The sun worked its way over the horizon with usual orange pinks and dark purples. The color spreads from window to window as the site of its rising grows more yellow. Sharon Butala told herself “If I could do nothing more, I could pay intense and precise attention, I could at least make a detailed accurate record of life here.” She, having been grafted into rural ranch life with its ups and downs including crushing drought, was talking about much more than the rising sun. But all the same, I think observation, or “paying intense and precise attention” is critical to understanding our place in the world.
I have been in Two Dot many times for the Summer Solstice when the sun rises in my most northern window. I have always wondered if it would rise in the most southern window for Winter Solstice, making a kind of lovely symmetry in the room. And here I am just a week late and while the light of the sun’s rising is vivid in the south window it rises just a little to the north. I will still claim the symmetry of it, the sun drifting from north to south. Of course it is the schoolhouse on this spinning planet that is drifting.

winter palette

A short winter stay in Two Dot began with a little desperation to settle down, to get the most of minimal interruptions and a long horizon. Of course there was family to enjoy, food to cook, food to eat and flies to vacuum…all important. But finally, looking out my six square windows, there is the openness, the stillness I long for.
Even with no snow, or ice, or frost the air is glittering under a bright winter blue sky. Bare cottonwoods and chokecherries stand in deep dark contrast to yellowy beige fields. It is not motionless. A roaring wind ripples through every bit of plant life, but it is constant and steadying. I will not read the whole stack of books I brought or get to all the projects on my list, but I am re-calibrating in a dreamy color palette.

water 6.17.2011

Clouds at the horizon prevent a dramatic sunrise, but the dome of sky is mostly clear promising a sunny day. It is the first thing I look for each morning as I wake, the winter having starved me of light. But I am thinking of those 30 families who lost their homes in Roundup too. Lucky/unlucky…there are really no words…no concepts to fit disasters. Everyone has his/her own circumstances, yet I cannot say there is some divine universal plan. The fact of 30 homes under water, 30 families loosing their savored possesions, their comfort, is exactly why I do not believe in grand plans from the universe. Things happen: rain falls, ground saturates, water rises, rivers swell, basements fill, roads are covered, then the river seeps under the door sill. If you haven’t left already, you move upstairs as water rises on the chair legs and stains the wallpaper. And when it begins to fill the teacups on the top shelf, you think about climbing to the roof…hoping for a clear sky and sun in a way I never have…with the fervent prayers of need. Hope turned to supplications…desperation. Am I resisting the existence of a spirit world? a great something? No… but I think we’ve been left in charge with all the tools in the shed.

west wind

The terrain shifts on Interstate 90 between Missoula and Garrison. That is where I feel the elastic band between one home and the other gather tension and pull stronger toward Two Dot. This line passes through me someplace just below my chest. I feel each end. Here. There.
Summer is our usual time to make this trip. I have often said I would not want to live in Montana through the winter. But last Sunday on that final bit of I-90 before we turned off onto Highway 12, fresh snow powdered the landscape leaving just enough brush showing through to define the hills like an etched print. The sky met those hills in a thin veil filtering a persistent sun. Cutting through the landscape, the Little Black Foot River was chunked with icy blue and rimmed with red twigs. What would it be to remain through a winter? Would it alter who we are?
In Two Dot, the familiar summer scene had completely changed. A dome of blue exchanged for white, leafy trees now dark silhouettes, and green and gold fields now white with a sheen of yellow stubble. Grey brown deer with snow on their backs searched for something to eat down in the dry grass in Mac Whites field… a herd protected by a few cranky ranchers…certainly not disdainful of hunting, but perhaps contrary to outside hunters.
We arrived in the afternoon. John tinkered with the furnace and turned on the water. I, wrapped in many layers of clothing, swept up dead flies. The schoolhouse was warm enough to crawl into bed at 9pm with three extra blankets, a fleece, a beanie, hoodie and gloves.
Our first full day was mostly quiet. John heard a few gunshots. Three hunters walked by under the kitchen window with a sledded deer, shouldered guns and big grins. I am in favor of hunting for food; respect those who take responsibilities for the meat they eat. And yet, I cannot reconcile the stiff carcasses hanging in trees with the animals that so easily sprint on 4 thin legs bounding over fences in beautiful arcs. But here we are in Two Dot during hunting season, the town taken by another agenda.
Tuesday, the temperature dropped to eight below zero and snow blew lightly from the east. There was little activity: some deer in the field, a few birds and everyone settled into their heated homes. Everything is muffled, not to silence but deep quiet. Richard told us that an east wind never amounts to much, but that the cold would break when a serious wind came from the west. A miserable day he warned…and so we stayed, watching.
On Wednesday the promised wind arrived. I spent the entire day trying to understand wind speed…miles per hour, knots, and the symbols that describe it all. On Thursday the wind still howled through the valley. The snow that covered nearly everything as a white sheet over abandon furniture blew fast and close to the ground. It gathered speed and collected in tall peaks and long rippling waves. This wind swept the sky as well. The stratus veil that hung heavy for days was gone in the night, and when I woke at 3am the stars were visible, the big dipper balancing on the tip of its handle. At 7:45 the sun crested Mac White’s field after a display of mackereled pink. Four grey partridge huddled into a low depression it the yard just as John and I huddled under comforters and quilts, waiting for the furnace to catch up. It is struggling to keep up with the blowing cold.
Wind is everything now. It is like an inside out train. The landscape roaring past us in billows of snow, as we stay still. What is the sound made with? Wind moving invisibly along, can only be seen by its effects on everything around it. And yet, at this speed it has its own sound. It is more the sound you here when you hold a shell to your ear than the ocean ever was. It is a rustling skirt amplified, a tympani roll slowed down. When I sit quiet, listening, it is joined by all the things it affects, the creaking attic, rattling doors and windows, rustling branches. The biggest gusts vibrate through the floor as the whole building shakes.
I looked forward to going to bed and lying still under layers of blankets. They are so heavy; they hold my shape when I get up for a minute to check outside the window. How far across the yard has the snow drift blown? Are there stars? A moon? But, even without getting up, I know if the wind is still blowing because I listen for it even in my dreams. It is a spirit, a ghost, a haint; it carries a presence beyond itself. And so I lay encased in my comfortable shroud wondering what the wind has to tell me, what is it trying to say.
The sun came up in a show on this our last full day at the schoolhouse. A long dark blue cloud above Mac White’s hill with pink underneath, curtains to the drama. We have been here just five days. Five days full of weather. The wind is still a presence, but calmed from yesterday’s 30-40 miles an hour. It fluctuates in intensity, but is still a constant sound. It is more blanket than punctuation and it ties me to this place, location, time, and season. The wind is seductive, luring me into its hold, “Stay…stay all winter…see what might be hollowed out, what drifts might be swept away.”

blue

The Field Guide to Getting Lost has been my guide all summer. Rebecca Solnit writes throughout the book about “the blue of distance,” referring to it as a beautiful magical blue that is only achieved by being separated from location. I tried to understand it in the beginning of the summer by climbing to the top of the jungle gym and documenting the distant deep blue hills with the Cannon Rebel but it was just another horizon snapshot. She wrote about gains and losses and their proximity to each other, longing being both about not having something and a way of holding something more closely. I was introduced to Simone Weil who wrote in, To Desire without an Object, “Let us love the distance which is thoroughly woven with friendship since those who do not love each other are not separated.” And now I am separating from the Montana that I love, hoping that she will love me back even in my absence. I think I understand “the blue of distance,” better. It is the dreamy mystery of where you are not, it is the melancholy and longing for what you love and hope to return to. Goodbye Montana.

taking leave

The owl was in the Vestal Place sheep shed with a companion. They both took their leave when we rounded the corner, one through the hole in the roof and the other over my head and out the barn door. I caught just its wing in a photograph. Richard and his sister Sonja both responded to our last sighting as if the owl was an old friend. “He’s been there forever,” they each said, then both speculating that perhaps this was a descendant of the owl they knew as children. “But owls live a long time,” Sonja added. I found another owl feather on the shed floor, but the wind took it. Yesterday I found a small owl feather on Daisy Peak and the wind snitched it from my pocket. I must have my quota all ready. The feathers are brown and cream with strips run across the grain…a complicated set of information all coming together to make a barn owl.
The time has come to gather my things and leave the sheep shed. The wind will continue to push in and around this structure without me, occasionally clutching at the now loose corrugated roof. And when it is very hot, the roof will crackle, but only the owls will be there to hear it with their beautiful feathered ears. It is time to leave the Vestal Place all together, not knowing if I will have the chance to return. Maybe never understanding why it draws me or why I could sit on this overturned half barrel on a floor of manure just inside the large barn door for hours listening to a soundtrack of wind, birds, insects, and sometimes cows, no longer sheep. It is time to drive up the old road and out of this valley, across the prairie and through the barbwire gate for the last time this summer. Every thing behind me pulling me back, the silence that is not silent, the emptiness that is not empty.

numbers and magic

The Two Dot community gathered at the fire hall for Rufus Kimrey’s 70th birthday. There was pulled pork from seven roasts, seven coolers of beer, two macaroni salads and a one-man band. Rufus danced with his number one sweet heart. And I talked with Mildred Ward who is 90 and upright and full of “piss and vinegar” as she described it. Mildred claims two things to be her medicine: working outside and wearing a hat in the sun. I rubbed one of her arms like a genie’s bottle and asked if her good health would rub off. She said, “I’ll give you a hug if that will help,” and promptly wrapped her two strong wrinkled arms around me. I took the magic.

traces

H Vestal 1905 carved into the sandstone. “All you can leave is thought,” Henry Real Bird’s idea, or at least his quote. H. Vestal left his name...a measure of where he once stood. His trace just here with this line of horizon, its dips and peaks largely unchanged. Is this place different for his standing here? We still call this ranch The Vestal Place in honor of his effort to etch upon these rolling scrabble hills a means of survival. The small house still standing, 4 rooms and a privy, the support of outbuildings. It is nostalgic to me for its trace of a long ago lambing season, me fifteen years old and naive to ranching. I was unaware that I was making a memory still held close in this my 57th year. What will The Vestal Place or anywhere hold of me when I am gone? “All you can leave is thought.” Is it true? Or are there less defined remnants of those whose shoes mark this soil. We spend a lifetime considering it and a lifetime unknowingly laying down traces that will remain.

gaining the night

I want to dream of Two Dot when I sleep. I want to keep my body here not worrying over classrosters or check out counters or places I need to be. I don’t want to wonder where I am as I gain consciousness, just slip from one state to another under the perfect bowl of Montana sky. And when I open my eyes in the night, I want the piercing starts I see to match the ones that I’ve been dreaming, each needling into my skin throughout the night…a kind of acupuncture. I want to breath with the deer that bed down in the field, to feel the owl’s lament in my chest and sense the river’s dark satin slip past my skin… everyone of these things returning me to my own flesh and the particular impression my head makes on the pillow. And then, when the sun rises, I wont have been away. The sand hill cranes and rabbits will find me here unscathed from the ravages of displacement. I will have gained the night and multiplied the hours.

open spaces

The dinner dishes were cleared and conversation chattered back and forth, but when there was a brief lull my cousin Richard said, “I have to tell you a story about my daughter’s mentor.” He speaks slowly with open spaces between most words as if leaving room for the Montana sky to coexist with what he has to say. He must have been working up to the telling because we had eaten an entire shrimp feed and sour cream lemon pie between his first mentioning the mentor and this announcement. These stories are rare and Richard’s friends and family know to settle down to listen. As it turns out the story was a sentimental one, not unusual, about the uncle of this man who meant so much to Richard’s daughter. It was far removed from its source, but had taken on folkloric even mythic proportions. The uncle had been in Hungry as World War II ended and was part of a detail offering assistance to survivors. The soldiers, including this uncle, were passing out Hersey’s chocolate bars to children. At this point in the story Richard’s eyes begin to collect water. He is a sentimental man. His wife Alicia teases that she can’t take him out in public, as you don’t know when he might tear up, which is not untrue. As the story goes, this uncle of the man who mentored Richard’s daughter went back to Hungry as an old man and by some serendipitous coincidence met up with one of the children he had given the chocolate to. The boy had saved the Hershey’s wrapper…perhaps as a testament to hope or generosity. And this boy, who was now a man, insisted on giving the wrapper back. At this point in the story it is clear Richard can go no further. The rest of us at the table easily fill with sighs and clucking, but it is Rufus’s beautiful South Carolina drawl at just the right pace “that’s a real nice story,” that complements the telling. There are places around the world that inspire slower speaking. Do these places also inspire a trust of “observational powers,” as Annie Proulx calls them. This place, the eastern Montana prairie is a place where time invested in observation inspires quiet and consideration.

what remains

...the places are what remains, are what you can possess, are what is immortal. They become the tangible landscape of memory, the places that made you and in some way you too become them. They are what you can possess and what in the end possesses you. Rebecca Solnit

mail room

Two Dot Spot Project #2 continues from the school house. When there is enough light to use a date stencil, my time and location are recorded on a postcard with a few lines about the day written on the back. The postcards are mailed to those who request them.

working

Craig and I weathered the weather, rain, hail, sun and wind together for a week. He furiously making art and me thinking about making. The studios did nearly grind to a halt for 36 hours of 45 mph winds blowing our brains out. The few birds we saw flying were low and taking cover to the backs of trees. The only thing to defy the constant heavy hand of wind bending everything to the east was the white tailed deer. Drawn to the tender leaves of fallen branches a few wandered into the neighbors yard in the afternoon. Earlier Craig and I speculated about animals hunkering down to wait out the storm but we were proven wrong. I counted a dozen does and bucks from the kitchen window; closer to dusk there were at least 18. Their agenda became unclear as there wasn't much left to forage. Was it refuge, or just a night in Two Dot when the residents had forsaken their lawnmowers and were safely held indoors.

In the morning the wind still made a rolling ocean of the pasture and wrapped the school house in an undercurrent of sound. Craig braved his camera and went out to record and I was seduced by the light raking across the hills outside and the comforter covering my feet. The familiar bright patches showed up on my studio walls and floor and I began to think about work.

first day of summer

2.21.2010
I went on a walk to mail postcards and photograph the river swollen from record rains, but once out I was drawn further down Haymaker road. I was not lost, but was seeing what I had not seen before: wild iris blooming in the ditch, the way antelope tease and chase…always out of camera range, and a pair of birds inadvertently flushed out from the fence line. They made such a ruffle and squawk I couldn’t make out their makings to identify them in my new Introduction to Familiar Species: Montana Birds.

Sitting by the irrigation canal, putting my head back on the gravel for full horizontal sun exposure, I couldn't recall another spontaneous walk that ended in sitting still by water, alone and without book or journal or other devises to keep me from getting “lost.” Was it high school?

On the way back, I noticed a metal ring in the ditch. It looked like the top of a crock pot. Trash! was my first thought, but as I got closer, I saw that it was a hubcap...not trash! Pulling it from the mud that is so close under the dirt’s surface, I saw that it was a unblemished chrome moon…perfect for reflecting the sky. I carried it home, inspiring the one truck that passed to slow down…a hubcap break down?? The driver was dressed in perfect John Wayne western gear. As he pulled up he must have realized what I was carrying. “Just walking?” he asked. “Just walking,” I laughed back and he was off again leaving me with my own stated purpose.

lost

The birds are singing and while it is chilly, it is worth having the windows open. The first morning here, a western meadowlark woke us at six. Since then we have seen pheasants, sand hill cranes, robins, magpies, flickers, and birds I have yet to identify. We are back in Two Dot and it is time for intakes of breath, for long-lasting gazes, for taking in before putting out.

I am reading Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost. She refers to a quote from Meno, “How will you go about finding that thing the nature of which is totally unknown to you?” It doesn’t seem like a completely impossible task here. Reading about getting lost inspired me to consult my Visual Thesaurus subscription, a gift from Lynnette who also believes in the power of words and understanding their meanings. As all of the synonyms for lost circled into view I was surprised to realize I hadn’t thought of the Christian reference… a counter to being saved – unregenerate. But Solnit is interested in a type of being lost that removes the prefix “un”: unsaved, unredeemed, un-recoverable. All of these words suggest preferable states that cannot be achieved. In fact the thesaurus lists few references that don’t have a negative undertone but amongst the prefixes un, miss, dis. I found be…bemused, bewildered, befuddled. Be means completely, thoroughly, deeply absorbed in. I like the suggestion of humor in these three words. And I am wondering, can I be searching, getting lost, and amused all at the same time?

return

We returned via the Highwood Bar in Highwood, MT. Jim and Rosita celebrating their 45th wedding anniversary with all 5 children, 4 grandchildren, siblings and spouses. We were nearly interlopers, nearly cousins, but welcome just the same. A generous family. We stayed over night in Vaughn where Nels boards cows as well as overnight cousins. The cows were a menagerie of shapes and sizes including Annabelle a long horn. It was a circus collection.

driving home

3.22.2010
9:51am Mountain Time, Highway 90

We just discovered that the Clark Fork River flows west from Missoula, toward the mountains, seemingly uphill. At St Regis it turns north toward Flat Head Lake, as if changing its mind or recognizing its folly. We on the other hand, labor up and over the mountain, deepening the groove between our two homes. For now Montana will have to wait, but this homeward trip will be reversed in June. Always driving home, be it one or the other.

glitter

3.20.10
7:55am
The sun is squarely framed in the window across from where I am sitting. It is bright white and illuminates fields dusted with last night’s snow. This reporting of the condition of the day serves as a beginning, a connection to my surroundings. When I look up again, the wind is blowing round the house lifting ice crystals into a flurry with sunlight reflecting off each facet. The empty air is electrified with glitter, as if to say the emptiness is not just important, it is not empty.
When I picked up this book to write, I was thinking of the repetition of practice, of the things that connect me to this place, to my day and to those I reach out to. I have been reading about Robert Irwin, who said “as an artist the one true inquiry of art as a pure subject is an inquiry of our potential to know the world around us and truly being in it.” In that Irwin draws no hard lines between himself and his audience, this may be a broad imperative. I am remembering Russell Rowland’s idea being a westerner; recognizing the desire to connect with whatever place you are in. Are being an artist, an art audience, and a westerner, the same? Is my desire to take note of the sun’s position throughout the day part of “knowing” where I am?
I chase light through the house, from window to window, recording its angle and intensity with leftover coffee and the sumi ink I drove 80 miles to get just because it is so lovely on the page. Is this being an artist? A westerner?
I had planned to record resent events: a visit from Stevie and the kids, John’s progress tiling the guest bathroom shower, brisk walks to the post office, short chats with Anne the post mistress, and Judy ever present in the post office, the rabbits in the yard, the deer in the field, the antler I found that was shed this winter in our croquet field, a pheasant strolling in the neighbors grass. These small moments in each day build connection, but just now I am dazzled by the whiteness of the morning and sunlight has just sliced in through the windows. It is time for work.

an observation

3.17.2010
7:30am
We wake up later in March. A small hill to the east prolongs the sun’s rising even more than daylight savings time. It should be up in another 15 minutes. I woke up at 6:30. The stars had dimmed to Seattle brightness, only a hint of their Two Dot nightlife. Around 7 there was an intense crimson pre-dawn strip and I am now waiting for the sun itself. Last night at a reading in Harlo, Russell Rowland said that what defines him as a westerner is a strong desire to make a connection with wherever he is. He went on to say that Eastern Montana requires a closer looking to be appreciated. Looking closely is what we do here.
Mac White’s field is filled with white-tailed deer this morning. I counted 23 through my field glasses. The deer’s coats are the color of dry winter grass. It is the white under their tails that gives them away. Last night on our way home, two whitetails came up from the side of the road. John slowed and swerved, but one still hit the car. It seemed they could not stop their trajectory once begun. John wanted to turn around, but of course there was nothing to be done. He pulled over and a car sped past, clearly the deer was not dead or dying in the road. She was either mortally injured in the ditch or bruised and battered with an uncertain future. I want to go back and look, like picking a scab. I know there are too many whitetails, that they are overtaking Mule deer habitat, but I don’t want to be responsible for injury or death. And yet, we set the mousetraps and swat the flies. I guess observation extends to recognizing our own place and impact.
The ranch is deep into calving. We went out our first evening here to watch Maggie, the Border collie work the expecting cows into the corral for the night. She is getting older, but still loves to work, controlling the much larger animals with eye contact. She is in charge in the field, but once they’re in the corrals she knows to stay out. Richard claims that Maggie has a relationship with each one. He described them lining up at the fence for her to lick each nose. We didn’t see it then. Were the cows too preoccupied with their forthcoming deliveries? Two calves were born that evening while we were in the house at happy hour. We got back maybe 10-15 minutes after they arrived. Richard had warned us, “If you stay and watch it will take hours and if you go to happy hour they’ll already be delivered when you get back.” We did watch as the calves struggled to stand. They need to suck in the first hour before the cow’s colostrum turns to milk. One of the calves had a difficult time, once up she listed and tipped straight over sideways. Funny at the moment, but later we learned the calf had weak joints that needed to be splint. It took a day of working with the calf and feeding by hand to get it on its feet and sucking. Now it is honorifically called “Splint.” Other calves have not overcome their difficulties: one squashed by an adult, others to weak to survive. Richard calls this ranching. Do ranchers harden themselves to these tragedies and losses, or is hardening not required? Is it just a different outlook? This callousness is matched by respect for the animals. It is calming to watch Richard move through his cows wearing the colors of the landscape, nearly silent, only slight movements of his arms directing traffic, singling out those that are “ringing their tails” with the labor of delivery.
Now at 8:30 the sun is beyond the window casing. I am sure the ranch has been active for hours. Jay has gone home from the night shift and new calves have been counted. The white tails in Mac White’s field have retreated to the scrub along the river and I have enough light to begin working.

Two Dot Spot Project #2: as the world turns

6.17.09 6:03am I was awake briefly at 5 to see a bright red pre-dawn strip on the horizon and to hear the densest layers of birdcalls. I know the western meadowlark, the magpies, and the sand-hill cranes, but there are many others I don’t yet know.

6.22.09 8:09am Following patches of light through stencils across the wall and then across the tabletop, my work has begun. It is a game to see how much I can get down before cloud-cover stops me or the sun moves beyond the window frame. I mailed three postcards today.

6.27.09 5:38am The sun broke the horizon just a few minutes ago and now at 5:42 it is behind a low grey cloud. Will there be enough light for me to work today? Yesterday was gray most of the day. I only managed two postcards and I mourn the loss of 6.26.09 on my large paper…but 7 is a beautiful number. Maybe these clouds will give. The meadowlarks are singing, perhaps declaiming the day.

7.7.09 7:30am A look at the clock each morning notes the start of the day, but the rising and the setting of the sun determine waking and sleeping. I finished a second large drawing yesterday.

8.7.09 6:07am Eyes on my wall, I am waiting for the sun to clear a last cloud. Each date working with the sun is marked. The absence of the sun marked with the absence of a date. I mailed five postcards today.

8.10.09 6:16am The days are shortening and our Two Dot summer is ending. It is amazing how fast the sun moves. In 10 minutes it has doubled its distance from the horizon and now there are two pink squares on my working wall, one at each end. In the beginning of the summer, the west square began in the middle of my wall, now it starts at the edge. The light is moving so quickly I will need to get up soon to finish the last large drawing. All summer I’ve worked with the movement of the earth as a locater and marker of time. Yet I continue to refer to the sun’s movement. It is hard to wrap my mind around the idea of the ground under my feet moving, yet it is in constant motion…Terra Firma…the solidness we depend on hurling through our universe. Nothing…nothing is as it seems.

early morning Lynnette and Ruthie

a man on a horse

Home for a month and Two Dot seems both far away and just at my back. Looking back is never a good full time occupation, but just a little glance makes me smile.

The first of July was Lynnette's last day at the school house and the day I finished my first large drawing. It was 7:30 in the morning and I was in the middle of tracing 7.01.09 on a sheet of Lenox when I heard cattle...not just one, but cows on the move. Running into the yard I saw the herd in the middle of the Two Dot Hiway. Shouting at Lynnette who was still asleep "the cows are in town", we all managed to roust our Seattle asses down the road with cameras strangling our necks. Two cowboys on horseback were trying to get their animals through town and tolerated us. One calf chose the open pasture. A horse and rider chased after it, but finally gave up in favor of assisting his partner. "I lost it," was all he said. John and I speculated all summer where that calf ended up and wondered just how experienced those cowboys were.

Two days later we saw the professionals in the Harlowton Rodeo collecting calves with whirling lariats, but that was showmanship. By that time, Lynnette was back in Seattle and James, Jamie, and David had joined us. They were more interested in the cowboys themselves than their skills corroborating what I blurted out to Lynnette while that Two Dot horseman tried to maneuver the wayward calf. Not matter what their skills, "there's something about a man on a horse."

Montana Wedding

There is nothing better than a Montana wedding, especially in the summer when bonfires and star lit dancing abound. Shane is my first cousin once removed, although removed from what I am not sure. and now after the party, Jane is my first cousin once removed in-law....an elevated position for sure from the lengthiness of that title. Regardless of genealogy, Jane and Shane are the fabulous people who are fabulous together that you want to celebrate at such an occasion. It was a privilege to be included....from my removed status....and I enjoyed every minute from staring down the moon to whiskey from the secret cooler to dancing with the cousins.

Climate Exchange

Crazy summer weather in 2009....are we globally warmed or just in the middle of a cycle longer than we can remember? Friends and family in Seattle cooked today as we in Two Dot stayed inside the schoolhouse out of the drizzle. It was a good chance to paint walls and contemplate things beyond our understanding.

Jessica Bender our current resident artist has been busy cleaning an antelope carcass, collecting dead moths in a bottle and sewing pearls on a pillowcase. She will leave on Wednesday and we will sweep up the moths alone. Don't miss her show at the Telephone Room in Tacoma opening August 5th. http://thetelephoneroom.blogspot.com/

Six Trips Later

Wondering if you will take me back?
Two Dot Spot has consumed all available moments leaving nothing for posting, but...always believing in room for improvement and the possibility of catching up, I'm back.

First Trip

8.21.7 Six toilets, two urinals, five sinks, a million windows and a full sky of light. Two days in the Two Dot School and we aren’t yet calling it home. There are four more days before returning to our other home, but we long for another week or a month. Yesterday, wind blew through the school and people came in and out taking things, everyone trying to keep a piece of the school. It wasn’t ours yet, we could have still bolted, but we didn’t. Today we signed our names and turned over our check and became a little Montana. Tomorrow we’ll start cleaning the basement.

8.26.7 Four days cleaning deeper and deeper until we were using a shovel to remove crumbled plaster. There is so much work to do, work that will keep going a long time. Will I be able to do “my work” in the school? On the way home, we figured out how to return in miles per gallon, miles per hour, days per travel, and minutes behind the wheel. We left belongings in Two Dot. My good garden hand spade is there so I can clean the edges of the sidewalk and weed in a someday garden. I feel bifurcated. This morning at the halfway back point, we talked about our good fortune and the feelings of not deserving it that come close on the heels of pleasure. There is no way we could deserve this. Never enough good works to deserve life’s pleasures.