pine needles

[asakiyume]

Alongside the road and in the woods, the pine needles have dropped. Where the woods path goes through a stand of white pine, I met a grandmother and granddaughter raking up the fallen needles with small bamboo rakes. They were putting them in a long bag, like a cotton picker's sack. Remarkably, they were both wearing coats of exactly the same shade of copper-orange as the pine needles.

"Are you going to put the needles around blueberry bushes to make the soil more acid?" I asked. "Or are you making baskets? Or maybe you're planning a fragrant bonfire?"

"None of those: we're gathering these for felting," the grandmother said. "I didn't realize how much Bethie'd grown this past year--show the lady, Bethie."

Bethie stuck out an arm and I saw the skin on her bare wrist between the end of her coat sleeve and her hand.

"We're going to make you a bigger one, aren't we?"

Bethie nodded.

"Wow--I didn't know you could make felt out of pine needles," I said.

"Oh no? Well, you can, if you have the knack," the old woman said.

I looked more closely at her coat, and at Bethie's, and saw now that the rich, fuzzy orange fabric was decorated with geometric starbursts of pine needle embroidery--a marvel. The grandmother caught my admiring eye and smiled.

A red-tailed hawk screamed, and for some reason that put me in mind of time passing. Work called.

"Well, good luck with the gathering and the project," I said. "The coats are amazing."

"Thank you," the grandmother said, returning to raking. "You have a nice day now." Bethie waved goodbye, and I continued on the woods path. I looked back once, but they were lost from sight.

Photo: "Carpet of Needles, Delamere, Cheshire," by Ian Helsby on Flickr

Comments

[queenoftheskies.livejournal.com]

Cool!

[xjenavivex.livejournal.com]

I had no idea.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

(alas, it's fiction--I should make a note to make that clear maybe?)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

:-)

[xjenavivex.livejournal.com]

You had it tagged for stories. I saw that before I responded.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Phew ♥ I didn't want to mislead.

[selidor]

I have a copper-orange felted hat from a felter in Vancouver. I wonder if some other daughter of these two has moved to Canada, to try her hand with cedar needles...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Could well be! And I passed a spot where larch needles had fallen--a very lovely yellow--which would make felt of another gorgeous shade.

here (http://asakiyume.tumblr.com/post/102956618133/pine-needle-headdress-by-katie-groves), by the way, is a lovely pine-needle crown.

[rachelmanija.livejournal.com]

I wish that wasn't fiction!

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I do too. I'd like a felted pine-needle coat.

I'm hoping to find a few minutes to draw a picture...

[sovay]

Remarkably, they were both wearing coats of exactly the same shade of copper-orange as the pine needles.

Prrrt.

If this isn't part of something longer, it should be. Or possibly just published as itself.

[pinkroo.livejournal.com]

yes, I want this to be 'true'. I want to see that coat!

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

A most awesome and earthy crown it is.

What happens when you read while distracted

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Bethie stuck out an arm and I saw the skin on her bare wrist between the end of her coat sleeve and her hand.

I read (understood) this as the girl growing out of her felting and needing to add more to disguise what she truly is. I imagined a woodsy creature made of bough and bark, coated in felted pine to make her look more human. Ah, the joys of trying to concentrate while being constantly solicited by wee ones.

The above was a "false" image I had, but I love all the "true" images this evoked for me.

[duccio.livejournal.com]

Your picture of the forest floor really looks like felt, with little embroideries of rocks, twigs, and stumps in it. I should have djaza make me a quilt of this - because my little bed is so hard.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I think djaza is one of the people with a knack for felting pine needles. She could definitely make you a soft quilt for your hard bed :-)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I'm hoping to draw/color my imagination of it--didn't quite get the chance yesterday.

Re: What happens when you read while distracted

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I love your "false" image too, and I think it may be one of those divergent true things that can exist simultaneously with other true things. After all, it is not certain at all who those two were....

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Maybe sometime I'll find a way to put it into something. So many of the small things I write are just moments, with no larger story--at least not initially.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

:-)

What happens when you read while distracted, redux

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Divergent truth is born!

[pinkroo.livejournal.com]

yay!

[heliopausa.livejournal.com]

This is a lovely story.:)

[amaebi.livejournal.com]

Yes, I like that.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Thanks--very glad you liked it.

[c-maxx.livejournal.com]

Great story! Like a fairy tale in limbo, is it true, is it fic?

Missed the clue but suspected fiction, like the suspended gender in Ancillary J!

Just finished Ancil. Sword, also very good.

Best witches, always, ca-madre!

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Glad you liked this little sketch :-)

Did you like Ancillary Sword as much as Ancillary Justice?

[oiktirmos.livejournal.com]

Sarah P still walks in western MA.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

And her brother walks in Pennsylvania.

[c-maxx.livejournal.com]

It's very good. The gender mysteria was so interesting, I missed this, tho it still cropped up, and the Odyssey was always one of my favorite books- and Justice followed that path. One reason I liked Cherryh's Morgaine Trilogy, altho it emulated Lord of the Rings more in its own way. Homer could have enthralled audiences for weeks or months with the M.T. [not to mention making a year's work out of Rings], as with the Illiad; I think of the Ody. as a shorter work, I'm not sure if it really is.

If you haven't read THAT (Mor. Tr), I recc it MOST highly; if you don't have time for extended reading, buy the old copies, Gate of Ivrel 1st, (with the hilarious covers [M. commandeering:] "so this is how you keep my liegeman?") one by one from Amazon, and digest them piecemeal, fairly short works, instead of buying the more recent volume. Poor Vanye is so troubled by circumstance, but Morgaine is troubled equally, so the emotional balance is better than some of C's other works.

I would say it is about the equal of Justice, just some of the interesting ambiguous ambience is dispelled...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Cherryh is definitely high on my to-read list. And glad for your take on Ancillary Sword--thanks!