Fixing the Mailbox

Posted on December 8, 2023 by Mary Beth Frezon

When I went out with my holiday cards, all zip-sorted and rubberbanded, I noticed that the rivet holding on the mailbox door on one side was gone.

So yesterday, I returned to a local hardware store where one young workers cheerily asked if I needed help and the other, apparently remembering my last trip, said – yeah! after this we can go home!

Last time I bought 3 allen wrenches to stash away. My bill was like $2-3 dollars.

This time, I bought 2 sets of nut, bolt, washer and my total was 95 cents. We all had a good laugh. I said they could go home now and I was going home to fix the door on my mailbox.

Which I did and like most jobs it was easier than expected. I managed not to lose any of the new parts and I duct taped the spare set to the inside of the mailbox for future use.

Posted in Do the Work, gratitude, In the neighborhood, photography, taking time to look | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

The Gettysburg Address

Posted on November 19, 2023 by Mary Beth Frezon

I am reposting this, from 2019 and as far back as 2015, because it still matters, remembering what our nation is about.

Looking back,I first posted these words here in 2015 after an incident in Baltimore triggered violence and looting. I reposted them two years later, a month after this president took office and thinking about what it means to be American and what is worth fighting for.

Today is the anniversary of those words being said overlooking the battlefields of Gettysburg. Two minutes that sum up what is worth fighting for and why we must continue to fight for what we believe.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Abraham Lincoln
November 19, 1863

Posted in Do the Work, good causes, In the neighborhood, life around us, note to self, rants, Ripped from the headlines | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Still on the Brink of the Web

Posted on November 19, 2023 by Mary Beth Frezon

A year ago, a first big wave of migration from Twitter happened and I found myself trying Mastodon and CounterSocial. Mastodon felt better somehow and it’s very nice, has great community, you can work up some conversation if you persist and post and leave comments – but that’s how ALL social media works.

Today I see a FB memory that I was trying these out and now we’re in the middle of another round of shouting about how awful Twitter/X is and especially because

the owner is a loud jerk who allows others to be loud jerks. OMG the other N word! OMG! Another round of migration.

Oddly, this is not at all my twitter experience. I don’t see any of that and it’s a MUCH better platform for getting faster news. I’ve laid off it for a few days because a part of me is bothered by the jerk-who-owns. (since the first migration, I’ve actually increased the number of artists and writers I see there as well as adding some excellent opinion people)

But, despite following so many of the same accounts of news and opinion people in Mastodon and now Threads (another arm of FB so don’t bother telling me how wondrously shiny and human it is – it also has a board of directors and a profit motive and an often jerky bossman), there is just not the same stream of information there. I don’t know why these news and opinion folks say they’re on other platforms and then don’t mirror their posts but they don’t.

Mastodon at least has the ability to find people across the fediverse, to search for hashtags etc and to f-ing edit posts. So despite and because of its reliance on volunteer folks willing to run physical servers, it has a lot going for it. Twitter has lost a lot of features but keeps its speed of delivery. FB is just awash in fake ads and other crap.

Deep in my gut I think that even if the Far Right folks prevail in real life, no one will care as long as their cat pictures and videos can still be posted. I am SO positive about this. I hate it. I remember when I had to continually explain what a blog was, so there’s not much can be done about my disappointment in this.

Congratulations for making it this far.

Posted in Administrivia, geeky stuff, life on the web, rants, RESIST, Ripped from the headlines | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

2023 Poetry Postcard Fest Thoughts

Posted on September 30, 2023 by Mary Beth Frezon

I started the postcard poetry fest early this year, about a week after receiving my list of addresses. Thirty-one names plus my own in group one (those over-eager, sign-up-right-away people). After a few years of hearing encouragement to start anytime after getting the list, for some reason this year I took it to heart.

In theory, it shouldn’t matter when you start, as long as you finish by the end of August. Originally the fest was all of August and that’s how I did it – one postcard a day with a newly written poem for each. I often started a few days early in hopes that the August first recipient might get it about on the day. No mail on Sundays of course so either two on Saturday or on Monday. I try to send the international cards early to account for long travel times.

This year, I started writing out my cards and off they went, one most days like normal. The only difference is that nothing arrived in my mailbox for days. I gave myself a pep talk, because I often am saying that the festival is all about the writing and sending, and the dailiness and the cards you receive are bonus. I strongly believe that. So I kept writing. Eventually August started and there was facebook chatter about people starting as there often is. Cards started arriving. I was a few weeks ahead though. I wrote some bonus cards. I wrote some response cards. I didn’t worry so much about sending the Sunday cards early because I was so far ahead. I just stuck with the plan of writing every day.

My own August tradition has been to send one card of my own design to everyone on the list – a day thirty-one card. It’s often something to do with my mailbox and mailboxes in general. I started thinking about this, but without the pressure of the end of August looming up close at hand. Got my card ready and now what?

I started hand-writing the cards a few at a time (rather than printing out the back with the same poem(s) to all), looking at what I’d received from people and writing a note and a response if I could. If not I chose from a handful of haiku I’d written for this. And so I finished a little before the end of the month and in the full swing of things, and feeling pretty good about it.

I think in the future I’ll stick with my normal timeline of starting just a day or two before August first. I was surprised that I missed the sense that I was one of a mass of people writing and sending poems. That mattered more to me than I’d known. And I’ll continue on keeping track of cards received so I can easily look to see what someone has sent me, in case there is a poetic response to be sent. Even if nothing pops up, it’s still nice to re-read at the time of writing and send thanks and acknowledgement.

So thank you Group One and all my bonus card friends!

my postcard to you
was magically changed to yours
by the mailman

Posted in Art in the world, Do the Work, haiku, Poetry and Lyrics, postcard poetry fest, the creative process, traditions, watercolor | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Remember

Posted on September 11, 2023 by Mary Beth Frezon

This year marks twenty-two years since that day. Over the last week or so I’ve noticed people are saying things like “we need to all grieve, whether we lost someone or not, directly or not…” We did all lose someones that day, and we lost part of ourselves too, and our innocence. Maybe not innocence exactly, but maybe some of our belief that good will triumph was shaken…

We still remember that beautiful September morning, blue skies and all the promise of back to school and autumn ahead. While I may repeat my post from year to year in memory of that day and the lives lost and changed forever, the feelings are fierce.

Things have changed in the world due to politics and a pandemic. The flow of days and what happens has changed, probably forever. But, we all know where we were; how we heard; what we thought; what happened next, even while trying to swim and keep our heads above water today. We may be frightened by different events as we were by the idea of homeland security and attacks against Americans by other Americans because they looked different or worshiped difference. Things aren’t that different now. Much of our fears and anger are created within our own borders these days. People are hard to understand, their actions sometimes unreasonable, dangerous, unloving, full of rage and hatred without realistic cause.

REMEMBER

911, quilt by Mary Beth Frezon, 2001. Photo by Pearl Yee Wong of the Michigan State University Museum

This is what I wrote as an early statement about this quilt:

September 11, 2001
The phone rang. I watched my mother talking and prepared myself to hear that someone had died. Who could have imagined? We didn’t have a TV where we were so we didn’t get the barrage of instant images. All we could do is listen to the phoned reports and wonder.

What stuck me about that day was the change. The sky was crystal blue, the Adirondack water still sparkled with the sun, the mountains still held in the lake on all sides. What had changed was me. I felt that someone had knocked a hole in my body or head. That there was a gap between the me of a few minutes before and the me now. I looked at the others and they seemed to have the same problem putting themselves into this new existence.

I’ve used simple images to portray that turning point where the innocent happiness changed on a moment in time. I’ve left a suggestion that this will continue to evolve. All grief becomes tempered over time but how long before the memory of that moment is softened?

We continue to remember and take the time to memorialize and to remember.

…I grabbed the last Sunday Times
You stole my cab
We waited forever at the bus stop
We sweated in steamy August
We hunched our shoulders against the sleet
We laughed at the movies
We groaned after the election
We sang in church
Tonight I lit a candle for you
All of you

from — “Nine-Eleven” by Charlotte Parsons

Remember.

Recently I realized that people coming into an age to work and to vote were either just born or about to be born in 2001. So we begin layers of people who have no connection, no memory of that day or its events. I realize that small children alive then don’t really remember, in the way that some younger than me at the time don’t remember Kennedy being killed. I don’t always know what to make of everything that brought us to this time, but I am still here, trying to do what’s right and making art and words and to keep remembering.

I remember being buoyed up by the responses to the September 11th attacks and also being worried about the sudden homeland security and searches and all “to protect us”. And I remember the rising tide of hatred, surrounded by all those flapping patriotic flags, hatred against those “other” people who hated us enough to want to hurt and terrify us. And here we are today.

Tides of fear and anger and hatred rise up over and over again and we must rise up too without fear and without anger and without hatred. Not in my name. Be strong enough to resist those easy paths and act with understanding.

Be kind. Be kind. Be kind.

This is the quilt I was working on that day as it was in September, 2001. It is still a favorite and still filled with loss.

This is Repercussion, the quilt I worked on in 2002. (Now in private collection)

Posted in quilting, RESIST, Ripped from the headlines, Sept. 11, the creative process | Tagged , | 3 Comments