A few days late letting you know about your Convivio Book of Days calendar for August, but, nonetheless, here it is, a printable PDF as usual, and a fine companion to this blog. Our cover star for the month is an 1867 painting by Winslow Homer, called Haymakers. As I mentioned in a Convivio Dispatch from Lake Worth just the other night, Homer’s painting reminds me of being a printing intern at the Sabbathday Lake Shaker Community in Maine back in the late 90s, for there were many days when I was not in the Dairy Cellar printing but rather in the garden weeding, or out in the fields, helping to bring in the hay. We’d load the bales onto the hay wagon, ride the wagon to the big red barn, and there, I would get to do my favorite thing: look up at the ceiling and at all those beautiful wooden boards, nailed in place in 1830, nearly half a century before Winslow Homer painted his haymaking scene. Looking up from inside, that barn looked to me for all the world like a vast cathedral, one filled with the sacred smell of animals and newly cured hay, sunlight streaming in on slanted rays through small clear windows.
I’d go home later each haymaking day with a stuffy nose and the worst sinus headache. A little too much hay. But I’d do it again if I could.
And here we are, at the Sixth of August: one of the most important days of the year in the Shaker calendar. I’ve heard it called Landing Day, but Brother Arnold and Sister June and Brother Andrew there at the Community, they always call it the Glorious Sixth, this annual summer occasion that marks the day in 1774 when the founder of the Shaker movement, Mother Ann Lee, arrived in New York Harbor after setting sail from England. Mother Ann was following a vision from on high that told her to bring her small band of followers from Manchester to the New World, and so she took that leap of faith. The passage was not smooth, and there is a tale of a great storm that roared up and caused a plank to tear loose from the ship, and the ship began taking on water, but Mother Ann had another vision that night, one of an angel telling her to be not afraid, all would be well, and then another great wave crashed upon the ship and forced the loosened plank back into place. The ship stopped taking on water, the storm quelled, what water was taken on was pumped out, and Mother Ann and her followers arrived in safety and began their quiet work. Work that continues to this day at Sabbathday Lake in Maine, the place they call Chosen Land.
My friends there will be first and foremost in my mind today, and especially at sunset, when they will celebrate with song and prayer this special day. Blessings on them, and on us all.
SUMMER HIGH FIVE SALE
Here in our neck of the woods, my mom, Millie, has been embroidering each and every day and is anxious to get back to it when she’s not. She’s having a ball making Millie’s Tea Towels, and they’ve turned out to be a big hit! Each one is embroidered by hand by my Mom, and since we introduced them last month, she’s made a few new collections that you’ll find now at our website: in addition to the original Baking Day, Kitchen Wisdom, and Java Jive collections, there are new collections of flour sack tea towels for beachgoers, for campers, for wine lovers, and a new seven towel set––one for each day of the week––all about PIE (one of our favorite things).
All summer long, use discount code HIGH5 at checkout for $5 off your purchase of $35 on everything in the shop. Take it to $50 and earn free domestic shipping, too. Click here to shop! You’ll find Millie’s Tea Towels under our new Linens & Textiles category.
Mom gets the full amount of each sale of her embroidered tea towels; it makes me very happy to see her happy in this new venture and that’s what matters to me (plus it pretty much takes her a whole day to embroider each towel!). That’s my mom in the photo you’ll see when you start shopping, in a fishing boat, circa 1950. Seeing that picture is reason enough to click.
Image: “Haymakers” by Winslow Homer, which also happens to be the cover star for this month’s Convivio Book of Days calendar. Oil on canvas, 1867 [Public domain] via Wikimedia Commons.