PNewS website still exists

I have hope that some day soon, I will figure out how to use it better. The address there is http://home.comcast.net/~pnewl.

For now, there's archived material--all the back issues--at http://home.comcast.net/~pnewl/tblcontents.html.

In some browsers, you can even see the pictures from our Central America trip. (Aha! Go to this address and you can see those photos: http://home.comcast.net/~pnewl/photos.html or get the link from the diary page. Must be some funky html on my part on the home page...SORRY.)

That's all for now. I have a plane to catch. More on the other side.

North Carolina...hmmmm

I went to a fabulous quilt symposium north of Asheville and can't get it out of my head. Sometimes, SWFL is a bit hot, for like half the year. I get tired of that. My dog gets tired of that. The bugs in summer are HORRID. And sometimes the size of the community (teeny) makes me claustrophobic.

In other ways, I love it here. It's beautiful no matter what. The water is mesmerizing. The birds are cool. The summer skies almost make the icky parts OK. I have my people, a place. It's a good thing. But one of the many things I learned in moving here is that there are fabulous people everywhere--perhaps I want to test this theory by moving again.

So I went to the Asheville area, hung out with Patsy and Ernie who have created a wonderful life, and felt quite at home. And I think that area may be one that embodies some of the things that are missing in this area: hills, for one. Young people, for another--the average age of residents of Buncombe County is 39.7: I would be old there! (I recently spent more time than I want to think about in O'Hare and was boggled by the number of small children (and how young their parents are!) and it came to me belatedly that I live in a place with a lot of older people and not so many youngsters. Oh my and duh!) Oh and there are others...

And here're more reasons to move there (from the virtual magazine at imagesasheville.com): AARP declared it as one of the best places to "reinvent your life;" Farmers Insurance Group ranked it one of the most secure places to live; and my personal favorite--Self Magazine says it is the "America's Happiest City for Women"--do you think that means there are no men or tons of men???

It also occurred to me that I could make this just the first of a few more moves. Say I give each place a max of 10 years or so...I could have a good three moves left in me. Since Martha offered to take care of me when I am old and dotty...or dottier, perhaps i will leave Missoula for the post-70s...then there's Portland OR...and Jackson WY. Yup, time to get moving...

PNewL PNewS Volume 15 Issue 1

REMINDER
26th Annual
Angel Island Picnic
Perles Beach
Saturday, June 23
Be there or
Be square

Heart Breaking, Back Breaking

I reached over and squeezed Sara’s forearm. “Does that hurt?” She looked at me with that look she has looked at me with for over 30 years:”What? Are you nuts?” We had been gutting homes in New Orleans for five solid days, a few of which involved hours of beating sheetrock into submission. We are not professionals. Everything hurt, in a good way.

I have felt negligent in not going to New Orleans since Katrina and my 50th birthday seemed like a good excuse. Darla, whose friend Betsy is better about getting up and doing than I am and now has been six times, offered to organize the work part leaving only the play part in my less-than-capable-these-days hands. Betsy had worked with the Episcopal Diocese of Louisiana and so Darla connected with them. Their organization is phenomenal--run, for the most part, by 20-somethings--and my father would have liked it. An all around good combination.

Five of us drove from Sanibel and two flew in from other locales. We stayed in housing provided by the Diocese--a dorm set up in what must have been an office with cubicle walls separating some of the beds. Fortunately there were only seven of us with 26 beds to choose from. With the bed next to me literally six inches away, I was glad it held my clothing and not another worker.

Each morning, we met across town for a briefing about our workday and then we toodled off to New Orleans East or the Lower 9th Ward or wherever they told us to go. The briefings included some background on the homeowner (age, experience in The Storm, current location--some were in nursing homes or hospitals out-of-state), description of the property (whether there was stuff inside, whether the homeowner planned on returning) and what our work would entail. Our crew leaders were college students who handled us and the work professionally and with respect. There was a lot of talk about respect--mostly with regards to the people we were working for. The homeowners had had unimaginable experiences and we needed to be respectful of them and their privacy. It was shocking, working with other groups, how many needed that reminder.

At first, I found it hard to walk into the “contents houses”--the ones that still held people’s stuff, their lives in photographs and clothes and kitchen stuff. It seemed so voyeuristic. I felt like I was intruding. And then I watched others doing it and, of course, thought I could do it more efficiently so I had to go inside and once in, had the understanding of why WE need to be there. Rifling through my own prized possessions with a coating of mud and mold and other debris, having survived all that had gone on in the past 20 months? I can’t imagine how exhausting and overwhelming it would be. No matter what an awkward and intimate experience it was to me, we needed to do it for them, with concern and respect and compassion. Many of us made up stories of the man with three wheelbarrows full of flashy shirts, the other guy with the exercise equipment, adult videos, and business management books.

On the other hand, the days of gutting left me with a physical feeling of accomplishment. At the end of each day, I felt better for the people who could now move forward, but throughout the work days, I was impressed by what we accomplished and pleased that my body was able to do the work. (I am now, after all, 50 years old!) When one of the homeowners arrived to help, he looked at the work we had done and he said something about how long it would have taken him to do this on his own while he was working fulltime. It felt really good to be there. And it felt really really good to take a shower each afternoon, scraping the drywall dust off my arms, shaking the bits of house out of my hair.

But it wasn’t all work and showers, and no play! We ate verrrrrry well. We went to the Jazz Festival and heard great music (and were run off by the humongous crowds). We wandered through the French Quarter and took in the scene. We supported the local economy. I had good long visits with good longtime friends (can’t say old friends any more because people might get the wrong impression.) A good time was had by all. At least, I hope so. One of my favorite comments after the fact was from Darla: “I’ve never enjoyed anyone’s 50th birthday so much...and for so long!”

Things I am Learning &
Miscellaneous Observations

• I think being boring or dull is one of the worst possible things to be called. One of the folks on “Survivor” said two of the women were dull or boring or maybe both and I thought, OUCH. On national television! It was worse to me than what he called the creepy guy.
• Quarters are real money--not like those namby-pamby nickels and dimes. People tease me about my pill bottle full of them in my purse and I say--that’s ten bucks and I am ready when confronted by a pay phone or a soda machine or a copy machine or a Laundromat or a newspaper box. Don’t use those things? Really?
• I just read a really sad story by a guy named Mike Tidwell, who wrote a book called Bayou Farewell, predicting a storm like Katrina. I read his next book called The Ravaging Tide, which predicts that well, frankly, we’re all hosed. The coastal areas will be hit by more storms; the interior parts of countries will be further devastated by freaky weather. It’s global warming with specifics. He calls the entire continent of Africa our Lower 9th Ward. Sigh. I don’t know how he sleeps at night, much less how he gets out of bed in the morning.
So I am living my little life, trying to be a good global citizen, and thought I have to do something--if only a small something--to deal with all this travel we are doing. So I googled around and asked another group of really smart women I know and I bought “carbon offsets” for my siblings who were here and for the air travel I know I will be doing this year and while I was at it, for my house and car. Will it make a difference? I like to think so. I can tell you more, give you names of organizations that were recommended to me. Just ask. You can also ask if you need names of organizations in New Orleans that you could support. I always have ideas of places to send money!
• I was reminded recently of an expression about Californians--that they tilted the continent and all the loose nuts (or some equivalent) rolled to California. Well, I think there is something equally unflattering that could be said when they tilted the continent heading towards Florida--I haven’t worked it all out, but I will.
• I read an article around the Super Bowl about what happens to all the gear (t-shirts, caps, etc) they print up for the team that loses but which shows they won. There are rules sent down from the National Football League (and I assume the baseball basketball hockey cricket soccer figure skating etc folk) that those items will never be seen in the U.S. (Not even on ebay, according to the article!) There is, in the case of the NFL, a charity (World Vision) that distributes them to people who can wear them far from our watchful eyes, in “developing” countries. It reminded me that I bought a t-shirt in Indonesia for the World Series Champion Cleveland Indians when they weren’t. The difference there was that I bought it at a department store in a fancy mall in Jakarta. Wonder how they got there...fell off the charity truck?

Life is NOT Boring

I moved to this sleepy little island off the coast of Florida in hopes of simplifying my life. I wanted to get healthy, do good work, and make quilts. Some of that has worked out. The problem is this is not a sleepy little town and things ain’t simple.

I have heard many times--and could use a good quote to the effect--it is impossible to control one’s life and the harder we try, the more out of control things get. I am living proof.
I moved to this place where a lot of others moved who were realllllly successful in an earlier life at another location and who thought they were going to kick back only they really aren’t wired to do that so they wind up being as busy as they were in the real world doing wonderful things for the environment, and the arts, and politics, only in shorts and sandals, and it exhausts me. Somehow, I got caught up in it and suddenly, I have to carve out time to do what I want to do or nothing. I hide to have free time. It’s not what I expected.

This winter, Gini and I chaired our women’s group’s annual fundraiser. What was I thinking? It was a lot of work, and working with a group of strong intelligent capable women is akin to herding cats. Cats with feelings. Some days I wanted to shoot them all. Some days, I could have kissed...well, at least a few of them. Through it all, I had to remind myself that the money we raise will help many people and I actually saw the forest for the trees. It was beyond challenging.

Meanwhile, there’s plenty of other stuff going on, and oh yeah, the dog and siblings visits and parents being gone and my computer took a dive and when fixing it they broke the case which meant three more two-hour-round-trips to the fix it place then... But most of it’s good--though not boring--and I am not complaining though you could probably detect a whine in there somewhere, but then again, it wouldn’t be me without it.

Welcome to PNewL PNewS

After 15 years of printing this and then putting it up on a website, I am finally going to stop fighting the trends and go to a blog. I can't remember how long I have been fighting this but Deborah Branscum suggested it around the time she moved to Sweden so you could ask her.

I will continue to attempt to put together a bi-monthly edition which I will remind you of, but I may also add a few things in the meantime. I am trying to work out all this new technology. I went to the bother (enjoyed it actually) to learn to write HTML and now I have to start all over again, so bear with me. I am only about six months behind in getting this most recent edition out--the next step shouldn't take that long but you never know. It's hot here in Florida so we hibernate.

Hope this finds you all AOK. Keep in touch.
Peggy