By Nellie Curtiss …
Not much is happening these days. Those stay-at-homers, who have interests or hobbies to engage them during these quiet but indoor times, are the most contented.
Overall, watching tv is probably the go to not-an-activity release during these covid19 times. It’s so easy to push the button and voila, there’s a brand-new film Hillbilly Elegy with Glen Close on Netflix; or Christmas Chronicles with Kurt Russel and Goldie Hawn—this month Part 2 dropped. Rolling through A&E, AMC, VH1, Vice and other channels shakes out any number of action-filled American standards like Godfather, Bad Boys, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, 2012, The Day After Tomorrow, San Andreas; and then some from literature like The Lord of the Rings, The Color Purple, and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. On TCM Saturday classic movie viewers can enjoy Saboteur, Giant, An American in Paris and Moulin Rouge. It seems the movies are endless.
Some facing down boredom engage in beading to thread and weave necklaces, earrings and loving straps for drapes. It is relaxing and a way to interact with colors and express a vision. Some used colored pencils and sketched out postcards or pictures to be stamped or wrapped and presented. I know a few who love to cook and expand family recipes for cinnamon rolls, chicken roasting, salads, casseroles and ranger cookies.
Brave and creative souls, maybe like me, might pick up shears, like in hair shears, to create a new hair style or re-invent that spikey and punky hair from the Eighties. It took a short time for me to lift and cut, lift and cut and to see the six-months of old bleached hair drop easily to the shoulders and then the floor. My sister says, “You did fine. Looks good. The good thing about fine hair is that whacks merely add texture. It’s all good.”
There are poetry planners too who plan which poem to write for who and how many will do. Dr. Seuss may have been one of these souls with Green Eggs and Ham or How the Grinch Stole Christmas. A local thrift store, The Nazarene, even welcomes visitors to Whoville in their display window.
Not many in our Valley are news junkies like me. Analysis of the day’s events is a favorite of mine to watch on Anderson 360, or with the coffee joe on MSNBC. Early morning news about Colorado is another reason to make 10 ounces of coffee with Sweet Italian Cream. PBS has some news casts and historical reels. Last night I watched the three-part documentary, The Rise of the Nazis. It’s an in-depth look at the events and political moves Hitler’s band of SS men made to undo the German democracy.
For those history buffs who still wonder what Nazis in America might look like Amazon Prime has the series, The Man in the High Castle. For a mind twist, not unlike Alfred Hitchcock’s signature movies, there is Hunters, The Lie, and the classic The Children’s Hour (not a children’s story) with Audrey Hepburn and Shirley MacLaine.
Some stay at homers, find time to look out over community cats. Caretakers help neighborhood sweeties who need visit for a wound or being a mother-to-be. There’s also good work to do like feeding trapped-neutered-released feral cats. Cats Alive SLV is need of donations to Trap Neuter Release (TNR) colonies of feral cats being discovered. Please consider a do-good donation to Cats Alive SLV at PO Box 84, Alamosa, CO 81101.
Still we can all be that good neighbor like in the commercial when we remember to mask up and follow the protocol for six-feet plus of distance.
Some of us know how to make happiness these days, despite the confining orders. Bad hair days or not, stay-at-homers, who fix and tinker or cook and share, are often contented and generous to other humans and creatures under the sun.
Columns by nellie 