Monday, November 12, 2007

Another Freewrite

Scares...And other Things

Sometimes getting scared means being startled. Or it can mean just plain creeped out. Or both. Like if you're playing hide-and-seek and you look somewhere dark, it's creepy. And then when Mariel and Cornflower both jump out from behind you, that's the startled part. When I get creeped out my hair doesn't stand on end but something just above the base of my skull in the back starts tingling. My heart starts acting like a metronome set at 240 beats a minute. My insteps tingle. I get really tense. My eyes get wide. My calls for them to "come on out" falter. Then ... they pounce! My heart speeds up. Some reflex SHOOTS up though my vocal cords until I sound like a lady on a movie. I curl up in a little ball like a pill bug. I shiver all over. It's fun to get scared AFTERWARDS, but not at the time! I love laughing about Mr. Honey and Cornflower scaring me with a koala teddy! But at night, when I can't sleep, "ghosties and ghoulies and long-legged beasties and things that go BUMP in the night" all join in efforts to keep me from sleep. Mariel, flitting to the bathroom, is a "ghostie". My china dolls become "ghoulies". The "long-legged beastie" is my own colthes for the next day. "BUMP-in-the-night" go my bed rafters.
Good Googly.

Friday, November 2, 2007

Friday Freewrite

Yesterday my wonderful Mother Auma borrowed a curriculum called The Writer's Jungle from one of the Ambleside Online women. One of the activities in it is a freewrite, and here is mine:

The water in the cup near me looks blue Is it? I love Mommy that M is awful but I dont care haha I didn't put any apostrophe in dont look I did it again and i like it and my I is not capitalized. I griped to thumper about being thirteen this morning and cried but then at 2:15 I went out and apologized she growled What was this guy's name again? I love Mommy's rolls or biskits or whaterer they are called haha look bad spelling What happens if we run out of paper before 10 minutes is up? I don't know and I won't care until I get there I can't wait to go to California and tell Ggmom and GGDad that we're 100 % tx and 100% ca! I wish we were there already I like freewriting it's so ridiculous I was going to write something else but I forgot it :-) I don't know if smileys go on paper I wish I could get into my Squirrel Band drawings whoa I'm thirsty but I still have 5 min or actually a bit less hey we're going to a church meeting tonight I wish I could bring Thumpee don't ask why did you know the early Celts wore hare instead of underwear? I'm spelling words I've known how to spell forever but I'm spelling them wrong and don't care the Celts didn't wear bunnies sorry they wore HAIR Mariel and Cornflower are mad at each other and I'm getting writers cramp I never realized I thought about such a wide variety of subjects!

Saturday, August 18, 2007

The Dancing Pirates

It's a play I made up for Mariel and Cornflower and I to perform for our parents' anniversary.

Here it is.

Act I, scene one. On a dock. Treedance and Moondance, two girl pirates, stroll about.

T: How does Captain Sundance know when we'll be back?
M: He said to be back at 4.
T: Who's that?
(Enter Fortune Teller)
FT: Hello.
M: Hi there.
T: Howdy.
FT: DON'T GO TO SEEEEEEEEE!
(She vanishes. A pause.)
M: Weird.

Act I, scene two. Captain Sundance, a boy pirate, walks up and down the deck. Moondance and Treedance get ready for bed.

S: Wait! We must dance to the stars!
(All jig up and down the deck of the ship and sing "We are the Pirates who don't do Anything".)
M: Goodnight!
(All sleep - Sundance dangerously near the edge of the ship. Moondance gets up and sings and dances.)
Oh, I wish they would wake up
Oh, I wish they would wake u-up
I'm about to fall asleep (drops and snores)
There's a dolphin in the sea -
No, that's a whale in the sea!
T: Save me! A shark!
(She faints and bumps Sundance overboard.)
S: Blub!
M: It's a whale.

Act II, scene one. Ekoce, a boy evil pirate, sails towards the pirate ship.

T: A sail! A sail!
E: Oh, I am called Ekoce
It's "coke" spelled backwards with an extra "e"
S: It's the scary pirate dude, Ekoce!
(Ekoce pushes Sundance overboard and swordfights with Treedance. Sundance swims around behind Ekoce and tickles his knees. Ekoce falls over and they pin him down.)
E: Stop! I'll do anything you want!
T&S: Dance with us!
(All dance and sing "We are the Pirates who do a lot of stuff". Curtain)

Cast:
Treedance - Me
Moondance - Cornflower
Fortune Teller - Mariel
Captain Sundance - Mariel
Ekoce - Cornflower

Director and Playwright - Me

************************
Mom and Dad greatly enjoyed the play and Dad said that as we had watched Moby Dick a few days previous...oh, read it yourself. My mom wrote about it on her blog.

Saturday, August 4, 2007

Hooray!

Day before yesterday, I somehow convinced Mother Auma to rearrange my room, Mariel's room back into the schoolroom, and Cornflower's room for both of them.

I don't know how I did it or even why we were talking about it in the first place, but I did, we were and now our rooms are rearranged.

For months I'd been asking Mother Auma and Daddy to let me put my bed by the window. Dad refused because "bunk beds don't go by windows". So when Mom and I took an allen wrench (one of those things that looks like an old-fashioned well crank and takes forever to find) and a few screwdrivers to that bed, we detached it from the bottom bunk, a desk, and moved the desk piece by piece into the schoolroom.

My bed is now smack by the window, with the organizing credenza (I am using it for a desk) near my feet and my dresser beside my head. My mirror and dressing table are by the desk and I now have room for a bookshelf and at least 64 square feet of open space in the middle (suitable for dancing, playing around, twirling round and round with the fan until you collapse, sleepover space, etc, etc, etc).

I am very happy with my room. For the last 2 mornings I have been waking up with sunbeams on my face. Just like in a book.

Monday, July 30, 2007

Thinking...

Near the end of July, my thoughts inexplicably turn to the approaching school year.

We don't start school until September, so there is no reason why my mind has to start a month early...except maybe for the fact that I like to have a schedule. One that goes the whole day.

Or maybe it's because Fall is my favorite season. Calm, tranquil and a lot cooler than hot summer sun. Leaves that are supposed to turn red and orange turning brown, long sleeves, and the schedule. Why does my mind keep coming back to that schedule?

I like to have the whole day on paper. Anywhere from "get up-go to bed" to "visit so-and-so, go to IKEA, clean house, do schoolwork, and go to the pool".

Oh dear.

In Fall the pool closes.

So maybe we couldn't do that particular thing. Go to the park instead.

Which brings up yet another rabbit trail. In Fall when it cools off considerably, Mr. Honey and Mother Auma take Cornflower and Mariel and I on Bike Rides and Nature Walks and Trips to the Park and the Zoo and the...World of Outside. My favorite place.

To go on another trail that is clearly a rabbit one...

My rabbit, Thumper, can stay outside for the whole day when it gets to be nice and cool and only gets up to 70 degrees outside in the middle of the day.

And church meetings! Almost as good as singing schools except you have to stay in your nice clothes all day. There are kids you've never met and people you knew a long time ago and friends you just made a month or two ago at Harmony Plains. Makes for some very good Indian bands, Castles with Invaders (usually boy-invaders against princesses and lady warriors (Ray and I, and whoever wants to be a warrior with us)), Cowboys (and Cowgirls), and any kind of pretend game you can get 20 kids to play all at once. I really enjoy church meetings.

I REALLY enjoy Fall. Just Fall.

Thursday, July 26, 2007

I checked out that season test...

Turns out I am Spring!

Not my favorite season (fall is, really) but quite possibly my next favorite.

If you want to try it, here's the link.

Monday, July 9, 2007

Photos, Photos Everywhere- and memories of a little house

I was looking at a stack of old photos (from when I was about 4 or 5) while Mother Auma sorted another stack into an album (a typical scene from our house this last week). I came across some from our last house. First there were some from a hands-on museum called "The Science Place" and then some from the house.

We had, then, a little wooden house, only about 5-6 ft tall, in the corner of our backyard. Mounted on cinder blocks with a muddy patch behind it, the little cabin was a central figure in our pretends back then. As I looked at the picture several memories ran through my mind. I turned to Mother Auma.

"Do you remember our little Troll doll? And how we buried her purple hair in the mud behind our playhouse so it would turn brown?"

"I remember something of the sort," grinned Mother Auma.

"And how we gave our dollhouse people beautiful smooth brown clothes? That mud was just Play-Doh to us," I laughed, remembering also that I liked to squish around in it barefoot.

Another stack of pictures featured my 5yo birthday party, in which the little house was also a big player. A friend of mine is in one, right before opening the little log door, and another shows 2yo Mariel teetering along the stepping stones to the log cabin. The little house was a home, a hotel, a castle, Laura Ingall's log cabin, and anything our active imaginations could think up. I remember writing things like "Ore Clubhous" and "Ore Hotel" over the door in pink or blue chalk, and taking the little plastic table and chairs in there and sweeping and being called "Mommy" by baby Mariel.

Oh, sweet, careless days of seven years ago.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Copperhead!

A few weeks ago, school was just not going well. Mother Auma spontaneously decided it was time for a very quiet nature walk. We wandered about the subdivision, not saying a word. Mother Auma was walking hand in hand with Cornflower just ahead of Mariel and I. As we walked past an overgrown yard with a drooping tree and a culvert leading to the creek, something stuck out.

It was not a stick.

Mariel and I froze. I wanted to scream but all I could get out was "mom". Mariel screamed - a short, gasping, awful sort of yelp. Mother Auma and Cornflower turned and saw a slender, menacing, triangular-headed brown snake.

It stared at us in defiance. We stared in horrified fascination at it. After several minutes of this standoff, it turned and slithered back into the yard. Nothing was there to show what had just taken place.

We continued our walk, shaken by the snake's sudden appearance. We discovered a picnic area and brought our schoolwork there. But that has really nothing to do with the snake.

Later Mother Auma and I looked up the snake. Goggy had told us it was some sort of poisonous pit viper - and we had seen a baby stroller on the front porch. We found out it was a Southern Copperhead.

Animal Control couldn't help - they didn't have a division for our area.

The Homeowners' Association was even less help. "We'll send a letter telling him to mow his lawn."

Mother Auma was furious. "Don't you think they should tell him there's a poisonous snake in his yard?!?!?" she demanded when telling us.

She took Cornflower for moral support and went to the house in her big tall hiking boots, intending to leave a printout of the info we found on the snake. The neighbor man was just coming to get something out of his car. Mother Auma brightened. These are the neighbors; they can give the people this information! She walked up to him. "Do you know these people next door to you?"

"Kind of."

"Well, could you tell them we saw a copperhead in their yard?"

"Are you sure it was a copperhead? I'm a herpetologist."

(For those of us who don't know what that is, a herpetologist is a snake specialist. Just think, right next door!)

He said to leave the papers in their mailbox, as the people were at work.

Thus ended our part in the "Epic of the Copperhead". We were all very happy it was over, too, although I had nightmares about it for a few days afterwards.

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Musical Rabbit

Yesterday morning my little sister Mariel was busily practicing her violin. It was a beautiful day, so my rabbit was in the back yard and the windows were open.

As strains of music were wafted by the late morning wind through the window and reached Thumper's long, sensitive ears, she sat up, trying to sniff the music. Suddenly, she jumped sideways with a funny twist. Her ears shot up in the air. She ran around the back yard, twisting and leaping with her ears high and her eyes wide until she reminded me of Wilbur in Charlotte's Web where he is being radiant.

Not to mention that when I was outside, playing my harmonica, Thumper suddenly ran around and around my feet, stopping when I stopped and racing around my feet when I played. Racing around someone is a bunny way of showing love...

Monday, April 9, 2007

Birches

When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay.
Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-coloured
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground,
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm,
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows--
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again
Until he took the stiffness out of them,
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
>From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

--Robert Frost

Sunday, April 1, 2007

New Blog

A new blog is not poetic
It's not and that is that
A new blog is not poetic
any more than is a hat