ask me, part 4
Questions courtesy apocalypsegrrl
1)Describe your perfect garden. What would be in it, how big, etc.
Wow. Well, I imagine I'd like a large kitchen garden that I could access from my kitchen and/or from a greenhouse. I would grow most of the vegetables that I regularly eat (because I don't work, see, and I have all that time to devote to gardening!) as well as a wide variety of herbs for culinary and medicinal use.
The kitchen garden would be bordered by waist-high stone walls and a gate that opens out onto a wild meadow at one end.
Another gate would open onto a flower-filled walking path that winds around the side of the house and through the lawns towards the woods that border my property (where I am, apparently, independently wealthy). I don't know much about flower gardening yet so I can't say for certain what I'd have, but I'd like to have little separate sections devoted to themes, like all color or all kid-friendly, and a "sensory" garden like they have at my old college, where every plant has a unique fragrance or texture or taste. I'm also especially fond of herbs, so I imagine there would be a lot of flowering herbs here as well. And of course there would be shade trees and shallow pools and lots of little niches where one could curl up with a notebook or a novel or a sweetheart.
It sounds big, doesn't it? But it needn't be huge. Make it too big and I'd have to hire people to take care of it for me, and where's the fun in that?
2)If you were having another child would you hope for a girl?
Yes.
3)Is there a novel or short story or poem that you think had a significant effect on you after reading it?
I know there are many stories that have strongly effected me, but I have a poor memory for things I have read or seen. However, I read The Lovely Bones in one sitting and sobbed at the end.
As for poetry, I've been blessed to see many of the country's best performers in person, the kind of poets that make you cry and laugh and believe in God in the space of an hour. Again, specifics often elude me, but for example Christian Drake is an amazing poet who had a strong effect on me. Also a lot of Ani Difranco's work gets to me, like her spoken word piece "Self Evident".
There's also a beautiful poem by Margaret Atwood called "You Begin" that made me cry when I first read it:
You begin this way:
this is your hand,
this is your eye,
that is a fish, blue and flat
on the paper, almost
the shape of an eye.
This is your mouth, this is an O
or a moon, whichever
you like. This is yellow.
Outside the window
is the rain, green
because it is summer, and beyond that
the trees and then the world,
which is round and has only
the colors of these nine crayons.
This is the world, which is fuller
and more difficult to learn than I have said.
You are right to smudge it that way
with the red and then
the orange: the world burns.
Once you have learned these words
you will learn that there are more
words than you can ever learn.
The word hand floats above your hand
like a small cloud over a lake.
The word hand anchors
your hand to this table,
your hand is a warm stone
I hold between two words.
This is your hand, these are my hands, this is the world,
which is round but not flat and has more colors
than we can see.
It begins, it has an end,
this is what you will
come back to, this is your hand.
4)If you could sit down to coffee or tea with any deity, who would you pick?
Coffee with Hermes. I've written about it, would love to make it real. Hermes is my Boo.
)Fruit or vegatables? Veggies. Fresh brussel sprouts with butter, crushed tomatoes spread on a toasted baguette, white Jersey corn chewed right off the cob, yum.
1)Describe your perfect garden. What would be in it, how big, etc.
Wow. Well, I imagine I'd like a large kitchen garden that I could access from my kitchen and/or from a greenhouse. I would grow most of the vegetables that I regularly eat (because I don't work, see, and I have all that time to devote to gardening!) as well as a wide variety of herbs for culinary and medicinal use.
The kitchen garden would be bordered by waist-high stone walls and a gate that opens out onto a wild meadow at one end.
Another gate would open onto a flower-filled walking path that winds around the side of the house and through the lawns towards the woods that border my property (where I am, apparently, independently wealthy). I don't know much about flower gardening yet so I can't say for certain what I'd have, but I'd like to have little separate sections devoted to themes, like all color or all kid-friendly, and a "sensory" garden like they have at my old college, where every plant has a unique fragrance or texture or taste. I'm also especially fond of herbs, so I imagine there would be a lot of flowering herbs here as well. And of course there would be shade trees and shallow pools and lots of little niches where one could curl up with a notebook or a novel or a sweetheart.
It sounds big, doesn't it? But it needn't be huge. Make it too big and I'd have to hire people to take care of it for me, and where's the fun in that?
2)If you were having another child would you hope for a girl?
Yes.
3)Is there a novel or short story or poem that you think had a significant effect on you after reading it?
I know there are many stories that have strongly effected me, but I have a poor memory for things I have read or seen. However, I read The Lovely Bones in one sitting and sobbed at the end.
As for poetry, I've been blessed to see many of the country's best performers in person, the kind of poets that make you cry and laugh and believe in God in the space of an hour. Again, specifics often elude me, but for example Christian Drake is an amazing poet who had a strong effect on me. Also a lot of Ani Difranco's work gets to me, like her spoken word piece "Self Evident".
There's also a beautiful poem by Margaret Atwood called "You Begin" that made me cry when I first read it:
You begin this way:
this is your hand,
this is your eye,
that is a fish, blue and flat
on the paper, almost
the shape of an eye.
This is your mouth, this is an O
or a moon, whichever
you like. This is yellow.
Outside the window
is the rain, green
because it is summer, and beyond that
the trees and then the world,
which is round and has only
the colors of these nine crayons.
This is the world, which is fuller
and more difficult to learn than I have said.
You are right to smudge it that way
with the red and then
the orange: the world burns.
Once you have learned these words
you will learn that there are more
words than you can ever learn.
The word hand floats above your hand
like a small cloud over a lake.
The word hand anchors
your hand to this table,
your hand is a warm stone
I hold between two words.
This is your hand, these are my hands, this is the world,
which is round but not flat and has more colors
than we can see.
It begins, it has an end,
this is what you will
come back to, this is your hand.
4)If you could sit down to coffee or tea with any deity, who would you pick?
Coffee with Hermes. I've written about it, would love to make it real. Hermes is my Boo.
)Fruit or vegatables? Veggies. Fresh brussel sprouts with butter, crushed tomatoes spread on a toasted baguette, white Jersey corn chewed right off the cob, yum.