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"Bee Yard Etiquette"
Sometimes you run across simple words of wisdom in unexpected places. Or maybe not so unexpected. I loved this passage, from p. 92 in The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. I read the book on the way to (and finished it in) Houston.
The story is about a girl who escapes an abusive father in the company of her care-giver. The setting is rural South Carolina, 1964. The two come to live with three black sisters in a town several hours away from the girl’s home. These women are beekeepers, among other things. The story is written from her perspective.
“I hadn’t been out to the hives before, so to start off she gave me a lesson in what she called “bee yard etiquette.” She reminded me that the world was really one big bee yard, and the samer rules worked find in both places: Don’t be afraid, as no life-loving bee wants to sting you. Still, don’t be an idiot; wear long sleeves and long pants. Don’t swat. Donte even think about swatting. If you feel angry, whistle. Anger agitates, while whistling melts a bee’s temper. Act like you know what you’re doing, even if you don’t. Above all, send the bees love. Every little thing wants to be loved.”
So that brings me to my final post about Houston. The best thing about Houston isn’t the quilts: it is the quilters! In this wondrous cyber-world that so many of us now inhabit, we can meet and chat with folks from, literally, around the world, just like here on this blog…who woulda thunk this could exist even ten years ago…. so here are the best photos of all, my friends:
Marie is one of the best friends I’ll ever have in life, and now we are on opposite sides of the US…fortunately, we both e-mail well, and have good long-distance plans on our cell phones! You’ve seen this photo before, of us in front of Marie’s quilt, but it’s worth showing again. I saw her last two years ago, in Houston, and it looks like it will be another two years until the next time….
Then there is our Far-Flung-Frayed-Edge, Deborah Boschert (who by the way has just self-published a fantastic little book, and we the Frayed Edges got to be her guinea pigs for part of it I think for our last meeting with her here in Maine–here’s here blog and website). Deborah’s hubby’s work took them to the dark side of the moon (aka Dallas, with apologies to all Texans, but it’s a different world than here in Maine LOL!). It was so so SO wonderful to get her call when she arrived at Festival on Friday and just chum around like we’d last seen each other a week ago, not the better part of a year.
On Saturday night, we went to Mama Ninfa’s for dinner with quite the crowd. My friend Lisa Walton (her blog is here) came the farthest, from Sydney, Australia. She’s the one at the far end of the table. Carol Soderlund (website here), dyeing teacher extraordinaire and just plain fun, is in the green in the middle, and then Deborah. We were quite jolly, having stood in line 90+ minutes with Margaritas and Coco Locos to while away the time! There were five others including Barb and Alex, good buddies of Lisa and Carol’s from California, and some friend’s of Barb’s, so we had a ball.
And here is Janis (tall one in the center, cream top), whom I met on-line on the quiltart and Janome 6500/6600 lists, and ladies from the 6500 whom well all met for the first time in Houston:
It’s SO much fun to meet people….then there are the bazillions of folks from the quiltart list whom I met again or for the first time, mostly at the QuiltArt reception generously hosted by Karey Bresenhan on Friday evening. Alas, I was having so much fun running around getting autographs on my journal book, I forgot to take ANY pictures!
And now, time to eat dinner and spend some quality time on the sofa with (or reading in bed to) the boys.
November 18th, 2006 at 7:53 am
Ah. I’m verklemp. I miss you!
November 18th, 2006 at 6:56 pm
What a wonderfrul time you had. Friends are the greatest!