Tag: ghosts

Posted on

Day 21 of #VerseLove with Stacey Joy: Mama’s Kitchen Poems

Stacey Joy is our host today for the 21st day of #VerseLove. You can read her full prompt here. She inspires us to write Mama’s Kitchen Poems.

Kitchens are oftentimes the heartbeat of a home. They are gathering places and hold memories like no other room in a house. Stacey mentions a recent podcast episode featuring legendary author Judy Blume, finding herself mesmerized by Blume’s memories and stories of her mother’s kitchen. If you are interested in listening to that episode, here is the link. 

Next, Stacey shares the process: Let’s share our memories from our mothers’ kitchens, our own kitchens, or any kitchen that holds memories for you. 

Photo by Klaus Nielsen on Pexels.com

A Lock of Hair

there, hidden in the cakes and pies section

of Mom’s Gold Medal recipe box

with all the family secrets

an unsealed blue envelope

holds tender gold tendrils

~ cherished childhood hair ~

ethereal

long blond strands

of me

steeped

in

love, one

remaining

wisp of a child

blended, kneaded, shaped,

her own recipe for

disaster ~ aproned kitchen

ancestors gather still to check

on this bun baked through all their ovens:

did she fall? did she rise? did she turn out?

Posted on

Messages in the Sound Machine – Slice of Life Challenge Day 23, The Stafford Challenge Day 67

Special Thanks to Two Writing Teachers for inspiring writers, especially sleepless ones.

#messages in the madness

The melatonin was working fine, just fine, I thought, but I figured either we had a rogue sound machine with broken buttons or that one of the machines was possessed. I kept hearing things, but my husband didn’t. Just like when the car starts making a sound, only not a car but a tiny little white noise machine.

So finally, finally – – he in his melatoninlessness began hearing mysterious sounds, too. I didn’t know whether to cry, be scared, or celebrate.

If your children tell you they hear funny voices at night, believe them and check the sound machine. They’re in there.

Photo by Mariana Montrazi on Pexels.com
our old fan broke
                but our new fan was too quiet 


     (they don't make 'em like they used to)

so
we bought a second 
                  sound machine 
                           the kind for babies
with the white noise

so we can both sleep
                      if one of us is traveling

but now I’m hearing 
                                              what he
can’t make out
                                   in all the white noise

                     in this Sound Spa machine

     we both hear
            all the usual things: rain, thunder, waves
                       crashing, crickets chirping, owls hooting

             but I roll over half asleep 
                           and I hear
                these:

        computer printer printing
                                                                              washing machine

                        pulsing monitor 

                                                      injured animal

                                                                             Moaning Myrtle
                                                             steel drums

                          robot sirens

                                              Amazon notifications

                   vintage typewriter return dings

                                                                         disco beats 

      messages in the machine

heard by one unpillowed ear

             I'm afraid next I'll hear a murder 
                                                                                                or a confession

                              or a ghost of a soldier who stood where I now sleep

                                             looking for his lost buttons
                                                                and his lost love



                                                                                                   no sleeping here
Posted on

Haint Blue

As a Christmas present in 1985, my parents gave me an antique chest of drawers that has needed a facelift for at least two decades now. The date on the back is stamped 1926, and it is made of a dark hardwood. Some of the original knobs fell off, and one drawer needs to be repaired at the bottom. It’s a lovely piece, and the feet resemble the posts on my twin beds that I slept on as a child and that are now pushed together to form a King Size bed. Believe it or not, I still sleep in these beds today with my husband and our three schnoodles.

I couldn’t get rid of the beds. They came out of an old house on Sea Island Georgia, a smaller island off of St. Simons Island, where I lived as a child. The undersides are painted Haint Blue, a common practice on coastal islands in the southeastern United States, rooted in the belief that this color wards off evil spirits and ghosts. Sherwin Williams even has a paint color named Haint Blue. In addition to painting this color under beds, people also paint it onto porch ceilings as well. 

Example of a Haint Blue porch ceiling (not mine)

I’ve had paint sample colors, paint stripping paste, and all sorts of brushes and tools ready to give some of our furniture a new life for six months now, and I’m finally getting around to the actual work. That Christmas gift from 1985 was at the top of my list, even though my grandmother’s kitchen table started the big avalanche of projects.

This week, I’ve watched about a half dozen YouTube videos and talked with my furniture flipping daughter on how to use chalk paint and all the variations and ideas for using it. I started simple – – with a can of Greige (a Behr paint color cross between grey and beige) and some new black knobs for the chest of drawers. I learned that a quick sanding is all that is needed, and that chalk paint dries in about 30 minutes, allowing a few coats and a complete project finish in an afternoon except for the wax wait time to cure. I used a small furniture roller and got to work.

Before:

Chest of drawers with trial replacement knobs attached

After:

Finished, waiting for wax to dry and cure (applied in a circular motion, which will show for a week or two) between buffings

I’m lining the drawers with contact paper to give it a fresher look, and moving on to my next project – – a small end table that I use in my reading room for my coffee by my reading chair.

I’ve chosen Sparkling Sage for the table and will finish the top with a white wash.

Let’s get sanding.