Judy – Page 90 – Dear Liza

Busy Easter

Dear Liza,

Easter Sunday wasn’t as warm or sunny as the day before had been, but it was still nice enough to get out for some fun.

After French practice and crosswords, Auntie Bridgett and I walked by our allotment to see how the seeds are doing. We have sprouts! The radishes and lettuces are sending up tiny green baby bits and I am so excited! I will come by tomorrow with the watering can to make sure they stay nice and moist.

We continued through the neighborhood, past pink drifts and blizzards of cherry blossoms, to the Pix-O-Matic on Burnside. Pix is a fancy French style patisserie. Due to Covid, they have installed high end vending machines to sell their pastries, but also Candy, toys, and odd bits of niftiness. We got a small collection of Easter candies and a pastry called a Shazam to have after dinner. Noticing that Kopi coffee was open, we stopped by and had interesting and delicious Ginger and cardamom coffees, and a blueberry scone. We sat at a tiny table on the sidewalk, watching and listening to all the humanity…..conversations, buses going by, car radios. It was nice to be OUT.

We got home and put the goodies away, did some art, and had lunch. Then Grandpa Nelson joined us and we walked way up into the Laurelhurst neighborhood, loving the spring flowers and blossoms on the hundred year old trees.

We got back in mid-afternoon and it was time to start dinner. I was cooking lamb shanks for the first time, and wanted to give myself time to do it right. Shanks tend to be tough, and need low and slow cooking. I used a recipe from The Spruce Eats online, and they turned out wonderfully! Tender, rich and yummy. I made mint sauce out of our mint from the garden, and it made the lamb even better! Hooray! I love learning how to make new delicious things!

Lamb shanks on the table, decorated with Pam Ferraschi’s ceramics

We remembered to save room for the Pix desserts, however. Shazam is an almond cake with caramel and mousse under a paper thin chocolate wrapping. Delicious!

And THEN it was time for my zoom visit with you, Liza. We chatted, giggled, and drew Easter eggs and bunnies. I showed you the collage I’ve been working on (more about that tomorrow) and visited with your mommy and daddy.

We finished off the busy day with “Escape from the Chateau” and working on a new jigsaw puzzle, and headed for bed.

Not bad for an ‘isolated’ Easter.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Portland Rainbow

Dear Liza,

Your great grandma Billie, my momma, knew so many poems by heart that they would sometimes just jump out of her when she was emotional. The words of the poems expressed how she felt better than her own words.

This is one I heard very often, a poem William Wordsworth wrote about 150 years ago. It is about rainbows, but it is also about trying to carry the wonder we feel as children into our adulthood. I have chosen it to accompany some lovely rainbow-colored flowers in our neighborhood.

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:

So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;

So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!

The Child is father of the Man;

And I could wish my days to be

Bound each to each by natural piety.

And that is your poetry for the day.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Still Growing, Part 2

Dear Liza,

Last summer, a few months after the Covid shutdown, I started painting with an online group organized by Ruth Inman. It made sense that we should start painting with flowers…. who doesn’t like flowers?

My skills weren’t very good, and I was scared of making mistakes, but being with an old friend put me at ease. The tremor in my hand got in the way a bit, but I’d just power through, realizing that the wiggly lines could be just part of the picture. Flowers don’t have straight lines, anyway.

As the year passed, Ruth would give us challenges to use different materials, like candy wrappers or other recycled papers. These let me realize that ART didn’t have to mean making a perfect painting every time. The making, the process, was the main thing. If other people liked it when you were done, that was a bonus. But it was not the main goal.

Realizing that, I got more confident. I also came to understand that different media work in different ways. Watercolors always show through, so planning is crucial. Acrylics are more forgiving and will cover up mistakes. Collage needs a careful hand but is amazingly freeing. And all of these can be used in the same piece, if you like!

This is my new favorite, a remembering of a drive along the Willamette. As I sat on a bench looking at Mt. Hood far away across the river, I planned out how I would construct it. Watercolors for the sky and ground, THEN the distant mountain (out of a bit of Kleenex box), THEN the flowers/ trees in front of it, then the river and dogs. I found the note in the sky folded up in our picnic table, and wanted to include it.

I built up from the background to the foreground, and was pleased with how it turned out. The snow on the mountain is a tiny bit of Posca marker.

I’ve learned a lot this year. Mostly, I learned that I am still learning, which is a good thing.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Seeds In!

Dear Liza,

Finally! After months of anticipation, we have seeds and a plant in the ground at the allotment. The weatherman has promised we will have no more frost this spring, so it was time to commit.

Auntie Bridgett went along with me, though she is not a gardener; there is too much mud involved for her liking. But she wanted to draw the garden, keep me company, and make notes. That’s what she does.

We bundled up against the chilly morning, carrying the seeds, the lavender plant, and nifty home made garden markers along in a bag. We chatted briefly with other gardeners. After so long in isolation we long for companionship, but we were all there on our own missions. The camellia tree had given us more blossoms, and I realized it may be a good idea to trim it back just a wee bit, to give us more space and sunlight. All good relationships need a little space, right?

The soil was very lumpy, and I spent a lot of time crumbling the clods between my fingers, making a smoother bed for my seed babies. I sprinkled the seeds in and patted the soil gently, laying down a bit of of decomposed straw over the top to keep them damp.

When my back was tired and my fingers were numb, it was time to lock the tools back in the shed and head out. Light rain is predicted for a few days, and should get the seedlings started. I am so excited for what happens next!

That marker says “LETTUCE”. That burst of green is a lavender transplant.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Back to the Riverside

Dear Liza,

On the way back to Portland, we all felt the need for snacks. We stopped at the very posh Lake Oswego Safeway and got coffee and pastries. I was in awe of the enormous collection of Kosher for Passover goodies! Kosher wines, macaroons, and a dozen different kinds of matzoh.

There was whole wheat matzoh, bran, rice based, and even spelt. But it was the gluten-free matzoh, Made of oat grain that made me laugh. I showed them to Auntie Bridgett but instead of laughing, she wanted to get them! Wheat based things don’t always agree with her stomach, and she thought this would be an interesting experiment. We got a box, almost choking on the five- times -regular-matzoh price tag, to have (along with Grandpa Nelson’s regular) for our Seder that evening.

With our new matzohs carefully stashed, we again set off for the city. We drove north on Taylor’s Ferry Road , catching glimpses of the mighty Willamette River between buildings and trees. “Should we find a place to stop?” Auntie Bridgett asked. “Yes, please,” I said.

Mount Hood, waaaayyy across the Willamette River

She found parking at Willamette Park, which had a very busy boat ramp. Apparently, everyone agreed with us that the day was too nice to stay inside. At the park we were again treated to a show of nature and humanity that we have been missing for a long winter and an even longer shut-down.

The sweeping views of the river and parkland seemed to open up our hearts, letting fresh air in. We just sat and let the sun soak into our skin, warming us right through.

After we had walked along the river, visited with more dogs, and soaked up hours of sunshine, it was really time to go home. We finished the drive, then rested and cooked dinner for our first night of Passover. We said thanks for our good health, our sweet life, and our good company.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Sunny Day, Sweeping the Clouds Away….

Dear Liza,

It was so pretty out Saturday, we just had to get out in the sun!

Auntie Bridgett and Grandpa Nelson figured out what we should do. While they got dressed, I packed a picnic lunch, and we headed off across the Willamette and south toward Lake Oswego. Looking ahead on the map, Grandpa Nelson found a park we had never been to.

We drove through a forested neighborhood with Tolkien-inspired street names like Rivendell and Arkenstone to the Durham City Park. The trees are still bare, but tiny green shoots are bulging and showing color. We found a picnic table above the soggy ground and enjoyed sandwiches and fruit in the nearly blinding sunshine. People walked by with dogs and kids, scooters and walking canes. It was a slow parade of humanity, all out enjoying the sunshine.

We crossed the footbridge over the Fanno River, enjoying the sounds of the rain-fattened stream. As we walked around the park we couldn’t get over the colors. Ruby red branches. Baby green leaves. Buttery yellow Oregon grape blossoms.

We walked until we were tired, chatting with people about their dogs. We got back in the car, and I thought we were heading back home. But life is full of surprises.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Progress in The Garden Journal

Dear Liza,

I haven’t done much work in the garden, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been thinking about it! My garden journal gives me a place to put my dreams and imaginings down in a art-y, fun, not-having-to-think-too-much-about- it sort of way.

So when the rain comes down and the garden plot is all mud, I dream and draw, get out the collage glue and the watercolors, and have fun making up what I WANT to be doing.

Hopefully, by the time I run out of ideas to paint, spring will have sprung enough to where I can put seeds in the ground.

I am anxious for spring to come and to be able to watch my seeds grow.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Spring Ups and Downs

Dear Liza,

Having celebrated my second lockdown birthday, I have lost some focus lately. Doing art with Ruth Inman and Jody Tockes on ZOOM makes me very happy. So does practicing French on Duolingo, and watching cool British sitcoms and documentaries. But for just a while, these were not feeding what needed feeding.

I got a bit blue. Nothing seemed fun or interesting. I had zero energy and couldn’t carry a conversation. My poor people knew I was sad but didn’t know what to do.

I did a lot of sitting and staring, or holding a book and trying to read. It felt like a light had gone out, that fun was something just out of my reach. I am lucky enough to only deal with this very rarely, and I know it will pass. It is, sort of, day by day.

I go for walks and notice spring flowers and the oddities of our old neighborhood. I try thinking about family and friends, but that just makes me sadder because of the impossibility, just now, of seeing them. I make art and learn history.

I know there is a ramp up out of this darkness, and if I just keep going, I will find it.

See you then.

Love,

Grandma Judy

A “New” Family at Lone Fir

Dear Liza,

Auntie Bridgett and I went for a walk in Lone Fir Cemetery the other day, in between rain showers. There were squirrels everywhere! They were being so friendly that it was a little alarming, fixing us with their little squirrel eyes as if to say, “Well, do you have treats for me, or not?”

As we stepped quickly to get pictures of the furry little guys, I noticed a set of headstones I hadn’t before. Particularly, this one.

Ollie Fliedner was just thirteen when she died “near Dallas Ogn”.
Dallas is a small town south west of here. I wanted to know more about her and her family.

Looking in old, digitized copies of The Oregonian newspaper, I fell down the usual ancestry rabbit hole. Mr. William Fliedner was from Germany and got barber training in New York when he first arrived in America, around 1850. After moving west and failing at gold mining, he started his business empire with a hair cutting and barber saloon in Corvallis. He married Chloe Norton, who had come to Oregon in a covered wagon. They moved to Portland and did well enough that by 1906 the family was able to build The Fliedner Building, which still stands today at the corner of SW 10th.

Chloe and William, Ollie’s parents, were prominent business folks

Mr. Fliedner was prominent in local politics as well, being appointed to the Fire Commission and running for office. He and his wife, Chloe Norton Fliedner, had two children, Ollie and William Louis. Ollie, whose headstone had caught my eye, died when she was just 13. I haven’t been able to learn anything about her short life or early death.

Their remaining child, W. Louis Fliedner, named after his father but called by his middle name to avoid confusion, married Gertrude Miller. Louis and Gertrude had two children; Barbara Jane Fliedner, who later married a Mr. Farmen, and a son, yet another William Louis. This man was the most recent headstone in this family grouping.

This William Louis Fliedner was born in 1915, served in World War II, and passed away in 2009. I still need to find out more about him, but he must have been well loved, living to 94 with a nickname like “Uncle Woo Lucky”!

I love getting to know more about Portland’s history through the folks who lived here, even when information is hard to come by.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Another Landmark Gone

Dear Liza,

It has been a hard spring for trees here in Portland. With so many of our tall giants being over a hundred years old, extreme weather takes a toll.

The other day in Lone Fir Cemetery, we saw with sadness that our General Joseph Lane Tree was gone. This maple tree memorial to the first Territorial Governor of Oregon Territory had come down in a storm and been removed.

The General Lane tree in 2017, with Pioneer Roses in the background

I can find no record of when this tree was planted. It may have been an accident of squirrels or an anonymous memorial to a loved one, as are many of the trees in Lone Fir. In 2009, the Pioneer Rose Association chose it as a memorial to General Lane and listed it as a Heritage Tree, and it joined a list of more than 300 other magnificent trees in the city.

It stood in the center of the cemetery, just across the way from the memorial to the soldiers of the Civil War and the Pioneer Roses of Oregon garden. It was Heritage Tree #295, and stood 100 feet high with a spread of 105 feet. It looked like it would stand forever.

I know in my head that this sort of thing is inevitable. Trees, like humans, are living things and subject to injury and age. But they are also landmarks, survivors of the past lasting into our present to remind us of who has come before.

But in my heart, I mourn for these living monuments. I wonder what finally broke them? Was there more we could have done? What will we do to remember them and honor their life?

And seeing that these monuments can’t last forever, I become obsessed with recording what we have, right in this moment, because I know that someday I will look and they won’t be there.

This year the city of Portland has lost many monuments. The statues of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, even the Thompson Elk, have been vandalized and removed for their own protection. I understand some of the arguments against who they memorialize (except the Elk) but these statues were part of the downtown I loved and I miss them.

Time keeps sliding by. Let’s see and appreciate what we have while we have it.

Love,

Grandma Judy