The Love Letter & Other Random Bits
July 3, 2011 by
*Yes. My name usually has two l’s.*
I just thought I’d share RW’s latest love letter with you.
I just thought I’d share RW’s latest love letter with you.
That envelope is a hum dinger, eh?
RW’s magnificent, shy and kind rookie brother and fellow smokejumper drew this up for me. I’m enchanted by it. Cap needs some encouragement, my friends, can we all put our hands together for him and tell him to never quit drawing. Ever.
*clap clap clap*
Also, he is a track and field star, lives in Tucson and is relatively single (though he informed me his girl situation is complicated…whatever that means…I think it means he’s single or can do better…). So if you’re in Tucson and you want to date one of the best fellows on the planet, please contact me at thenoisyplume@gmail.com and I’ll arrange a blind date for you in autumn.
Why?
Well. Because.
I believe in love.
And this fellow deserves love.
______________________________________________
Righto.
Funny anecdote that will make you snicker (and swoon because a man handling a baby thing is always very touching):
A couple of weeks ago RW and a few other boys were out with their base manager doing something to a fire look-out tower on the top of a mountain. When they pried a board off a wall of the tower, they found a chipmunk nest. RW’s boss took a stick, poked the nest and eventually found a baby chipmunk in it. He reached out, stroked it gently with one finger and said:
It won’t bite.
He scooped it up, put it in his pocket and took it home to his little girls.
I officially have baby chipmunk envy.
I am also incessantly pestering RW about finding me a helpless baby critter in the woods to care for, it doesn’t even have to be a chipmunk, it could be an owlet or a star nosed mole or a young bison. Whatever. I just want something wild and fresh living with me here at The Gables.
*Apparently, Mister Belsby also has a pet flying squirrel he rescued as a baby from the forest…what have I got to do to rescue wild infantile critters??!!! You may or may not believe this, but I watch for them all the time when I’m out and about. I have since I was 12 when I used to scour the banks of the Saskatchewan River for owlets — just like Farley Mowat.*
*Apparently, Mister Belsby also has a pet flying squirrel he rescued as a baby from the forest…what have I got to do to rescue wild infantile critters??!!! You may or may not believe this, but I watch for them all the time when I’m out and about. I have since I was 12 when I used to scour the banks of the Saskatchewan River for owlets — just like Farley Mowat.*
____________________________________________
And in review:
I watched this and it was very good but disturbing (only because it was so real and set in normal, present day). I can’t help it, I think Carey Mulligan is so extraordinary. Every role she’s ever had has been utterly compelling. What ever “it” is, she has it. Watch it.
One of my dear, long distance friends sent it to me.
Not only is the story gritty, breathtakingly beautiful and heartbreakingly real, but it’s beautifully structured and composed.
I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m utterly haunted in every way.
And I love my dogs.
And I’m ever more afraid of rogue pit bulls (but think about it, the breed was bred to fight for centuries…you’re going to have those instincts surface from time to time…) (urp…that’s a sensational topic, isn’t it…).
Most of all, when the author described herself as a gregarious hermit, I understood her. Fully.
Just pick up a copy.
Ukulele and Eddie!!!
I like it because it makes me feel like a feisty, countrified pineapple salad.
Just give it a hear.
Ok?
Ok.
I have to run,
I told Penelope we’d play Scrabble.
She likes to use big words like onomatopoeia.
She likes to use big words like onomatopoeia.
x
Raised By Wolves
July 1, 2011 by
From the Naturally Occurring Objects Series:
solid, cast sterling silver & 22 karat gold
Wearing it is like holding hands with your wolf mother:
golden claws, matchstick legs, eyes like moons.
Jiggity Jig
June 29, 2011 by
I’m just back from taking a quick holiday in RW’s arms,
up in the Methow!
For those of you who are new, RW is not in prison, he does this for a living, three states away from here. Actually, the highlight of this trip was when I told a barista in Spokane that I had been visiting my husband, she gave me a terribly strange look and I told her this very thing:
He’s not a felon.
He’s a smokejumper.
I don’t think she believed me.
Anyway, we did all sorts of lovely things:
lake swimming
hiking
eating
driving
live music-ing at the brewery
cooking with the boys
smoochin’
gardening
cabin shopping
coffee sipping
climbing
sleeping in
parachute packing…
…or at least RW did a bit of rigging…
…I was a mustard-wearing distraction.
I do my best, ladies, I do my best.
We shine so bright.
I feel the beautifullest when I’m with him.
All in all it was a truly beautiful and fairly restful trip.
I rolled into The Gables last night at midnight after a full, 15 hour solo drive (well yes, I am a trucker). I meant to stay over in Missoula for the night but I arrived there at 6PM and the daylight was eternal and I didn’t feel like hanging out alone for hours until the sun set. I wanted to sleep in my own bed so I pushed on in my swift, silver chariot. Thanks to the besterellas who connected with me by telly and helped keep me awake in the final hours of that drive — I know I didn’t make a lot of sense but it made me happy that you were laughing so hard.
This morning, Plum woke me up at 6AM, and we just spent a full 8 hours gardening, pulling weeds, planting extra beet rows, cutting fresh flowers for the house, harvesting the chamomile blossoms, irrigating the yard with the spring creek and guess what?!!! I just heard from RW and he’s going to be here tonight! Apparently those smokejumpers get around and they’re running an errand down in New Mexico for the next few days. Life swirls in mysterious ways.
Scratch that. They’re headed direct to Provo via the Twin Falls cut-off.
Drat.
Sometimes it’s such a pain when the heart hopes…
Scratch that. They’re headed direct to Provo via the Twin Falls cut-off.
Drat.
Sometimes it’s such a pain when the heart hopes…
I hope you are all well.
I missed your souls.
xx
PS I have a confession to make: I really. REALLY. Really. Like the Methow Valley.