Lucky Enough

If you are lucky enough to live on the water, 
you are lucky enough.

Unknown Author

I was upstairs when the doorbell rang. It was too late for the mail lady to be delivering, and most everybody else would text before dropping by. I could see thru the blinds that she was turning to leave by the time I opened the door.

She was young and petite. It was hard to say how young. She was old enough to drive, old enough to have multiple tattoos and a small nose ring. Her eyes were dark pools, her curls were of silky brown hair, and her smile was as soft as a child's. "Girl" seemed right for the short shorts and half T shirt.

She turned abruptly as I opened the door. I must have looked puzzled, because she immediately started to introduce herself, or rather her mission, as she wrung her hands.

"I know this is going to seem weird, I mean, I don't usually do anything like this. I hate to interrupt you but I just thought I might take a chance. I mean, if you were nice enough to give me a few minutes. Would you mind if I took a quick look, I mean, could I ask...." I opened the door wider and backed up to usher her in.

"I grew up spending every summer here with my grandmother. Everyday between the end of school and the beginning of the next year I was here.....WOW! This looks incredible! Wow! It looks so different!"

 "You remember that the deck used to go all the way around", I said. We just enclosed the part that was covered to add a dining space, and more room for the kitchen."

"I almost thought you had turned the house around. But yeah, I used to ride my bike around and around the deck".

We spent a little time talking about the new kitchen we had put in last year. Yes, she noticed the front of the house looked different but she still recognized it. When we bought the house, was that big square chopping block still there? Are Mr Jim and Miss Betty still next door? His brother? I like your garden.  Do you like flowers? My grandmother really liked flowers. That room right there was my room. The one with the glass doors overlooking the water.

"I came here every summer until I was about 12 or 13. Then my grandmother and my step-grandfather got a divorce. I never saw this house again." A pause as she looked around a little more.

"Would you mind if I went out on the back deck?"

"No, sure, come on." I led her across the living room and we walked out to the water side of the house.

"Oh, it looks just the same as I remember it. It is so beautiful."

Then a look back at me. "I was on my way to pick up my grandmother. She lives in Harlowe now. My mother is getting married again this weekend."

Then a look out again at the water. "I was having a really bad day. So on the way I just decided to stop by here. I knew it was a long shot, but I just had to try it. Thank you so much for letting me see it again."

Another far away look, so I said, "Why don't you just spend a little time reminiscing. I can leave you alone out here".

"Oh, would you mind? That is so nice of you. If I could just have a few minutes, it would be so helpful." She sat down on the top step, knees to elbows, head on hands, and stared out at the water.

I went back inside and sat down at the computer. I had never heard anyone talk about a grandchild in this house. I knew about the couple, the ugly divorce, then finally the death of the man. Wonder what had gone wrong today?

I glanced back out at the steps. Rain had moved my visitor from the step to the porch swing, but her gaze had not changed. She moved the swing a bit as if riding the ripples in the water. She almost seemed to hold her breath, diving deep and long before surfacing; then deep again.

At this pace, I began to wonder if she had lost track of time; maybe if she would even be able to walk away. Then I heard the back door open, and her cheerful voice say, "Thank you so much for letting me spend a while here. It was just what I needed."

She walked across the room and out the front door, down the steps and across the yard to her car. I don't think she ever turned back to look again. Whatever it was, she left it here. She wasn't fighting it anymore. She must have learned how to do that from the water long ago, when emotions were fluid and flexible.

I walked back out onto the deck and smiled. My soul is already sticky and stiff and I am just learning. Feels like maybe I am on the right track in the right place. 

“I have been feeling very clearheaded lately and what I want to write about today is the sea. It contains so many colors. Silver at dawn, green at noon, dark blue in the evening. Sometimes it looks almost red. Or it will turn the color of old coins. Right now the shadows of clouds are dragging across it, and patches of sunlight are touching down everywhere. White strings of gulls drag over it like beads.

It is my favorite thing, I think, that I have ever seen. Sometimes I catch myself staring at it and forget my duties. It seems big enough to contain everything anyone could ever feel.” 
― Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See

D'oh!

“My heart is strong, 
I will not fail, 
I won't be wronged, 
I will prevail.” 

― Alexandra Lanc, Lyrics of the Heart

I've been taken. Duped, fooled, suckered. I fell for the con about this time two years ago, and it has taken a huge amount of my time and energy since. It's like I'm slowly moving thru the 7 stages of grief, only I can't quite read what the next one is supposed to be. Closure and Acceptance will be nice....if I ever get there.

Getting ready to move from Georgia to North Carolina was a big deal. We were closing down a business that had been my life, my love and my livelihood for over 25 years. We were selling the property that held countless unique and sentimentally valuable plants.  We were leaving the house we designed and built on our own; the one that would be our last house ever, we thought.
To get that done took a lot of re-imagining, a lot of re-planning, and a lot re-organizing of convictions, sensibilities, and perspectives.
But, on the other hand, moving could be a good big deal. If we could manage the physical and mental move, we would be going to live and love the salt life at the coast. We could be downsizing the stuff of our lives in exchange for the grand babies that would fill our hearts. If we could just hold our breaths for about 12 months and get it done, we would be good. I made it for about 11 months. It was a bit of a struggle letting go. All the emotion coming and going was building to that final month. Time was getting short. Decisions needed to be made.  It was the band aid I just had to rip off, hoping the pain would go away quickly.

One of the very last things I had to do after moving but before actually closing on the sale of the house was to have an estate sale. We had some nice furniture and antiques, some silver, china and glassware that should have sold pretty easily. It mainly amounted to things that I would just not have room for in the new place at the coast. So it would be nice to pull in a few bucks for this or that, but mainly I needed to be done. So I started looking for someone to run an estate sale for us.
Then I slipped.

Looking back now, I was stupid; and willfully stupid. I did not want to face the final separations. I just wanted someone to come in and take care of it all. I wanted to look away; to be forced to stay away. And boy, did she know that. She was based nearby. She said all the right things about my stuff. She said her husband was a UGA professor. She said she could do the sale before the closing.
I asked a few questions. I checked out her husband at UGA. I stopped asking questions. I signed the contracts. Stupid.


At first it seemed like everything would be fine. Joe packed up his final loads and finished the move. Kathy Dove started staging the remaining items in the house. We would let her run the sale, take remaining items on consignment, and clean out the house before the closing. All that seemed to go according to plan, and the house did present itself clean and empty when we arrived for final walk just before the buyers. I was almost done holding my breath.

In the next month I got "the package" from the sale. Not a lot of money, a sheet scrawled with vague items sold, pictures of what furniture supposedly went to consignment, and a note full of excuses about the inventory not quite finished....one of her main guys was in the hospital....she would get it to me soon.....she would be sending monthly checks and reports on the consignment items.

So the weeks went on into months, and I started writing emails asking about the inventory and money she owed me. I even mentioned recommending her to our real estate agents hoping she might respond better. Well, that did get her to respond with a tiny check and a big goosh. But after that, for 6 months I got nothing.

By then we were really moved and settling in. Life was good on the coast. I really wasn't worried about the money. But I was nagged by the idea that I had been fooled; that I had trusted without verifying.

The story goes on from here, but the queasy feeling remained. I have retold each excruciating detail to myself a thousand fold....mostly in the middle of the night. The long story short version is that I took back what was left of the consignment. Much had "sold" without being paid. I made myself sit down with the original sale list only to find that many, if not most, of the expensive, choice items were unaccounted for. As she said to an undercover reporter just last week, "She was a picker before it was cool to be a picker, and she got most of her good stuff from estate sales".

From there I made myself go through everything in order to prepare to sue in Magistrate's court. She avoided service. I found a way to have the Secretary of State accept the service for her company. She did not pick up her certified letter. That meant she missed her allotted to to respond. I got a judgment. She renamed her company for the third time, and started over again. I had her shut down on the national estate sale advertising websites with that judgment. She still continued locally. I wrote bad reviews everywhere I could think of. I wrote the BBB. I contacted the trade organization for legit estate sales companies. Somewhere in here folks started contacting me about their experiences. I was not the only one fooled, cheated, frustrated. Each story held different details, but all shared the theme.

The struggle continues. It's still not about the money. It's about owning my mistakes. It's about not being the victim. It's also about working with other women who won't be victims. It's also gotten to be about law enforcement's reluctance to help us fight; about the bad guys and good guys; self esteem; the truth. I have learned a lot about the law. It's not perfect. It's not a straight line. I am beginning to see how using the law, even in this insignificant way, is more art, study and creativity.

So where am I now? I am trying to pursue and let go all at the same time. I am trying to support the group. I am fighting disappointment and relishing success each step of the way. I am leaning on my friends and family for good times, and hoping to improve. Hey, I am trying to remember..... that's life.

 "If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid." 

Epictetus, Greek philosopher

The Great Pine Needle Basket Caper

If you are not willing to learn, no one can help you.

If you are determined to learn, no one can stop you.

Anonymous

Alone we are smart. Together we are brilliant.

Steven Anderson

It all started innocently enough. A friend had been making wonderful art and baskets out of longleaf pine needles for a good while. A few times a year she offers a class on pine needle basketry at the Beaufort History Museum. I signed up for the class with a couple of other friends, and we arrived on the appointed morning ready to learn. Well, let me take that back. They were ready. I was completely unprepared. I did not bring a pocket book since I had a ride; no pen, no paper to take notes. I did not even think to bring my glasses to see the up close stitching I was supposed to be doing.

I spent a little time catching up by borrowing as much as I could, and calling my husband for an emergency glasses delivery. Finally I was ready to go, trying to get into the swing of the things. The process is time consuming and painstaking at first. But with friendly chatter, helpful oversight by our teacher, patience and glasses, we managed to pump out a sweet little basket each by the end of class. One little basket, and we were all hooked.

From there we took all sorts of directions. There were twines to source and buy, colors to pick, stitching needles to find, plastic straws to cut, bases to slice or invent. These items would come to me from one of our group before I had even thought about it. She'd tracked down everything we might need on Amazon, and packed the full set of supplies in a handy, homemade pouch. I was still working from behind.

Then of course there were pine needles to gather. First, we had to locate Longleaf Pines. They are usually found in areas nearer the southeastern coast, and I was sure I could spot them easily. We got some hints during class, and ended up one day in beach chairs under large longleafs chatting, collecting and bundling brown needles.

But what about green needles? Didn't we need some of those to dry as light tan additions to weave or dye? 

So that sent us off in search of shorter longleaf trees.  There were a few spots here and there with trees, but very often the green needles were not within reach. So we branched out to find hiking spots with large areas of longleaf pines that were protected, periodically burned, and otherwise controlled to safeguard the ecosystem. One of these spots was the Nature Conservancy's Green Swamp Preserve. 

                                                                                                                     We found Pitcher Plants, Sundew and Venus Flytrap growing among the wiregrass, sphagnum moss and cranberries. We located the burrows of gopher tortoise, identified  other plants in the mix, and found small, medium and larger sized Longleaf seedlings coming up after the burns.

 Armed with our collection bags, we secretly harvested green needles from unsuspecting juvenile trees to stash as bundles in boxes at home. 

Since then we've hiked in other Longleaf areas. The habitats have been different. Some are sandhills, some are swamps. Wherever we go, we now notice the differences in the look of pines. 

We watch each other's backs as we snatch more handfuls of green needles.  Imagine old women patrolling the back roads for seedling sightings, loitering under power lines, laughing over the loot, savoring our simple successes. No matter what the setting, these majestic trees stand silently over us, offering up needles for baskets and lessons of ecosystems, evolution, and stewardship. 

Now we're in search of interesting basket bases. Perhaps fired clay slabs from a friend's new pottery studio? Or maybe slices of a cedar trunk, or a driftwood log? So many ideas to explore.

 One little basket. That's all I've made so far. But I have so much more to show for it. 

In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.

 John Muir