Category Archives: family

by

Cauldron

2 Ways to Manage the Emotional Cauldron of Anger
Freud’s Theory of the Unconscious Mind

So, the iceberg graphic is wrong, wrong, wrong. Am I right? Icebergs are about 90% below the surface, which is NOT what the picture shows. Regarding the first article, preset timeouts? I think when two people are losing it, that may go by the wayside. My strategy is, “I have to use the bathroom.” It might take a while if I am really upset and want to rip the sink off the wall. But, it lets me cool down, cool off and not say terrible things. Let them stay inside my head until I am calmer and realize how stupid and nasty I wanted to be.

But let’s think about cauldrons, yes? A stew of emotions? Our culture still has little respect for emotions. Just think if we were all nice on the surface all the time and never showed any other emotion. Bunch of AI robots, I think.

Cauldron

It’s not so surprising to look up the emotional cauldron
and have it be about anger. Anger in couples, but the cauldron itself
brings up witches and therefore women. Women in black
women with cauldrons, women boiling angry.

I vacillate between thinking that black men are treated the worst and then, no,
women are treated the worst. Assumptions, useless, toys, pretty, be nice,
true that women don’t get shot as much, but our country found a black man acceptable
in the white house, but not a woman, black or white.

Anger is not nice, I am told. But anger is appropriate at injustice, when people
are discriminated against, treated badly, pushed from homes, jailed, hung and shot.
Much of our country reveres guns to protect homes, a man’s home is his castle,
and what is left for women? Not the workplace, the public, the home.

How dare they take the cauldron as a symbol of anger stewing?
The truth is that men fear women’s anger and rightly. They fear the people
who are enslaved, discriminated against, shot and dismissed, rising up.
Rising angry, anger not in a cauldron, but hot as lava and righteous.

A sermon about fear and abuse and the minister says, this is where anger can be understood
and is right. Anger at the abuse and at the fear, letting people break free.
Energizing a person to leave abuse, to leave an intolerable situation
and no reconciliation without the abuser taking responsibility.

What the cauldron really holds is greed, the people who think they deserve
more than others, more money, more women, more adulation, more more more.
Greed, gossip, lust, and all the other sins. Anger at mistreatment is not wrong
though it may not be safe to show it. Let it be conscious even if not expressed

and fight on.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: emotional cauldron.

The photograph is my mother, Helen Burling Ottaway, in 1945. She was seven. I have photographs of my daughter and me with the same expression. Not anger, thought. I cannot credit the photograph because I don’t know who took it.

And to lighten the mood, both sexes are profiled.

Not all anger is right, though, and it’s often because of different interpretations, different frames of reference or misunderstanding.

by

Wild light

Christmas 2018, my son, daughter-in-law, daughter and I drove to Roanoke, Virginia to see my two aunts and one uncle. We went to the science museum. Among other things, there were mushrooms that light up under black light.

I am not sure any of these are neon lighting. But they are wild light!

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: neon.

by

Story morph

I’ve been seeing some embroidered stories. They are based on a true story, but the details are wrong or exaggerated.

One is an old friend of my sister. He notices a chair in his garage and contacts me. Now, my sister died in 2012. He says the chair is from Grandmother Tessie and that my sister told him “It’s the only thing I have left from my grandmother.” He wants the chair to go to my sister’s daughter and he may be willing to have it recovered for her.

He sends me photographs. Touches your heart, doesn’t it?

Except that Tessie was not our grandmother. She was my maternal grandfather’s mother, so my great grandmother. I have never seen the chair before and it would have to be late 1800s or bought late in her life. It does not look that old, though it looks chewed. Also, we all got boxes of stuff from my maternal grandmother Katherine, to the point where we all agreed it was ok to get rid of some of it. We offered it to each other first. Seven cousins and I got two pitchers. I asked my mother, “Why two pitchers?”

“After your uncles and I picked what we wanted, we lined up seven boxes. Then we went pitcher, pitcher, pitcher, pitcher. There were enough to send everyone two.”

Oh. My grandmother was a serious packrat. I got a silver plate pitcher and sugar bowl that look like they are from the 1930s, art deco. I had never seen them before they came in the box. So they are not attached to my memories of my grandparents at all, but I like them very much.

I send the chair message on and I don’t know if my niece will want the chair. Nor do I know if it was great grandmother Tessie’s chair. I had an enormous box of tablecloths and pulled thread doilies and so forth after my parents died. I would bet money that there was something from Tessie Temple in there. I offered it to both my children and my niece. They each took one tablecloth and napkins. I kept a few and got rid of the rest.

The other day I noticed that one cloth that I kept is signed Margaret White. She was my maternal grandmother’s oldest sister. I have Margaret’s small leather sewing kit as well, made in Germany and stamped with her name. I’ve had that since my teens and used it until the leather corners are wearing down. My mother said that my grandmother found her sister Margaret difficult, but I don’t know if that is true either.

At one point I emailed with a family member found on Ancestry.com. This is my paternal grandmother’s father’s half-sister’s descendant. She said the family rumor was that they were related to John Philip Sousa. I said, “My great grandfather, Fredrik Bayers, played saxophone in John Philip Sousa’s band.” She said, “Oh, that must be where that story came from.”

Are these stories benign or not? With social media and the ongoing trials of various people from both the government and investment schemes, the stories seem less benign to me. If my niece wants the chair, I think that is very kind of my sister’s friend to make the effort to get it to her, but the story was rather garbled. It makes me want to be careful with the stories I tell.

Peace.

The photograph is from 1965 or 1966, of my grandmother Katherine White Burling, me, and my sister, Christine Robbins Ottaway. I would guess that my grandfather took it.

by

Music to my ears

I grew up with lots of music. My father played guitar and lute and Segovia is engraved in my memory. He and my mother sang in large choruses: the Brahms Requiem, the Mozart Requiem and Bach. We had lots of classical records. I was born in the early 60s when my parents were in college, so they had tons of records. The Band, Bob Dylan, the Loving Spoonful, Joanie Mitchell, Oscar Brand and Jean Richie. I didn’t buy my first record until I was in my early teens and I bought ABBA. My father said, “This is POP!” I said, “I am a 14 year old girl. OF COURSE it’s pop and it’s really good.” He was mildly horrified.

We sang folk songs. My parents were editing them by the time I was three, because I was memorizing the words. They put the naughty folk song records away. They avoided sentimental songs. We learned “dead girl songs”, as my sister called them (Banks of the Ohio, Long Black Veil, Clementine, When I was a Bachelor, there are a lot of educational dead girl songs). We learned lots of comic songs. We also learned work and protest songs and absorbed our parents’ hatred of discrimination.

I set up a recording session for my father and sister and I after my mother died. I have a recording of us singing Long Black Veil and other songs. Here is The Band singing it.

Let’s have a band with women too, and for me that is Sweet Honey in the Rock. Acapella, with a sign language translator, and now they have been singing for ?forty years? They have amazing children’s songs and they are willing to sing about grief and protest. They have sustained me through the loss of my mother, sister and father.

And from one of the children’s albums.

The photograph is of my father at his 70th birthday in 2008. Malcolm K. Ottaway, with Andie Makie and Coke Francis. Andie is playing harmonica, my father on guitar. Malene Robinson took these photographs. The next is me and my sister at that party.

And one more of my sister, Christine Robbins Ottaway.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: bands. Wait, you said keep this light. Oh, well. Fail on that.

by

No waste

My daughter and I hike in Cinque Terre, Italy. There are five villages along the coast and a trail from the first to the last. Lots of stairs! And look at the terraces, built to farm the area. They grow mostly grapes and olives.

No cars in the towns.

Here is a map.

Here is a stairway from the path to a terrace.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: waste. No waste here.

A view from the path.

by

Diversity

This is the Trevi Fountain. We can curate the photographs so that we can’t see the crowd. Here is the crowd.

There are lots of changes from 43 years ago, 1980, when I traveled there. More people. We were traveling in January and February 1980, so that’s not a fair comparison. But the crowd is more diverse. At that time we ran into Australian travelers, the same people in hostels as we traveled. We were mostly Caucasian. Now the crowd is much more diverse and I also do not know what language a person will speak. Race is a messy construct anyhow, very unscientific, but I really like the diversity and not knowing what language a person will be fluent in until I hear them speak.

Here is the Vatican Museum. Also crowded and diverse.

Here is a park near the train station in Rome with some “Olympics” for both kids and adults.

We were staying in hostels and only did one formal tour. I wonder if the expensive hotels have the same diversity.

Let’s end with the fountain again.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt.

by

Supplies

When my (now ex) husband and I were first married, we bought two gold chains. I was just starting medical school. Third year we hit the wards. This meant that I was often running around the hospital wearing scrubs, rings off. I wanted a chain to put my wedding ring on. Some people tied them to their scrub pants, but they can get lost.

I go home from Richmond, Virginia to Alexandria. We show the chains to my parents, both used ones, but gold.

My sister reports to me later. “Our mom said, why are they buying gold chains? That’s dumb. They don’t have any money!”

“Maybe they want them,” says my sister.

“Well, I think it’s a waste.”

“You bought more paper the other day.”

“Oh. Hmmm, yes I did.”

“You aren’t using that paper yet and you have an entire vault of paper.”

“Yes, but I am an artist. I need supplies.”

“Katy wants the chain for work to put her ring on. How is that different?”

“Oh, well. Maybe you’re right.”

I am very pleased that my sister defends me but it also was very funny. My mother had a stack with one by ones with thin 24 by 30 boards, on them, stacked five feet high to put paper in. Cheap shelves, though it would be totally unstable in an earthquake. She bought paper that she loved and used it too. She did watercolors, etchings, carried a sketchbook everywhere, oils, scorned acrylics, woodblocks, clay, colored pencils, chalk pastels, oil pastels and then she loved crafts as well. She was a master of paper mache. Artists need supplies, but everyone has something like that. My daughter did not get the pack rat gene and is a minimalist, but even she has some things she really likes. Real stationary, for one.

I wore that chain for more than 14 years. We were divorced at 14 years but are still good friends. My ex went on the nursing school and has been a Covid-19 hero, much to some people’s surprise.

My mother was inconsistent, as we all are. She prided herself on being frugal and not spending money, but when it came to art supplies, she wanted them. She still could be frugal but she certainly had the supplies and she would stock up when beautiful paper was on sale! And pencils and pastels and watercolors and oils. My father would quote Ralph Waldo Emerson, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” Both he and my mother would call each other out when one was being inconsistent. They could be very very funny.

The lead photograph is from winter 1991-92. Mark Warren Wilson, Helen Burling Ottaway, Christine Robbins Ottaway, me and Malcolm Kenyon Ottaway. Taken by Joel F., my sister’s first husband, with my camera. This next was taken by my father and there is Joel F. We went to Colorado and all stayed in a condo and skiied. My father found out that he really did not like heights, either driving or the ski lifts. Joel and Mark staged a pretend dramatic argument making fun of Chris and my arguments, and they were right on. We were quite embarassed and annoyed, but not instantly cured. And the skiing was delightful.

My mother, father and sister have all died. I do miss them. Hugs for all the recent losses of people.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: inconsistent.

by

Student travel

I traveled around Italy for two weeks with my daughter. We had backpacks and we planned it as we went. We usually had a place to stay two days ahead or a little more and both had return tickets. Hers is changable, mine was not unless I got sick. Then the insurance should kick in.

The last time I traveled in Italy was with two cousins in 1980. We traveled from January to March, with a Eurorail pass, and tried to do $20 per day. We did not like Italy very much because we felt terribly hassled by men. They yelled things at us, invited us into their cars, felt us up on buses and in general were awful. We were dressed in jeans, hiking boots, down jackets and frame packs. This made us obviously from the US or Canada, but we certainly were NOT dressed in a “suggestive” manner. We were very relieved when we got to Greece and there was less harassment.

I did not think I would be hassled since I am 43 years older. We were not hassled and I really did not see that behavior happening. I did see some outfits that I would consider rather sexy on young women in the hostels, but mostly people were in summer clothes. Narrow tank top straps, mini skirts and short shorts were frowned on in a number of the Catholic churches, and my daughter borrowed a large scarf from me as a skirt a couple of times. I liked Italy much much more this time. Thank you!

It was interesting to travel with a backpack in Europe again. There are other grey haired people in the hostels, though the closer to the tourist areas we were, the younger the clientele. I liked my pack better than a roller bag because honestly, there were stairs everywhere. At first both my feet and my quadriceps complained about the amount of walking and walking with a backback, but I got stronger. I woke up with terribly sore quads every day the first week.

My daughter wanted an open schedule. We had the first two night’s stay set up but no more than that. We took turns finding places to stay, getting tickets for big things like the Vatican Museum, and getting bus and train tickets. Google maps is quite amazing. We could put in our destination and it would tell us which bus and which stop and trains and metros. Back in 1980 we pored over maps, so that is a big change.

When I got off my last plane, I put the pack on and thought, either it is lighter or I am stronger. Both, I think, because I had eaten all the food while on the airplanes. Food is heavy!

I want to travel again next year, though I don’t know where. I have a long list of ideas.

Here is my daughter’s neat pack:

And my messier one: