My idea of housework is to sweep the room with a glance.

 —Erma Bombeck

Do you think if I print out the poster below and tape it to my chest this weekend it will help as I fly through that long to-do list I mentioned last week?  The list on which the only thing crossed off at this point is getting the dog bathed (and I didn't even do that, my son took her to the groomer!).  Let's see....count my blessings.  That's easy--I am blessed to have a home.  Even if it is currently rather messy.  Practice kindness...okay, I won't yell at the people who actually MADE the mess in my home.  Let go of what I can't control...I assume this means I can't control the fact that some people in my home (who will remain nameless, but hey, my son doesn't read my blog anyway...) consistently forget to put trash in the trash can and dirty dishes in the sink?  Listen to my heart...be productive yet calm.  Ask any of my children...the calm part tends to go out the window when I'm at the last stage of preparing for a holiday and the arrival of relatives.  Just breathe.  Hmmm, the last time my daughter told me that, I think I forgot the part about practicing kindness.... 

I know, I know!  I had poetical visions this week of blogging about loftier thoughts...thankfulness, gratitude, the love I feel for my family and friends.  And I am thankful, and filled with gratitude and love, and I am really looking forward to everyone coming home for Thanksgiving.  Who blogs about dirty bathrooms and messy linen closets?  Dusty living rooms and cluttered guest bedrooms?  Well, I guess I do.  Because that's a part of my real life, just as much as the part of my life that is full of books, music, poetry and delight in the outdoors.  It's all about balance, right?  In the meantime, wish me luck with all my unfinished projects and home preparations, and here's a poem written by someone with whom I obviously see eye to eye!

Dust if you must, but wouldn't it be better

To paint a picture, or write a letter,

Bake a cake, or plant a seed;

Ponder the difference between want and need?

Dust if you must, but there's not much time,

With rivers to swim, and mountains to climb;

Music to hear, and books to read;

Friends to cherish, and life to lead.

Dust if you must, but the world's out there

With the sun in your eyers, and the wind in your hair;

A flutter of snow, a shower of rain,

This day will not come around again.



Housekeeping ain't no joke. —Louisa May Alcott

“Piglet noticed that even though he had a Very Small Heart, it could hold a rather large amount of Gratitude.” 

from Winnie the Pooh, by A.A. Milne

One week to Thanksgiving!  Remember my to-do list from last week?  Status update....the dog is now bathed and looks great.  Other than that, well, let's just say I need to get in gear!  Thank goodness neither my sister or my mother own a pair of white gloves for checking dust.  Do you think it's rude to put 'do not open' signs on closets (and rooms!) where I am reasonably sure I'm going to be stuffing/hiding things at the last minute? (just kidding...well, maybe not kidding...!) 

Of course, Thanksgiving isn't about perfectly decorated homes (at this point, though, I'd settle for a picked-up home...I think clutter multiplies while I sleep).  Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays--a day to be deeply grateful for all the blessings bestowed upon my family.  I am keenly aware that this year even the simplest of things we take for granted should fill our hearts with gratitude--when thousands are still without power, I am grateful that I can shower when I wake up, turn on the lights to read, watch a television show or movie, cook a hot dinner for my family.  When so many have lost their homes and belongings, I am so grateful to have my home.  When so many of our fellow countrymen and women are struggling to find jobs, I am thankful that both my husband and I are employed.  I do not take these things lightly. 

Cultivating a spirit of gratitude starts early.  Like Piglet, my husband and I have always wanted our children to incorporate thankfulness into their daily lives.  It is no coincidence that my family starts each meal with a simple prayer/song of gratitude, the Swedenborgian Hymn, better known as the Johnny Appleseed Song.  The lyrics are simple and easy to learn, but the meaning is powerful...the Lord's been good to me.  Today, even though my heart is very small, like Piglet's, it holds a large amount of gratitude. 





 

Oh, the Lord's been good to me.
And so I thank the Lord
For giving me the things I need:
The sun, the rain and the appleseed;
Oh, the Lord's been good to me.

  I wake up every day
As happy as can be,
Beacuse I know the Lord is there
Watchin' over all my friends and me
The Lord is good to me.

God gave you a gift of 86,400 seconds today. Have you used one to say thank you?                                                                                                                                          

A picture is a poem without words....(Horace)

Happy birthday, Claude Monet!  Thank you for sharing your artistic vision with the world and for making the world a more beautiful place.  In college I fell in love with the impressionists, Monet, Manet, Renoir, Degas and Cassatt, and made many trips to Kansas City's beautiful Nelson Art Museum to visit the Impressionist Gallery.  Now that I live fairly close to Chicago, my trips to the Windy City almost always include a visit to the renowned Art Institute, which houses one of the world's most famous Impressionist collections, including over 30 Monets (and six Haystacks!).  And it's not just the ethereal visual art that touches my soul...the music of Debussy, Ravel, Satie and Faure' explore delicate textures and a veiling of sonorities, capturing the movement of color and light in an opalescent and almost transparent fashion that takes my breath away.  Longfellow wrote this lovely poem, Sunrise on the Hills, in 1825, fifteen years before Monet was born, but I think they would have recognized in each other a true kindred spirit in their love of nature. 



Impression, Sunrise by Monet--this painting gave rise to the name of the Impressionist movement

Sunrise on the Hills

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I stood upon the hills, when heaven's wide arch
Was glorious with the sun's returning march,
And woods were brightened, and soft gales
Went forth to kiss the sun-clad vales.
The clouds were far beneath me; bathed in light,
They gathered mid-way round the wooded height,
And, in their fading glory, shone
Like hosts in battle overthrown.
As many a pinnacle, with shifting glance.
Through the gray mist thrust up its shattered lance,
And rocking on the cliff was left
The dark pine blasted, bare, and cleft.
The veil of cloud was lifted, and below
Glowed the rich valley, and the river's flow
Was darkened by the forest's shade,
Or glistened in the white cascade;
Where upward, in the mellow blush of day,
The noisy bittern wheeled his spiral way.

I heard the distant waters dash,
I saw the current whirl and flash,
And richly, by the blue lake's silver beach,
The woods were bending with a silent reach.
Then o'er the vale, with gentle swell,
The music of the village bell
Came sweetly to the echo-giving hills;
And the wild horn, whose voice the woodland fills,
Was ringing to the merry shout,
That faint and far the glen sent out,
Where, answering to the sudden shot, thin smoke,
Through thick-leaved branches, from the dingle broke.

If thou art worn and hard beset
With sorrows, that thou wouldst forget,
If thou wouldst read a lesson, that will keep
Thy heart from fainting and thy soul from sleep,
Go to the woods and hills! No tears
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.



Haystacks at Sunrise--one of my favorites!





For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her...

We live in an age of advanced entertainment technology, with HD televisions, 3-D movies, Wii's and PS3's and a host of hand-held game systems. And music has come along for the ride as well.  From tiny transistor radios and unwieldy boomboxes we have quickly graduated to MP3 players, I-pods, Bose sound systems, and even listening to music via you-tube on our computers.  But long before all of these shiny new toys, we had....record players.  The 'suitcase' record player like the one below, on which my cousin Brenda and I listened to Elvis Presley in the 60's.  We drank Coca-Cola in bottles, wearing our pedal-pushers, and sang along to In the Ghetto and Nothin' But a Hound Dog and listened in awe to the striking similarities between Kennedy and Lincoln's deaths in the 1966 hit History Repeats Itself, watching the 45 rpm records go round and round.

 

Then came the family stereo system, on which we listened to Mother's beloved Mario Lanza operatic arias and sang along to Christmas carols with Andy Williams and Bing Crosby.  We carried out our Saturday morning household chores to the strains of Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops.  To this day, every time I hear the Bacchanale from "Samson and Delilah" I have an urge to grab a dustcloth and start polishing furniture!

And then when I turned 13, I discovered Simon and Garfunkel.  Here's a copy of the first album I ever purchased, bought with babysitting money.  I was so excited, holding the album in my hands in the record store, feeling so very grown-up.  The simple beauty of poetry put to music held me in thrall then, and works its same magic now.  My mirror may say differently, but everytime I turn on my (ahem...stereo purchased thirty years!) and let the lovely melodies of Scarborough Fair and Sounds of Silence fill the air I'm a young girl again. 

Ode to the Vinyl Record

by Thomas R. Smith

The needle lowers into the groove

and I'm home. It could be any record

I've lived with and loved a long time: Springsteen

or Rodrigo, Ray Charles or Emmylou

Harris: Not only the music, but

the whirlpool shimmering on the turntable

funneling blackly down into the ocean

of the ear—even the background

pops and hisses a worn record

wraps the music in, creaturely

imperfections so hospitable to our own.

Since those first Beatles and Stones LPs

plopped down spindles on record players

we opened like tiny suitcases at sweaty

junior high parties while parents were out,

how many nights I've pulled around

my desires a vinyl record's cloak

of flaws and found it a perfect fit,

the crackling unclarity and turbulence

of the country's lo-fi basement heart

madly spinning, making its big dark sound.

What was your favorite album?  Do you still have it? I may have moved into the CD and I-pod age, but I still proudly own all of my early records--Chicago, James Taylor, Simon and Garfunkel, and the Fifth Dimension!  I hope you have a lovely day, in which you take time to listen to a favorite tune from way back when!

...and not to yield

My husband and I went to the new James Bond movie, Skyfall, on Sunday.  In the middle of the action, violence and obligatory sex scene all of a sudden there was a stirring moment where Dame Judy Dench, as M, delivers a quote from Tennyson.  It was not a poem I had heard before and it reminded me of my father and his generation, who fought the good fight to keep our freedom intact.  Since I don't blog on Sundays, I am using today's blog to honor my father, my uncles, my brother and brother-in-laws, my sister-in-law, my cousins and especially my nephew, Aaron, who gave his life for his country this past June.  All of you, strong of will and ready to do what was called upon you to carry out, moved heaven and earth to keep those of us at home free.  And for that, a simple thank you seems woefully insufficient.  Gratitude, day in and day out, is what we need to carry in our hearts for the lives you put on hold while serving our nation and keeping it strong.   Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.

Though much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

--From Ulysses by Alfred, Lord Tennyson 

My dad, WWII Navy veteran

My beautiful sister and her husband, who we welcomed back from Afghanistan last year

My brother during Desert Storm

My nephew, who gave the ultimate sacrifice for his country

 

Happy Saturday!  I woke up this morning and started doing the math...11 days until company arrives for Thanksgiving!  That means 11 days to get the dog bathed and clipped, get the carpets scrubbed, whisk all the odds and ends around the house out of sight (thankfully I have a couple of large storage spaces!) and plan menus.  11 days to sew the rest of the family room curtains.  And, most time consuming of all, unpack and display all of my Dickens Village for the holidays. I'm not complaining, as I am so excited that my sister, her family and my mother are joining us for Thanksgiving and can't wait to see all of them.  I am wondering, though, how to squeeze a few extra hours into each of the next few days! 

Having my mother visit is always special, because we are incredibly close and literally finish each other's sentences.  We have a really special bond, forged when it was just the two of us for the first five years of my life.  I'm sure it was difficult for Mom to be a single mother and work so hard to support me, but I never knew it--I was surrounded in a cocoon of love and family. 

We had a series of little apartments, and I don't remember them very clearly, but I do remember two little guys that traveled with us from place to place, and even came along for our exciting journey when Mother married and moved to South Dakota.  They were happy to sit on Mom's bookshelves for many years, and then one day a box arrived at my house--and I happily discovered that Peter James and John had come to pay me a visit!  They now keep their vigil in my library, a treasured memento from the past.  And where did they get such spiffy names, you might ask?  From a Sunday School song I loved, although I didn't quite figure out that Peter and James were two different people, hence the larger owl is Peter James while the smaller one is only John. 

Fifty years ago.....

Peter, James, and John in a rowboat
Peter, James, and John in a rowboat
Peter, James, and John in a rowboat
Out on the deep blue sea!

Cast their nets and
caught no fishes,
Cast their nets and
caught no fishes,
Cast their nets and
caught no fishes,
Out on the deep blue sea!

Today...keeping watch over my Anne Perry books in the library

http://mockingbhirdhillcottage.com/

I'm sharing my favorite owls today over at Claudia's Mockingbird Hill Cottage blog.  You can find Peter James and John keeping company with many other treasured favorite things--please join us over at Claudia's!   

Have a wonderful weekend!

Secret confession...I am hooked on Etsy. What's not to love about an online store of creative offerings, a vibrant marketplace where you can browse amazing handmade and vintage gifts?  For a bibliophile it's like being a kid left alone in a candy store!  You love Wuthering Heights?  How about this the fun bracelet to help you keep Heathcliff and Cathy close to mind: 

 

baublesbeadsncharms

You need a little Mr. Darcy in your life?  Perhaps wearing his ardent proclamation of love will lift your

spirits....



cnhbigadventure



or if you need a private chuckle this would be a great print for your kitchen (it makes me laugh every time I picture this scene with the fawning Mr. Collins):



LeighsArt

This weekend I am going to start reading Jane Eyre (well, to be honest, I will be RE-reading Jane Eyre, since I practically have the book memorized) with a dear friend from 'way back when'.  We are going to read a chapter a week and then get together online to talk about it.  So of course I had to go strolling through all the amazing Etsy "Jane Eyre" merchandise today....don't you love this framed print?  Doesn't it just make your heart beat a little faster when you see Reader, I married him?!

Second confession:  I ordered this pin a few months ago and wear it jauntily on my coat.  How often can you get a ton of enjoyment for $1.50??  While thankfully it doesn't apply to my husband, the quote makes me laugh, AND I love to see the spark of recognition in someone's eyes when they read the button (and if there is no recognition, odds are they probably aren't a kindred spirit!).

beanforest

 

You don't have to be a 'romantic' to enjoy the Etsy literary offerings...how about a blast from the past with your favorite girl sleuth, Trixie?  She can come along with you as you run errands or meet a friend for coffee:



PocketbookPurses



Or perhaps you'd like to curl up with your favorite Anne book some Saturday?  This charming pillow can keep you company:



TwoStrayCats

Since I have Jane on the brain today, I'll leave you with a poem by Charlotte Brontë, who was intimately acquainted with the brooding, desolate landscape of northern England and a glimpse of our heroine, broken heartedly battling the windswept moors after she has fled Thornfield Hall (good thing we know there is a happy ending!). 

 

Speak of the North! A Lonely Moor

Speak of the North! A lonely moor
Silent and dark and tractless swells,
The waves of some wild streamlet pour
Hurriedly through its ferny dells.

Profoundly still the twilight air,
Lifeless the landscape; so we deem
Till like a phantom gliding near
A stag bends down to drink the stream.

And far away a mountain zone,
A cold, white waste of snow-drifts lies,
And one star, large and soft and lone,
Silently lights the unclouded skies.

Have a good Friday, and I'll be back tomorrow, linking up with Mockingbird Hill Cottage's Favorite Thing Saturday!