Hand made hemp cord lying on a sketch of the Castelfranc bastide (10), the Lot river (3), and the promontories, Pech des Fourches (4) and Pech du Vert (8(
It was a bad moment getting on the cattle car of a small jet on the first leg of the trip to Castelfranc, Burlington to Washington, DC. Ceilings so low many of us had to bend our necks. This added to my sense of unsteadyness brought on by Betsy, as I have named the non-malignant tumor on my ear nerve. To keep claustrophobic panic at bay, I immediately withdrew into an alternative ipod world. I was just getting into La-bas si j'y suis, my favorite French radio program, when the unsmiling flight attendant made me shut it off. I didn't think of objecting or even asking for a reason why. Or even bleating like a sheep.
It was still hard to get the incident at security: a young man standing in the designated footprints drawn on the floor with his arms outstretched like a Jesus in Abu Graib while he answered polite questions. All I could catch was, "Do you want to bring a witness?" He answered "No, that's ok" like he didn't want to cause them any further fuss. He was taken to the side and a hospital type screen was whipped around him. The rest of us all pretended it wasn't happening.
In any case, it seem uncivilized to ignore the woman sitting next to me even though she was occupied weaving a basket. She was an ethnobotanist working in Vermont for a California organization of some kind and on her way to see her bosses at the mother ship. She had a thick photo album of objects made with vegetation, gourds, and especially baskets many of which were in museums. She showed me how to braid cordage by taking the rightmost of three strands, twisting the hemp fibers to the right, then winding that same twisted piece to the left. I think. The result is that when you let go of the braid, it doesnt tend to unwind. She uses basket weaving to teach prisoners in South Burlington about geometry and arithmetic. She says it requires three P's: perseverence, patience, practice. Soon the landing was announced and the woman noted that I had probably had the most pleasant 2 hours of the trip in spite of my looming claustraphobia. She was right.
