Essays and Banjos: An Interview for Rock & Sling

I recently had the chance to interview friend and writer Jessie van Eerden for Rock & Sling. It's up on their rad blog: http://rockandsling.com/

Liberace Western Wear

When I moved to Spokane last summer, my thrifting focused mostly on housewares: dishes, a couch, a coffee table, latch hook art and gewgaws for home and office.

Yours truly models
a snazzy Rockmount Ranch
Wear blouse.

My quarters are in pretty fine shape now (dust topiary notwithstanding), so I’ve returned to my first love: clothes.

This week I’ve been in L.A. on Spring Break with my guy, John, my mom, and my brother. We nosed around some shops in Santa Monica and the Beverly Center, but I approach a Coach store or Tory Burch boutique more like little museums than places where I would actually transact business. I can’t even set foot in one without worry that I’ll set off some kind of hillbilly detector.

I felt most at home at Buffalo Exchange on La Brea. I know I’ve rhapsodized about BE before, but they’ve got my number. I visited that store last spring on a Friday night when the karaoke machine was fired up (patrons received $5 off their purchase if they signed up to sing).

I spied this white Rockmount Ranch Wear shirt and was seduced by its pearly snaps and tablecloth feel. At $4.50 (yay for 50% off tag!), I knew that even if I'd only wear it a couple of times this semester, I’d get my money’s worth.

Though I enjoy reading fashion blogs such as Fashionable Academics or Kendi Everyday in which the bloggers post pictures of themselves in their stylin’ outfit combos, I’m not ready to set up a tripod nor do I live with someone who can snap photos of me just-so. (I’m also not sure if this is a fashion blog or not, but my blog’s identity crisis can wait for another post).

To facilitate the clothing photography, I plan to make my own dress form one of these weekends. My artsy craftsy friends assure me it’s not that hard, and I think they'll come to my aid if I provide the cocktails.

But here I am in these photos. Why yes, that is a robin’s egg blue bra I’m wearing. My concept is Rihanna meets Liberace Cowgirl.

Note too the frilly cuffs and the sleeves (great joy) that are long enough for my dental floss arms!! 

reddish / purplish, forked, upstanding, twiggy / stuff (thanks, WCW)

Almost a year ago to the day, John, my friend Barbara, and I ran the L.A. marathon. I wore my burgundy-brown Nike via Thrift Town shorts even though Barbara and I called ourselves Team Capris during our training. (Our alternate name was Team Velveeta, reflecting our love of post-run grilled cheese). In the race, I wore my water bottle fanny pack, removing the bottle for a baggie of pretzels and Cheez-its. (Why can I not write about running without also writing about food?)
The 2011 L.A. marathon was yesterday. I spent most of the day on the couch at John's parents' house, winnowing down a stack of grading and staring at gray sky, glad we'd picked the right year for that race.
The truth is that I probably haven't run 26 miles total this year. I hope to come out of hibernation, get some new running shoes, pick a race, buy some Teddy Grahams, get moving.
In one of my classes recently, we read William Carlos Williams' poem "Spring and All." One of the things I appreciate about this poem is its un-Hallmark look at the season. In place of daffodils or Easter grass is the "reddish / purplish, forked, upstanding, twiggy / stuff of bushes and small trees / with dead, brown leaves under them / leafless vines--"

Before spring erupts, Williams suggests, one must face winter's brush. In the clutter, "[l]ifeless in appearance, sluggish / dazed spring approaches--" Spring is a resurrection, but not much to look at when it first shows up. Spring is here, especially in the green folds of Malibu. It's spring break, after all (I hope I never outgrow spring break). Although I look to Williams' poem as a reminder that spring's is a slow approach, I'm also struck by how signs of spring do show up overnight. Just last week at my school in Spokane, one day the courtyard was mulch. The next day, crocus.

OK, there's some shopping and thrifting to do in L.A. I'll ease up on the kum-ba-yah about the seasons and get back to business.

Mental Math

We’re getting more light in Spokane (by nearly three minutes a day!). Tonight I drove home from work at twilight. Glorious.

I rode the bus earlier this week because of the freezing rain and snow. I do realize that for a blog that’s purportedly about thrift shopping, I put a lot on here about weather and food. Know that there are some clothing posts to come. I was in Portland last weekend, and found some fun recycled items. I’ll need warmer weather to break out the floral dress and silk blouse and two-toned pink t-strap shoes.

One evening this week on my ride home, I was reading under anemic bus lights with my paperback close to my face. I didn’t pay much attention at first to a woman and two teenagers who boarded. The woman wore grayscale camo skinny jeans and black hightops, which I can respect. One of the girls wore a trucker ballcap kittycorner on her head. The younger, blond one didn't wear any distinguishing accessories. She seemed not to have realized yet that she's pretty.

I should say that eavesdropping on the bus is one of the greatest perks of riding public transit. Attempting/pretending to read is a perfect cover. The girls were asking the woman about what she was like when she was younger. “I was like a girl looking down, with her nose stuck in a book,” the woman said. “I was so shy, not like I am now.”

The girls were teasing her about a new gentleman caller. “He tried to kiss me,” she said, “but I turned away.”

They wanted to know how and why she got pregnant with them when she was so young. “Your dad would just sneeze near me, and I’d get pregnant again.” The woman had much more humor than regret.

Why this family chose this bus on this evening to ask about the stories of their conception, I’m not sure.

But I was sure this was more interesting than my book.

I studied more closely the woman's face. My first thought: she looks like hell. I was trying to figure out how old she was to have teen daughters. 

Maybe she could sense my computations.

“I was pregnant at 16 with your older sister, in 1992.”

Oh.

Then I realized the woman is one year older than I am.

Really.

Uh-huh.

Wow.

Damn.

I couldn’t help but salute her as we exited the bus, young mom and her hatchlings from the front of the bus, me slipping out the side.

Companion Bean

Last weekend I attended a conference in D.C. That city turned out to be a Venn diagram of friends from childhood, my Peace Corps days, and several academic roosts. I’ve spent this week catching up on work and sleep, finding myself drinking pints of Emergen-C and staring at the wall.

Here's Bean Pillow in a moment of repose
with fellow pillows on the chaise.

My birthday has once again scrolled up to the edge of the event horizon, which might explain why I’m grooving on heady questions like “what is the nature of friendship?” and “where is my life going?” (these questions run in tandem with “should I stop at Taco Bell or be a good girl and make real food at home?”).

A word about friendship: long ago, I was a Brownie Scout for one year. I loved the uniform that we were supposed to wear to school one day a week. I favored the cocoa slacks rather than the skirt with my printed uniform shirt and wide sash lean on patches. 

Our initiation ceremony involved circling a round mirror three feet in diameter on a Methodist church floor and ringed with votive candles in glass lanterns like cupped hands. We’d been learning the sign language for the song “Make new friends, but keep the old/ One is silver, and the other’s gold.” To make the sign for “old,” grab at the invisible Father-time beard growing from your chin. “Silver”  and “gold” were similar signs, both like jewelry fluttering from your ear.  “Silver” was a thumbs-up that rocked like a pendulum and descended from your ear. Ditto for “gold,” except for thumbs-up substitute hang-ten. (Dear reader, you should know that my father didn’t raise me to be a quitter; I finished the year as a Brownie scout, exulting in the day camp at the end of the year, which pretty much made up for the fact that we sold magazine subscriptions instead of the famed cookies.)

Who can resist bean pillow's sunrise eyes?

I’m grateful that—unlike facility with a volleyball or small talk—the ability to make friends has come to me pretty easily. I can thank my years as an only child, as well as my habit of switching cities every so often.

II’ve felt homesick here in Spokane but not alone. I have some new/silver friends here (well on their way to gold, nay platinum, status). There’s Dickens, my fearless cat. There’s the rowdy Spokane river I see from my apartment window. At my elbow, there’s my delightful bean pillow, made by friend Lemon Cadet. I read her blog Project: Project with joy even though I am not a crafter (a trip to Michael’s makes my palms sweaty). I experience a kind of contact buzz from her documented crafts that elevates me to a higher self.

No Bad Weather, Only Bad Shoes

When I taught English in Moldova as a Peace Corps volunteer a few years ago, my students would remind me, “There is no bad weather, only bad clothes.”

Today was a good clothes day.

[Imagine I took a photo and posted it here: light caramel cardigan with asymmetrical ruffle detail and raised seams, and a pink tank top with scooped neck with tiny flat ruffle fringe, both from last weekend’s Banana run; and a pair of black Calvin Klein jeans, from Coeur d’Alene Goodwill. This might sound like too much ruffle, but in truth they echoed nicely.]

My problem was bad shoes. Dansko clogs were no match for the slick sidewalks. Wily water! Looked like rain. Felt like ice.

Last week I also had shoe problems. I wore my biker boots even though I knew they weren’t waterproof, so the slush seeped in. I thought I had an extra pair of socks in my desk (no), or that the campus bookstore would sell socks (no longer). We missed our transfer bus, so we had enough time before the next one to browse the ceramic knickknacks, notebooks, do rags, slippers and socks. These socks were divine: orange, synthetic, broken out in a rash of hearts and flowers,  “Cutie” in yellow cursive at the top. 

The students and I spent a contemplative afternoon at St. John the Evangelist, where we walked their canvas labyrinth, a copy of the one in the floor of Chartres Cathedral.

We learned that "labyrinth" is not synonymous with "maze," though they’re often used interchangeably. A maze is a puzzle, with many dead-ends. A labyrinth doesn’t trick you, at least not on purpose. It leads you along one path into the center and back out again.

This difference reminded me of a Sunday School lesson in which the teacher explained the difference between jealousy and envy. You can only be jealous of what you already have, she said. You envy what someone else has.

After all of those lessons, among all those crafts and songs with hand motions and flannelgraph Jesuses and Pharoahs, who can say why this fine semantic shading has stayed with me so clearly?

Love & Goodwill

Precious hours of my youth were spent in shopping malls, especially The Huntington Mall. It was a sanctioned place of supervised privacy, an early arena of financial and social independence.

It was my job to choose my turtleneck-vest combo with care, and to spray my bangs into an exclamatory wing over my forehead. It was my job to have change for the payphone to call a mom or dad to retrieve us in a Dodge caravan with faux wood paneling on the sides. Also important: wearing my sun-and-moon watch with leather strap, so I’d know when to meet up.

John and I strolled along Spokane's Centennial Trail on Sunday.
The red wagon is both a slide and a landmark!

John visited me this past weekend, and while the spring-like weather pushed us out of doors, my coupon for Banana Republic nudged us back in. It makes me happy that John likes shopping in small but potent doses, as do I. We share a similar aesthetic. Mine calls for more hot pink and leopard print than his, but generally we both applaud clothes that are fairly fitted but not clingy, with unexpected details in fabric or stitching.

As the sidewalk icy rinds melted outside, John and I commandeered side-by-side fitting rooms. I helped him find shirts in the sale rack he’d overlooked. He appraised the fit of my cardis.

Dickens waxes reflective next to the disco pillow I found at a thrift store
this past weekend in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.

On a retail high, we drove to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, to track down a vintage shop my friend Thom had recommended. Farther down 4^th street, we hit a thrift store Bermuda triangle. I caught two stores back to back, then we regrouped for happy hour. Happily, we spotted a sizeable Goodwill that was open till 7 on our way out of town! Happy!

Love takes many different shapes, and one of them is a man in a plaid scarf, reading his book on a Goodwill couch, tuning out a little girl banging on a nearby used piano, while you scout out a fitting room to try on your treasure.

John snapped this view of the Spokane River along the Centennial Trail
(in my head, I sing "working on some night ducks...").