ashmae.etsy.com
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Sunday, August 17, 2008
I'll trade you that pog for a silly putty.
When Dane and I were little, it was a weekly activity to round up all of the neighborhood kids and have what we deemed a "trading session." A trading session was when you gathered all of your belongings that were of small person value, ie: pogs, baseball and basketball cards, miniature cars, jewelery, the tiny lipsticks my mom kept in a box because she was an avon lady, and small odds and ends from the 25 cent machines, old halloween candy. There would be a meeting place, usually the bedroom my brother and I shared because most likely we were the organizers of such events. We would usher the kids in and they would lay out the goods. This was a very deliberate step, good things in front for the viewers, neat lines and piles. Then we would get behind our stuff in bargaining position. In quiet and serious tones, the trading session would begin. It was a long process in which every kid had to be on his toes, wheelin' and dealin'. Items such as Magic Johnson cards or my special set of Peter Pan pogs were haggled over with determination and skill.
After a couple hours my brother and I ushered out the clients, into the hallway and through the front doors, the new possessions rolled up in the front of their shirts. My brother and I would go back and talk business. Look over our deals and loot, and talk about what and who had been traded. Who had totally been ripped off and which slightly older kid had bullied us into giving away more than we had planned.
Almost indefinitely, a few hours after the trading session, a neighborhood parent would find out and realize that something very valuable had been given away for peanuts. With heads hanging and resent at being caught we would usually thrust newfound treasures back into the grubby hands of the neighborhood kids and they would give back a piece of my moms jewelery or my dad's nolan ryan card.
I only think about this now because i having been helping elisa clean out her room for the past six hours and she keeps giving me things. I am finding the same joy in small and insignificant treasures that I had no idea I'd be claiming as my own. Also, I am currently wearing a sweater I got from Erin, a skirt that I got from Elaine, listening to a cd davey gave me and amanda just texted me and said that she and Mary are wearing the shirts they got yesterday at our big joint garage sale. I think I am experiencing "trading session", college version, and I'm loving it. I just hope my mom doesn't make me give back the sweater and skirt, they were only a dollar.
After a couple hours my brother and I ushered out the clients, into the hallway and through the front doors, the new possessions rolled up in the front of their shirts. My brother and I would go back and talk business. Look over our deals and loot, and talk about what and who had been traded. Who had totally been ripped off and which slightly older kid had bullied us into giving away more than we had planned.
Almost indefinitely, a few hours after the trading session, a neighborhood parent would find out and realize that something very valuable had been given away for peanuts. With heads hanging and resent at being caught we would usually thrust newfound treasures back into the grubby hands of the neighborhood kids and they would give back a piece of my moms jewelery or my dad's nolan ryan card.
I only think about this now because i having been helping elisa clean out her room for the past six hours and she keeps giving me things. I am finding the same joy in small and insignificant treasures that I had no idea I'd be claiming as my own. Also, I am currently wearing a sweater I got from Erin, a skirt that I got from Elaine, listening to a cd davey gave me and amanda just texted me and said that she and Mary are wearing the shirts they got yesterday at our big joint garage sale. I think I am experiencing "trading session", college version, and I'm loving it. I just hope my mom doesn't make me give back the sweater and skirt, they were only a dollar.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
A man must not choose his neighbor; he must take the neighbor that God sends him. In him, whoever he be, lies, hidden or revealed, a beautiful brother. The neighbor is just the man who is next to you at the moment, the man with whom any business has brought you in contact. -George Mcdonald
I've been trying to write something on and off all morning. and for some reason, the words are just not coming the way I would want them to. so for now I will leave you with snippets from two people who really did know how to say something eloquent. The first one is from a book called 'Unspoken Sermons', I read this piece over the shoulder of a friend in relief society and have been thinking about it since. The quote below is from a High Council man talk that my friend Thelma sent me.
Perhaps you see the gospel from a different vantage point than those who surround you in your worship services. Perhaps you have doubts. If so, come and sit on the bench with me and we’ll share our doubts. But don’t try to suppress or deny them, or they’ll come back with a vengeance that you may not be able to control. And don’t apologize or feel guilty for having them. Doubt and faith are two sides of the same coin, and a healthy interplay between them makes for a healthy spiritual life. Winston Churchill warned his troops not to do anything that would “frighten the horses,” so be responsible in vocalizing your doubts in a public setting. But the way to deal with them is to deal with them, and there are plenty around you who can help you to do so. David O. McKay, whose name may sound familiar to you, was a pretty good doubter in his day. To a missionary who wanted to come home from his mission because he doubted, he wrote: “Over fifty years ago, when I was about to leave for my first mission, an agnostic friend said to me, among other things: ‘David, teach only that which you feel to be true—things about which you are in doubt, keep to yourself until your doubt is removed.’ Following that injunction, I went from what was known to what was unknown with respect to doctrine and Church policies, and today, believe me, doubts that shook me as a young man, as doubts are now shaking you, became as clear as Thomas’s assurance of the resurrection of the Savior when he said, ‘My Lord and my God.’” Hugh B. Brown, who served as a counselor to President McKay for a decade, told students at a BYU devotional: “We are not so much concerned, now, whether your thoughts are orthodox or heterodox as we are that you shall have thoughts.”
I've been trying to write something on and off all morning. and for some reason, the words are just not coming the way I would want them to. so for now I will leave you with snippets from two people who really did know how to say something eloquent. The first one is from a book called 'Unspoken Sermons', I read this piece over the shoulder of a friend in relief society and have been thinking about it since. The quote below is from a High Council man talk that my friend Thelma sent me.
Perhaps you see the gospel from a different vantage point than those who surround you in your worship services. Perhaps you have doubts. If so, come and sit on the bench with me and we’ll share our doubts. But don’t try to suppress or deny them, or they’ll come back with a vengeance that you may not be able to control. And don’t apologize or feel guilty for having them. Doubt and faith are two sides of the same coin, and a healthy interplay between them makes for a healthy spiritual life. Winston Churchill warned his troops not to do anything that would “frighten the horses,” so be responsible in vocalizing your doubts in a public setting. But the way to deal with them is to deal with them, and there are plenty around you who can help you to do so. David O. McKay, whose name may sound familiar to you, was a pretty good doubter in his day. To a missionary who wanted to come home from his mission because he doubted, he wrote: “Over fifty years ago, when I was about to leave for my first mission, an agnostic friend said to me, among other things: ‘David, teach only that which you feel to be true—things about which you are in doubt, keep to yourself until your doubt is removed.’ Following that injunction, I went from what was known to what was unknown with respect to doctrine and Church policies, and today, believe me, doubts that shook me as a young man, as doubts are now shaking you, became as clear as Thomas’s assurance of the resurrection of the Savior when he said, ‘My Lord and my God.’” Hugh B. Brown, who served as a counselor to President McKay for a decade, told students at a BYU devotional: “We are not so much concerned, now, whether your thoughts are orthodox or heterodox as we are that you shall have thoughts.”
Saturday, August 9, 2008
Mr. Farmer's small town market!
I made a total of 3.00 today at the farmer's market, but I spent 1.00 on peaches, .50 on a mango popsicle, 2.00 on a pair of feather earrings, so i guess really i made negative .50 cents at the farmer's market today. However, i did get to spend all morning next to greg caldwell and his beautiful bowls and mugs, got a free giant zuchinni, made friends with the a few vendors, got a free slice of sourdough bread and talked about Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close with the bakery booth man. Although I'm still broke this afternoon, I will consider my soul all the richer for spending my time at the PROVO FARMER'S MARKET, EVERY SATURDAY IN PIONEER PARK FROM 9-2. Really, it was a lovely morning, and I love seeing it grow. I overheard Raquel say that today there were 66 booths.
Thursday, August 7, 2008
In my studio right now I am working on a set of paintings, each one is about a person I know. How do you quantify a person on a 12 inch by 12 inch piece of paper? Is it because I'm afraid I will forget them, or because I want to show them I love them, or because they are the corners or my mind and secret places of my heart.
There is a game I like to play with my friends and in my head when I get bored, maybe it is an obsession with reducing life down to something that I can handle, put in my pocket and save, or consequently put in a painting. The quintessential game consists of thinking about the most quintessential things about a person, place or time. For example, once we were playing the quintessential outfit game with a group of my guy friends, they concluded that my quintessential outfit was like a sister missionary only more hip. In which case, my time stamp outfit would be a jumper with a little grey sweater and a pair of the boots i always wear in winter. unfortunate? maybe.
If i were to play the quintessential memory game to describe my parents, this is the memory I would choose: It was probably the summer after my freshman year in college, I had come home around 1 a.m., as I approached the closed front door I heard something inside. I put my ear to the wood but still couldn't quite make out the sound, I opened it to find that the noise I'd been hearing was a beach boys record spinning on the record player. My parents were sitting on our green, worn in, leather couches next to each other. I don't think they were actually holding hands, but I like to manipulate memory for the sake of romanticism and sanity and insert that detail as well.
My poetry professor always says that once something is on paper, your responsibility is no longer to portray accurate reality or history, but your responsibility is to what you've written.
There is a game I like to play with my friends and in my head when I get bored, maybe it is an obsession with reducing life down to something that I can handle, put in my pocket and save, or consequently put in a painting. The quintessential game consists of thinking about the most quintessential things about a person, place or time. For example, once we were playing the quintessential outfit game with a group of my guy friends, they concluded that my quintessential outfit was like a sister missionary only more hip. In which case, my time stamp outfit would be a jumper with a little grey sweater and a pair of the boots i always wear in winter. unfortunate? maybe.
If i were to play the quintessential memory game to describe my parents, this is the memory I would choose: It was probably the summer after my freshman year in college, I had come home around 1 a.m., as I approached the closed front door I heard something inside. I put my ear to the wood but still couldn't quite make out the sound, I opened it to find that the noise I'd been hearing was a beach boys record spinning on the record player. My parents were sitting on our green, worn in, leather couches next to each other. I don't think they were actually holding hands, but I like to manipulate memory for the sake of romanticism and sanity and insert that detail as well.
My poetry professor always says that once something is on paper, your responsibility is no longer to portray accurate reality or history, but your responsibility is to what you've written.
Monday, August 4, 2008
i can't believe i am doing this. but a amy scott and i were talking about bravery. these are a couple of my poems.
A First Step Towards Loss
The first time I know summer
My parents tell me to get back in bed. I am six. I stand at the blinds without moving slats:
watch neighborhood kids run cat-footed in fields and dusk. Sun setting silhouettes
christened in purple shadow and wet, wet, wet, sprinklers click on lawns.
orange sky yawns—slow as counting stars. Elephant light through lazy white drapes,
darkness is coming, first firefly night.
(this is the one i wrote that day that i didn't go to class)
Heirloom
I nearly fused the gold band to my middle finger.
When I spilled the chemicals.
There was a moment of panic,
Then a sting of courage
When I saw the tender white
Ring of puffy skin underneath.
The first time I know summer
My parents tell me to get back in bed. I am six. I stand at the blinds without moving slats:
watch neighborhood kids run cat-footed in fields and dusk. Sun setting silhouettes
christened in purple shadow and wet, wet, wet, sprinklers click on lawns.
orange sky yawns—slow as counting stars. Elephant light through lazy white drapes,
darkness is coming, first firefly night.
(this is the one i wrote that day that i didn't go to class)
Heirloom
I nearly fused the gold band to my middle finger.
When I spilled the chemicals.
There was a moment of panic,
Then a sting of courage
When I saw the tender white
Ring of puffy skin underneath.
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