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Moving On

At the Walnut Street art show in Springfield MO

My van failed to pass inspection last May and I sold it yesterday, marking the true end to my art fair gypsy life.

I’d long ago cut out the rainy/cold/windy/beastly hot/snowy! outdoor shows. Then along came a little virus. No indoor shows. And last year, aside from a very small, easy, one-day show just down the road, I did not travel. Moving on to other things.

But since I absolutely HATE buying and selling cars, I only just put the van on the market last week. Now it’s gone. Ahh.

At Iowa City IA

I took advice from a friend about how to post it. Put it up on my Facebook page, hoping the friend who’d bought both my loveseat and Honda Accord, would feel the need to own an old van with 209,000 miles on it. Mostly highway! Nope. I then had to offer it to strangers. Nerve-wracking. I was asking $2500, as Edmonds’ suggested.

Right away, like the naive old lady I once heard loudly reading off her credit card number, three-digit code and expiration date into a phone at a thrift store (true), I got scammed. A flurry of messages asked me to give my cell phone number so they could send me a code and, as I found out, grab my number and use it to get into my Google account and scam other people. Don’t ever do this!! I foolishly did it one time, against everything my body and intuition were telling me, then feverishly called one son and then another, to fix it. How would I get along without them? What was I thinking?? I know better!! And yet. Old Lady.

At Salina, Kansas

Then there were the lowball offers. Who makes an offer sight unseen, anyway? Several offered $1000. One of those said he could throw in some “firearms” if I was interested. My only interest in firearms is that they be outlawed! I wanted to say (yell). Another offered $300. Cash!

In the end and rather quickly I sold it to a guy who said it was for a good cause. Piqued my interest, of course. I checked it out and it’s all true. He is a lovely man who knows two of the nicest people I know and who is creating a transitional living house for people struggling with addiction. Since I once worked in that field, I was happy to let him have it for less than I’d wanted. So my trusty green Toyota, which has had a pretty beautiful life already, will be transporting people who are trying to better their lives. La! Both I and the van are moving on, in good ways. I like it.

“Girls, you’ve gotta know when it’s time to turn the page.” ― Tori Amos

“There comes a time in your life when you have to choose to turn the page, write another book or simply close it.” ― Shannon L. Alder

“We can’t be afraid of change. You may feel very secure in the pond that you are in, but if you never venture out of it, you will never know that there is such a thing as an ocean, a sea. Holding onto something that is good for you now, may be the very reason why you don’t have something better.” ― C. JoyBell C.

If you’re looking for my cards or art, you’ll find all of that on my website. If you enjoy these letters, feel free to forward this one to anyone you think might like it. And if someone forwarded this one to you, you can sign up here to receive the letters right in your Inbox. Finally, you’ll find past letters and poems here.

Thanks for listening,
Kay

P.S. MerryThoughts is the name of my first book, out of print at the moment. The word is a British one, referring both to a wishbone and to the ritual of breaking the wishbone with the intention of either having a wish granted or being the one who marries first, thus the “merry thoughts.”

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The Pine Tree

The pin oak is finally turning red, red orange, burnt sienna

though the ginkgo is still quite green and that old pine tree

stands nearly bare when it should be green and full of needles.

Old age, vines and weather have finally defeated it

a tree my neighbor who lived to be a hundred planted

when she was young.  When she was old her neighbor

to the west climbed it every December to hang

a lit wreath high up in its topmost branches.

Both now gone from here, one to the country

a young wife and two little boys, one after those

last bitter years to death and whatever comes next.

So everything changes even those things we

imagine don’t matter that much nevertheless

adding to the humble landscape of a human life

for as I look now back there I recall a whole

other time left behind as my life goes on and on.

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Turn of the Season

The landscape has changed overnight or

was I simply not seeing, the day before?

Poison ivy is turning red along with

the leaves of a tree whose name I do not know.

Yellow blooms in the fields and across the woods,

tufts and patches suddenly brighten the crowded trees.

Leaves litter the paths now, brown, red, ochre, yellow.

How did this come about so suddenly?

What I once took for normal is no more

and though nature’s face will once again

be fresh and new bursting with Spring’s youth,

my own slides slowly towards old age,

renewals of spirit my only possibility

and only if I’m lucky.

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Change

My days all cracked apart, changed, rearranged

and though I know it’s temporary and all to the good

I wonder if it’s worth all this, the exhaustion, the forgetting,

the crazy upset of my apple cart newness, not of course as in

giving birth or finding oneself suddenly broken and beaten in an overturned car

no, not at all at all, but nevertheless jarred by this self-imposed change.

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Turning of the World

Oh the lacy light of summer

favorite and best slanting across

early in the morning and if one

sleeps too late lolls awake fails to take

oneself (one’s dogs) out in the

world of it soon enough

well then it’s another thing

and one has missed that thing

but then there’s this and on and on

that goes for everyone knows

the world keeps turning

all things change

moment to moment

for better or worse

’til death do us part

and then who knows

maybe

after that as well.

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Circus

So what if in a moment it all changes

as It tends to do?

And what if Life takes an unexpected turn

the acrobat loses balance

misses the catch

missteps on the high wire?

What if it all falls down around us

the wire

the gymnast

the jugglers’ pins

the voluminous tent

the girl on the elephant’s neck

the colorful flags

the ringmaster’s tall black hat?

What will we do then?

What will we all do?

What will happen to that elephant?

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Challenges

Are you ready? Am I?

For the next big challenge

the unexpected loss coming

at any moment

the sudden change in circumstance

disrupting daily life

the lucky break, even

the windfall

some fortuitous happenstance.

Are you ready are we ever ready

for those events that interrupt and

forever alter Life As We Know It

and if we are if we maintain

grace and equanimity in the face

of shattering change

stretch our spines

rise to our full height

grow and expand

along with our universe

what then?

Do we get a pass for whatever

might have come next?

Or do we just move on

to the next level, each challenge

more difficult than the last?

Or somehow easier?