decorating for Christmas #4
Decorating in our house involves some cleaning and maintenance since I do not keep up with housework through the year. One of the things I do for Christmas is shine our basket of glass floats.
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Glass floats were once used to keep the edges of fishing nets buoyant and you can buy new floats as well as antiques. They are beautiful and come in many festive colours. I consider them a Christmas decoration because of their beauty, because they remind me of stained glass and because my Mom and Dad gave me at least one of the green glass floats in my collection. I used to keep them on top of the piano, but I have copied my niece who keeps hers in a basket by her wood stove. When I visited my niece a few years ago, I drew her collection of floats and wrote a poem about them.
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glass floats
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the fog’s still glow
penetrates glass
and air incorporated
an age ago
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weightless, flamboyant
on salt water
swell
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glass inflation
tethered by hemp
on an ocean
whipped to froth
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Copyright Jane Tims 2017
nichepoetryandprose 
Oh? I just learned something new. Is that where glass floats came from? Was it first used for fishing before it became ornamental?
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Lone Grey Squirrel
December 21, 2017 at 3:48 pm
Hi. Yes. They are very buoyant but have since been replaced by styrophoam or wood. I think fishermen still use glass floats in some parts of the world. Jane
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jane tims
December 21, 2017 at 5:49 pm
Just a bit surprised. I would have thought it would be too fragile for such a rough environment.
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Lone Grey Squirrel
December 21, 2017 at 11:22 pm