My friend, Jen, made these antler baskets, although they were snapped at my house on a very cloudy day. These are just a smidgen of what she has weaved.
I’m not doing so great on the health front, with even more pain and less energy than usual. It’s been digressing this way for about eight months. I still plug away at my part, taking care of what things that I can, and that always includes balance. So, I do a little less of almost everything, a lot less of some things, and let unnecessary parts go completely.
In the past, life has always come back around and caught me for a bit. Granted, I have never fully gotten back any health that I’ve lost. Still I trust that my body will allow me some freedom and energy in the future, maybe tomorrow, to swing back into capturing what still exists, even grows, and preserving it here.
Each Saturday morning, I’ve been going to the Sauk-Prairie Historical Society and working with fellow archivists to scan and analyze local glass negatives from the early 20th century.
I feel like the person in the movies who sits in a dimly-lit library at night, only it’s morning, paging through thick volumes of material and looking for that obscure clue. I’m Lisbeth Salandar tap-tapping into online databases. Last week, I signed an email “Sherlock Holmes”. Next time, maybe, Encyclopedia Brown or Inspector Clouseau.
I was sharing with my daughter some of the subject matter. In the very first image, there was a man crouching in the bushes with a child while his wife posed in the foreground with a bicycle. Yesterday, in what looks like a graduating class of six young women, way over on the edge, there is a man peeking from behind the skirt of a girl. Silas joked that this must have been the photo meme of that generation, the 1910′s version of planking. Glass negative bombing, if you will.
When I get home in the early afternoon, I sit down with a stack of books at my desk and my favorite online databases open on the computer, and I take out the notes from that day’s scans. I generally find a few hits and I get sidetracked by a lot of misses. By Sunday, my desk is covered in papers, they are my tracks in the snow. Arrows. Lists of names and places. Initials instead of whatever RMV means.
Next month, I hope to share the project on PortalWisconsin’s blog, where I am a new contributor. Jody Kapp wrote a nice introduction to the glass slide project HERE.
[The daguerreotype above was found behind another photo when I bought a vintage frame several years ago. More here.]
And so, I think that I will sign off from my digital diary until the new year.
Before that, I have to note that although I keep this daybook for myself and write as if there is not an audience, the truth is that the feedback is truly humbling, welcome, and even life-changing at times. I have made so many friends after nine years of blogging. Some I have met and hugged, some I hope to meet in the future, and some, although we are unlikely to cross physical paths, I feel like I have spent countless hours in person with them.
I received some holiday cards and I think that I managed to thank everyone personally. I hope so. This year, I didn’t send out greetings of the season by mail. I sent good wishes via thought, but the trouble with those is that most don’t know that I’ve wished well for them. That’s okay. I will give everyone my best wishes every day of the year, so they’ll know at some point or another. Or not.
Okay with it all, I am.
Though scant, I will surely attempt to peek in on some of my favorite sites during my daybook-keeping break. If I can. No promises or I will surely break them.
Signing off now in the early evening, I am now going to lollygag for a while, take the dog on a brisk jaunt about the yard, then settle in with a bit of crochet and telly while I wait for my husband to get home from a work trip to Iowa.
P.S. I am sort of on Twitter again, after an off-again-on-again hiatus of … a while. I will probably post any relevant phone snapshots on there.
I was thrilled when Kathreen Ricketson invited me to me part of the 2012 WhipUp.net annual calendar. I remember, last year at this time, pouring over the 2011 calendar and being so amazed by the talent. It is very humbling to be part of this. I tend not to think of myself as a crafter or an artist or anything but… “hey, I like doing this and I’m going to document it a bit”. I did a small interview there and have been featured alongside June calendar girl, Katie of Duo Fiberworks. (There are links to all the contributors HERE.)
The calendar is available for purchase in two formats, a downloadable PDF file (in three calendar designs) or a print-on-demand version from RedBubble, which is quite oversized and glorious.
In other news, I recently purchased the most beautiful pair of earrings from Julie Smith’s Etsy shop, Under the Tulip Tree. She has a blog with the same name and an aesthetic for making simply lovely things that are not too busy. I routinely don a pair of diamond studs that belonged to my grandmother-in-law, and I feel honored to have those, but I’ve been wanting some variety in my decoration. First, it was over-sized rings and now I’m onto earrings.
Next, I might go wild and shop for a bracelet.
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Hello, and welcome to Daybook, my little online journal where I keep track of things from my days. My name is Jodi.
© 2002-2012 Jodi Anderson
All content on this site, unless otherwise stated, is my property and cannot be reproduced without permission. If you'd like to use anything, please drop me a line at jodi@akeepingofdays.com. Thanks so much!
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