Visitors

  

Kathe

Lisha

Secretly  happy to be sitting

City goat

   Our longtime friends Kathe and Lisha left their sheep ranch in Colorado to visit us here in the rainy Northwest.  They are superb shoppers, so that's what we did.  They scoured the antique shops of Sellwood for brooches, while I peered over their shoulders and Judy pretended to wait impatiently.  Even though Lisha is a real farmer, they were interested enough in urban radical homemaking to visit the Portland Homestead Supply store with its equipment for making cheeses and soap and canned fruit.  Judy played with the resident goat.

New clothes

   They insisted that I needed new clothes, and made me try on many new styles that stretched me out of my Land's End comfort zone.  I was not allowed to look at the housewares until I had found something new to wear.   We took up residence in the dressing rooms. I was in one room with too  many garments, Kathe was seated in the doorway of one opposite room,  and Lisha in the doorway  next to it.  They played What Not to Wear, making comments and laughing and judging  everything I tried on.  A woman looking for blazers modeled several for them, and asked their opinions.  Then a young teenager wanted their help choosing from among three scant black sequined prom dresses.  When we finally emerged from the fitting rooms, the attendant was still laughing, and told us we had made her job fun.
     At home, Judy and Kathe played ukuleles.  We had long meals filled with conversation and laughter. All the while, our other house guest sniffed about, looking for opportunity.

Lexie

     Lexie is living with us for a month while her owners travel.  She had come to Ruth and Ed as a rescue dog, who cowered under the sofa whenever company visited them.  When Ruth's  living room was crowded with musicians,  Judy was the only one who could lure Lexie out from her hiding places.  For about a year she would stick only her head out to be petted.   Then she began to sit on the couch next to Judy.

Friends for life

      The first time Lexie stayed with us, she didn't eat for three days, and  hid under the hearth.  This time, she gobbled her food right away, and spends her time wedged in next to Judy in the rocking chair. She wriggles all over, tail wagging, whenever Judy comes into the room.   She demands to be let out to protect the back forty from squirrels, and barks ferociously at anyone who comes to the door.  She yaps at us to tell us that it's time for the whole family to go to bed, and rolls  over insistently  to have her stomach scratched.  She is turning into a real dog.  I think that she and Judy have a dog and foster mother resemblance.