downsizing

My fascination lately has been with simplified living, tiny homes, and RV living. Although we have a vacation trailer, I can't imagine getting everything I value in my home/homes into it. How would I store the books? How about the art? My gosh, the art would have to go, and how could I get rid of paintings I love so much? How about the Navajo rugs, the Hopi pottery, the rocks my parents collected that take up so much space? 

Yet, there is this appeal at the idea of simplified living especially with a trailer and being able to boondock (live off the grid) with solar panels. For me, I like to stay connected in terms of the Internet and be able to write using my computer. I bought a fold-able desk to use next time out. We use HotSpots to connect wherever there is enough cell signal (some places there is not). 

I hear about some who desire to live in planned, senior communities and to me that sounds like hell on earth. Yet, how would I feel about not owning anything but a trailer and truck? I don't know, but those who do it fascinate me, and I watch some of them on YouTubes to learn how they live. 

Couple Living in an Airstream

That video is on a YouTube channel by a guy I check up on every now and again, Cheap RV Living, where he posts RVer interviews and what he's learned about how to make it work when you don't live a life like everyone else. He's done some good interviews with women who have chosen this life for assorted reasons. 

Fearless retired woman

Solo Woman Joyfully Living

Well, actually, on YouTube channels, there are quite a few women sharing their lives that way. Most are positive, but I've seen a few like the next link. 

 Scary experiences also happen

We have done trailer and van camping over many years and have had a few scary events also. Be aware is my advice. What she did is what we have done-- leave, even in the middle of the night, when it doesn't feel safe.

Still, most is good. It's not all about old folks these days. Some might be forced out of a stick and brick home, but there are those who want no mortgage or just the freedom to travel. Full time RVing is not new as I remember when our kids were young and a magazine called Trailer Life had a regular feature on those where their rigs were their homes.

Van Life-- Our Custom Van

While I don't see myself doing it at this point, I find the cable shows and videos fun to watch. I used to be a fan of the home remodeling shows, but now it's more tiny living or YouTube for those who have put aside the regular life for one that is unconventional. I am interested in why they made the choice and how they expect to live. I am interested in how it might change a person to live this way. 

Reflections on what society has become

I've thought of it always as something I could do if the economy turns disastrous. It's not for me right now other than as a voyeur.

Some of that and my own experiences with trailering inspired me to write a novella that I first called Red Hawk Christmas but more recently changed to Diana's Journey. It might actually end up with a yet different title, as it's hard to get across a book that isn't really a romance as such and yet is about a romantic journey that a woman makes not to find 'the' man, but to find herself when life has changed for her. 

It was intended to be first in a series of women starting over, with not all involving an RV; but I got sidetracked by the paranormal books and so that put that series on a back-burner for someday. (It also is the one that got a very negative review that literally killed its sales-- reviews can do that.). Still, I like the story and was able to share a lot of my own experiences where I've camped and spent time in the West.

Diana's Journey

I think it's had a problem with not being a romance and yet it kind of is. Cross genre books have this problem.

changes

 last October heading across the Willamette Pass

It's hard to believe we're back to October. I am trying to figure out where the summer went. It seemed gone in a flash. The farm is ready for winter (whether I am or not) with the barns full of 13 tons of alfalfa and 36 tons of good grass hay for the cattle and sheep. Ranch Boss has also been getting the vacation trailer cleaned up and ready if we do take it out in October-- the tentative plan. 

We are still debating whether to get a fifth wheel trailer. There are pros and cons. It would be a little larger, back up easier and supposedly handle better on the highway, but we manage with the 26' travel trailer as it has the basics. We'd have to sell it if we bought something else; so we're still ruminating on the issue. Either way our RV will have a desk for my writing. I don't do well on the laptop as at home I use an ergonomic keyboard to avoid carpal tunnel. 

We found this desk online as something lightweight, small and easy to stow. I also ordered a wireless keyboard, mouse, and smaller monitor, which will be stored in the trailer leaving me only to bring my laptop when we go somewhere.

Writing has been what I've done this summer but for little real gain in  measurable ways. I wrote two shorter books (60,000 words) that have not caught the interest of readers. I've gotten a good start with the third one-- but became derailed twice by other projects.

The first derailing was a Christmas short story that I thought might fit into an anthology that a group of writers will bring out this year with all the profits going to a worthy charity. I realized when I finished it (just under 5000 words) that it had the potential to be a novella (just over 20,000 words) that would lead into the next full-length Arizona, historical romance. As a short story, it'd not serve that purpose. So I went back to thinking what could I find that would work for a Christmas short story.

The second one began with a comment a reader made about writing an RV park romance. At the time I laughed, but then I thought-- hey, mature romance, transition in life, and recreation vehicles, all of which interest me right now. So I wrote a second short story, set it in a small Utah town where I'd love to spend time but which I've only driven through. That required research-- something I always love.

Finishing it up and its many edits, I looked at the requirements for the anthology. A biggie caught my eye. They are going to not be taking all that are submitted. I realized that these are writers who have done a lot of projects together. My story might or might not fit, but if being part of the group is factored in, mine would not be accepted. I totally understood how the ones who have been friends and worked together will have priority. But wait, if it is rejected, it also has the potential to be a novella. There is no losing on this.

I submitted my story and began working on its novellal using the same characters and situation but expanding it. If the short story does end up accepted, I'll hold this back for a future time, as the contract does not give them exclusive rights to even the short story. I even created a cover for it, which if it goes into the anthology I can use to promote purchase of the collection, but if it does not, then I'll use it for the novella. I really like the cover but won't share it until I know more where I'll need it.

If that sounds confusing, I will add to it by saying next I will write that first short story also as a Christmas novella, which I can bring out in mid November-- no matter what happens with the second one. I am enjoying the break from suspense, but I will get back to the paranormal, just not first.

Both of these short stories involve heroines and heroes in their late fifties and early sixties. Both follow a woman at a transitional point in her life where she's looking for a change but unsure what that would be. The two are set one hundred years apart, which means the women's options are not the same. 

I like it that there is no danger or suspense-- given our political season, stories like this are more relaxing to write. I also like writing characters closer to my own age and especially with that second one where it worked into my interests in those who live in their recreation vehicles full-time. I don't see myself doing it but that's the beauty of being a writer-- I can do it vicariously. Oh and the contemporary woman has two dogs, something I don't have but fun to write about for her.

Above images from Stencil, CanStock, Deposit photos, and my own photographs

who we are and are yet to be

 You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you.     James Lane Allen

With a new year, a new calendar, it can be a fitting time to look at our lives, to assess where we're going, whether we are who we want to be, ask if changes should be made. Part of looking forward once in awhile means looking back.

A few years back I had been thinking that what I had done when young was part of what I was at that very moment, and it led to a bit of a poem. I used a photo of myself as a young woman to illustrate the idea (which the above quote also says). She was the mother of me as I am the mother of all I am yet to be. It's both an awesome responsibility and a great joy when you think of that because it doesn't let you ignore today's reality as though it doesn't matter. It is feeding your future.

That  thinking led to my looking for a photo collage I had created also a few years back. It was about how all the people from whom I came and who I have loved, they are a part of who I am. Pieces of all those people, beloved or otherwise, are part of my thinking and being. Since I am not one to look back often, creating the collage was a way of acknowledging what was true without dwelling on it.

To even think about how these people are all gone from the earth both amazes me because they don't seem gone and also because someday so will I be. It really is the most mysterious part of life because it never feels like we could really come to an end and yet we can and will. They and I, for awhile, will live on only in memories-- hopefully positive ones.

Today there are people, children, grandchildren, friends, and they are part of who I am and who I am yet to be. Because I don't use the family photos here, you will just have to take my word for it that they are all beautiful-- in all ways. My family is really my deepest joy as I see them experiencing their lives, building their worlds apart from mine, and it's what life is all about-- the grand cycle.

For me, the land is a big part of who I am, that on which I grew up, where I live today, and the places I go and love. I don't know if land is so critical to everybody, but I grew up on a farm where I loved that land but had to move. Now I live on a different farm where I love that land but whether I die here or have to move, I cannot hold onto it. It will, however always be part of me-- including that which I own in Tucson.

Beyond my own places and land there are other experiences that come up when I think of treasured moments, moments that make me who I am today. I can think of so many, but to illustrate one would be my times near the great buffalo herds of Yellowstone.

In Yellowstone, buffalo, grizzlies, wolves, interact and live as naturally as is possible with humans on the fringe of their lives but not influencing their fears (nor hopefully diet). It is easy for humans to forget this isn't a zoo. Getting too close is best done with a telephoto lens.

Those times sitting on a bluff somewhere or from our vehicle and observing grizzlies, wolves, buffalo, birds, etc. are part of my inner treasure. To watch their family interactions, the way they move, hearing their sounds are memories I can draw up whenever I need them. Such inner experiences help me when dark times come or just on a day when I want a jolt of something to excite my energy.

 digital painting at coast using a ruined photograph to create something new

I am who I am because of the experiences I have gone through whether pleasurable or not. I have learned a lot by things that I would not have chosen to experience but can see how they enriched and gave me a depth I'd not have had otherwise. There is a saying, which I am paraphrasing, that it's not what happens to us so much as how we react to it.

Some might think by the age of 69 a person would stop thinking what they want to become. In my experience, not only with myself but with friends my age, those years haven't come yet if they ever do.

Lately I have been busier writing and less involved with self analysis, but once in awhile I think it's good to take time out and think about where I've been, why I am here, is it where I want to be? Sometimes I write a list of things I want to emphasize in the year ahead but this time I didn't do it--yet anyway. I am pretty happy with what was in my 2012. It was one of those years where I stepped out on something that was an emotional risk, and it feels good now to know I did it.

2013 is a special year for me since I will turn 70 during it. Those years where we get to start over with a 0 at the end of our age seem special to me. When I begin a new decade, I often try to come up with something I want to be doing when that happens. I'll give that some thought as my turning 70 isn't until the fall. Although as often happens, with my friends and those in my age group already turning 70, I tend to feel I feel I am already there from the beginning of the year.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder-- or is it?

When I read this piece on Daily Beast by Ashley Judd, I thought it was worth bringing here.

Get out of my face 

Her article led to Daily Beast posting a follow-up--

Your own puffy faced moments

Generally I don't get into these kinds of debates as she's a celebrity, she is under more pressure to always look her best, does it really impact me or readers here? Well it does in the sense that when the media ridicules or puts down women for their appearance-- especially as it relates to weight, beauty, health issues, or aging, they do impact how we see ourselves. It doesn't just happen to movie stars.

Think how often Hillary Clinton has been put down by one media or another for her hips, her legs, her hair style, or her aging. It takes a confident woman to go through that and stay true to their own style. Then there has been the physical putdown of Meghan McCain who, if you have seen her know, is a beautiful woman. That's not good enough for some people and the media, as they decree her to be fat and bring it up regularly as a way to ridicule. And if you follow the media's talk about women, a size 10 is plus sized.

Where it comes to aging celebrities, how many times have you heard someone put down Clint Eastwood for looking old? Not happening. But a woman in his age bracket better be skinny and have done some face work or she will be virtually asked to put a sack over her head.  If the celeb has had work done, the appearance police will evaluate whether it was a good job. Woe to that slim celeb (of any age) where her muscles show. Woe to the celeb male where they don't.

In some ways it would seem it shouldn't matter to women like me. We don't have to get out into the celeb world and be photographed regularly. The thing is do ordinary women then avoid being photographed in their own world?

How many young women, who are raising kids, feel fat compared to Cameron Diaz; how many will have zero photos of those years because they felt fat? Or when they get old, refuse to be photographed because they look their age and did not have surgery? Someday in a family album they will be as though they never existed, weren't really there-- and if you think that doesn't matter, consider the future generations who won't have known that person but might have a feel of who they were by those kind of photos.

Last lady on the right is my great grandmother. I never met her, not even as a baby but have seen a lot of photos of her proudly with her family and did she mind that she looked old, probably had no teeth by that age? If she did, she didn't let it stop her.

I only know how much fun my grandmother could be because I scanned some old negatives that had belonged to one of my aunts and saw this photo of her looking through a watermelon rind with her youngest son. My grandmother was overweight all her life but I have a lot of photos of her through the years. It means a lot to me now. Someday it might mean even more to my great grandchildren.

Some of this drive for perfection comes from advertising and our entertainment choices. Smile and if your teeth aren't perfectly even and nearly glowing with whiteness, shame on you and get ye to the dentist or the newest teeth whitening treatment. I had no idea how much was out there until I was in the toothpaste aisle and saw all the whitening products for teeth and that doesn't count the money going to dentists for even more advanced whitening.  If those teeth aren't totally white, do NOT let anybody take a photo of you smiling.

Yep, I have not had mine professionally whitened and feel lucky I just still have them. Well most of them...


For every Oprah (who is always battling her weight) there are more slim and beautiful TV and movie success stories. In a lot of the books out there, the hero is muscular and handsome-- heroine slender and beautiful. I can only think of a few exceptions like Bridget Jones Diary who was trying to lose weight but looked like an average woman-- oh the misery. In books off the top of my head, I can think of two obese heroines-- Little Giant of Aberdeen County and The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (and to play the role in the HBO series, the actress had to be inflated to fit the part. No really fat actresses to do it?) Jane Eyre is supposed to be plain but when you see a movie of the book, no plain women playing the part, are there?

Recently in the writer forums at Amazon I heard women complaining about there being only one male model who is regularly used on the covers. And it's true. He is everywhere from indie to paper covers and frankly he's found a market that it's too bad more interesting looking men and women don't mine by providing photos of themselves that would be suitable for say historic or contemporary book covers.

Besides, access, there's a reason he's on so many. He looks like who is in the books. And that includes some of mine as I have him on two because he does look like those heroes. I could have two more if I decide to publish my historic books and create my own covers for them. Why did I write about those kind of heroes? Well they came to me but why did they come to me?

One factor is that it's what readers want. I wrote one book with an ugly hero (who the heroine, of course, saw otherwise) and I have yet to find a cover model who could make it work to do a trailer-- and I will be doing a trailer for that book. I see men in real life all the time who don't have perfect features and yet have that certain something. Try finding a photo of one where you can buy the rights to use-- at least for a price independent writers can afford.

One writer said we can blame this on Clint Walker and she might be right for my age group. I had such a crush on him when he was doing Cheyenne (western TV series for you younger readers). Oh my and when he took his shirt off, well it's not too surprising a man looking a lot like him is making money these days pretending to be the hero about whom the writers wrote. I so wanted Clint Walker to be my husband someday and was quite disappointed to find the actor who played him was already married.

I am not sure why we like our advertisements full of, our movies populated by, our books about perfect looking people when none of us are. Maybe it's part of the fantasy. Well if it is, it's a problem when we take it with us off the pages or away from the screens.

Cougars-- no, not the wildlife

For awhile now I have been hearing the term cougar to describe older women (from their 40s to an undefined upper limit) with a yen for younger men or was that older women who could still attract younger men? Or maybe it's both.

I had little interest in it beyond some cultural curiosity since (besides being in a relationship) younger men, as such, have never appealed to me in the romantic sense. Maybe it's because I have a 50 year old son-in-law and a nearly 40 year old son? (Maybe not as I don't remember ever thinking men much younger than myself were that appealing even in movies which is getting to be a problem as the older guys are often no longer playing romantic leads, with a few exceptions and when they do, it's too often with a woman young enough to be their granddaughter.)

To me, age differences, when less than 10 years either way don't matter; but beyond that, I'd think there would be some things that the couple would not have shared for common experiences. Would I want to date a guy where I had to explain who Sky King was? I think not.

It would not make me feel younger to know a younger man was attracted to me; and if I was out looking and was interested in a younger man, he better not look younger. No way would I want to walk into a restaurant and have the server thinking I was with my son-- unless I was.

Then I heard a new take on cougars. It was in a clip from the Today Show where Meredith Viera was interviewing three older women (by older I am guessing from 50s to maybe 70 or thereabouts) as they discussed what a cougar was and that it didn't have to relate to marital status. There was a website and on the website is the video of that interview if you click down a ways:

Real Cougar Woman

Since this was a new definition to the term, I did a little research online. It appears still that most of the time cougar means an older woman looking for a younger man (you would be amazed at how many sites there are to display your older woman status or if you are a guy looking for one, to see what's available. No, I did not check them out to see what the women looked like).

The impression I got, from reading some of the pieces on the 'Real Cougar Woman' site, is that being a cougar is more about who the woman is and not about the man she's with or even if she wants to be with someone. A cougar woman is confident in herself, sensual, energetic, with the knowledge that comes with experience. If riding a dragon is what is required to get her where she wants to go, she will do it.

There was a time where, I think, ages were more clearly defined as to what was expected. Not that some women didn't go against the norms, but there was a general cultural consensus of what was appropriate at 20 but not okay at 70.

Some of this has maybe changed because of many products out there designed to make someone look younger, a drumbeat of advertising, and many women in the business world where there can be age discrimination. But it might not just be about trying to look younger. Maybe something, in terms of who we are as women, has just changed period. What do women expect for themselves today?

After reading the site for cougar women (not joining) I had to ask myself. Is that who I am? The women in the interview said that being a cougar is about being true to your age, not trying to dress like a young woman but dressing in ways that can be glamorous and accentuates where you are today. It is about women who are or have been successful at something. I think that could be at anything that has left the woman feeling empowered by what she knows she can do. It is not about beauty, weight or age but an empowering inner spirit.

As I often do when I want to illustrate a concept, I decided to get some pictures of cougar women. The easiest ones came as I remembered some self-portraits Parapluie had painted. Could they be any more powerful as images of an inner self?

Then, since I can't very well go asking certain women I see out if I can take their picture, there was taking some photos of me. I found out (like with the wink), that this wasn't as easy as it sounded. It's not particularly hard to look sexy in a photo, to look like you're having fun, to be grandmotherly, or to look outdoorsy, but what says to others-- this is a cougar woman? Should she be relaxed, at ease, moving, thoughtful? I know these women when I see them, but how do I capture that in a photograph?

I think a cougar woman should have a certain spirit, an aura. I think she can be any age. She's not trying to sell herself because she is comfortable with who she is. She should have a look in her eyes that says she knows something. Others see that and are drawn to it. The problem is obvious: How do you show that in a photograph? Feelings are always challenging to photograph. Easy to take a vacation picture or a catalog shot. Harder to capture soul. I am not sure I ever succeeded but will try again sometime as to me this concept is about empowerment for women.

Poor Farm Boss, trying to understand what I was talking about, and then tasked with snapping the photo at the right moment-- or not. Self-timed has a drawback when you are trying to get into a certain mood while at the same time jumping up, pushing the camera button, getting back down and posing before it clicks (although not bad if you want one that looks like you are ready to pounce).

One thing I can say, this is no way to get into the mood for Thanksgiving...

Incidentally, check out Parapluie's blog, Umbrella Painting Journal as she is writing a novelette in installments, which explores the creative world of a female artist.

Women and Politics

It is easy to forget how recently women had no right to vote. Imagine that the year when my mother was born, 1912, was the first year women in the state of Oregon were allowed to vote. The federal government would not recognize that right as a whole until 1920 when the United States, along with a movement that was sweeping the world, gave full voting rights to women.

Some states had given the vote to their women earlier. Wyoming is the most famous for what it said when it was considering coming into the Union. They had permitted their women to vote from 1869, but the United States government didn't want women having that right-- might be catching, dontcha know. Heck, women might even get the idea to run for the presidency... Nah, that's too far out!

Wyoming, the land of macho cowboys and tough men, had long before realized the power of women, valued their wisdom, and obviously had men strong enough in themselves to not fear strong woman. They said, "we will remain out of the Union a hundred years rather than come in without our women." In 1890, they came in with them, women's right to vote intact. It would be thirty more years before the country as a whole granted suffrage to all women through the 19th Amendment to the Constitution.

It is not like the United States was alone in not permitting women to have the vote or run for office. The first place to grant women the vote was Pitcairn Islands in 1838. Until that time, women everywhere could be governed but had no voice in who was governing them. That is still true in Saudi Arabia (our supposed moderate friend), which currently is one of the few Arab states not permitting women to vote. If the Muslim extremists gain in power in other nations, more women could lose that right.

Yet with this history of only in my mother's generation having had that voice granted them, with so many having sacrificed and fought to gain that vote, there are women today who find politics too boring to be informed or simply don't consider it feminine to be interested in political topics-- not women bloggers in my experience, but women to whom I talk. Now why would this be?

The women who don't want to know about political happenings are women I respect in so many ways. They are involved with life, active in their families, but the word politics turns them off. If I ask what do you think about this candidate or that issue, they change the subject to something more enjoyable to them. When they tell me it's boring to discuss it, I want to remind them that was the argument men used to keep them from getting the vote-- women aren't temperamentally suited for deciding on important things.

Politics impact every thing we do from working conditions, sexual laws, education, our very air to breathe or water to drink, what taxes we pay, who do we help, what laws govern our health care, and even whether we send our offspring off to war. How can it be boring to be informed as to what are the right things to be done.

Yes, in a lot of ways, we are all tired of politics right now, but experts are saying our candidates for the '08 presidential race will be decided before the first primaries. So when we say we don't like our choices, could it be we didn't start caring early enough? We are a representative government which means we don't get to vote on individual issues but rather for men and women who believe as we do about those issues.

To be clear, this is not about whether someone likes to argue political issues with others. Not all men or women enjoy those kinds of heated discussions, but it's whether as citizens we know what's going on, understand what our government has been doing, inform ourselves about candidates for office, understand the world situations in which we are involved, support candidates who are in agreement with us, and finally and most importantly use that hard-won vote responsibly.

I wonder if the answer to why too many women have felt it wasn't womanly to be politically savvy comes down to this. It's those who lost out on stopping them from voting but would keep women thinking they should not bother their cute, little heads with such complicated subjects-- just vote how I tell you, dear. It's the last gasp of the ones who still would like to keep women from being real factors in the laws and rules that govern their lives. If we believe it's not feminine, we will stay out of it and let men run it. And that has worked so well...

(The photo is last week on this farm-- cute, sweet sheep-- and represents what we are when we allow someone else to run our lives-- man or woman.)

Random thoughts on women in politics

What inspires this particular blog are two things I have recently read. These are not new but always amazing to me how women are held to different standards than men-- particularly in politics.

The first was when, in a hearing, Senator Barbara Boxer said to Secretary of State Rice that because she hadn't been a mother, she might not have compassion for what an overseas war is costing this country. Her implication that we have to be a parent to know what love is was plain nuts. Would anybody say the same thing to a man? Does Boxer not see that maybe Rice could love someone and therefore understand what loss means without being a mommy?

I don't like much of what Rice has done, don't understand how she seems to blindly back Bush, but the problem is not that she wasn't married nor had children. It's total loyalty to a cause (or is it a man). She is a very intellectual woman, does she have any of her own thoughts on this? any doubts? Not that we can tell. I don't see how having children would have changed that.

Then I read Time Goes By about a blogger who posted a photo (not this exact one) of Hillary Clinton that illuminated every wrinkle, sag and line. He had made a crack about not getting older but bet... stopping with that and letting his reader draw the conclusion that Hillary is not a beauty queen.

To me, despite the fact that I am not a fan of Hillary, something is wrong when people put a woman down for looking like she is almost 60 which is what she is. On Hillary's face, you see the life she has led. Why is that bad?

Yes, she does not look twenty, nor does she have that totally line-free, plastic face of some middle-aged celebrities. I am trying to understand why it mattered that a United States senator does not look like a movie star. Do people want their senator spending a lot of time in beauty salons having facials? No wonder women (and men) in leadership sometimes feel forced into Botox or surgically remedying the horrors of looking old. Oh my is there a worse fate?

Is it impossible in our country to see the beauty in a face that shows its age? What is wrong with a face that shows the pain, the laughter, the whole life that the woman has lived? And, does a woman who wants to be in politics have to marry and have children to prove she can do the job as well as a man? How dare a woman be the one to question that! Senator Boxer deserves the negative press that she got from this.

Being gung-ho on this war isn't the exclusive province of those without children. It's possible to even have a child in the war and be a war hawk-- ie John McCain.

A woman's tools

Women's tools are always of interest to me. One of my Christmas presents was a different design of a whisk. While I am not a gourmet cook, I enjoy adding good spices, coming to new ways to cook something I think others will enjoy, and I love kitchen tools. Perhaps it all goes back to some primeval feeling that a woman feeds her family as a sign of love or her place in the scheme of things. Although some of that has been lost in a culture where many women work outside the home and with the ease of take-out, perhaps fine cooking has even more value when it's truly a gift.

Besides modern tools, I receive great pleasure from owning a few of the tools-- grinding bowls, mortars, pestles, mano, and matates-- left by the peoples who traveled this land before the settlers arrived (no, I don't grind anything in them).

When the Luckiamute peoples lived where I do, they moved with the seasons. Their stone tools were left of necessity in the places where they camped. They were sometimes buried, and generation after generation would know where to find them. One day those people stopped coming. The tools remained hidden until a flood or torrential rain would uncover them for another people to find.

It is easy to imagine the women gathered along the creek below their hide or cedar shelters and grinding the paste from nuts and roots that can be formed and cooked. Chattering as they work, they left their energy on the things they used. I know this is so because I feel that energy. I also know it as I prepare food or sit talking to another woman while she cooks. Can I help? What did you add to that? Mmmm that tastes good. Women gather many ways but one of the most enjoyable for me is in a kitchen with a glass of red wine while we laugh and talk.

My grinding stones have either been found on this creek or purchased in a store that sells artifacts gathered from private land. That last part is very important as there is no right to gather or even buy artifacts from public land. Private land or not, there is also no right to own funerary or ceremonial items. If those are found, even on private lands, they are to be left where they are. Sacred items are to be respected -- most especially if you are a believer in karma!

Sometimes such items are claimed to be old but in reality have been created for selling. Know your dealer, and buyer beware is a good warning here as elsewhere.

(The last image is a painting Parapluie did some years ago of one of my grinding bowls. She was yet another woman feeling the energy of the tool and desiring to capture it with her paints.)