hoodiegoodie

a while ago i made myself a hoodie

because i knew i was going to need it at Haystack

and then

it left me

for someone else.

now the temperatures are sliding southward

i needed something to keep me warm

[i do have my coat but those sleeves are not practical when hovering around a cauldron]

so i cut and sewed [by hand, with silk]

added pockets here and there [but DANG, forgot to add one for a poem at the back. ah well]

made an enormous hood

that has buttons on it so i can play with it as a collar

and dyed it with leaves that had found their way into my pockets

on a favourite hill a month or so back [relax, they didn't cross any borders and went from pocket to boil-up, now in freezer in case of re-use]

the materials were from the red,white+blue thrift store in New Orleans

and included a duck-egg blue cashmere, a lilac silk, a brown merino [that brown was really too fuzzy for clear prints but so warm] and some rather paler scraps that had been cut from cardigans i am re-shaping

so this hoodie

like the other

is constructed and dyed with special magic.

the warmth comes not just from the physical materials...

i'm not good at self-portraits

so these pix will have to do

i added a good bit either side. hips, ya know?

sideways. ah well. here's the hood down, as collar

hood in roughly a hood-shaped arrangement

you'll just have to imagine the face peeking out

buttons on the hood opened

i told you the hood was enormous.

delicious detail...mostly hidden on the hood. but i know it's there and that's what matters

looks like something that Ötzi might have worn

ai = love

i worked all day saturday
and then on sunday
i thought
i will just pop in and do a few stitches
and then i will go out and wander somewhere
take a look at Portland

the Dogs had other plans
when i looked outside
it looked like this

that window is my studio

i think it may be
that i am in love with blue
it is a colour that takes me to a quite specific place and time
James Tate wrote beautifully about it
[click on the audio icon to hear the poem being read aloud]
there's a good reason why the Japanese word for blue is the same as the Japanese word for love 

or so i have been told.

today i was thinking about our blue planet
and how the maps we have available are always too small
especially for someone has left footprints on four of the seven continents [gazing at Egypt from the deck of a boat on the Suez Canal as a toddler sadly doesn't count as stepping in Africa]; who keeps a bicycle in New Orleans, a cat in South Australia, her heart in San Francisco and "einen Koffer in Berlin"       ##
 
so
i played around in Photoshop
and made a map that is really useful for planning trips
because
it allows you to compare distance easily with a piece of string [well, except for the curly bits around the poles] and goodness me, what a lot of blue!!!!

got any good maps you'd care to share?



## i plant trees to make up for all this wanton wandering...

north by north west

i didn't take many pictures in San Francisco this time

too busy

listening to the sounds of the city

the glory of foghorns

parrots around t-hill

the whirr of humming birds' wings

the slow drift of the fog

the espresso machine as it unleashes my Africano into the glass

at Cafe Trieste

where

two older men address each other lovingly in Italian

i sipped my coffee

and

thought about friendship

and how much certain friendships mean to me

while reading "World enough and Time"

a book i was introduced to by my friends John + Patsy Sangster

on Lopez Island.

i think

i may make this book compulsory reading

for all workshop attendees.

after coffee i headed north.

i could simply have driven up the Interstate 5

but

it doesn't go anywhere near the edge.

i love the edge

so

i took the 101

which took me through Fortuna

and past this magical old cinema

i took this photo for my friend Shelley

i wanted to build a fort for her

but

it was really really cold.

so i went wandering instead

while wandering

i began to fill my pockets with stones

having a vague plan in my mind

to use them in Portland

+

looking down at my pinny

with its bulging pockets

i remembered that somebody

[contemporary of Virginia Woolf ? or other rejected lover somewhere?]

sewed stones into her dress

and then walked into a river

it would be so easy to do in a place like this

in the fog

where

footprints would soon be awash

and

the continental shelf drops away in moments

however

that was not something i was about to do

the water was far too cold

and i am enjoying the wild ride of this adventure we call 'life'

far too much

 

+

 

then a figure emerged from the fog

wandered over, making greeting noises

showed me a handful of exquisite polished stones 

pulled from a pocket

fished one out

and gave it to me saying

"take this one, it's a lovely amber colour and have a good day"

 

the stone looked like a piece of cold honey

reminding me of the eyes of a friend

[they are like those of a wolf]

honey coloured unless sparkling with excitement

when they suddenly turn green

 

 i was already having a good day

but that reminder made it even better

+

later i saw mollis azaleas

growing right beside the ocean

in Australia these plants are mollycoddled

and protected. otherwise they shrivel in the hot north winds.

here they grow like weeds. sigh.

wandering further north

i found evidence of my people

so

i left a mark of my own

 

and now i am in Portland

for six weeks.

bliss.

the driest state on the driest continent

it feels like an exceptionally cold winter here, in the driest state on the driest continent
if i travelled north a bit
to where this image was shot last year
it would be a lot warmer
and not just in terms of the colours...

thanks everyone for your kind thoughts in response to the previous post


also grateful for various kind mentions here and there
Cass Nevada
and a friendly book review from earlier in the year
a lovely image of workshop samples here

off topic, but for the dog-loving readers
Chiengora

for people who like to thoroughly investigate one plant
twelve colours from osage orange by Tali Weinberg

and now
having played with the time vampire for far too long
i'm off out to the studio
to make something warm and felted to wear
when i go  here

[yes, i DO have a big woolly coat, but it's very very heavy
so i don't fancy schlepping it all across America
via San Francisco and New Orleans
on my way to the eastern bit of Canada]

in love with a sunburnt country

followed that marmalade trail
north
into the wild
where flowers are blooming
that haven't been seen for 21 years
under stars
and over stones
into sacred places
shadow and light