There is a traveling museum exhibition I just got wind of—
Lists: To-dos, Illustrated Inventories, Collected Thoughts, and Other Artists’ Enumerations from the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art see a slide show of a few examples & {clickity-click right here to read all about it}
Wow – I want to see this! Because~
I love lists.
Seeing some one else’s lists inspires me in my list-making.
Lists feel organized to me, so even when the topic is heavy and huge, numbering the points down a page make it all manageable.
I love that lists are important to other people, too, and important enough to create a museum exhibition for them.
I hope someday my lists will be in an exhibition. :)
Johnny Cash’s to-do list sold at auction on Dec. 5, 2010 for $6,250
Karen Carpenter would be 63 if she were alive today. Oh wow-she was THE voice. When I first started diving into the pop music scene, I was ten, and I’d sneak my dad’s little leather-encased transitior radio outside and turn the buttons just so until I found the station and there it was: Close to You, and Bless the Beasts and the Children, both charting at that time. I’d hold it my ear as I sat in the tire swing as evening fell and her smooth voice just enchanted me, took me to a magical, romantic place.
I found this image of a transistor that was already sold on ebay. I think my dad won his in a contest at work and I am almost positive it was this exact model!
The Carpenters had such a mellow, beautiful, soft sound, it is almost a miracle, during the changing times then, with Woodstock, drugs and the 70s, that they’d be so successful. But Karen’s voice was like butter, so smooth, so low….I LOVED that because I was an alto. She became my hero, so easy to sing with.
Honestly, it would be harder for me to list 5 of their songs that I don’t care for, because I can’t think of any. But I decided that if I was going to make a list of 10, I’d just have to let the songs that come to mind first be the ones I list. Because on a different day – the list could be considerably changed and still be true, still be my top ten favorites.
For I love the first song I ever heard them sing (“Close to You”) the best, because it was the first. But I also find their cover of the Beatle’s “Ticket to Ride” just hauntingly beautiful. How did they have the nerve to do a Beatles song so soon and how was it able to be fully theirs and so amazing? And “It’s Gonna Take Some Time This Time,” was so picturesque, so beautiful in words, bending trees and wisdom on living through hard stuff and how you can learn something from everything, even the heartbreaks.
“Touch Me While We’re Dancing,” and “I Know I Need to be in Love” are also wonderful-wonderful-wonderful!
Oh-oh-oh-oh – as you know, one of my all-time ever fav songs is “Merry Christmas, Darling,” but I am not adding it here. Because it is a Christmas song. And a song about home and it has made other lists. But you know I LOVE it!
There were even post-humous releases, after Karen’s shocking death in 1983. “Make Believe it’s Your First Time,” and “Now,” among others. Richard has released more material as recently as 2001, including the much-recorded, “The Rainbow Connection,” and, as if no one else had ever recorded it, it is pure Karen. Just beautiful.
SO MUCH good music. I have taught my kids to appreciate the Carpenters. Sometimes we still play the vinyl albums.
Here is my list. Ten of my favorite Carpenter’s songs {not necessarily in order}, out of so many more favorites:
Hey-I finally got on Spotify and it is awesome! {The first track doesn’t work, but it is listed again later. Ignore it and listen to these amazing songs!} IF YOU ONLY LISTEN TO ONE, listen to “Good-Bye to Love.” Her voice is just UH-mazzzzzzzzing!
Close to You // “Why do birds suddenly appear everytime you are near? Just like me they long to be close to you.” This is a happy song of the general sense of well-being we get when we are loved and in love. Bright. Joyful. So sweet. The song just skips down the sunlit street of happiness. Hear the birds chirping, figuratively, anyway?
Good-Bye to Love // I was 11 and just loved (and sang along with great fervor) the dip-scoop of the melody, “I’ll say good-bye to love…no one ever cared if I should live or die...” Haha. It also appealed to the deep drama in the heart of a prepubescent girl – already longing for the love of her life to appear.
Superstar // The funnest lyrics to sing ever: “Baby-baby-baby-baby-oh-baby…” :) Actually, this song is so haunting and full of longing, “Long ago and oh so far away, I fell in love with you before the second show. Your guitar, it sounds so sweet and clear, but you’re not really here, it’s just the radio...” See? Doesn’t this work in a way it almost couldn’t now? Because it would be “You’re not really here, it’s just Pandora or Spotify or live steaming or an online station or YouTube or iTunes or…? “Come back to me again and play your sad guitar…” *sigh*
Hurting Each Other // “Closer than the leaves on a weeping willow, baby, we are…” I mean – songs that have lyrics that can create a picture like this in your mind just stand the test of time!
Rainy Days and Mondays //“…always get me down.” Melancholy at its’ absolute finest. And if it’s Monday AND it’s raining, then I probably will be found, “Talking to myself and feelin’ old,” but don’t worry – “…we know what it’s all about…”
Yesterday Once More // Sweet. “When I was young I’d listen to the radio waitin’ for my favorite songs. When they played I’d sing along, it made me smile…” For me, this is a true story. Music is everywhere now, you don’t have to wait for your favorite songs on commercial radio. But as this song goes, when I hear an old song from past times, “Those old melodies still sound so good to me as they melt the years away. Every sha-la-la-la, Every wo-o-wo-o, still shines…” Memories in music are the deepest and sweetest.
I Won’t Last a Day Without You // Dave sang this to me at our wedding. Before that, it was just another in a long line of beautiful Carpenter’s songs, in the hit-after-hit line-up they had going. But Steve Hellwig played, and Dave sang, holding my hands and looking straight into my eyes. That was 32 years ago (in 8 days). “It’s nice to know that you’ll be there if I need you, and you’ll always smile, it’s all worthwhile...” I hope he still thinks that. :)
Bless the Beasts and the Children // This is a universal song about just being nice, about covering and caring for little children and helpless animals. Just be nice. Live here and protect the world God created. “Give them love, let it shine all around them…”
For All We Know // I wonder if there was a wedding between 1971 and 1985 that didn’t have this played or sung? Quintessential wedding song!
We’ve Only Just Begun // Rolling Stone Magazine included this as one of their top 500 songs of all time. Ok-if there was a wedding between 1971 and 1985 that didn’t include #9, I bet they used this song! “We’ve only just begun to live, white lace and promises. A kiss for luck and we’re on our way. We’ve only begun…”
Karen was the {most amazing} voice, Richard, the genius behind the production and arrangements, the lyrics and the clear-cut direction they had musically. Smooth, clear, timeless songs, a sound that flows like a clear mountain stream through the 70s soundtrack of my heart and soul, their deeply felt and beautifully communicated music will always be important and very high on the songlist of my life. From a transistor radio to 45s and LPs, to 8-tracks to boom boxes and stereos, to digital, I love the Carpenters! Always have, always will.
I was scrolling through my past Tweets the other day and I liked this one. It was a silly thought, but still, I liked my own Tweet. There. I admitted it. :)
Meaning: things in our lives that have brought us so much satisfaction and joy and fulfillment as people often get pushed aside for something we think (or have been told) is more important. I mean, really: in Kindergarten, was there a better day than the one in which it was your turn to use the easel and the paints? Of course there wasn’t.
I bought some big packages of that grainy, yellowish-gold manilla paper. I have wonderful paints for the grandbebes. But I got out of Kindergarten and let it go. Why?
Other things I wish I’d done more with ~
being more artistsic in whatever fashion I took a fancy to: painting or learning to draw well or lettering or papier mache (please say it the way the French do) or graphics or collage…I really did always love collage.
reading more, for the love of reading
studying more – there is just so much to learn about so many things, but I only reward myself with delving in to a topic when “everything else” is done
but mostly singing…I wish I hadn’t let singing go. I used to sing.
My first observations after the trip to see the parentals…
Dave had added lots of deli meats (ham!) and cheeses and condiments (spreads and dips) to his food collection.
Most of the fresh produce I left was still in the fridge…but no longer fresh.
This rather self-congratulatory piece of mail arrived in the mailbox.
Meanwhile – all Brighton residents were on a water ban for 3 or 4 days! There was e-coli in some of the testings and all chaos broke loose. All the grocery stores were out of water. Restaurants had to close. Everyone had to boil their water for anything consumable (including doing dishes!)…it was crazy. But I missed all the excitement, hallelujah!
Dave took his garden-watering instructions quite seriously and my garden…well, it’s a jungle out there, e-coli be darned!
The basil has already delighted in some fresh bruschetta and slow-simmered marinara.
The hollyhocks have taken over the universe. But since they are in full bloom, I cannot bring myself to declare war on them.
The lettuce could feed an army. The cilantro, did indeed, bolt. I told Dave it could not be trusted. But alas. I am home to whip him back into compliance (the cilantro plant, not Dave)!
The purple petunias – well, they were all crowded and fully-bloomed waiting to welcome me home and are quite lovely, thank-you very much.
Dave put in the first 1/3 of a long meandering sidewalk which shall stretch from the back patio around to the back garage door then around the garage to the front yard to meet the south area of the drive.
Plus, the K’s have been in St. Louis all week and we are babysitting Tuppy-the-Puppy. Everywhere I go I am in a sea of doggie feet (because if Tuppy is going to go with me, Sandy is too!). Picture Pigpen, the kid who moved in a cloud of dirt and dust in the Peanuts comic strip. That is me with these two doglettes!
I am home. I miss my mom and dad and the sibs. But this is my place in the universe.My mom, my little sister, Tami, my dad and the baby of the family, Danny.
My mom and I laugh so much. She loves to be silly and torment me and it just cracks me up because she is really the kindest, most loving person in the whole world!
Danny was practicing taking pics with the iPhone and there I was, flanked by beauty and beauty.
Finally: success! We are all there. Danny-the-history-teacher, my strong and commanding dad, my selfless and generous sister, me and my sweet mamala!
I don’t want to open a new jar of salsa when there is an inch of it left in the old jar. Just use it, and wait until it is gone before you open a new one.
I don’t want to throw away 2 unused hot dog buns or dump the small amounts from 3 water bottles into the sink before tossing them in to recycle.
I don’t want 6 bottles of shampoo or 3 cans of hairspray hanging around. I want just what I need and to use it until it is gone. And pul-eeze do not toss a roll of toilet paper with perfectly usable squares still on it.
You had no idea I was so compulsive in this area, did you? :)
Maybe it all goes back to my childhood when my mom saved every Wonder Bread bag and reused them to cover food or wrap a dirty diaper for disposal or for our feet inside our boots for snowsledding (keeps your tootsies warm and dry). Or maybe my commitment to not wasting anything was inspired by the cookbook I got at my co-worker bridal shower in 1981 which included a picture of a needlepoint quote: “Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.” I’ve since learned that quote came from the WWII era when the value of saving-not-wasting was at its’ height.
I hate waste – whether it is food or time. I believe in finishing what you start, eating what you take (yes, even at a Chinese lunch-buffet – don’t be a waster!). Leftovers were meant to have a next-day life – not sit in Tupperware until the mold takes over.
And when you buy things: clothes, furniture, cars, computers, phones – you take care of them and use them well and don’t just move on when something looks shinier. That is consumerism at its grossest. #imho
I love to see people recycle and re-use and re-purpose materials and objects in unique new ways. I even have a whole Pinterest board devoted to my love of this type of thing {here}. Waste in an anti-value for me.
I am at a crossroads. It is time to go a new direction, try something different. And, though I have no idea what the heck that will be or how it will look, I am adamant: I don’t want my life to be wasted. I don’t have endless years to throw down the tubes or time that can be carelessly spent. I want every moment to count. I don’t want my days, or hours or even minutes, in whatever place I choose to spend them or give them away, to be squandered or valueless or meaningless when there is legacy to leave, heritage to share. I want my ideas and creativity to flow freely towards a worthy cause, something trascendent – that will live long after I am gone. I don’t want to waste my life and my time. There is just too much good around me (my lover, my parents and extended family, my children, my deep friendships, my garden and walking and talking with God there) to become a part of something, anything, where what is in {my hand/my heart/my soul} brings no value, adds nothing. That would be a waste.
How about THAT paragraph for a cover letter on a resume? Haha!:)
Houzz.com is such a visual paradise that a good cup of coffee early on a Sunday morning and some Houzz time can just take me away. But I really love it when the images are accompanied by really good writing, which to me means, fresh/new ideas, or ideas and thoughts that are tried and true but are being presented in a cool, updated way or that make me feel like yeah-I knew it! I especially love writers who tug at the heart-strings {*sniffle}, but make you laugh at the same time. I have a short list of fav writers there, but Alison Hodgson is my FAV ever!!!
Yes, it turns out a Home-Design-Decorating-and-Remodeling site can also be a place for great articles and wonderful writers. Really. Go there: www.houzz.com. Search for anything written by Alison Hodgeson and you will know I have read it and loved it. She writes a lot about our homes and how they reflect what really matters in them. Her stuff comes from actual experience in losing “everything,” but finding out why what really mattered wasn’t actually lost. I refuse to spoil this for you. Go. Read!
This article today: TRUE! Wise. Inspiring. Took me back to when my kids were young and you’d find them making up whole scenarios with the simplest “props.” Heck, it took me back to when I was a kid: forming our very own Drake Relays and homemade winner’s ribbons, or the backyard circus with dogs who refused to jump through our “flaming spheres,” aka hula hoops…ah, good times.
LOVED this article. AGREE with what she is saying. HOPE you will enjoy it and know that an unplanned day might just become one of the most memorable in your kiddos’ lives. Maybe. The day is so full of possible!
My mom is the queen of jotting notes on scrap paper.
She was searching for something she had written about a dream she’d had, among a million things she has written and saved, for hers is a poetic heart, easily inspired by everyone and everything around her. She opened the drawer of her desk and began to search for that certain thing she wanted me to see.
As she rifled through saved momentos, cards, letters, photographs and her most treasured keepsakes, she was lamenting how vexed my dad is for her to keep it all, but she was telling me how each thing she has touches her heart and means so much to her.
“I probably keep too many things,” she mused as I smiled at the stacks of copies of articles or funny emails, pieces of paper scribbled with her handwritings, no value on the open market, but oh-so important to her. As I waited, she explained,
“But I just want a copy of life!”
I love her. I love reading all her little writings, too. Her blog is on paper in a very special drawer.
Where did June go? I loved June. I needed two full months of June, at least. June is the most romantic and lovely of them all, isn’t it? The days are long and the nights are sweet. *sigh…Yes, June, I shall miss you.
Snapshots I got and some of my favorite June quotes, below:
Averi J. She is my 5-year old beauty!
Did some retro-coloring. Snapped this on their porch one evening in between Taylor Swift YouTube videos on the iPad. They love them some Taylor Swift!
Cake Batter Rice Krispie Treats
Gemma May & Guini-Poo. And the Peonies.
Gavin & Gemma were checking out a kite in the sky.Uncle Rocky with Malakai.In Aunt Tara and Uncle Dave’ back yard. The older kids are getting tougher to get photos of. Always on the move. Trampoline or pool or chasing games.
This quote is funny. If I am not crying. Haha.
Here the my good-looking guy. Always hard-working. Always sweet. The world’s best dad to our kiddos and my 32-year lover!
Uncle Ryan and the nephews at the lake for Tredessa’s 30th celebration. They were all styling the backwards hats.
Kai and Poppa.
Amelie overseeing the sunset from Tara’s backyard.
And Gemma did indeed slide down the dirt pile in her pretty yellow sundress. Oh my.
Love a romantic June night. ALL June nights are romantic. You may quote me on that! :)
Title quote:“On a strawberry sundae of a day, all daisies and June sun and pastoral posing by world leaders on the Lancaster House lawn.” -John Vinocur
Sandy-the-Dog will need special understanding and will probably go into deep depression in my absence. Be sweet to her. She likes watermelon as a special treat. :)
The snow-in-the-mountain is in serious need of a haircut. I bet the electric trimmer would work, though I usually snip carefully by hand, for they are delicate and sensitive souls. If the mood strikes you…
Water the pots out back each day. If you see an obvious weed, please do not let it grow to gargantuan proportions – remove it. But don’t hurt my plants. It’s a dance.
Water the pots out front every-other-day or so. Since I sorta forget them sometimes 5 days in a row, they’ll probably really take to you. Dead-head the geraniums and, oh, pull the weeds between the mountain rocks for me, will ya? Also, on the front, south side? Make sure the blasted hollyhocks are not creating babies everywhere. In fact – no matter where in the yard, do not let the hollyhocks bully you around – I do not want to have to deal with a zillion new ones when I return. I must insist on containment. This is suburbia!
Obliterate any and all grasshoppers and wasps, but not where bees might be hanging out in search of pollen. We don’t want Mansanto happening in our yard!!! {Booooooooo to corporations that are killing the bees, boooooooooo}
Water the garden squares once daily and watch those baby weeds that try to hide under the real plants. But don’t mistake the beets or okra or something else wonderful for weeds.
There is a zucchini that is lounging at the base of the sunflower patch. He likes it there. Please remember to water him daily. Even though the sunflowers are probably ok with just the water from the sprinkler every few days now.
Watch the cilantro and the basil. Lop off any and all flower heads very decidedly. I don’t want either going to seed (the cilantro can hardly be trusted at this point – so watch him very closely). Use the leaves for your food. Delish!
Have lovely lettuce for a salad each day. Pick the leaves in the morning while they are moist and plump from the cooler night air; rinse and refrigerate to crisp up for later: red ruby or green gem, oak-leaf, even spinach and arugula. Throw in some of the little peppers. Eat what I have grown. It is beautiful and good for you, too!
Honestly, I don’t expect you to aggressively cut back the Russian Sage even though they desperately need to be disciplined, as they are a bold lot and can be quite intimidating. But I actually heard the assembly of them this morning plotting against me -in front of two grasshoppers, nonetheless. Please do note if you catch “prolificating” happening. They have absolutely no morals. Sage prolification is quite rampant. Tsk.
If tomatoes or tomatillos start really sprouting longs arms, tie them gently to their stakes with the green garden ribbon. And talk to them. They like the daily chats. It is important they know they are my favorites in the garden and that we give our main attention to them. I am sure they will wonder where I am. Let them know I will be happy for a fresh-ripe-red-tangy-and-sweet-garden tomato sandwich upon my return.
The fridge is filled with fruits and fresh vegetables. I hope you enjoy them and they don’t go to waste, honey-bunch. xxoo. LOVE-me!
PS – One more thing:level. I would hate to have to make you re-do the whole thing if it isn’t level when I return. And please-please-please stay in our plan?!! You know what I am talking about! ;)
My dog adores me. She thinks I am positively amazing. I hope I can live up to her expectations.
My dog also adores watermelon – rind and all. If I’d let her, she would eat the whole thing! She may love watermelon more than me.
Hawaii and Alaska were the final 2 states to join the union. That was in 1959. They are as old as me. What prompted this trivia? Stormie having us dig a flag out of the rafters for her (old flag=super cool home decor). She took the one with 50 stars. I kept the one with 48. Now – where shall I hang it???
Is it wrong that I am OK with the wasps pollinating the flowers on my veggie plants, but I know I plan to kill them as soon as everything is fruiting?
Averi-kins
I remember being 22 like it was yesterday. It was the year I finally learned to like cantaloupe. I just cut one in the kitchen and the scent is taking me back – so sweet, so tender (both the cantaloupe and me). Hahahaha. Oh, wow – time does fly.
I just got my hair cut. But this is last week, the before. I made Dave take a picture. Because I don’t know (at this advanced stage of life) if it will ever be this long again. :)
I did NOT get enough Poblano pepper plants. I kept thinking I would run across more on sale. I only have 2. This will not satiate my Chile Relleno needs.
A couple of grand-girls are coming to spend the night. I’m the lucky one.
