asakiyume: (turnip lantern)
Asa-no-ha moyō

My third kid, Little Springtime, was born in Japan. Friends there gave us baby clothes for her that had this pattern on it. We were told that traditionally, this was a protective pattern that will keep babies safe.



I thought I'd like to make a quilt with this pattern for my arriving-in-April grandchild, so I wanted to find it online so I'd be sure to get it right. But I didn't know the name for the pattern. Imagine my amusement when I found out it's 麻の葉文様, asa-no-ha moyō. "Moyō" means "pattern"; "ha" means "leaf"; and asa (麻; also read "ma") means .... drumroll please... cannabis! (but also hemp or flax; all these things are related). In fact 麻 is the first character in the compound 麻薬, mayaku, which means "narcotic."

Japan is very strict with regard to drugs. It's something universities here have to counsel students who are going over on an exchange year about: certain ADHD medications are prohibited--Adderall, for example--and certain things that are over-the-counter medications in the United States are also prohibited (e.g., Nyquil). And let's not even talk about cannabis possession.

But in olden times, people knew another truth ;-)

A father's face

My dad frequently buys ham at the deli in his local Hannafords, so he's a familiar face there. One middle-aged woman behind the counter is always friendly to him. Yesterday, when he was there, she said,

"Do you know why I like you so much?"

"Is it that we know each other from somewhere else?" he asked.

"No--it's that you remind me of my father." She gestured to her chin to indicate my dad's beard. It turned out her father passed away two years ago. She and my dad got to talking more. "You've inherited his friendly ways," my dad said to her. It turns out she's from Iraq.

Sometimes people are angels in our lives, and I feel like he was one for her and she was one for him.
asakiyume: (Em)
While cleaning out the shed this past weekend, I found a number of things that are no longer useful to our household. A lawn spreader, for instance. I used it once, to spread lime. Then I decided to leave the lawn to its own devices, and now I have thyme and clover and hawkweed and dandelion and plantain growing--along with various sorts of grasses--and contentedly watch the bees and butterflies all summer long.

Also two skateboards, a snowboard, a soccer ball, and a street hockey stick and puck. "We never used it for street hockey," the ninja girl reminisced, later. "It was always a weapon or a staff or something like that in the games we played."

I put these out on my front lawn with a sign saying "Mysterious items found in shed; help yourself" and went into the house to post them in the neighborhood facebook group. By the time I had done that and come back outside, the lawn spreader was already gone. Brilliant!

Some time later, in the evening, I came onto my porch to shuck some corn, heard voices out front, and lo and behold, there were four children out front, three girls--sisters--and a boy. The older two girls, maybe 11 and 9 years old, were each cradling a skateboard. The boy had the street hockey stick and puck. The youngest girl, maybe 6 or 7, was standing dejectedly in front of the snowboard and soccer ball.

"Oh hi!" said the oldest sister, when she saw me. "We can really take this stuff?"

"Yes, definitely," I said. "I appreciate it!"

"She's unhappy," said the middle sister, indicating the youngest one. "Because she wanted the street hockey stick, but Noah took it."

"I love street hockey!" said Noah fervently.

"Do you have another one in your shed?" asked the middle sister.

"I'm afraid not--that's all the stuff I have," I said. "I don't suppose she'd like a soccer ball? I guess probably everyone has a soccer ball, huh."

"Well. Not everyone," said the oldest sister.

"What if you share it?" said Middle to Youngest. And then, to Noah, "Next time you come, you could trade off with her." From which I gleaned that Noah is visiting.

Somehow they sorted things out to Noah and Youngest's satisfaction.

"Please take the soccer ball too!" I begged. "All this stuff was my kids'.** I'm not going to be playing soccer."

"What grade are your kids in?" asked Middle.

"Oh, they're all grown up." I said. Oldest and Middle nodded. Of course, of course. That explained everything!

Youngest generously deigned to take the soccer ball, which left only the snowboard. You can't really expect to move a snowboard in August! Today I took it to the take-and-leave hut at the town transfer station.


**Actually, one of the skateboards was mine, but I don't plan on skateboarding in the future.
asakiyume: (Iowa Girl)
It's a choose-your-own post ;-)

made-up story )

true story )
asakiyume: (shaft of light)
story news
I don't generally like to share news like this ahead of time because I'm afraid of jinxing it, but after a hiatus of two years I should have a longish short story coming out in a venue I won't name yet (again, the jinxing thing). I guess this time I'm risking the jinx because it's just been so long! And I'm very excited to share this story with the world.

It's called "Semper Vivens," but when I was writing it, I called it my Amazon Annihilation story. Not because it's about annihilating the Amazon but because it let me express my feelings--sort of, modified by fiction!--about the Amazon, and the result ended up kind of being my take on some of the movie Annihilation's themes. (I specify the movie because I didn't read the book.)

the babies and the 18-wheeler

Wakanomori and I were in a McDonald's last week, rather late, and there was one other patron present, a middle-aged Puerto Rican guy who was pouring powder-format electrolytes into his Sprite.** He engaged us in conversation from the other side of the establishment.

"You should get a McDonald's card. You get the discount, whatever McDonalds's you go into. On everything. It works everywhere. Here, in New York, in Puerto Rico--wherever you go."

"When we were in Puerto Rico, there was an earthquake," I said. "The McDonalds was the only place with power. Everyone was there."

"Uh-huh, that's right. The McDonald's always have power. Where were you at? Ponce? San Juan?"

"San Juan."

He nodded sagely.

"I came over here 30 years ago," he said. "Drove an 18-wheeler. Brought my babies over. We lived in the 18-wheeler."

"You lived with your babies in an 18-wheeler? You need to write your story!"

"I know," he agreed. "I gotta write my story. Hey Vanessa, you leaving?"

"Just going across the street; I'll be right back, JJ," Vanessa, a McDonald's employee, reassured him.

"Okay, that's good; see you!"

Wakanomori and I boggled all the way home.

I want to read the story about the babies and the 18-wheeler.

**I know because that was actually his opening gambit: did we know you could get electrolytes in this format? Better than buying Gatorade or Pedialyte, he assured us.
asakiyume: (more than two)
Sometimes on Wednesday nights, I join an online writing session--you know the type of thing: everyone introduces themselves, then settles down for X amount of time for writing, then comes back together to chat about it. Usually, along with the introductions, there's some kind of icebreaker question...

CW! You are about to enter the realm of petty, competitive thoughts and resentments! )

So there you go folks! Unvarnished Asakiyume!

Jennifer

Apr. 21st, 2023 07:29 pm
asakiyume: (feathers on the line)
A kid came up to me in the early evening of my first full day in Leticia as I was going into an eatery. She was skinny, with hair going every which-way and dark patches on her face that might have been bruising or dirt or a birth mark. She said something to me that I didn't quite understand--but I suspected that she was asking for money, so I opened my purse to get out some money.

"No, no," she said. And then something else ending in "sopa" (soup).

"You want me to buy you a soup?" I asked.

She nodded.

So we sat down at a table, and when one of kitchen staff came over, I ordered fish for me and a soup for her--and with my eyes I tried to ask silently for indulgence/forgiveness/understanding because I know that one person's idea of a good deed can cause trouble for other people, but the woman just nodded, like she did understand and wasn't troubled.

I asked the kid how old she was, and she said eighteen. I highly, highly doubt this, not just from her size, but from the way she acted. But maybe she truly was: not getting enough to eat can stunt your growth. Or maybe she had reasons for claiming to be not-a-minor. I asked her what her name was, and she said "Jennifer," pronouncing it like an American. I asked her if she had any brothers or sisters, and she said she had older brothers.

The woman brought out a soup.

"And can I have a soda?" Jennifer asked. So I got her a soda.

"Boy they sure are slow here bringing you your fish!" Jennifer said in a loud voice. The women at the next table, who were wearing uniforms for the Claro mobile phone company, looked over, frowning.

"It's fine. The fish takes time to cook," I said.

"I think they're just SLOW" she said. And then, brightly, "Hey, when it comes, you'll share your rice, won't you?"

"Sure, okay," I said. And I asked the woman from the kitchen if we could have two plates.

Eventually the fish came, and I put half the rice on the second plate.

"And can I have some of the fish, too?" Jennifer asked.

"Okay," I said, and gave her half the fish. This was fine: I couldn't have finished the whole thing anyway.

She ate with food-flying gusto, sometimes shooting rude remarks to the kitchen staff, who replied that she'd better behave herself or they'd call the police, whereupon she offered her thoughts on snitches who call the police.

At other moments she seemed about to fall asleep into the plate, her eyelids half closing. I suspected narcotics rather than exhaustion, and the fact that she put a teeny-tiny twisted plastic bag of something on the table strengthened my suspicion. But she always roused herself.

After she finished eating, her remarks to the staff got more provocative, and they repeated their threats. I felt anxious and sorry--anxious that we were well past wearing out our welcome, sorry for the employees, sorry for the other customers, and extremely sorry for Jennifer and her situation.

"Jennifer, you've had something to eat. Maybe now would be a good time to leave?" --I said this knowing full well that she likely had no place to go to.

"Okay," she said equably, and sauntered out. One of the Claro employees offered her a half-empty bottle of soda, and Jennifer took it.

After she left, I apologized to the Claro women and the kitchen staff, and everyone said no, no, it wasn't a problem at all. I asked the kitchen staff what Jennifer's story was, and they said that her parents were likely drug addicts and that she lived on the streets.

I didn't ask about social services. I know there are some around--I looked, later on. But there are always reasons why, and times when, what's available doesn't help, as I know only too well from how things work here in the United States.

I can imagine Jennifer's story any way I want. I can imagine that she finds her way to people who help her out. That she's able to escape the road that seems mapped out for her. But my imaginings are only that: imaginings. In the end all I actually did for Jennifer was provide one meal.

asakiyume: (feathers on the line)
I've been visiting my father, usually on Sundays, during the summer, but this weekend, knowing that Henri was coming, I went on Saturday. When the hurricane came up, he reminisced about the famous (in these parts, anyway) Hurricane of 1938, which he could remember.

My dad was a little boy of seven at the time, living in Lexington, MA. He said that at that time, no one in the region had any experience with hurricanes. His uncle Sal (whom I believe I've mentioned on these pages before: he was part of the team that captured top-recorded** world wind speed in 1934 from atop Mt. Washington) told the family, "A big wind is coming."

He said there were pine trees by the house, and one just snapped, halfway up its trunk, and the top went sailing by the house. Everyone in the family was huddled on the second floor of the house when there was a loud noise from the attic. The negative pressure had caused a skylight in the attic to blow open, and a huge gust of leaves came rushing in and whirling through the house.

He said his father said, "I need a rope; where's a rope?"--he wanted to go tie the skylight closed.

Well, my father's little brother--my uncle--was clutching a brown paper bag full of his precious possessions (my dad mentioned a teddy bear whose head had fallen off), and among those possessions? A length of rope!

"I have rope," my uncle said.

So my grandfather used that rope to batten down the skylight--my three-year-old uncle saved the day!

As for Hurricane Henri, right now it's bringing us the intense but very fine rain that hurricanes do. By the way, do people know the site windy.com? It's fun for looking at storms and wind patterns. (Here's Henri.) You can move the little marker on the far right further up to get the wind speeds higher in the atmosphere (they get faster; it's very pretty).


**The record was broken, as the link says, in 1996 by a wind recorded by an unmanned instrument station on Barrow Island, Australia during Tropical Cyclone Olivia.
asakiyume: (far horizon)
Yesterday it did end up raining--nice and dramatically--and we're glad, because it's been dry.

Earlier in the day, though, when it was still hot and sunny, and I was preparing to go for a run, an elderly couple walked by and commented on the how dry it's been, and we mused together on whether rain would really come:

Wife: "How come Holyoke gets a thunderstorm and we don't get nothing??"

Wife again (darkly): I heard the Quabbin holds onto it.

(The Quabbin, for those who don't know, is a massive reservoir that our town borders on and that provides the drinking water for the greater Boston area.)

Me (confused): Well... if the rain ever falls, I guess it does.

Wife (emphatically): No. It never lets it go.

Me (internally): Far be it from me to venture any opinions on your meteorological views, ma'am

Me (aloud, cautiously): Yeah... I don't really know how it works.

I shared this story on Twitter, and one of my pals there shared this music with me, "Ghosts of Quabbin." It starts with frogsong but gets good and headbangy.

...

Have a broken-pavement crocodile.

broken-pavement crocodile
asakiyume: (nevermore)
So, three days ago I made up a little story while I was mowing the lawn, the story in the previous entry.

As you'll recall if you caught that entry, it involved a cloisonné dagger.

So, I was more than a little freaked out when THIS arrived at the house just now.



...Admittedly, not for me but for Wakanomori, BUT STILL.

Of all the thank-you tchotchkes and souvenirs you could send from Korea ...

...It required a signature. The tiny young woman who delivered it was wearing silver bangles with bells around her ankles, and she commented on the fragrance at the front of the house, where we've let a lilac bush expand into all available space.
asakiyume: (shaft of light)
Have a jasmine flower. You can stand beside it and feel sultry in a tiny way.

jasmine


A knife (no photo)

There is a knife in my knife drawer that has a vendetta against me. We were mortal enemies in a previous life, I guess: I must have been a fool who blunted it, using it to cut willow switches or to carve my initials in a beech tree, or maybe I was a careless crafter who ruined it with glue, or maybe I foiled the schemes of the person whose grip around its handle it loved best in all the world---in any case, it vowed to draw my blood in all subsequent lives and worlds in which we encounter each other, and the result is that I *cannot* pick up that knife without injuring myself.

But I feel superstitious about just discarding a knife. Really I'd like to send it to Hamono Jinja, the sub-shrine in Yasaka Shrine that commemorates faithful knives. Mine is not faithful to me, but it's definitely faithful to something, and maybe honoring it in that way would make us even. In the meantime it crouches in my drawer, sneering when I take out some other knife instead of it.

blackout

Feb. 25th, 2019 09:46 pm
asakiyume: (cloud snow)
At 6:30, this windstorm knocked out the power, and I freaked out, picturing us without power for days in the well-below-freezing temperatures. The pipes would surely freeze and burst and then cost extravagant amounts to fix, and anyway we wouldn't be able to fix them right away because everyone else's pipes would have burst too, and so the helper-fixer people would be in short supply.

I went to the supermarket to get milk and maybe another candle. In the parking lot, I met Wakanomori, who'd just gotten off the bus; he said the town to the west had power. I knew from the gossip in the supermarket that the town to the east didn't.

"We'll just have to sleep in one huge bundle in the living room under coats and blankets to keep warm," I said as we drove home. Without street lights or house lights, it was deeply dark everywhere.

As we were about to turn in at our driveway, our headlights illuminated a huge and unearthly creature, the color of smoke and about as corporeal, standing where we usually park. It was a deer--standing in the middle of the driveway. It stared at us a moment, then ceded us the parking space and walked away down the slope into our neighbor's backyard accompanied by a friend who'd been standing by our apple tree.

"National Grid estimates the power will be back by 11 pm," the healing angel reported, once we were inside.

"Please let it be so," I prayed.

And a minute later, the lights came on.

I think it was a blessing from the deer.
asakiyume: (Em)
The same day my friend showed me the photo from the previous entry, I had a great encounter in a pharmacy. There were two pharmacy technicians, young women, chatting. One came over to give me the prescription I was picking up, and I saw on her name tag that she had the same surname as Em in Pen Pal, and a really pretty, unusual first name (so unusual that when I typed the whole name just now into Google, a picture of her popped up on the first page of results).

I don't know if you've seen that meme on Twitter that goes

don't say it
don't say it
don't say it
don't say it

And ends with you blurting out the thing, but that was what happened with me. Don't say she has a pretty first name; that's intrusive, I told myself. And DEFINITELY don't mention that her surname is the surname of a character in a story you wrote.

But I did, and she smiled and said, "Oh really? My name? Where does the story take place?" So I told her, describing Mermaid's Hands, and said that it was kind of a fantasy, and she said, "I love fantasy! You know, that was one of the things I wanted to do before I turned twenty-one--write a book. I started, too, and got 2,000 words ... but then I stopped."

"Oh no! Why?"

"Oh, I let a friend read it, and she had so much to say. She was really sarcastic."

"That stinks! What a terrible friend!"**

"I know, right? The story was about the four elements, and now I see so many stories like that! If I had only finished it. . ."

"So maybe if you write your next idea? It sounds like you're tapped into what people want to read."

... I love encounters like that.

**I really believe this. When a beginning writer gives you something to read, it's terrible to close them down like that. I'm not talking about a situation where you're in a writer's group together and sharing critiques, or if an experienced writer asks you to beta read something--that's different. (Though even then there are ways and ways of giving criticism.) But if a friend shares something they've created with you, you don't shit all over it, any more than you would if they showed you their first photos or their first pottery or knitted item or sketch. If the thing genuinely appalls you, there are still ways of begging off without giving the creator a world of grief.
asakiyume: (man on wire)
In the supermarket the other day, a mom scolded her baby, who was sitting in the little seat at the front of the shopping cart, when the baby leaned down and started chewing on the cart handle. "Don't do that! You don't know where that's been!" the mom exclaimed.

AND HOW RIGHT SHE IS! Just **think** of the adventures shopping carts get up to!

The cart you are sitting in right now, baby, may recently have been sunning itself on the beach...


(source)

Or it may have been tangling with rival gangs in shadowed alleys... (though your shopping cart seemed more hale and hearty than this one)



(source)

It may have been for a refreshing swim...



(source, an old LJ friend's journal)

Or perhaps spent time communing with the mountains...

Abandoned Shopping Cart At The Banff Railway Station

(click through for source, Flickr user "Malcolm").

Baby, if we were to give you a blessing, it might be to travel as widely as a shopping cart.
asakiyume: (turnip lantern)
I was at an event last week, a breakfast event, and I was sitting at a table with people I didn't know, but we were all making conversation, and somehow the talk turned to animal visitors, and one woman started talking about how a squirrel had been paying them visits over the summer:
I left the window open, and there's no screen, but I didn't worry about anything getting in because we're on the second floor. But I had a bowl of nuts on the kitchen table, and it kept on going down. I kept on refilling it--I thought my husband was eating the nuts. But it was a squirrel. A squirrel was coming in and eating the nuts! But you know, squirrels are like cats. If they like you, they'll leave you something, as a present. Better than a cat's present! Well I guess the squirrel liked us, because one day I came into the kitchen and there was a doughnut on the table.

"Is this your doughnut?" I asked my husband.

"No, it's not mine. I thought it was your doughnut."

"If it was my doughnut, do you think it would be sitting here, uneaten?"

It was the squirrel. It had had so many of our nuts, it decided to leave us a doughnut.

Now maybe the squirrel just happened to be carrying a doughnut it had pilfered from somewhere else, and it set it down to much on some more of this woman's nuts and then scampered off in a panic, forgetting its doughnut. But I really like the woman's interpretation of the events.

traveling

Oct. 9th, 2018 10:38 am
asakiyume: (autumn source)
For reasons that would make a good story, which I will tell any of you if I see you in person, but which I won't go into here, we made a journey to Canada yesterday.

That is a long trip for a day trip, may I just say, but anyway. We encountered some interesting people along the way.

The Leaf Lady

She was from England. We encountered her at a a rest stop and information center on the interstate in Vermont. She was here, apparently, for the foliage, which is looking pretty magnificent in northern Vermont right now, but my phone got itself in a tizzy trying to update operating systems, so NO PHOTOS.

Leaf Lady: Excuse me, where are the leaves?

Visitor Center Staff Person: There's a board out front that tracks the foliage. It's best in the Northeast Kingdom right now.

Leaf Lady: All right. How far is it to Kingdom?

VCSP: You're entering it now.

Leaf Lady: And so I'll see leaves?

VCSP: Well, it's overcast today, so it may not seem as impressive, but yes.

Us, mentally: THERE ARE BEAUTIFUL LEAVES LITERALLY ALL AROUND YOU.

We made up a story that one of her children, who likes mountain biking and free running and recaning old chairs and making cheese, came to the United States and married a Vermonter and wanted her to see this beautiful place, but the mom is very suburban and didn't really want to come and this is her passive-aggressive resistance.

That center had a school parent-teacher group raising money by offering fresh coffee and baked goods fro a donation. Excellent.

The anti-tourism border guard

We crossed into Canada at a very small crossing point. There were no other cars on the road, and only one border guard, a young woman in her twenties.

Border Guard: And what is the purpose of your trip to Canada today?

Thanks to Wakanomori's research, we had a good answer to this question.

Wakanomori: We're going to see the museum in Coaticook.

Or was it a good answer

Border Guard (incredulous): No one goes to see the museum in Coaticook!

Wakanomori (laughing): Uh, well, we are.

Me (piping up from the passenger's seat): It's a holiday in the United States.

Border Guard: It is here, too: Thanksgiving.

Me: Hmmm. I wonder if the museum will be open, then...

Border Guard: And where are you from again? Massachusetts? And you're coming up just to see the museum?

Wakanomori: It's a long story.

Border Guard: I have all day!

Wakanomori then told her the story of how he and the older kids had biked this route to Canada years ago, and how he'd noticed about the museum then, and....

Border Guard: I see--so you're retracing your steps! Well, enjoy yourself. Maybe you can get some honey or cheese!

Interestingly, we saw a place selling honey a little further along the road--so we could have!

The gas station attendants

These were boys who looked to me like maaaaybe they were 14 or so, but I guess they must have been older? They were full of life and smiles, and they were going to pump our gas! It wasn't a self-serve station. Going to Colombia has emboldened me in languages that I'm not fluent in, so I tried out my rusty, rusty French: "Avez vous une salle de bain?" And he answered me in French and pointed out where the bathroom was! 通じた!(This handy word means literally, it passed through and more accurately, I made myself understood. THE BEST FEELING)

The man at the museum
The museum had a definite shut vibe to it, though there were other people walking the grounds when we got there. We rang the doorbell, as requested by the sign. After a bit a man appeared and told us, politely and with a smile but at length, that he was desolé and that it was un dommage, but the museum was closed. We nodded and thanked him but he kept apologizing, and in that moment all I could think of for "we understand" was 分かりました and entendemos.

The fox spirit
On the grounds of the museum, the healing angel spied a fox. It ran under the museum porch, but then came out again and ran up some stone steps leading up a hill behind the museum. It was very tall for a fox, with long, graceful legs. It stood on the steps halfway up the hill and regarded us, very foxy. Then it ran the out of sight. It was a prince among foxes, a god, a spirit.

Annnd then we came on home, long drive back. Hope you all had a wonderful Indigenous People's Day/Thanksgiving/Monday.
asakiyume: (squirrel eye star)
A student said one of the best things in class today. People were sharing stories they'd been told when they were young, and she recalled being at her grandparents' house during a thunderstorm. It was dark--no power--and it was thundering and the lightning was flashing, and all the kids were scared, and her grandfather said about the lightning, "Don't be scared--it's just the astronauts taking pictures."

The lightning flashes were the flashes from the astronauts' cameras.

Isn't that the best?
asakiyume: (Iowa Girl)
I still haven't managed to do any more Inktober sketches, in spite of some excellent prompts, but here's a doodle of a young woman who was in the waiting room at the mechanic's where I went to get my car inspected.

She was perched on one of those molded-plastic chairs that have depressions for your bottom and your back. She had her legs drawn up to her chest and was concentrated fixedly on her phone. She was pretty, but nervous seeming, someone I'd expect to express themselves in waves of rapid speech.

She was having a Prius fixed. Unrelated to whatever its troubles were, it was missing its rear hubcaps. Before it had been missing one, but now it was missing both. "Oh well--now it's symmetrical," the woman said.

One of the mechanics chatted with her as she was paying, from which he (and I) learned that she'd moved to this area from California, which she'd left because of the--what do you guess? Guess anything! I was thinking she'd say wildfires. (Answer is below the picture.)

at the service station

She said traffic. Which I know is bad, based on what friends have told me. But so bad that you move state? And not just to a different state, but 3,000 miles away? There's more to this story than meets the eye. Or ear. It's none of my business, but I do wonder.
asakiyume: (turnip lantern)
Little Springtime (who lives in Japan--I had better add that detail,or the story may be confusing) told me about an interesting experience she had in a bar. She's sporting a new haircut and looking pretty boss; she used to look a teensy bit like Taylor Swift, but now she looks a teensy bit like Scarlett Johansson with short hair.

...Okay, she's blond; that's it. She actually doesn't look anything like Scarlett Johansson--just, she's blond, and now has short hair and is looking slightly tough, but not mean-tough.

So she's in the bathroom, and there are two young Japanese women her age in there eyeing her, and one of them says something to the other, but LS can't tell whether it's critical or complimentary. She hurries out. Then one of the two come up to her at the bar and says, "You look really cute!" which pleases LS, and they get to talking, and LS ends up asking her what she does for work, and the woman says, "I'm a sex worker." Whereupon LS quickly marshals all her feminist thinking and says something along the lines of "Oh, okay; cool," and--since she has complicated feelings about sex work--soon turns the conversation elsewhere.

At some point, the young woman passes a thousand-yen note (very roughly equivalent to ten dollars) to LS, saying, "because you're so cute," and LS is thinking, generally money is supposed to flow the other way? , so she says, "How about we *share* a drink?" And so they do.

Also. . .
I know this is going to seem like a very bad pun and nothing more, but the truth is I've been wanting to share this cool picture of all these different heads of screws for some time--so why not now?? Aren't they cool? I never knew that screws could be so fancy and so various.

a rescue

May. 12th, 2017 11:16 am
asakiyume: (bluebird)
I saw a pickup truck pulled up on the opposite side of the road from me as I was driving to do the recycling. As I neared the spot, I saw a catbird just sitting in the road ahead of me, not moving. The burly guy in the pickup truck said, "There's a bird in the road."

I stopped. The guy's lanky companion, who was outside the truck, approached the catbird with a jacket in his hands, to pick it up gently and without touching it. Just as he was about to, the bird fluttered off the road and into the long grass and dandelions. "He tricked me!" said the lanky guy. The guy in the truck shrugged his shoulders and laughed.

I drove on, really happy that those two guys--going in the opposite direction--were willing to stop and help out a catbird in need, even if in the end the catbird declined the offer. IRL goodness.
asakiyume: (feathers on the line)
I was at an informational event on sanctuary cities and the Massachusetts Safe Communities Act this afternoon, and before it started, I was chatting with Cliff McCarthy, a wonderful local historian (I've shared one of his other stories in the past--a tale of poverty, murder, and arson). This time he told me the extremely dramatic story of Angeline Palmer, a free child of color "hired out" by the town of Amherst (Angeline was an orphan and ward of the town) to work for the Shaw family in Belchertown in the late 1830s. "Right in that house over there," Cliff said, pointing out the window to the house next door to where our event was happening.

You can read the full story at Freedom Stories of the Pioneer Valley, Cliff's history website, but here is the outline--and some highlights. Mason Shaw, known as "Squire Shaw," had gotten swept up in western Massachusetts' "mulberry craze"--he was investing in mulberry trees, with the hopes of making a fortune in the silk industry. He was also trying to *sell* mulberry trees--in 1840, he traveled to Georgia to try to interest farmers there in buying them. While there, he sent a letter to his wife, telling her to bring twelve-year-old Angeline south, where Shaw reckoned he could sell her for $600.

will Angeline be sold into slavery?? )

The story was so dramatic, so empowering, and--at least briefly--had a happy ending. There are no pictures of Angeline! I wish there were--as it is, we'll just have to imagine her. Visit Cliff's page on Angeline to see a sketch of Henry Jackson and a photo of the house from which Angeline was rescued.





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