paul’s Pantry, McDonald’s on Rt. 33, Bob Evans on Sunday, and at Lakeside Coffee ‘n Cream. The regulars at the Chef used to have parties together, attend weddings and funerals. I could hardly start the day without them.

I used to go to work five days a week. From fall 1986 to fall 2000 I was the Veterinary Medicine Librarian at The Ohio State University.  Loved that job. The students were terrific, and the library was located on the far west side of campus, so I never had to fight the bad traffic. The field was fascinating, and I’ve remained interested in medical topics to this day as you can tell from my blog topics. It included research and publication, which I enjoyed. Blogging allows publishing without the middle man. But I’d had many jobs before that because I accepted temporary contracts before a tenured permanent job came along so I could be home with the children in the summers.  I’d worked in agriculture, Latin American studies, user education, and I’d also worked for a library non-profit (Ohio-net) and the State of Ohio (Ohio Steps) before returning to Ohio State, and in both jobs I did research and publishing.

I used to bake pies.  I used to call myself the 2nd best pie baker East of the Mississippi. Mom got first place, of course. When there would be a family event in Indiana or a church pot luck, someone would always suggest I bring dessert, because they knew it would be a pie.  But something happened, maybe 10 or 15 years ago.  The pie crusts just weren’t turning out.  And as far as I’m concerned, no crust no pie. So I’ve passed the family mantle along to my daughter, who not only makes wonderful pies, they are works of art.

My Sugar free apple pie from 2009

Chocolate Peanut Butter,  chocolate peanut butter cream cheese tart, Strawberry rhubarb, flaky pie crust,  apple sour cream, applesauce pie, raisin (sugarless), cheesecake pumpkin, onion pie, apple dumplings, peach fluff pie,    cheeseburger in paradise pie,

My daughter’s artistic pies.

I used to be a dog person.  Since 1976 we’ve always had a cat (Mystery, We Be Three, Lotza Spotza, who is now about 18). When I was a child we always had a dog around. Lassie. Lassie 2. Pretty. Brownie (or was his name Fluffy?). Zero. Jerry. Lady. Polka dot.  Lady and Polka dot were Dalmatians. Lassie, Pretty and Brownie were part collie.  Zero was a mixed hound who “followed” me home one day (with a lot of encouragement). We left Lassie at my grandmother’s when we went to California in 1944—he died in a tractor accident.

I used to be a horse fan. Now I just enjoy looking at them. I would spend my afternoons at the Ranz’ horse/cattle barn near our home, I would ride the horses of friends, and I was fearless.  The Wiggins children  had a blind pony which I would ride bareback along the hi-way. I would draw pictures of horses and write stories.  My brother and I would build snow horses in the yard.  I saved all my babysitting and paper route money and finally when I was 11 years old I bought a horse.  Got over it.

I used to draw and paint, both as a child and an adult. I probably haven’t painted anything in 4 years. Mainly I did watercolor most recently, but back in the 70s I did a lot of paintings using acrylics. When I was a child my mother would get rolls of discontinued wall paper for me to use, and provided stacks of used white newsprint from the printing plant in Mt. Morris. My grandmother gave me a box of oil paints when I was about 10 and gave me her old supplies.  I still have my wood box. Our schools didn’t have art classes, but one year my mother took a typing class in night school in Freeport, and I went along and took an art class.  I didn’t like it because I was the only child in the class and couldn’t draw horses.

Watercolor paintings from several years ago; I think these are studies done in classes I took.

Paintings from the 1970s when I used my children as subjects.

I used to not appear in public in jeans and athletic shoes. After I retired, I was always well dressed when I went to the coffee shop, then would change when I got home. Until about 2010, I always wore high heels with my slacks.  After exercise class I would go home and change clothes rather than appear in the grocery store in my athletic clothes.  Somewhere after 70 I decided that was probably wasted energy.  Now I can look as much a slob as other retired people.

I used to be a Democrat—for 40 years. I voted for George W. Bush in 2000 and haven’t looked back.  I may have been a Conservative for many years before since I am an evangelical Christian, was pro-business, and I was pro-life even as a Democrat. When my husband started his own business in 1994 I really had my eyes open, but it took awhile for that to translate to politics. That said, it still bothers me that Republicans are like bulls in a china closet, and can’t hang together to accomplish something or use a crisis the way the Democrats do.

I used to hate exercise.  Actually, I still do. But I’ve participated in an exercise class at church most years since I retired. For 2015 I’ve been riding my nice Power Spin Gold’s Gym stationery bike, and by doing just a mile at a time about 6 or 7 times a day, I’ve found something that doesn’t hurt my legs and yet is good cardio and burns calories. I’ve ridden 1500 miles since Christmas and lost 35 pounds in 6 months. I could say “I used to weigh 170 lbs.”

I used to sing.  About 9 years ago I decided to join the church choir. I grew up in a home with music and I missed that. I even sang in a little quartet with my siblings. Only one of us had the talent and determination to become a musician and it wasn't me, but I did take piano lessons and play trombone as well as participate in choirs until I graduated from high school.  At UALC in 2006  I just loved it thinking my soprano range would come back.  The director Mike Martin was wonderful. But the voice didn’t come back.  If you don’t use something for 50 years, there are penalties.  So after a year I gave it up.

A poetry prompt from Tweetspeak this week was on games.  So I chose Hide and Seek and worked in the “I used to” theme. I used to write poetry, but hadn’t done it for several years.

-----------------------------------------

Poetry prompt--games

Hide and seek, 1950 and 2015

I used to run through damp grass at dusk
Hiding behind fat trees--or in the garage,
Excited that the all the kids showed up at our house.

Now I scan the shelves for my car keys
Looking for my purse--it’s not where I put it,
Concerned that the dinner date is in fifteen minutes

Stop editing yourself is this blind painter’s advice

There’re so many people saying, ‘Well, I can’t draw a straight line,’ or, ‘I can’t do this or that,’ and it’s interesting how, if you stop editing yourself–if you stop judging every little thing you do when it comes to art–you end up invariably being able to do way more than you thought. It seems like it’s the same way in life. When I lost my eyesight, I really thought everything was over because I already had epilepsy and all; but then thankfully, with the painting, I stopped thinking about it that way. I stopped editing everything I did, stopped worrying about the past or the future and just focused on being in the moment. Things got a lot better after that. I wish more people would do that, because they don’t realize that what they’re capable of is incredible.” John Bramblitt

https://usodep.blogs.govdelivery.com/2014/08/06/artist-sees-painting-as-a-way-of-life/

 

http://bramblitt.net/

This film is 10 years old, but shows how he has developed his art and skill. https://vimeo.com/5497828

Now for today's project--painting the garage

Instead of buying off the shelf storage units for the garage, we had some new shelves and a tall closet built to hang out with the former kitchen cabinets. The bottom two shelves are stationery, the others can be moved. The cabinets won't be painted on the inside, so they are already jammed. I think we could have purchased gold plated cheaper, but oh well, the price you pay for living with an architect. We also have beautiful new hardware that doesn't match the hinges. Hate that. Here's Paul Miller and a few scenes from today's project--which will probably last 3 days. The last photo is stuff that needs to go either to a shredder, a technology dump, or back on the shelves. I wonder what people do who have a clutter problem? We're actually rather tidy people.

Paul is doing a lot of careful prep work--that's the key to a good paint job whether interior or exterior. Clean, sand, fill holes, etc.

Faux finishes--are they gone yet?

I don't know when faux finishes became popular, but I know the guy decorators of our place were here before 1990. Most of the faux is gone now except for one tiny room. We discovered sanding down a faux comb glaze was virtually impossible and spread dust throughout the house, so we ended up just painting over it and having an odd texture show through the new paint.

The walls used to be the color of the blue carpeting, with a comb glaze.

According to the WSJ, the new color for 2011 is sort of a hot pink; the color for 2010 was turquoise. Not sure what khaki and peanut are, but that and this very pale gold will be with us for awhile.

This looks much harder than blogging

But maybe I should try it. My New Year's Resolution to get back to painting lasted about 3 weeks. Peter Yesis is painting a 30 day, self-portrait challenge. He's got a few more days to go and is reall bored. He even painted a portrait of his feet! Go to the left column of the blog for the thumbnails.

How will this help world peace?

It's nice I suppose to be idealistic, but I do wonder how holding hands around a pyramid built centuries ago with slave labor will help.

More than 1500 students, teachers and parents from 50 nationalities “formed a circle of peace that symbolized peace in the world” at the Giza Pyramids in Cairo, Egypt, Thursday, April 2, 2009, “delivering a message that young people from different cultures and religions can live together peacefully.” It’s hard to imagine what else that much money for the travel, food, hotel, etc. for 1500 might have done if these same students had just stayed home and helped their own countries. Perhaps that wasn't the purpose of the trip--maybe it was just Spring Break for rich kids and they needed a plan to get credit for it. However, tourism is Egypt’s number one industry, so I suppose they did help feed a family or two, just as we did during our recent trip.

Update, April 8: A reader has informed me this was an event of the New Cairo British International School. Upon checking the school's very nice website, I see nothing on the school calendar--no mention at all--but if you click to "parents" that's where you'll find the photos and the information which didn't appear in any of the news sources I checked. The school also celebrates Coptic Christmas holiday and has an Easter egg roll. The Prince of Peace you may recall, spent some time in Egypt when he was very young, and we celebrate his resurrection on Easter Sunday.

Meanwhile, young people of a number of different nationalities, mostly sponsored by radical leftist organizations backed by Soros and various communist/marxist front organizations demonstrated against the G20 and U.S. capitalism (fast crumbling under the weight of Obama’s heavy hand to push us over the cliff into socialism/communism). All these countries are covering their own ineptitude and grabs for power with their "bash a banker" hooliganism, led by the likes of our own Barney Frank drooling and lisping in front of cameras for the world to see.

Update, April 8: You gotta love these capitalists. Some enterprising Frenchman is charging empty headed young people with full wallets $67 a piece to learn how to be street demonstrators against the evil capitalists. Saw it in today's WSJ--with photos of drop and roll.

And here is one of my husband's first paintings of our recent trip--he's moving faster than my blog which is still stuck on our first day in Israel.

Friday Family Photo

Here it is. The new bed, with the new bedspread, and the new wall color. Not quite finished yet. The bathrooms still have some work now that the carpenters are finished (try to get that done before you paint). I'm hoping this will be the last bed. We've had a problem with that.

After: new color is light gold with some green undertones, flipping the wall and trim colors from the guest room, looks good with the wood tones. Coverlet is cream, gold, green and blue. Bed is from Amish Vault in Bucyrus, OH.
Before: with dark blue faux glaze that was awful to try to cover. Every room in the house was either faux glazed or wallpapered, but this one seemed to have an impenetrable glaze over the glaze--and was actually lighter than most of the other rooms, so we did it last.
Still a bit of work to do
Have you seen that ad on TV where the guy starts flipping the wall switch asking his wife in the next room what it is for? She has no idea. Meanwhile, down the street a garage door is going up and down on a car hood, "Life comes at you fast," is the voice over as it crashes onto a bewildered woman inside the car. We'd forgotten that switch that shows above the dresser top because it was faux painted too. No idea what it goes to, but if a garage door starts moving. . .