Colonial Williamsburg

I think it is safe to say that I'd have been happy to wander the brick and cobblestone sidewalks and streets of Colonial Williamsburg for many more days, camera in hand, searching out little pockets of light and old, storied things to photograph.

On our way up to the Eastern Shore of Maryland for a family wedding last week, we decided a weekend stop in Colonial Williamsburg was called for.  What with the bonnets and the horses and the gardens and the old well-worn things full of history and other people's stories, it is most certainly right up my alley.  Right up the alleys of all three of us, truly.  Last Saturday evening, we checked in to the most budget-friendly of the Colonial Williamsburg-owned hotels and walked into the historic district after everything had closed up for the day.  It was quieter than it'd have been earlier.  Cooler, certainly.  We peeked in at the cooper's shop and walked through the gardens of the governor's palace.  We fed handfuls of grass to the oxen and we peered into shop windows and made plans for the following day.  We had an amazing meal at the Amber Ox and then, nighttime hotel pool swimming.  Because hotel pool.

Sunday morning, after a breakfast enjoyed outside (we dragged the chairs from the room outside and set them up on the sidewalk- super classy) and creatively put together from things scrounged from the cooler and the hotel's offerings (with me of course going back and forth grabbing different jars and things from the car to use for food acquisition in the hotel lobby- so as to avoid as much plastic as possible- because I do little things like that all the time that maybe drive my people nuts), we set out on foot to explore all that the historic district had to offer.  And then we did the same thing the following morning, heading north around lunchtime on Monday.  We walked and walked and walked.  We quickly realized we each had our own favorites- Claire would have been happy to spin and weave and feed grass to the oxen the entire time, while papa was keen on talking saws and cuts with the carpenters and outdoor brick oven plans with the baker.  Me, I mostly wanted to take photos and look at all of the gardens and touch all of the horses.  It became evident in no time that we all three have a strong preference for learning about and seeing the homes and workshops of the tradespeople and not the gentry.  I really wasn't impressed by the silver cup that king so and so had touched, but I was mighty captivated by the rough linen towels blowing in the breeze and the strong ink-stained hands of the printer and the smell of garlic and camphor in the apothecary.  The oyster shell paths in the gardens, the creative trellising and companion planting.  Oh yes please.

We took a house tour of one of the grander homes- a home owned by Robert Carter, a cousin of Thomas Jefferson's and an important man back in the day of the Continental Congress.  Indeed, his home was grand.  The tour guide lost me though when he started going on about how slaves during that time had it pretty good.  That it showed one's wealth if their slaves were well-dressed, well-fed, and even, because apparently it was never illegal for slaves to read and write in Virginia, literate.  He said they (the enslaved) likely looked down from the grand windows of the grand home and saw the poorer white men in the square and felt sorry for them.  Well.  I did that thing where you kind of simultaneously snort and laugh out of your nose in disbelief- what is that called?  Anyway- whatever it is called- I did that.  And I said something like "Really? You really think so? I bet they weren't very happy with not being free...."  He carried on without missing a beat and I noticed when he brought up the slaves again later he did so with what I thought was a bit more tact.  I honestly think he was just trying to illustrate that they weren't 'treated badly' (obviously this is relative here) in this home- trying to illustrate the 'goodness' of this man while still acknowledging the obvious fact that slavery was a very bad and very horrendous thing.  I don't know though- I can't really abide by that "well, so and so, he treated his slaves really well.........slavery was a 'peculiar institution" sort of talk.  In my book, I think if one finds oneself in the business of buying and selling PEOPLE, then they (the buyers/sellers) can't really be categorized as 'good people'.  Ugh.  I'd have been all sorts of mixed up if I lived in Williamsburg in the 1700s.  Happy to walk the oyster shell paths and hang all that linen to dry and cook over a fire, yet dodging the corsets and stays and wigs and all the other finer things as best I could.  With my heart heavy as lead in my chest with the awareness of how many of my darker-skinned neighbors were being treated.  Come to think of it, in a lot of ways that sort of describes the me of today.

Moving on.

What we really wanted to see in the Robert Carter house was the kitchen and the outbuildings and by the time we finished with the house the outbuildings were closed and that was when were realized we really just wanted to see the trade shops and the rougher bits.  Not that I can't appreciate fancy imported wallpaper and elaborate interior decor, but... well...... the blacksmith is a bit more my speed.

So we spent the rest of our time peeking over garden gates and talking to the cooks and the blacksmiths and the gardeners.  Papa talked shop with the carpenters and Claire and I rolled up our pant legs and stomped barefoot through the mud pit at the brickyard, laughing and yelping our way through it.  She played Elizabeth Cotten's 'Freight Train' on the harpsichord at the furniture makers' shop and we watched the firing of the noon cannon and listened to the fife and drums corp marching and playing across the big village green.  It was a pretty splendid weekend, really.

Many times as we wandered the streets I thought how, if I could choose a superpower, it'd be the power to look back into time.  Time travel, I suppose- though I wouldn't necessarily want to be visible or involved during my journeys.  I feel this way often when we are in places with centuries of amassed stories spanning several generations.  Maybe this is why historical fiction is my favorite genre when it comes to books.

Home now, though.  Where I can don my apron and hang my clothes on the line and heat our home with wood and tend my garden and dry and preserve each season's offerings at whatever pace I want to, if I choose to.  And then come in and enjoy the running water and the (mostly) reliable electricity and the fact that should all that preserving and gardening fall to the side for whatever reason, well...... there are about 4 grocery stores within a few miles of me and I can drive my car to any of them in a few minutes.  Ah, progress.

goodnight, february

 We had a warm February down here in Western NC.  I know many have, in many places.  Frighteningly many places, really.  This is the second year in a row that we haven't been able to tap the neighborhood sugar maples (we haven't had a long enough period of cold and then freezing nights and thawing days before the trees set bud).  I don't like having to buy maple syrup after making our own for three years, but that's not the real reason it bothers and worries me, of course.

 So yes, a sunny and mostly very warm February.  I actually didn't set out to sound so gloomy about it, but sometimes I can't help it.  I mean, who doesn't love sunshine on their shoulders, right?  But still........ ugh.  There are so many things out there, hugely important things, that rely on seasons and the appropriate playing out of natural rhythms in order to move along just right, and often I just can't help but feel anxious about it.

 Anyway- a February wrap-up, that's what this is.  And so here goes:  Claire invited a new neighbor over for a tea party (our new neighbor is a woman in her 60s who lives two doors down with her two miniature dachshunds.  Claire has become fast friends with all three of them, and it is quite sweet and reminds me of my own childhood friendship with an older next-door neighbor.  I need to tell some stories about Lulu, sometime......), we continue watching the birds regularly for Cornell University's Project Feederwatch, there are plants in sunny windowsills, eggs a plenty once again, daffodils blooming everywhere.  Witch hazel blossoms, and the plum tree, too.  Grape hyacinths, violets......... I've even spied a few dandelions.  A wonderful visit with a dear sweet baby cousin of Claire's and my lovely sister-in-law.  Seeds are started, peas and spinach have been planted, the garlic we planted in the fall has a solid 6" of growth peeking up through the leaves.  I have spent the whole month eating mostly broth and vegetables and meat and a bit of fruit and coconut thrown in.  I miss crunchy.  Maybe soon.  I've aimed to do yoga every day and just about made it.  Not quite, but pretty close.  I've read a few good books and just started another.  I suppose it is noteworthy as well that I wasn't sick at all this month.  A little scratchy throat from time to time- thwarted each time it would seem by a couple days of regular dosing of good homemade tinctures and extra tea and rest, but nothing that really got me down and out.  Looking back, it seems February is often a month that I finally succumb to a bit of wintry illness after thinking I've just about gotten away with not.  Not this year, though.

 She got a new jumprope for Valentine's Day and has been happily hop-skip-jumping around with it.  There have been several barefoot days.  There was even a day, last Thursday, when it hit the high 70s and we pulled out the blue plastic dollar store kiddie pool and Claire splashed around in it at lunchtime.  In February.

 The plum tree is out in all her glory now.  Just in time for a 28 degree night last weekend.  Things are still looking okay though- the bees were all over it today, their legs heavy with the bright pollen.  The tree looked almost as if it were buzzing itself there were so many honeybees and mason bees and various other pollinators on it.  I think we're supposed to be back into the low to mid twenties in a few nights, so........  we'll see.  We didn't get plums last year because of a similar pattern, so I'm not getting too hopeful.  We'll just see.

And now, March.

oh, the feelings

my heart feels heavy, like something is pressing on my chest making it hard to breathe.  it's the photos of the children in syria going around the internet.  the 'Where do the Children of Syria Sleep?' series by the swedish photojournalist.  it breaks my heart (as I assume it does to many).  there's one in particular that gets me, a five year old girl with haunted eyes that have seen so much more than they should have.  were it not for the simple fact that our own ancestral providence happens to have lead us to a certain life on a certain continent (which is not at all to say that there aren't very real struggles going on every day, all the time, on our own turf, in our own country), affording us a certain level of comfort and security........ she could be Claire.  I could be the mother, building little pillow forts for my daughter every day, giving my all, beyond my all, to offer her an illusion of comfort and safety.  a feeble attempt to distract her from her nightmares, all the while pushing aside my own.



I have no idea what to say, what to write.  I want to bring those children, all of them, into our home and feed them soup and biscuits and hot cocoa, and give them clean fluffy pillows and sing them lullabies.  I want to invite the mothers for tea, and I want to remove their shoes (if they have any) and give them foot massages and then send them off to a nice warm bath.  instead, I cry for them and send money when I can.  I'm also very inspired by this organization that is collecting baby carriers for refugees, and thank Lisa for putting that on my radar.

are horrific things happening any more today than in the past?  or is it just that we are all now so aware and exposed to it so easily, so quickly.  I'm guessing it's the latter.  to be sure, it is a good and worthy endeavor to be worldly and informed, to know the challenges and the triumphs of others near and far.  no doubt it is wonderful and necessary, this humanity, this learning of one another so that we can better reach out in some way, in any way.                                           but I admit there are times I wonder what sweet bliss it might be to just be ignorant of it all.


paris, syrian refugees, sudanese refugees, the dam burst in brazil........  how to sit with the knowledge of all this terror and tragedy and balance out the joy and the cheer of this time of year?  I know that meeting terror and tragedy with joy and cheer is a good general practice.  I know it begins with me, with you.  peace, hope, resilience...... we must live and breathe these things that we want for the greater world in our own small ways in our own small lives, and hope that at least some of our humble efforts trickle out where they can be woven together with others and grow into something larger, something strong.

still, in the face of imminent holiday cheer, joyful advent countdowns, and all the goodness to come with it, right now, I am a bit sad.  I am, however, most definitely happy too, and much more so than I am sad.  I tend to feel things big, never having been very subtle with my emotions.  I tend to worry, to feel like I should be doing more, and I must remind myself that I'm doing what I can, and that the small things I do to bring joy and peace into my own little world are important, big things.

so here's to the joyful days ahead, and to reveling in them happily, freely.  and here's to the feelings, the big sad ones, that sneak in needing to be felt sometimes.  here's to letting them in and letting them ride, and then taking a deep breath and doing what we can to bring more peace/hope/resilience/what-have-you into our own small worlds, one tiny little consequential bit at a time.

random bits

:: reflections in the wood stove
:: going through old things, this set of boxes I've hauled around since college.  lots of photos and random bits, my first car keys, an unused dissection set from biology class.... and everything smells like incense and memories
:: sweet Oliver (Ollie), who meows in 3 or 4 syllables, almost always.  me-yow-ow-ow.
:: looking up at the sourwoods in the driveway (they've been my favorites this year, along with the brilliantly golden hickories)
:: our dining room, from the couch.  the glass server sadly empty of cider doughnuts.
:: stopped in town, waiting for the train
:: favorite photo prints, a new poster, seaweed from Maine, odds and ends, an old favorite poster