Writing – Two People & A Cat

Today is Election Day. In my precinct, there is a mayoral race and two questions on the ballot to consider. Once again, with just hours before the polls open, I checked with neighbors and friends to get their thoughts on the candidates and issues. As of this posting, two have graciously responded. If I hear from others as the day goes on, I will amend this post accordingly.

Sample Ballot

CITY QUESTION 1 (St. Paul)

Referendum on Ord 25-2 amending the City Charter.

Should Ordinance Ord 25-2, amending Chapter 6.03 of the St. Paul Charter, regarding Administrative Citations take effect? Ordinance Ord 25-2 amends the City Charter to authorize the issuance of Administrative Citations that may result in the imposition of civil fines for violations of City Ordinances. Administrative Citations are not Criminal Citations. A “yes vote is a vote in favor of amending the City Charter to allow the City to issue administrative citations. A “No” vote is a vote against amending the City Charter and against administrative citations.

SCHOOL DISTRICT QUESTION 1 (ISD #625)

Approval of New School District Referendum Revenue Authorization

The board of Independent School District No. 625 (Saint Paul), Minnesota has proposed to increase the School District’s general education revenue by $1,073 per pupil, subject to an annual increase at the rate of inflation. The proposed new referendum revenue authorization would be first levied in 2025 for taxes payable in 2026 and applicable for ten (10) years unless otherwise revoked or reduced as provided by law.

Comments

Below is what I’ve heard as of this posting. Should I receive more comments, I will add them below.

One trusted neighbor wrote:

Hi Rebekah. I hope you and Brian are well.

I voted for Her but am not as politically active as previously and cannot offer an insider perspective. As my Rep., after redistricting moved me from Dave Pinto territory, Her had the right positions but I find her rather elusive. Compared to Pinto, she is quiet and not strong on outreach. During the mayoral, she seemed to recognize that and emphasize her “get it done,” no show-boating style.

That professed (and maybe real) style served her well in this campaign because more people now realize that Carter is pretty much hot air. His mirco-versions of potential national solutions come as his own city is falling down around him. A quiet yeoman Mayor who will fix the basics sounds pretty good in comparison.

I voted for both ballot questions in spite of my respect for Jane Prince’s warning about limitless administrative citations. I’m assuming there will be penalty guidelines. And I’m in favor of heavy investment in public schools not just for facilities, personnel, and curricula but to fend off the largely right-wing attack on them.

Your newsletter had a welcome section of food shelves. I’ve been delivering groceries from Keystone to homebound individuals in Saint Paul and surrounding territory. Doing a little is alternately satisfying and very troubling for the recognition it affords of how much more is needed. And then there are the fucking Republicans.

Another thoughtful neighbor wrote:

Hi Rebekah,

Two reasons not to vote for Mayor Carter:

He did not bother, despite multiple requests, to respond to a questionnaire from Neighbors for Responsible and Livable Development about a proposed moratorium on the tear-downs of original homes the the neighborhood and their replacement with barn-like structures to be used as private student dormitories. Like I said when we chatted this morning, I don’t oppose greater housing density, but I do oppose perfectly good century-old homes in the neighborhood being demolished and replaced with cheaply built, hideously ugly structures.

He is apparently not in favor of requiring bird-safe glass in new zoning rules for the Mississippi River Corridor. We should all know by now that regular glass is deadly to birds. Requiring bird-safe glass for construction in a city in the Mississippi flyway should be a total no-brainer.

So, who gets my vote? I asked a number of my politically savvy friends about their choices for mayor. Most of them favor Her, with Chen in the #2 ranked choice spot. I am probably going with Her as #1.

My Thoughts

As I watched a debate last night, Brian grumbled with every hostile jab between candidates: “Debates are useless.” He’s right. They lack nuance and the time it takes to tease out viable solutions to problems.

What’s with the hostility?

As for the hostility, I’m worn out by the lack of civility in politics. We can disagree and even correct a statement without resorting to making enemies of each other. Please, to every candidate everywhere: Stop it. To be clear, I’m not arguing against passion. We need people to – for example – stand up for the poor with some vigor. But it’s disheartening to watch politicians who should be allies tear each other down with petty complaints. If I were teaching a debate class, I would ask my students to rewrite this one such that candidates were cordial and made their points without the snark. In my view, Rep. Kaohly Her would need the most editing in this regard. Yan Chen seemed to mainly stay above the fray, while Mayor Carter came across as the most likeable. If I based my decision on this debate alone, he would be my first choice.

Unresponsive government

However, Carter’s unresponsiveness to advocacy groups who oppose tearing down single-family homes, as mentioned above, is very concerning. The current Mayor and the City Council seem intent on bulldozing their way to solutions without acknowledging the harm they are doing to our neighborhoods in the process.

It’s hard to see how tearing down blocks and blocks of quality homes that have lasted over a hundred years and replacing them with cheap eyesores can be a serious response to the “climate refuges” we are expecting. Aside from wasting resources, these buildings are not even a solution to affordable housing for the people who already live here. For example, a neighbor recently became homeless (one crisis away from homelessness is real). She lived within blocks of dense new construction but she couldn’t afford the rent. Meanwhile, college students (who – despite the justifications for doing away with parking requirements – do drive) seem to be able to swing it.

Unlike my friend quoted above, I like that Carter is thinking beyond the “nuts & bolts” and is trying to do what he can to address things like gun violence in the face of failure elsewhere in government. It’s a little ironic to fault him for this while complaining about crime. In any case, anyone who is resisting the Trump administration, which Carter has been doing, deserves some credit, even if there are potholes that need to be filled. There will always be potholes.

If Kamala were president…

At the recent No Kings Day protest near St. Kate’s college, I saw a sign that said, “If Kamala were president we’d all be at brunch.” Like a lot of the signs that day (“Clean up in aisle 47,” “No Faux King Way”), it made me laugh. Brunch did sound good. But the sentiment also points to a problem. To believe that electing Democrats means that we can let our government churn along unattended, as if they too aren’t tainted by corporate money that makes things like universal health care – as then presidential candidate Sen. Amy Klobuchar put it – “pie in the sky,” is a mistake. Even today, presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg is singing the same song. Anyone who says that universal healthcare is impossible in America should be disqualified from consideration for any office, let alone the presidency. Now is the time to make this clear. Just like last month was the time to start a discussion with my neighbors about an election that is happening today.

Our collective “brunching” is the reason why our democracy is on the verge of collapse. Thank goodness for the advocates who are keeping an eye on things.

I’m inclined to support them.

As for the questions on the ballot, I’m inclined to support my neighbors who are feeling crushed by their property taxes. May I suggest looking into establishing a state bank, as they have in North Dakota, to finance the public good? In the Minnesota House, there used to be a bill with bipartisan support to establish one. That was a while ago, and I’m not sure where the bill stands today. The ultimate solution is to tax the rich appropriately. In the meantime, as a neighbor suggested, we can try to fund our schools with a tax on plastic bags.

No Kings

Here are some pictures from the No Kings rally that Brian and I attended on October 18.

1,000,000 died for our democracy. Don’t let one man take it away.

Does this all make my democracy look small?

This is the Night, Really Love

My reaction to This is the night (2021) movie and Really Love (2020) movie.

My better-late-than-never movie reactions

In addition to straightening up my physical office, this morning I took a minute to organize some digital files. In the process, I found a piece on two movies: This is the Night and Really Love. An updated/finished version of the June 2022 original is below.

I also came across some photos of pumpkins (top), which go even farther back. I know this because last year was a bust squash-wise. Still, it was only recently that I used the last of some frozen puree to make pumpkin and black bean soup. I found the bee balm (below) in the same place, in a folder marked “Garden.” So, not so disorganized after all.

This is the Night (2021)

Spoiler Alert: Reading this before you see the movie This is the Night might lesson your enjoyment of discovering the various plot points on your own.

While I liked This is the Night (TITN), a movie written and directed by James DeMonaco, it pained Brian. However, it should be noted that he never nodded off. Not once. And that’s something. Nevertheless, the critics — at least those who bothered to review the movie — appear to be with Brian on this one. They hated it.

Ignorance might have bolstered my enjoyment of the movie. One, I’m unfamiliar with DeMonaco’s previous work. So, warnings about how this movie is nothing like the Purge series are lost on me. Two, I know Rocky as a cultural phenomenon but I don’t know the movies, let alone Rocky III — the movie that’s at the center of TITN — specifically. In other words, I know the Rocky theme music and could pick out a movie still, assuming that Sylvester Stallone is boxing in it. Finally, I don’t presume to know the creator’s intent.

I know the Rocky theme music and could pick out a movie still, assuming that Sylvester Stallone is boxing in it.

If ever there’s a whiff of a contrived plot or hokey dialogue that points to the same, I will bail within twelve minutes of a Netflix movie. And as not to throw good time after bad, I can easily quit a movie halfway through it. Three-quarters. More. However, though TITN gave me pause at various points, I stuck with it. I’m not sure why. Nor can I find a review that captures it for me.

Where some critics saw a failed tribute to a popular movie, I saw a story where a popular movie served as the backdrop for characters who needed to wage their own fight and who — yes — were inspired by said movie. But it would be wrong to say that this movie was about Rocky, no matter what a superfan might post on a YouTube channel.

The movie was cartoonish and regardless of whether that was the intention, it worked for me. Nevertheless, I had my doubts along the way. For example, we begin with teens splashing around in a public pool, which I loved for the memories it evoked. That I could almost smell the chlorine promised a nostalgic style and the film delivered. But then a stock bully (Steve Lipman) is introduced when he razzes the protagonist, Anthony Dedea (Lucius Hoyos) (one of the protagonists, which I’ll explain later), for wearing a t-shirt in the pool. It’s cheesy. Fine. But the bully’s girlfriend (Madelyn Cline) sticks with him even though she disapproves of his mean behavior. And I have no love for a movie where a supposedly nice woman — even a naïve sixteen-year-old — is hooked up with a jerk just so we can see the part where she realizes that she likes the kind of self-conscious guy who wears his shirt in the pool.

Nevertheless, I stuck with it. Was it because of the way Rafe the Handsome Mailman (Constantine Rousouli) flirted with Anthony’s/“Shirty’s” older brother Christian (Jonah Hauer-King), hinting at a juicy side story that turned out to be much more than that? Was it wondering about whether the family restaurant could be saved? Did I just want to see how the Dedea mother (Naomi Watts) looked as a blonde or whether she would liberate herself from that cranky husband Vincent (Frank Grillo)? Or was it some other basic character-wants-x-will-she-get-it hook? Whatever kept me engaged, there was a definite moment when I decided to roll with it, despite the guy next to me who was sighing with every Rocky reference that went straight over my head.

It happens right after the Dedea family watches Rocky III in the theater. This is where our bully from the pool returns and makes it look like “Shirty” yells out, “Rocky is a pussy!” Now a mob is after the kid, including some out-of-place biker dudes whom DeMonaco must have resurrected from — as it happens — the 1986 Gary Busey film Eye of the Tiger. It’s ridiculous, just as some critics have complained. But then the manager of the movie house appears just in time to whisk the imperiled “Shirty” down a secret hallway and to a back door where he escapes. From that point, for reasons I can’t explain, I was on board. It’s possible that I wrested the wheel from the story’s creator. Either way, I enjoyed the ride.

So, when critics say that the fervor surrounding the premiere of Rocky III is unrealistic, pointing to the ticket lines that wrapped around the building (It’s surprising that no one took issue with the size of the theater. You could have filmed it in my living room.), or that it was laughable when an entire town turned on someone for hurling insults at “the greatest hero of our time,” or that the movie was overly sincere with one critic warning us not to give DeMonaco any credit by taking any of this with a grain of irony, I say phooey. I don’t care how DeMonaco would have me take it. I thought it was funny when the cops kicked “Shirty” and his friends out of the squad car when they realized that he’s the one who questioned — or supposedly questioned — Rocky’s manliness.

And now for an intermission…

… and we’re back!

There would be more cringey parts to come. The worst was when “Shirty’s” mother tells his brother Christian that she knows that he (Christian) is a cross-dresser. In fact, she insists that he put on a dress. She helps him put on a wig… and lipstick… Acceptance? Great. But this was a bit much. Maybe someone could pull off “blurry boundaries” without “incestuous” coming to mind. But this was bad. Cut to gratuitous nightclub scene (Every movie! Come on!) and more blurry boundaries where mom lurks after dropping off her freshly-out Christian. I suspect that DeMonaco just needed “a moment” to extract an emotional response from his audience. He should have either smoothed over the rough edges of this scene, in which case he would have needed to start with a monster belt sander. Better yet, scrap it and try another approach.

Despite this, I stuck with the movie and discovered that all of these odd little parts — save a few that left even this sympathetic viewer scratching my head — add up to a satisfying and surprising and lovely ending. But wait! This only worked because there were accomplished actors who were able to wring water from a rock. Fine. The battle that the mother has with the father at the end of the movie is worth it. And when you consider that she was standing up for her non-conformist son who likes to wear dresses, it seems to me that Rocky is the perfect backdrop to this movie. And given the shift in the social climate where we are just beginning to see a transgender world, maybe even timely. It’s not a matter of giving anyone too much credit. It’s a matter of what I picked up on, regardless of anyone’s intent.

This brings us back to the idea of the multiple protagonists in this movie. The main character is obviously “Shirty,” right? That is to say Anthony who faces down the enemy and gets the girl. I’m not convinced. Though a small character by comparison, I would argue that it is the father who makes the biggest transformation when Mister That-would-be-stupid finally says yes. Or is it his wife, who finally puts her foot down? Or is it Christian who — at last — comes clean with his dad? I like a movie where you can make the case for multiple characters, even if the writer must choose one. For example, realizing that Troy Dyer (Ethan Hawke) is the protagonist of Reality Bites as opposed to the obvious choice, Lelaina Pierce (Winona Ryder), made the movie better for me. As for who Lelaina “ends up with,” I have strong opinions. But I’ll leave that debate between the generations for another time.

I don’t know if it will be worth it for you to get there, but I have no regrets about spending my time with This is the Night. Nevertheless, this is one case where I won’t be able to convince Brian that he might like this movie if he approached it with the right mindset. And judging from the comments elsewhere on the Internet, he holds the more popular view.

Really Love (2020)

We also didn’t see eye to eye on Really Love, directed by Angel Kristi Williams. I thought critic Roger Moore had it right: “…beautiful people doing beautiful things set to a silky smooth jazz score all do their best to atone for a script seriously thin on originality or conflict,” whereas Brian found a lot more to like about this film. There was something about a realistic evolution of a young romance that he liked, whereas I was bothered from the start. Again, Moore says it best: “They meet at a gallery show. He’s forward, fingering her necklace. She makes a lot of eye contact and allows it.” He also makes note of some “clunky dialog,” quoting the exact phrases that hung me up as well. The writer might have benefited from that belt sander — working up to super fine steel wool — once DeMonaco finished with it.

The ending of Really Love is predictable. It’s also lovely and it almost makes me forget the weird beginning and the glossed over middle where we are to accept without any evidence that there are real barriers to these two lovebirds to be together. I can’t recommend it. However, it is beautiful and it was fine to have on while I untangled some yarn and rolled it up into a ball. It kept my interest in that I wondered if the slow pace of the movie, which was great, was going anywhere. Alas, it was not.

Christmas Trees & Cats Don’t Mix

Happy New Year!

When I woke up this morning and looked out my bedroom window, the frosty tree limbs grabbed my attention. Maybe we should’ve cancelled coffee? Later, I found Brian standing in the middle of the alley looking like a caroling Peanuts character in his trapper hat. Through a crystal canopy that lined the way, he looked toward the golf course.

“It’s quite beautiful,” he said. “A real winter wonderland.”

He was on coffee duty. On Saturday mornings, it’s his job to set up the table and plug in the coffee pot in time to be ready for whoever shows up. When I moved my car to the front – also in preparation for our guests – I ran into Emily and Justin who were on their way over. When Emily stopped to notice the ice crystals that had formed on some dried wild flowers, “Close up!” was a natural thought. Despite the fancy camera and the tripod, these are mediocre snapshots.

Born of the pandemic, we’ve been hosting coffee for just over two years. Here’s what I posted about it in the early days:

“Three weeks ago, Brian Harmon and I bought a coffee urn. On Saturday mornings we’ve been offering coffee to the neighbors on the lawn (or in the garage if it rains). It’s BYOC (bring your own cup). I’ll be curious to see how far into the winter we can go before people quit coming. Or maybe that’s exactly when we’ll need such a thing, when we’re feeling even more cooped up. People have appreciated this (someone just left a medium roast from the Mississippi Market on my porch) and have done a good job of maintaining the proper social distance. We know that sometimes it might be just the two of us because it’s drop-in-if-you-feel-like-it, no RSVP needed. But so far that hasn’t happened. If you ever want to drop in to say hello, feel free. Rain or shine. We will be there.”
Rebekah Smith, Facebook, October 2, 2020

With all eyes on a beautiful sunny day, no one at coffee noticed that my shoes didn’t match. I didn’t catch it until I took them off, prompting me to quiz Brian.

“What’s wrong with this picture?”

Seeing Miss Ruby this morning was a treat. Zipped up in a comfy bag, she and her doll arrived on a Norwegian push sled pushed by her dad. Upon learning that her favorite song is Dancing Queen, Brian brought out the Red Sox Bluetooth speaker, a gift from his sister.

She let me off easy this year. It could have been a bedroom set.

After coffee, Brian usually makes a “rail hand breakfast,” a reference to the eggs and hash browns I used to order pre-pandemic. We haven’t been in a restaurant ever since a server at Pizza Lucé gave us her roller derby card. It was right before the first “safer in place”/lock down mandates. And I remember it feeling eerie sitting at the bar, like “Should we be doing this?”

Thank goodness for my friend Alex. We were discussing a time to meet and he mentioned Zoom, which was unknown to me at the time. “I’d rather meet in person,” I said. He set me straight. Along with the NBA shutting down when Rudy Gobert tested positive for Covid-19, it’s one of my first memories of “Oh, this is serious.” It was odd because I had recently attended a rally for Senator Bernie Sanders who was running for president. There were thousands of people there. I remember seeing one person – just one – with a mask and thinking, “What’s up with that?” The rally was at once exhilarating and foreboding. As the arena, twinkling with magical screens and going round and round and round in feverish waves, I couldn’t help but think: “Should we be doing this?” Now it’s strange to listen to the recordings I made that day. It was the last time since the onset of the pandemic that I have walked up to a random person on the street and said, “Can I ask you a question for my podcast?”

Maybe I’ve lost my nerve.

In addition to making breakfast on Saturdays, Brian names them. Today, he knocked on my office door, cracked it open and announced, “Your ‘Dancing Queen Irish Cream Rail Hand’ is ready.”

We covered “Dancing Queen,” Ruby’s favorite song. As for the Irish Cream, I assure you that coffee in the yard is usually alcohol-free. But it’s New Year’s Eve. So, when I brought out some chocolates, I grabbed a bottle just in case anyone might enjoy “a snort.” Is that how you say that? It’s not something I normally say but I heard it at coffee this morning and thought I’d give it a try.

Speaking of… Dancing Queen.

Speaking of… Irish cream.

Speaking of breakfast… specifically eggs. Do you notice anything funny about this picture?

In one case (the eggshell on the right), the break is clean. In the other case (left), the egg is cracked with cartoon zigzags, like this:

As for Christmas, it was lovely. As Brian has said (and I have repeated too many times), “We’re up to our asses in socks, books and Clinique!” In fact, these words made it into my five-year journal, something I highly recommend that you keep:

Lovely Christmas Day with Brian and cats Michael and Bert. Chicken dinner reminded me of Grandma Choate. “We’re up to our asses in…”
Christmas, 2022 – Five-Year Journal, Rebekah Smith

The journal makes it easy to look back five years per page. For example, the entry above this was:

Brian made a roast for dinner. Nice gifts. Lots of stuff for woodworking. A router. Clamps. Power stapler…
Christmas, 2021 – Five-Year Journal, Rebekah Smith

And above that:

It’s hard to find a podcast that I like. Brian made a rail hand breakfast and we opened presents. He said he missed shopping this year and the Christmas vibe.
Christmas, 2020 – Five-Year Journal, Rebekah Smith

As I sit here right now, my ankles are warm thanks to my new socks and I am grateful.

The big question this year was whether to put up a tree. For the past few years, we’ve been skipping it, partly due to these two clowns:

Now that Michael and Bert are older, I thought maybe they could handle it.

I was wrong.

They cannot handle it.

Bert didn’t get interested in the tree until after we decorated it. And then he proceeded to undo it.

It was lovely for about a minute. But now the tree is a mess because I’ve given up on fluffing it up and rearranging the lights every morning. So, I’ll probably take it down sooner than I normally would, which is just as well. Valentine’s Day is late for boughs of holly.

We were supposed to look at cross country skis today. Maybe tomorrow? Tonight, there will be a movie because my friend Craig insisted that I watch The Glass Onion. The coffee crowd agreed. We’re guaranteed to love it. Good. The last movie that Brian and I watched together was The Vanishing. As a palate cleanser afterwards, we went to Tom Papa. It was a good movie (I think). But it was intense. Tragic. Sad. Disturbing. Usually, my kind of movie. Not so much Brian. We still haven’t talked about it. Not much. Brian called it a story about breaking from procedures. Initially I saw it about – not greed exactly – but shifting morality. Pivotal escalating choices. However, the more I think about it, the more I like Brian’s perspective.

At coffee, Ralph said that he was in a Quaker group that would bring in the New Year with a meditation. From 11:30 p.m. until midnight, they would sit together in silence, except for the ticking of a thousand clocks. None of them synced. Insert smiley face here.

So, that’s the report, as disjointed as it might be.

Happy 2023.

Rebekah

Not Bored but Maybe Boring

Brian groaned when he realized the purpose of our post-lunch errand. Nevertheless, he was relieved to find out that my haul would fit into a grocery bag. In other words, it wasn’t another chair.

I love my recent acquisitions, two paintings I found on FreeCycle. The first is a sunset – or a sunrise? – that I see as I turn around to face the hallway at the top of the stairs.

The second is a place that feels familiar, though I’ve never been there.

If you ask me what I’ve been up to, this is what I’ll tell you. I hung up two paintings the same day I got them. If there’s time and you seem interested, we could talk about how something as simple as a free painting can lift a person’s spirits or how these random paintings about which I felt lukewarm belong here. For the person who gave them away, these paintings were clutter or reminiscent of a time best forgotten or just ugly. Or maybe it was painful to give away her mother’s art that was collected over the span of a childhood? But she’s moving to Denver. Starting over after a messy divorce. No room. Downsize, like it or not. Or maybe she read Marie Kondo’s book and said, “These colors don’t spark joy! Get them out!”

Maybe.

Or I might tell you about how I’ve been replacing the boards on my deck and how being done with hauling 16-footers on top of my car (after hours of picking through them at the warehouse, ugh!) is a cause for celebration, even though there’s still more to do.

Or – being of limited skills in the way of needle arts – how I cannot believe that I managed to recover four patio chairs using my consumer-end sewing machine. It was tricky but not as hard as sewing a patch on some old jeans.

It’s an out-of-body experience to look at a finished product (mostly finished, I might add some buttons but I’m counting it as not to despair). It’s the same feeling I get whenever I see the door at the top of the stairs. It was caked with layers of brittle paint and it was a huge job to repaint it. The ceiling in the dining room. The office I’m sitting in right now used to be Pepto Bismol pink. These are good things to remember when you’re in the middle of a never-ending project like when there are still boards to cut, clamp and screw down to the framing of the deck. With every swing of the hammer, I wonder “Am I about to ruin my house?”

“I’m not bored but I might be boring.”

That’s what I told my mother when we were catching up this morning. She called just as she was sitting down with a fresh cup of coffee and just as I was about to do the same.

Boring is no badge of honor anymore than eschewing television makes you better than me. I would welcome adventure. But it’s still cool to take pleasure in second-hand art and to think, “Perfect! I love it.” And then to put away the drill that has a place because you’ve already done the boring task of organizing your tools, which didn’t bore you at all.

Bert claiming the materials to make the seat cushions. He loved the plastic mesh that I was able to reuse after reinforcing it with fabric.

“You’re not going to throw out these filthy cushions are you?”

I did document the patio chair project and keep meaning to post some tips, if not for the random person who might find it useful (Spoiler alert: pockets, as in shams, instead of zippers), then for me. Because it’s already starting to feel like someone else must have done it and I’m not sure I could do it again.

It’s just sewing.

In the past, whenever someone came over to visit and we sat on the deck, I’d throw an old sheet over one of the patio chairs that have seen better days. This was going to be the year to address the problem. We should have replaced the cushions a long time ago when Steve offered to make them at cost. He wanted to return a favor, if you can call being patient a favor.

We first met Steve Cone when we hired him to reupholster the old chair that Brian had inherited forty years ago during his time at Rural Sociology at the U of M. While it was supposed to take weeks to fix the chair, due to extenuating circumstances, the initial deadline was blown by several months. We didn’t care. As long as our dusty chair with its springs that dragged on the floor sat in Steve’s shop, it wasn’t in the living room. Mission accomplished, as far as I was concerned. There was no favor to return. But Steve insisted on giving us the deal.

“It’s just sewing,” he said.

It made me think that a person in his line of work must be accustomed to fussing or downright difficult clients.

Steve was a rock star in the world of upholstery and I feel lucky to have crossed paths with him when I had the chance. Recently, when a salesperson at A-1 Foam recommended his book, Singer Upholstery Basics Plus: Complete Step-by-Step Photo Guide, she said “People have started businesses based on what they learned in that book.” I couldn’t help myself and had to make it known that we too had met the man and knew of his greatness. What I didn’t say was that I have good memories of how easy it was to chat with Steve and I feel strangely proud that he felt the same way about me.

Maybe he made everyone feel that way, which would have been another testament to his greatness.

As he went over the numbers for the patio chairs, Steve said that he could reuse the fabric on the back of the cushion, which was this light gray plastic weave that’s used for sling chairs. I wasn’t so sure I liked that idea. I was sick of these awful cushions and I wanted something new. Wasn’t that the point? Whatever we decided, before he could do the job, Steve would need some time to give his hands a chance to rest. In a couple of months, I was supposed to call him to get on the schedule. Then time got away from me, as it always seems to do. When the Christmas card I sent to Steve was returned in the mail, I had a sinking feeling that too much time had slipped away. And I was right. At the age of 71, Steve had a heart attack and died.

He missed the first pandemic shutdown by just a month or so. He also would have missed the last party we had before the coronavirus took over the world. If only we had invited him…

It was a stupid calculation. On the one hand, I could see him at the table. On the other hand, it was early on in the dinner party experiments that Brian and I were planning for the year… So, maybe we should stick with people who we knew would roll with it regardless of whether a silly little game worked as planned or whether anyone had anything insightful to say about the topic at hand or whether the evening went south in some other unexpected way. We would invite Steve once we figured out what could help keep things interesting yet comfortable enough amongst a group that didn’t necessarily know each other very well. In the meantime, there’s no need to torture anyone or to look foolish so early on in what I had hoped would become a friendship. Had I to do it over again… would’ve, could’ve, should’ve… I should’ve trusted that Steve could’ve rolled with it and it would’ve been fine.

So, back to square one with the chairs. “Send photos!” a handful of upholsterers said.

We bought this secondhand patio set fourteen years ago. That pattern strikes me as 80’s but I’m not sure.

So far, there has been one response, not counting a prompt response from Repair Lair that doesn’t do upholstery even though It’s just sewing.:

Rebekah,
These cushions are pretty complicated and definitely beyond my sewing skills….
S*

At another place, we were warned to be prepared for how expensive cushions can be: “The stuff made in the factory is cheap. So, when you have them custom made, they’re going to cost you more than what you paid for the entire set.” In addition to that, a backlog of work meant that it would take weeks just to get an estimate.

Next stop: A big box store where they stock bolts of fabric so that a person can walk out with a yard. Probably inspired by watching too many YouTube videos, I would try to repair the cushions myself and I needed supplies to experiment. Whether my consumer-end sewing machine was up for the task was just “part of the discovery process,” as Brian likes to put it.

So far, so good.

Bert approves of the newly recovered chair, though he was also happy to claim the dirty naked Dacron that’s been sitting on the floor by the front door for the last few weeks.

In an upcoming post, I’ll describe what I did to deal with the worn parts of fabric that I reused on the backside of the cushion (I came to appreciate Steve’s suggestion to reuse the fabric and have noticed that upholsters in general take pride in keeping what’s salvageable), explain how I got around installing a zipper (and why I wanted to avoid it), and let you know how I ultimately finished this cushion. For now, I have discovered enough to know that what I’m trying to do is possible. As for the frames of the chairs, eventually I’ll repaint them.

In case you forgot, here’s a before and an almost-done after.

Steve has been on my mind as I’ve been working on this project. I’m on shaky ground, as I am not a sewer. Just cutting into the fabric feels scary. So, telling myself, “It’s just sewing,” can be helpful whenever I get stuck.

Steve Cone and Brian who is sitting in the newly reupholstered chair that Steve just delivered.

Paw in Pocket

Bert put his paw in Brian’s pocket and I grabbed the camera. Plus how to jinx yourself as a writer.

“Bert has his paw in my pocket.”

I got the camera.

Bert on Brian’s chest with his paw in the shirt pocket.

The first five pictures I took were totally black because I didn’t notice right away that I wasn’t in the point-and-shoot mode. That required a flash that made the picture look flat.

This is a nice picture of Brian. The light catches is eyes. But the picture is still flat.

I flipped though some of the pre-sets on the camera to see what would work.

I liked the slower shutter speed better. But I needed my subjects to stop moving. A tripod would have helped. I like that this picture had more light variation and isn’t so flat. But does it have a focus? The lamp in the background is probably blown out. But this was an improvement over the flash. I like the suggestion of trees through the window and the way the blue wall color shows.

In the pictures without the flash, Bert’s orange markings stand out better.

Speaking of Bert, he would like to have breakfast now. I assume that’s why he is meowing at the office door. As for me, I am going to get back to working on some writing. After I had already told some people that I am writing a novel, I heard an author say that he doesn’t like to make such announcements because you can’t be sure that the thing that you are working on wants to be a novel. So, then you have put yourself in the position of forcing – let’s say – a short story into being something that it isn’t. Or maybe after a lot of work you discover that you don’t have anything. Why not fail in private? Jinxing myself aside, I feel mostly confident that I will finish this. Whether it turns out to be “anything” can be another problem for another time.

Restoring Old Homes

Restoring an old home versus replacing it with cheap apartment buildings.

With all of the old homes that are being torn down in our neighborhood in favor of density, it was distressing to come upon a gem that had some “architectural interest,” though it had fallen into disrepair. Next to an open lot – maybe two – that had already been cleared of the homes that used to be there, I was certain that Brian and I were looking at the future site of yet another apartment building that would be made with particle board. My heart sunk. I didn’t think that the house had much of a chance of escaping the wrecking ball.

I was wrong.

Recently, Brian noticed a crew working on the home. We confirmed that the place is being restored and I am relieved. For starters, the house is sitting on a brand new foundation after having been moved from the adjacent empty lot. On Sunday, two guys were busy framing a new garage.

Porch. The Christmas lights on the front porch hint at an interesting story. Who put them there? The previous owners? Was it a last hurrah of some sort? The new owners – the people who are fixing it up? I am picturing a celebration after they had just bought the place.

Density in the city core is supposed to be the environmentally responsible thing to do. However, if that’s the case, then why not require the buildings that replace old homes to meet LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards? They should be state-of-the-art, zero-waste and carbon-free (almost free?) structures. Green roofs. Grey water. Passive solar. The works. They could be made to last for centuries. And they could be made for Minnesota. What do I mean by that?

Several years ago, I was in Virginia for a wedding. The area had been going through a crazy heat wave that ultimately took the power out for many of its residents, including the family of the bride. The hotel where several of us were staying was not effected and so there was some shifting to accommodate various guests, some of whom were getting baked out of the spare bedrooms where they were staying with the locals. Even the bride took over one of the rooms at the hotel so that she could get ready for the big day.

It was scary. And it made me wonder. When did we stop designing buildings based on the conditions of the natural environment versus the assumption that air conditioning (or heat) would always be a simple flip of the switch? Do we have to go back to adobe homes? Our own house that is just over a hundred years old was also built with the belief that we would never need to worry about the supply of cheap power or the consequences of using too much of it. So we have added insulation and taken some other steps to conserve energy. But now that we know what we know, when we build new housing, shouldn’t we build for the environment from the start?

When I took these snapshots, I didn’t anticipate that I was going to make a video with them. But I wanted to try it and used what I had.

And that is just considering the energy standards. There are also human standards. For example, we were talking to a couple at a friend’s party (pre COVID-19) who were telling us about their woes looking for a town home in a retirement community. The good ones have – ahem – community spaces. And this couple was holding out for one such place. According to them, the newer developments treated things like lounges and meeting rooms as wasted space, which is to say that they were not included. While the two embraced downsizing, retreating to their pod where they would feel isolated wasn’t what they had in mind when they decided to retire.

There is also green space to consider, which is another aspect of the human standard. New buildings should have green rooftops. Courtyards. Enough grass for a picnic. Balconies. Playgrounds. We cannot concern ourselves with this, right? However, we do concern ourselves with how many parking spaces there will be, which is funny since density is packaged with this idea that the new arrivals will use the public transit and therefore should eliminate any concerns about the impact on traffic. In the meantime, in one of the apartments going up near us, eliminating balconies from the plan is supposed to assuage the fears of the neighbors who see the development for what it is. College housing. Elsewhere, another development received a variance that essentially traded green space for parking.

It feels like people are pitted against each other in weird ways and bad decisions come out of that. I wonder if it’s because economic problems are easier to solve than human ones (I think I am channeling Brian here because this is a theme for him.). If I only have to think about the cost per square foot, it is easy to find a solution. But if I have to ask myself whether I want my grandmother to live in a place where there will be almost no chance that she will get to know her neighbors or whether a little kid wouldn’t be better off growing up in a place where there are trees and grass – those are bigger, messier questions that will depend more on stuff that cannot be expressed algebraically. These are values that exist outside of ledgers.

A while ago, I recall reading about a family that was selling their house on Marshall Avenue to a developer. The neighbors were upset for all of the reasons you would expect. But the sellers insisted that they had no choice. They needed the money to retire (it might have been a case of a parent who needed to move to assisted living, but the point here is the same). I just hope that they were able to find a place where the developer did not skimp on the community space because that is what the market dictated. Now, why people are in the position of making economic choices that they would rather not make is another issue. But I mention it here because long term care security and a broken health care system are a part of this story that should be explored further.

Finally, I have a question about how the neighbors are economically impacted by these developments. For example, down the street from where I live, a property sold for over a million dollars to a developer. The one on the corner across from it sold for 700,000 dollars. But what if suddenly having an apartment building next to your house makes your property value go down? Or what if, you can no longer see the sky when you look out of your office window and this really depresses you? What if it shades your tomato plant? Should you be compensated for this? Conversely, do these over-market-value sales have an impact on my property taxes, since home valuations are based on recent sales of comparable homes in the area? Or should I expect my property taxes to go down since there will be more people to share costs?

This is not a rant against density. However, it is an observation that it is not the only thing and it can be taken to an extreme. The airlines serve as a cautionary tale. Over the years, we have watched legroom on flights disappear. And now just as we thought that it would have been impossible to jam another row of seats into economy class, the industry has been considering yet another tier of traveling where passengers would essentially stand for the duration of the trip. Yep. Too far.

Roblyn 21XX – The Podcast

Can we make a podcast based on our neighborhood zine? I make a pilot episode to learn more about it.

Roblyn 21XX, Issue #7, January 17, 2021

Back in September, I started to dread winter. We anticipated feeling even more cramped inside our bubbles, as Dr. Fauci predicted a surge in coronavirus cases. Maybe we would get antsy and panic like a flock of ducks flushed out of the security of the brush. So, Brian and I started hosting Saturday coffees with the idea that by the time winter came, we would have established a routine where we could easily pop out of the house for a quick hello with the neighbors.

That was the plan. And it still is. But there would be no perfect record, as I had hoped. The single digits eventually forced a cancellation of our Saturday routine. More would follow. Though disappointing, the bitter cold gave me an idea. Or it might be more accurate to say that it brought an idea forward. Could we base a podcast on the neighborhood zine that we have been publishing since July? Would this offer some additional connections that might be valuable?

I was adamant that the zine itself should be printed and delivered to households. That’s why I began with what I alone could manage, which was essentially my block. Then a few people offered to print and deliver even more copies. It became the model. The zine would be as big as this volunteer pool would allow. And while we don’t quite cover it at present, I see the natural physical boundaries of the zine to be east of Cretin, west of Cleveland, north of Marshall and south of St. Anthony Avenues.

Though I love the e-newsletter that I produce for my podcast, QuOTeD, The Question of the Day, I was positive that the Roblyn 21XX zine shouldn’t be online. Part of what makes it cool is that you have to live here to get it. (Note: I have mailed hard copies upon request. Most notably my parents are subscribers.) However, I think a companion podcast to the zine is different. Yes, it is online. Yes, there is a screen. Yes there are links to click. But, a podcast like this could also be our private low powered radio station where there is a little more room, like a secret swimming hole before it is discovered by litterbugs. Plus, there is a warmth in hearing a voice. Maybe it can warm us up on those days when it’s too cold to do much else.

So, just as I did with that first issue of the Roblyn 21XX zine, I made a pilot episode of its companion podcast. This could be a one-and-done, a nice idea that doesn’t have legs. That would be fine. Or it might stick and become something even better. Either way, I enjoyed making this episode and hope that you enjoy it too.