Family Gathering and Age

Posted to Multiply August 22 2011

That was the nicest family get together anyone could ask for. 

One of the joys of having our son in the same city as his sister is that we get to see both offspring at the same time more often. For many years we'd see both kids regularly, but hardly ever at the same time. 

Daughter and spouse made a  quick trip to retrieve the grandson from his summer in the country, and to visit SIL's parents, who cannot make it to Vancouver due to health problems. The demands of everyone's work dictated a fast trip: Arrival Saturday night, departure Monday morning. It takes about 8 hours of driving. Son decided to come along for the ride.

We often make this an occasion for an extended family get-together here. Once in a while I enjoy cooking my brains out and hosting some people. 

The extended family in this case consists of three sets of grandparents: us, our fellow grandparents, their other grandchildren with parents, and the cousins' other grandparents. We need words for these relationships. 

This was not the best weekend at my end, but the kids said they'd take care of things. Did they ever! 

No matter how early I start, and how much I make ahead of time, preparing a dinner party always takes longer than I think. At least I calculate that in these days. The usual scenario finds me red-faced and sweaty in the kitchen until 10 minutes before guests are due. I am all in favor of cleaning as one goes but find it hard in practice. When people ask if they can help I explain that they can keep me company with a drink at the kitchen table, but because I am a terrible organizer I am incapable of delegating. 

Not so my brilliant scientist daughter. The woman has inherited her grandmother's ability to stay calm in the middle of threatening chaos, and to make efficient use of other people. Both my children are fantastic cooks, with a cheerful rivalry about making  use of all one can find in Vancouver. Critters with tentacles, odd body parts, weird produce from land and sea ....  But for this occasion son graciously allowed his sister to take the lead and did the prep cook/dishwasher grunt work.

I got out of the way and went up the hill to tend to gardens and chickens.

When I got back about 2 hours later all the food was prepped and the kitchen was clean again. All I had to do was shove the meat into a slow oven, make a plate of deviled eggs and a salad and grill the zucchini later. I also took care of desert, a humungous Black Forest Cake bartered for with reflexology.

The young people went to the beach to enjoy the new boat that N's SIL and husband had just bought. I ended up opting for a relaxing bath and a rest on the shady lawn at home. The water is just too cold for swimming this year. Chris has never been a beach person, but I have always been a fanatic. Not so this year. Another sure sign of getting old.

The shift is more noticeable every time we get together. The offspring are both in their thirties, settled into good professional jobs they enjoy. They are the grown-ups now, fully participating in their time. We are becoming the old ones on the periphery, struggling to keep up with new technology. Watch us fumbling to answer a cell phone. 

Guess what: it is OK! One of the more pleasant surprises of age is that so many changes you dread in anticipation are OK when you get to them. Between 60 and 65 I felt ageless. At 68 the years are starting to bite. Or at least nibble. 

I fully intend to remain as healthy and productive as possible for as long as I can. I intend to stay on this land as long as possible. But I won't cling to illusions of still being what we are not. Denial of reality by the old creates burdens for the young. They have a tough enough row to hoe without that. 

And now, I'd better go do my exercises..... 

Something's gotta give

Originally posted to Multiply July 28 2011

July is flying by in a blur of work and a feeling that we are still waiting for real summer to start. This is so wrong! This is the summer we are given, here and now. There is no snow on the ground and things are growing, even if other critters are eating too many of them.

It is last year's next year. Every year halfway the growing season I start translating this year's disappointments into next year's dreams. My epitaph will read: "Here lies Ien. Next year she will have a perfect garden."

It has NOT been a good year so far.  

Part of the reason for that is the cold spring and the plague of slugs, but let's face it, part of it is my own fault. I am simply over-extended. Now some people, blessed with more energy, design sense and organizational skill may be able to create and maintain lovely flower borders, do the chickens, get the herb garden/nursery beds organized, take care of the greenhouse, pot up plants for market and have a thriving food garden. 

I am not, especially since my right hip has developed a mind of its own lately and occasionally slows me down.

Something has to give. The something will be plants for the market. Sales are slower by now anyway. It is just too time consuming, not to mention the exhausting shlepping involved. I left them at home during Music Fest. It was such a cinch to load and set up!

It seems every time I start doing something gardenish I find myself at the sink in the greenhouse potting up some suffering plant in a container.

I'll just do Reflexology for the last month, and perhaps leisurely create a bunch of stuff for a last-day half price table on Labour Day weekend. It gets chilly by then.

Tomorrow is the weekly free day, mine to spend entirely as I please. The intention is to go up to the fenced veg garden and work like crazy. It is PATHETIC. The potatoes were a bright spot, but now there are signs of rodent activity. Wilted leaves that turn out to have a chewed-up stem somewhere. I'll take some pictures tomorrow. To be continued.

Bite me! Or: growing pains at the Nakusp Farmers Market

Originally posted to Multiply June 5 2011

The Nakusp Farmers' Market is  becoming the victim of its own success. Farmers markets are big these days, both with the public and with vendors. What happens when something whose charm is partly that it is small and informal starts growing? It may be forced to become more organized and lose some of its charm in the process.

Compared to most other markets we have been an easy-going freewheeling bunch.  Alas, gone are the days when a vendor could just show up and have a choice of places to set up. What it boils down to now is that we have more potential vendors than we have spots.

Some of it works itself out. For instance some vendors only come at the beginning of the season to sell bedding plants. They are gone by the time others want to take advantage of the tourist season. But if everyone shows up at the same time we have a problem.

For years Ray and Lynn Robson did a fabulous job as market managers. Ray is working in Alberta now. Do we ever miss him!

Meanwhile long-standing marketer Colette and yours truly are trying to hold it together.  Not because we are power-hungry control freaks but because we love the market and the job needs to be done. It is not easy.

Yesterday I lost it for a moment. Colette was away so I had to be IT.

One regular had accidentally set up too far in one direction, which left less room in that section, which meant a spot we thought was available wasn't.  An old regular showed up unexpectedly. There would have been room for him, just not in his old space, but he did not wait. I had forgotten we had promised a certain spot to a new couple and I had totally forgotten about another new small vendor. I was afraid a certain local artist who has used the market for years would show up. She had said she'd start coming again in June, but when? Did we make it clear enough to her that she now had to call first?

This is all going on more or less at the same time. My stress level is way up and my blood sugar way down. And while we are trying to get everyone settled the buskers cheerfully plonk themselves down in a prime location, one that potentially had room for a tent if that was needed.  When I called them on it the answer was: "But this is our spot!" They were there last week.

At which point I did not explain nicely and politely, as I would have done had this happened an hour earlier. Reader, I am afraid I barked. "You're buskers, you don't have a spot!".  Dismayed body language. And a friend of theirs asks: "Who makes these decisions anyway?" To which I replied: "I DO. BITE ME."

I did go over a bit later to apologize, but while I regret the tone, I stand by the action. Fortunately the veteran manager of the New Denver market allowed me to pick her brains this morning. I look forward to working with Colette to implement some of her strategies.

Later I looked up the astrology. Mars was almost exactly on my Ascendant.  So that's what it feels like to be an Aries!

Post script. Just to have a record for myself.

The writing above contains wording I had created for a potential Letter to the Editor of our local papers. I also wrote a note to the marketers. It all took a few hours. On Thursday I met with C. to measure the market location, and we went over it. 

The mentor from the other town happened to come by and gave her input. She was so right. I had put things in a negative way that could just as easily be portrayed as positive. So I went home and re-wrote, just for internal use. The result was the following. It looks so smooth and effortless, but hours of thoughtful editing and others' input went into it. Time that should have been spent outdoors....

Dear fellow marketeers,

We all want to see shoppers, visitors and vendors alike continuing to enjoy the same friendly market that we have built up over the years.

We are facing some changes and challenges. In the spirit of "It's a tough job, but someone has to do it" Colette and Ien have taken on management of the market on short notice and without training. We have been flying by the seat of our pants and making some mistakes. 

Like other markets ours started small and casual, and then blossomed into a community event that many people want to be part of. An influx of potential new vendors is now presenting some issues. 

Our location in the heart of town next to an ATM is perfect, but limited. This is not a bad thing. A market should reflect the size of the town. Not every weekend is Music Fest.

Some of it works itself out. But when everyone showed up at the same time we already had a problem. The bottom line is that we have more potential vendors than we have available space. We cannot possibly accommodate everybody all the time.

In order to keep the peace and maintain a smooth flow we must now work with reserved bookings. The easy-going days when one could just show up are gone. This is the price we pay for being a success!

To all new vendors:

We are truly sorry, but we have made some promises that we cannot keep. We should have told every new person this: “The market is as good as full. We will put your name on the waiting list and will let you know when and where we can fit you in.”

Any promises about permanent spots made the first three weeks are voided. We are starting over with a map that shows a clear picture week by week. You may have to put up with being moved around, or rotate with other new vendors.

Over the years we have built a precious place of cooperation and friendly energy that is drawing people every Saturday. Please work with us to maintain that energy as we face the daunting task of puzzling it all out, and let's make it a great summer.
 

Desk tops and knitting class

The year was 1952, the scene the third grade classroom in Holland.

Post-war Europe was more like a full employment version of the thirties than like Norman Rockwell North America.

As part of the regular curriculum girls were taught knitting, sewing by hand, darning socks, fixing holes in sweaters, and other skills indispensable to any housewife in the thirties. The boys got to do things with wood.

On the first day of knitting class we were given a ball of pale-green cotton yarn and shown how to cast on and "insteken, omslaan, doorhalen, af laten glijden" in other words make the four moves that constitute a knitting stitch.

I was utterly bewildered, especially by the part where one knitting needle dives underneath the other to pull the loop of yarn through.

After hours of strenuous effort I had produced a tangled mass of knots, black from my sweaty grimy little hands. We had a special teacher for needlework. The combined efforts of her and the classroom teacher could not unravel what I had wrought. They had never seen anything like it.

The state of my computer reminds me of that piece of work.

I often minimize something I am working on and come back to it later. I am always de-cluttering and re-cluttering.  As a Moon in Pisces with Venus in Virgo, I like order but tend to create chaos in my wake.  There is a blog brewing on ADD and the art of filing but that will have to wait.

What I want to know is: how in Pallas' name did I end up with a desktop folder inside the contact list that you get when you click contacts in the windows email program? C:\Users\Ien\Contacts\Desktop 2\Desktop

In retrospect a while ago my handy shortcuts had suddenly disappeared.I shrugged and made new ones. I will spare us the details but when I tried to get rid of the weird desktop things stopped working. 

It may be time for a refreshing reformat, but first I want to make sure my precious stuff is safely on a disk. There is no urgency, gardens first. But I do wonder how I did it.