Tag: Blue

indigo days (2)

theresakishkan4 Comments

My hope with this latest dye work was to rejuvenate two sturdy but stained cotton duvet covers. I wrapped one of them, on the right, with jute string, thinking I would get some eel grass and areas of deep blue. (Because the fabric is twisted tight, the dye doesn’t penetrate evenly; I am always amazed at the contrasts.)

In the centre of the other one, I stitched a spiral leading out to a single trail. I also tied some beach stones in fairly random places. The spiral didn’t work as I thought it might but there’s a lovely circular Fibonacci pattern there which is a nice surprise.

I could do this forever. It takes time, going back and forth to submerge the fabric in dye, then removing it to let it oxidize. You pretty much need most of a day. I let them bundles sit out overnight and discovered this morning that a bear cub had been to the compost, leaving a pile of poop near the dyed bundles. Maybe it was curious. I wonder if it is wandering around, blue-nosed, this morning?

So after a vinegar rinse, the fabric is now hanging to dry. I’ll let it rest for a few days, then I’ll wash it with gentle soap. And to use up the remaining dye, I put a length of ramie (a fibre related to nettles) and another length of some unknown stuff I bought for its contrasting weave. I don’t imagine they’ll get very dark — most of the indigo was used up — but they might make nice tablecloths or scarves or who knows. Not me. Not yet.

(threads)

theresakishkan5 Comments

thread

Swimming in rain, small waves, an eagle over the islands, one, two, three laps, then four, a sudden swirl of tiny fish, maybe sticklebacks, in the shallows, one raven yelling. When I came out of the water, John was sitting in the shelter of the big fir, putting on his shoes.

All night it rained. This morning the barrels are full, the two tree frogs who’ve huddled for days in the green hoses are nowhere to be seen.

I have the thread of an idea. It came to me in the night, awake because the cat couldn’t settle, wanting in, then out, then in. Red thread, or blue? The idea wants both.

It is still raining. Blue is playing, songs I first listened to 50 years ago, in Victoria, then in Greece, the love I had then taking me to Matala in a three-wheeled car he borrowed from a friend. I knew every word. I picked wildflowers for my room, rosemary, chamomile, dittany. It wouldn’t have occurred to me to wish I had a river but it does now.

In Spain, I bought pink espadrilles, rope-soled. I wore them on cobbles, walking along the Darro River, trees heavy with oranges, lovers talking in the night as we passed the little cafes, already wishing we could stay.

Wind among orange blossoms,
Genil and Darro, lowly
And dead among the marshes.
   –from Lorca’s “Little Ballad of Three Rivers”, trans. Rolfe Humphries

I have the thread of an idea. Blue, or red?

a perfect day

theresakishkan4 Comments

A walk at Schooner Cove this morning, where the ghost of the girl I was shadowed me on the beach —

P1100535

— followed by lunch at Shelter in Tofino (mussels in Thai coconut broth; fish tacos), and then Long Beach where some swam (not me), and where this shell presented itself:

P1100534Sometimes we can go back. Sometimes a place holds what we loved so beautifully that we feel our hearts ache a little for the past but we know that the hours can be perfect all the same. We can listen to Joni Mitchell’s Blue while Sahand cooks Khoresht gheymeh (lamb stew with lentils and the most delicious smelling potatoes and eggplants alongside) and the view is soft, crows in the trees bickering, and everything is now.