PNewL PNewS
Volume 26 Issue 6 “All the pnews that phits.” February 2019
In Search of a Title
Next winter, I am not making plans to leave the house between November and March. It’s too stressful to watch the weather reports and experience the heartbreak of bad weather on the few days I really want to do something.
One day that didn’t mess me up this winter started at 3am. A successful before dawn drive to Greenville resulted in a slow but successful trip to Puerto Vallarta. En route, I met up with other members of the class I would be attending and the transfer to Hacienda Mosaico was painless.
I have taken classes with Molly, a talented metalsmith and supportive teacher (even for those of us with Itty Bitty Skills), before and I knew jewelry was not my strong suit (and come to think of it, I have an even weaker skillset with clay). The class is called Silveramics, the setting a lovely super-artistically decorated hacienda in warm weather in the dead of winter. The draw of travel and artful crafting was irresistible.
Silveramics is the creation of Molly, the silver part, and David, the porcelain guy, First we learned to layer colored porcelain to make cool patterns. Then we formed them into something hopefully useable, and then we waited…for the kiln to tell us if we’d done it right. Then we started playing with jewelry designs. It was exciting and inspiring to see the results and to see how each student used what they had made. (Shameless plug: https://mollysharpmetalsmith.com/silveramics/)
We ate well, we worked hard, and we had a congenial group. Oh and we could swim after lunch. Lunch? Oh my. The food was incredible and beautifully presented. Jorge, the chef, was a magician.
Then, not with a bang but a whimper, I was off to the next phase. A taxi to a bus to a meet up with Doug and Barbra and a taxi to a beach town that will remain nameless to protect its simplicity and charming atmosphere ended with an icy beverage and perhaps a sunset—the sunsets were stunning.
When I first arrived, the silence caused my ears to ring—it was so different from the hustle and bustle of PV. Our accommodations provided a great outdoor space to decompress after a lot of people time. (My fellow students were good talkers!) Doug and Barbra have an impressive community they’ve created over the 12 years they’ve been going so mostly, I hung by another pool and watched them come and go on their adventures.
I have wanted to visit them for a while. As one who doesn’t usually return to places (except for a few islands that come to mind), I was curious. Now I get it—it’s an easy place to be with nice people to be with. And there’s good food available and things to do and plenty of opportunity to just hang out.
I am beginning to see the appeal of going some place warm and sunny in the winter. Perhaps it’s aging or maybe I am just getting smarter.
Things I am Learning
& Miscellaneous Observations
• I went to a volunteer gig last week and my “boss” wasn’t there so I left…and suddenly, I had FREE time. I have a lot of free time actually but this was unexpected and somehow really special—and Roger the dog wasn’t expecting me! I didn’t go on some grand adventure, but I did stop at the grocery store on the way home. It was 10:15-ish and apparently that is when people like me and older go to the grocery store. It made me laugh. (Coincidentally, I have wound up at Trader Joe’s and another grocery store since then and have found the same scene…few people, all with grey hair.)
• I couldn’t fall asleep last night so I was thinking about visiting different states in this country. I have been to all of em but have not slept in all of them. So then I went across the country in my mind to figure out which I haven’t slept in. I am pretty sure I haven’t slept in Delaware or Rhode Island. On the other hand, I don’t remember why/when I would have slept in Wisconsin, Indiana, Mississippi, Alabama or Maryland. Several I would rather not sleep in again (probably don’t want to even visit—see notes on visiting Kansas a couple years back), but I haven’t made that list yet.
• I know I have said this before but it’s happened again—I am wasting time on a website for tools wondering what I would need these things for. Then I have to remind myself, if I don’t know what it’s for, I don’t need it. Move on.
• Based on the crap that has been done to my teeth during my life—starting with a sadistic dentist who drilled massive holes for the bad brownies (cavities) without Novocain, through braces and an orthodontist who refused to complete the process after I broke my front teeth, through a bajillioncrowns on the front teeth, through the resulting trashed teeth because of the sadist’s massive holes—one would think that I would be used to dental disasters. Last night when the crack the dentists were watching caused half the tooth to fall off, I was once again startled. It’s like vertigo I think. Unsettling. By 3pm the next day I had a temporary crown and the worst…for now…is over.
• Wash your sweaters!! It makes a difference.
• Also, send some hot water down your plumbing every once in a while. I dropped an earring down my bathroom sink and spent a couple days trying to get the pipe off. Finally, I sat in front of it and thought, “What would Jeff do?” and I tapped all around it and it finally unscrewed. What a scary mess. I found the earring but it was like the Creature from the Black Lagoon in there. Very satisfying to clean it up but it made me wonder about other fixtures. I remember when the nice man spent hours trying to clean out some pipes in the Florida house—he said houses need people to live in them, run water through the pipes regularly. Huh. Good advice. (To clarify: I do live here, I just don’t always run as much water as most people do. Comes from living in the land of drought during my formative years.)
• Sometimes I get good information from seemingly goofy places…like articles titled 5 Things that Tidy People Do That You Don’t or something like that. Tidy people pick up as they go. I do not. But I am going to try. They also don’t store stuff on the floor, which is like a WOW moment to me. I thought that was what the floor was for…What does one do when all the horizontal surfaces are already covered? Okay, will work on that too.
• There was a nametag for Diane in my bathroom garbage. Who is Diane and where’d that come from?
• I told my doctor that I didn’t like to visit her because it was in her office that I had to face aging—that I was told that what was happening was age-related. I told her she needed to be a cheerleader: You’re aging beautifully! Go girl go! This annual “wellness check” seemed especially short. Didn’t take off my clothes, just lungs heart (listen) ears and mouth (look). That’s not how I remember annual check ups before. Perhaps she didn’t appreciate my comments.
• Speaking of aging, I think it was at about my age that my mother was diagnosed with emphysema. Humbling.
• I am thinking of dropping my landline. Then I thought, I’ll send out an email saying delete my landline number, and since most people’s records are not perfect, I figured no one would know which was which, and then I thought, it doesn’t really matter--I don’t answer either of em!
Speaking of dropping the landline, it is interesting. I have had one since…well…forever, and it feels odd to drop it. How will I find my cellphone? How can I multi-task with a cellphone? It doesn’t fit in the crook (?) of my shoulder as well as my cordless does. For instance, I finished cleaning the refrigerator (OMG, what a nightmare—I thought at one point perhaps I should just buy a new one!) while talking to Peter on the landline—I couldn’t do that on my cellphone (and I am not so good at speaker phones.) And I love my phone number. But…well, stay tuned.
• I told a friend that I was feeling kind of obsessive about travel this year—more than average, and she said her husband put it this way: It’s the go-go 60s, the slow-go 70s, and the no-go 80s. I’m going with that—only aren’t the 70s the new 60s or something like that?
• I’ve read many good books since last I listed them so I thought I’d make another list. I’m an audiobook junkie so most of these I “read” with my ears.
*Waking up White and Finding Myself in the Story of Race/Debby Irving. Ignore the part about journaling and answering her questions—I did.
* Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America/Michael Eric Dyson. A little dry but good and he lists a ton of authors and books to read towards the end.
* We’re Going to Need More Wine/Gabrielle Union. Funny, honest essays.
* Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers her Superpower/ Brittney Cooper. Fast sharp great audiobook. I’ll listen again because there is so much in it. (I’ve started buying some of these and donating to the library so they’ll be there—kinda like a public storage unit.)
* Becoming/Michelle Obama. Listen to her read it…she’s awesome and honest.
* You’ve Been So Lucky Already/Althea Black. Good frantic honest and not race related!
Plus a John Grisham, a James Patterson or three, a few Michael Connellys, etc.
Re-reading this, I suppose I should be embarrassed by my horrifying cleaning experience, but I’m not.
“There is no social change fairy. There’s only the change made by the hands of individuals.”Winona LaDuke
