Dear Liza

Dear Liza,

The other day I accidentally broke something that belonged to Auntie Bridgett. It was the lid of a very nifty baking dish, a gift from a dear friend years ago. I felt awful. There is no repairing it. Could I replace it?

First, I went online. EBAY has it, but I would need to buy both the dish and the lid, and it would cost nearly fifty dollars to buy it and have it shipped. Ouch.

But our neighborhood is full of ‘Vintage’ shops. These carry old things, like garage sales do. Some are fancier, and more expensive, than others.

I went walking. At House of Vintage, on Hawthorne by 35th, I found only three little shelves of kitchen stuff, rather carelessly piled up, and not what I wanted. It was sort of depressing.

I walked west a bit to Vintage Pink, near 24th. This shop is more fussy about what they carry and how they display it. I swear, I saw bar and table arrangements that my Aunt Barbara (who is great at decoration) would have done.

I enjoyed this shop so much! But still no Corningware Buffet Server B-1.75. The lady running the shop recommended a site called “Replacements.com”, which I did… I also (while I was online) tried the Corningware website. No lids in stock at this time.

You know I am stubborn, and I will find a way to try and make this right, to replace what I broke.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

I know, I know… six months ago I was going GAGA over the Spring colors….Purples, pinks, outlandish yellows. But now I’m going to gush a little over Fall’s colors.

Growing up in Southern California, my neighborhood was full of evergreen shrubs and trees. “Less messy!” “Pretty all year!” everyone said. And they were right, in the same way that the same outfit everyday would be. But change…. change is good.

Reading about how to care for my new-ish bonsai forest (The Hundred Acre Wood), I learned that the delicate-seeming bonsais (birch and maple, in this case) need to be exposed to the sometimes freezing cold of winter. This lets them have the hibernation period so they can re-awaken in Spring rested and healthy.

And I think that’s true for us, too. People need to rest, tune out, and re-charge. Small kids (and older folks) take naps, but those in the middle need time off, as well. Life doesn’t always make it easy, but I think it’s important.

For me, real winter is sort of a new experience. This past year I noticed that I did more serious research in winter, not being distracted by the drop dead gorgeous-ness of blooms or leaves. In spring, my eyes began to work overtime and I walked miles everyday, just looking.

This winter I hope to finish my story and get it out to folks to read. A few months of grey and rain may be just what I need.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

The other day I got to go make cookies with Cousins Jasper and Kestrel. I took some sugar cookie dough and some frosting, and even a few piping bags.

Auntie Katie has about a hundred cookie cutters, some of which I used when I was a little girl, because they belonged to my Momma. Auntie Katie loves using them, she says, because she gets to think about Great Grandma Billie every single day.

Kestrel chose four cutters (Jasper said he wasn’t particular) and we rolled the dough out on a split plastic bag to protect the table. We couldn’t find the rolling pin, so an empty wine bottle worked just fine.

As Momma always said, “It will all work out. Maybe not the way you thought it would, but that’s okay.”

It was wonderful seeing the cousins get so good at piping frosting! It can be frustrating but they did a fine job.

As we rolled and cut Kestrel started naming the cookies, and when they cooled enough to frost, she began creating their story.

“This is Sally and Sam Squirrel, and they are getting married. Susan is officiating at the wedding, and Fred and George reindeer are the witnesses. The wedding is in a forest because they love the forest.” I love that she figured out that she needed to turn one of the cookies over to allow Sam and Sally to face each other!

We needed to scoot off to an event at the Hosford-Abernethy School before we were completely finished, but before the cousins went to bed, Kestrel assembled everyone for a wedding portrait. Isn’t it wonderful?

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

Grandpa needed some medical tests done the other day, which of course meant it was time for another adventure.

The lower part of OHSU (Oregon Health and Science University) is in an area of town called the South Waterfront. In the early 1900s, this area was lumber mills and other industry. Then, for years, it was an abandoned, polluted chunk of riverbank. Now, it was been re-built as an ultra-modern ‘village’ of glass tower medical offices and condominiums.

We took the Magic number 15 downtown, then transferred to the streetcar. There is a lot of very noisy construction downtown, and we watched as a tall crane swayed ominously in the wind.

After Grandpa Nelson’s five minute appointment, we started our walk back. The Tilikum Crossing and Willamette were beautiful in the bright fall sunshine, with some brave folks boating on this chilly day.

We walked to find lunch at Ladd’s Taproom, but it was closed. Heavy sigh of hunger and disappointment.

Walking up the hill on Hawthorne we found Burgerville, which was a less than stellar experience but kept us fed. As we continued, we found some retro decor in the outside of Lounge Lizard, these stylized lava lamps.

Then we stopped at Farina, a pricy pastry shop that mostly smells $2.50 macarons. I knew Auntie Bridgett had been wanting to sample them, so we bought three to take home. They were delicious. I don’t know if they were $2.50 delicious, however.

After a rest, Auntie Bridgett and I walked down to The Nerd Out where the owner, our friend Mitch Gillan, wanted to buy some of Auntie Bridgett’s Squirrel buttons.

While we were out, we had a walk around the neighborhood and then a before-dinner drink back at The Nerd Out. Moose Drool Ale for me, absinthe for Auntie Bridgett.

Feeling very indulged, we went home for dinner and ended the evening by watching The House if Wax, a silly old Vincent Price movie.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

At our house, we start getting ready for Halloween as soon as we turn the calendar page over from September.

Auntie Bridgett brings down the decorations from storage, and we get to say hello to old friends we have collected over the years.

There is The Assistant, who hangs on our balcony and turns in the wind. We got him about ten years ago. He has graced parties and yards and always gives me a start.

But some of our spooky goodies are much older. This wonderful light-up witch was painted by Auntie Bridgett’s Mom Donna about forty-three years ago.

Our taste in Halloween decorations is not gory. We don’t go in for blood or guts. We like ghosts that are cheerful or at most pensive, not tormented. We like the notion that spirits hang around at this time of year, but not that they have evil intentions.

I guess if I thought ghosts could be evil, I wouldn’t love visiting cemeteries as much as I do. Lone Fir never feels sad to me, although there have been many sad funerals there, I am sure.

But the dead are past all that. If they do watch us, it must be from a philosophical position of “well, that’s interesting,” or “those poor people, they just can’t understand.”

Maybe that’s why I love Halloween. Besides the pretty colors and cooler temperatures, costumes and candy, it lets me play with the ideas of living and dead, here and gone, timely life and the timeless beyond. It thins the veil, as they say, between worlds.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

When we visited London years ago, Grandpa Nelson and I saw lots of streets torn up, and the dirt that was being dug smelled bad. Stinky bad. Poop bad.

It turns out that in 2004, London was just pulling out the last of its 1906 WOODEN sewer pipes. “Things in Europe are old-fashioned.” I noted.

Last month on the Seattle Underground tour, we saw an example of one of these wooden pipes that had been used in Seattle for many years. Since sewers and water systems were invented before steel or plastic, pipes to carry water IN and poop OUT were made by drilling two inch holes in logs and joining the logs together with wooden pegs.

Yes, they leaked. Yes, they rotted. But that was the best folks had, and compared to no pipes at all, they were a modern revolution.

This week, our neighborhood in Portland is getting dug up for new drains and sewers, as well as new bioswales. Bioswales are the little street side gardens you saw here, that help clean the street water before it flows into the river.

As our population has grown, we need bigger sewer pipes. As our respect for the Willamette River has grown, we are diverting more street run-off to bioswales. I am happy to put up with some noise and street closures to keep our water system up-to-date.

And I am very glad that I haven’t seen a single wooden pipe come out of the ground here!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

A big part of our Halloween celebration is watching movies about spooky things. Like our choice in decorations, our tastes in “horror” movies is very tame. No guts or blood ( or at least, not much).

A few years ago we bought a boxed set of Classic Universal “monster movies”, most directed by Carl Laemmle or James Whale. Dracula, Frankenstein (and the Bride of...) The Wolf Man, The Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Invisible Man, Phantom of the Opera and The Mummy, are featured with short documentaries about the directors, actors, and other background details.

The first ghost movie I ever saw was The Ghost and Mrs. Muir. I probably watched it because the leads, Rex Harrison and Gene Tierney, were two of my mother’s favorite actors. The story of a widow being befriended by a ghost (who helped her write a novel!) let me wonder if spirits hang around, and why, and what if we could talk with them?

Last night we watched a more recent movie that plays with this idea of talking to ghosts, 1999s The Sixth Sense. It is scarier than our usual fare, and has some grab-the-person-next-to-you frights.

But it asks the same questions about spirits. What happens when we die? What would keep a person from “moving on” into a peaceful afterlife? Can the living help the dead? Can the dead help the living? I like it for its hopeful answers to these questions.

To get back to our collection of Classic Monster movies, my favorite is The Mummy. Why? Well, it feels mysterious rather than scary, and the Egyptian sets and costumes are pretty to look at, even if not accurate.

But mostly, I like it because the Mummy came back to life, and did all he did, for love. Misguided, a bit over-reaching, but love, anyway.

And love is all you need.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Dear Liza,

We got back from really wet, cold Vancouver and Seattle to slightly drier but cooler Portland. We have had rain, thunder showers, and that wonderful dry, clear cold that people call “crisp”, I guess because breathing it is like biting into an apple.

The leaves are changing, too. The colors that have always meant “School’s Starting!” now mean “Time to get to the pumpkin patch!” and “What should I be for Halloween?”

It is also mushroom season. The owners of SideStreetArts building, Michael Pratt and his wife Rita Larsen brought the artists a whole bunch of Chanterelles that they hunted in the forest. I don’t hunt mushrooms because I haven’t been trained and might accidentally get a poison one. But Michael and Rita KNOW, and we enjoyed the bounty. Delicious roasted with veggies.

Of course, the prettiest part of Fall is the leaves changing colors. This year, I have my own private show! The Hundred Acre Wood, the trees I am growing as a bonsai forest, is changing like all the other trees.

The seeds I grew them from came from a tree only a few blocks away, so they feel like they are home.

I look forward to seeing the whole cycle play out on my balcony. Life is sweet.

Love,

Grandma Judy