The Lady of Shalott (by Tennyson)

On either side the river lie
Long fields of barley and of rye,
That clothe the wold and meet the sky;
And through the field the road run by
To many-tower'd Camelot;
And up and down the people go,
Gazing where the lilies blow
Round an island there below,
The island of Shalott.

Willows whiten, aspens quiver,
Little breezes dusk and shiver
Through the wave that runs for ever
By the island in the river
Flowing down to Camelot.
Four grey walls, and four grey towers,
Overlook a space of flowers,
And the silent isle imbowers
The Lady of Shalott.

By the margin, willow veil'd,
Slide the heavy barges trail'd
By slow horses; and unhail'd
The shallop flitteth silken-sail'd
Skimming down to Camelot:
But who hath seen her wave her hand?
Or at the casement seen her stand?
Or is she known in all the land,
The Lady of Shalott?

Only reapers, reaping early,
In among the bearded barley
Hear a song that echoes cheerly
From the river winding clearly;
Down to tower'd Camelot;
And by the moon the reaper weary,
Piling sheaves in uplands airy,
Listening, whispers, " 'Tis the fairy
The Lady of Shalott."

There she weaves by night and day
A magic web with colours gay.
She has heard a whisper say,
A curse is on her if she stay
To look down to Camelot.
She knows not what the curse may be,
And so she weaveth steadily,
And little other care hath she,
The Lady of Shalott.

And moving through a mirror clear
That hangs before her all the year,
Shadows of the world appear.
There she sees the highway near
Winding down to Camelot;
There the river eddy whirls,
And there the surly village churls,
And the red cloaks of market girls
Pass onward from Shalott.

Sometimes a troop of damsels glad,
An abbot on an ambling pad,
Sometimes a curly shepherd lad,
Or long-hair'd page in crimson clad
Goes by to tower'd Camelot;
And sometimes through the mirror blue
The knights come riding two and two.
She hath no loyal Knight and true,
The Lady of Shalott.

But in her web she still delights
To weave the mirror's magic sights,
For often through the silent nights
A funeral, with plumes and lights
And music, went to Camelot;
Or when the Moon was overhead,
Came two young lovers lately wed.
"I am half sick of shadows," said
The Lady of Shalott.

A bow-shot from her bower-eaves,
He rode between the barley sheaves,
The sun came dazzling thro' the leaves,
And flamed upon the brazen greaves
Of bold Sir Lancelot.
A red-cross knight for ever kneel'd
To a lady in his shield,
That sparkled on the yellow field,
Beside remote Shalott.

The gemmy bridle glitter'd free,
Like to some branch of stars we see
Hung in the golden Galaxy.
The bridle bells rang merrily
As he rode down to Camelot:
And from his blazon'd baldric slung
A mighty silver bugle hung,
And as he rode his armor rung
Beside remote Shalott.

All in the blue unclouded weather
Thick-jewell'd shone the saddle-leather,
The helmet and the helmet-feather
Burn'd like one burning flame together,
As he rode down to Camelot.
As often thro' the purple night,
Below the starry clusters bright,
Some bearded meteor, burning bright,
Moves over still Shalott.

His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd;
On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode;
From underneath his helmet flow'd
His coal-black curls as on he rode,
As he rode down to Camelot.
From the bank and from the river
He flashed into the crystal mirror,
"Tirra lirra," by the river
Sang Sir Lancelot.

She left the web, she left the loom,
She made three paces through the room,
She saw the water-lily bloom,
She saw the helmet and the plume,
She look'd down to Camelot.
Out flew the web and floated wide;
The mirror crack'd from side to side;
"The curse is come upon me," cried
The Lady of Shalott.

In the stormy east-wind straining,
The pale yellow woods were waning,
The broad stream in his banks complaining.
Heavily the low sky raining
Over tower'd Camelot;
Down she came and found a boat
Beneath a willow left afloat,
And around about the prow she wrote
The Lady of Shalott.

And down the river's dim expanse
Like some bold seer in a trance,
Seeing all his own mischance --
With a glassy countenance
Did she look to Camelot.
And at the closing of the day
She loosed the chain, and down she lay;
The broad stream bore her far away,
The Lady of Shalott.

Lying, robed in snowy white
That loosely flew to left and right --
The leaves upon her falling light --
Thro' the noises of the night,
She floated down to Camelot:
And as the boat-head wound along
The willowy hills and fields among,
They heard her singing her last song,
The Lady of Shalott.

Heard a carol, mournful, holy,
Chanted loudly, chanted lowly,
Till her blood was frozen slowly,
And her eyes were darkened wholly,
Turn'd to tower'd Camelot.
For ere she reach'd upon the tide
The first house by the water-side,
Singing in her song she died,
The Lady of Shalott.

Under tower and balcony,
By garden-wall and gallery,
A gleaming shape she floated by,
Dead-pale between the houses high,
Silent into Camelot.
Out upon the wharfs they came,
Knight and Burgher, Lord and Dame,
And around the prow they read her name,
The Lady of Shalott.

Who is this? And what is here?
And in the lighted palace near
Died the sound of royal cheer;
And they crossed themselves for fear,
All the Knights at Camelot;
But Lancelot mused a little space
He said, "She has a lovely face;
God in his mercy lend her grace,
The Lady of Shalott."

Henry Cejudo, Big Story, and Getting Things From Grandparents

These past few weeks I've been busy getting ready for school. We just finished our first week with students. Yesterday we had an assembly, which we always do the first Friday back, but this one was modified to be in honor of Henry Cejudo. He graduated from Coronado, our school, in 2006 and became the youngest U.S. person to win a wrestling Olympic medal this past week. There is a really nice story about him and his win here.

One of my main goals this year - work related but more about life in general - I am trying to generate positivity. My work environment had been sometimes quite negative the past few years, and you could just feel it pulling you down. I want to get rid of complaining, I want to see the silver lining in every cloud, I want to appreciate blessings and natural beauty in the world, I want to think the best of people, I want to avoid spending time or giving ear to negative people and voices. Along with that, I am trying to reconnect with my Big Story. A quote from a book I'm reading:

"Australian Aborigines say Big Stories hunt the right people to tell them, like predators stalking and sniffing in the bush. The trick is not to go chasing them, but to let them catch up with us. Sometimes a Big Story seizes us through a riff of coincidence we simply cannot dismiss. When we are seized by a Big Story, our lives are different. We have the power to cope with everyday dramas with greater courage and grace, because we are aware of a deeper drama."

When I read those words, I related with them instantly, because this is exactly what happened to me when I converted to Islam. After the fact, I was able to see a string of tiny, seemingly unconnected events throughout my whole life that led to the Big Story of becoming Muslim catching up to me. I felt like the story had been coming for me all along.

But I don't think I'm done yet. I want and expect more Big Story in my future. Sometime along the way, I found I was starting to forget how to dream when it came to my own life, and to see those coincidences pulling me to a Big Story. I'm looking for opportunity now for some additional Big Story to catch up to me. I want to imagine possibilities. I want to see meaning in dreams. I want joy, which I've been too subdued to really feel perhaps always, except in brief fleeting moments. The way you look at things in life is more important than your circumstances. I'm tired of thinking and hearing that change isn't possible. I'm tired of feeling resigned. If we believe powerfully enough that something can be done, no matter how crazy, then it can. But most of the time we forget that or deny it, so we don't believe. But if, for example, all the Shias in the world REALLY believed the Imam (as, ajtf) could likely return as soon as tomorrow - and not just in some distant age they won't live to see - then I think belief would become reality. Belief/faith makes the world ready for change. What we envision we create; our thoughts not only change our perception of the world, they change the world itself. So I want to change my thinking, to expect more good and big things and look for the positive in everything and everyone.

Mom and I just recently saw a movie called "Henry Poole Is Here". It seemed to fit right in with my current thoughts. I don't want to give away the story line in case someone wants to see it. But the grand theme is that your belief/faith/expectation or lack thereof causes things to happen - good or bad - that we choose a lot of what happens to us, even when we think it is all out of our hands, and that you can have a great life and miss it because of your frame of mind.

Today I visited my grandparents. They seem to be getting more settled into their new home. Their stuff has been shipped to them finally, so they have pictures hanging on the wall that my grandmother had painted years ago, plus a Zion National Park poster in a frame that has my great grandfather in it (he was a cowboy on the park land) and now they have some of their old furniture, etc. They did not have room for probably 3/4 of their belongings, if not more, so many of their things were passed on to us or given to other people. It feels strange in a way to have some of their things while they are still living, but I am happy to have the connection to them and to my memories of the things in their previous homes.

My grandmother had already given me a few things over the years - she sent me her Japanese Noritake dishes from Alabama - some of them broke, but a lot made it. She sent me her spoon collection - a few dozen few-dollar spoons from various places over the years, she sent some cups and saucers she collected, and a charm bracelet and her NHS necklace from when she was in high school. Now I have a few more of their belongings. I'm getting all of their photo albums - about 45 of them! I got a quilt my grandmother made probably in the 60's or 70's, a few Native American or Mexican pots they picked up when they lived in New Mexico, a table cloth, a place mat, a few bed sheet sets (too small, but I think I might make a prayer chador out of one), a few more cups and saucers, a sandiacast Native American pewter plate, and Montezuma. Montezuma is a huge black velvet painting that I remember staring at for hours as a kid when I was at their place.

So thinking about all these things, I thought I'd share a few photos of things I have as decorations in my house and tell a little of their stories.


These little butterflies came from my ex-next-door neighbor. She and her husband were retired farmers. I almost never saw her husband. He was in very poor health, hunched over and mainly bed-ridden, I think. He passed a few years ago. Last summer, she had a garage sale that I got the butterflies at, trying to get rid of things to move to an assisted place. Her daughter always came and mowed her lawn. Now I think she lives closer to her son, down in Phoenix. Or maybe near to her daughter, because I would see her now and then with her daughter caring for their yard while waiting for the house to sell. Now I have new neighbors - a man who works for the water company and is very fastidious about yard work - and his teenage daughter and sometimes her boyfriend. The house across the street from me is still empty. A young couple had bought it right around when I moved in. They had a second child and moved on to a bigger house probably 3 or 4 years ago. Then a late-middle-age to early-retirement-age man moved into it by himself. I never really got a chance to meet him - but we exchanged waves a few times when he went off to work. He died of something wrong with his liver one day and the house has been empty since. I'm not sure if he died in his house or not. I never even knew he was sick because he went out about his quiet life like normal until the end, going to work, etc., but from what I heard he had been terminally ill for some time and knew he was dying - but I don't know for sure. He reminded me a tiny bit of my dad because he was so quiet and because he had a Coleman lunch box, glasses, and a truck.


These are the two cups and saucers I got from my grandmother in addition to the ones she had given me previously. I don't really do anything with them - the rest are just put away, but the point is that they were a gift from her. The silver plate is pewter, cast in sand by Pueblo Indian artisans. And the plate in front of it is Lenox Autumn - I just like the pattern and saw it at an antique show once. Whenever I go back there with my parents (it is a show that comes every month or two to the City Auditorium) the vendor always remembers what I bought and asks about how I'm liking the Lenox Autumn. That's really pretty cool. You can see under them a squirrel - it one of a pair of Van Briggle book ends. No self-respecting Colorado Springs citizen, especially a native, would fail to have something from Van Briggle.


This is a painting I just bought this summer one day when my parents, I, and my brothers' kids went to the Flea Market. It was $10 and I just liked it. I realized you really don't see too many paintings of snow scenes, especially with sled dogs. :)


This is actually a calendar - one of those wood roll-up ones. But, I rolled up the date because it is old now. I kept it because I loved the picture of Masjid un-Nabi. The other side has a picture of the Haram in Mecca. I didn't buy this - it was sent as a freebie one time when I had bought a jilbab on the Internet several years ago. I also have a few other pictures of Medina and Mecca - two little metallic/foil ones.


This is Surah Kawthar. A family that has hosted me many times when I visited the Shia community up in British Columbia gave this to me as a house warming gift. They also gave me a cool calligraphy painting a friend of theirs made. It says "Allah" in English, but when you read those letters right to left it says "Alhumdooleluh" in Arabic - so it says both in the same letters. I also have two posters that have names of Allah on them and one poster that has the entire Qur'an on it in tiny, tiny print.


This is Montezuma. It came from a trip to Mexico (probably Juarez) that my grandparents made years ago. I'm guessing it was probably in the 70's. My grandparents lived in New Mexico for a good chunk of my early childhood and I remember this being in their house over the fireplace. I just got it today and tried to find a decent place for it here. It is really big - about 2 by 3 feet I'd guess. And it is rather unusual in style - certainly wouldn't find him in just any house. As a kid, I found the painting to be kind of mysterious - attractive to the imagination.


This plate is calligraphy with the name of the Prophet of Islam (saw)on it - it is some kind of souvenir plate with a date on it. I think it is a bit more than 30 years old or something like that. My ex-husband and I had been walking with my parents through an indoor antique/flea market and it was hanging on the wall upside down - the person who put it up had no idea what it was or where it was from and didn't recognize the script, obviously, so Mohamed had felt it needed to be rescued to make sure it was taken care of properly and not disrespected.


The pots came from my grandparents. The big one is a basic souvenir pot from Juarez. The middle one is supposedly Tarahumara Indian, as that is what the tag they put in it says, but they picked it up if not there, then one of the various pueblo reservations in New Mexico most likely. The little one on the right is Navajo horsehair pottery - it was given from my parents to my grandparents, and now to me. The picture came from the Renaissance Festival - it is a print of a chickadee painting done on feather.


This is the little placemat from my grandparents. Almost Miami Dolphin colors. I don't know much about it.


My parents brought back this sand painting from a trip they went on. They have a lot of larger sand paintings at their house.


The sand paper weight was by a lady in Montrose, Colorado and I got it on ebay for a few dollars. On top of it is some cool lab-grown bismuth crystal from a rock show.


This is a piece of calcite, also from a rock show. My dad likes to go to the gem and mineral show that comes to the Phil Long Expo center a few times a year. The cool thing about a good piece of calcite - not only can you see through it, but it magnifies the image underneath. This piece does that very well for a $3 specimen, but I don't think that shows in the picture. They also sell jewelry and stuff at those shows - I have a few items like that from there as well. I even have a silver rollo bracelet from a gun show I went to with my dad. :)

Well that's not everything, but a few things and their stories. Things are only things. They come and they go, but some things with memories, history, family attached to them have a bit of value beyond the material.

If interested, I'd like to tag a few other people to share stories of some of the decor in their homes - maybe Carol?

Sewing 301

What people will pay

My dad just sold this lighter on ebay. Isn't it amazing what people will pay for stuff if they decide it is old, rare, collectible, etc.? But good for my dad; he decided to sell it to try to raise money for a plane ticket to visit his terminally ill younger brother before he dies.

Red Rock Open Space

This is Red Rock Open Space off highway 24 near Manitou and Garden of the Gods, with fellow teachers Jenny and Eric and Jen's dog Baloo.

Upper Columbine Trail

Mt. Cutler was closed for maintenance - but we found other trails in the area. Thanks for coming down Carol - and sharing zucchini! We intensely examined and pondered tree sap, listened to the wind, talked about Sherman Alexie novels, Alzheimer's and lots of other things. I guess I talked her ear off. Then she drove home to a wildfire, which had also been a topic of conversation....

Neighbor

Mom and I were walking the dogs and the little old hispanic lady across the street by the track compelled us to visit her on her shady porch because her family was out. She is 83 and lost her husband of 62 years this spring. She cried about it and went on telling us about various things in her life, often looking far into the distance with her memories while repeatedly forgetting our names and losing track of the conversation. I thought of my own grandmother down in Florence in the Veteran's home, silently comparing how well the two women of the same age were in terms of health and memory.

My neighbor never drove, so she walks to the store, although her son and other family that live with her or visit her disapprove, she said, worrying about her safety. Often her house is overrun with people and cars - she has 18 great-grandchildren. But at the moment she was alone. She said it gave her a chance to clean up the house and went on about a particularly messy room used by a grandson.

Today she was upset that she didn't have a cold drink to offer us, she said; Someone in her family was supposed to bring her some soda but they hadn't, and she was clearly disappointed or distressed. After awhile we left,having to excuse ourselves, as she would talk as long as we would sit and we were always eager to go on back to our homes.

And I went to my house across the street and contemplated if I should bring her a soda. I wanted one myself after being out in the heat, and I knew she must be sitting there wanting one, too. How terrible that I was contemplating it and not just doing it without a second thought. But here I was, thinking things like if it would upset her son who lives with her but wasn't home at the time, or if she has some medical problem that a soda would exacerbate, like the lady in Chocolat, or if I would make her feel bad by bringing it over.

But finally I went to my fridge, found I had two sodas left, and I got them both out, put one on my counter and took the other, went out my front door and across the street to give it to her. She came down to the fence to meet me. I gave her the soda and fresh tears came to her eyes.

"I was just sitting there praying to God for someone to give me a cold soda!"

I thought that was a funny prayer, and then followed that thought, "Well, why not pray to God for a cold soda?", but I just said, "Well,there you go, then," wondering if I was really the answer to a prayer for cold soda and still feeling pretty stupid about the whole thing. But her tears had taken me aback, made me uncomfortable that I did it and uncomfortable that I almost didn't.

Devil's Head Lookout

So today I met some IES friends at Devil's Head Lookout on Rampart Range Rd. for a hike. For the drive up, I went through Deckers and the remnants of the Hayman fire and it took about 2 1/4 - 2 1/2 hours. The hike took maybe two hours, and then for the drive home I stayed on Rampart Range Rd. down to Woodland Park - dirt all the way but I got home in about two hours.



After a 1.4 mile hike up, you go up these stairs to get to the lookout tower. A ranger is stationed there to look for forest fires.



Here is one view from the tower. There were some turkey vultures flying around, so if something looks like a bug, it is probably one of the vultures. Oh and you can buy a t-shirt from the ranger to prove you were in the tower, if you want. :) He also gives out these little cards to everyone that goes up there to prove you were there. And you can sign a log book. Some of the kids were busy signing it and I wanted to head down since I didn't know what to expect for the drive back down the dirt Rampart Range Rd.

I recommend the hike, but it does require some fitness to get to the top. Fast and easy down. I thought my niece and nephew were going to go with me, but they ended up having a birthday thing today. It was a long drive without company but I didn't really mind except briefly in the middle of Rampart Range Rd. when I hadn't seen another soul/car for many miles and a fair chunk of time. :) No one would know where to look for me. Did you ever read that Richard Bachman (Steven King) story about the roads that cut through time?

I would like to hike more but I need a partner; my mom would worry too much if I did it alone very much. So let me know if you want to go hiking sometime. I'm not going back to working Saturdays this fall - I am arranging to try to pick up near the same hours during the week after my regular work day - so Saturdays would be great!



Saw the moose at the Cheyenne Mt. Zoo yesterday.