Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Display cases, spiders and on the edge.
As often happens, something will occur during my day and my mind grabs on to it and starts weaving thoughts around it, pulling up memories and chewing on them.
The trail for the start of this thought had to do with my granddaughter Tania's hostile reaction to a spider yesterday.
As you know by reading here, I have been working on getting a kitchenette set up in my section of the house. I have been making my nesting portion a true 'mother-in-law suite'.
Well, the hardscape portions of the project are done. Walls are painted a nice almond. The luxurious cherry bourdeaux cabinets are fixed, the bisque Corian countertop is smoothly and seemlessly joined to the large matching sink. Brushed nickle plating accents are found on the high arched faucet, on the drawer and cupboard pulls, and on the face of the new small microwave oven.
The marbled gray floor tiles are layed and the baseboards are stained and tucked back into place, all the finishing touches are done.
What remained was to winnow through my 50 boxes of crystal, china, decorative bits and pieces, and the piles of kitchen things. I needed to get the feel for what was essential living accoutierments and what pieces soothed my need for decorative examples of my good taste.
Tania, my granddaughter, is here from Seattle with her brother visiting her father for the summer. She is earning money by helping me get my boxes unpacked and stuff stowed appropriately.
We got the 6 essential boxes unpacked and stowed easily in the first hour yesterday. These were the boxes I have been using since I moved in six months ago. They contain my absolutely bare minimum kitchen items -- pot holders, insulated mugs for iced drinks, paper plates, steak knives, soup cans and plastic wrap.
Once these boxes were unloaded, it was time to start bringing in the boxes from the back of the garage. The first boxes contained my clear glass vases and my treasured japanese butterfly vase. It is lovingly mended from accidental incidents of childish awkwardness and gusty winds.
The second box contained about fourteen pieces of intense cobalt blue glass objects -- glass cups, tea pot, fiesta ware pitcher. These things went upstairs to daughter-in-law Christine. She will pick and choose items to display on the tops of kitchen cabinets, just as I did in my old house.
We unpacked my Norataki "Heather" china. I explained to Tania that any sound you make handling china this fine can lead to cracks and breakage. Tucked into this same box were six gold Winslow Homer collector plates.
I think these plates are the best of my mother's plate collection. The scenes are reproductions of Homer's "children at play" portraits. These plates fit with the style of the two original large Jeanne Downs pencil sketches I collected that are hanging in the kitchen upstairs. ("Mother's helper" - a young boy with a broom, and "Why me?" a put upon boy at a tea party with two dressed up girls.)
Too bad for the plates, they had to be tucked into the downstairs coat closet, no wall room for them now.
The next box we worked on contained part of my stemware. It was the smaller white wine glasses. This brought back a flood of memories.
In our younger years, my husband Bill and I bought a house from a friend. We had known the various previous owners of this house from the day it was built (the Burdues, Vivrettes, McNamaras). It was five bedrooms, three baths, just down the street from the school on Tamerack Drive in Dublin, California. This house had been partially burned twice. Each time it had been well cared for and brought back to spiffy newness.
My husband's inventory control consulting work was going gang busters, so we brought the house, and started doing a little remodeling on it.
It had a large kitchen-eating space that was very informal. We bisected this space with a wall with a pocket door. On the wall facing the kitchen side we placed a high shelf for indoor plants, Regulator school pendulum clock, and below the shelf, my two Jeanne Downs sketches hung.
On the other side of the new wall, we designed a sort of built-in mirrored crystal display with cabinets below for my table linens and china storage. All this was overlooking the new formal dining space with its surrounding buttermilk sky (pale, pale yellow) colored silk curtains, matching carpet, and the striking long case Thomas clock.
I worked with my brother-in-law Bill Leber on the design of this built-in display case and he constructed it for me. It was done in rich cherry mahogony, with full plate mirrored back wall and glass shelves simply mounted in two side panels of cherry. It was a stunning piece of work and was topped with a recessed light bridge shining down on each of the many faceted crystal pieces shimmering like sparkling diamonds.
Bill died on Friday at his home in Castro Valley.
His carpentry craftsmanship lives on in that wonderful dining room display case. I know it is the center of attention for anyone living in that house now. But I remember Bill's skilled hands and his deep laugh.
We unpacked my white wine glasses and we put them in the cupboard above the refrigerator. They will hide behind the cupboard door and will not sparkle or shimmer as they did in the past, set so proudly on the table for dinner with Fr Moran, pastor of St. Raymond's.
Perhaps, one day child or grandchild will serve a dinner party calling for wine glasses.
As we unloaded the box with the old toaster oven, a spider scampered out of the box on to the floor. Tania danced from one bare foot to another and tried to crush the spider with the base of the wooden block of the knife holder. She squeeled and squeaked as the bug dodged her attempts. Finally she got it, ganz tot as the germans say -- entirely dead.
Hmm, I thought. Why am I not afraid of spiders? Why do I find them facinating? A memory floated in.
I remember a warm summer morning when I was about eleven. I smell grass drying from morning dew. I am laying on my stomach on a hillock, bare foot, watching a trap door spider peek out of the door to its den. The spider is large, black and a little furry. Bobby Thorpe is on the other side of the den with a stick poking at the lid trying to see if there are more spiders in the den. Danny King is sitting next to me watching, trying to control Bobby's desire to do destructive things with that stick.
We make up fantasy stories about the poison-ness of this spider and how it would battle and win all its fights. We wanted it to dominate every living thing in this pasture. Little did we know that it was a female and could live up to 20 years if we just left it alone.
http://mamba.bio.uci.edu/~pjbryant/biodiv/spiders/Bothriocyrtum%20californicum.htm
Whatever fears I might have had about spiders turned to curious caution watching this spider. I just was not afraid.
Growning up, our house was on a block at the end of a long street. It dead ended and on the other side of the street barracade was the baseball and fort playing areas. Then farther east and up was Hwy 50 (now I-580), a two lane highway. It was easy to dart across in the morning, and easy to use the culvert passing under it on the way back during the busier afternoons.
On the other side of the highway, the hills mounted higher and higher and then sloped down to the city water reservior. The large lake was completely surrounded with a high wire fence, topped with rolled razor wire. We just were not encouraged to climb that fence and swim. It was our drinking water and we did not want to mess with that.
South of the reservior were pastures and fallow fields of grass and hay. The ground was uneven, so it could not be ridden over with a bicycle. This was walking and exploring country. We watched birds and bugs and once found a dead cow, gaseous and smelly.
We found the Pioneer Cemetary in the Cherryland area, from the early days when the hacienda people would bury their folks on their estates. We think the Estadillos owned this graveyard. Then some of the land between the Estadillo hacienda in San Leandro and the one in Castro Valley was called Cherryland until the suburban sprawl filled in the hills and fields to the east of Hwy 50 (the Bay-O-Vista development).
http://166.107.72.47/cda/redevelop/maps/index.htm
Slowly as I grew up, the fields were soaked up and twisted into straight tree lines of block after block of one-story stucco houses with their small back yards and detached one car garages.
The city edge moved away from the end of our block. I was pulled more and more into city life and the lives of trap door spiders pulled away from me.
In young adulthood (in the mid 1960s), I lived in the newly developing town of Dublin, California, smack dab in the middle of the fallow fields between Alamo and Pleasanton, on the eastern edge of Alameda county and civilization. It was a great place to raise kids and push them out the door in the summer time to explore in the fields just as I did.
Now I live on the city edge again. I like living on the edge. Sadly however, even here in unincorporated Cobb County, Georgia, the edges between cities are invisible lines drawn on maps. The developed tree-lined streets meander and there is no free space for a kid to roam around and explore an unused grassy pasture.
No wonder kids are afraid of spiders.
Good-bye Bill Leber, we will miss you.
Thinking of you Andrew on your 18th birthday.
The trail for the start of this thought had to do with my granddaughter Tania's hostile reaction to a spider yesterday.
As you know by reading here, I have been working on getting a kitchenette set up in my section of the house. I have been making my nesting portion a true 'mother-in-law suite'.
Well, the hardscape portions of the project are done. Walls are painted a nice almond. The luxurious cherry bourdeaux cabinets are fixed, the bisque Corian countertop is smoothly and seemlessly joined to the large matching sink. Brushed nickle plating accents are found on the high arched faucet, on the drawer and cupboard pulls, and on the face of the new small microwave oven.
The marbled gray floor tiles are layed and the baseboards are stained and tucked back into place, all the finishing touches are done.
What remained was to winnow through my 50 boxes of crystal, china, decorative bits and pieces, and the piles of kitchen things. I needed to get the feel for what was essential living accoutierments and what pieces soothed my need for decorative examples of my good taste.
Tania, my granddaughter, is here from Seattle with her brother visiting her father for the summer. She is earning money by helping me get my boxes unpacked and stuff stowed appropriately.
We got the 6 essential boxes unpacked and stowed easily in the first hour yesterday. These were the boxes I have been using since I moved in six months ago. They contain my absolutely bare minimum kitchen items -- pot holders, insulated mugs for iced drinks, paper plates, steak knives, soup cans and plastic wrap.
Once these boxes were unloaded, it was time to start bringing in the boxes from the back of the garage. The first boxes contained my clear glass vases and my treasured japanese butterfly vase. It is lovingly mended from accidental incidents of childish awkwardness and gusty winds.
The second box contained about fourteen pieces of intense cobalt blue glass objects -- glass cups, tea pot, fiesta ware pitcher. These things went upstairs to daughter-in-law Christine. She will pick and choose items to display on the tops of kitchen cabinets, just as I did in my old house.
We unpacked my Norataki "Heather" china. I explained to Tania that any sound you make handling china this fine can lead to cracks and breakage. Tucked into this same box were six gold Winslow Homer collector plates.
I think these plates are the best of my mother's plate collection. The scenes are reproductions of Homer's "children at play" portraits. These plates fit with the style of the two original large Jeanne Downs pencil sketches I collected that are hanging in the kitchen upstairs. ("Mother's helper" - a young boy with a broom, and "Why me?" a put upon boy at a tea party with two dressed up girls.)
Too bad for the plates, they had to be tucked into the downstairs coat closet, no wall room for them now.
The next box we worked on contained part of my stemware. It was the smaller white wine glasses. This brought back a flood of memories.
In our younger years, my husband Bill and I bought a house from a friend. We had known the various previous owners of this house from the day it was built (the Burdues, Vivrettes, McNamaras). It was five bedrooms, three baths, just down the street from the school on Tamerack Drive in Dublin, California. This house had been partially burned twice. Each time it had been well cared for and brought back to spiffy newness.
My husband's inventory control consulting work was going gang busters, so we brought the house, and started doing a little remodeling on it.
It had a large kitchen-eating space that was very informal. We bisected this space with a wall with a pocket door. On the wall facing the kitchen side we placed a high shelf for indoor plants, Regulator school pendulum clock, and below the shelf, my two Jeanne Downs sketches hung.
On the other side of the new wall, we designed a sort of built-in mirrored crystal display with cabinets below for my table linens and china storage. All this was overlooking the new formal dining space with its surrounding buttermilk sky (pale, pale yellow) colored silk curtains, matching carpet, and the striking long case Thomas clock.
I worked with my brother-in-law Bill Leber on the design of this built-in display case and he constructed it for me. It was done in rich cherry mahogony, with full plate mirrored back wall and glass shelves simply mounted in two side panels of cherry. It was a stunning piece of work and was topped with a recessed light bridge shining down on each of the many faceted crystal pieces shimmering like sparkling diamonds.
Bill died on Friday at his home in Castro Valley.
His carpentry craftsmanship lives on in that wonderful dining room display case. I know it is the center of attention for anyone living in that house now. But I remember Bill's skilled hands and his deep laugh.
We unpacked my white wine glasses and we put them in the cupboard above the refrigerator. They will hide behind the cupboard door and will not sparkle or shimmer as they did in the past, set so proudly on the table for dinner with Fr Moran, pastor of St. Raymond's.
Perhaps, one day child or grandchild will serve a dinner party calling for wine glasses.
As we unloaded the box with the old toaster oven, a spider scampered out of the box on to the floor. Tania danced from one bare foot to another and tried to crush the spider with the base of the wooden block of the knife holder. She squeeled and squeaked as the bug dodged her attempts. Finally she got it, ganz tot as the germans say -- entirely dead.
Hmm, I thought. Why am I not afraid of spiders? Why do I find them facinating? A memory floated in.
I remember a warm summer morning when I was about eleven. I smell grass drying from morning dew. I am laying on my stomach on a hillock, bare foot, watching a trap door spider peek out of the door to its den. The spider is large, black and a little furry. Bobby Thorpe is on the other side of the den with a stick poking at the lid trying to see if there are more spiders in the den. Danny King is sitting next to me watching, trying to control Bobby's desire to do destructive things with that stick.
We make up fantasy stories about the poison-ness of this spider and how it would battle and win all its fights. We wanted it to dominate every living thing in this pasture. Little did we know that it was a female and could live up to 20 years if we just left it alone.
http://mamba.bio.uci.edu/~pjbryant/biodiv/spiders/Bothriocyrtum%20californicum.htm
Whatever fears I might have had about spiders turned to curious caution watching this spider. I just was not afraid.
Growning up, our house was on a block at the end of a long street. It dead ended and on the other side of the street barracade was the baseball and fort playing areas. Then farther east and up was Hwy 50 (now I-580), a two lane highway. It was easy to dart across in the morning, and easy to use the culvert passing under it on the way back during the busier afternoons.
On the other side of the highway, the hills mounted higher and higher and then sloped down to the city water reservior. The large lake was completely surrounded with a high wire fence, topped with rolled razor wire. We just were not encouraged to climb that fence and swim. It was our drinking water and we did not want to mess with that.
South of the reservior were pastures and fallow fields of grass and hay. The ground was uneven, so it could not be ridden over with a bicycle. This was walking and exploring country. We watched birds and bugs and once found a dead cow, gaseous and smelly.
We found the Pioneer Cemetary in the Cherryland area, from the early days when the hacienda people would bury their folks on their estates. We think the Estadillos owned this graveyard. Then some of the land between the Estadillo hacienda in San Leandro and the one in Castro Valley was called Cherryland until the suburban sprawl filled in the hills and fields to the east of Hwy 50 (the Bay-O-Vista development).
http://166.107.72.47/cda/redevelop/maps/index.htm
Slowly as I grew up, the fields were soaked up and twisted into straight tree lines of block after block of one-story stucco houses with their small back yards and detached one car garages.
The city edge moved away from the end of our block. I was pulled more and more into city life and the lives of trap door spiders pulled away from me.
In young adulthood (in the mid 1960s), I lived in the newly developing town of Dublin, California, smack dab in the middle of the fallow fields between Alamo and Pleasanton, on the eastern edge of Alameda county and civilization. It was a great place to raise kids and push them out the door in the summer time to explore in the fields just as I did.
Now I live on the city edge again. I like living on the edge. Sadly however, even here in unincorporated Cobb County, Georgia, the edges between cities are invisible lines drawn on maps. The developed tree-lined streets meander and there is no free space for a kid to roam around and explore an unused grassy pasture.
No wonder kids are afraid of spiders.
Good-bye Bill Leber, we will miss you.
Thinking of you Andrew on your 18th birthday.
# posted by Dornar @ 11:46 AM 
