Recipe for Sane Family Travel

And that's the wonderful thing about family travel: it provides you with experiences that will remain locked forever in the scar tissue of your mind.

Dave Barry

How does a family of eight travel to an expensive city and find a place to stay everyone can afford,  have everyone get to do what they want to do -- and no one hates each other at the end of the trip? Question before us a few months ago as we planned travel to NYC for youngest son's graduation.

Ingredients:
Husband/wife
Three sons
Two most significant others
Two uncles
Guidebooks
Google Maps
AirBB
NYC Subway
Citymapper


Step One: Go to AirBB and find an old brownstone in not the most popular neighborhood in Brooklyn.

Step Two: Eat at the airport after the long flight so no one is hungry while progressing to final destination. Study car services before getting there so you don't get highjacked into paying some outrageous price to get to your place of stay - and a car that arrives at the appointed time.

Step Three: Don't try to organize anybody other than yourself -- for whatever. Supply information on the subway, phone Aps for directions, Broadway plays, sports events, parks, gardens, museums, bus tours, etc., and let it play out on its own.

Step Four: Keep your cell phones on to send or receive texts every now and then that say, "Hey, we're here and gonna do this. Anyone want to join us?" If you feel like it. Meet in good people watching places - Bryant Park, the fountain in front of the Plaza Hotel, the yellow and purple egg at Rockefeller Center.

 

And while you are waiting, take a quick stroll through the bottom end of Central Park.

Step Five: Make certain where you are staying has a huge table in the dining room so all can gather at the end of the day, toss down their collected brochures, ticket stubs, found treasures, and share their tales of the day.

Tales which might have included

The Guggenheim

Food!

Baseball!

The theatre

Or more eggs.

Bike riding through Central Park

This old broad made it 7.3 miles around the park. This is me at the end.

Some of us, uh...

Brothers loose in the city.

Step Six:  Have a son who is a chef so he can come over and cook for you one night.

with the assistance of his sister-in-law - the only one who can keep up with him in the kitchen anymore.

while his dad and oldest brother do plate prep and cleanup.

And the rest of us fart around waiting for the food.

Which was well worth the wait.

Step Seven: Converse and enjoy.

There you have it. Recipe for successful family trip without scar tissue. 

Take that Dave Berry.

What's on Your 2014 Summer Reading List?

Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another’s skin, another’s voice, another’s soul.  

Joyce Carol Oates

Time once again to post my summer reading list. After years of doing this, I've only made it through the entire list once -- by year's end. I'm easily distracted for some of the very simple reasons I now list.

A new book that has just come out from a favorite author

More than a few trips to the library

Choosing from the stack that arrives at Book Club 

Grabbing one of the other twenty-five books on my To Be Read shelf

A trip to the book store or a late night perusal on Amazon

A backlog of New Yorker's requiring attention

The multitude of short story books that crowd my night table - Best of 2013, 2012, 2011 or poetry books or a Dorothy Parker reader or...

Often what is next on my list just isn't what I'm looking for at that moment. What can I say? I'm flighty and subject to a moment's whim. 

I need to revisit but I think there is a blog group that reads only from their To Be Read shelf in January or February. Probably would be a good idea for me to catch up on those that show up on my summer list year after year. Lakeside Musing? Was that you?

Alas, this summer's list.

The Interestings  Meg Wolitzer
Longbourn  Jo Baker
The Lowland  Jhumpa Lahiri
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao  Junot Diaz
Taft Ann Patchett
Written in My Own Heart's Blood  Diana Gabaldon
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle  Barbara Kingsolver
Of Human Bondage  Somerset Maughm
Sous Chef Michael Gibney
The Snow Queen Michael Cunningham
Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary of War Robert Gates
Outliers Malcolm Gladwell
The Mouse-Proof Kitchen Saira Shah
Honeymoon in Paris  JoJo Moyes

I also highly recommend these books by some of my fellow Austin WriterGrrls

Hip Girls Guide to the Kitchen  Kate Payne  A hit-the-ground running approach to stocking up and cooking delicious, nutritious, and affordable meals.

Twisted  Marjorie Brody Sarah Hausman must hide a secret--even from herself. If she acknowledges the truth, it will destroy everyone she loves.

Out of the Frying Pan Robin Allen  Health inspector Poppy Markham suspects murder when a popular chef buys an organic farm.

Skirts at War  Jennifer Newcomb Marine  - Overcoming dual-family conflict with proven strategies for creating peace at home.

Slow Family Living Bernadette Noll  75 simple ways to slow down, connect, and create more joy

Take My Husband Please  Kimberly Jayne  (Due out in August) A soon-to-be divorced real estate rookie's hot new love affair gets derailed when a series of blind dates turns her ex into the man she always dreamed he could be.

I'm always on the lookout for well-written smut in my summer reading so let me know if you have a good one. Meanwhile, I'm off to my hammock.

What's on your Summer Reading List?

The Places We Will Go

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures. 

Thornton Wilder

Last Friday my husband and I went to lunch at Betony -- a James Beard nominee restaurant in New York City. Right there on West 57th, just down the street from Carnegie Hall and a couple blocks from Central Park. For a girl from southern Minnesota and a boy from Pontiac, Michigan, I'm not certain we ever envisioned such an opportunity. But one must do what one must do.

After being seated at an incredible table with views of the entire restaurant with its ornate brick walls and towering bar shelves, intricate ceiling and wooden staircases, we perused our menus with delight. Appetizer choices of Hen's Egg Tagliatelle and Ham Hock, Rocotta Gnudi, or Pig's Head Terrine with Salsa Verde. A main course of Roasted Beef Tenderloin with potatoes and baby leeks or Sauteed Skate Wing or Poached Lobster with asparagus and almond. Desserts of Dark Chocolate with Earl Grey ice cream and Olive Oil cream or Amaranth with maple and banana.

We enlisted the waiter's help for our menu choices and then ordered some wine. Sat there sipping and taking it all in.

Two runners appeared with a carrot buttermilk soup. Sweet and tangy. Delicious. With that settling on our palates, I saw a couple flashes of white approaching the table and looked up to see the Executive Chef - Bryce Shuman - setting an appetizer before me. And someone behind him setting another in front of my husband. I shook the chef's hand with delight, but excused myself to rise with tears in my eyes to embrace the young cook standing behind him - our son, Ian.

Ian had no idea his parents were in the house. He was more than a little rattled when Chef Bryce yelled at him to get upstairs to help deliver plates. He grabbed the dishes wondering why he was carrying and not the runners he passed en route.

Too much fun.

After a quick acknowledgment of their being in the middle of service, they returned to the kitchen. If that incredible moment and the food were not savory enough, more surprise arrived when the Chef returned after the meal to tell us our boy was doing well in his work. We thanked him for the opportunity he'd given Ian. Incredible parent moment.

Check out my entree.

We weren't in New York City strictly for the fabulous food. We were there, with all our kids and a couple of uncles, to celebrate Ian's graduation from the International Culinary Center, formerly the French Culinary Institute. Yes, the last of three kids to graduate and begin their very own lives. Off our payroll!

Ian technically finished his classes in January and began his job as line cook at Betony in February.  Graduation was held at Carnegie Hall now. All the classes from the past year including culinary, pastry and sommelier participated and Bobby Flay gave the keynote speech.

Ian took a selfie from the stage.

 

And we took a few photos.

Pomp and Circumstance

Two of Ian's favorite chef instructors

Chef Jeff

Chef Henri

 

Proud Family

Mom and Dad

Earlier in this post I mentioned that girl from southern Minnesota and a boy from Pontiac. I can't speak for the boy, but I recall that little girl dreaming of boundless adventure. That an entire world existed beyond the boundaries of Mower County. That someday I wanted to see it, taste it, experience it, even though I wasn't certain how to make that happen. Or certain I had the guts.

A gratitude-filled ride it has been. Grateful that I found a partner that was eager to explore and supply most of the guts. That we were blessed with the opportunity to have these kids of ours and create a home base.  That they, each and every one of them, have taken us on adventures and road trips and exposed us to things beyond whatever I imagined way back when.

Ian's turn this round. We are most proud of you. Be Good. Do Well. Come home once in a while.

 

Let the ride continue.

How Many For Dinner?

To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly. 

Henri Bergson

Now that all the kids are off and independent, I'm trying to adjust to cooking for two. Difficult, as often at home and at the lake, the numbers at the table had a tendency to grow at any moment. I became adept at Stone Soup. Start at 4. Grow to 9, 12, even 18.

Things have changed. The realization that all our kids are indeed off on their own and financially independent is beginning to sink in. Through the years, seemed this time might never arrive, but now that it's here, it's taking some time to adjust and become aware of what might be ahead.

Easter Sunday I normally have crowds. This year - just my husband and me. No visiting college students or extended family. No friends from town. My sons that live in town, their significant others, and my husband and I will soon gather in New York City for youngest son's graduation. I figured with all that family togetherness ahead of us, the kids should spend Easter with their other parents.

I wasn't going to cook, but then decided that I must. Just because everyone was off in other directions didn't mean my husband and I shouldn't honor the holiday. Hell, we even made it to church!

But, as you can see, my measurements are off.  I had a meal prepared for many more than two.

That roast lamb was a tad more cooked than it appears in this photo. You had your golden beets and goat cheese, your heirloom tomato Caprese salad, roasted fingerling potatoes and your broccolini.  Strawberry shortcake for dessert and a nice bottle of wine.

The dinner was so good that we, in fact, had it again on Monday night. And Tuesday night. And although there is enough left for tonight as well, I think we're gonna eat something else. Good as it was.

The point of this story? Seemed like we were in that mode of almost getting to Empty Nest for so long. Kids going off to college, but not all of them gone at the same time. One kid coming back as one more left. Although they didn't require much from us, still, we were not completely deparented.

Now, with the youngest employed and financially independent like the others and no one living in the upstairs, it is not only safe to use the toilet up there, it's a little quiet as well.

Adjustments. Seems life is filled with them. Always an adventure.

Are Morning People Truly Better?

Night Owls Rock!

 Julie Sucha Anderson

I couldn't find an apt quote for this post so I made one up.

When I get up in the morning, it takes me a while to get going. I don't care to have a conversation with anyone. I need time to gather my brain. It took me a long time to get to sleep and, therefore, a long time to wake up.

I understand this about myself. My inner time clock works this way. No matter how I try to change it, even with 50 plus years of getting up at the crack of dawn, my sleep pattern cannot be changed. At night, I'm awake. In the morning, I struggle. 

If I have a defined place to be by a certain time, like teaching or an appointment (or for umpteen years raising babies and kids) I function fine once out of bed. I can do it. But on mornings when I can wake up at will, I tend to loll around, in bed. First I daydream with my eyes closed for a while. Then I might get a cup of coffee and grab my computer, my journal, the book I'm reading, and my phone. I retreat back to my bed where I sit upright and can see out my slider to the backyard.

I study the birds talking to each other as they flit around the trees. The squirrels chasing one another. Leaves blowing about the yard if there is a breeze. Today I can see the herbs sitting on my picnic table that need to stretch their roots in the newly tilled soil of my garden. I imagine them magically planting themselves.

I'm writing this post four hours after I awoke. I've had two cups of coffee, a breakfast of uncured Canadian bacon scrambled in two eggs with a dab of cheddar cheese. Salt and pepper. I've ordered the invitations for my youngest son's graduation, played four games of Solitaire on my phone, caught up with three of my Scrabble games, set up a time for later in the week to visit with an injured friend. Haven't touched my book and it's almost noon.

I have to say that although I have big plans for the day -- YMCA, garden center visits, planting, watching the last DVD of last season's Nurse Jackie, and probably a few other things in there -- I'm not unhappy that I'm still sitting here. In fact, I could probably last until about 3pm before finally moving my ass.

(As you can see, my last post on finding a rhythm has had no definitive effect on my day to day. I'm still doing free expression rhythming.)

I've read five or six newspapers online and a great article about the writings of my friend, Sorayya Kahn, whose new book City of Spies will be published in December.  I've also read an article in the Huffington Post by Sarah Klein that has me huffing.

As a non-early riser, the article lured me as it was entitled  "7 Things Morning People do Differently."  I hoped to be enlightened. To gather something that might give me new information in a positive forum. Alas, apparently early risers (Larks) are plain better people than the likes of me (Owls.)  And photos display Larks with sunny light surrounded with love.

I'm rather offended. Tongue in cheek.

Instead of going after the nonsense of that article, I'm going to have some fun with it. For I'm an Owl and since this attribute comes to me genetically, there is nothing I can do about it anyway. I have to continue to try to function in the perfect world of larks.

Here we go.

Does having to hit the snooze button a few times make me a not nice, unproductive person? Maybe for the first half hour of the morning, but seriously all I have to do is set my alarm to accommodate those 30 extra minutes and I get up on time. Genetically engineered misfortune overcome.

Is there a fog about me when I awake? You bet. Who wants to be clear-headed first thing in the morning anyway,  bombarded with the days events before you even have a chance to pee or brush your teeth?  The only kind of perking I want to hear in the morning is my coffee pot. Perky people scare me.

Are larks more conscientious?  Different words for conscientious: diligent, industrious, punctilious, painstaking, sedulous, assiduous, dedicated, careful, meticulous, thorough, attentive, hard-working, studious, rigorous, particular; religious, strict.

I don't even want to be some of those things - sedulous? punctilious? rigorous? strict? Sounds like the equivalent of a stick.

Larks get better grades. Okay, you got me there.

Larks are more productive. BS. Plain old BS. We just produce at a different time of the day.

Larks are less likely to be depressed. Really? All I have to do is drag my ass out of bed early and I won't ever suffer depression? Really?

I couldn't suppress my laughter (or disdain) at the last line of this article.

"In a small 2013 study, larks were less likely than night owls to possess "Dark Triad" personality characteristics like narcissism, Machiavellianism (meaning a person may be manipulative) and psychopathy, potentially because the darkness of night allows evening-type people to get away with dark deeds."

I'm thinking that was indeed a small study.

Dark deeds. Hmmmm. Sitting in my Lazy Boy at night, watching The Daily Show and The Colbert Report while knitting or reading the New Yorker or folding clothes or writing letters to friends, I'm really narcissistic, Machiavellian and psychopathic. Please don't tell my husband, the Lark, sleeping in the next room. Please?

My rant for this day ends. I'm off to do all those things I planned to do today, just getting a later start than a Lark.

I must ask you, though -- Who would you rather have fun with when your focus isn't being nice, productive, consciensious or perky? A Lark or an Owl? Who would you rather party with? A Lark who has to retire early so he can wake up with a sunny disposition? Or someone who can stay awake and contribute to the fun? Like me.

Finding Rhythm

rhythm  [rith-uhm]  
 noun
movement or procedure with uniform or patterned recurrence of a beat, accent, or the like.

rhythm
noun
1 the rhythm of the music: beat, cadence, tempo, time, pulse, throb, swing.
2 poetic features such as rhythm: meter, measure, stress, accent, cadence.
3 the rhythm of daily life: pattern, flow, tempo

Other than being a difficult word to spell, I find rhythm difficult to incorporate into my life. I relish when I'm in step with myself, but struggle when I'm out. Often I don't know just when to step in, if my lagging foot will catch up. Or drag. Or go way out in front.

Often, I only seem to circle. Safer there. Accomplishing what needs to be done in that little orb.

My husband has a rhythm. Monday through Friday, from the moment he awakes he has his movements down. From what time he makes his coffee, enters the bathroom, turns on the iron, the shower, puts his shoes on and greases his lips from the Carmex jar on his bed stand followed by picking up his gym bag, yogurt, and brief case.

I know not to get up while he is on his route. Days when I teach, I lie in bed until I hear the door to the garage close before I get up to begin my day. I would only get in his way, ruin his routine. His pattern. His rhythm. 

When he comes home from work, he gets the mail out of the mailbox, then tosses his dirty gym clothes into the basket in the laundry room, sets his brief case on the desk chair and his gym bag on the desk. He grabs a handful of almonds to hold him until dinner is ready. He then goes into the bedroom to change into his shorts or sweats (depending on the weather) and takes a seat on the couch, remote control for the TV in hand.

On the days I teach, the rhythm is handed to me. Nothing is required but to follow along, I do fine with that. But when left to my own devises, I struggle. I am not so defined. I have no patterns.

Perhaps it is my days as a mother - always prepared to turn in any direction. No chance to find a schedule of any permanency. Prepared to drop whatever I may have going to tend to the needs of others.

These days I don't have the constant jerk of something taking me out of sync and into another direction -- except for that man I live with. My job doesn't have a permanent work schedule - working different days of the week for different teachers. Different students so no routine there. If I do seem to find a pattern, things like Christmas, company, or a new project take me out of the norm. I find it difficult to get back in order. To make it all fit.

My home life has the rote activities such as cleaning and laundry, Grocery shopping and dinner making. Cleaning and laundry. Grocery shopping and dinner making.

But my days are not very well planned. I can't find a schedule. I'm faced with too many options. I gather my lists and don't know where to begin. Should I work on the taxes? Should I call the eye doctor? Should I wash my kitchen floor? Should I finish that blanket I was making? Should I get those files refiled? Should I go dig up my garden? What time should I go to the YMCA? Should I get a new blog post written? Should I finish getting my pictures on the wall?  Should I just sit and read a book? Should I get my novel out and seek the rhythm of that venture I so love?

Should I call my friends over for Happy Hour? Or should I play another game of Solitaire?

Too many choices. Too many requiring a rhythm that doesn't connect to the next. I don't know how to section out the day for some of those things on my list. How to get back in the more intense rhythm required for those that require immersion - like the taxes or the writing.

How do you get into a rhythm? How do you choose which rhythm? What will you allow to interrupt your rhythm?

It May Not Be A Snowstorm to You...

We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are.  

Anaïs Nin

Snow Day! Snow Day! Okay, not quite the snow days my family and friends are having in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Boston, and New York. In fact, they would probably laugh that our city shut down last night and this morning due to a dusting of snow and little layer of sleet.

For those of us that run barefoot many more days than not, this is a snowstorm. Just look at what I saw when I looked out the window this morning.

 

My neighbor had a white roof. 

 My garden in front had actual definition. I frowned thinking of my poor agapantha under that old sheet. "Be tough," I whispered.

Best shot comes from my picnic table. One can really tell how much snow has fallen by checking out the picnic table.

Wow! Look how high that's piled. 

Okay, I'm done trying to Wow you. You can stop laughing. I truly am still a Yankee in real life. Twenty-six years living below the Snowbelt hasn't erased my memories of a real snowstorm. I recall getting my car stuck in snowdrifts, shoveling snow until my back ached. Scraping ice off my windshield. Shoveling out my driveway, again, and again, and again, and again...

When I was a kid, I didn't know any better. The weather was what it was. I eagerly awaited the first snowfall, always asking my dad if that stuff on the neighbors roof was snow. "No, just frost," he'd say. Until that one day each year the depth of the color and consistency of the substance on the roof, and the lawn, and the street indeed declared that snow had arrived.

My older brother and I ached to sled at Skinner's Hill.  For the ice to freeze on the lagoon so we could use the new/used skates we traded for the previous year's now small size. (The bike shop switched to tables of used skates come every November.) 

Often we had to wait a few snowfalls to get enough snow on the hill to sled or enough cold days for the lagoon to be safe. Often we argued with our parents for more minutes to play outside at night -- the entire neighborhood of kids out in the cold air making snow forts and sledding in the yards. 

"Ten more minutes, please, Dad?" We pleaded, we begged. We offered to trade minutes off the next night for more that particular night. We peeled off our layers of socks and snow pants, our boots and wet mittens, snow covered hats and scarves, winter jackets and sweaters. With our faces scorched red with the cold and our noses running we stated our case. "Please, ten more minutes."

What the hell were we thinking?

I can't believe I walked every Minnesota morning to school, walked home for lunch and back to school for the afternoon. Then home again. I played outside until dinner and most nights went out again after. 

Even if I stayed at school for lunch, I ice skated. Our "recess" came with our lunch hour. The firemen would shovel off a square at all the elementary schools and shoot out water to form a rink. Bundled in my winter attire, I was far from being able to imitate Peggy Fleming on ice. But, my imagination made me believe I was her as I swirled and skated backwards.

Even moving to Colorado in middle school and becoming a snow skier didn't dim my zest for the cold and winter. That was just life. I didn't know any better.

But age and awareness always seems to come creeping. When I was a student at Michigan State and couldn't afford a bus pass winter quarter, I became more than aware of the cold. My classes always on the opposite end of campus from where ever I lived. No longer immune to the cold, I shivered.  Froze my ass off walking, each step swift and hellbent for the warmth found at the end of journey. Basically had no ass from walking so fast.

More years again in Colorado, then Utah and Connecticut bound me to the cold. I still skied. I still shoveled. I still shivered. One day in New Haven, while scraping ice off my windshield, a car came by and splashed slush all over my boots and coat. I looked up to the sky and took a vow that someday I'd live in a warm place.

Even though there were fingernail marks in the freeway all the way from Connecticut to Texas (my mindset of warmth was more of the southern California variety) I had to admit I was lured by the idea of pansies growing in my yard in winter.

I do have pansies in my yard. I will run barefoot again in a few more weeks. But, they don't make heaters here like they do in Minnesota. The high today will only be 34 degrees and I'm cold. I'm wearing two pair of socks and two sweaters. Sitting under a wool blanket. 

Last night I listened to the sleet hitting my skylight and awoke not to a winter wonderland this morning, but as close to it as one can get living below the snow line. 

I'm fixing to brave the cold to visit the grocery. Invited friends over for Chicken Chili.

Thinking I won't be hanging my sheets out on that line today. 

It's a SNOW DAY!

Why I'm Not at the YMCA -- and other tales

There is no truth.  There is only perception.  

Gustave Flaubert

I'm supposed to be at the Y. Sweating. I'm not.

I'm enjoying a morning at home. The Y is open every day, isn't it? How often does one get to enjoy a morning at home? Alone?

This is what I'm telling myself as I sit in my favorite spot - my bed. I have this view to my backyard  if I just lift my head ...

And this view, if I look to my right.

And all my crap spread out on the bed before me. Journal, book, phone, computer, coffee cup.  Lunch. What more could you want?

Well, there is that svelte body the Y reminds me I want.  And the gratitudes I haven't written yet today.  I'm also in need of a new journal for this morning I finished my old one and once again it is time to make a new one.

I've long been an advocate of journal writing, dedicated to the cause, anxious to write in it every day. Not only does it provide an avenue to bitch, but also a place to share my ideas, joys, novel notes, New Yorker covers, stickers ranging from tea cups to birds. An email or letter from someone I want to save. A hatred I want to rid from my brain. An event I want to remember. A plan to improve myself. Another plan to improve myself.

Yes, my journal pages are personal. I don't worry about what I've written for I'm fairly certain no one will ever read them. Anyone willing to peruse the pages would probably die of boredom and if they perchance came upon that one little nugget here and there, most likely they'll have flipped past it while yawning.

For years, before children and with children, I started journals. I don't know how many I had with only a few entries before I forgot about it. Five entries seemed to be a magic number before I no longer remembered the dedication I'd sworn to uphold. Finally, finally about 15 years ago I began a much more defined foray into my thoughts. I'd read where if you did something 21 times in a row, it would become habit.

I passed my newfound knowledge onto my mother as I sent her another pretty blank book to collect her memories and thoughts. "Twenty-one days in a row, Mom. That's all we have to do." (I also used that method to entice her to wear her seatbelt. Twenty-one times, Mom. Then it will become habit. "I just don't like being confined.")

Need I add that when I cleared my mom's house I found most of those journals I'd sent - complete with empty pages. However, there were many a plain old spiral notebook filled with incredible gems of her thoughts and past.

To each her own in the type of journal, but I digress. The point of this story is that I didn't get to the Y because I wrote my three morning pages in my journal this morning and I finished the last available page. Twas time to put it up and create a new one.

I keep old journals on the top shelf of a bookcase in the bedroom.

Up there on the top shelf. That black binded stack. Here's another reason why I know no one will ever read my old journals. None of the men in my family would look up that high. My husband sleeps in this room every night for sixteen years and he probably doesn't even know there is a bookshelf in there. Even though that's his baseball signed by somebody famous on the second to top shelf. (Okay, he probably knows that is there but chances are that is all he sees on that shelf.)

That's my Michigan State football music box. Go Green!

Anywhoo, when I went to add my newly finished journal to the shelf I discovered the stack was crammed to the top. Therefore, I needed to move that stack to this box in my closet (which I'm also certain no one in my family knows is there. See, you all know stuff now that those closest to me don't.)

Before adding them to the box, I spread them out on my bed and leafed through a few of them.

What I found surprised me. Even though it was a healthy stack of writing, the journal I'd completed before this one today encompassed almost two years of time. That the one I had finished this morning only the past year. That the other sixteen covered the three years before that.

I knew that the last few years I'd become remiss. That events in my life had left me cold for words. That those years, although filled with many joys, had been hampered by a few deaths. But still, so few words during a time of such activity and emotion.

I blame my Midwestern upbringing.

Something about stiff upper lips. Something about don't brag and, most certainly, don't whine.

Okay, I get that. But it never occurred to me that that thinking would transfer to my personal thoughts in a journal. That the times that rang high through graduations and weddings I couldn't translate into words on my morning pages. Having too much fun. Or that the events and emotions leading up to and after the deaths of my parents wouldn't convey either. Much too painful.

Perhaps it was my Midwestern upbringing in regard to the bragging. Perhaps I was just a chicken shit for the whining.

At any rate, it is time to make a new journal. Obviously I make my own. Here are my ingredients:

Empty pages - spirals, black-spotted line or blank book
Paper - either scrapbook paper, old wrapping paper, newspaper, whatever appeals on the day

 

Construction paper for inside flaps

Ribbon for a placemarker

Spray glue

Scissors

And there you go. A new journal.

Here are my choices today, always based on mood, for my next journal.

 

Butterflies. For new beginnings.

The Shortest Day

The days are short
The sun a spark
Hung thin between
The dark and dark. 

John Updike, "January," A Child’s Calendar, 1965

I'm glad today is short, for I've worked very hard and I'm tired. At day's end I watched the sun finish its retreat into winter, and then set. I sighed. Tomorrow's sun will begin retracing its path, right, across the lake -- to its summer's end rest stop.

For today, I say, rest sun. You have done well.

Shopping Wears Me Out

Efficiency is intelligent laziness.  

David Dunham

I should be writing my Christmas letter. I didn't get one out last year. Or cards. Can't seem to get my fingers to type beyond, "Merry Christmas" though. I'm tired. I've been shopping all day.

Dear friends are laughing now. They know I don't go shopping all day. They know I'm good for two hours at most and then I've either found a bar or escaped home. But, no, to you naysayers. I shopped for a good seven hours today. All that time someone else might spend fighting crowds and looking for parking and elbowing one's way through the check out line. Hmmmph! Nuts to that. I'm almost done.

I shop from my chair. Catalogs galore. A book bag full of them. Great deals online. Added bonus -  much fun to open my front door and there everything is. Right on my front porch. Don't even have to haul it from the car.

Lazy? Maybe.
Exactly what everyone had on their lists? Maybe. Maybe not.
Guaranteed to be fun opening it? You bet. 

Why? The hundreds of catalogs delivered to my house offer a plethora of items for consideration. I get catalogs for everything from underwear to dog food. I get weird T-shirt catalogs. Weird yard art catalogs. Cooking utensils and electronic foot massage catalogs. Art museum catalogs. Wine, cheese and pear catalogs. College flag catalogs. Flower and seed catalogs. Give a herd of sheep or a gaggle of geese catalogs.

Every day beginning in September my husband arrives from the mailbox and a loud bang hits the kitchen table. "Here's today's load," he says.

If I didn't recycle, I'd feel guilty. It isn't all my fault for once you order something from a catalog, Those That Hold Your Address pass it on to everyone else. Pretty soon everybody and their brother who sells something sends you a catalog. Or, if your mother passes on and her mail comes to your house, Those That Held Her Address now switch to yours. As well as all those charities she contributed to for the past 85 years.

My mailman assures me he doesn't hate me. I normally give him a homemade sweet bread for Christmas. I'm thinking this year maybe he needs something a little extra. Any ideas? After all, my mailbox is only so big so there are times, often, when he leaves his jeep and comes up to the door to hand me my newest load. Or leaves it discreetly on my porch swing.

So, back to where I was. Oh, yes. Shopping. I'm in pretty good shape. Just need to order a few fruit and wine or coffee or English muffin or cookie baskets to out of town family and I'm good. Leaves me open to begin the quest of writing that Christmas letter, addressing the cards, digging out the advent wreath, making the bread, meatballs and cookies. Oh, yeah - decorating the house. Planting the hyacinth bulbs curing in my refrigerator. Putting up the tree. Wrapping those gifts after they arrive at my door. Planning the meals. Cleaning the house for out of town company. Remembering what this season is supposed to be about.

Those of you who do it know what I'm talking about. Merry Christmas to you.

My mind is now fully overwhelmed. Thinking I'd better go get a glass of wine.  And dream about...

... December 26.