Spinner

"In tough economic times people get creative. 

They fall back on old and proven methods." 

For this rancher spinning is a meditation. His spinning wheel is considered a beginners one, but the bigger spindel suits him just fine and he appreciates how the wheel fits just right in to his pick-up truck. His booth, part of the artist market right across from the farmers market on Saturdays, holds photos of his sheep.

Stereotyping be damned; men can spin 

and women no longer have to!

P.S: in Swiss-German "Schpinner" would also translate in to meaning "idiot", more specifically to someone crazy, or someone that creates a web of lies. The term was used frequently in it's derogatory meaning in my growing up years. So it tickles me to think of it in new ways, in appreciative ways, in ways where life is approached in a more old fashioned, slower, more contemplative manner. A life where status is not of utmost importance. But being down to earth and real, maybe even self sufficient, is where it's at. The times they are changing and so are the meanings of words as language  and humanity evolve and this makes me chuckle.

Necessity is the Mother of Invention

I stuck what used to be my Mom's red umbrella (parapluie) in what used to be my Mom's biggest vase - for shade. I am afraid that seedlings will not last unprotected from the intense sun of our high (7000 feet) desert climate, here in our City Different. I am rather pleased with my ingenuity.

In the foreground sits a Jalapeno Pepper plant that I just got on sale for 99 cents. The strawberry plant was given to me at the Farmers Market that bore already 3 fruits,  eaten by pests. There is a catnip plant for our Pretty Kitty to knibble and an arrangement of seedlings made up of lettuce and basil of various kinds. 

I am not familiar with growing edibles. All I know is to remember to water  my mostly decorative plants that I acquired over the decades. But times are a changing and I am experimenting.

Ingenuity

My Ingenuity!

I brought my Begonia that had been sheltered indoors from potentially freezing temperatures out only this past, last day of May. 2 weeks later then our normal frost free date, May 15th. The winds had been real strong, not just for the month of March but all through out May. 

As I wondered how to protect this Begonia from the literally burning, intense sun light of our arid, high altitude desert climate, I had a bright idea. I remembered my Mom's parapluie stored in my closet since her passing, now almost a decade ago. I am very pleased with the result and even more so with connecting the dots, and coming up with a new and workable solution. Something that had not crossed my mind in prior years when this Begonia suffered blistering burns.

My 'Goddess with an Attitude' of course does not mind in the least all the exposure to those to some so damaging sun rays. Rather she reminds me to swoon in the little pleasures that life offers, again and again.

So I wonder what other solutions we might be ignoring right now? What other resources might be lying there in reach, waiting for us, me and you, to remember?

The oil spill comes to mind and our dependence on fossil fuels. Where there is a will there is a way, my Mom used to say. Where is our collective will to get off the merry-go-round and get truly serious about green, renewable power. I suspect that collectively we are right now ignoring solutions that are lying in wait, eager to be employed and experimented with. Solar - and wind energy are so under utilized, it makes no sense at all. 


President Obama was elected on a notion of change and a collective excitement on all that might be possible with a right set of mind frame. We are in dire need of change. Enough of this war mongering already! Let's get to work and use what Americans are so good at, the freedom to go ahead and change what needs changing and create  what needs creating, and be once again at the scientific, technological, philosophical, modern forefront!