Chairs Invite Conversation

FROM WHERE I SIT     CHAIRS INVITE CONVERSATION   JULY 7, 2014   P.D.SPILSETH

Chairs register with me.  My weekly column is titled “From Where I Sit”.  My first logo accompaning the column had a woman sitting in an Adirondack chair on the beach...that was supposed to be me, reading and writing.  Often I’ve written about the two comfy, red leather chairs sitting by our fireplace, where my family usually reads and talks together by the fire.  My writing friends have their own special chairs picked out to sit and discuss when we meet monthly.  

I expect soft comfort to encase my bottom when I sit in a chair.  And I need a back to rest against.  It’s an added bonus to have a footstool, a hassock, for my legs to be elevated.  Adirondack chairs fill my need for the perfect summer seating on the deck, around the firepit, on the lawn or down by the beach.  They’re perfect to sit and dream, talk with a friend, mediatate.  They help create a relaxing mood for folks and invite conversation.

Poet Laurete Billy Collins writes poetry about chairs.  Like me, he must have an affection for simple, comfortable chairs.  This week I’ve been reading Collins’ collection of contemporary poetry entitles AIMLESS LOVE.  In simple words and plain speech,  Collins leads readers from one line rolling into the next, giving his readers imaginative suprises and pleasure.   His poems are playful and delightful, sometimes serious.  He writes in free verse...there’s not a rhyming couplet in this collection of easy to read poetry.  His style reminds me of another poet laurete, Ted Kooser, from the Great Plains who writes poems about valentines, winter morning walks and life in rural and small town America.  His simple style using plain words is a delight to read. 

Collins poem of chairs sitting on a porch is a favorite of mine.  It reminds me of today’s lack of communication between people, used to texting in abbreviative phrases rather than conversing face to face.  The poem has me remembering the two white Adirondack chairs on our deck with a table between to hold coffee, books and treats.

“The Chairs That No One Sits In

You see them on porches and on lawns 

down by the lakeside,

usually arranged in pairs implying a couple.

who might sit there and look out

at the water or the big shade trees.

The trouble is you never see anyone

sitting in these forlorn chairs

though at one time it must have seemed 

a good place to stop and do nothing for a while.

Sometimes there is a litle table

between the chairs where no one

is resting a glass or placing a book facedown.

It may not be any of my business,

but let us suppose one day

that everyone who placed those vacant chairs

on a veranda or a dock sat down in them

if only for the sake of remembering

what it was they thought deserved

to be viewed from the two chairs,

side by side with a table in between.

The clouds are high and massive on that day.

The woman looks up from her book.

The man takes a sip of his drink.

Then there is only the sound of their looking.

the lapping of lake water, and a call of one bird

then another, cries of joy or warning--

it passes the time to wonder which.”

Adirondack chairs sit in pairs on our deck overlooking the lake.  Most evenings in the spring, summer, and fall I like to relax in these chairs and talk over the day with my husband or another friend.  Sometimes in the snowy winter, I leave these chairs on our screened porch so I can sit in them, bundled up in down coat and hat, with coffee and my journal.  I enjoy the falling snow, cross country skiers on the lake and the ever changing ice patterns frozen on the water.  

The chairs have a way about them: they seem to elicit conversation, shared secrets and dreams.  The chairs invite conversation.  They invite friends to communicate and enjoy life together.  687 words

Waterworld is a Beach Bummer!

FROM WHERE I SIT   Waterworld is a Beach Bummer  June 21, 2014    P.D. Spilseth

When you think of summer, you envision sunny skies, swimming and water skiing, backyard barbeques, parades and fireworks.  I’m still hoping, but June’s  consistently rainy days, lightening and thunder have brought a conundrum of spoiled beach days, soggy barbecues, cancelled golf and tennis dates, flooded basements and ruined crops.  Day after day, dark, threatening skies pour rain on our spoiled summer.  2014 has been a beach bummer that has rocked the boat for too many folks looking forward to relaxing in the sun by the water on their one annual vacation.  In MInnesota we count on those three months of summer sunshine!

The Summer Solistice arrived with sunny but wet conditions around the lakes of Minnesota.  July means that summer is half over!   Already celebrations on the water have had to be cancelled because of flooding conditions.  Taste of Minnesota has scrambled to find a new location, basements are flooded, and fewer boats are floating on Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes.  At my house, we have an extra lake on the lower lawn, no beach, and our docks are submerged in high water.  Everything is soaked!

Rain, rain, go away...come again another day.  We’ve had over eleven or twelve inches of rain in June.  The forecast is gloomy, depressing for farmers, resorters, golf courses, anyone living near water and those who planned a summer vacation on the water.  We can’t waterski, jet ski, even swim in some lakes.   The water table is at record highs.  Sewage has been pumped into several lakes to avoid flooding home basements of homes with sewage.  People I meet on my neighborhood walks with Buddy my Beagle are wearing frowns, lamenting the lack of summer, dreary dark rainy days and ruined gardens.  Summer swimsuits, rafts and camping gear are already at a 50% clearance sale.  School supplies are already in the stores!  

This is NOT the summer Minnesotans are entitled to have!  After our eternally long, freezing winter, we expected a glorious summer of sunshine and beach time.   The guys got our dock in early, the boats on lifts and covered, the screened porch and deck cleaned, lawn chairs out... we were ready to barbeque in May.  Then the rains came.   

I’ve seriously consided building an ark.    However, unlike Noah, I will NOT bring along 2 mosquitoes.  We already have too many biting critters on the standing water appearing on lawns and in new locations everywhere.  

However, I have to admit, today is a serene day on the dock.  The sun is out!  The sky is clear with fluffy clouds in the endless blue above me.  No rain is forecast, though the weekend will be brutal with heavy storms.  There’s a No Wake zone enforced on our lake so boats can only speed up to 5 mph.  Huge megacruisers drift along, crawling at speeds no faster than kayaks and canoes.  Sailboats are the fastest vehicle on the water today.  

Quiet and peaceful...  today feels perfectly serene as I relax with my coffee and newspaper on the deck early this morning.  As I read letters to the editor, several are recommending that June be a yearly NO WAKE zone holiday time every year.  The only noises in my neighborhood are barking dogs and construction workers building new homes nearby, their vehicles swamped in mud and puddles.

Golf courses have been forced to close in order that their greens will, hopefully, be preserved for sunnier days.  Resort owers and restaurants on the water must be hurt with loss of business this year.  Farmers are in dire straits.  Many can’t plant crops because the fields are drenched with rain: tractors would get stuck in the muddy furrows.  Prices will surely rise.  How are we supposed to eat healthy veggies and fruit if growers can’t produce crops?  

Walking the dog through the neighborhood, I see rolled up, stinky wet carpets waiting for the trash trucks to pick up and carry to some landfill.  In some instances, dry wall has been soaked and removed from basements.  Landscape companies are busier than ever.  Gardens and hanging baskets are soaked with rain.  No tomatoes will be growing in my neighborhood this summer unless they’re in individual pots sunning on a deck high above the lake.  Weeds are flowering wildly in my untended gardens, but I do see blooming yellow and orange lilies, white and yellow daisies, unidentified purple flowers and a takeover weed that looks just like white lace.  Even the weeds are blooming in purples, whites and yellow flowers with an invasive, trailing vine.

Since there is a No Wake zone in force, boaters are cruising our lake at 5 mph to avoid lakeshore erosion.  This year it will take hours to get anywhere, but slow cruises can be relaxing.  Maybe people will begin meditating on the water this summer rather than partying with loud, rollicking music blasting from giant speakers.  More and more fishermen are appearing in our Bay every day, hoping to catch the BIG ONE under our dock, which is filling up with lake weeds.  Finally fishermen don’t have to worry about getting their lines tangled with water skiiers or jet skis.  Recent news tell us that it may be late July or August before the lake is low enough to speed through the waves.  Until that time, Waterworld residents are enjoying peace and quiet.

Surely 2014 will be the summer we won’t forget.  May and June have had an overabundance of rain causing flooding, limiting summer celebrations.  I’m hoping July, August and September will bring Minnesotans the summer we’ve been dreaming about all winter long.   How will we entertain summer guests when they arrive expecting to have fun on the lake?  Come on, Mother Nature, get with the program!  We want; we need one of those fabulous Minnesota summers on the lake for at least a month!  981

Queens of Summer

FROM WHERE I SIT    “Queens of Summer”    July 21, 2006  pat spilseth

Tell me, girls, doesn’t every woman want to be a queen!  It’s part of a female’s natural psyche.  We want to be queen of something, somewhere, at some time in her life.  We covet those sparkly, though rather tacky, rhinestone tiaras!  All most of us need is one measly day of queenliness.  

I confess.  Yes, I wanted a tiara.   Along with dozens of others, I was one of the smiling queen candidates at my hometown’s water festival.  Waterama queen candidates were posed on hayrack floats decorated in blue crepe paper and shimmering silver flags, fluttering in the fashion of waves.   I remember that blistering July Sunday of forty-some years ago.  Steaming, hot sunshine beat down on the crepe paper float where I sat, red-faced and dripping.  I was embarrassed to be so exposed in that form-fitting swimsuit.  Of course, it was a modest, one piece; I didn’t have the guts to be a “hot number” who flaunted my emerging figure in a revealing two piece swimsuit.  

I settled for the more demure full suit; I knew no mortifying accidents of losing my top would occur when I dove off the tower, performing my favored swan dive.  I’d seen what happened to a pal in a two-piece when she dove off the high dive.  Not a pretty thought.

Friends still tease me today about the fuchsia, Rose Marie Reid, bathing suit that encased my sweaty body like a sausage.  Queen candidates, Linda, Diane and I, were posed on a hay wagon in swim attire and three inch, wobbly, white heel.  “Switch” was the cue to change waving hands, in the standard figure-eight wave pattern, and shift to the opposite hip, in unison.  Being band members, we were used to formation drills; we responded automatically.    

Seductively positioned, one knee up, the other leg resting flat on the hard float floor, I tried to look cool.  Thank goodness, a few of my friends were with me on that float, all with big bouffant hairdos of the day.  Aqua Net hairspray shellacked our curls in place that a tornado couldn’t budge.   “Kiss me Quick” red lipstick enlarged our lip-licking, moistened lips.  “Chantilly” perfume, “Wind Song” or “Opium” sprayed heavily on our sweaty bodies, camophlauged our girly glow of perspiration. Running through my head was Jerry Lee Lewis’ popular tune “Chantilly Lace and a Pretty Face.”  Don’t you fondly recall those raging teenage hormones that we didn’t know quite what to do with in the Sixties!

And do you remember the talent show?   Candidates had to perform some skill: twirling a flaming baton into the air, then miraculously catching it; singing some popular song or warble a classical operatic aria; tap dancing like Debbie Reynolds while flashing a wide grin; playing  an etude by Chopin or Debussy; or toe dancing in a tulle tutu with the ever-present tiara balanced on her twirling head.  As the years progress, my mind seems to embellish the details, but as I recall it was quite a show.

Next came the gangplank walk.   Worries ricocheted in my head as I worried about the platform walk all candidates had to make at the band shell stage.  Running through my head was the persistent question, “What if I trip?  I’d be mortified!”   I remember my staggered walk down the uneven aisle of loose boards to the judges, who stood at a microphone with hazardous, trailing wires, posing tripping problems for the queens.  

The end was near.  The BIG question was posed to each beauty: “If you could do anything in the world, what would it be?”

No contest!  The obvious answer was “WORLD PEACE!”  Most of us planned to be teachers, beauticians, social workers, wives and mothers.  Being women, we dreamed of jobs that served others before we became wives and mothers, serving our families.  We’d been programmed for duties that didn’t involve great cash rewards.    

No tripping, no fire from the flaming, twirling baton, no fainting marred my summer weekend.  The parade and coronation are over.  For most of us, ever-hopeful queen candidates, there was no queenly, rhinestone tiara and no world peace…but a girl needs to dream.      701 words

FROM WHERE I SIT  I Love a Parade! July 1, 2014 P.D. Spilseth

Grabbing lawn chairs, coffee cups and nibbles for the kids, every July Fourth we rush to our annual parade spot before ten in the morning.   Neighbors turn out annually with coffee and folding lawn chairs to meet at the prime parade spot on Casco Circle to watch our own Fourth of July kiddie parade.  

Dozens of kids, from parents carrying babies sporting flag t-shirts and red, white and blue bonnets, to kids who ride their bikes with the wheels strung with red, white, and blue crepe paper.  Handlebars have long, colorful streamers and flags waving in the breeze.  Little kids careen around the giant curve of Casco Circle on tricycles and others ride in little red wagons.  Some families ride on their lawn tractors.  A few years we’ve had a horse or two in the parade.

Patriotic music blares from big speakers set on a pickup’s flatbed.  Several moms make bars and cookies or rolls for the parade viewers.  We toss wrapped candy to the parade participants, who screech to a stop to collect the candy and check out treats on the card table.  They’re hungry; they’ve been riding almost a mile from the starting point of the parade; they need nourishment!  

Several moms wear red, blue and white T-shirts; dads have tall stovepipe hats like Uncle Sam or caps in appropriate Fourth of July colors. Everyone waves miniature flags, gifts of a local family selling real estate.  This annual parade is a Big Deal in my neighborhood.  Some folks return to their old neighborhood simply to see who’s in the parade and have a cup of coffee.

It’s tradition on the lake to see fireworks from several spots on our peninsula.  When darkness falls, neighbors with insect repellent walk down the hill to their docks either to launch boats to view fireworks on the Bay or to sit and watch from their docks.  Some submerge sweaty bodies in the lake, hoping to avoid the mosquitoes.  Everyone rushes outdoors to watch the colorful fireworks display exploding in the summertime sky from every direction.

Kids light sparklers to celebrate this Fourth of July holiday which honors the many freedoms we enjoy in this country.  Campfires are lit; we roast marshmallows and make s’mores with graham crackers, melting chocolate bars and gooey marshmallows.  I’m reminded of the campfires teenagers enjoyed on Halverson’s Point before houses were built there, eliminating our best summertime party spot.  

We loved parades in Glenwood, my hometown.  The Fourth of July parade featured marching uniformed veterans, the ladies auxiliary, and the Glenwood High School band.  It was always dreadfully hot!  As the honor guard marchers aged, I could see that it was tougher and tougher to squeeze into those uniforms from the war year.  But I’ll never forget the jaunty, creased caps and the ominous rifles.  Everyone stood as the flags passed and put their right hand over their heart, remembering the sacrifices our veterans had made to keep freedom throughout our land.

I still remember sweating in those sticky, hot, wool band uniforms we wore in the 60‘s and that visor hat that kept dropping into my eyes so I couldn’t read the music notes attached to my clarinet.  But I did enjoy marching in the Waterama parade later in July when FINALLY the band boosters purchased white trousers and blue and white striped t-shirts for band members.  I think we might have had a colorful orange or red bandana too…didn’t we?  I know we wore white bucks like Pat Boone, the popular Christian crooner of that era.  He was popular in the sixties, but probably not as popular as Elvis with his oily ducktail and swiveling hip action.

We had three summer parades when I was a kid: Memorial Day where veterans carried flags and shot off a gun salute over Lake Minnewaska; the Fourth of July parade; and the annual Waterama parade at the end of July with lots of marching bands, queens in one-piece swimsuits and stiffly sprayed hairdos, jazzy, rhythmic drum and bugle corps which crowds loved to follow, and politicians shaking hands with potential voters.  It was a busy summer back then.  I still love a good, old fashioned parade! 717 words