Category Archives: housework

Happy Things

housework, my garden,

Today I’ll just mention a few things that have made me glad this week.

1) I’ve been waiting and waiting for a certain echinacea plant to start blooming. It is later than the purple coneflowers nearby, and I was expecting it to be the orangey-brown variety that I bought last summer after I saw Kim’s on her blog. It opened up this week and it’s not – it’s white, which I don’t even remember planting. That one like Kim’s must not have made it through the winter. But I like white.

2) I found some dishes I liked at Target. I like the color and the design, and that they were on clearance, so I bought the salad plates. I don’t have a complete set of any dishes. For most of my life I’ve specialized in white dishes, and we often bought a dozen bowls or plates at a restaurant supply store. They have held up very well over the decades of children learning to wash dishes. White dinnerware makes the simplest meal, if it has a balance of colors, look very special. To have this many dishes that are more colorful in themselves is a new thing around here.

3) We had Mr. and Mrs. C. over last night to watch a movie. We also ate some apple pie that I made and served on my new plates, and I picked a few zinnias for the table. I really did enjoy Elia Kazan’s “On the Waterfront.” It came out in 1954. Marlon Brando is great as the young man in the story, and the screenplay, as one reviewer said, is “impeccable.” There was an important part of the story about how Jesus is right there with you when you are at work in a dehumanizing job, and how He will help you to do the right thing. Those were the days!

4) I have alwaP1100786tshirtsys taken great satisfaction from doing laundry, especially my husband’s clothes. I even like ironing his shirts, but since he retired he wears more shirts that don’t need ironing, like the T-shirts I washed today. Folding and stacking these soft cotton knits freshly fluffed in the dryer makes it easy for me to be the Jolly Washerwoman.

5) Over 20 years ago we planted a rosemary bush next to our front sidewalk. Once or twice a year I prune it. Today I gave it a severe trimming and noticed how gnarly and thick the branches have become. I realized that even though it has some holes in its canopy, I’m not ready to replace it yet. It’s become an old friend.

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6) I love succulents. I like sticking them into places that don’t get quite enough water to support most annuals. This afternoon I decided to do something about a bare spot that has showed up in the front yard, where the automatic misters for some reason don’t spray enough water. I dug up some of the red sedum from the back yard where it spreads like crazy, and put it in that spot with some granite rocks. Of course, I love granite rocks, too!

7) I love my robins. Yes, I was thrilled to discover that “he” is actually a pair of robins who have become frequent hoppers about the back garden. One day they sat on the fence facing each other having what seemed to be an intense discussion, or maybe they were just singing a jazzy duet. They were too shy to let me take their picture together, but I did get one of them on that fence. A couple of days later I found “him” again on the other side of the garden, still at a distance, but more clearly silhouetted against the sky. Someday I hope to snap his picture on the birdbath, but I’m really glad to have this much success.

8) As I was planning this post I thought about how the many material things in our life can be thought of as having little value compared to the intangible realities like love and truth and kindness. But as soon as we are thankful for them, when we see them as gifts from our Father and receive a little bit of Him in them, they become threads connecting us to God, bringing grace in. And that’s the power of thankfulness.

The morning air is all awash with angels.

housework, poetry, ,



Lots of us homemakers, in the Northern Hemisphere anyway, are writing about laundry, as the summer sunshine makes it easy to use the fresh warm air to do part of the job. Cathy even posted a poem, which reminded me of my own favorite laundry poem. Funny, it’s from a man’s point of view, and written by a man who probably didn’t have too much direct experience, but maybe that’s why he could see not just the mundane and practical aspects, but the poetry and love of washing and drying the clothes of our fellow humans.
.

 Love Calls Us to the Things of This World

    The eyes open to a cry of pulleys,
And spirited from sleep, the astounded soul
Hangs for a moment bodiless and simple
As false dawn.
                          Outside the open window
The morning air is all awash with angels.
    Some are in bed-sheets, some are in blouses,
Some are in smocks; but truly there they are.
Now they are rising together in calm swells
Of halcyon feeling, filling whatever they wear
With the deep joy of their impersonal breathing;
    Now they are flying in place, conveying
The terrible speed of their omnipresence, moving
And staying like white water; and now of a sudden
They swoon down into so rapt a quiet
That nobody seems to be there.
                                                       The soul shrinks
    From all that it is about to remember,
From the punctual rape of every blessèd  day,
And cries,
                  “Oh, let there be nothing on earth but laundry,
Nothing but rosy hands in the rising steam
And clear dances done in the sight of heaven.”
    Yet, as the sun acknowledges
With a warm look the world’s hunks and colors,
The soul descends once more in bitter love
To accept the waking body, saying now
In a changed voice as the man yawns and rises,
       “Bring them down from their ruddy gallows;
Let there be clean linen for the backs of thieves;
Let lovers go fresh and sweet to be undone,
And the heaviest nuns walk in pure floating
Of dark habits,
                          Keeping their difficult balance.”
–Richard Wilbur

The Complementarity of Heat

grandchildren, housework, summer

I noticed some ways that our heat wave complemented all our hospitality in the last few weeks:

1 – The extra warm temperatures that stayed up into the nighttime followed closely upon a late rain. This sort of tropical weather caused the basil (and everything, really) to grow lush early in the season, and that meant I could — I had to — make a huge batch of pesto.

Pippin was here to be my recipe consultant and we decided to try adding some lemon juice to my recipe. My friend told me that she does that as a bit of preservative, and the kind of pesto they sell at Costco has a lemony flavor which some people prefer.

2 – It was convenient to have extra people around to help us eat the large quantity of green beans we slathered with the fresh pesto. Yum!

3 – Ivy and I could enjoy a long session with the lavender in the evening and we didn’t have to go back inside for our sweaters.

 

4 – Water play all day long! In the past I’ve seen others of our grandkids engrossed in washing play dishes while their teeth were chattering, it was so chilly. Ivy and Scout could be comfortable and wet at the same time.

 

 

 

 

5 – The pool warmed up and was fun to play in for hours. People could swim until the sun went down and not have to watch the fog come in.

6 – But I think my most favoritest thing has to do with the fact that I love to hang laundry in the sun to dry, and sheets are the easiest things to do that with, because they are so big, it doesn’t take long to get them up on the line and down. This summer I’ve had lots of sheets to wash already, and I have four times had the supremely satisfying feeling of using the free sunshine and afterward folding up the warm and sweetest smelling bed linens. I should write letters to the dear people who slept here and thank them for this.

If we keep living here I might never experience this concurrence of heat and guests again, and this will go down in Glad history as The Summer of the Complementarity of Heat and Hospitality.

St. Joanna the Myrrhbearer

church, homemaking, housework, icons

Today’s my name day, the day we remember Joanna, one of the women who followed our Lord Jesus around during His earthly ministry and helped take care of everyday needs. I don’t know what kinds of work those women did on His behalf, but perhaps it might all come under the broad category of hospitality?

In the two week period of which we are approximately in the middle, I have eleven different house guests coming and going. There isn’t much that makes me happier than creating a comfy and welcoming space for people who are away from their usual routine. 

I like to put fresh flowers in the bathroom, and give the lodgers space for their suitcases and stuff. In weather like this I open the windows wide so that fresh air will greet them, and I give them choices of fat or thin pillows for their beds.

Jesus said that the Son of Man had no place even to lay His head; that was a particularly difficult hospitality challenge. It’s a joy to remember St. Joanna as I prepare one more room this afternoon for people I love.

Here is what is on the Orthodox Church in America website for this woman whom we remember today:

Saint Joanna the Myrrh-bearer, wife of Chusa, the household steward of King Herod, was one of the women following and attending the Lord Jesus Christ during the time of His preaching and public ministry. She is mentioned in Luke 8:3 and 24:10.

Together with the other Myrrh-bearing Women, St. Joanna went to the Sepulcher to anoint the Holy Body of the Lord with myrrh after His death on the Cross, and she heard from the angels the joyful proclamation of His All-Glorious Resurrection. According to Tradition, she recovered the head of St. John the Baptist after Herodias had disposed of it.

Saint Joanna, pray to God for us!