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Published by the Library Staff Association of the University of Oregon Library System
No. 5, December, 1998
Bright Gift
"Be grateful for the weeds you have in your mind, because eventually they will enrich your practice" -Shunryu Suzuki, from The Little Zen Calendar.
Salem, Oregon, winter, mid-1960s: Welcome to the land of drabness. Rain falls, gently or in torrents, but continuously. The sky reflects the color of concrete, and it sucks all the green from the trees. At midday, the sky is no lighter than at dusk. Cars flow by with their lights on. People walk with their heads down. Umbrellas blow inside out.
Our small house is steamy, and packed with bored children. The rug has a damp and muddy track from the door to the closet. The window glass trickles with condensation. Coats and hats and shoes develop a permanent dampness that is either warm or cold, but never gone. Tea and madeleine, indeed; it is the smell of mildew that evokes my childhood in a flash.
Yet, this was the Christmas I received the best present ever. It was a plastic, two-heddle table loom. It was capable of producing a web about twelve inches wide, in a plain basket weave, with the simplest of designs: stripes. I was eight years old. When I saw it, I knew what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I felt defined. I tore open the box, read every line of instruction in the accompanying booklet, and spent the rest of Christmas day setting up my first weaving project.
Weaving captured my imagination. That is no mere cliché: I spent hours every day at school having intense fantasies about weaving on my loom. I constructed whole garments, impossibly ornate, in my head. The teacher noted that I used class time unwisely, sketching designs in my notebook. I failed to return assignments on time. My grades went down. I began to lose things: homework, library books. My teacher warned my parents that something was up. They worried.
As time went on, I read every book I could find in the school, city and state libraries written on weaving and looms. I read about the various types of looms, and how to construct them. I read about the history of looms and weaving in the United States, from Colonial times to the present. I read about related crafts: tapestry making, rug weaving, embroidery, tatting, and quilting. I read about weaving and textiles in different cultures. I read about cloth making and dyeing, about indigo and woad, about other dyes made from tree bark, nuts, roots, flowers, insects, fish and snails. I read what I could find about fiber, natural and synthetic, from silk worm culture to the invention of rayon, to the husbandry of fluffy angora rabbits.
My collarbone developed a permanent bruise from packing around big, glossy art books in my backpack. My eyes developed permanent bags from reading late at night. I yawned so much during class that my teacher made me sit in the hall.
My parents talked at me frantically, I saw their mouths moving; but I was tuned to a place in the back of my mind where a nomad woman in vibrant embroidered robes, in front of her colorful felted yurt, stood deftly spinning amidst her flocks of goats and sheep. My fantasy world was a cloth woven of saffron, scarlet, emerald, and fuchsia against cobalt, purple, dun and gold. I had transcended Salem, Oregon, in a time of great dreariness, to exist in a fairer realm.
My actual weaving had not progressed much. Over a few weeks, I finished one short scarf and gave it to my dad. He never wore it. I should have made it into a place mat, but there was too much for one and not enough for two. I didn't mind too much, because by now I had crossed a certain threshold. I "snapped out of it", according to my teacher, and my relieved parents saw me return to my former obedient self, schoolwork done every morning, lights out at ten, no dreaming at the table, no doodling during work time.
The nomad woman is still there spinning. The realm of bright colors continues to grow year by year, furnishing itself with passions, enthusiasms and dreams. In winter, it is particularly luminous; the sky is azure and the land is emerald green. I visit often.
And so from that fair realm to this one:
Get out your cookbooks and look up those favorite recipes: the annual Holiday Potluck is scheduled for Tuesday, Dec. 15, from 11:30-1:30 in the Browsing Room. George Shipman is once again donating the turkey. Many thanks, George! Volunteers are needed for setting up and cleaning up the Browsing Room. Contact Stephanie Midkiff, x1661, or Shelia Stigall, x0759, for more information.
Our treasurer Kathy Wittwer would like to remind everyone that LSA dues are now $6 annually. The dues year begins in August. Dues money covers our subscriptions to the Register Guard and the Oregonian, both available daily in the staff lounge, and funds LSA scholarships and functions. You may contact Kathy at x3046 (kwittwer@oregon), or you may give your dues to any LSA committee member.
The House Committee lives in the hope that one day, some kind soul will either donate, or sell for a very reasonable price, a nice large sofa for the staff lounge. If that philanthropic individual happens to be you, please contact Susan Stumpf at x1957 and make her day.
--LRS
The Fall Cornucopia Sale on November 20, 1998 was a huge success! Volunteers collected $114.00 in dues, $38.00 from raffle tickets, and $273.00 selling delicious cookies, jam, syrup and other donated items.
Around 50 people attended Michael Majdic's presentation
on Woody Guthrie on November 5th. Michael and his collaborator, Denise
Mathews (Journalism and Communication) are completing a
documentary film which details Guthrie's short but fruitful
career as a songwriter for the Bonneville Power Administration. Michael
and Denise showed film clips from their documentary and talked about the
project.
Guthrie was hired by the BPA in the spring of 1941 to write folk music
for
a documentary
film which was to promote the Bonneville Dam project. Guthrie toured the
Columbia River Gorge area and in 30 days wrote 26 songs, including "The
Grand Coulee Dam" and "Roll On, Columbia". The beginning of World
War Two brought the film project to a halt, and it was never completed.
Michael and Denise managed to get interiews with many of the principal
people Guthrie was involved with during the BPA project, including Stephen
Kahn, Guthrie's BPA 'boss', Mary Guthrie Boyle, Guthrie's wife at the
time, and his driver during the project, Elmer Buehler. Michael also
interviewed two of Guthrie's children,
Arlo Guthrie and Nora Guthrie, and he expects to interview Pete Seeger and
Studs Terkel in January. Michael says the interviews were fun, because
"you never know what you're going to get!"
Michael has always been interested in film. He says he has worked on
hundreds of different projects, including documentaries on the American
Flag, on the restoration of Abe Lincoln's home in Springfield, IL, on the
Lane County Summer Migrant education program, on the Heppner Flood, on
James Jones, and many more.
Denise Matthews came to the University in the fall of 1996 from Florida.
She has
experience
in producing all types of documentary, promotional and educational pieces.
Michael thinks the documentary will be done sometime in February. He
says it would be fun to have an on-campus premiere.
If you'd like to hear Woody himself singing the songs he wrote for the
BPA project, visit the Douglass Room. The Library owns 5 copies of the
Columbia River Collection, a mono recording
of Guthrie singing 17 of the songs he composed during his sojourn in
Oregon. Remember to bring your staff ID or your valid driver's license.
Douglass Room materials do not circulate.
Been to an interesting conference?
Send us a
brief report for publication in the next newsletter. Thanks!
News From Former Staff
LSA News will occasionally feature news items from former Library staff
members. This month we hear from Alice
Allen.
Would you like an update on someone in particular? The Editors welcome suggestions for future news
features.
December staff profiles:
Juanita Benedicto,
Social Sciences Reference
Librarian
Leslie Bennett,
Head, Music Services
Department
This month, Colleen Bell reviews the
re-release of the classic
film, The Wizard
of Oz
Woody in Oregon
Comments? Please address them to
Letters to the Editor