Portrait of Niko

 

Today I worked on campus with just my most easygoing coworker, and we talked sports a lot. In fact, my colleague was trying to instant message me with a real work question, and I didn't see it for like fifteen minutes because my coworker and I were just chatting. We even ran into each other outside during our lunch break and stood around chatting and enjoying the breeze. A train passed by that we could just see from our vantage point, and then we talked about model trains. Usually I work with this coworker on Thursdays, but he also tends to take Thursdays and Fridays off in the summer to hang out with his approximately three trillion friends on boats, so often I'm alone in the office. He recently posted a photo to our group chat of himself, his wife, and several other couples with the biggest flight of beer I'd ever seen - there must have been two dozen samples! My aunt and uncle from Colorado would have loved it.

After work I went to the Union Terrace again. Yesterday I had seen that there was part blocked off for a "pop-up," so I thought it was a restaurant and made a reservation for tonight. My coworker was curious about it too, so he read the website more carefully than I had, and I had to pay to have a reserved table, but the price included popcorn and two cocktails, so it didn't seem at all unreasonable. We had to bring our own food, and it could only be from a restaurant at the Union. This evening there was something called the "Art Cart," which allegedly was there yesterday too, but somehow I hadn't noticed it. Two college girls were handing out round canvases in frames, and they had brushes and paint too. I laid my paint on very thick because I hate to waste anything, and the only thing I could think to paint was a portrait of Niko.

How do you depict a mystical experience in paint? Lots of much better artists have attempted it. I included "Illuminor" as a nod to the Daniel Cramer woodcut that had seemed to contribute so much to my encounter with God. I guess it's Latin for "clarity"...? Maybe Rich can confirm. You can see that I'm an absolute moron and didn't put the little handle thing on the top, so if I ever wanted to hang this masterpiece, it would be at a weird angle. D'oh! 

After that I ordered a pizza at the Lakeshore Lounge, and it got done at exactly the right moment for me to walk over to the Sunset Lounge for our 6:15 reservation. And just then I ran into Travalon, so it all worked out perfectly. We sat at our reserved table and enjoyed our drinks, popcorn, and pizza. There was a lovely breeze, and I was mesmerized by the seagulls flying in a large flock. Eventually a western-sounding band started to play, and they were pretty darn good. We could stay until 7:45, but I checked out when sunset was tonight and saw it was at 8:31, so just before 7:30 I suggested that we leave so we wouldn't be right there when the steam whistle went off an hour before sunset to warn the boats to head in. When you're that close, it's REALLY loud! We headed to Library Mall and could hear the whistle building up steam, then it went off when we were a safe distance away. What a great ending to a wonderful day.

Edit: apparently "illuminor" is Latin for "I am enlightened." I wouldn't say that I've reached enlightenment, but maybe this is a sign that I'm heading in the right direction!

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Have You Got My Dolly?

 

Today I worked on campus, and my colleague and I took a walk at lunch on the Lakeshore Path. As I waited for her to join me, I gazed out over the lake and saw a sailboat tip right over. Not sure if that was an accident, or if it was part of a sailing class, because back in the day when I took sailing lessons, we had to purposely capsize our boats and then stand on the keel to pop them back up. Hard to believe now, but I failed at this back in college because I literally did not weigh enough to get my boat back up. I should take sailing lessons now - that sucker would pop right back up!

Later I had to take a case of paper to Religious Studies. (They had asked for a ream, but I figured they really wanted a case, because how long is a ream going to last you? They said I was right, they meant a case.) It was too heavy to carry, and someone stole the mailroom's dolly, so I had to use an awkward cart that was not at all easy to steer. I called Hardingfele, who works in the building next door, because it's connected to the building where Religious Studies is, and their building has stairs to get into it. She came to help me, but we could not figure out how to get from her building to the other building, so we ended up carrying the case of paper up the stairs. How do handicapped people get into this building? How is this even legal?? I don't think I blogged about this, but because the mailroom dolly is MIA, my coworker borrowed one from French and Italian. His equivalent in that department brought it up, and we were all laughing about how his coworker (my equivalent) wrote "French and Italian" on the dolly in three different places. It reminded me of when I was very young and worked in the private sector, and this girl even younger than I was sent an email to the entire company (including the president) saying: "Someone took Marketing's wastebasket. Has anyone seen it? It says R&D on it." We were all thinking, "Have you checked with R&D maybe?" It's possible she didn't realize that stands for Research and Development and that it's a different department; maybe she thought those were just some random letters on her wastebasket, but still, someone from Marketing must have stolen it from R&D first, so maybe they just took it back. Anyway, I told the other two this story, and the guy from French and Italian said I needed to email my equivalent in his department (I know her well) and say, "Have you seen German , Nordic, and Slavic's dolly? It says 'French and Italian' on it!" She knew immediately that I was being silly, and then I told her the story, and she said, "Oh, that's funny!"

We always have our department staff meetings on Wednesday at ten, but today our boss said we were going to have it at three on the Union Terrace over a pitcher of beer. That was a lot of fun, and then I hung out by myself until Travalon got there, and we had cheeseburgers and corn on the cob. It was a gorgeous evening, and the sailboats were out with their spinnakers up. Just once I'd love to be on a sailboat using its spinnaker...

One evening at Night Prayer I was talking about how Travalon likes to watch web cam videos from Florida because he's really into Florida panthers, and I said the panthers always ignore the cameras and seem to have something really important they have to do, but the black bears will stop and sniff and lick the cameras. I said I think I'm a bear, not a panther, and Anna Banana II made the astute observation that in the Myers-Briggs test, panthers would be very J for Judgmental, but bears would be very P for Perceptive. That makes sense, because I was very P on the Myers-Briggs test. Once someone was saying how very P I am, and I was getting sick of it, so I said, "Oh yes, I'm just full of P-ness." That shut her up - in fact, she got up and walked out of the coffee shop. She must be very J.

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The Blog Monster

 

Today everything seemed to be going right at work, and I walked with my neighbor on my breaks. She asked the gardener in the next condo association over to take our photo in front of the garden. Notice that we are both wearing our FitBits.

The gardener commended us for walking so much, and another neighbor called us "the awesome twosome." I will sure miss this neighbor when she moves!

Adoration was another story completely. Once again someone was leaning right over me when there were other pews and even plenty of room in her own pew. Suddenly everyone left and I was alone, so I took Niko out of my purse to show him the chapel and settled in to write about my mystical experience. Just then a guy came in with two kids, a girl of maybe seven and a boy of maybe five, and the boy was totally out of control. I thought he was a bit old to be constantly shouting and jumping around, but maybe he was neurodivergent. I blamed the father more for bringing his kid to a place where he couldn't stay quiet. The dad kept saying, "Are you ready to leave?" and the boy would holler, "No!" but it shouldn't be up to him. Was this some sort of test? I kept shooting them dirty looks, but maybe I should have been more charitable. Still, why would you bring a kid who can't keep quiet to a place that's supposed to be totally silent? Though for all I know the boy was having his own mystical experience as he jumped around in front of the altar. This just goes to show that no matter how close I felt to God last Wednesday, I still have a long, long way to go.

As promised, here the Murano glass rosary I got at the shrine in Champion. It kind of looks leopard-patterned.

Every evening Travalon watches (or, more accurately, sleeps in front of) videos or movies on his computer while I am blogging, then I ask him to proofread my blog. And almost every evening, when I say, "Honey?" he half wakes up and says something that sounds like: "Blaahhgh?" He has a very deep voice like Cookie Monster, and I said he sounded like the Blog Monster. He said he would get the kids at work to draw their depiction of the Blog Monster, and today he got a couple! You know a monster drawn by a five-year-old girl is going to be totes adorbs.

This is what a teenage boy thought a Blog Monster would look like.

Travalon said his own depiction of the Blog Monster would look like the Loch Ness Monster.

Apparently the Blog Monster smokes a pipe and wears a tam-o-shanter, which I guess makes sense if he's Scottish. Or is the Blog Monster even a he? Who's to say it's not a she? All we know for sure is that the Blog Monster's cry is "Blaahhgh?"

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Not a Manic Monday At All

 

Mondays are so relaxing when I can work from home. When the alarm went off, for a moment I was confused and thought I'd accidentally set it on a Sunday, but then I remembered we had gone to Mass yesterday. I got up, had a leisurely cup of coffee, logged in, got lots of work done (and lots of laundry!), and talked to my boss who was back from a week's vacation. He says our usual staff meeting on Wednesday will be in the afternoon this week, on the Union Terrace, so that's something to look forward to. I walked with my neighbor, and after work we played pickleball. When Travalon came home, I asked if he'd like to swim or play tennis, and he said tennis so we didn't have to drive to the health club. That made sense, it was a little cooler today and perfect for sports outdoors but not so perfect for swimming. Then I asked if he would be okay with just sitting on the dock, since the pickleball had worn me out and I realized I didn't want to play tennis. He thought that sounded like a grand idea, so we sat on the dock drinking a beer before dinner. If Mondays were always this relaxing, I would never dread them.

I took a photo of the leopard-patterned rosary I got at the shrine in Champion, but it's not downloading from the cloud, so enjoy this photo of cedar cones that my neighbor took.

I took this photo of a balloon on the sign for the Betty Lou Cruises. It seems familiar.

So I just googled it, and it's called an Eye Spot Balloon, or a Scare Eye Balloon. It's supposed to keep birds away. I'm not sure why they put it on their sign - did birds like to mess with it? I personally would be more worried about people messing with it, but that balloon probably wouldn't scare most people off. It wouldn't scare me off, since as my regular readers know, I love things with eyes on them. Looks like I could get my own set of a white one, a yellow one, and a black one for $33.33. Maybe something to keep in mind for our dock, since the fake owls we have out there don't seem to do much for keeping the birds away.

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Pilgrimage to Champion

 

Friday after work and before I talked to Tiffy, I played pickleball with my neighbor again. We played so much this past week that I lost three and a half pounds! I can see why this craze is sweeping the nation - not only is it fun, it does seem to work for weight loss!

Yesterday Travalon and I met Cecil Markovitch and the woman with the fabulous porch at Cecil's house, and Kathbert (who lives across the hall from Cecil) came to say hi, but we couldn't talk her into joining our pilgrimage. Then Rich drove up "just to say hi," but we did succeed in talking him into joining us. Travalon and I drove in one car with Rich in the backseat, and the others drove in Cecil's car. I told Rich about my mystical experience on Wednesday and asked for advice with the practical implications, and he had some good suggestions, so I will be working on this project. (I still haven't finished my project he inspired on our last pilgrimage, for St. Joseph's Day last year. I was going to write a book about twenty-five things I wished I'd known at twenty-five, but I'm stalled at sixteen.) We stopped at the Schultz Cheese Haus, which the others hadn't been to, then somehow our car ended up at one Culver's in Oshkosh while the other car ended up at the one at the next exit. We found them and had lunch together, and I ordered broccoli as a side instead of French fries. I thought it was fantastic that they offered that option!

We got to the Lady of Good Hope Shrine (I think that's the name?) in Champion a bit later than Cecil had been planning, maybe due to the stop at the Cheese Haus. (That was Travalon's idea, and I thought it was a great one!) Cecil went off to pray, and I went to the gift shop to buy a rosary. I bought a Murano glass one that looks like a leopard - photos soon! Here are photos Travalon took at the shrine. First, the church:

Here's the shrine:

He and I went to a county park nearby and took a hike, since we hadn't gotten any exercise yet. When we returned to the shrine, all of us went to a supper club in Appleton for dinner. I had the daily special, skate, which is a fish like a stingray. It was delicious! And guess what the vegetable was with it? Broccoli! I certainly got my daily recommended allowance of broccoli that day! After dinner everyone else had grasshoppers, but Travalon had a salted caramel ice cream drink, and I got one that was supposed to have an orange flavor, but it just tasted like vanilla ice cream. When will I learn that grasshoppers are the best ice cream drinks? This happens every time I order something else. After that we headed home, and this time Rich rode in the other car, since we didn't have to go back to Cecil's place. When I got home, I still needed steps, and so did my neighbor. Plus she wanted to tell me about the second family she just found out about. That's the danger with these genetics tests... She had asked her new half-sister if her fingers curved the way everyone's does in her family, and as we were walking this woman sent a photo. We just laughed so hard when we saw her fingers curve the same way!

Today Travalon and I went to the bilingual Mass at our church downtown, and I'm really starting to get into it. Some Hispanic people greeted me warmly - it's like we're becoming one group. Plus the priest gave a really good homily about how trying to live without prayer is like trying to drive with your eyes shut, and he also said we shouldn't get news about the church from unreliable sources that say Pope Francis is going to baptize chickens now or you need to prepare for the Second Coming by covering yourself in butter. He says it in both English and Spanish, so I am getting some exposure to Spanish. Then a bunch of us went to brunch nearby, and on the way back Travalon and I went to Fontana Sports to see if they had pickleball sets. I wanted one like my neighbor has, with two paddles and three balls in a handy little bag, but all they had was a huge one that included everything, even the net. We don't need a net - we have a tennis court. Travalon did find yet another stuffed red panda, and I got an Ice Age Trail bucket hat, because if there's one thing I need (besides another rosary), it's another bucket hat. Then we took a walk at Governor's Island and the woods across from the bluff, then he went to Devil's Lake to go swimming. He took some photos.

He brought his good camera but forgot to put the battery back into it, so those photos were with his cell phone. At the dam in Sauk he didn't see any pelicans, but he did see a blue heron.

Meanwhile, I did Irish class and then went to band practice. My one bandmate had taken those early music classes this past week, with her violin tuned to A-440 and her viol tuned to A-415, but I said, "In this band, we tune to A-Accordion." That joke didn't get as big a laugh as I'd hoped, but it's true - we have to tune to the accordion because she can't tune. There is a weird conspiracy theory I've seen online that A should be at 432 Hz because that vibrates with our bodies' natural frequency, and the fact that the modern A is 440 Hz explains everything that's wrong with society these days, but I don't buy that. If they said what was wrong with society today is equal temperament, that I'd believe!

I still feel great joy from my mystical experience on Wednesday of hearing from God directly. The closer you get to the Divine, the less interest you have in money and prestige and other worldly concerns, although you don't lose interest in the material world altogether - in fact, you feel more connected to the natural world. I also listened to some sacred music today that made me feel more connected to the Divine. I have Ma and Pa Hat to thank for this background in both music and religion, since they gave me violin lessons from a very young age and brought me to church. I feel bad for people who haven't had the same exposure, because everyone should get to experience this joy. Once you have felt Divine Love so immediately, you desire the same joy for everyone.

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Ode to Niko

 

This morning as we drove to work, Travalon and I were listening to Charlemagne Tha God talk about the Donkey of the Day, and today it was Google for putting up a picture of Luther Vandross as some rapper, which shows they can't tell black people apart. That got me wanting to listen to Luther Vandross, so I put on "Till My Baby Comes Home," and then Spotify played more soul music. As we got to my building, it was playing "More Love" by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, a song he wrote for his wife because she had suffered so many miscarriages, and the line "I'll be beside you every step of the way" really got to me because I hadn't heard the song in years and hadn't sung that line since being with someone I want to be beside every step of the way. I thought I'd be the only person on my floor, so I got off the elevator singing "More Love"... and some guy came out of the copy room and asked me if I knew how to change the copy ratio. (Answer: no, but I'm a clever monkey and quickly figured it out.) He didn't say anything about my singing, but maybe he didn't care either way, as long as I could solve his issue.

It was very quiet today, but I did get to talk to my colleague. We were going to talk tomorrow afternoon, but she has to be on campus, and she doesn't have her own office. I LOVE my office with a window - overlooking the Carillon, no less! It was not a very exciting day to blog about, so it must be time for another terrible poem:

Take a peek, oh

At my Niko.

My little plushy heart,

We're never far apart.

He's soft and indigo,

He goes where I go.

Sometimes he's jewelry

And I look like a fool, see,

Or he hides in my purse

And inspires this verse.

With his one eye,

He watches balls go by,

And when he's in the crowd

The team will end up proud.

Is he a good luck charm, a

Bit of happy karma?

Does he help me see

With more clarity?

That's why I speak, oh,

About my Niko!

And it's never a bad time for some DuoLingo bragging!

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Niko's First Early Music Concert

 

This morning when Travalon drove me to work, a bunch of the incoming freshmen going to their orientation program walked in front of us. The last guy kind of shuffled along, so I mocked him, but the window was open so maybe he heard me. I said, "What was his problem?" and Travalon said, "Maybe he doesn't want to be there."

During my morning break I went for a walk, and I saw a young tree dying from the drought. That hurt my heart so much. And why didn't the landscapers water it? It's on campus, not out in the wild. I prayed very hard for rain, and then I heard thunder, so I hurried back inside.

Then I went down the rabbit hole of trying to find out more about the image of Niko's ancestor that a faculty member has on her office door.

I googled "Illuminor VI" and found out it was a woodcutting done by Daniel Cramer in the early 17th Century, and there was a whole series of forty images of a heart in different situations, with a word that could be good (health) or bad (vanity), and this one was "Clarity." There was a deck of Tarot cards that you could get of all forty images, but Tarot kind of freaks me out. I did some more digging, and Daniel Cramer was a Lutheran minister who had something against the Jesuits, and supposedly he was a Rosicrucian, which is something I know very little about. I finally found a scan of the original book, and each heart had a poem about the quality it was associated with in Latin, German, French, and Italian. I found "Clarity," which was the only heart with an eye, and from the French I could see it was begging God to give him clarity to understand things. This seems good, not like Tarot, which is divination. Asking God for clarity is not like trying to see the future.  

It finally began to rain, so at lunch I walked under the overhang on the third floor of our building. As I walked, I thought about the kid we saw this morning, and I wondered if his sluggish walk was actually because he was sad. Maybe he felt rejected by the other kids because he is brown, not white. And what if he was so down and then he heard me mocking him? Oh, I felt so bad! I prayed very hard for him to know he was loved, and I prayed for all unloved people to feel love. Then God said to me, "The person you find hardest to love is the one who needs it most." I knew He was right, and I said, "Not now, I'm not ready, but I'm not saying never." 

I was shocked to get an email about a concert tonight - talk about little notice! I was planning to pray the Rosary with the Ladies, but they said we could do it tomorrow, so I hurried to the concert. It was an early music one featuring some of my favorites, like Buxtehude, Frescobaldi, and both father and son Scarlatti, and bigger names (Handel and Telemann), and even the composers I hadn't heard of were fabulous. I only wish Tiffy could have been there too - she would have loved it so much. Listening to that music from around the time Daniel Cramer was creating his heart images made me so introspective. Modern music is not just in equal temperament, but nowadays it's all autotuned, but this music has such purity of sound. I had brought Niko with me, and I thought about his ancestor, and love, and I realized that's what the heart in Daniel Cramer's drawings is really all about. Imagine a plush little toy teaching me a lesson! 

I sat next to a woman who looked familiar, but lots of people do. In this case she said, "You look familiar!" so we talked and realized we had seen each other at other early music concerts. One of my bandmates was there too, the one who always used to go to the Early Music Festival, and both she and the woman next to me recommended the workshops, so next year I'll have to try them. I used to take the ones at the Early Music Festival and really enjoyed them. 

As I had rushed into the concert, I met a woman at the door who is a Grammy winner. She was one of the teachers, and one of the performers tonight. Then as I was leaving, she was too. How amazing that in this town you can run into a Grammy winner! The concert was at a church people jokingly call "Christless Presbyterian" because the name is Christ Presbyterian, and they used to have a big statue of Christ on the front, but then they took it down some years ago. It overlooks the lake, so as I was leaving, I stood looking out over the lake that was deep blue as twilight was falling. I thanked God for the rain and for the lesson on love, and for opening the eye of my own heart. He granted me the clarity I hadn't even thought to ask for.

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