the tale you're in

Baba’s Gotta Dance; hand woven tapestry; linen, dandelion stems, cotton sewing thread; 7” x 5” 2024

It’s not exactly a fence made of bones—

—but a border of dandelion could be just as disconcerting.

It certainly appeared to be so for a passerby who recoiled when she glimpsed the taraxacum officinale merrily blooming on the fringes of my yard—

—recoiled as though the golden topped plants were a new form of Baba Yaga fence rather than a bit of perceived horticultural irresponsibility.

I guess it’s a matter of perspective.

For in a different tale—a tale of dandelion wine and the search for unsullied blossoms— my yard has been a source of gold-speckled delight.¹

I like to think about stories: to wonder at the tales that have me, all unknowing, trussed up in their leaves; to find the myths I might want to stay in; to identify those from which it would behoove me to step away.

What does this fable expect? What does that seem to offer?

Now Baba Yaga with her chicken-legged house and fence of bones—she’s an enigmatic creature about whom I know little, imagine much, and parts of whose tales I am choosing to embrace—at least as I can—in concrete ways.² The business of the house on legs that moves from here to there is clearly deeply enticing.

And while I’m still stationary, how not to admire that marvelous fence? Indeed, now that I’m into my Baba years (or are they Yaga years?³) with neither the hand strength nor wherewithal to tame the bird-attracting thickets around my dwelling, I seem to be growing one.

Well, in truth I try to keep the longest tendrils sufficiently contained to keep the sidewalks clear—so on the rare occasions that I get out my clippers, how not to save a few fronds for willow bark cordage and future herbaceous borders?⁴

How not, indeed, to do the same with nettle when the stalks are tall and the leaves too tough for eating?

There are myriad ways to work with both plants⁵ though my favorite (at least right now), is to separate them into thinnish strips while fresh, let them dry, wrap the strips in a damp cloth when I’m ready to work, then thin them out a bit more just before twisting.⁶

Nettle fibers are particularly fine and strong and working this way I can separate them almost to individual hairs—almost but not quite since the resulting cordage is still decidedly green.

Yes, retting and such would yield a more yarn-like product, but there is something about going almost directly from garden to cord that is pure magic—especially when the plants themselves seem into it.⁷

Because sometimes, they are not.

Not into it, that is. And when that happens there is no point insisting.⁸ If the plants say “cordage yes, tapestry no,” that is how it will be.

And honestly, who better trust than your collaborators? How not (at least after unweaving that first optimistic half inch), to admire the generosity of these plants who will bend with a touch and also let me know when I’m out of line?

How not also, of course, to be disconcerted by the whole business.

Still, I’m an optimistic kind of Yaga—

—with an optimistic canine companion—

—and we’re both easily amused by the ingredients at hand. ⁹

So taking a break to re-think doesn’t hurt us a bit. One of us, indeed, might prefer those breaks to telling the textile tale at hand (not saying who but you might be able to guess…)

And either way, the next chapter awaits us both. What tale will it tell?

1. I did not have a dog at the time, so unsullied implies not having been peed upon by passing canines, or stepped on by random shoes.

2. Though I haven’t yet gotten around to flying in a mortar and pestle, as a cartoonist I do get to have many a ride on magic swaths of cloth

3. There seems to be some disagreement about what Yaga actually means. (Something to google for days….)

4. Hopefully you can see in the photos that the cordage is made from the inner layer that I peel from the sticks after scraping off the outer, dark green later.

5. In the case of willow bark, boiling the strips in a washing soda solution makes them extra pliable and seemingly stronger. It also turns them a warm reddish brown.

For nettles, the delicate white fiber are apparently best released through careful retting, drying etc. For more on that, here once again are links to Allan Brown’s wonderful and informative site Nettles for Textiles and the utterly lovely film he made with Dylan Howitt: The Nettle Dress

6. For all you ever wanted to know about making cordage from myriad plants, check out Sally Pointer’s Youtube Channel.

7. The insulated pink mug has made this morning routine extra pleasurable (as the comics indicate), because my coffee now stays really hot for a very long time and I therefor stay put and happily twisting for longer than I might. This, alas, vs coffee in my beloved ceramic mugs—for even with multiple wooly cozies and scarves and cunning little dishes over the top to keep the steam in, the coffee cools quickly enough that I slurp down my few precious ounces in no time at all. And oh, this time of year there is nothing quite like hot coffee, flexible fibers, morning light, a well walked recently fed dog, and birdsong — all at once if possible because I’m a glutton that way.

8. As Liz Gilbert wrote this week in her Letters from Love : it is not a problem to have a goal (sure, go for it, have fun, knock yourself out!) but it’s a big problem to be attached to the outcome of your goals — or, worst of all, to tie your idea of yourself, your WORTH (your worth, heaven help you, your worth?!) to whether or not you got whatever you wanted. Why attach so much value to things that are not up to you? What a recipe for doom! …What if you changed the word “goals” to “guesses”?  What if you just did things, tried things, created things, and each thing was a guess as to what would happen next? Good guess. Good guess!

9. One of those amazingly lovely things was that in this week’s Substack Reads (the 100th issue), the incomparable Katherine May included last week’s Gusset in her list of the “excellent reads” that stayed with her. How gloriously heart-lifting is that? And what a feast of compelling essays she gathered, from Will Dowd’s piece on Zora Neal Hurston to Josie George on having an open heart, Celine Nguyen on Research as Entertainment, and more. Oh but the world is filled with wonders and ways of being.

Also: WELCOME to all of you who have come here thanks to the glorious Katherine. I couldn’t be more delighted.

Research as a leisure activity, solstice strawberry, and things to do besides worry