In the Studio...
It's been a long time since I've worked on any serious artwork. Last week was so warm and sunny that it drew me outside. So strong was its influence, that I had no choice but to set up my studio outside under our pergola. (I love that I have a yard with a pergola!) I felt so inspired and so happy to be working outside that I thought I couldn't fail to produce a masterpiece (being an artist so affected by her environment).
Things started out well - I had managed to build up a surface that looked inviting and promising. But then something crazy happened - I somehow managed to forget simple principles of design. And I ended up with a mess of paper and paint which were fighting for center stage making the whole thing get lost in a mesh of colour. Sigh. Disappointing, but not without its moments of redemption - there's something going on in that background that I quite like and I think if I have another go, I'm sure I'll come away with something more attractive.
On a more positive note, however, I managed to create a pattern for a crocheted hot water bottle cozy that I really like. Although it's been my intention to make one for ages, it took a request from a friend to get me going. It was a fun challenge because I'm not particularly great at following crocheting/knitting patterns which means that I have to make things up for myself as I go. And because I find crocheting to be a bit more forgiving and flexible, I tend to work in crochet. I really enjoy having the challenge of a design in mind and then it's often when I'm out walking the dog that I get that "A-ha!" moment and am able to work it out in my head how to approach the project. The picture here is the result of my efforts. And my friend absolutely loved it, which is always a nice outcome!
From the library...
On my to-do list since I was about 16 years old has been to read The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. It may seem silly, but I was avoiding it for ages just for the sheer thickness of the novel. I say silly because this is the same person who's read The Fountainhead twice - the first time when I was 16. For some reason I thought The Grapes of Wrath would be really dull and a laborious read. But I've always been of the mindset that a book finds you when you're ready for it. This must be why I've only just picked up the book. And I have to say I was hooked from the first line (which was true for me of The Fountainhead also):
"To the red country and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred earth."
There are so many comments I would love to make and an in-depth conversation I would love to engage in, but what I want to focus on about this book is the role women played in the novel, the matriarch of the family in particular. I'm obviously drawn to this discussion because of my body of work and its exploration into the role of women. This novel seems to make the quiet case that circumstances of the time (the Dustbowl and mass migration to California) allowed women to rise to a position of power they'd not experienced before. The role of the men was to find work and when they did find that work to earn as much as they could from the limited work there was. There role was to earn the money to buy food and other necessary provisions. I recognize that is a difficult job in itself - the pressures of finding work to feed your starving family must be overwhelming. But it seems to me the men had the easier of jobs. Time and again Ma was burdened with the task of trying to fill the bellies of her family, especially the men, so they'd have the energy to work; a simple task when you have the provisions to work with - not so easy when all you have is flour, water and a bit of grease. She also had the job of trying to barter with shopkeepers to get any discount she could and was often up against a wall in trying to make a dollar stretch far enough to get what the family needed for sustenance. They were the cooks, cleaners, general homemaker, peacemaker between children (and sometimes between the arguments of the men) and morale booster. They were responsible for keeping the threads of the family from fraying and breaking apart during stress and strife.
There's a passage in the book that summarizes for me very well this position women had and demonstrates the source of their strength - this is the same passage that marks the end of the 1940 film adaptation of the novel:
" 'We got nothin', now,' Pa said. 'Comin' a long time - no work, no crops. What we gonna do then? How we gonna git stuff to eat? An' I tell you Rosasharn aint' so far from due. Git so I hate to think. Go digging back to a ol' time to keep from thinkin'. Seems like our life's over an' done.'
'No, it ain't,' Ma smiled. 'It ain't, Pa. An' that's one more thing a woman knows. I noticed that. Man, he lives in jerks - baby born an' a man dies, an' that's a jerk - get a farm an' loses his farm, an' that's a jerk. Woman, it's all one flow, like a stream, little eddies, little waterfalls, but the river, it goes right on. Woman looks at it like that. We ain't gonna die out. People is goin' on - changin' a little, maybe, but goin' right on.'
'How can you tell?' Uncle John demanded. 'What's to keep ever'thing from stoppin'; all the folks from jus' gittin' tired an' lyin' down?'
Ma considered. She rubbed the shiny back of one hand with the other, pushed the fingers of her right hand between the fingers of her left. 'Hard to say,' she said. 'Ever'thing we do - seems to me is aimed right at goin' on. Seems that way to me. Even gettin' hungry - even bein' sick; some die, but the rest is tougher. Jus' try to live the day, jus' the day.' "
"To the red country and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred earth."
There are so many comments I would love to make and an in-depth conversation I would love to engage in, but what I want to focus on about this book is the role women played in the novel, the matriarch of the family in particular. I'm obviously drawn to this discussion because of my body of work and its exploration into the role of women. This novel seems to make the quiet case that circumstances of the time (the Dustbowl and mass migration to California) allowed women to rise to a position of power they'd not experienced before. The role of the men was to find work and when they did find that work to earn as much as they could from the limited work there was. There role was to earn the money to buy food and other necessary provisions. I recognize that is a difficult job in itself - the pressures of finding work to feed your starving family must be overwhelming. But it seems to me the men had the easier of jobs. Time and again Ma was burdened with the task of trying to fill the bellies of her family, especially the men, so they'd have the energy to work; a simple task when you have the provisions to work with - not so easy when all you have is flour, water and a bit of grease. She also had the job of trying to barter with shopkeepers to get any discount she could and was often up against a wall in trying to make a dollar stretch far enough to get what the family needed for sustenance. They were the cooks, cleaners, general homemaker, peacemaker between children (and sometimes between the arguments of the men) and morale booster. They were responsible for keeping the threads of the family from fraying and breaking apart during stress and strife.
There's a passage in the book that summarizes for me very well this position women had and demonstrates the source of their strength - this is the same passage that marks the end of the 1940 film adaptation of the novel:
" 'We got nothin', now,' Pa said. 'Comin' a long time - no work, no crops. What we gonna do then? How we gonna git stuff to eat? An' I tell you Rosasharn aint' so far from due. Git so I hate to think. Go digging back to a ol' time to keep from thinkin'. Seems like our life's over an' done.'
'No, it ain't,' Ma smiled. 'It ain't, Pa. An' that's one more thing a woman knows. I noticed that. Man, he lives in jerks - baby born an' a man dies, an' that's a jerk - get a farm an' loses his farm, an' that's a jerk. Woman, it's all one flow, like a stream, little eddies, little waterfalls, but the river, it goes right on. Woman looks at it like that. We ain't gonna die out. People is goin' on - changin' a little, maybe, but goin' right on.'
'How can you tell?' Uncle John demanded. 'What's to keep ever'thing from stoppin'; all the folks from jus' gittin' tired an' lyin' down?'
Ma considered. She rubbed the shiny back of one hand with the other, pushed the fingers of her right hand between the fingers of her left. 'Hard to say,' she said. 'Ever'thing we do - seems to me is aimed right at goin' on. Seems that way to me. Even gettin' hungry - even bein' sick; some die, but the rest is tougher. Jus' try to live the day, jus' the day.' "
On the stereo...
Naturally, this novel re-ignited my interest in American folk music from the time. And one song in particular came to me over and over again when reading The Grapes of Wrath: Do Re Mi, by Woody Guthrie. This song can be heard as the anthem of the hundreds of thousands of families making the long, dangerous journey from the Dustbowl region to California to find a better life. Their hopes kept them going during the most difficult of conditions - conditions that we would find it hard to imagine today: riding in rickety cars, loaded down with all of the possessions they could carry, through unbearable heat - dirty, hungry, sometimes starving with no home where they're going and no home from where they came, all in hopes of making a better life in the land of promise and plenty. Only to get there and to be turned away or to live in horrible migratory camps in conditions even worse than what they encountered on the road. Guthrie's words capture the raw emotion of this epic journey and the musician Ani DiFranco's cover of the song brings out a different rawness that has a way of hitting you straight in the heart as if with a long, cold spike. It gives me chills everytime. I encourage my readers to listen to both versions. The song is a window to a monumentous time in American history and to know this background is to better grasp the unbreakable, hardy and pioneering spirit of the American people.
Lyric of Do Re Mi:
Lots of folks back East, they say, is leavin' home every day,
Beatin' the hot old dusty way to the California line.
'Cross the desert sands they roll, gettin' out of that old dust bowl,
They think they're goin' to a sugar bowl, but here's what they find
Now, the police at the port of entry say,
"You're number fourteen thousand for today."
Oh, if you ain't got the do re mi, folks, you ain't got the do re mi,
Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia, Tennessee.
California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
But believe it or not, you won't find it so hot If you ain't got the do re mi.
You want to buy you a home or a farm, that can't deal nobody harm,
Or take your vacation by the mountains or sea.
Don't swap your old cow for a car, you better stay right where you are,
Better take this little tip from me.
'Cause I look through the want ads every day
But the headlines on the papers always say:
If you ain't got the do re mi, boys, you ain't got the do re mi,
Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia, Tennessee.
California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
But believe it or not, you won't find it so hot If you ain't got the do re mi.
Lyric of Do Re Mi:
Lots of folks back East, they say, is leavin' home every day,
Beatin' the hot old dusty way to the California line.
'Cross the desert sands they roll, gettin' out of that old dust bowl,
They think they're goin' to a sugar bowl, but here's what they find
Now, the police at the port of entry say,
"You're number fourteen thousand for today."
Oh, if you ain't got the do re mi, folks, you ain't got the do re mi,
Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia, Tennessee.
California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
But believe it or not, you won't find it so hot If you ain't got the do re mi.
You want to buy you a home or a farm, that can't deal nobody harm,
Or take your vacation by the mountains or sea.
Don't swap your old cow for a car, you better stay right where you are,
Better take this little tip from me.
'Cause I look through the want ads every day
But the headlines on the papers always say:
If you ain't got the do re mi, boys, you ain't got the do re mi,
Why, you better go back to beautiful Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Georgia, Tennessee.
California is a garden of Eden, a paradise to live in or see;
But believe it or not, you won't find it so hot If you ain't got the do re mi.
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