PaperGirl Blog by Mary Fons

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6 Oct 2016

Colleen, This One’s For You.

by Mary | posted in: Day In The Life | 24

Me and "Whistler's Mother" in Oshkosh. Selfie by me n' Colleen. — Me and Whistler’s Mother in Oshkosh. Selfie by me and Ms. Colleen.

Something amazing happened in Oshkosh the week before last but this is the first moment I’ve had to really write out the incredible story. PaperGirl is lengthy today but you’ll see: It’s so worth it.

Many of you are familiar with Carmen, my beautiful, capable, lovely assistant in Colorado who came onboard this summer to help with gigs while I’m at school (and forever after, I hope.) Without her making my dossier and communicating with my hosts about details (bios, supply lists, etc.) I simply could not be making this work. I’ve proposed marriage to her at least three times. She’s already married, so it’s not gonna work.

Carmen’s dossier for the Oshkosh gig was perfect. But I read it wrong.

I didn’t see that the location of the workshop that day was different from the location of the lecture that night. It was there in black and white, but I didn’t register that. So, bright and early at 8:25 a.m. — plenty of time to spare before 9 a.m. class because that’s how I roll — I show up at the venue for the lecture…and the comedy of errors began.

“Hi!” I said, brightly, to the desk person at the community center. “I’m teaching quilting today. Can you tell me where I need to go?”

The woman looked at her schedule. “Oh, sure,” she said. “Just follow this walkway through to the back.”

Great, I thought. Let’s go to work.

When I got to the classroom, I was surprised to find just one lady there. She was basting a quilt and only half the lights were on. I hope the numbers for the class are okay today, I thought. If a class has low enrollment it’s like, the worst. Every teacher has experienced it and it doesn’t mean people hate you; sometimes, for whatever reason, you have a small class. What can you do? I greeted the lady with a warm smile and, thinking she was my host because she was the first to arrive, I said:

“Hi! You must be Janice!”

The lady looked up at me and said, “No. I’m Colleen.”

“Oh,” I said, “Well, it’s nice to meet you! I’m Mary!” I stuck out my hand to shake hers. She shook my hand but did not make any gesture of, “Welcome! It’s so nice to meet you! I watch your show!” or “Welcome to Oshkosh!” She just kinda…looked at me. Though it feels weird to say it, that’s kinda what happens when I get to my gigs. I mean, I’m the guest teacher and everything and usually people are happy to see me, you know? That was not what was happening.

I looked around. “Colleen, I have to say: It’s funny there aren’t more people here, yet. Do you know if the class is full?”

“I have no idea,” Colleen said, still looking at me funny. “I didn’t know we had a different teacher today. Where are you from?”

Oh, no. Something was wrong. I felt my stomach drop. Anyone who works on the road knows it: that first, horrible wave of anxiety when you get to a gig and something doesn’t look right. I was in Wisconsin, right? Yes, I drove there the night before. Was it September 21st? I literally took out my phone to look. Yes, it was the 21st of September. Plus, I have Carmen, now. She is my angel. Carmen wouldn’t let me drive to Oshkosh on the wrong day.

“Well,” I said, trying to breathe, “I’m concerned… I haven’t talked to Janice this morning and I know I’m in the right place…”

“I’m not sure who Janice is,” Colleen said. I felt sick.

“Janice P.,” I said, “asked me to come and teach for you ladies. I’m teaching you the Thousand Pyramid.I’m Mary Fons and —”

“No you’re not.”

“What?”

Colleen looked like she had seen a ghost. “You are not.”

I thought she was kidding, of course. I chuckled a little. “W-well, yes. I… I’m Mary Fons.” I hated how that sounded, like, “Eeeeeewwww, yeeeessss, I’m Mary Faaaaaahhns,” like I eat cucumber sandwiches all day.

She stared at me. “No, you’re not.” Colleen squinted through her glasses. “I mean, you look like her but…”

I had to laugh, though the clock was ticking and I was not feeling good at all. “Yes, I’m Mary. And, uh, I’m really worried, actually, that I’m in the wrong —”

Colleen gasped and clapped both her hands over her mouth. “Oh, my God! It’s YOU! It’s YOU! Oh! It really is you! Oh my…! It really is! Y-y-you’re here! What on Earth??? You’re…here?!”

What was happening? I mean, this lady was awesome and I felt flattered that she was so excited to see me, but the prickly heat had begun. The woman at the counter of the community center told me where to go to find the quilters, right?? Yes, she had! And I read the address on the dossier that morning and put it into Google maps. And this woman is a quilter with a quilt on a table. I was in a very bad dream. Tick-tock. Everyone waiting, somewhere, for me. Pendennis, help me!

Colleen looked at me like I had a halo or wings or something. “I watch you all the time. I love your show! Well, I don’t like it when you’re not on. The best episodes in over a decade of that show are the ones with you and your mother! How on Earth did they get you to come here???” Colleen trailed off, staring at me, shaking her head. “I just can’t believe they got you to come here! You must cost an arm and a leg!”

I went around to hug her, partly, I think, because I needed a hug at that moment, though I also was really liking this lady through my fear.

“Colleen, you are so sweet. Thank you. But Colleen, um, something is very wrong, though. I was invited by Janice. Do you know her? The guild? I am very confused. I don’t cost too much, I guess, I mean, I was asked to come, so…” I had my phone out, frantically flicking through emails and the dossier and text messages, looking for whatever piece of crucial information I had missed. With my other hand, I searched my totebag for the dossier, my contract, a treasure map — anything that could help me.

I texted Carmen. While I waited to hear back, Colleen solved the mystery.

“Wait!’ she said. “You’re here for the Lakeside Quilters.”

“Yes, yes!” I cried, and pulled out my papers. “Look! I have this address on my schedule!”

“Ohhhkay,” she said, scratching her chin. “That’s the problem. This is a quilting class offered by the Fox Valley Community College. We’re not a guild. We’re just a class. We meet on Wednesdays.”

That same moment, Carmen texted me back: “Mar, the workshop venue is 14 minutes from where you are — I think you’re in the lecture venue! Two different places!”

Dang it. My whole body felt hot. If I left that second, I could get to class by 8:58 a.m., which is not good but is a lot better from being in the wrong state or the wrong galaxy, which is where I thought I was.

“Colleen! Okay! I got it! Oh, thank you so much — I’m so sorry, you must think I’m such a dummy!”

Colleen was so helpful and sweet and tried to give me directions, but I was already plugging the correct venue into my phone. She was saying how no one would believe that she met Mary Fons this morning.

“No one’s gonna believe me!” she said. “I lie a lot.”

I laughed and pulled the handle up on my suitcase, about to literally run to my car. But I was kind of in love with this lady. She was wily. There was something special about her; I could feel it even though my stress. What was one more minute?

“Do you have a phone, Colleen? Wanna take a quick selfie? But we gotta do it super, super quick,” I said. She said she didn’t have one and wasn’t that just her luck. I grabbed my phone out of my back pocket again. “Okay, I’ll take it an email it to you, okay? Let’s do this!”

We took our selfie. I emailed it to her right away. This woman was still in total shock. It was kind of amazing. She was just shaking her head the whole time, still kinda not believing that Mary Fons (!) had walked into her Wednesday morning quilting class at the community college. After the email sent, I flew to the classroom venue and we had an awesome day.

But it was stressful. This stuff happens. And when you meet someone like Colleen and funny things like that happen, it makes it okay. She was so adorable and sweet and she made the Oshkosh mix-up story a good one, not a bad, stressful, day-in-the-life-on-the-road one.

Colleen, you are the best. What a funny situation we were in, my friend. I’m going to paste in the thank-you email you sent me last week because it is priceless — priceless — just like you. (“Whistler’s mother”?? A mickey in your Geritol?? I am speechless with admiration.)

I shall never forget you, CoCo. Stay in touch — I mean that.

Dear Ms. Mary,
Thank you so much for the selfie. I just love it, your so cute and I have a bit of Whistler mother about me so its all good.

I couldn’t wait till lunch to tell my story. I had to wait till lunch because everyone would be there and they couldn’t interrupt me because their mouth would be full. Well it went over like a lead balloon, no one believed me and someone asked me if Iwas drunk. Being a tea total-er I said no unless someone slipped a mickey into my Geritol. It really hurts to be telling the Truth once in your life and no one believes you.

Then some one walk in and said Mary Fons was going to be at the gild meeting tonight. Every one certainly changed then and I just said Well I know she would be there and when they ask how I knew I told the truth. She told me, her and I go way back (at least 29 min) but I left that part out.

I watch you on PBS and I like you But in person I LOVE you, your so warm and friendly and your hugs are your crowning glory.

Im going to get so much millage out of my selfie I might have and 8 by 10 made and have it bronzed .
Thanks Mary for just being you. You made my day. Correction you made my year.

Colleen

4 Oct 2016

The Dovetail.

by Mary | posted in: Art, School, Work | 22

"Dovetail" foundation paper and test block. Pattern and photo: Me. — “Dovetail” foundation paper and test block. Pattern and photo: Me

One of the serious, who-does-that?? advantages of getting my MFA in Writing at the School of the Art Institute (SAIC) — aside from the fact there’s a longarm in the textile department and they want me to use it — is that I have not one but two advisors and I meet with one of them every other week.

Week 1, I meet with Jesse Ball, who is A Very Big Deal. Guggenheim Fellowship, awards coming out his ears, OMG-level reviews in the New York Times, Atlantic, Paris Review, etc., etc. Sometimes I’m intimidated by him because he’s this rockstar type, but aside from one awkward meeting where I felt like a big dummy and didn’t have one intelligent thing to say, we’re peas n’ carrots.

Week 2, I meet with Sara Levine, also A Very Big Deal. Essayist in a bazillion “Best Of” anthologies, professor at the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, reviewed by Oprah…it goes on and on. The truth is, all of the faculty at SAIC is this way and, as Claus told me this spring, it’s practically unheard of that a grad student gets an advisor appointment on a weekly basis.

“This is what you’re paying for,” he said. “And it’s worth every dollar.”

Sara is working with me on my book. Did I tell you I’m writing one? I have been poking at it here and there for over a year, but now it’s happening for real and that’s one part of the reason I’m doing this school stuff. It’s a book of essays about my life in quilting — and so, so much more — and the best way to describe it is to say that if PaperGirl is a snack, Piecing [working title] is a meal. A meal I’m prepping in the kitchen right now. You are gonna freak out when you see what I made you for dinner, you guys — in a good way, as long as I can pull it off.

Sara helped me so much the other day when she read a portion of a chapter and said, “This. This part right here when you talk about pre-washing and then you jump directly into moving to New York — that’s it. That dovetail. I want to see more of these moments. Where else can you dovetail two disparate things in the same way? Think like a woodworker dovetailing two pieces of wood. Does that make sense?”

Yes.

Ever since she said that, I’ve been writing like an absolute maniac. Most of it is garbage. But it’s important garbage and at least a few chunks are keepable. And everywhere I look, I see potential dovetails; places where two things come together and they just fit, even if they’re not “supposed to” or I didn’t think they ever would.

And then the other night, I closed my laptop and went to the sewing machine. Because there was another dovetail I kept seeing. A fabric one.

I sketched out the paper foundation a couple times. The one up there, that’s the one I like the best. It’s an abstract shape and I’m a pretty traditional quilter, so it’s a departure, style-wise, for me. Do you see it? It’s a dovetail. And I made a few sample units with some sashing in between and I felt happy in a way that I haven’t ever before, not quite like this.

It’s happening. Writing and quilting and art. It’s coming together in this new way.

And this is what I’m paying for.

2 Oct 2016

Breaking The Bad Bitmoji News.

by Mary | posted in: Art, Day In The Life, Family, Tips, Work | 6

I think I've got it? Bitmoji by me using Bitmoji app. — Close enough. Image: My bitmoji avatar made by using Bitmoji app on my phone.

Someone said to me recently, “You’re all over social media!” and I was surprised to hear that because it’s really not the case.

I’ve seen legit social media masters and that ain’t me. Believe me, I see the benefits of being all up in the social media game, posting this video and re-tweeting that, but the only way I can increase my social media reach is to do more social media and I just don’t have it in me.

Being a blogger isn’t the same as being a social media whiz. When I write a blog post, I always let folks know by posting to Facebook and to Google+. And yes, I do enjoy Instagram, but I go in spurts: I’ll be stuck in a coffee line and post a few shots before I get to the register. But I resigned from Twitter because I don’t want to send text messages to the world. I have taken in some light Snapchatting, but I must be too old for Periscope — and I never made a single Vine. I don’t even play games on my phone! By the way, I know Pokemon Go is a game, but is it a social media gamey thing? Like, do you follow people’s games? Probably. I doubt I shall never know.

But it’s time for another confession. I do have a goofy app thing that I love. I love Bitmojis.

Using bitmojis is definitely not using a social media platform, but if I socialize with it via text messages, does that count?

In case you don’t know — you probably do — Bitmoji is an app for your phone that allows you to create a cartoon of yourself and then gives you hundreds of “bitmoji” illustrations to choose from to express hundreds of different emotions in your text messages, from “I love you” to “It’s red wine night!” to “Busted!!” to… Many other strange things, e.g., you, as a unicorn, blasting off a rainbow that kind of looks like a fart. It’s so much fun! I’m amazed at how much my bitmoji looks like me and how much my sisters’ bitmojis look like them. Sophie’s got a good one, too.

But yesterday I had a rather awkward text conversation with a friend of mine who is in his early fifties and made his bitmoji.

My friend’s bitmoji did not look like him. Actually, that’s not true: My friend’s bitmoji looked like him about 30 years ago. There were no lines on his face. He put himself in a polka dot shirt for crying out loud — he’s a t-shirt n’ sweater vest kind of fellow — and the body shape he chose for his bitmoji was rather…optimistic. All of these things I tried to tell him super diplomatically when he asked what I thought, but I when he texted me that he was depressed after hearing the feedback but followed up immediately with an “LOL, jk!!!” I knew we had a problem.

When Sigmund Freud was 63, he wrote about being horrified on the train one day when he realized the elderly gentleman he was observing was his own reflection. When I waited tables at Tweet, I worked for dear Michelle, who told me once, “It’s amazing to me when I give a man a wink and then I remember, “Oh yeah: I’m old. How about that.” My friend’s off-the-mark bitmoji showed me that we stay on intimate terms with younger versions of ourselves. Every once in awhile I see a picture of myself and I think, “How about that.” It’s not that I’m one foot in the grave; it’s that I’m not twenty — even if I feel like it. (I often do.)

Bitmoji did not pay me to write this post, unfortunately, but I do encourage everyone to go make one and enjoy it; but make it true to how you look. It’s more fun that way.

p.s. Were you just thinking, “Hey, I wish I could read a funny, extremely short play”? I gotcher’ play right here!

1 Oct 2016

Confession: My Knees.

by Mary | posted in: Sicky | 46

Go patella on the mountain. (Not my knee.) Image: Wikipedia.

I talk to my incredible mom frequently, but she does learn certain things about me via this blog. After all, I blog about five times a week; Mom and I talk once a week, on average, with texts and emails in there as needed. I got to spend quality time with her last weekend in Manhattan — and took a pretty terrific selfie with her and legendary quilters Paula Nadelstern and Mark Lipinski which can be found on my Instagram page right here — and we had dinner and saw Rebecca Fons in a show at Second City in Chicago on Monday, but I never got around to telling her that I have some bad news. Sorry, Mom. Knee-brace yourself.

My knees are in trouble. It’s both of them, and it’s serious.

Admitting this is a big step. Admitting you have a problem is the first step in dealing with the problem and I have not dealt with The Knee Thing for… I have put my head in the sand about my knees for probably two years. But I am making myself accountable tonight. I have to see a doctor. It is getting worse and worse.

Look, when you have Ulcerative Colitis and then you have organs taken out because of Ulcerative Colitis and then you weather infections and things, those events don’t happen in a vacuum. My GI doctor does bone density scans (they’re not fabulous) and we do blood work (hello, iron infusions that cost $750 each) because while no one is “normal,” some people are less normal than others. At least some people have less bone density and iron than others and have absorption issues because of high-maintenance or non-existant intestinal walls.

The constant throb of knee pain that I have may or may not be related to my illness. It could be that I have, along with my other fun body portfolio, plain old “bad knees.” But I’m not overweight, I’m not an athlete, and we don’t have “bad knees” in my family, so I’m inclined to think it’s got something to do with UC, not from an absorption issue but…

This is where the blogger who blogs about her personal life has a decision to make. Do I tell you why I think I have knee pain really? Or what is most certainly compounding it? How much information is too much? If it’s scary to tell you the truth, does that mean I should tell you or does it mean I shouldn’t? In this case, after staring at the computer screen for long minutes, I have decided to tell you the ugly truth out of empathy for other humans who might have the same issue or need to know they are not the only ones.

My knees are shot because of getting up and down off the toilet so much for nine years.

There you go. Sexy, right? So cool. So glamorous. How cute am I now? How together do I have it now? Are you impressed? Did my Facebook likes go up? It’s the truth, comrades, and there does come a point when the truth is the best thing because you’re just too tired for anything else. At my sickest, I went to the toilet 30 times a day. It hasn’t been that bad for a long time. But when I had an ostomy (three years total), I went a ton, just because I hated having anything in my bag. When I got sicker, I went a lot. And now, better but never normal, I go probably 10-12 times a day. When you don’t have a colon, that’s actually a pretty good number.

That’s a lot of up and down, you know? That’s a lot of knees.

When I realized this, when I heard horrible crunching, gritty sound of my knees without even putting my head near them — this started well over a year ago — I was getting up from using the commode. Have you ever laughed bitterly? I mean really bitterly? I have. I did that day. I thought, “My God. My knees are a casualty of this.”

But who wants to have bad knees in her thirties? Who wants to admit why? No one, and not me. I’d rather make quilts. I’d rather work on the book I’m writing. I’d rather make dinner for Mariano (he’s coming over in a little while!) and I’d rather be with you, talking about anything, anything other than this.

My life is so incredible. I love school. I love writing for Quilts, Inc. I love my friends and my family. I adore where I live. I’m embarrassed when I look around at all that I have, really. Knee surgery ain’t that bad. I just don’t know when I’ll do it. Maybe this summer.

Because it’s bad, Mom. They hurt all the time and they click and pop. And I’m really sad.

29 Sep 2016

“The Field Mouse”

by Mary | posted in: Poetry | 24

Croquet Scene, by Winslow Homer, 1866. Image: Wikipedia.

Last week, my “Literary Animal” workshop — can you tell that I really love this class? — left the classroom to take a field trip across the street to the museum. Our assignment: Wander through the hallowed halls and be inspired by an animal in a work of art. From there, we were to write something. Sounds easy enough, right? Sure, except that writing something good is hard, even if — especially if? — it includes some cute little monkey on a Chinese vase dated 610 B.C.

The class fanned out once we were inside. Where did I go? Straight downstairs to Decorative Arts, of course. I thought I might find a cool animal carved into an ash sideboard from 1802, or maybe some jade rabbit on a chair.

I found those and more. There are so many animals in the things we make and paint and carve. We live in a world with animals and they show up, let me tell you. It’s really neat when you go looking for something and realize it’s all around you all the time (e.g., love, generosity, cats, etc.) But though I found lots of animals, nothing stopped me in my tracks until I saw Winslow Homer’s “Croquet Scene,” painted in 1866.

And there’s no animal in it.

Why do we respond to art? Why is it that sometimes, something just clicks into place when we see a painting or hear a song or see a quilt at a show and sometimes, we get nothin’. When I turned my head and saw that painting, my heart and brain flooded with understanding, familiarity, and something close to kinship.

It’s the woman. Do you know what I thought when I saw her? I thought — and this is basically verbatim thought process, here — “She hates where she is. She loathes croquet. She wants to go home. She’s newly married and is alienated from the family she married into. She’s looking at a field mouse and she wishes she were him.”

The animal in the picture isn’t in the picture. But that little field mouse is real.

So I decided to write about that. I tried some prose but I hated it. I decided to do a poem. But what kind? My approach was to do research on the time period and see what sort of poems were popular in 1866 when this picture was painted. I’ll spare you details of the legwork, but I will tell you that Helen Hunt Jackson was a poet popular at that time and I found a one-verse poem by Jackson with a fascinating (read: hard) rhyme scheme: ABABBACBADDADAA.

I know, right?? The prose might’ve been easier in the end. But nope: I went for it, and I’m so glad I did. I really love this little poem, even though it will continue to be polished. I do feel that I captured my heroine’s black mood and her longing for a simpler life. Like, real simple. Field mouse simple. Don’t you feel that way, sometimes?

Ahem:

The Field Mouse
Inspired by Winslow Homer’s Croquet Scene, 1866.
(c) 2016 by Mary Fons

I’ve seen him twice, now, run past the ball
Near wicket three on th’ flattened grass
Of this scorching lawn. As we shift and stall
And wait for Ben to make his pass,
That nimble field mouse, cool and fast,
Dips through shade, finds waterfall;
I’d give my life to trade with him.
The petticoats and primers, yet another looking glass,
— Ben’s mother’s high tea protocol! —
Oh, for a tail and four silent feet
To streak as lightning through golden wheat
And leave behind this game and all
The family I must rise to meet.
We kings of beasts are mannered, tall—
But field mouse is free, if small.

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