Take Three Garlic....

Take Two Garlic and Call Me in the Morning Last night I woke up sniffling. Then I swallowed and felt my throat talk back to me. A cold-- just what I needed right before Thanksgiving. There’s so much to do, so much to enjoy so of course it’s the perfect time to cough and blow your nose continuously. I lay there trying to talk myself out of it. There have been times when I’ve ignored a cold and it actually left. But this was not going to be one of those times. That’s the problem with colds. Though they are all the same they are also just different enough to be exasperating. There are colds that come on so gradually that you barely notice them. There are colds that smack you silly so quickly that all you can do is try to cope with all the stuff that simultaneously emerges from the orifices in your head. There are colds that are gone in a few days and those that linger on for weeks. The ones where a hacking cough holds you hostage and others that steal your voice. A veritable rainbow of delights. Because of these differences no one remedy ever works consistently. Sometimes one thing succeeds and other times it makes no difference at all. It’s very disheartening. When I was growing up my mom always plied me with tablespoons of honey and lemon and rivers of tea. I always hated the taste of pure honey so I dreaded those tablespoons. It was all I could do not to gag. She also made me gargle with warm saltwater, another amazingly nauseating remedy. But she made me chicken soup, which tasted wonderful, and rubbed Vicks Vapo rub on my chest so that I smelled like a eucalyptus plant. When I was older my dad would mix rum in hot milk for me and that was lovely. I may not have been cured but I certainly was happy! I had a yoga teacher who swore by her netti pot. It’s a small teapot-shaped container with a long narrow spout. You fill it with warm salt water then pour the solution up your nose to lubricate your sinuses. You can achieve similar results by swallowing water as someone tells you a funny story. We used to do this quite often during school lunch hours, when kids drank their milk. We’d wait for them to take a sip then say something hilarious and watch the kid lubricate his sinuses by blowing the milk out of his nostrils, whereupon we would all yell, “Through the nose!” Of course the best way to take care of a cold is to rest but that’s never possible. You have to work, or take care of kids who probably have caught it from you so that you’re all one big sick, cranky family. When Lisa was a toddler we both caught bad colds. We were stuck in the house alone since none of our friends wanted to come near us and risk contagion. I tried to get her to play the game, “Let’s-take-a-nap” but she wasn’t having any of it. The worst part was that even though my upstairs neighbor was also sick she got to rest in solitary comfort, sipping tea and watching the soaps. She didn’t have to blow her nose while playing endless games of Chutes and Ladders. Plus her friends kept sending her flowers which she never accepted because she was sleeping so the delivery guys would leave them with me. Every few hours I would trek upstairs to hand her yet another bouquet while she stood there dressed in gorgeous lingerie complaining that there was nothing good on TV. I had some very unkind thoughts about what I wanted to do with her flowers. Nowadays when I’m blessed with a cold I follow my routine of swallowing decongestants, or as I call them, my little red wonder pills. At night I gulp down a cough suppressant and spray more chemicals up my nose to help me breathe. I’m a veritable cornucopia of cold remedies. I’ve also sucked on zinc lozenges, which makes my tongue feel like a troop of squirrels have done a conga on it, and drank gallons of Echinacea tea in an attempt to flush the germs out. Last year my daughter Lisa swore by a natural method for getting rid of colds…raw garlic. You chop up two cloves, let it sit for 20 minutes then mix it with a little liquid and swallow. I tried it a few months ago and it actually worked. I was ecstatic. So I tried it again another time but it didn’t work. This week when both Mariel and I were starting colds she talked me into trying it again. So we did garlic shots, followed by a tomato juice chaser for me and ginger ale for her. I warned her that for the rest of the day her mouth would reek of garlic. But she also discovered that it was not a good idea to swallow garlic with a carbonated beverage—for the rest of the day she burped up raw garlic, an experience she never wants to repeat. Yesterday, despite the garlic and Echinacea, I developed one of the worst colds that I’ve had in years. I’m back to my red pills and cough syrup. And if all else fails rum and milk will go down a treat.

Of Sharks and Flame throwers

Of Sharks and Flames If I had to make a list of things that I hate doing, interviewing for a job would be right up there. Isn’t it everyone’s dream to enter a room where they are at the mercy of someone who can make them feel instantly flustered and utterly stupid? I once read somewhere that an interviewer makes up her mind within the first ten seconds that a person walks in the door. I used to try and impress that on my students when they came to me for advice before heading off for a job. “Ms. Joan! Do I look okay?” they would ask. I would look over to see that they were wearing jeans, a t-shirt and sneakers and just sigh. I would ask them why they hadn’t come to me a couple of days before so that I could have given them some pointers. Then I’d tell them to go home and change into a shirt with a collar, nice slacks and shoes. But they would always insist that they were fine and then inevitably come back the next day angry because they didn’t get the job. I used to conduct interview classes to give them advice but my students believed that if the employer couldn’t accept them the way that they were, they didn’t want to work there anyway. Most of us have no problem dressing for an employer’s approval. The dressing part is almost the easiest. You find a decent suit, comb your hair, slap a smile on your face and you’re done. It’s the questions that are the unknown descent into hell. After having been on countless quirky or soul crushing interviews, when I’m on the other side of the desk looking for employees, I become the warm, fuzzy questioner that smothers you in sugary sweetness. It’s absolutely nauseating. But I honestly feel that the more relaxed an interviewee is, the truer picture you get of their personality. And in the adult teaching profession, personality counts for a lot. If you have a class of 18 year olds who have dropped out of high school after having challenged everyone who has ever tried to teach them, you need someone strong, with a boatload of patience and a good sense of humor. An industrial whistle helps too. The only time that I was completely relaxed in an interview was when I applied for a job that I didn’t really want. So of course I got it. I tried to explain that to Lisa a few weeks ago. Interviewers can smell desperation. They’d rather hire someone who plays hard to get. It sounds crazy but it’s true. Since Lisa and Matt moved to California, Lisa has been job searching. She has two nice suits, a good looking resume, and a great personality. (Okay I know I’m her mom, but it’s true) She also has the usual case of job hunting nerves. Last week she got called in for an interview that would last from 9:00-4:00 and encompass everyone at the company including the custodial staff. So she decided to enlist Matt’s help in the interviewing process. She asked his help despite knowing how absolutely, adorably nuts her husband is. It’s the main reason why he fits in so well with our family. The “interview” began with just the two of them but quickly mushroomed as we all got electronically involved. Lisa: Ask me about a time when I faced a challenge while conducting research. Matt: You can't tell me what to ask you! I'm the interviewer! Lisa: Ok. Matt: Errrmm, ummm . . . what would you do if you were stuck in a castle surrounded by a moat full of sharks? Lisa: Umm . . . can I catapult myself off? Matt: No, that would kill you. Lisa: Umm . . . do I have a hot air balloon? Matt: Yes, but it catches on fire. Also, the sharks can walk and talk and have keys to the castle. They eat you and you die. You're going to have to find another job. That’s how it began. Lisa e-mailed that to me, Steve and Mariel so of course we all began to stir the pot…… Joni: Matt definitely has a future as an interviewer...what imagination! What daring! What utter craziness! Can I work for you Matt???? Steve: From where I stand the interview would be a killer. Joni: Excuse me, but it's obvious that Lisa should have gotten into her plane or helicopter or had plenty of food and beer to feed the sharks...This sounds like a typical interview for a job at Google! Mariel: I sent this link to Matt this morning: http://xkcd.com/585/ (go to this site for a great shark lesson and all around amazing comic) Matt: The sharks have sabotaged all the planes and helicopters Steve: Then there’s only one correct answer. The sharks play Bezzerwizzer* and will allow Lisa to cross the moat if she lets them win. Matt: Actually, the correct answer is to use a flame thrower which Mariel guessed in a separate thread. Mariel: Matt gave me a clue when he told me you couldn't beat the sharks with science, but with FIRE. Lisa: I want to print out this email chain and frame it I want to print out my family and frame us! We are all nuts……but we interview well! *Bezzerwizzer is a fantastic strategic trivia game that our family is addicted to!

Philistines

Philistines Philistine: a person who is guided by materialism and is usually disdainful of intellectual or artistic values It was a beautiful fall day so we decided to go for a ride. I had read that a new exhibit had opened at the deCordova museum in Lincoln. Though Steve is not a great museum aficionado, he does appreciate interesting exhibits and outdoor art and the deCordova had both. So off we went, excited to be on the road again. I pretended that we were heading somewhere out west or down south or up north, to spend the week meandering. But though it was just a day trip the ride was still lovely. The museum itself was tucked into a quiet neighborhood, hiding behind the twists of a country road. As we entered the driveway I could see enormous sculptures surrounded by woods and could hear the soft sounds of chimes and children laughing. We parked and pored over the map trying to decide where to start. We began outside since we don’t often get the chance to wander in sculpture gardens. Some were huge and overwhelming, others small and intimate, yet others downright weird. As we passed each one I would read its plaque to see if the name of the piece would give me a hint as to the creator’s intentions. Most of the time the title seemed to have nothing to do with the piece at all. Shatz told me that he was tempted to come to the museum at night and switch all the signs to see if anyone would notice. Surrounding the sculptures were meandering trails through gardens and woods, and kids and dogs running through it all. It was wonderful. After a while we went to get some lunch before venturing into the indoor museum space. After we ate I visited the restroom--that was my first mistake. I opened the door to a voice that seemed to be speaking to me. Confused, I looked around to see if someone was talking on a cell phone, but no, the voice was definitely talking to me. Suddenly I realized that it was a recording, but that didn’t make it any less strange. And let me tell you, being in a stall while hearing a voice say, “You can do it. You’re a magnet for success. Your existence matters. You’re fascinating and interesting. You’re a winner. People like you,” is not exactly conducive to the business at hand. I ran out of there. It wasn’t until we entered the exhibit, How Deep is Your, created by the artist Julianne Swartz, that we figured out what was going on. “These whispered reassurances, emitting from invisible speakers are audible from the comfort of a black couch situated in a lobby and you can hear them, disconcertingly, in the bathrooms, too. They’re part of a work called, Affirmation,” Sebastian Smee pointed out in his Boston Globe article, “Works as Fragile as We See Ourselves” 9/15/12. We walked into the main exhibit space and found ourselves surrounded by various configurations of tubing, wire, feathers, wooden blocks and prisms. Things hung from the ceiling and sat on the ground. They climbed up walls and went around corners. There was a blue line that seemed to travel along one room and into another. Pieces of wire dangled aimlessly, bits of string hung or were pasted on wires, little lights blinked on and off. There was a tube that bent into the wall and sat there. We were a bit confused. Later I read Smee’s critique of the show and found out that, Most of Swartz’s work is about forms in space and how we perceive them. It’s about materials and textures. It’s about gravity, air, light, shadow. Oh. Shatz and I stood there looking at a pile of the blocks scattered on the floor and began to laugh...uncontrollably. We both knew what the other was thinking, “They call this art? They paid how much for all of this????” I tried to hold in my laughter but we all know how that works—the more you hold it in, the more it sneaks out. Suddenly I noticed one of the young security guards looking at us with a smile on her face. Our eyes met and then I quickly walked away. She was either laughing with us or at us art-ignoramuses who couldn’t tell a Picasso from a Monet, but I’d like to think that she was on our side. The giggling continued to burst out of me making me feel like an ignorant yahoo, until I reached a big white funnel. It was the exhibit’s main advertising image so I already knew that I was supposed to stick my head into it. And so I did. I could hear the Bee Gees singing, How Deep is Your Love followed by John Lennon singing All You Need is Love. I pulled my head quickly out of that funnel and ran out of the gallery with my laughter following me. Smee may have written that, Swartz’s work is ultimately about love, but for us it was about disbelief and a bit of lunacy. What can I say? Having discovered that we’re basically artistic louts, we’ll probably end up buying one of those dogs-playing-poker pictures to hang over the fireplace and we’ll make sure to include an Elvis on painted velvet as well. After all, as brand new Philistines we have reputations to establish.

The Pink Door

The Pink Door For years whenever I would give anyone directions on how to get to our house the last direction would be, “and we’re the only house on the street with a pink door.” When we bought the house the door was blue. I liked it so I’m not quite sure why I decided to change it. I must have seen a rose colored entry on a house somewhere and liked it so when we repainted the house I decided on a change. You don’t see many pink doors so it was also fun being a bit different. Through the years each spring I would buy flowers to hang near our front entrance and would always make sure that they matched our door. Otherwise I never gave it a second thought. I mean who spends much time thinking about their door? You buy it, install it and forget about it. Until you need a new one. For a few years now we’ve known we needed a new one. We could see daylight along the bottom that crept in along with the cold air. We had already replaced all of our windows and had seen what a difference that made in our heating and cooling bills, but somehow we kept putting off buying a new door. But then we noticed that the sliding door to the porch needed replacing as well so it was time to think doors. We got the names of a few contractors and were thrilled to find out that the cost of replacing both doors and a fence in the yard wouldn’t force us into selling a child (or a dog). I was happy because we were in the midst of spiffing up our place for Lisa and Matt’s wedding and I thought a new front door would add a bit of class to the joint. That was the good news. The bad news was two fold: first, our chosen contractor considered us small potatoes. He would have to find time in his schedule to fit us in between his larger jobs and that wouldn’t happen quickly. Second, we would have to choose a door style. I didn’t mind the first as much as the second. Shatz and I usually make quick decisions when it comes to major purchases. But if the purchase involves an aesthetic element, we’re doomed. We once spent days choosing wallpaper for the small bathroom and kitchen of our first condo. I ended up sobbing over books of wallpaper, visions of flowers and stripes galloping through my brain. So I told Steve, “I want a door just like the old one only I think I want to change the color. This time I want a red door.” In reply he dumped a pile of catalogues on me and said, “Choose.” It was then that I found out that there is no such thing as a simple door. I sat poring over the books in increasing frustration, deciding finally to drive around the neighborhood and look at doors. That proved to be quite an education. Have you ever noticed people’s front doors? The range of colors is rather limited, mostly dark, muted shades except for a really lovely lilac door on Norfolk Street that I’ve always admired. Everyone plays it safe when it comes to color. But there are myriads of styles. There are doors with lots of glass, no glass, a bit of glass or stained glass. There are brass fittings, iron hinges, mail slots, no slots, kick plates, screen doors. There are stained wood doors, doors with mosaics, doors with knockers. There are wreath hangers, no hangers, signs, and door bells. I was getting very confused. I went home and chose a door as close to the style that we already had and pointed it out to Steve, “That one. In red.” However it turned out that my chosen door was in a catalogue that one of the contractors that Steve had not chosen had left behind. I learned that each contractor only dealt with certain manufacturers and that the door that I wanted only came in white. When I begged Shatz to ask our contractor if he could get it in red, it turned out we could---for a price that was equal the price of the door. Or we could paint it ourselves. Remembering some of our less than successful paint jobs there was no way that we were going to dabble in red. So white it would be. The day our new door was installed was only the beginning. We had to take down everything that had been on our old door: our number, knocker, curtains, mezuzah, wreath holder—how could there be so much on a door?—and then put it all back on the new one. We had to buy a lock and install it. And we ended up painting it anyway because the white paint that it came with was pretty cheap looking. So it took a day to install it and two weeks to finish the job. The last thing I did was hang a summery wreath to give the door some color. Already I missed the pink. But it is nice and new and no errant breezes come shooting into the house. And the next time we call in professional painters to paint the house I will ask for, “One red door please!” It’s still fun being different.

Changes-the Sequel

Changes: The Sequel Forgive me if I seem to be dwelling on this topic lately but like unwelcome company, change seems to have moved in and refuses to move on. And though I understand the whole, “only a rock never changes” concept (which my daughter the newly minted geologist would certainly have a problem with—listening to her wax eloquent about a rock’s life history is akin to listening to a soap opera) there is such a thing as too much change too fast. I hate myself for feeling that a rut seems a comfy place to settle into, but the older I get, a rut is the only thing I have energy for. My kids have been major, abrupt change-meisters lately. Usually kids leave in stages as evidenced by some moms that I’ve been talking to whose kids have just left for college. When they tell me that they feel like they’ll never see their kids again, I assure them that their offspring are only in stage-one leaving—they still come home for holidays and vacations. They’re gone long enough for you to miss them but they return for extended stays. Mariel left for college but came home for the holidays. Even when she moved to Arizona it was for graduate school so she came home for holidays and summer vacation. But now she’s gotten a job that will take her to Houston and so the party’s over. Now she has a full time job and a separate, full time life. There will be no more long, leisurely vacations at home with mom and dad (and Snoopy). Lisa stayed in Boston for school and jobs so that even when she and Matt moved into their own apartment it felt like she never really left. But now that they’ve moved across the country, I’m feeling a bit lost and bereft. I wake up on Friday mornings wondering excitedly if we’ll be seeing the kids during the week-end, but then I realize that we won’t be seeing them at all for a while. But we do SKYPE every week and we will see them on Thanksgiving and then hopefully we’ll travel out west this spring and, and ……..So why am I still sighing? Thank goodness my job keeps me so busy that I don’t have time for a proper mope. And ironically it’s change that’s keeping me busy. I’m at a new site with new people doing new things—very un-rutlike. It’s taken me a couple of weeks just to find my way to the bathroom. I turn left when I should go right, go up when I should be down. Almost a metaphor for my life. I used to complain about the lack of room at my old school but now I would give anything for that space. We had our own classroom and office space whereas here we use the school’s class rooms for our evening classes. That means that there’s no place to leave papers, or books, or hang maps and word lists and everything has to be in its exact place when we leave. We even have our own clumsy rolling white boards to use which we cart in and out when we come and go. The only spot that we can truly call our own is the office. At first I was worried that I wouldn’t even have a desk to work at, but thankfully I found one. A girl’s got to have somewhere to put her coffee cup. I’ve done battle with a new copy machine and some strange printers that I’m about ready to strangle and toss on the junk heap. I’m constantly looking for simple things like staplers and markers and paper. It’s amazing how much we take for granted the ease of finding our stuff and knowing how to work the machines we live with. But the hardest change is my new schedule. My hours are now 1:00-9:00 pm. Our classes run from 6:00-9:00 and so by the time 8:00 rolls around I’m ready to fall asleep on my feet—and that’s a bit difficult to do when I’m teaching. Our students all come to school from full time jobs and families without complaint, so I feel ungratefully guilty to be kvetching about my lack of energy. Then there are the times when I’ve psyched myself up too much and I become the Energizer bunny. But at least it combats my students’ yawns and occasionally my own. There’s just so much you can do to make a reading class scintillating at nine o’clock at night. I knew I was finally adjusting when I managed to fit the last piece of change into my life—the gym. I had been sleeping late every morning, ignoring the alarms that I had set, falling blissfully back into my pillow. But last week when I changed my closet over to winter wear, all it needed was one pair of snug jeans to get me moving. So this week I’m back to morning classes and people I haven’t seen for four years, who assumed that I had died. And I almost did. I’d forgotten how challenging the daytime aerobics instructor, Kathleen is. She worked me over and spit me out. And as I lay there trying desperately to find the energy to peel myself off my mat, I felt nostalgic for the trusty old rut that I had left behind.

The Circle Game

The Circle Game This summer has been all about change and I have to be honest I don’t like it. It’s one thing if you’ve initiated change but when it’s been thrust upon you it’s not usually something that you wished for. From something as small as having your supermarket rearranged so that you now spend all your time aimlessly wandering the aisles and muttering, or having a favorite store close (I’m still in mourning for Jordan Marsh and Filene’s) to the more serious loss of a job or a loved one. I understand that change is growth but it’s also painful. The biggest change for me came about in June when I learned that the Department of Education (DESE) had not refunded my adult education school, the Blackstone, for the coming year. This meant that I had to close it down, lay off my staff and find spaces, somehow somewhere, for my students. After hearing the news I walked around in a fog of denial. Surely, this had to be a mistake—they couldn’t just shut down a school that was the last opportunity for so many adults, the last place for them to get another chance at success. But of course they could. Every five years all the adult literacy programs in Massachusetts have to reapply for the money that enables their existence and money is getting tighter by the minute. I’m not quite sure where DESE wants my students to go when we close our doors. But I suppose it’s not my job anymore to worry about Randy and Matias and Laura and Deanna and the rest of the adults that I have come to know and care so much about. I’ll have to adapt to the change just as they will. They left us one site at the Perkins Community Center in Dorchester. My long suffering boss, Mike, installed me there as the site counselor coupled with teaching and administration duties. What worries me is that this school holds classes in the evening from 6:00-9:00 and my energy levels aren’t what they used to be. I’m keeping my finger crossed that at 7:00 each evening I won’t fall asleep on my desk. Fortunately Lisa and Matt’s summer wedding proved a lovely distraction as did having a house filled with daughters, their friends and loved ones, so for once change was wonderful. But the knowledge that Matt and Lisa would soon be moving to San Francisco was hidden in every corner of my mind waiting to slither out—and it did last week-end when they moved some of their furniture and various other boxes filled with their lives into our attic. They were really leaving. Shatz and I find it both wonderful and funny that they will be moving to their new home slowly over the next few weeks—driving cross country, discovering new places. Funny because we did the same thing the year before we were married 37 years ago. In fact Lisa and Matt will be seeing some of the same places that we passed through all those years ago. It was about that time that Joni Mitchell’s, The Circle Game was popular and now the song haunts me: And the seasons they go 'round and 'round And the painted ponies go up and down We're captive on the carousel of time We can't return we can only look behind From where we came And go round and round and round In the circle game Last week Shatz and I took the day off to explore the Fruitlands Museum in Harvard. It was a beautiful day, just the two of us on the road again, heading toward lovely summer vistas. We wandered in and out of the galleries dedicated to the various groups that had lived in the area: Native Americans, the Shakers, and Louisa May Alcott and her family of Transcendentalists who had set up an agrarian commune on the spot. Afterwards we had lunch outside in the museum restaurant gazing at the expanse of hills and mountains as we ate. We talked about the kids’ upcoming trip, and how similar their experience is to ours. Suddenly Shatz asked me, “Could you do that? Just decide that you want to move somewhere else for an adventure?” Then he stopped short with a funny look on his face and said, “Oh I guess you did,” remembering my travels to Israel and then back to the States. But Lisa and Matt’s decision seems different, healthier. I was running away when I left for Israel and later when I returned to the States. In the beginning I desperately wanted independence and later I needed to escape the grief of being a widow. Lisa and Matt are heading off for the sheer joy and adventure of it. Then it was my turn to question my 36-year partner even though I already knew his answer. “Do you have any regrets at all about your life?” “No, never,” he answered. “Regrets only hold you back. I always look to the future.” And that’s why I love him so very much. He keeps me from keeling over with regret, keeps me from battling change fruitlessly, keeps me filled with hope that it’s not so terrible out there after all. Especially with a partner like him to hold my heart. There'll be new dreams, maybe better dreams and plenty Before the last revolving year is through.

HItchhiker's Guide to our Attic

A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Attic In two weeks Lisa and Matt are moving to San Francisco for their great adventure. This means many things: they will indeed have wonderful adventures, they will be warm while we freeze in New England, we will miss them unbelievably, and finally, the contents of our attic will increase yet again. It seems that no matter where my children travel, they never forget these touching words: be it ever so humble there’s no place like mom and dad’s attic to store stuff. As I’ve said before, there are nights when I lie in bed gazing at the ceiling wondering when the attic will crash down on our heads. It’s not a thought conducive to sleep. The attic runs along the entire length of our house. On one side the former owner created a separate area to serve as his work space. This is the room that is currently filled to the top with my daughters’ various moves and adventuring, beginning with college. The rest of the space holds their childhood in plastic containers—every last beanie baby, little pony, and Fisher-Price-everything. King Tut would have been found in even better condition if he had been encased in some of the Rubbermaid products that I have invested in. I should have bought stock in that company years ago. Every few years when I go “attic-crazy” my daughters make a half-hearted attempt to throw out some of their precious memorabilia. The problem is that as they unpack each box they say things like, “Oh my God I forgot I had this!” You would think that if you have completely forgotten you had something it would be easy to throw out, yes? But evidently not since as my daughters clutch their newly found treasure they plead piteously, “But Mom it’s part of my childhood!” Well so was chickenpox but you don’t see me holding on to that! Last month we hired a contractor to do some repairs. When we asked him about the condition of our shed he said that he would have to demolish it and build a new one. He told us that part of the expense would be renting a dumpster to hold the old shed. He stopped when he saw the beatific look on my face. “Are you serious?” I asked him. “You’re not playing with me?” I told him that for years I’ve dreamt of renting a dumpster to hold all the stuff in my house that I’m dying to toss. “That’s funny,” he answered. “That’s the usual reaction I get from women when I tell them that!” I might just write a book entitled, “Fifty Shades of Crap” to cash in on this dumpster fantasy. Anyway, when Lisa asked if there was room to store some of their furniture in the attic I thought she was joking. The only reason that we have no squirrels up there is simply because there is no room! Seeing the incredulous look on my face she added, “I mean I would clean out some of my old things before I put anything else up there!” I told her that if she was serious I would happily help her with the attic project. Ironically, if there’s anything I love more than shopping it’s throwing stuff out! To my surprise last week-end Lisa made good on her promise. While I relaxed downstairs reading the Sunday paper I could hear her moving things around, dropping boxes and occasionally talking to herself. After a couple of hours she came down to tell us that she had most of her stuff in piles and could we help her get it down? When I went up I came face to face with yet another of our children’s crazes: 3-D puzzles. Mariel has always been the best puzzler of the family--the harder the better. So when she discovered these 3-D concoctions in middle school her eyes lit up. For the next couple of years she built, with Steve’s help, the Empire State Building, The White House, Notre Dame Cathedral, The Taj Mahal, Lower Manhattan complete with the World Trade Center, and various European castles some of which even lit up. And of course once she built them I couldn’t bear to take them apart so they were displayed—everywhere. Once she went off to college though we moved them up to the attic, where they gave the room a bit of class and a creepy abandoned-city feeling. I volunteered to take them all apart and put them back in their boxes for some future puzzler. So there I sat on the living room floor, deconstructing all of those landmarks, vacuuming the various bugs that had moved in, and shoving thousands of puzzle pieces into Ziplock bags. But when I came to the World Trade Center I just couldn’t do it. It was so incredibly complex and I simply didn’t like the feeling of destroying the towers all over again. So I dusted them off and took them back up to the attic to rule in solitary splendor. I must admit, I was impressed with Lisa’s work. The space looked better than it had in a long time—like a whole new galaxy. We should probably draw up a guide so in the future we know exactly what to throw out without having to search through everything again. After all—that dumpster won’t be here forever.

Wedding Girl

Wedding Girl Our back yard has seen so much--Troops of kids digging in our sandbox, hanging from monkey bars, sliding down the slide and swinging from swings. Games of Hide and Seek, Duck-Duck-Goose and Tag. Softball and soccer rolling through the grass, excited shrieks echoing in the sky. We’ve hunted for snakes and watched caterpillars creeping along. We planted a garden and pulled up our first carrots. When the kids got older we set up a badminton net, swung croquet mallets and spiked volleyballs. We’ve watched the birds that come in an unending stream to our feeders, the deer who creep into our yard in the early morning, and have even seen wild turkeys on Thanksgiving Day. We’ve spotted a fox race across the yard, raccoon babies in trees and a groundhog who knocked himself out on a log trying to escape. We’ve barbecued on Memorial Day, July 4th and Labor Day with friends and celebrated High School graduations. The more I write the more I remember. So when Lisa and Matt asked to be married in our backyard it seemed like a natural extension of our lives. We would invite just the immediate families and celebrate the beginning of Lisa and Matt’s life as a married couple. We only had a couple of months to plan but it didn’t seem that there was that much to do since Lisa and Matt did most of the groundwork. But as the date approached, it suddenly became a race. Steve and the kids worked outside, I attacked the inside. There were menus to discuss, flowers to buy, games to plan for Matt’s nieces. And of course we spent weeks praying for good weather since our plan was not only to have the “formal” ceremony outside but then to change into comfortable clothing so that we could play in the yard afterwards. It reminded me of our wedding. Shatz and I were married in a penthouse room which was connected to a large roof deck with an amazing view. We wanted to be married on the deck surrounded by our parents and then invite everyone out for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres before dinner and dancing inside. We prayed for sun and got it in spades. It was 95 degrees and humid. Though we did get married outside, our guests quickly ran off to the air conditioned hall inside. I still remember the musician we hired playing the keyboard on the deck, looking rather forlorn playing for himself. Last week Lisa and her friend Laurel made beautiful huge, paper dahlias to decorate the yard and porch. We put up tikki torches giving the yard an exotic feel, set up seats, volleyball and horseshoes. And yes, we got sun….plus 90 degree hot, humid skies. Déjà vu. So we cranked up the air conditioning, set out fans and bought tubs of iced drinks to keep everyone cool. Steve and I had met Matt’s father, sister and nieces but this was the first time we would meet the rest of his clan. We were strangers suddenly expected to become family and at first it was awkward. Thankfully, Matt’s nieces, Izzie (Isabelle, 7) and Sydney (5) were the perfect ice-breakers. Gorgeous, bright, fun, they were the bubbles in a glass of champagne. After some getting-to-know-you conversation, Lisa turned to Matt and said, “Okay, let’s go get married!” And so they did. Steve and Matt’s dad, Jerry, officiated at the ceremony. Steve had applied for a one day license (he actually needed a character reference!) from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and received a very fancy letter with a gold star making it all official. Lisa and Matt had created their own wedding script which included their thoughts about marriage and their vows. The families sat in a semicircle with Izzy and Sydney as the official bubble blowers. Throughout the ceremony, if Lisa would begin to cry, she would stop everything and say to them, “We need more bubbles guys!” I read a poem that I had written and Mariel recited “Happiness” from “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown”, a record that we had worn down through all our years of listening. We stood there in the heat, torches burning, birds chattering, an occasional squirrel looking over at us curiously, the big, bright dahlias coloring the sky, sniffing and smiling through our sniffles. I held my script and told myself not to cry—but it was hopeless. At least I managed to get through my poem. And then suddenly Steve pronounced those magic words, “By the power invested in me……” they broke their wine glasses and I was the mother of a married woman. How did you suddenly become a wedding girl? Standing there in your cream/dream dress Next to your sweet guy….his girl now, Even though you’ve always been your own girl, You were mine once. My baby girl, My bright-eyes girl. They say that no matter how old your children become You never see them as adults, Always babies. I’ve never found that to be true. Whenever I look at your lovely face I see a woman who finds her own roads. It takes effort to see you as my once baby Searching for mommy’s hand. And that’s how it should be As you marry your beloved Eyes bright open. Take his hand, Say your vows And wedding-girl Become a married-girl Eyes wide toward your future.

This Old Yard

This Old Yard Next week my daughter Lisa will be marrying her long time love, Matt. Steve and I are thrilled since we’ve been watching them gradually move toward this moment for three years. They are utterly in love, two parts of a whole, so there’s no problem there. The problem appeared when they asked us if they could be married in our back yard. Initially I was beyond thrilled--somewhere over the rainbow euphoric. That lasted until I took a good look at the condition of our yard. When we first moved into our house in the fall of 1989, it boasted a beautiful lawn. There wasn’t much landscaping--just a few scraggly bushes out front, and no real front walk, just gravel with brick stepping stones (what can I say we were neophyte home buyers back then) but the lawn was gorgeous. The owners gave us the name of their lawn care company and that spring I dutifully called Chemicals ‘R Us to continue their care of our green carpet. Soon their trucks came out regularly to feed, aerate, and spray some kind of stuff guaranteed to continue the green-ness of our grass. As homeowners-in-training our learning curve was steep that year. We learned that raking leaves was not the Norman Rockwell family activity that we had dreamed of, (After the first hour the kids got bored and ran off and I acquired a hatred for brown oak leaves that I nurture to this day), that the pretty shiny leaves that grew in such abundance at the edge of our property was poison ivy, and that no matter what the season there was always too much to do. But it wasn’t until our first spring season that I became uneasy about the truck that visited our lawn like clockwork. When I finally read the pretty little yellow flags that the drivers left on the grass, I panicked. They instructed me to keep pets and children off the lawn within 24 hours of spraying. Lisa and Mariel had been running around within minutes of the trucks’ departure. What was going on here? I called the company and was assured that everything was perfectly safe, that the flags were only there for silly legal purposes, that there had never been any problems and never would be. I talked to my friends who also told me not to worry. But I worried anyway. I started reading about the chemicals that were being dumped on my lawn and I didn’t like it….not at all. The next year I called every company in the book asking if they could treat my lawn naturally. I was accused of being a troublemaking crackpot, and told rather nastily that if I discontinued the service our lawn would die immediately and become the neighborhood shame and disaster area. I looked around at the other lawns on our block and decided to risk being the grass pariah of the block. Unfortunately the chemical people were right. Despite Steve’s ongoing efforts at seeding, lime strewing and fertilizing, our grass has never been the same. Experts have told us that we have bad drainage, too many pine trees, too much shade, too much organic matter resulting in too many mushrooms, and generally too much bad stuff and not enough good. Too give you an idea of how clueless I still am about lawn care, when I boasted to my friend Roxy about the great “new” hardy grass that had suddenly shown up, she came by, took one look and informed me that it was crabgrass. Hey, some lawns boast a nice combination of Kentucky Rye and fescue, we happen to be inordinately proud of our crab grass. It’s green, hardy and reliable. That’s all I ask for in a grass. Though there have been times when I’ve looked at our lawn and sighed, mostly I’ve come to accept that we’ll never be a golf course. But the thought of Lisa and Matt being married in our yard, suddenly forced me to look at our house and its surroundings with the eyes of a stranger, and it definitely needed some sprucing up. Bless Lisa and Matt (and from a distance, Mariel); they immediately told us not to worry. They would come in for a week-end and help us spruce. Matt was a trifle dubious. He is not an outdoorsy kind of guy but he gamely volunteered his services for the cause. Steve had already spent weeks doing the regular outdoor chores when Lisa and Matt, general contractors arrived last week-end. Thankfully the crabgrass had arrived right on schedule, so all I needed to do was plant pots of flowers all over the front yard. I had also spent a day bleaching every bit of mold that I could find on the house so that the kids could paint. We gave them brushes and two cans of paint and off they went. It’s amazing what some paint, nails, flowers and elbow grease can do. After the week-end I stood back admiring our handiwork. I still have the bushes to trim and when Mariel comes in from Arizona next week she’ll shower the place with mulch, but basically we transformed the place even if much of it is only a temporary fix. But that’s okay. It just has to look good for the one day that will begin the rest of Lisa and Matt’s days together. And it better not rain.

Rebirth

Rebirth The last week of the school year. Time to find inspiration energy, new ideas. Time for a field trip. When we received a flyer from Roxbury Community College advertising their “College for a Day” it was the perfect opportunity for us. I had never visited RCC and I very much wanted to see the place that we had been recommending to our students all year. We handed out flyers, talked about the day as if it were God’s gift to GED students, and arranged to meet at the school at 10:00. I hoped that at least one person would show up. I happily counted ten students waiting for us in front of the building. I must have sounded like a slightly demented cheerleader, laughing and greeting everyone, running from student to student exhorting them to sign up, grab their stuff and find their seats in the auditorium. I was just so happy to see our students there that I couldn’t stop bubbling. Eventually I settled down, and we waited for the program to begin. When the Dean of Student Affairs, Charles Diggs, asked the various schools to shout out if they were there, we all yelled, “Yes!” when he called out the Blackstone. Surprisingly, our group sounded really excited. We listened to the day’s agenda, welcoming remarks from the head of the Community Coalition and then waited to hear three RCC students tell us their stories. One woman had waited until her seven children were grown before becoming a student herself. She got her GED then decided to try college. Despite her fears and uncertainties, her many supporters convinced her that she could do it. She told us how everyday she would finish class and everyday she would declare that there was no way that she was going back. And yet everyday she did. Before she knew it she had finished her first year. “And I’m coming back next year!” she told us triumphantly as we applauded her. “If I can do it so can you!” The next gentleman told us about emigrating to the U.S. from the Cayman Islands. He learned English in an ESOL program then moved on to a GED school. Once he got his GED he attended RCC, finished its two year program and transferred to UMASS Boston. He had just graduated a few days before. “If I could do it so can you!” he told the crowd. The third gentleman was a Navy vet who, after many detours, decided to attend college when he retired. He regaled us with his life’s story ending with his schooling at RCC. And once again we were told, “If I could do it so can you!” Now you have to understand that all year long we have been talking, cajoling and even shouting at our students that that they could get their GED if they only worked, but their responses were dispiriting. Yet as they listened to their peers, all around me I could see heads nodding in agreement and secret smiles. I knew they were telling themselves, “If they can do it then maybe I can too!” Hope reborn. Afterwards we each chose a class to visit: Theater Arts, the Humanities, even Chemistry. I decided to go to, “Poetry and Morality.” Nine of us followed the teacher, Ted Thomas, trooping off to his class. The room was small and airless and for the first few moments I had misgivings. Professor Thomas handed out a syllabus and told us that he would be treating us as if we were attending our first class of the semester. I felt warm, stifled and bored and wanted very much to leave. This was a mistake. What was I doing here? Then suddenly our teacher caught fire as he began preaching poetry. He paced back and forth, asking us questions with his hands, pleading for poetry, drawing us into a passionate conversation. I moved to the edge of my seat, trained my eyes on him and smiled. I had forgotten this--the excitement of a great teacher stirring thoughts in my brain that had lain dormant for too long. It felt like church with all of us yearning to yell out, “Amen!" to his assertions about poetry and life. And then he asked us to write a poem. A poem? Was he kidding? I couldn’t remember the last time I had written a poem. He saw our frightened faces and said that it was not so very dreadful a task that he was asking. Just a poem. I sat there, feeling rebellious, angry, scared and then suddenly, my hand began to write as quickly as it used to so many years ago. Within five minutes there was a poem on my page. How had that happened? Wonderingly I held up my sheet of paper and showed it to him and he smiled. “May I read it?” he asked gently. My hand shook a bit as I gave it to him. I watched as he read it, wondering that I had handed it to him at all. When he turned around and told me that he liked it and would I send it to him, I suddenly realized that I had been holding my breath. My prayer felt answered. Oh yes, I would send it and quickly before I had second thoughts, before I could lose my nerve. Who was I to question a rebirth?

Zoned Out

Zoned Out I used to love flying--the whole idea of getting away to something and somewhere new. Even the time spent in the airport was fun. Once you checked in you were already on vacation, poking around the airport stores, buying snacks that you wouldn’t usually eat and magazines that you would never read outside of a dentist’s office. People watching--wondering how that woman could possibly be comfortable in those shoes or wondering if those were pajamas that girl was wearing, the one who was carrying a pillow and teddy bear. You waited patiently to get on the plane knowing that they would let you on from back seats to front so that no one would block the aisles. The stewardesses smiled at you, welcoming you aboard and then asked you if you needed anything. I would always eagerly grab the airline magazine to check out the in-flight movies and menu. There was a pillow and blanket on your seat and earphones so you could listen to music. Once the plane took off the stewardesses would walk around offering people warm wash cloths, drinks and snacks. And best of all there was enough leg room so that you didn’t feel that if you sneezed you would end up with your knee in your ear. All fond memories. Luckily last month we were able to purchase our tickets for Tucson with points. Two seats cost us $70.00 plus $25.00 for a checked bag. Later I would find out that the headsets were free but using them would cost me seven bucks. Not bad, not bad at all. Or so I thought. What I hadn’t realized was that not paying full price for tickets had set me up for adventures before I was even settled on the plane. The first revelation was that even though I had chosen seats they weren’t locked in. My friend, Ginette told me that she had made plane reservations for her family months in advance and naturally had chosen four seats together. When they got on the plane though, they were scattered throughout the cabin like breadcrumbs. It seems that if someone is willing to pay an extra $25.00 for a “good” seat, i.e. near a window, on the aisle, or in the plane, they automatically bump you to another seat. Theoretically, I suppose, you could end up sitting in the bathroom. The second fun-filled adventure was zoning. United Air assigns you to a boarding zone according to how much you paid for your seat. After first class, business class passengers and babies, you are no longer seated from back to front, but by zones. I noticed that we were assigned zone 7 but since we already had our seats I didn’t care when we boarded. However I would shortly learn what being a denizen of zone 7 meant. It seems that after the enlightened people of zone 4 had boarded, there was no more room in the overhead bins for carry-on luggage. We were told that our bags would be shipped separately. All that time that I had spent carefully packing my carry-on with clothing and toiletries in case they lost my checked bag, had just been thrown out the window. I ended up groveling at a stewardess’ feet so that I could take mine on board. One desperate economy-gentleman pushed his bag into a first class overhead bin as he got on. The outraged stewardess threatened to throw him off the plane, have him arrested, and then claim his first born child, if he didn’t immediately and forthwith remove his offending bag. I was shaking as I boarded not daring to look at her lest she throw me off as well. Shatz and I soon realized that there were other differences between the zones as well: Zone 1—First class, business class, cute, quiet babies and paid in full AARP members. They all boarded first and were allowed to tread on the royal blue carpet on the right. Definitely the 1% of flying. Zones 2 and 3—Premier carpet people. These were flyers who had paid extra to board second, walk on the afore-mentioned blue rug, (I believe the rug vibrated to give them a foot massage) and have plenty of time to settle into their seats to contemplate everyone else struggling to get on. Zone 4—Was not allowed to walk on the blue rug, but on a red rug to the left. The last people on who could bring their carry-on bags, (see above) they were also allowed to wear a smug look on their faces. Zone 5—The last people to have over 6 inches worth of leg room. Zone 6—The last people that the stewardess acknowledged with, “Have a nice trip”, also the last people allowed to use the bathroom gratis. Zone 7—Our zone. The dregs of society, deadbeats, i.e. people who actually had the nerve to use points for tickets. They pulled the rug away when we walked up (while I was walking on it!) People in our zone had the flu. The stewardess told us to, “Have a trip.” When we got on board we weren’t even allowed to buy food! Our money was no good there. As we prepared for take-off I heard the lady behind me say, “These seats seem so small!” “First timer,” I sighed and thought seriously about hitchhiking to Tucson next time.

The Graduate As I sat through two graduations during these past few weeks when so many of our children were graduating, the strangest word popped into my brain: Plastics. You may remember the 1967 film, The Graduate. Dustin Hoffman plays a recent college graduate who was unsure of what to do with his life. At his graduation party a well meaning family friend pulls him aside and tells him he has one word for him, “Plastics.” Evidently that’s where he felt the future lay for the very confused lad. Thankfully, unlike Dustin, both my girls have a good idea of what they where they’re heading. We began our celebrations with Mariel, who was graduating from the University of Arizona with a Masters in GeoSciences. As many of you know, my youngest is madly in love with rocks and the earth that they come from. Her interest was ignited by a fantastic Canton Middle School science teacher, ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬Ms. Birtwell, a father who loves science, and a family trip to a Hawaiian volcanic caldera. The only thing that I can say is that I bought her a bag of pretty rocks when she was eight. We set off for a long week-end in Tucson, excited, yet a bit apprehensive. I no longer love flying the way I used to thanks to all the rules and regulations involving liquids, shoes and clothing removal. On this trip Steve and I were introduced to body scanners. We could have chosen to be frisked but I had heard from friends how “intimate” that could get, so I opted for the scanner. It was strange. Not only do you remove every extraneous article of anything on your body, but you stand spread-eagled with your hands above your head while the scanner finds out if you intend to blow up the eastern hemisphere. Just my luck I was also randomly chosen for a body pat down. “Why me?” I wailed uselessly since random is random, yes? I like to think that it wasn’t random at all—that I was chosen for my great beauty. We flew to Houston without incident where we were scheduled for a four hour layover. However the gods were not smiling on us. Due to mechanical malfunctions and Texan storms we ended up waiting for eight hours till we were finally allowed to board our plane. Half of us on that plane were scheduled to attend graduation at the U of A the next day but we were the only ones whose ceremony was at 8:00 in the very early morning. After landing, figuring out the time change (Arizona does not change its clocks) and picking up our rental car, we were blitzed. Thank goodness our hotel was across the street from the rental place. After four hours of sleep we groggily set out. At 7:15 am Steve and I shook hands congratulating each other that we had made it. Now all we had to do was stay awake. The ceremony, which was only for the school of science, was held in a sports arena so there was a jumbo-tron hanging from the ceiling. Instead of the usual pictures of people going nuts when they saw themselves up there, the names of the graduates, their degrees and parting comments were shown. These ran the gamut of, “I love you mom!” to various existential quotes, to “Meet you on the unemployment line!” It was hilarious. When it was Mariel’s turn to be “hooded” for her masters, I tried in vain to get a picture while enjoying the moment in real time. It went by so quickly I didn’t even have time to cry. I took a few deep breaths and tried to get used to the fact that I was old enough to have a daughter with a master’s degree. Thank goodness for Lisa’s graduation we did not have to separate fluids or be body scanned. All we had to do was drive into Boston on a beautiful summer’s day. Lisa was also graduating in an intimate venue, Boston University’s Agganis Arena. She was getting her master’s degree from the School of Public Health. Unfortunately it was as cold in there as it is when the hockey team is playing--I could have sworn I still saw ice on the arena floor. And because everyone there was getting a masters or PhD, everybody was being hooded, which meant that we had plenty of time to enjoy not only every second of our daughter’s moment, but of everyone else’s child’s as well. And that was actually wonderful. Sitting there in the midst of hundreds of proud parents, knowing that our children were part of the lucky few who were beginning their professional lives with degrees; knowing that there were doors that would open for them because of their education, was at once gratifying and humbling. As I knew so well there were countless others who would not even finish High School, whose futures were mortgaged before they even began. Lisa and I have often joked that we want to try and save the world. I have since narrowed that down to my local world and then even further to one person at a time in my neighborhood. One by one, step by step. And hopefully all of our graduates will go out into the world and save a bit of it too. It all adds up.

The Jewel of Beacon Street My husband, Steve runs a business from our house which means I never get to see him anymore. Well, okay I do pass him in the hall or the kitchen but lately we’ve become ships in the night. When he used to work a typical nine-to-five job, our week-ends were reserved for family and chores. But when you work from home, work-time and home-time blur together. Add my hectic job schedule to the mix and it’s a wonder that we still recognize each other without a pink carnation stuck in our lapels. So whenever I have a day off I ask my husband out on a day-long date. We always look for something to do in Boston since we never tire of walking around the city enjoying the sights like any other tourist. If it’s cold it’s a bit harder to find an activity since I love museums but Steve only likes the smaller, quirkier ones. Last Presidents’ Day we arrived at the Isabella Gardiner Art Museum only to see a line weaving down the street and around the block. We sighed then drove off to find an adventure in a less crowded venue. It was then that I remembered another place that fellow library trustee and friend, George Comeau, had recommended a while back. George’s face glows when he speaks about the Boston Athenaeum. He’s been a member there for years. When he heard that I had never visited he was horrified. I kept promising him that I would eventually, but somehow eventually never came. As it turned out that February day was not the day, but another April day was. We hoped that the weather would cooperate so that we could squeeze in our usual walk around Boston before we visited the Athenaeum. Happily it was gloriously perfect. The sun was out and even the wind decided not to appear that day. We parked our car in the South End where we planned to have lunch and walked over to Beacon Street. We stopped to admire old buildings, spring flowers, cute dogs and Boston skylines. We waved at the tourists on the Duck Boats, bumped into hordes of them peering at maps, and felt infinitely superior to the bunch excitedly gathering at Cheers. Approaching the Common we finally found 10 ½ Beacon Street. I gaped at the two large red doors flanked by heavy carved ones. We entered silently and were welcomed by the receptionist who told us that we were welcome to visit the first floor reading rooms and art gallery but the rest of the building was for members only. We hadn’t even been there for five minutes and already I wanted desperately to be a member. This place has that kind of affect on you. Free and open to the public, the Boston Athenaeum, was founded in 1807 by members of the Anthology Society, who began with a plan to have a reading room but then expanded their vision to include a library encompassing books in all subjects in English and foreign languages, a gallery of sculptures and paintings, collections of coins and natural curiosities, and even a laboratory……. in 1809 (they) bought a small house adjacent to the King’s Chapel Burial Ground, and in 1822 moved into a mansion on Pearl Street. In 1849 the current location at 10 ½ Beacon Street opened We tiptoed in, barely breathing at the sheer loveliness of the space. High vaulted ceilings, graceful moldings, huge windows, sculpture and paintings everywhere. Books filled the central room and the art gallery led to small niches where people could rest and read. I was standing in the central room when I saw a dignified gentleman waiting for the elevator. I couldn’t resist asking him, “Are you lucky enough to work here?” “I am,” he answered, and something in my wistful expression must have urged him to say, “Would you like to see the most beautiful room in the building on the fifth floor?” “Oh yes!” I said, “Could I really?” And so Robert took us up to the fifth floor reading room reserved for members. It was a jewel, echoing the design of the rest of the building, with tall windows, private research nooks, paintings, sculpture, and peace. Again we tiptoed, (this was definitely a tiptoeing space) as he took down several first editions to show us. A Labrador slept peacefully beneath the desk of a researcher. Even dogs were respectful of this place. Robert took us out to a small terrace overlooking the city and we chatted about Boston, books and life. After thanking him for the unique gift that he had given us, we returned to the first floor. As I wandered I discovered yet another treasure adjacent to the children’s room, a small children’s reading room named, Chris’ library. The room was covered in soft, starry-night-blue carpeting whose theme was reflected in the overhead light which was designed as the earth revolving around the sun. There were two spacious yet cozy, cushioned benches opposite large windows overlooking the Granary burial ground. Tourists milled around the tombstones while I sat peacefully longing for a child to bring here. When we came home we looked up the Athenaeum staff to find that our wonderful tour guide had been Robert R. Ashton, Director of Development. Thank you Robert for turning a simple visit into a joy. And thank you George. I owe you one.

Spring Laughter A spring day can’t possibly be lovelier than this. The sun is warming the temperature up to the 70’s, the few clouds in the sky are the fluffy cotton candy kind, and the birds haven’t even stopped for a breath. And I am lucky to be sitting in my favorite place, my back porch. Snoopy is lying in a patch of sun having given up begging to be let out. Spring drives him crazy. The moment the air hints of warmth and the light grows lighter his only desire is to be out and running, chasing anything including the smells of spring. Unfortunately he has to wait for someone to walk him. I swore that I would not write a spring column. I do it every year, first the swearing and then the capitulating. Every year I make myself crazy trying to find new words to explain why this season awakens every hope that I bury during the winter, every desire I thought I had tamped down, every longing that I was certain I had very maturely shed. And then the warmth stirs the air and I crack open my window at night. The tree frogs pipe continuously and the birds return to my feeders. And the light—oh that light--expands and stretches and disappears later and later each evening—and once again I’m hooked. No other season makes me want to be seven again the way spring does. It stirs up pools of memories bringing them to the surface. My senses remember everything, jostling and crowding each other for attention. I smell the woods after a rain when the salamanders would creep out to sun themselves on the moss. I taste the grass that we would blow as whistles. I feel the slight chill riding on the warm air and watch trees grow thicker and greener everyday. But today for the first time, thanks to something I read in this morning’s paper, I finally understood why spring now leaves me not only restless and hopeful but also aching for the past. Spring was always the prelude to summer when, unknown to my parents, I would leave my bed in our bungalow colony bedroom in the Catskills, to creep outside so I could listen to my parents and their friends talk and hear my dad telling one of his wonderful jokes. Today I read the obituary of a man I had never met, never even heard of, yet I felt like a member of my family had died. His name was Lou Goldstein. According to Joseph Berger of the New York Times, Lou Goldstein was: The consummate tummler, one of a zany species of entertainer who kept them laughing, long ago in the borscht belt hotels of the Catskills. A tummler (pronounced TOOM-ler) — the job title comes from a Yiddish word for someone who stirs up tumult or excitement — was a jack-of-all-trades social director who was supposed to amuse the hotel guests with jokes, songs and shtick, as they sat by the pool, emerged from lunch or headed for bingo. One of Lou’s favorite jokes was, the one about the mother whose son excitedly announces that he has been picked for the part of the Jewish husband in a school play. The mother replies, “You tell the teacher you want a speaking part.” Lou, the son of a tailor, was born in a small town outside of Warsaw, Poland. He and his family immigrated to Brooklyn when he was five years old. Eventually he ended up living and working in the Catskills near a town called Liberty. From everything I’ve read about him he was a very funny man. My father was the son of tailor from a small town outside of Warsaw who immigrated to Brooklyn when he was a young man. He was also a very funny man. But unlike Lou he didn’t live in the Catskills he just vacationed there with his family every summer. My dad wasn’t a tummler though. He was a quiet comedian. He and my mom would be sitting with their friends when he would say a few words and suddenly everyone would be holding their sides. When I was older I would be one of the group that could no longer breathe because I was laughing so hard. But when I was younger most of what I heard was my father’s voice and the inevitable laughter. Lou Goldstein worked at Grossinger’s, the premier Catskills resort from 1948 till 1986 when it closed. But our family couldn’t afford to spend our summers at Grossinger’s. Instead we went to bungalow colonies in the area from June till September. Summer was wonderful but spring was anticipation, the best part of everything. Spring meant that in a few weeks I would leave the city where grass grew in small squares, trees popped up one at a time, and squirrels were the only native wildlife, and live it the way it should be felt—bursting in the woods, across stretches of lawns--and if I was really lucky, in the early morning hours as a doe and her baby nibbling the grass outside my window. Now every spring I listen for my dad, the quiet tummler, regaling his friends with one of his many jokes, while I still try not to laugh but always fail. And I’m so grateful that my dad always had a speaking part.

A Day in the Life

A Day In the Life

The alarm rings at 5:30. I feel like a diver that has gone too deep and can’t find her way to the surface. It can’t possibly be time to get up. But it is and no amount of complaining is going to get me any more sleep. I fall out of bed. In the shower I go through my usual litany of questions: “Why am I up when even the birds are still sleeping ? Why does 5:00 seem like such an evil time to get up? Why should I care if my teachers stand outside in the cold waiting for me to show up and let them in?” But I care, I know I care, so I dry my hair, slap some color on my face and head in for coffee.
I have my usual half hour to gulp down some oatmeal and coffee and catch the train. I just hope that the Snoopster will stay asleep so that I don’t have to take him out and get his breakfast--but no luck. I hear him stretching in the hallway. Does this dog have an appointment that he has to go to that I don’t know about?
I get to the station just as the train pulls in, but happily I meet Harry on the platform. We get two seats together on a three-seater. As we sit down the woman near the window huffily moves her things so we can sit. When Harry and I begin to chat quietly she informs us rather nastily that this is the quiet car and we should basically shut up so madame can fume in silence. I am sorely tempted to whack her, but I behave, merely thinking evil thoughts about her during the ride. After such a rotten start I have the sinking feeling that this day is going to be a doozey.
The walk to school is blessedly uneventful and I begin to think that everything will be okay after all. I unlock the door and see that our classroom water cooler needs a new bottle, so I begin the process of hefting it onto the cooler. After I turn the bottle over I notice that there is a crack in the bottom. Suddenly I hear a loud whoosh and then a furious flow of water. I watch horrified as a flood runs down the sides of the cooler and onto the floor while a hissing noise signals that something may be burning.
I decide not to panic. I pull the bottle off, throw it in the trash and unplug the cooler. I am now as wet as the floor. I rethink my former decision and decide that panicking may be the thing to do. This is a mess that paper towels won’t handle. Thank goodness I have the custodian’s number and Kevin, bless him, is there in five minutes with his mop. My knight in shining flannel. I pray that the water hasn’t caused a short in the electrical wiring.
In the middle of this mess, as Kevin mops and I wipe as fast as I can, my GED teacher arrives unexpectedly early. He stands there cluelessly, looking like he’s about to step over Kevin and into the room. I inform him that if he wants to live another day in my school he should make himself scarce for a while. I flee to my office, take out my tiny hair dryer and begin drying my skirt and sweater, desperate not to go through the day soaked to the skin. Yes indeed, blow drying yourself at 7:30 in the morning is a great way to start the day.
Kevin puts another bottle on the cooler (at this point I’m ready for a bottle as well, and I’m not talking about water) assures me that the day will get better and leaves me with a nice clean floor. I’m still damp but at this point I don’t care anymore.
It is now 8:30 and I have two minutes before the hoards descend. I gulp my coffee wondering whether I shouldn’t just pour it over my head for maximum caffeine effect and slap a smile on my face. By 10:00 a semblance of peace has descended—or at least until the students in my GED class decide that they’ve had it with their teacher and begin a revolution.
My assistant, Lalitta and I can hear them telling him that he needs to get organized; that they’re tired of doing the same lesson over and over because he’s forgotten what he’s taught, and they don’t want to learn words like “pentathlon” because when were they ever in their lifetimes going to use them?!!
Quietly agreeing with my students, I wish that I had thrown him into the river that was the classroom this morning and ended all of our suffering. I have spoken to him countless times about his teaching but he’s very courteously not having any of it. This is one teacher who will not be returning next year, Harvard degree and all.
The rest of day slowly slides downhill—the copy machine dies, we lose our heat, our lights go out. Somehow I get through it and go home to crawl into bed. Thankfully it is Friday—perhaps on Monday we will have heat, lights and a copy machine. Then again Haley’s comet may show up as well. I remain optimistic.

Sleep Like the Dead

Sleep Like the Dead
The last time we bought a new mattress was during the Norman Invasion. We didn’t have many choices back then, it was straw or straw as I recall. So when I told Steve last week that I believed that I was waking up every morning sore and achy was not because a squirrel was beating me up at night, but because we might need a new mattress, he was not happy. The word “new” always means that there is shopping involved and whenever shopping is involved Steve is not.
Steve and I have an interesting history when it comes to major purchases. We bought our house in a couple of weeks having chosen not only the town we wanted to live in but the school district, (our realtor told us that she considered herself lucky that we hadn’t narrowed it down to one street!) our cars usually take us a week and lately, if something can be ordered online and delivered to our door, we don’t even leave the house. This is nirvana for Steve.
But a mattress is tricky. All the web sites say that it’s difficult to make equitable comparisons between mattresses since every brand has its own styles, and every store its own brands. Since the important stuff is pretty much hidden, purchasing a mattress is akin to buying the proverbial pig in a poke.
The first stop on our mattress hunt was the store where we had bought mom’s bed. She was happy with it so we figured we had a chance of success. The salespeople wore white lab coats perhaps in the hope that you’d defer to them as you would your doctor. Either that or they were going for a lab tech image, but why I would buy a mattress from someone who does research on small animals puzzles me. I kept thinking that at any moment they would be asking me for a blood sample.
Most of the shoppers had brought their extended family--kids, uncles, cousins, nephews, to give them advice. They were all lying down pretending to sleep, bouncing, arguing, and offering their opinions. The two of us felt a bit bereft but we were shortly assigned a “sleep technician”, who after asking our price range, promptly steered us to a mattress that was at least $500 more than the figure we had named.
We tried “sleeping” on a few mattresses like Goldilocks but I was too self-conscious to find anything that felt just right. Lying down in a busy store dressed in a coat and boots was not the optimum experience for figuring out my comfort zone. I asked Shatz to snore a bit to create our usual sleeping ambiance but he refused.
The couple next to us was having some serious comfort disagreements. The wife said that she loved that the mattress was firm while the husband said it felt like he was lying on cement. She sighed that the two of them would never agree on a mattress. I suggested that they investigate those sleep number gadgets where everyone gets to choose their mattress firmness. She told me that her parents had one of those and hated it. Her mom was tired of looking up at her dad at night. It turns out that the firmer you like it, the higher your side of the bed grows--like blowing up a balloon.
Steve and I discussed a memory foam mattress but I was hesitant. Our friends, Nancy and Harry, bought one a few years ago. She told me that after sleeping on it for one night they called to have it removed. “It was awful!” she said. “I felt like I was sinking deeper and deeper into the bed and that I would never get out!”
I wasn’t sure that I wanted to be tapped in my bed like quicksand, especially if I wanted to get up during the night. The idea of having to wake Steve so that he could push me out didn’t exactly appeal to me. This is one old lady who doesn’t relish having to fight her bed in addition to gravity just to go to the bathroom.
According to a web site Shatz found called, Sleep Like the Dead, memory foams have disadvantages. One of them is off-gassing. This is when your bed smells like Old Faithful due to the gas in the materials. I won’t even comment on that.
We also discovered that memory foams tend to sleep hot meaning your mattress builds up heat as you sleep. This last was confirmed by a friend who told me that during the summer she felt like she was sleeping in an oven. She kept dreaming that she had died and gone to hell.
But it was the column titled, “Good for Sex?” (which has nothing to do with sleeping hot) that convinced me. I quote, “What complaints there are tend to involve models with memory foam; See Mattresses and Sex, for more info.” I decided not to, since the visuals dancing in my head were already disturbing enough!
This week-end we’re off for another try. This time I’m going in my pajamas and bringing the dog. I’ll throw him on one of the memory foams to see if he can get out. If he can’t we’ll definitely cross it off our list. I have enough stress in my life without worrying if my mattress is gong to eat me.

Snowshoeing in the Streets

Snowshoeing in the Streets

What a day! The sun is out, no clouds, no wind, 50 degrees. And it’s February. This is my idea of a winter that I can live with. For years I’ve said to anyone who will listen, “I wouldn’t mind the winter so much if there was no snow and the temperature stayed in the fifties.” A pipe dream for Massachusetts, but this year it’s a pipe dream come true. This morning even though I shivered at the train station, I knew that on my way home I would no longer need my scarf, but my sunglasses instead.
Today has been an easy day. I’ve accomplished everything on my to-do list and a few people canceled their appointments, leaving me breathing room. The community center office upstairs is quiet and no one has rushed into my office with a crisis.
Yet for some reason the date seems familiar. The Super Bowl is over, Valentine’s Day isn’t here yet, it isn’t anybody’s birthday that I can think of so why does this date refuse to leave the edges of my mind? And then on the internet I see a small story at the bottom about the blizzard of ’78.
The small blurb informs me that 34 years ago today the heavens dropped twenty-seven inches of snow on Boston and the rest of New England. On a beautiful day like this it’s hard to imagine being buried in over two feet of snow. But we were. Thirty-four years ago I couldn’t push open our front door and could barely see out of our second story apartment window. I still remember the excitement of having work canceled, classes canceled, usual life canceled because of a relentless snowfall that showed no inclination of stopping anytime soon.
After listening to governor Michael Dukakis reassure us that even in this state of emergency we would all be fine if we just stayed off the roads, we headed across the way to a state-of-emergency party that had just been called by a neighbor that we had never met but were about to.
Today old-lady-me would be staring nervously out of the window, checking to see if we were stocked up on batteries, candles and food and praying to the electricity gods to stay put, stay on. I would imagine freezing to death on the couch, or starving to death in the kitchen or…you get the picture. Thirty-four years ago I simply gazed out dreamily, happy to be with Steve, never even imagining that this would be anything but some fantastic experience that we would enjoy together.
I sit here in my office knowing that it all happened to me but feeling like it’s a fairy tale that someone has told me that I’m only just remembering. That seems to be happening more and more lately—feeling that the events of my past life are only fairy stories and not my history. Most are vague and faded like the photographs on my wall that I’m having restored. Maybe I can ask the camera store if they can work on my memories as well.
I can clearly see us tramping off for groceries to the nearest STAR Market, but can barely remember what else we did with our days. And as our days turned into a week, while the plows worked to unearth us from our snow castles, I remember feeling bored but not bored enough to want to return to real life. It was too much fun staying home playing with friends, building snowmen, even digging each other’s cars out from under mountains.
Even as the stories began drifting in about people being stranded, people unable to get home, people with no power for days, people dying in the snow banks, we somehow never worried that any of that would happen to us. We were too young to think that this would be something other than a lark. How I miss that girl! During our latest Halloween snowstorm I spent the entire day worrying about the really important things in life like, how would I ever be able to go to work unless I dried my hair and how could I dry my hair without a hairdryer?
Is this what growing older is about? A double whammy of losing your memories and fearing life? In ’78 I saw people snowshoeing on the roads and wanted to rush out and join them. Now I gaze out of the window and feel old and too likely to break a leg if I dared try.
During snowstorms I no longer party or recall past parties, instead I watch our trees and wonder which one will break and land on the roof. I watch the driveway and worry about when the plow guy will come. I watch the electric lines and will them to stay up. I watch and worry and miss seeing what is right in front of my eyes—a life that should be lived in sharp Crayola hues and not worried to death.
Today, on this sunshine filled day, I have nothing to worry about. I will get up in a few minutes and enjoy my walk to the station in balmy February weather. But there is snow forecast for Saturday. Maybe I should go out and get myself some snowshoes before I remember to be afraid. And then I should go out and find some new memories.

All Through the Night

All Through the Night

I get up at 5:00 am every day to catch the 6:39 commuter train into Boston. That insane wake-up hour gives me time to shower, dress, eat and make it to the train with seconds to spare. Since I’m barely conscious at that hour I prepare everything I need for the morning the night before. Coffee is in the espresso maker, oatmeal waits in the bowl, even the milk glass sits waiting. If I could figure out a way to eat in the shower I would do it. If I wasn’t so prepared I would have time to dress or eat but not both and would probably walk out the door wearing two different shoes.

Knowing that I have to get up so early in the morning makes me a nervous sleeper. Each night I wake up five or six times to check the clock to see how many more hours of sleep I have left. It goes something like this:

6:30 pm: I prepare the next day’s lunch and breakfast. Lunch is always a celebration of the gustatory senses—a tuna, bologna or turkey sandwich. Of course the fact that I eat my lunch running from one thing to another means that I usually have no idea what I’ve just eaten anyway. There have been times when I have asked my secretary if she’s seen me eat my lunch because I have no recollection of doing so. She just sighs and points to the saran wrap filled with crumbs on my desk.

7:00 pm: Having completed all my preparations I head for the bedroom followed by my faithful companion, Snoopy. I grab our special blanket and a cup of tea and we settle in for a couple of hours of togetherness--if that’s what you can call me at one end of the bed and him at the other. He doesn’t want to actually snuggle or be near me, he just likes to know I’m there. I watch some TV and read for two hours until…

9:00 pm: When it’s time for the Snoopster to go for his final outing and me to go to sleep. Yes folks, I go to sleep week nights at 9:00, depressingly early, but if I stay up any later I go around the next day searching for my brain.

9:15: I fall into a wonderfully deep sleep guaranteed to rejuvenate me for the entire week.

9:30: I wake up feeling like I’ve slept for hours only to glance at the clock to see that I’ve been asleep for exactly 15 minutes. It will take me forever to fall asleep again.

9:30-10:30: Toss and turn trying desperately to find a position that doesn’t feel like every part of my body is lying on nails. I look at the clock hoping that maybe I’ve been asleep for hours without know it but no dice.

10:35: Finally fall asleep and manage to stay that way until…

10:55: When Steve lands in bed like a cluster bomb, throwing the covers and tossing himself around as if he were a crepe in a frying pan. He adds a few sneezes and grunts and voila! I am completely and utterly awake and ready to kill my bed mate.

10:55—11:30: Lie in bed dreaming up ways to torture my husband or at least wake him up. How can he sleep so deeply while I’m over here planning his untimely demise? I tell myself to relax and start counting something, anything-- sheep, enchiladas, kittens, to find some sleep.

12:38 am: Finally fall asleep again after having checked the clock at least a dozen times to see if I had just dreamt being awake.

2:00: The snoring concerto kicks in, bass section and all. I look over at mi amore, see that he is lying on his back so I give him a gentle tap on his arm (okay, maybe I whack him a good one but at this point can you blame me??) which is his signal to turn on his left side so that his snores will calm down to snorts and we can all get some sleep. I check the clock once again and utter some words that cannot be printed in a family newspaper.

2:30: The dog decides to meander in and begins to shake, stretch and then lick every single part of his body. The slobbery licks make me so nauseated that I threaten to dismember said animal unless he goes to sleep. He looks at me as if I have lost my mind.

3:38: I look at the clock and see that I have exactly one hour and 62 minutes left before I have to get up at 5:00. I try to count my blessings (enchiladas sure didn’t work) and all I can come up with is that I may be exhausted but at least the snoring and licking have stopped.

4:45: I finally fall into a deep, deep rejuvenating sleep.

5:00 am: My alarm goes off and when I realize that I have to get up I decide to ignore it and go back to sleep. At that point a cold nose pokes itself into my side demanding to be fed. It’s been a long day’s night.

Nerdvana

Nerdvana
A while ago I confessed that though I love Shakespeare, Arthur Miller and Chekhov, at the end of a long, stressful day all I want is a television show that helps me escape. I want to be entertained, taken completely out of my world and, if you can make me laugh, that’s a bonus. So I watch soap operas like Downton Abbey, science fiction like Dr. Who, beloved reruns from the 1980’s, and the occasional new show. Sometimes Lisa recommends programs that she loves but usually I come upon a show as I’m hopefully switching channels.
This year I’m hooked on The Big Bang Theory. Maybe the theme song sung by the Bare Naked Ladies caught me or maybe it was a snatch of scientific give and take between the characters, whatever it was I’m now a groupie. The show is about a group of young scientific guy-geeks who interact with the “normal” girl next door who has more common sense than all of them put together.
The characters have grown interesting. Originally the four guys had no clue how to interact with anyone of the opposite sex (in fact Sheldon had no idea how to interact with anything that had a pulse). Now they are at the point where one of them is engaged and two are in serious relationships. It’s also a kick that one of the actresses, Mayam Bialik, who plays a neurological scientist, is one in real life. Unfortunately I’ve learned more about science watching this show than from my days spent in high school science class.
When Mariel came home last month for a couple of weeks we continued a ritual that we had begun when she was last here—watching my new favorite show together. Last summer I had mentioned to her fiancé, Dan that I enjoyed the program. It turned out that he liked it as well so he began regaling Mariel about the funnier aspects. So she decided to join me to see what the fuss was all about.
So there we were: me, Mariel and Snoopy perched in front of the TV watching the trials and tribulations of Leonard, Howard, Rajesh, Sheldon and Penny. When some arcane bit of scientific information was included in a joke I would ask Mariel for clarification and then the show would become even funnier. But then suddenly Mariel started to laugh for no reason that I could understand.
“What’s so funny?” I asked her.
“I suddenly realized”, she said, “that the reason we like this show so much is because both Dan and daddy are also science geeks!”
I thought for a moment and knew she was right. Both were engineers who preferred to spend their time figuring out a problem with a piece of machinery or a computer to socializing with humans. Dan illustrated that the day that I asked him to download the Indiana Jones ringtone for me. My problem was that I couldn’t find it in the on-line i-crap store and so had no idea how to get it onto my phone. I figured Dan could do it in five minutes.
When I asked he gladly agreed. However an hour later he still had no success. For some reason he had to update my phone, my computer, my entire life before Indiana Jones could be persuaded to play his theme song on my phone.
“Apple always makes easy things difficult!” he told me. I told him that he was wasting his time, to stop trying because it just wasn’t worth it.
“Are you kidding?” he answered. “It’s the principle of the thing now. There’s no way Apple is going to win!”
So he spent the entire afternoon wrestling with that piece of bitten off fruit until finally he got it. Only a true nerd would do that. We liberal arts majors don’t have that kind of insane focus. I once saw Dan spend an entire day staring into his computer doing a homework assignment, barely moving until he finished. Very impressive and very scary!
And Steve? When he was in high school he was nerd captain, or as it was otherwise known, captain of the computer squad. Before that in elementary school he had been on the AV (audio-visual) squad, another geek infested group. Later we found out that Dan had been on that as well. They claimed that it was a great way to get out of class but Mariel and I knew better. It involved endlessly tinkering with machines and that was the very air they breathed.
Steve even had a white plastic pocket protector filled with pens, along with the white socks and black framed glasses to go with it. He was the height of geek fashion. In fact thinking back I guess you could say that he was a pioneer nerd, playing around with a computer the size of a classroom, solving equations with relish and playing the earliest computer adventure game with only a printer to guide his way. He got me caught up in that idiocy as well. We spent months trying to find the keys to various doors and swords to dispatch a never-ending stream of dragons, snakes and trolls.
So Mariel is probably right. We enjoy the Bing Bang Theory because those guys are basically our sweethearts—awkwardly navigating the social aspects of life but still the sweetest, truest guys around. May they live long and prosper!