thelmasmith

I’ve been quiet lately. I’ve been overwhelmed by life. That is slowly changing.

One of the things I’ve been up to is reading. Articles from the New York Times are taking some of my time.

The one linked above is good reading. It is about the issues of climate change and the touting of green everything from cars to light bulbs.  This article discusses all sorts of legal, political, bureaucratic, and individual actions.  I find it disconcerting.

I’m one of those people who grew up on a farm.  Self sufficiency seems to be in my genes.  I can build a fire or build a house.  I can read and think and look at all sorts of ideas from an analytical and critical thinking perspective.  This article, while covering all the bases, neglects the idea that most people are of good intent while being frantically busy.

One quite simple solution to all of this is to spend an afternoon – only one afternoon – and plant a tree.  You have contributed to photosynthesis.  You spent a lovely day in the spring.  You do not have to pull weeds.  Granted, you have done nothing directly to feed yourself.  But is that true?  You have planted a tree that will return oxygen to you!

Regardless of the part of the world, the culture, the economy, or the bureaucrats there are plenty of places that can benefit from the gentle gift of oxygen and shade.  Public places, private places, it matters not.  It’s something to think about.  That said as someone who has lived in both the tropics and the desert.  The lack of shade is the true poverty in these areas.

I still have not printed my linoleum cut. I’ve another to cut and I want to add some lines to it before I do. The class moves on. I’m being dragged along without enough hours in the day or energy in my body.

I do come home from the end of class with my enthusiasm renewed. We have begun working on collagraph. I had ordered Collagraphs (Printmaking Handbook) by Hartill & Clarke. Their shipping policies are more kind than those of US companies.

Yesterday I got a look at Collagraph Printmaking by Mary Anne Wenniger. Looking at other people’s books always costs me money.

Anyway, here’s a look at the plates I’m working on.

Bamboo underlaid with tissue paper and gauze. The sidebar is heated tyvek, ironed to flatten. All these plates need more acrylic medium and a lot more sticking down. My husband brought in the shrink pack of generic super glue.

The cats jumped into the fishtail palm that is recovering from last winter’s hard freeze. I decided since this was already broken that it was fair game for a collagraph plate.

This one is dry bok choy. I had to reconstitute it partially to unfold it. I think it will make a good looking print. One of my classmates grew up in Hong Kong. The scent of the soaking bok choy drew her to my table. The remainder of the package, reminding her of home, went home with her to make soup.

From food for the soul to food that feeds both the soul and the body:

Fresh waterchestnuts!

If you have never had the opportunity to eat fresh waterchestnuts do keep watch in the oriental markets. They are a pain to peel. I simply sautéed them with a little peanut oil, garlic, ginger, and green onion. Food fit for the gods. You will never buy a tin can again.

The other week I took some glycerin and diluted it well with water. The porcelain, butcher’s tray, doesn’t show you the water. What you do see is the dry lotus leaf beginning to rehydrate.

What is imagined as a flat circular leaf floating on top of the water is, in fact, a shallow cone shape when dried. There is no way to open it fully.

The beautiful drops of water happen because of a natural film on the leaf.

It eventually, over a few days, softened enough to either make a print or to make joan, a chinese tamale, that one can still find in big city dim sum lunch rooms. I have eaten them. I do eat the lotus root.

I chose to make a print so that I could carve a linoleum block.

The one picture of all the lotus root was out of focus. You can see here, one uncut segment and some slices that were used to print.

I went looking for the lotus symbolism. I decided it was going to be a week long research job. Not today.  There is something about the lotus there for me.

I had to get the print work done as I was going to lose the lotus root; it survives a long time in my refrigerator but not forever.

Since I working on another project and trying to get it finished up, I laid the linoleum blocks away to be carved another day.

Marion Barnett has tagged me as a gardener who might have something to say about living and growing things in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. Hum. Once upon a time, long ago, and far away, I had both a gardener and a housekeeper. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

My back has had a snake like shape to it all my life; it does not appreciate stoop labor. I began to use flower pots thinking that would help. Even they are not high enough that I can keep them tidy comfortably. So, rather than seven things you don’t know about my gardening I’m just going to give you some images.

Claret Cup Cactus in bloom.

Santa Rita Prickly Pear in bloom.

The Texas Mountain Laurel takes a long time to grow large enough to flower. However the spring rains push it into bloom.

The end of the first, early spring flush of roses. Once we get to June and the 106º F weather the roses have to be deadheaded. Then with the first of the monsoon I cut them back less severely than in January and fertilize them. By September we will have roses again; they will continue blooming until late December.

One of the flower pots in bloom outside my workroom door last spring.

And last, but not least, a baby pomegranite that has not yet shed it’s flower. Now, in mid August, they are the size of softballs.

As to tagging anyone as a gardener; consider yourself tagged if you wish to play. The gardeners I know are June and Jer Underwood in Portland, Oregon, and Barbara Littlefield in Deming, New Mexico. I’m mentioning them; not tagging them.