Tag: Musings

What you can do with a banana

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

They do come in bunches. Here are some fine uses.

  1. Make a sinful split for dessert.
  2. Or banana bread.
  3. Or a smoothie.
  4. Daiquiris!
  5. Or, with the peel, become a pratfall comedian. (Are they really that slick?)
  6. You can also soak the peel in water to use as indoor plant food.
  7. Or rub it over bug bites, poison ivy, or rashes to relieve itching and promote healing.
  8. Or use the peel to polish leather and silver.
  9. Now, back to the full fruit, we won’t go into what can happen in private.
  10. My favorite? Feed ’em to a bunny! Which gives us more peels.

Get used to driving to Bangor if you wanna live here

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Bangor, a 2½-hour drive from Eastport, is our closest metropolis this side of Canada. And getting there or back can be a bear in winter. Oh, yes, you need to keep your eye out so you don’t hit a bear. There’s even a lodge along the way that touts the services of a bear-hunt guide.

The city itself is about the size of Dover, New Hampshire – roughly 30,000 population, but unless we cross the border to St. John, New Brunswick, it still has the closest:

  1. Interstate highway.
  2. Major hospital and specialists.
  3. Airline flights.
  4. Mall and many big-name, big-box stores.
  5. Daily newspaper.
  6. Array of ethnic restaurants.
  7. Cineplex.
  8. Synagogue.
  9. Greek Orthodox church.
  10. Toyota dealer.

Smaller Ellsworth, gateway to Acadia National Park, is about the same distance to the south. It also offers some respite as a civilized alternative.

 

How flimsy are all those social media stats?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

I know that everywhere you go, everybody seems to have their nose stuck in their cell phone, oblivious to just about everything going on around them. You know, the bubble people.

Or, where I’m now living, they have those phones up in the air taking pictures so they can look at what’s in front of them later.

Oh, my. What a world.

As a writer, I’m supposed to be active on all platforms as a matter of marketing , but as many others are discovering, those venues rarely lead to book sales or loyal readers. Let’s be honest.

I’ve toyed with some of them, but drifted away, even Twitter.

My primary social medium is here at WordPress, blogging. I know how to manage my posts easily. The Reader feels to me like a real mailbox, with dispatches from around the world – postcards, letters, clippings. As for you?

For that matter, I’ve never quite “got” Facebook. It’s cumbersome to navigate, most of the content feels like gossip cluttered with advertising, and I don’t like having to sign in to see what should be public information for local retailers, schools, or public events.

Still, living in a small town, I’m finding that’s where the local “party line” is, and checking in regularly is essential. I still have qualms about the bigger corporate picture, with its shadowy agendas.

Recently renewing contacts with folks from my ancient past has also had me turning to FB.

What’s surprising me, though, is the gap between those who are active in a social medium and those who are “members” but rarely or even never check in.

It’s not just FB. Even email accounts. I suspect many of my contacts are that way, too. Hello! Anybody there? Did you get my message? When was the last time they posted or commented? Take that as a clue to their presence … or absence.

The numbers, then, might not be nearly as big or influential as they’re boasted.

Meanwhile, I keep falling down these Internet rabbit holes, pursuing arcane information.

Where are you spending your time online? Or even elsewhere?

Whatever happened to my silk scarves?

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

The first college I attended had an excellent writing program, and somehow most of the kids in it began wearing scarves as a kind of identity badge. I posted on that back in 2013, but am now reflecting on a later incarnation, once I had relocated to New England.

In the intervening years, I had discovered the glories of silk, a fabric I had been taught was expensive and somehow beyond our means. What I found instead was how marvelous it felt to the touch and how warm its lightness could be in winter here or how well it breathed in warmer weather. And then I picked up a few brightly patterned ones that were scarves. They were a stylish touch to my otherwise nearly Plain wardrobe and made a definite impression, often eliciting favorable comments.

But then, when I remarried, they vanished into my stepdaughters’ collections. Fine enough.

The other day, though, I flashed on the thought I could really use those again – they do hold the heat in cold weather – or cold rooms, especially.

So I’m on the lookout. This should be fun, picking up a couple or more.

Now, as for my necktie collection? When’s the last time I’ve even worn one? Will I ever wear one again?

 

In case you’re considering a pet rabbit

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 6 Comments

You’ve been seeing our duo, Salty and Pepper. Before that were Boo, especially, and Widgeon.

Now, for some details on the species.

  1. Officially, they’re lagomorphs, though we find their chewing habits resemble rodents – you know, beavers, when it comes to wood. You’ve been warned.
  2. Existing as an animal of prey, meaning a food source, makes them skittish. Boo, though, came to be a lap rabbit, sitting for hours in her someone special’s lap.
  3. In short spurts, they can zip along at up to 45 miles an hour. As ours do when they’re first out of their cage in the morning.
  4. In general, they’re silent. They don’t bark or meow or anything like that, though Salty has a whiffling snore while dozing. You’d think she’s in pain, but she’s not.
  5. They’re meticulously clean and can be potty trained, like a cat.
  6. Their ability to jump straight up, from all four legs, and twist and spin about in the air is called binky.
  7. Born covered in fur, they can run from the start.
  8. Their teeth and nails never stop growing.
  9. They cannot vomit, which requires us to be careful in what we feed them. Even when they seem to eat almost everything we offer them. That, by the way, has been an incentive for more attentive weeding on my part. Those weeds suddenly become bunny treats, and watching those greens be so assiduously devoured is quite amusing.
  10. They’re cute and soft, mostly.

 

Ways this move was easier than others in my life

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

I’m not counting the few times I relocated across town. I mean the big moves, from one state to another, even from one part of the country to another.

You already know my fondness for Dover – and I have been intensely loyal to some of the locales I’ve made home but not others – yet this transfer of fidelity has been rather startling in its speed.

Dover? That was the address I had longest anywhere, edging out my native Dayton. Yet the 300-mile leap from Dover to Eastport was a breeze in comparison to the others I’d done. It’s rather perplexed both my wife and me.

Here are a few factors.

  1. We needed to downsize, and our house and garden and stuffed barn were more than we could keep up with. Quite simply, they were weighing on us, not just emotionally but especially when we looked at our bank balance.
  2. I had been to Eastport. Apart from Dover, where I had been worshiping as a Quaker, the previous moves had dropped me in as a total stranger. I hadn’t even visited Indiana University until showing up as a student in the middle of my sophomore year. Well, there was my return as a research associate, this time with a wife and a duplex rental on the other side of town. I hadn’t even been to Binghamton, New York, for a job interview.
  3. Eastport had a few things I was anticipating. Quoddy Head State Park had rekindled a sense of wilderness I’d left behind in the Pacific Northwest 40 years earlier. And the local choir had a repertoire much like our Revelsingers in Boston. Plus, I had been to the small Quaker Meeting and worked in projects with one of its outstanding members.
  4. I wasn’t alone. Eastport started out as my elder daughter’s wild dream, soon supported by my wife. Where else could we afford to live so close to the ocean? Back to downsizing, but as a whole-family venture. No more Lone Ranger sans Tonto, even if I was coming up as the vanguard. Their visits were festive occasions.
  5. We weren’t doing it all in one fell swoop but rather in stages. For the first four months, I was commuting back to New Hampshire almost weekly as we prepared our old house to market – meaning largely decluttering and cleaning. On this end, we still need to make renovations before filling this place with goods now in storage. Frankly, I’m enjoying doing more with less.
  6. Emotionally, Covid had already distanced me from many connections. I wasn’t swimming daily, for one thing, so that part of my routine wasn’t severed. I hadn’t even seen my pool buddies or the lifeguards for the better part of a year. We Quakers were worshiping and conducting business by Zoom, and I could keep that connection going a while longer. I was even getting together monthly online with Dover’s religious leaders and a Seacoast writers’ schmooze.
  7. Being in the middle of a big writing project gave me a crucial focus and meant the solitude on this end was welcome. Normally, access to libraries would be essential to what I was investigating, but I found rare resources in my computer searches and downloads. Yes, times have changed.
  8. There was no accompanying sense of failure or betrayal. My job hadn’t been terminated or taken an unacceptable turn – gee, that could lead to another Tendrils! (You know, the modern American workplace – see my novel Hometown News for examples.) I didn’t even have a new job to confront – what a relief! My lover hadn’t just dumped me or failed to reconnect when I arrived, and I wouldn’t be searching for love, either. Nor had I left paradise for an industrial or suburban wasteland.
  9. I’ve enjoyed exploring with an eye for what I’d introduce to the others on their visits. And meeting some fascinating new folks, likewise. I still feel I’m living in a real-life Northern Exposure.
  10. Well, there were moments of feeling exiled, like “What have I done wrong,” but they were soon countered by reclaiming some of my independence. I’d gotten spoiled, as far as food goes, and not really cooked anything for two decades, other than lighting the grill or popping something in the microwave. (Well, there was a fried rice that impressed one of our Chinese guests.) But now our morning phone calls have included cooking advice and insights. That sort of thing. I’ve been pleased with my dinners, even the ones I wouldn’t serve anyone else, should I have to. As for exile? Nah, I’ve never felt more comfortable anywhere.