An Important Message

May catches Ned in the study.

"Hello, Miss Maybelle! How are you today?"

Maybelle doesn't repond well to cliches and hackneyed greetings. Sometimes she doesn't respond at all. This time she gets straight to the point.

"Putois says to tell you something."

Ned is puzzled, but decides to humor the child. He scratches his head.

"Now, let me see. Do I know Putois?"

Maybelle stamps her foot impatiently. "You saw him in the garden. He told you to save Saint-Pierre."

"Oh," says Ned, "he's the gardener chap. Yes, I remember him and his little song. I didn't know it was a command."

"He says to tell you, Saint-Pierre is in the manger. You have to save  him, or go on being poor."

"I see," says Ned, although he doesn't. "And who is Saint-Pierre?"

"He was one of the twelve 'Postles."

"Right. Right-o! But how can he be in the manger, after all these years?" And where in the world is the manger, Ned wonders; are there stables somewhere?

"You have to ask Putois," says Maybelle. "That's all I know."

Monday is washday.

The spring in the woods near Graymont is an ideal place to wash clothes. The stream flows under the ruins of an old folly, and runs off over a bank on the far side. Mrs. Gudenov and her daughter are preparing to do the week's wash, and Billy will help them.

He's filling the tubs and the boiling pot from the spring.
*
On my cat food/Cokes/cigarettes run today, I went by the pretty thrift shop on the Parkway. I saw oodles of good stuff for the dolls' house; fortunately, most of them were a bit too big. Anyway, I did find a beautiful ribbon-embroidered pillow--the center one on the settee:

Three Cups of Tea

Greg Mortenson's book was wonderful. I just wonder why he didn't publish it as a novel, in light of the apparently true accusations that some of it is "lies." Maybe bad advice from agent/publisher? Gregory David Roberts' marvelous book Shantaram was based on his own experiences but published as a novel, which was the right way to do it. I'm sorry Mortenson didn't do it that way. I'll probably read both books again someday.
*
Our Fourth of July celebration, for which Susan outdid herself in the way of a feast for everyone, was really, really fine. Great food, great conversation. Jed came over Monday and stayed until this morning. We met Pat, Buffy and Phil at Ixtapa for Mexican food on Monday evening, then Jed and I had dinner at Chili's on Tuesday. This week has been a real treat for me, and I hope for others in the family. I've missed seeing Reed, but he's still visiting his Pa in Los Angeles.
*
Jed brought stacks of books, including the four-volume opus, The Years of Lyndon Johnson, which I admire my son for having waded through all four books. Also several John Le Carre novels, and I'm already halfway through The Spy Who Came In From the Cold, which I hadn't read before, only saw the movie.

Here Comes the Rain

Woke up early this morning, feeling pretty good. Jed's coming over today to stay for the Fourth.

It's too blamed hot to cook out, or to cook in, for that matter. And now it's thundering in the thicket.

Yesterday I risked heat stroke by toting containers of water out under the trees for the birds and squirrels, cats and dogs and such.

Got a few chores to do this morning. I think I hear the rain coming.

Up on the mountain, when I was little, I used to watch the rain progressing across the fields toward our house.

*

I really like Big Daddy Hollingsworth's song:

"It ain't gonna worry me for long,
It ain't gonna worry me for long,
I'll just get up in the morning,
And I'll still be a-singing my song!"

Ubi sunt qui ante nos fuerunt?

The reason I'm posting this old poem here is that I don't want to have to search my bookshelves or the internet to find it, next time I want to read it. Never can remember which book it's in.

*

Were beth they that biforen us weren,
Houndes ladden and havekes beren,
And hadden feld and wode?
The riche levedies in hoere bour,
That wereden gold in hoere tressour,
With hoere brightte rode;

Eten and drounken, and maden hem glad;
Hoere lif was al with gamen i-lad,
Men kneleden hem biforen;
They beren hem wel swithe heye;
And in a twincling of an eye
Hoere soules weren forloren.

Were is that lawhing and that song,
That trayling and that proude gong,
Tho havekes and tho houndes?
Al that joye is went away,
That wele is comen to weylaway,
To manye harde stoundes.

Hoere paradis they nomen here,
And nou they lyen in helle i-fere;
The fuir hit brennes hevere:
Long is ay, and long is o,
Long is wy, and long is wo;
Thennes ne cometh they nevere.

Anonymous

A little French ditty

Wandering around outside one day, Ned notices someone working in what might once have been a garden--and might someday be such again.

Walking closer, he can hear the man singing a little song with French words, the tune of which Ned dimly recognizes as "Sur le pont d'Avignon."

Glancing up toward Ned, the gardener sings the verse again, this time louder and very slowly, as if the words are important.

"Depechez-vous! Depechez-vous!

Sauvegardez! Sauvegardez!

Depechez-vous! Depechez-vous!

Sauvegardez Saint-Pierre!"

Amused, Ned calls back, "Save him yourself!"

Walking on, he wonders where Brother Alexis found these apparently French servants. Maybe they are some Granny Gray holdovers, and considering Alexis' usually strapped financial condition, maybe they really ought not to be here. He decides that, first chance he gets, he'll discuss the matter with Billy Bones.

A Visitor

On his first night at Graymont, after sitting up late giving Alexis a long account of his recent adventures, Ned has just entered his pleasant room. Beauty, Lucinda and Billy Bones have scurried around all afternoon and into the evening, hanging curtains, making the bed, arranging Ned's books in the bookcase and stowing his other baggage in the big old wardrobe.

Feeling almost too tired to start unpacking, he lights a candle and is about to sink into a chair, when the door to his room gives a soft squeak and opens a crack.

“Yes?” he says, turning toward the door.

An attractive young woman in a long white gown comes a little way into the room. Ned has not seen this person before. As she stands quietly looking at him, he realizes that his mouth is slightly open.

“May I help you?” he says, finally speaking in spite of his amazement.

“Mon nom est Corday,” says the apparition. “Je suis la gouvernante.”

“Oh! Oh, I see,” Ned says, not “seeing” at all, but understanding that she says she is the governess. “I b-b-believe the children's rooms are two flights up.”

“Oui. Deux vols jusqu'a.” She continues to stand in the doorway, gazing at him.

“Then shall we say g-good night? Bonsoir!” Ned says, a sense of panic creeping over him.

After pausing for a moment, she says, “Bonne nuit, Monsieur Edouard.” She backs out of the room and pulls the door closed after her.

Ordinarily, Ned is never flustered by an encounter with a beautiful woman. Puzzled, perhaps, but not to the point of a stammer and nervous perspiration. But this was a stranger in his brother's house, when he thought he had met all the staff. No one had told him there was a governess. And what the devil was she doing there, wandering around downstairs barefoot, and opening doors in the middle of the night?

He will certainly speak to Miranda about this.

No, cooling down, he thinks it might be unfair to the governess to mention the event. After all, the girl was probably just curious to see the new resident of Graymont.

What I mean is, . . .

"I'm liberal. You, you aristocrat,
won't know exactly what I mean by that.
I mean, so altruistically moral,
I never take my own side in a quarrel."

Frost was probably half-joking, but I think that's about the size of it. I seem to feel a bit of a sense of guilt that goes along with it: Half-suspecting that the conservatives are almost as correct on a few points as they think they are, and feeling guilty for disagreeing with them. Maybe guilt because I used to call myself conservative back when conservative (so I thought) meant supporting the U.S. Constitution.

"Home from the sea...."

"Well, Brother Ned, I was expecting to see you in a sailor suit, with an eye patch and one trouser leg pinned up. Instead you look like Percy Bysshe Shelley."

Alexis (Daddy Doll) had hair like Ned's, before he dyed it black.

"The newest thing in wooden legs, and I hardly even need a cane. Keep leaving the d---d things on trolley cars. Listen, Lexi, I've started writing a book about my travels. I wondered, now that you have Granny Gray's idyllic country estate, would you accommodate me with an attic hideaway and a crust of bread now and then? Just somewhere I can sit and think, and maybe write a word or two."

"We can do you a bit better than that," Daddy says. "We had the devil of a time tunneling through Granny's hoard of trash and treasures, but across the passageway from our kitchen, there's a room we've just finished raking out. I'll show it to you later, and until we find you a bed and a chair, you can sleep in my study. Here's Beauty with a snack and a drink for us. Welcome home, old salt!"

Migraines and Dead Heroes

Reed looking nice

My son Jack asked me if he could be Oliver Reed, and if not, why not? I gave him my permission to be Oliver Reed, or Robert Shaw, or any star he pleased. Recommended he check out Bobby Darin before he transmogrified.



Shaw looking sexy - He needed to sweep his hair to the left, to balance the slant of his nose.

 I slept ten hours last night, and now I've got the migraine messing with my vision. I wonder if this is how cataracts affect the vision--sometimes you can see things, and sometimes you can't, or they have holes in them.

Ramey and India brought me a pot of vegetable soup yesterday. And I made cornbread and a crock-pot full of beef stew. Gonna go heat up something.

Grrrr!!!

I knew that when I ever got my printer to work again, the solution would be something simple that made me feel about as stupid as a clod of dirt. Sure enough, I got so frustrated about a week ago, I turned the printer off. Today I turned it on again. Still wouldn't work. After going through troubleshooting and all that jazz again, it still wouldn't work. I decided to throw it through the window or stomp on it or something, so I unplugged it from the wall socket. Then I regained my composure and plugged it back in, and it works fine.

Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart

People with children are supposed to train at least one of them to do everything around the house, and to stay at home to help out in their parents' old age. Take care of their parents. Clean the cat's litter box. Tote groceries up the stairs from the basement. Et cetera, et cetera.

We three Ramey sisters were thought to be pretty smart. At least, we thought we were. Yet, all of us having had multiple children and step-children, only one of us has proved smart enough to keep a child at home to take care of her in her old age. And Ramey doesn't even have a basement.

*

On Seeing a Cloud With Three "Heads"

I seem to hear a heavenly host,
The Trio that I love the most:
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Though They have not been heard to sing,
They manufactured every thing
That ever went a-caroling--

Alto and bass, the high, the low,
Allegro and fortissimo;
We sing because They made us so.

Thanks, High and Heavenly Mystery,
One Deity shown forth in Three,
For sky, clouds, life, breath, song, and Thee!

By JRC 6/21/12

New Poem

The Lightness Of the Dark

Atop a mimosa tree that never bloomed
in all my tenure here, a dozen vines
around its slender trunk leafed out so thick,
they brought it crashing down. One of the vines,
the wild grape muscadine with heavy leaves,
likewise had never bloomed and never borne.

I almost see them, had they bloomed and borne,
a torch of blossoms lighting up the sky,
festooned with chandeliers of musky fruit.
It is my heart that sees them, not my eyes,
and wishes that the eyes could be so blessed.
The heart has vision that defeats the dark
of nothingness, and puts nonbeing to flight.
The dark is but a shadow of the light.

By JRC 6/20/12

Who Killed Vera Bates?

The case against O'Brien:

Motive: Her guilt over causing Cora's miscarriage makes her determined to protect Cora against further threats. Vera is a threat to the Grantham family, thus to "my lady." For some reason, O'Brien is fond and protective of Thomas. Bates is a threat to Thomas's ambitions. If Vera is murdered and Bates is hanged for it, that gets rid of both threats.

Clues: (1.) She tells Thomas twice that she won't stand by while Vera hurts "my lady."

(2.) We see her wandering around the village, so it wasn't impossible for her to get away from Downton if she wanted to go to London, or to get away from the family when they're in London.

(3.) She borrows baking soda from Mrs. Patmore. This is seemingly innocent, but in her twisted mind it might possibly have some connection to disguising the poison.

(4.) The family goes to London to visit Rosamond. Presumably, O'Brien goes along because she is Cora's maid. This is O'Brien's chance to find out about Vera, maybe to visit her and get acquainted, to find out about her household arrangements and any convenient means of getting rid of her. An opportunity to tell Vera stories about Bates and Anna.

(5.) In an online blurb, it is announced that some "difficult person" will die in Series 3. This could be a clue that O'Brien is convicted and hanged for Vera's murder.

Others:

John Bates: Bates would have had to do it in a fit of rage. He would have broken her neck or strangled her. Poison would never have occurred to him, unless Vera had it on the table. Bates didn't do it.

Richard Carlisle: I don't think there's any case against him, as far as murder is concerned. He had other means of retribution.

Vera's paramour: We don't know enough to speculate.

Vera herself: If she killed herself, it was probably accidental. Such as, on John's last visit, she brewed tea and put poison in his share, then somehow the cups got switched. But she seems too clever for this.

I vote for O'Brien.

Downstairs is really Upstairs

The rooms in Graymont's south wing are comfortable enough for a nice relaxed summer, while work goes forward on the family home. Daddy is off somewhere with the dogs, probably reclining under a tree. While he's out, Lucinda has arranged the study to suit herself. If Daddy doesn't hurry back, she'll probably set vases of wildflowers all over the room.

Billy Bones is helping Mrs. Gudenov arrange the washtubs at the Temple Spring, in the woods halfway between her home and Graymont, and they're having trouble stringing a clothesline between some columns--more about that later.
*
I started out with the living room and kitchen on the top shelf and was too lazy to shift them to the bottom. So the upstairs rooms ended up on the lower shelves. Click on the picture for a slightly better view.

Sister Susan is making a dollhouse quilt. I'm looking forward to seeing the individual blocks (rooms) as they emerge.
*
My blog is five years old this month.

The Magazine That Never Dies

On June 5, 2012, one of my favorite writers of fantasy and science fiction was translated to the next world, a little more than two months short of completing his ninety-second year on this planet. Ray Bradbury was a constant and a shining light in his literary genre, and his passing made me resolve to read my long-held Weird Tales anthology, published by Marvin Kaye in 1988.

Weird Tales was subtitled "The Magazine That Never Dies," probably because it failed, went out of business and was resurrected again so many times, from the 1920s to the (I think) 1980s. Mr. Kaye recalls that it was published under the aegis of Ms. Dorothy McIlraith from 1940 to 1954. This incarnation of the magazine was one of my earliest reading experiences. My grandmother, Sarah Dova Mullins Satterfield, subscribed to Weird Tales during my childhood years, probably until its 1954 demise. I read anything that anyone left lying around, anywhere I happened to be, so of course I consumed many of Granny's WT issues.

Last night, after sleeping four to six hours, I woke up. As I wandered around the house and fed Mo, my glance fell on the WT anthology that I had unshelved and left on top of my defunct printer. I picked it up and read Marvin Kaye's introduction and the first reprinted story in the collection, which was a very brief tale, almost a vignette, written by a very young Ray Bradbury.

Leafing through the book, I read titles of stories which, if I ever read them before, I have surely forgotten. Stories by the old guys and girls from Sir Thomas More to Edgar Allan Poe, from Charles Dickens to H.P. Lovecraft and Fritz Leiber ("der lieber Fritz!") and them. They made me realize, once again, how much has been written that I haven't read or don't remember, and that the recent hiatus in my reading is inexcusable.

So let the Weird Tales anthology, a two-inch-thick tome of pulpy pages with tiny print, restart my reading motor. Given a few more years, I may even finish reading The Great Books of the Western World.
*
Before I read any more fantasy-sf stories, here are some that so impressed me that I haven't forgotten them:

Xong of Xuxan, by Ray Russell
The Last of the Spode, by Evelyn Smith
The Quest For Saint Aquin, by Anthony Boucher
The Ugly Little Boy, by Isaac Asimov
Now Inhale, by Eric Frank Russell
The Mezzotint, by Montague Rhodes James
The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James
Four Ghosts in Hamlet, by Fritz Leiber
The Willows, by Algernon Blackwood
The Cask of Amontillado, by Edgar Allan Poe ("Montresor! Montresor!")
Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury (which contained a germ that seems to have infected Stephen King.)
The Portable Phonograph, by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
The Silly Season, by Robert A. Heinlein
Leg. forst., by Clifford D. Simak

Pretty Stuff and a Dictionary Word

Over the weekend, I went with Pat and Susan to the thrift store, and found a pair of Johnson Bros. salad plates to add to my blue-and-white dishes,

 and this great old ten-inch Taylor, Smith & Taylor vegetable bowl:

Susan had brought along her "Mama in the Mirror" quilt to show me. It is gorgeous, and truly an amazing work of art, fully illustrated today on her blog "Blackberry Creek" (link in my left column). This quilt won all kinds of prizes in her quilt guild show on Monday.

The big square doily in my photos was made by our Mama, and the pink candlesticks glimpsed in the top photo were given to me by my sister Susan.

Monday evening, we had a lollapalooza of a wind storm, constant lightning, electricity off and on for hours.

Wondering if I had spelled "lollapalooza" right, I looked in the dictionary. Not only did I spell it right, it's really a dictionary word. Amazing.

Commentary

The world is too much with us. Late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away-- a sordid boon!
This sea that bares its bosom to the moon,
These winds that will be howling at all hours
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers--
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. Great God! I'd rather be
A pagan suckled in a creed outworn,
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea,
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

By William Wordsworth

*

". . .The angels keep their ancient places--
Turn but a stone and start a wing!
'Tis ye, 'tis your estrangèd faces,
That miss the many-splendored thing.

But (when so sad thou canst not sadder)
Cry--and upon thy so sore loss
Shall shine the traffic of Jacob's ladder
Pitched betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross.

Yea, in the night, my Soul, my daughter,
Cry--clinging Heaven by the hems;
And lo, Christ walking on the water,
Not of Genesareth, but Thames!"

From "In No Strange Land," by Francis Thompson

Little Two-Eyes

I dreamed I was leaving some kind of performance at "The Center," when the left side of my face felt numb and I couldn't open that eye. The numbness seemed to be creeping across my face, and the right eye would only open spasmodically. Panicked, I rushed out and left my blue coat and purse in the seat. In the lobby, I realized I had left my things, so I started back, just in time because a guy was locking the door. He let me in, and I grabbed what I thought was my blue coat and left the room again. Outside, I realized I had left my purse, and the blue thing I had was somebody's shirt.

All this time, my left eye was shut and I could only see occasionally with the right eye. I realized I was standing near a policewoman or guard, and I asked her if anyone else in the building had a key to the theater besides that man who had just left. She said no, but he would probably be back in a couple of hours to check the building before he went home.

I told her my eyes weren't working right and I had left my things in the theater. She said what was wrong with my eyes was a nervous spasm, and if I'd sit down and get calm, it would probably pass. So I sat down on a bench and tried to relax, and tried to hold my right eye open with my fingers. After a while I noticed sunlight coming in through a window, so I must have been there all night.

Then I woke up, and my face was buried in my pillow. When I turned over, my eyes opened OK.

Emails

"MCB:

I’ve entered my novel, Big Baby, in one competition. They were very complimentary, but did not choose it for publication.

This is the book of which you read the first chapter. It’s 80,000+ words long. I wondered if you might have time (in your spare time!) to read it and tell me what you think.

Don’t think for a moment that I will be offended or miffed in any way, if you decline. I’ll just send it somewhere else.

This book may not be your cup of tea at all. It’s about an Alabama mountain family in the early 1940’s, trying to get their heads above water after the Great Depression. Specifically, it’s about one of the daughters, her education, love life (such as it is), and care for her family. It touches racism rather lightly, sex even more lightly, and homophobia not at all, so it’s not up-to-the-minute on popular causes.

Speaking of homophobia, I’m now writing a book (probably novella) about a couple of gay boys in the 1950’s, before gay was cool.

Love, JR"

*

"Hello, Joanne!

I'll be glad to read it. Send away.

MCB"

*

So now I've got to go through the ms. and do something about the little boy's speech defect, which bothered MC when she read the first part.
**
Dinner, with the sisters at Susan's yesterday evening, was scrumptious. Now that I've got the fleas on the run, I aim to start inviting everyone to my house on a regular basis. Maybe we could watch "Downton Abbey" some more, or maybe "Balzac" or "Lonesome Dove."

Problems

The ceiling in the study is definitely coming down, its fall accelerated by the movers.

Billy and Beauty were left in part-time supervision of the house. Billy is interviewing Mrs. Gudenov, the Dolls' washerwoman, trying to persuade her to go out to Graymont once a week to do the laundry. She actually lives near the edge of the Hag Woods, but protests she would have to walk two miles to and from Graymont. Billy assures her that Mr. Doll will drive her both ways in his automobile, but then worries because he wasn't authorized to make this promise.
*
My poem "Southern Snow Dance" won honorable mention in the Ala. Writer's Conclave contest.

Sort of a Dear John letter

Yesterday I received a letter from River City Publishing. It was complimentary about my Big Baby novel, but said that it did not qualify as a finalist in the Fred Bonnie Memorial Award competition. Said my book gave an accurate regional picture of the South in its time setting. It also said they had extended the deadline to June 30, 2012, so I guess they're still receiving entries. So I hope they find whatever they're looking for.

Up until a few days ago, I was hankering to rewrite Big Baby. But with this new novel to work on, I now plan to send BB somewhere else to linger for another year, while I finish this one.

Susan's Memorial Day dinner yesterday was wonderful. We were quite a crowd, gathered around her new dining room table. And I sat in her beautiful new armchair in the living room. Ramey and Reed spent an hour or so going up and down the street with Reed's scooter, so Ramey was too tired to go to the poetry reading at seven p.m. She and Suze were planning to watch the Hatfield-McCoy miniseries on TV at eight o'clock, anyway.

The poetry reading at the Arts Council drew a small crowd and lasted a long time. I was the only one there who didn't bring a poem to read. Something's wrong with my printer. Joan had brought a printout of the poems we wrote at the Private Eye lecture, and I did read my two short ones.

Speaking of TV, I watched "Mermaids" on Animal Planet last Sunday. They showed photographs of bone weapons supposedly made by the sea people, and webbed fingers and ridged skulls that had washed up in various places, or that were found in the bellies of sharks. They found evidence of these people first because of the difference in their calls from dolphins or whales, and they told how primitive "ancestors" might have developed, some on dry land and some in the sea. Uh huh.

"And when the Sirens sang,
and we bound each other to the mast,
I could have tied slip-knots, and where would you be
now?"

I also thought of the "perfect little woman" that SDS and Lawrence found.
*
"Dear Mrs. Cage:

"Thank you for submitting Big Baby to the Fred Bonnie Memorial First Novel competition. Even though we extended the entry date until 30 June 2012, we have decided to start sending out letters to those whose works we have already read carefully.

"Competition is keen this time around, and there were many variations in genre--from literary, experimental, romance, science fiction, hardboiled mystery, fantasy, historical, and suspense. We received manuscripts from all over the US, and your story captures the time period and the mountain people beautifully; it was a very good read. However, I regret to inform you that your manuscript did not place for future readings for the final Fred Bonnie award.

"I am sure you will find a home for this novel! Just continue writing and submitting your manuscripts to competitions around the country. As you know, the more exposure your work gets, the better. We wish you the best of luck and great success in your writing.

"Yours truly,
____(signed)____
"Editor"
**
I think I've found a competition for entering BB again. Most of the publishers I've found aren't accepting new submissions except through annual competitions, so I'll go that route.
***
I've also found a flea exterminator. But it seems all the work will have to be done by me, like thoroughly cleaning the house and vacuuming some more, and me and Mo staying out of the house for four hours after they bomb the rooms, then vacuuming more and more. So after I get another supply of vacuum cleaner bags, I'll go that route.

Progress

Today I added five sentences (long ones) to the new novel.

Have to get ready for dinner at Sister Susan's this evening, then poetry group meeting after that.

It's harder to start writing something than to keep going after you've written a few dozen pages. Starting out, you want to say everything at once. Somebody said the best way is to start at the beginning. But Diane Chambers is probably the only story-teller who ever literally applied that method. Or maybe Sophia Petrillo.

Maybelle

Grandma had tried to keep Maybelle with her in the city ever since her parents were killed in a buggy wreck in 1907. But she kept running away, back to her home at Graymont. However, when Granny Gray passed on, Maybelle said that all the "servants" left, so she consented to stay with Grandma in her city apartment. Most of the time.

Maybelle is a pretty little red-haired girl, a bit fey. She is almost a year older than Camilla, though very tiny. Her room at Graymont is on the third floor in the south wing, and the Dolls have cleaned out the other rooms on that floor and arranged a guest room, plus bedrooms for Dolly and Camilla. There's a tiny bathroom at the end of the hall behind these rooms. The only sources of heat in this wing are on the first floor, so the Dolls will have to move back home before winter comes.

Mama and Daddy have legally adopted Maybelle, in accordance with Granny Gray's wishes, although May always makes Daddy uncomfortable with her chatter about nonexistent servants, animals that act like people, and learning to fly like the birds. Grandma says that she will "grow out of this." But Grandma is an optimist, and she really doesn't pay much attention to children's chatter.

Unable to find enough bedroom furnishings at Graymont, the Dolls moved their upstairs furniture to Graymont instead of putting it into storage while work on their home is in progress. When they picked up Dolly's big blue piggy bank to move it, the parents were amazed at how heavy it was. This is Dolly's room,

and this is Camilla's:

The "guest room" at the east end of the hallway now contains things from Daddy's study at home, and a long narrow daybed that can be made up for sleeping. They didn't move all the books. The box with Leonardo on it is really a disguised strongbox where valuables are stored, including the chess set when it is put away.

The chess set was a gift from Brother Ned when he was in Russia. Ned said the black pieces are solid gold and the white ones are solid silver. Daddy doesn't quite believe it, but he treats the set as a treasure anyway. He has never asked how Ned acquired the set, and he feels very guilty for having lost the "gold" bishop.

The pig in the corner is made of lead, and was a gift from a family friend, Mr. Jack Dyno.

What I Need

1. Someone to tell me to put on some clothes and get busy. To get this house in shape would take a crew of nine large men, working nonstop for about forty days and forty nights. Or two Chinese gentlemen a weekend. Or that's how it feels to me.

2. A dedicated writing room. I've started a new novel. It's all in my head, but I'm too lazy to write it down. It isn't laziness, exactly. It's worrying about all the stuff that needs to be done around here. Sort of paralyzes me.

3. Energy. I've started back taking calcium, aspirin, B12 and Spectravite (multivitamin). I may add Vitamins C and D, when I get used to swallowing the first four.

*

The new novel involves nasty-mouthed little kids, or teenagers, and I don't know if I can write that stuff without throwing up. But it'll probably develop at some point.

Revoltin' Development: I've lost my taste for ice cream. Last time I had some, I threw half of it down the drain.

A Letter From Ned

Dear Brother Lex,

Thank you for relaying news of my miraculous survival to our mother. I knew that you could handle that job!

From the postmark you'll notice that I'm writing you from up in Canada. I have been in a hospital, just got out. The telegram I sent was a bit misleading, in that I claimed to be unqualifiedly (if that's an English word) "all right."

The fact of the matter is that one could hardly have escaped whole cloth. A couple of wet and freezing hours in the old Atlantic O., with a broken leg--I should say a crushed leg--complicated matters to the point of an amputation of the offended limb. Just above the knee, don't you know, not anything tragic--and at least it was the left appendage instead of the right, like poor old Billy Bones! Now, Billy and I can be mirror images.

"How's your right stump, old Bill?"

"Tolerable, old Ned. How goes it with your left stump?"

For G__'s sake, don't show this note to Randa or Mother, or anybody. Sorry to run so graphic.

The upshot is, when I finally get down to your neck of the woods, it could be quite a shock to the family. I count on you to inform and prepare everyone for the sight of a somewhat diminished,

But still your faithful bro.,

Mycroft Edward Dahl, Esq.
23 May 1912

The Gathering Room

The family are increasingly frustrated in trying to get into the main house at Graymont. So far, the only areas they've penetrated are the south wing and some cellars. They've done the best they could for a living-dining room, with some metal garden furniture and a round stone table. The fireplace and columns were already in place, and the girls found the big Art Nouveau posters. For chair seats and pads, Mama doll chose the colors in the posters, and she added more garden style with the screen and drapery at the far end of the room.

 The glass tea table and frosted glass sideboard help to keep the room from looking too crowded. Mama hates to think of bringing oil lamps into this pretty room, and having gas lights or electricity put in doesn't seem worth the money (which they don't have, anyway), since their residence there will probably only be temporary. Maybe she'll use candles, if she can find something to set them on.

The 4 posters are by Alphonse Mucha, and are called "4 Times of Day."

A Sad Little Song

Red Wing

There once was an Indian maid,
A shy little prairie maid,
Who sang a lay, a love song gay,
As on the plain she'd while away the day;

She loved a warrior bold,
This shy little maid of old,
But brave and gay, he rode one day
To battle far away.

Now, the moon shines tonight on pretty Red Wing
The breeze is sighing, the night bird's crying,
For afar 'neath his star her brave is sleeping,
While Red Wing's weeping her heart away.
*
I don't know why this song makes the hair rise on the back of my neck. There's a link to it in my left column/Music Links.

Graymont Kitchen

The Dolls (and a lot of helpers) have made a couple of Graymont rooms usable, but it was hard work. The south wing originally consisted of three floors of tiny rooms and narrow hallways, with a cupola on top.

They created the kitchen by knocking out one wall of an old butler's pantry that adjoined the dining room in the main house. It had a sink with a water pump and leaky faucet, and a whole wall of empty shelves. They repaired the floor as well as they could, then painted it white, and brought the wood stove from the attic at home, also the lead-lined icebox.

The girls keep finding what they consider treasures, a lot of copper and brass, even a silver tea set missing its sugar bowl. Mama only wants to find a long table and enough chairs to seat everyone around it.

While the work was going on, a little brown-and-white cow kept wandering in every time someone left the back door open. The girls decided to name her Buttercup.

Time Out

I have sat down for a cigarette and some juice before I finish re-re-vacuuming my half-acre of house. And it occurs to me, I don't eat enough. In the past two years or less, I've lost twenty pounds avoirdupois. "Avoirdupois" sounds like "to have some peas." Which sounds good to me. Anyway--

I would eat--I do eat, a lot, when it's set before me. Or late in the afternoon when I get hungry, I cook something or heat up a can and eat all of it. When I run the microwave and the toaster at the same time, it blows a fuse and I have to go downstairs and flip circuit switches. And then I have to come upstairs.

The point is, like all old folks, I need someone to cook it and serve it to me, then go away and leave me alone. Maybe I could start eating at least one meal a day at a restaurant. That would involve ironing clothes, showering and dressing, getting there and back, and then the day would be over. All day for a meal. And then when would I run this wrist-straining vacuum cleaner? Middle of the night.

I once saw a science fiction film in which David Ogden Stiers played an alien from a culture where at age sixty, each person was obligated to pull the plug and go down the drain, so to speak. It may seem like a bright idea, except from the 60-year-old individual's standpoint.

I'm not really depressed. Just tired.

Maybe I could get "Mills own Whills."

I didn't write it.

Said the flea to the fly, "Let us flee!"
Said the fly to the flea, "Let us fly!"
So they flew through a flaw in the flue.

Daddy Doll Teaches Chess

Daddy Doll is going to teach Camilla to play chess. Somehow, he has lost a bishop, but thinks they can substitute something for that piece.

Little Dolly takes a look at the board.

"But it's all wrong," she says. "The big ones ought to go in front to protect all those little ones."

"Well," says Daddy, "the little ones are--they're like soldiers."

"I don't like that game," says Dolly.

Bra la la, how the life goes on!

Lunch today was okra and tomatoes, great northern beans with chopped onion, and cornbread fresh from the skillet. I ate until I couldn't eat any more, though I wanted to.

Mo is still lounging in the bathroom, getting served a small 2-course meal five or six times a day. I need to relocate him and scrub the bathroom down again.

My favorite Jeopardy contestant won the Teen Tournament today, a tiny teen named Elyse with braces on her teeth and big glasses, giving me a good laugh.

Maybe the fleas came to teach me how good life was before the plague. But it's getting better. Mo doesn't have any, and I have a plan to finish them off tomorrow. As usual, tomorrow I'll do great things.

Another Guy's Poison

My lunch today was a big tray of grilled vegetables. Unfortunately, I shook on a little too much Zesty Italian, and about three-quarters through the tray, I had to throw the stuff out. All I could taste was oil. If your mama ever made you swallow a dose of castor oil, you'll understand why I've always been a little bit leery of oil of any kind. Lucky for them, by the time Susan and Ramey came along, Mama had discovered that castor oil is poison.

Ricky Reed is outside cutting down dead shrubbery and mowing grass. To the tune of another C-note. "Oh, time, life, cash and patience!" Or something like that. Quoting Herman Melville or Samuel Johnson.

A New Quilt

Mama Doll saw the quilt Dolly found in the attic and thought, "iAy, caramba! I can do that." So she made this pink and green print quilt for Camilla in about a day and a half.

Kitty and Spot look indifferent, but both are planning naps on quilts as soon as the girls leave the room.

The girls have lots of books, and Camilla tries to keep them organized in the bookcase. But Dolly's favorite, "Mother Goose," can usually be found on top of the big dresser. She's not quite five years old, but she can already read almost anything. She finds that "Mother Goose" makes more sense than some of the adult books around the house, such as The Peep of Day by Mrs. Favell Lee Mortimer--which Dolly was not supposed to read. A few nightmares made her wish she hadn't read it.

Camilla remembers learning to read, sitting on Cook's knee and reciting what Cook called "the A-B-abs."

Dolly can't remember when she couldn't read, at least a little bit.

Ars Longa, Angst Longior

One day when I was working for Social Security, I interviewed a guy who was a professor, or some type like that who knows everything. The interview turned into a conversation, and he asked what my hobbies were. I said painting and writing. He said, "The writing doesn't matter. The painting does." Maybe he was right. Maybe I took the wrong road. Maybe the world needed a painting of Walt Whitman instead of a poem about him. Unfortunately, I never saw him close up enough to paint him.

I did try to paint him from a photograph. Got as far as a pencil sketch on the canvas and gave up in disgust with myself.

I think, if I had to paint Walt Whitman, I would just paint some tall grass with a wolf or a coyote gnawing at some carrion. I think that would please Mr. W.

Tuesday

Brought Mo home from the Clinic yesterday. Maybe he's better, but he looks worse than when I took him in. He has chosen the front bathroom for his domain, and won't leave it. When I carried him upstairs to the living room, he ran and jumped up onto the coffee table and sat staring around as if he didn't believe it. But since then, he hardly moves. But he eats every couple of hours and drinks a lot of water, so maybe he'll recover by and by.

I called Dave to come and clean the carpets and kill what fleas are left. Mo's hidey hole seems to be clear of fleas, maybe because he and the beach towel I had him wrapped in are still [I can't think of the word] soaked with flea repellent. So maybe he'll last until Dave has been here on Friday.

Yesterday I petted the stray white cat, and he bit my hand twice so that I had to disinfect and bandage the puncture wounds. I'm done with pets. Finished. I don't ask them to say "thank you" for the food and water and the porch to lie on or under. Just don't injure me, that's all.

Fairhope, Alabama

The winnahs--my baby sister and me! No, that's not Mary Ramey on the right, it just looks like her.

Beautiful fountain in the park beside the Bay.

Beautiful roses.

Beautiful tree.

Beautiful people. Ramey and Jed.

*

Not to mention the beautiful birds--Pelicans, little black birds and their houses up on poles, and the prettiest seagulls in the world, I'll bet. I just couldn't get good photos of them.

*

The event was the spring awards meeting of the Alabama State Poetry Society. I won a first prize, a second prize, two third prizes and two honorable mentions. Ramey won a first prize and an honorable mention. If she had entered more poems, she would have won more--I don't just think so, I know it.

*

My Walt Whitman poem won second prize in its category. It contains the best line I've ever written: "I [Walt Whitman] will give  you antidotes to fear and loneliness."

Lost In Hag Woods

The very next Sunday, assured that the Titanic sinking involved no more of their acquaintances, the family pile into Daddy's treasured automobile and ride out to Graymont. There they find that the only possibly livable part of the house--indeed, the only part they can get inside of--is the south wing. The children have never been to Graymont before, and they are enchanted by it.

"I'm staying here," Dolly declares.

"You can't have my room," says Maybelle Buff-Orpington who greets them in the courtyard.

"We don't need a room," Camilla informs her. "I would live here if I had to sleep under a tree."

"Me, too," says Dolly. Her favorite place around the house is an old weather-scarred, rain-whitened gazebo that's just visible through the trees and undergrowth.

"This is where I'll live," she decides.

"That's my summer house," May claims.

"Mine now," says Dolly.

Maybelle mumbles something cross, and leads Camilla away to see another country wonder.

"Chipmunks," she says. "Did you ever see two chipmunks dancing, Cammie?"

Soon it's time to go home. Mama has settled herself in the car with Peter in her lap, and Daddy calls to the girls. That is, he calls to Camilla, who is talking to May in the courtyard. Dolly is nowhere in sight.

"She's prob'ly still at the gazebo," Camilla says, but they can't find her there.

After going up and down stairs in the south wing, and searching the woods and dark places around the house, they find themselves back at the gazebo. Peter hardly ever cries, but he is tired, hungry and fretful. It occurs to Camilla to call out.

She shouts as loud as she can. "Dolly! Where are you?"

"I'm up here," comes a squeaky little voice from somewhere over their heads. A creaking, grinding sound follows, and the roof of the gazebo slowly rises in the air.

As it turns out, Dolly has found a crank down below that raises the roof, and when one climbs up, it can be moved up and down by pushing and pulling. She loves the inside, that's painted one of her favorite shades of blue.

"How did you get up there?" Daddy demands.

"I just climbed on the rail and shinnied up the pole."

As he is helping her climb down, it never occurs to Daddy to threaten her with punishment. He's wondering if he could still shinny up a pole if such became necessary or desirable.

Getting Ready To Travel

We're going to Fairhope, Alabama on Friday, for the Alabama State Poetry Society spring awards luncheon. So I have to spend today and tomorrow getting ready, as far as possible. Anyone who knows me knows that I hate to travel. I like to have traveled, for something to look back on and feel as if I've done things and been places. But the actual experience is like holding my breath under water until I get back home.

I haven't always been so backwards; I've been all up and down the east coast of the U.S. and parts of the middle west. I've been to Canada, and across the water to England. Flew low enough over Ireland to see how green it is, and to wish I were down there. While I was in traveling mode, I should have gone out west and down to Mexico, and I would feel like I'd seen all of Earth that I was meant to see.

Some of the traveled spots I like to remember are Madison, Wisconsin; Wells Cathedral in England; an oolitic limestone formation near Tuscaloosa, Alabama; Cherokee, North Carolina. I think I could feel at home in Wisconsin. But when I crossed the line back into Alabama, I'd probably dissolve in happy tears, the way I've always done.

At least this weekend, we'll still be in Alabama.

*

The vet said she could give Mo a blood transfusion, and it might make him feel better for a few days. But if his bone marrow isn't making red blood cells, it wouldn't do any good in the long run. They have a calico cat running around the clinic who is their "donor" cat. I worry that maybe the blood types wouldn't match. Do cats have blood types? But she didn't sound optimistic about any treatment for him.

I know one thing: No more pets will enter this house while I'm in it, except to visit and go home elsewhere. Fleas, neither, if I can ever get rid of the ones I've already got.

*

I got antsy and phoned River City Publishing in Montgomery. Talked to a nice guy who said they were down to judging the final few manuscripts entered in the 2011 Fred Bonnie Memorial competition. He took my name and phone number and said he would get someone who knew more to call me. When I told him the title of my manuscript, he said, "Oh, I remember that!"

Poor Mo

Mo the Cat is in the pet clinic, and the vet says "maybe this" and "maybe that." But he's severely anemic, Lord-knows how old, and I don't feel optimistic. We decided to give him another day to start eating and moving around, if he can. So tomorrow, we'll see how he's doing.

*

Dolly found this pretty quilt in an old trunk in the attic, and claimed it for her bed. The girls are admiring it. Camilla hasn't decided whether she wants a quilt or a crocheted spread.

Dolly loves blue, and Camilla likes pink and green, so their room doesn't have a real color scheme. Each one expects to have a room of her own when they move to Graymont, but at present that seems to be only a temporary arrangement. The family will probably move back to their house when the renovations are done, and any extra rooms will be filled with babies.

Panic Attack or Simple Insomnia?

Blam! Pterodactyl Time!

Panic--greater standing mute or screaming?
Is this a death-in-life experience?
Better to lie still or run in circles?
Just now it's hard to tell the difference.

Flee, for your life, the south pole of inertia!
O tremor, shake this form with trembling!
Cliches and proverbs, exercise your power
And bring whatever comfort you can bring!

Tomorrow will be better--That's salvation!
Clutch at that thought with fingers cold as sleet!
There's still a mind that's capable of thinking,
Up there where dawn and dreams and reason meet;

And swirling in this nowhere-scape of shadows,
Familiar landmarks to the vision creep.
Ah, welcome, blessed angel of exhaustion!
With you at last, deliverance and sleep!

By Joanne Cage April 23, 2012

*

Apr. 23, 10:00 PM - I'll work on this poem, trying to clarify what it's about.

A Day To Remember

After spending half an hour on the phone transferring my depression onto my son Jed, I felt so much better that I jumped up, fixed lunch and ate, then cleaned up the house. Well, not completely, but I got a good start.

*

On a cool April afternoon, the family decide they're not up to going out to the Hag Woods to investigate the condition of Graymont house. Having decided to put off that job for another day, they gather in the living room, light the fire, and prepare to listen to Daddy play his violin. He's a pretty good fiddler. Billy Bones has been drafted to accompany him on the piano, because nobody else plays except Dolly who can play "Yankee Doodle" with her right hand, and Daddy doesn't want to play "Yankee Doodle." The servants have lined up in the doorway to listen.

Suddenly Beauty rushes in with a telegram that has just arrived. Everyone freezes. No one knows exactly  what to do. None of them has ever received a telegram before. Finally, Billy suggests that Daddy open it and see what it says.

Daddy does so, then looks around the room, dazed.

"It's--" Daddy clears his throat. "It's from Brother Ned," he says. "He was coming home from England on the RMS Titanic, and the ship sank early this morning. He--he wanted to let us know he's all right, before we heard about the wreck from the [radio or the] newspaper."

[Breaking the stunned silence, Camilla says, "See, Mama? I told you we should buy that radio we saw at Harte's on Saturday!"]

Mama, who hasn't yet fainted, gasps, "I hope no one else we know was on board."

"Thank God Ned's all right," says Billy.

"Somebody run see if the afternoon paper has arrived. I'll go telephone to Mother. Ned doesn't say whether he telegraphed her," Daddy says, and leaves the room.
*
You know, when I look at pictures of my dollhouse, I get the same calm, right feeling that I had while writing Big Baby. Like I'm fulfilled in some way. Go figure.

***

MY MISTAKE: There was no radio except wireless telegraphy until 1920 or later. So Ned didn't mention "the radio," and Camilla didn't regret not buying one at the furniture store.

Complications Ahead

The house has become too crowded for the family. Granny Gray has recently gone on to somewhere else, and surprise! She left Graymont to Daddy, with the condition that he adopt little Maybelle Buff-Orpington and raise her as one of his own children. Sigh.

Mama and Daddy are discussing the move to the country. As long as the subject of the adoption doesn't come up, things are pretty quiet. Peter, Tiny and the teddy bear listen in but have no input to the conversation.

So, as soon as Graymont has been cleaned out and made livable, the family will move over there, and work can begin on the attic. And another bathroom.

(Daddy secretly hopes that some of the antiques at Graymont will be valuable enough to sell and help finance the work on the house.)
*
Something has happened to my blog. Nothing stays the same, except changes to cope with.

It's Always Something

Daddy Doll is contemplating the ceiling in his study, which is sagging. Looks like it's about to fall down. The ceiling fan, he thinks, is probably the only thing holding it up.

Well, he thinks, when the work starts on the attic, they'll just have to repair the ceiling, too. This is what he gets for scrimping (or running out of money) and failing to put up crown molding. He's considering an Art Nouveau chandelier to replace the ceiling fan and light. Daddy gets champagne ideas on his cider budget.

The wall clock hanging over his head is one he calls "Goliath's pocket-watch."

Lucinda is cleaning the study again. It must be spotless, because she spends a lot of time in there. She's not as old as Grandma, but she's several years older than Daddy, and she's awfully fond of him. Daddy secretly thinks she's the only person in the house who understands and appreciates him.

Daddy notices what looks like a ghost peering in through the top left pane of the glass door to the balcony. If you click on the ceiling picture, you can see the "ghost."

"Lucinda, do you see that weird reflection in the glass door?"

Lucinda turns and, glancing at the door, says, "Why, Mr. D., that's not a reflection. It's just a jug of flowers I put on the balcony this morning. I declare, sir, you ought to start wearing your specs, or go get some new ones."

Daddy winces, hearing another cash register ringing. He has lost his old eyeglasses, having refused to wear them on a ribbon around his neck.

Something To Shoot For

My goal is to make every room in my house please me at least as much as my dining room does. Then I'll move away and leave it all.




*






I've been looking at houses to buy if we sell this one. But I've really only seen one that I liked as much, the one Jed and I looked at last week.

My grand-nephew Jesse's grandmother Billie has passed away, and I'm very sad for the family.

Almost Certified

Ever since last Sunday, I've been feeling like a real poet instead of just a pretender. Because someone outside the immediate circle of poets, family and friends posted on FaceBook that I was one of her "favorite poets in all the world." But the euphoria is wearing off, and I realize that what I have to do is "lodge a few poems where they can't be ignored," as Frost said.

So I'm going to start annoying The New Yorker by sending them a group of four poems every month until they give in and publish one. I may have to use a pen name like Hrvak Jroykin or Po Nuyen. And send in my subscription renewal money.

And publish a book of all my prize-winning poems!!!
*
Susan's sister supper yesterday was wonderful. It was just the three of us, and we straightened everything out. Temporarily, at least.
*
There's a mockingbird outside my window, sitting on a holly bush and eating the berries. And turning her head this way every time I whistle.

Tempus fugit, faster and faster

These Brief Days

Life travels with the speed of light;
No sooner Monday than it’s Sunday–
A whole week gone, and it seems like one day!
Why do we name the days that fly
Like racing clouds across the sky?
Calling names won’t slow their flight.
Adam and Eve and all your kin,
This is how you’re paying for original sin.
In the garden–

In the garden,
Morning felt like forever;
Noon was time enough to walk
From the northwest corner of the north forty
To the southeast of the south.
In the garden a girl could grow up
In a single April afternoon
Under the apple blossom sprays, heavy,
Heavy with honey-scented white
And (suspicion being all that ever slept)
When the golden fruit
Weighed down the golden boughs,
Might feast in silver shadows,
Veiled from any troubled gaze.

A gentle comedy, unthinking players!
How could the apple stir our brains
Into the folly of naming these brief days?
We string them together in wilted daisy chains
And set them winding on time’s blurred wheel,
Whirling too fast for us to see
The worm at the core, the serpent at our heel.

By Joanne Cage, October 1979

*
I guess Jed's still in California. I've slept much of the time since he left here on Saturday, to keep from worrying about him. "If God had meant for man to fly," etc.

Susie is giving "Sister Supper" again tonight. I think I'll do that in May. Hope I've got the house in better shape by then.

Brave New Words

No coward soul is mine,
No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere:
I see Heaven's glories shine,
And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

O God within my breast,
Almighty, ever-present Deity!
Life--that in me has rest,
As I--undying Life--have power in thee!

Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men's hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as withered weeds,
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by thine infinity;
So surely anchored on
The stedfast rock of immortality.

With wide-embracing love
Thy spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou were left alone,
Every existence would exist in Thee.

There is not room for Death,
Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou--THOU art Being and Breath,
And what THOU art may never be destroyed.

By Emily Bronte

Time Out

Yesterday I worked in the basement and got a lot done. Meant to finish it today, but fate intervened and I received the Downton Abbey set I had ordered, so you know how that went.

Jed just phoned and said he would be in Decatur, AL tomorrow and would come by here in the evening and stay until Saturday. That's wonderful--I was getting lonesome for some good faces other than cats and the occasional Gretchen dog. Seriously, I will be very glad to see my boy.

Ho Hum

Yesterday I put in several solid hours of work on the house, mostly outside. Cleaned up the deck, carried out loads of trash-- How can a house accumulate so much trash, with just one old woman and a cat living in it? Maybe houses ought to be phased out; they're beginning to take on a life of their own, collecting junk against the wishes of their occupants. I also called a guy about cutting the grass, did three loads of laundry, and then collapsed. Plans for today are much the same, but I ought to be writing.

When I'm writing, I think I ought to be cleaning, and vice-versa. I do have an idea for a story, somehow involving Charlotte Corday. Girondins, Montagnards. Marat, Robespierre. Corday was a Leo, born on July 27th. Maybe she's just a ghost at Graymont, sometimes carrying her head under her arm. But that has been done. Maybe a story will develop--but I suspect the only time a story develops is when someone sits down and starts writing it.

Anyway, in March I decided that April will be cleaning month. "April is the cruellest month...."

Graymont

Among the Dolls' relations, there's an old lady who lives 'way out in the sticks. Grandma calls her Granny Gray, though even Grandma gets confused when trying to trace the exact family relationship. This crone may be even older than Billy Bones claims to be, and her first name is Gertrude. Or Geraldine, or Gretchen. Gilda or Gwendolyn, no one is sure, because of the scrawled nature of signature on the rare greeting cards they receive from her.

A hundred or so years ago, Granny G's house was a mansion called Graymont, but now it is a (pardon the anachronism) rambling wreck crammed with all manner of trash and treasures. Much of the Dolls' household furnishing came from there. If anyone should want a bustle or a farthingale, a French clock with cherubs, a German player-piano called a Fortsenzitter or something like that, a death mask of George Washington, a steam-powered tricycle-- Well, Granny G can usually find whatever is needed in one cubbyhole or another, with the aid, so she claims, of various ghosts in the house.

With random hired help, she does keep a few rooms tidy and functional, such as the pretty suite occupied by little Maybelle Buff-Orpington, an orphan child who is said to be a grandchild of Step-Grandpa Barry Buff-Orpington.

Daddy Doll wants to send a crew of photographers to Graymont to record some of the flotsam there before the whole place goes up in flames or falls to dust. He hasn't yet found professionals willing to take on the job for a reasonable fee.