Pure Gravy: October 2011

Sunday, October 30, 2011

Always With Love

"He tried. He always, always tried, and always with love at the core of that effort. He was an intensely emotional man."

Mona Simpson, Steve Jobs' sister, speaking of Steve Jobs

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Monday, October 24, 2011

It's Getting Harder

"A single parent with a preschooler and a school-age child in Seattle needs to earn $56,904 a year.

In East King County, the same family would need $65,690 a year, the highest self-sufficiency cost in the state. The lowest, Wahkiakum County, is $32,997.

A lot of working people, of course, don't make even that much.

Washington's minimum wage is the highest in the nation, and it is scheduled to go up Jan. 1 to $9.04 an hour.

According to the report, at the new level, that three-person family would have enough income to cover less than half its living expenses."

Jerry Large | Poverty Report: What's the Cost of Living? | The Seattle Times

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Willa Cather, My Ántonia: "I was something that lay under the sun and felt it, like the pumpkins, and I did not want to be anything more. I was entirely happy. Perhaps we feel like that when we die and become a part of something entire, whether it is sun and air, or goodness and knowledge. At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great."

October 8

My Job as a Parent

"I realize my job as a parent is to parent myself out of a job. I know I need to teach values, lead by example, and give my kids opportunities to think for themselves so they can make their own decisions and mistakes and grow from them. And hopefully by the time they've gathered and digested all of this information they'll be perfectly capable and functioning people. On paper this all makes perfect sense, but when you're in the trenches it's a lot more difficult, because letting go of the reins means giving up control; and without control I no longer can determine outcomes, even though I intuitively know that trying to control anything is an illusion."

Saelen Ghose | "Parenting at Halloween" | The Milford Daily News

Friday, October 21, 2011

You Were Almost Home

Renting Again

by Kate Lebo

No city in the world will save your life,

But you keep hoping. On your old block

A house kneels on a corner and watches

Its thin lawn, some fences and next door's

Bamboo blinds. Last year you'd stood

On its porch and felt solid, waiting only

For a ride. You were happy.

Not exactly. You were almost home.

Inside someone watched football.

Someone cracked an egg. Someone

Sorted yard and glue and sequins

Into meticulously labeled drawers.

Do you know your body's address?

You could find that house again, right now.

One day you'll be daydreaming on a bus

And your house will burst out of its doors before you

Lit from within and dirty, like the little boy

You haven't yet birthed.

From a river & sound review via KUOW

Thursday, October 20, 2011

My Favorite

Which of my photographs is my favorite?
The one I'm going to take tomorrow.

Imogen Cunningham

How I've Learned to Hide

Afoot and Light-hearted

I like the way this photo captures our time in Port Townsend.
Awash in patterns,
eating a hot dog from Dogs-A-Foot,
Imogen gives a dollar to a cute girl busker.
October 2

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

So Lucky

Imogen this morning:

"Mom, why are Canadians―or people from another country―so lucky that they don't have to go to school and they sleep in cots? I mean hammocks. [She shares her thoughts on hammocks: made of ropes, skinny, 'swingy'] Anyway, they do have to kill 'aminals' to eat. But I don't want to kill aminals. But we do eat aminals sometimes."

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

World Vision

Kenya: It's a Tough Life for Single Mums

"For those folks who still harbour crazy hang-ups about single mums, just remember that they are trying to raise normal children in a rather abnormal environment while struggling to maintain their identity and femininity. It is a tough world! Cut them some slack."