Children's Books: This Girl Isn't Just a Girl

A girl, but not just any girl.

I often find interesting things on the street, mostly because I'm always looking at the world around me, and so I make great finds. I passed by a church that has an elementary school, and I noticed that one young student must have had one heck of a good time with this book. 

BOO! Did I scare you?

Well-loved books, like beloved children's toys, come apart with heavy use, and this darling book about a little girl witch was no exception. As much as I make books to last (as part of my job), I also recognize them for what they are; precious objects that are also made for human use, especially by our littlest ones, who need them the most to learn. Besides, this girl loved finding it among the autumn leaves. 

It just seemed right.

No problem! I got it covered.

Mad about books?

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/reading-writing-books/

Fall, and school reading.

Travel: Poetry in Motion

Wait. What the heck does that say?

It's about ripping off tourists. Neat!

On a recent trip to and from the city, I found myself sitting behind a gentlemen with a language book. I couldn't help but read over his shoulder because it was printed in very large print, a book designed for the elderly, which he clearly is. 

The funniest parts were the language lessons themselves, translations of certain key phrases from English to Spanish, like "Does the tourist need a map?", or "I just sold a watch to that tourist." and "Does the tourist need a watch?" Definitely not a native New Yorker. Now I know the next time I visit Old Mexico, just what phrases I need to brush up on....and not to wear a watch. You know, just a case a tourist needs one, too.

South of the Border, yo.

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/travel/

Toys: Baby BOO's!

Boo! For Halloween!

Just in time for Halloween, comes the worlds' cutest dog in an adorable small size, with different types of hoodies to match his every mood. 
I took one out and pulled the blue hood on his tiny little furry head myself...and then I cooed at it like it was a baby. 

This particular basket full of Boos caught my eye in the Port Authority bus terminal. The bookstore manager said everyone stops to look at him in the store window, and I know why. He's the world's cutest dog! That's marketing pull. Boo to you!

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/dogs/ 

 

Faith: Horray!

 

When I was a kid, I thought this cartoon was about Catholicism, because I thought the people in yellow hooded robes were friars in habit. It seems funny to me now, but that's how I absorbed one of the most important early lessons we have; to be a fan of nature, to enjoy our natural resources as part of the miracle of creation, and to welcome dramatic events and happenings as part of the mystery of our faith. It made me happy to see brothers cheering the falls, happy to be witnesses to such a great spectacle. Yellow was also my favorite color. I was allowed to pick a paint color for my room as a kid, when it needed repainting, and this was close to the color I chose. When my mom asked me why I picked such a bright color, I said, "Because yellow is cheerful. It's bright and sunny. Like the sun."

It's certainly reflects how I feel about nature: a devoted fan of flora and fauna, and the beauty that's all around us. I don't remember the first time I went to Niagara Falls, and the second time I went (in winter), I was so sick that I forced myself through the experience, which seemed dramatically commercialized. The malls and the shopping centers surrounding Niagara seemed to almost overwhelm what was happening outside. I did buy an incredible pair of leather gloves from Canada, and that satisfied the Acadian part of me; seeing two sides of myself reconciled above one of nature's greatest forces, spanning across two countries. And that's how I now see this link between my childish perception and the reality of our practices - the perfect forging of two perspectives into one harmonious whole, which is exactly how it's supposed to be. Happy Monday to you!

http://www.ccr.org.uk/archive/gn0807/g11.htm.

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/faith/

Birdhouses: Indoor Decor

The little white birdhouse.

I bought this pretty little house years ago, when I took care of my bedridden mom, down for the count with a broken back. I had spent some of the money I got from a contractual buyout (http://mariedoucette.blogspot.com/2013/09/sunday-paper.html) to spend a month nursing her through yet another fall, the result of MS and her own inability to cope with the disease. She was depressed, angry, and prone to violent fits. My brothers had warned me over the phone that she had gone seriously downhill before I flew back East: a normally intensely neat women with daily cleaning rituals, her apartment started to become cluttered, dirty, and messy.

Years ago I discovered Feng Shui (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feng_shui), and while I wasn't a mad devotee by any means, I bought a few books on the subject out of curiosity. Much of it is simply basic good design sense for any space: lots of light, green plants for color, oxygen, and good health, water features for relaxation, and mirrors to bounce around the light, to make small spaces feel bigger. The different centers of the eight-sided Bagua correspond to different areas of life; there's one corner for wealth, another for health, and so on (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagua).

So, after nursing her physically and emotionally, I set about making her place warm and welcoming. First, I needed a lot of garbage bags. She had held onto papers that had the same year as my grandfather's death, which was never fully addressed in her mental health care routine successfully. I spent days going to her room to show her each and every piece of paper stuffed away into various nooks and crannies. She cursed me and fought me so viciously that finally, out of desperation and in exhaustion, I finally looked at her wearily and said "Look, honey, you can say whatever you want to me, but this process isn't going to stop. So do your worst. It won't change anything."

And like that, the spell was broken. I went to a crafts store soon after to begin bringing some cheer to her place. I created a little area of interest on top of a book case with a basket holding some fake ivy, and intertwining those branches, I stuck in these cheerful little birdhouses to add more interest. After I went back to Colorado, my mom thanked me for pulling her out of her downward spiral. She had gone to see a doctor who tested her for depression, and she had drawn a clock backwards, which is a positive sign of it. Her real recovery began, as so often happens when I am directly involved.

That time period taught me a lot about the power of beautifully decorated space, and how important design in the home is. It's where we spend most of our time. I hadn't really had a knack for interior design prior, because I never had the money or a place of my own to express myself, but once I came back to Brooklyn, my interest caught fire in earnest (http://mariedoucette.blogspot.com/2011/01/joys-of-winter-comforts-of-home.html). This year, moving back home for my own reasons, my mom turned to me on the couch, and asked me, "What is that there?" Only the white birdhouse remained from my time nurturing her through that period. I took the little birdhouse away, into the other room, and there it now lives.

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/birdhouses-and-treehouses/

Sacred Spaces: The Tagaste Monastery

The Tagaste Monastery, Suffern, NY.

It seemed like no surprise and also very surprising that across the street from the Good Samaritan Hospital is a monastery. I didn't know there was an order in Rockland County as a kid growing up in New City, and the sight of it made me really, really happy. What a blessed place of beauty we live in! Here's hoping that your views and vistas today bring you some peace. Amen.

Stone wall, Tagaste Monastery.

Moon through the trees, Suffern, NY

http://www.tagastemonastery.org/our_history.asp

 http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/street-art-sacred-spaces/

Gardens: Secret Garden

Children's Garden, at the Good Samaritan Hospital.

Going to the doctor's is hard enough, but it's especially difficult for women and their children. On a recent trip to a local hospital for a free women's healthcare event that promoted breast cancer awareness, 

I saw this little garden out the window, and you know what? It made me feel better, like this was a place that cared about people. One of my favorite charities is Splashes of Hope (http://splashesofhope.org/), an organization that creates beautiful healing spaces, because as artists, they realize that an environment not designed for our senses is one that cuts out a huge part of our life. They give children spaces that make them feel more connected to the outside world by joyfully filling their senses. 

Leonard Nimoy, (SPOCK!) is very active for a hospital in California (http://www.leonardnimoy.de/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1558:the-healing-arts-&catid=27:interviews&Itemid=14) that did just that: it created galleries out of empty wall space for their patients, so they could stroll down the hallways and look at the art. One women fighting cancer said it gave her a reason to live, because she wanted so badly to get better to go outside to look at a landscape like the one she passed by every day with her portable chemo IV drip in her arm. The greatest gift we can give one another is the gift of hope, a reason to go on living, because we know we're not alone.  

What do your gifts do for others?

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/gardens-and-green-walls/ 

Nature: Mystery Fruit

Mysterious fruit tree.

I walked past this weird tree several times this summer, and it intrigued me each time. I'd never seen something like it before. The fruit kinda looked like a chestnut, but the fuzzy texture threw me. WTF?! Finally, I had to go deep, and I picked one so I could kick it. No dice, because it didn't rupture open upon contact. OK, fine. I stepped on one, and it exploded like a ripe grape. Nice! Naturally, that led me to picking one so I could dissect it for further scientific experiments. Sorry, neighbor! 

What the....?! What is that?!

Me and my mom looked at one on the kitchen table, while I expounded on my theory: it was citrus, because it had a slight orange-y scent and a dimpled rind, though the peach fuzz stumped us both. I left it out for awhile (so I could get it open after it ripened), and then I put it on a bookshelf and forgot about it, until one morning I remembered that I wanted to cut it open. So I did. Aha! We looked at its' distinct sections, which made it definitely citrus, as did the seed shape. 
But what fucking kind? We didn't know. 

Aha! Getting closer to the answer....

I went to the library and looked it up on Google by typing in the words "citrus" and "fuzzy" and there it was: the freaky looking fruit tree. See for yourself, for great mysteries revealed: http://www.al.com/living/index.ssf/2012/06/that_twisty_thorny_plant_with.html. 
Even the name is cool.

I got your nature right here: 

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/nature/.

Cottages: Daily Dose of Cute

Warmth and charm.

American Quaint.

Perfectly Adorable.

Right here: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/cottages/.

Street Art: Poetry

Conjunction Junction, what's your function?

I found a piece of paper on the sidewalk, grammar lessons from a child's notebook, and I thought it formed a poetry of its' own. 
Everyday magic is all around you.  Stop for a second look.

Dogs: Dog Statues

Notice the intent stare on this dog statue.

Devoted dog owners, like people who love to cook, are people who like to have a good time. We're wacky in a socially acceptable way. Walking around town, I noticed a lot of funny doggie statues, some oddly realistic, like their eyes follow you and stuff. I had an uncle who loved to go through garbage dumps for weird stuff that he would dump on our lawn when we weren't home. 

Bulldog with human bifocals.

It was great fun for me as a kid, because you never knew what you'd find when you pulled in the driveway. It could be a tree, or a tire planter, or a plastic statue. My mom is pretty serious about her "no plastic lawn ornaments rule" (or those racist jockeys statues, that's just wrong) so when I see wacky dog sculptures, it reminds me of him. I love beautifully decorated houses and lawns, but thrown in a good sense of humor, and I'm done.  

What could be more welcoming?

Terrier in the garden.

You're a weirdo, funny dog person. 

Be glad: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/dogs/.

Beauty: Make-Up Free Marie

Tired, make up free me looks OK (with help from cleavage).

I was surfing Twitter last week, and I noticed a story about celebrity women without make up that freaked me out. They're not new stories, and of course, the shots were by paparazzi in a quest to catch these particular celebs at their worst, (women famed for their beauty), either in poor lighting, or very early in the morning, or just leaving the gym, or when they weren't dieting for a role. Jesus. The "with" makeup and "without" shots were gruesomely different, with the exception of one or two woman, most notably Kim Kardashian, who looks great naturally. I've written about my public stance on cosmetics before: I'm not against them at all, I just don't want to get caught out looking like a circus clown in plain clothes, or a drag queen on her day off. I blame overzealous Photoshopping production artists pushed by ad execs as much as I do the photographers, though. You have to be complicit with sort of thing to airbrushwoman into all irrelevance with regards to her day to day life.

Me, the morning of this piece, minutes after waking up, make up free.

As it so often does, pop culture lead me back to myself, to take a good hard look. I know I look great at 43, I know I look great without make up, I know I'm photogenic, and I know I 'm an exception to most rules, but I'm also a woman, vulnerable to the same harshness of society's gaze as any other woman walking the streets, and I've heard it all: "She's plain" to "She has, like, these little bumps all over her face that you can see if you talk to her up close" overheard by me as a bridesmaid to my soon-to-be sister-in-law. Yay! She ignores me mostly or takes weird passive-aggressive snipes under her breath when she leaves the room. For the record, my skin DOES have bumps, and pores, and some fine lines, and sometimes blemishes, just like all human skin does. It doesn't not have the excessive skin damage of say, a sister-in-law who thinks that tanning cures all her ills. Sorry, girl. I'm pale and I know it. But by knowing who we are really well, it prevents other  people's insecurities from getting under are skin, and that's the most valuable advice I can give any girls out there struggling with the crap thrown at them when they dare to look through a fashion mag: to thine own self be true, and the rest are just haters.

Me in natural light, with pores, bumps, blemishes, and some fine lines.
I'm wearing cover up set with powder, mascara, cream blush, & lip balm. 

So, in the interest of honesty, I shot myself in different lighting conditions, with makeup and without, while still trying to get a nice looking pic with good color, clarity, good composition, etc. And it really is true, I honestly prefer myself without make up because my dark eyes pop out against my skin tone, which gives me what I think is a unique appearance, one that holds the key to my ethnicity and cultural make up. I also train fairly regularly in gyms or dojos, and if there's one thing I know for sure, it's this: if you have even a bit of oily skin, the quickest way to ugly break outs is sweating profusely in make up. It's just so gross, plus it gets on my gi, and that stresses me out more. I may leave cover up on a raging blemish out of deference to my sparring partner, but even that I dislike. I wash it ALL off before I train, and I wash my face again afterwards, going home with a clean face. 

Diffuse light gives a warm glow to the skin that's favorable.

 It's one of the times when I feel most like myself. In professional settings, I prefer to wear make up because it helps me either blend in or knock 'em dead (like war paint), depending upon whichever effect I need to perform for that day. I famously took the summer off from cosmetics at one publishing house early in my career; it gives my skin a chance to air out, plus I get freckles, a little color that I find appealing, and my hair lightens up in the sun. Instead of saying kudos, the art director looked at me and noted I looked "surprisingly well". He's not exactly my biggest fan, but like I wrote, because I actually like myself, I can withstand just about any barb someone throws my way. Wanna-be photogs be warned: not only can I shoot better pics than you armed with just my iPhone (and ruthlessly critique said shots like an art historian in print), I fight, too. Let that sink in, and don't let me catch you behind a bush. When the lights go dim at the end of the day, who are you? Do you like what you see? Do you wake up looking at a stranger in the mirror, or simply like yourself?

Overexposed (highlights are blown out, losing some detail), though still showing some fine lines on the skin that make it realistic as a portrait.

Curly-haired, and you've accepted it? Same: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/curls/.

Small Town America: Town Center

Town center.

Do you live a town with big square or park in the center? Then you're living in a town that's designed right! It's the heart of a healthy community. Enjoy the warm days and cool nights of autumn.  
Winter is coming....

I love New York, and so do you.
 http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/new-york//

Faith: The Madonna

Our Mother Mary.

Another nice aspect about homecomings are the natural similarities 
we feel in the surroundings we grew up with. There are a dearth of Catholics in my hometown, and I didn't really feel the impact of 
that until I moved to the Mid West, where there's a religion called "Christianity" that's about as wacky and dissimilar to Roman Catholicism as a glass of tap water with ice cubes from your freezer 
is to an iceberg: both elemental, but as different as forms of water 
that one can get.

Here, I see signs of my faith everywhere, in the form of something we call "Madonna in a bathtub", because years ago, people submerged a bathtub into the ground and put a statue of Mary in the center of the arch the tub created, to symbolize visions of her in a grotto (ex:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Our_Lady_of_Lourdes). Nowadays, they handily sell statues with a pretty eggshell blue background background (Mary's color), which saves Catholics quite a bit of work.

As I walk around, it's nice to know that I can save myself a bit of work too, on lengthy explanations. I'm not naturally loquacious. It was something I worked hard to learn in school and then develop on the job over the years because I had to, in order to explain the sometimes extraordinarily difficult concepts I deal with daily. I'm naturally shy, so whenever I can say something with an image over hours of sometimes wasted talk, I'm happy to go with that instead.  

Silence is a great blessing.

Got faith? Me, too: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/faith/.

Street Art: Fortune Teller

Doctor Killgore ain't real.

Don't trust this Ouija board, kids. That email address is fake! 
How dare they?! For the real deal, look here: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/street-art-sacred-spaces/.

Nature: Thunderstorms

Yellow sky after thunderstorm.

Birds on wire.

Do you know that yellow color that seeps into the sky right before and right after a solid rain with thunderstorms? Got it.

Nature lovers and other fans of Mother Nature, seek me out here: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/nature/.

Movies: Gopher It

You realize this means war.

One of our best-loved comedies as kids was Caddyshack. My oldest brother worked at a local country club in high school that's a golfer's paradise. Me, my middle bro, and our cousin got bored one afternoon at an older cousin's wedding, held conveniently on a golf course. Without too much thought or planning, we jacked a golf cart for a joy ride around the grounds that was the height of the day, if not for the summer of that year. We still laugh about it, and I remember the outfit I wore: a waitress-inspired preteen dress separate, with white polka dots on a grey background, pink trimmings on the collar and sleeves that mimicked the rolled up ones of real diner outfits. 

Tragically, one of my mother's oldest school friends from her old neighborhood in the Bronx died suddenly from head trauma as the result of falling out of a golf cart onto a rock while riding with her husband around their Arizona golf community's grounds. Even though none of us are avid golfers, golf courses and greens seems to run a current through our family's lives, and that's just what the movie is about: working class Irish Catholics looking to break through to WASPY society and its' supposed access to wealth and benefits. Some of us figured out a long time ago that money ain't the only way to a dream, and some of us still feel that money is a ticket out of dysfunction to a better life, and that's what the exclusivity of a country club promises to them; proof that they've finally "made it". 

My mom loved the gopher from the movie the best, and he no doubt is a scene stealer: a cute, cuddly, rascally troublemaker who ruins golf paradise by simply showing up to do what gopher's do. She loves his little dances and song skits so much, that when I saw an animatronic doll that's a a dead ringer for the movie version, I bought it as a gag Christmas gift immediately. She loved it! All these years later, the darn thing still works. One of my nephews was terrified by it as a baby, and we still laugh about that, too. A doll that looks like a TeddyBear but moves?! Uh uh. Not right. He'd get this wide-eyed suspicious look on his chubby face that was the exact opposite of the intended reaction. Good times.

 

Cinephiles, Culture Vultures, and Couch Potatoes, I got it covered: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/culture-movies-and-t-v/.

Birdhouses: Local Color

Birdhouse in garden.

Birdhouse in orchard.

Birdhouse on arbor.

http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/birdhouses-and-treehouses/

Food: Cinnamon Apple Muffins

Little sour apples.

I found a recipe for apple muffins on the back of a box of pancake mix. It looked really easy to make (and it was), and I had a few small sour apples on the counter that I had picked from a local orchard. 

The muffins came together great, and those little apples still have some snap left in them, even after baking in the batter. Apples and cinnamon go together like bread and butter, and weeks later, I have a few left in the freezer from the original batch of twelve I made.   

A nice set up for fall right?

Apple cinnamon muffins.

Food fan? Same: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/food/.

Bluebell the English Bulldog

Who's that little doggie in the parking lot?

Little Bluebell with the big personality.

I first met Bluebell walking to the library. I noticed a dog sitting in a window seat often, in a house behind the local funeral home. One day I saw a little white bulldog sitting outside, looking up at another dog sitting in the window seat of the house, in a way that seemed like teasing. I called out "Hey! What are you doing?" and then the white dog started racing across the parking lot in spurts, stopping then starting, with me giggling nervously but also enjoying the show. Then a man with a handlebar mustache came out, shouting and calling to the dog, which made it take off in a tear towards me, jumping right over a small hedge easily, surprising for a doggie with such short legs. I shouted out "Is he friendly?" He said "She's a girl! Very!" I noticed she had a pink dog collar as she tried to bite into my shoe, snuffling around my ankles. When he came closer, she jumped back over the hedge, circled around his legs a few times while he chased her, trying to bit his feet, too.
It was really funny.

Belly rubs!

After that, I kept an eye out for her, and one afternoon I noticed the owner sitting outside on a lawn chair, so I went over to say "hello". He told me her name was Bluebell, an English Bulldog, one of two dogs he had. I noticed her big personality right away and told him so. There was also what I thought was an Irish Setter, a long haired Retriever named Highway, lingering near us with a tennis ball in his mouth, trying to engage us in a game of "keep away". When I asked him about his name, he said it came from his favorite Clint Eastwood movie, Heartbreak Ridge, and he asked me if I'd seen it. I couldn't remember if I had or not. He said Bluebell was a lot nicer than his first bulldog, an irascible, grumpy little fellow, but his son loved the breed so much that they got a second one when he died. She was his opposite; gregarious, friendly, endlessly charming, always ready for playtime, attention, and affection. She let herself out of the house often, and she also liked to sunbathe in the parking lot on her leash.

Aww. Puppy face. "Hi Bluebell!"

Haha! Shake it off, Bluebell!

He said it was a shame bulldogs didn't live very long because of the aggressive inbreeding used to create their distinctive looks. 
I understood. My Giant Mal didn't live long, the same as the other snow dogs I had, and that it was harder for us humans than it was for them, because we missed them so much after they were gone. I realized after I said goodbye to my new friend and walked away that I was probably one of the few people in town (if any) to say those consoling words to the town's funeral director, a man who has said them countless times to people in their times of comfort and need. I'm sure the irony wasn't lost on him, either. 

Precious little doggie with sad face :(

Are you a crazy pet person and you know it? I've got your number right here: http://www.pinterest.com/mariedoucette/dogs/.