Stop Discontinuing My Stuff !!!

In an earlier column, Zack declared he was old because he drops food on his shirt. A cousin told me she’s old because she received her Medicare card in the mail. I recognize some signs that I’m getting up there, of a certain age, long in the tooth, older than dirt. Things take longer to [...]

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Poor Pitiful Piano

Poor Pitiful Piano As a kid, my parents arranged obligatory piano lessons. Mrs. Lang suffered me for four years.  I learned the basics during lessons at her home, for which I’m grateful. I was never an inspired, intuitive musician, and it didn’t come easy. When God doled out my talents, he was generous with creativity [...]

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Leather Love Seat

This story begins with an inherited, avocado green couch. It had started life decades ago with my aunt and uncle in “the house”, the old, family residence of my grandparents, circa 1895, depository of all things antique, familial, too sentimental to discard without indescribable anguish, soul-searching and indecision. When the couch was reupholstered in the [...]

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Different Strokes. . . .

Before Zack was paralyzed and forced into early retirement (which means he’s home every day now, 24/7), I believe I can remember occasionally having some time all to myself and actually controlling the TV remote for various odd hours during certain days. This usually happened when I sat down to eat. I discovered DIY, the [...]

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Paper or Plastic?

I’ve regressed yet another step back in time. We’ve been called old-fashioned. I live in an old farmhouse with antiques —and not just Zack and the dog. New things don’t look quite right here. We make certain exceptions like appliances, computers, and vehicles. SOMETIMES newer IS better. Despite the prescient word whispered to young Ben [...]

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Serendipity

Talk about serendipity. I’ve always said that we never know what may fall upon us from the sky. Sometimes it’s good, and sometimes—-well, not so much. Often these surprises make us scratch our heads in wonder. Now that we’re in the middle of repairing the ceilings in the little farm house and painting the hideous [...]

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Preconceived Notions

                I was thinking about preconceived notions. I’ll give you an example. I always imagined by this age, I’d feel, act, and look REALLY OLD. I can’t do as much about the latter, but I don’t believe I act OR feel as old as I expected to by this point. My parents, their siblings, cousins [...]

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Unexpected Renovation

When I was growing up, I had a friend whose family saved up for two major expenses each year. One was a car trip (or as it was called in Animal House, “ROAD TRIP”). This was their annual vacation. My friend was a fairly well-behaved only child of older parents (as was I) so the [...]

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Recycling II

I wrote before of recycling and repurposing a vintage alligator purse into a clutch bag — and an old mink stole/fur lining into an au currant vest. It occurred to me I’ve repurposed plenty of things in my lifetime. Some of my transformations resemble the ordinary recycling that people of moderate means have always employed. [...]

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Recycling and Repurposing

I’ve always been into recycling, but not necessarily cans, jars and bottles. Years of searching my New York City neighborhood for found objects to use in art projects taught me the value of the discarded. One man’s trash is indeed another’s treasure. (My mother would have been horrified). In shopping at yard sales, thrift shops, [...]

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