Etiquette

I found a book the other day which I immediately realized I had to bring home with me. Rather incongruously it was on top of an Atkins diet book in the occupational therapy cubby at the hospital. The book is this one:

Original edition was 1922. This is the 11th edition, 95th printing, published in 1965 (Emily herself died in 1960 at the age of 86). There are many revisions I can imagine happened between 1922 and 1965, most along the lines of "in this age of women's equality" which inevitably comes right before something like this:

"She who changes her dress and fixes her hair for her husband's homecoming is sure to greet him with greater charm than she who thinks whatever she happens to have on is good enough. The very fact of looking more attractive makes one feel less tired and therefor more charming and better company." (671)

Perhaps she has a point, but it is a good thing I don't have a husband because mostly now that I am almost 40 I subscribe to Tina Fey's, when you're 40 you get to take your pants off when you get home (See her book Bossypants which I am going to shelve next to Etiquette from now on). I am fairly certain the woman pictured below (Emily Post herself) did not put on sweatpants when she got home from work:

I was surprised to find the variety of situations for which we need to know the social rules. (And I have to mention here that there is an entire chapter entitled, "An audience with the Pope.")

"Dressing for television: You can always decide on appropriate clothing for your television appearance by calling and asking the advice of the producer..." (121) Do you think Bjork did this when she chose the swan outfit for the 2001 Oscars?

For when you go on a trip: "Cancel milk delivery.... Have all laundry and cleaning delivered before you leave so that it is not left hanging outside for days or weeks.... Never give your travel plans or dates to your local newspaper in advance...." (130) (I can see it now, Tapestry Artist Leaves Studio Empty for 6-month Walk from Mexico to Canada: Locals ask if she is clinically insane or just a little nuts.)

"Whenever a damask or linen cloth is used, the middle crease must be put on so that it is an absolutely straight and unwavering line down the exact center from head to foot...." (178) Does that mean I have to use an iron?

Since I am getting married this summer and I was curious about what Emily Post had to say on this rather monumental event, I flipped pretty quickly to the wedding section. By the time I read the second paragraph, I was convinced Miss Post was not going to be of much help to me:

"Let it be said at the outset that our discussion of wedding plans will include a complete description of the most elaborate wedding possible. Not because more than a very few will want or be able to carry out every detail, but because only then can the pattern be complete. In other words, it is important to explain all possible details of perfection so that you can follow as many as you find pleasing and practical for you." (339)

Being a bit of a perfectionist myself, my heart sank a little as I turned the page... In fact I flipped through the whole chapter and couldn't find the section labeled, "Lesbian weddings". (Certainly it was just an oversight on Miss Post's part, after all, she didn't know Harvey Milk, Stonewall, or the successful gay wedding market Vermont has staged since they started letting same-sex couples get hitched in 2000 (civil unions, marriages in 2009)--brilliant way to increase tourism, don't you think?). 

And by the time she started talking about "eight or ten bridesmaids, flower girls, pages, and a ring bearer" I was feeling a little ill. Did you know that black fruitcake is traditional for a wedding reception, and, Emily adds, most expensive. (350) You have to have flowers including various corsages and arrangements, canopys, special carpets, and Wagner's Lohengrin for the wedding procession (HELL no). That bit of information may come in handy some day at a cocktail party however ("[a cocktail party] can be the answer to a busy housewife's prayer", 215). So just remember, "Here Comes the Bride" is actually part of a Wagner opera with some less-than-romantic plot twists.

The number one question I've gotten about my wedding after, "When and where" is, "What are you wearing?" I really could use some help from Emily Post on this one, but alas chapter 44, The clothes for the wedding party did nothing to enlighten me. 

"At her first wedding a bride suitably wears a dress of white and a bridal veil whether she be sixteen or forty!" (360)

Firstly, I will be just three weeks from forty (got in under the wire, eh?) when I get married and I resent the implication that I'm almost over the marriageable hill and secondly, I look horrible in white. I'm a pasty caucasian of European descent who sunburns easily and freckles cutely not at all. What I really want to know is is this a question a heterosexual bride gets asked or is it just the "lesbian wedding" phenomenon that makes the question pop out first. For the record, I have absolutely no idea what I am wearing, but I may try to get Tina Fey to help me out.

Emily Post is all about moderation and not making a spectacle of oneself. "Nothing could be more inappropriate than the bride and her attendants coming down the aisle of the church made up as though they were in a chorus line in a musical comedy." (361) I guess we'd better leave the queer contingent off the invitation list.

Please keep in mind, in the words of Emily Post, "If you know anyone who is gay, beguiling, and amusing, you will, if you are wise, do everything you can to make [her] prefer your house and your table to any other, for where [she] is, the successful party is also." (38, but I may have changed the pronouns a little) I will expect your dinner invitation to  be engraved on a white card in a proportion of 3 units in height to 4 units in width preferably with your family crest embossed on the invitation. Please see chapter 52 of Etiquette for further details.

I suspect this book will be a great source of entertainment for many years to come and I have no intention of returning it to the cubby in which it was found. I will, however, leave the Atkins diet book in situ.

Post, Emily. Etiquette. New York: Funk & Wagnell's Company, Inc. 1965.

Tales of a Traveling Weaver Chapter 5; Weaving patterns...

Montezuma Valley (where Cortez is) from Mesa Verde

Last week we spent some time at Mesa Verde National Park. I would have stayed longer but they kicked us out at dark.

Weave for us a garment of brightness;

may the warp be the white light of morning;

may the weft be the red light of evening;

may the fringe be the falling rain;

may the border be the standing rainbow.

                                                                   -Tewa song

The patterns in the stone walls are fascinating to me. I have used ideas and feelings from these walls in my Emergence series of tapestries, especially Emergence I and Emergence V (links to photos of those pieces). Repetition is important. I have resisted it in many places in my life. But repetition teaches us something. It is comforting, and we learn from it. These walls are beautiful.

A wall at Lowry Pueblo, Canyon of the Ancients National Monument

Sunset at Lowry Pueblo, Canyon of the Ancients National Monument

Square Tower House, Mesa Verde National Park

Lowry Pueblo wall, Canyon of the Ancients National Monument

Cliff Palace, Mesa Verde National Park

Spruce Tree House, Mesa Verde National Park

La Plata Mountains from Mesa Verde

The great housing search ends...

Thanks to my intrepid (and very pregnant) sister and her valiant husband, we have found a suitable house for our tenure in the San Luis Valley.  I am happy to report that it is not only a significant upgrade from the rental described in this earlier post, but it is actually a cheerful, sunny place where I can see the stars and dream about hiking long trails and perhaps weave a few magic carpets or even tapestries.

Of course one of the drawbacks of the San Luis Valley of Colorado is the extreme cold in the winter. Despite the solar gain from the south-facing windows, we are going to be paying much more in propane for the next few months.

Ice on inside of the windows

My time in Cortez is concluding. Cortez is a great place to visit, especially if you are interested in the Anasazi/Ancient Puebloan cultures. I could explore the canyons and ruins here for the rest of my life. But for other reasons, I am moving on.

Emily came home with these beans the other day--grown and packaged just down the road... hopefully they were not grown by the original Anasazi however.

Snowy fields near Dove Creek, CO--one place I go in my home health travels

And I have a new weaving buddy--Thanks Grace!
Ernie is egging me along on my commission. I'm not quite halfway done and now realize I will have to move the loom with the tapestry partly finished.  This would never be my first choice, but in this case, I have to move Feb 4th and as I still have to work approximately 96 hours (5,760 minutes) between now and then, I may not finish the last 24 inches of weaving before Cortez is but a shadow in my rear-view mirror.

Knitting a new year

I have been working on various knitting projects. Yes, I'm still weaving and the new Emergence series piece is moving along (see photo near bottom).  But occasionally other fiber that is less serious and takes less concentration needs some time.

There was the wee little elf sock... and since Dobby died in the last Harry Potter movie, it was destined to be the new baby's (not mine, my sister's) first Christmas tree ornament.

And the scarf I made for my brother-in-law's brother's girlfriend... (yarn came from Germany--well, the first ball I got in Germany when I was there in 2010 and the second I had to have Conni Gardella match and bring back for me when I didn't have enough to finish the scarf)

Christmas was full of snow adventure, cozy cabins, and a lot of family. My sister (who is now 8 months pregnant) went all out and knitted 5 women French Press slippers. They are felted and they are fantastic.

And here is what I use mine for...

The floor in this little rental house in Cortez must have zero insulation in it because my feet are always cold. These felted slippers keep them warm and I can feel the treadles through them. (I am approaching the halfway point on this sixth Emergence piece. I hope to speed it up soon, but tapestry resists hurry. Perhaps that is the point.)

As for my travels through Montezuma County, CO...
This small valley still has signs like this:

Those aren't signs to towns, they are signs to individual people's houses.

Housing Humor... the trials of a traveling weaver...

We're moving to the San Luis Valley in a month and need a place to live.  I asked my sister to go and check out a property in the valley which, admittedly, was surprisingly inexpensive for a "furnished" house... and this was the result in email form after their visit:


Subject: "Call me after reading this list of rousing endorsements..."


1. It is wedged between a cemetery, a utility company storage yard, 2 trailers, and  a highway.
(at this point I am starting to suspect the viewing did not go well. The spare tire in the front yard also doesn't speak well of the property)

2. It stinks. Kinda bad.

(I once rented a small house in Sparks, NV that REEKED when I was looking at the place, and I convinced myself that the stench would go away... thus began 3 months of fighting with the landlord to replace the cat-pee saturated carpet and stop my perpetually tearing eyes. I think my co-workers were convinced I had taken up residence at the city dump... so this endorsement furthered my apprehension about the place. By the way, after a few days the cat pee stench which had also saturated the floorboards worked its way through the new carpet and I was forced to move out.)

3. The landlord said, "if any of these appliances break or are damaged, it is your responsibility to repair or replace them. They come AS-IS."  Keep in mind that the furniture is mainly things that disgruntled tenants left behind (probably b/c that was cheaper than the dump), and the appliances were state of the art in 1963.  Fortunately someone thought to clean them somewhere around 1986.

(Unfortunately our furniture is in storage in NM and I was hoping to find a furnished house, but  this isn't exactly what I was looking for in the sectional sofa department)

4.He said the electric would be around $75 a month (for lights????) The rest is propane.  The electric is metered with the adjacent trailer, so you have to kind of trust that he's making up the right amount for the electric bill.

(Never trust a landlord. I just spent three years drinking bacteria-infested water and suffering the gut-wrenching consequences... and didn't realize it until I was back on city water--I'll be paying the whole block's electricity and propane will be $500/month)

5. He said he'd take $375 per month for 3 months (to help offset the cost of the propane?) and after that, $425, which includes $25 per month for the dog.

(I am not sure exactly how my yellow lab could possibly damage this particular house)

6.The maintenance & cleanliness standards for your house in Cortez were MUCH higher than here. Though this place is perhaps slightly bigger.

(Keep in mind that when moving into the aforementioned Cortez house, we had to scrub it down, especially the kitchen. This place probably doesn't have a clean layer under sticky rings in the kitchen cabinets.)

7. It is a LOT better than living on the street (see-- I found something nice to say about it). Also it is fairly bright inside, and I'm pretty sure that no one has ever been murdered in the bathtub, but that doesn't necessarily mean you'd want to get in there naked.

(I'm not convinced she has any grounds to be so sure about the murder thing.)

8. The BOUG1  asks me to remind you that it kinda stinks.

(pregnant ladies being especially susceptible to stench)

9. Then my sister called her realtor and emphasized that we're professionals, and that translates into certain standards... I hope that is true. My track record isn't very good actually, so perhaps Emily should pick the next house. Besides the cat pee house in Sparks, NV and the water-disaster house in Velarde, NM, there were these housing adventures: 

• the house in LaGrande, OR that had a bedroom I took one look in and vowed not to use it for anything except storing my car topper (and I checked it for varmits before I put it back on the car). That was the same house that had oil heat which my traveling company didn't know needed to be filled and I spent an entire eastern OR winter weekend huddled in front of a small space heater in the bathroom.
• the trailer in Chama, NM which took an entire bottle of Lysol in the kitchen before I would even put a carton of orange juice in the refrigerator... and I kept ALL my food in the refrigerator. The rest of the cupboards had copious evidence of recent mice visitation.
• the house north of Reno that was infested with packrats--they chewed my boyfriend's ultralight airplane to shreds in what seemed like days and weren't too nice to my car either... actually, in retrospect perhaps that was the real cause of all the problems I had with my Ford Tempo... 
• the trailer in Dulce, NM where the pipes froze repeatedly in the -20 degree weather which the school (who owned it) refused to fix thus making me live in a casino hotel for the next 6 months surrounded by cigarette smoke and cursed with unuseably slow internet... but at least the casino had beds to sleep in.
• the basement apartment in Fort Collins, CO where I thought my piano would fit down the outside stairs, but turns out it couldn't make the corner so the piano guys had to take it down (and eventually up) the steepest, narrowest set of stairs I've ever seen... oh, and there weren't any windows either.
• the lovely adobe apartment in El Rito, NM that was so small, my brother-in-law had to come and put my bed 4 feet in the air so I could store all my yarn underneath it. I got used to eating dinner either at the loom or standing at the kitchen sink.
• the cabin on the side of Mt. Blanca in CO without heat or running water where I had to pee in a bucket because the composting toilet was too small for all that liquid (probably from too much beer drinking to survive the -20 degree winters)
• the house I shared with the vet student and her herpetologist boyfriend where I lived in the basement... also the home of assorted tortoises, turtles, snakes, iguanas, a pair of alligators, a cat named Louise, revolving rescued kittens at least three of which died in the year I was there,  three dogs, and half of the live crickets that got out of the various tanks and ended up on my pillow (I slept on the floor in graduate school)... I loved the vet student and the dogs, but the rest of the crew, especially Louise and the boyfriend, I could really have done without.
• the off-the-grid luxury log cabin 12 miles up a mountain near Monte Vista, CO which I had to buy a 4x4 Toyota truck to access in the winter (mongo snow drifts) and which had absolutely no heat in the bathroom--and no shower... so I rigged up a bucket shower in the sunroom which was actually a pleasant 75 degrees on a sunny winter afternoon.  Please don't tell my landlady...

Whew. Maybe I should just give up now. I have a horrible track record when it comes to rentals. Emily, it is your game from here on out because I definitely don't want to add this particular house to the list.

____________________________

1. Baby of Unknown Gender

Tales of a Traveling Weaver, Chapter 4: Reindeer and such

There are many ways for Santa to get around...

If you live in Dolores it looks like the reindeer pull the Galloping Goose.  I'm not sure how they get to places without tracks, but perhaps they have a way. (This Galloping Goose #5 carried mail, freight, and passengers in the San Juans from 1933 to 1949. It was easier to maintain than a steam engine... though clearly now it needs reindeer help for mobility.)

In Cortez apparently they have substituted reindeer with Toyotas:

A wee tiny elf left his stocking at my house. I hope his toes aren't cold.

Regardless of how Santa gets around in your town, I hope that you have a wonderful holiday weekend with your loved ones.

Tales of a Traveling Weaver, Chapter 3: Signs of the times

This is where I am headed to finish off my Christmas shopping:

The relative price of things...

We use words about weaving and tapestry all the time.  The Methodists in Cortez even put it on their sign:

It doesn't take too much to control Cassy these days...

The liquor stores here are quite creative!

Say the name fast and run the words together...

This one is in Dove Creek which is just a few miles from the Utah border...

And this is my friendly corner liquor store...

And as always: