The Other Side of the Ocean

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

state of the ocean 

Applause. It is expected.

Folks. Here she is, the author of ocean.

I took a drive into nowhere today. How did it happen? I was being pampered by Jason, the hair person supreme, who has taken to telling me wonderful things about my hair, my age, my future… (Himself? Well, he is going through a difficult phase).

I left his place drunk with gratitude but saddened by the injustices of it all.

The sun rapidly sunk into some comfortable billows of low lying clouds.





A brief period of being away from it all was enough. Within minutes, I was back in the urbe-urban setting of Madison.

I met a friend, we drank cabernets and cosmos (I the latter). I waited for the crowds to flood the premises, none came and so I retired, brushing aside the world. I posted this – I am incapable tonight of being more expansive.

So be it.

Monday, January 30, 2006

prettiness in the ordinary 

I hardly left the loft today. It was an immensely tiring day as I began work at 4, just to catch up. I did not catch up. But almost.

What held me back? Several things.

First, inspired by yesterday’s poke around downtown condos (the ultimate Madison urban experience), I rearranged furniture. No kidding. Everything is now at an angle to its neighbor. I really got carried away with the idea. The TV is at an angle to its stand. The coffee table is at angle to the carpet. The chair is at an angle to the side table. And the couch is at an angle to the whole lot of them.




When you think your life is not moving fast enough, rearrange your interior space. I can’t remember when I had such fun pushing things around. Probably not since my daughters were in strollers.

Secondly, I decided it was time to cook soup. You know, to counter the bleak skies outside. One of my favorites is oven-roasted tomato soup. It requires an at home presence on account of the roasting. What should not happen is for you to decide to leave in the middle of the roasting project to get olives at your local Fraboni’s Italian deli. Because then on the way back you are likely to stop at Blockbuster, you know, for the hell of it, and then lo! They happen to have a copy of the Constant Gardener which you have wanted to see. But tell me: has anyone ever just gone into Blockbuster and not canvassed all four walls of new releases? I haven’t. That, of course, took time.

Which made me all too late to take out the roasting tomatoes. No matter. The more roast, the richer the flavor – is what I always say.

And a photo of roasted tomatoes is, to me, up there with the Monalisa. Maybe not my photo, but just in general. Roasted tomatoes are a dreary day’s godsend.



Thirdly, I corresponded with Donna Flora. Donna Flora lives in Sicily. I don’t even remember how I unearthed her. She has a friend, Donna Donatella, who in turn has Internet. So Donna Flora hikes over to Donna Donatella’s and we touch base in this way.

The issue? Donna Flora has a room I will be renting for a few days this Spring. That is fine and well, but I want Internet access. (You got it, for Ocean reasons.) And so I set Donna Flora on the mission of finding a way for me to connect out there in the middle of nowhere. If our confusion of Italian and English translates to what I think it does, I am set. But it took not a wee amount of time.

My days are so unruffled right now. It’s as it should be. Calm is good.

Sunday, January 29, 2006

jewels 

I was telling someone yesterday that I do not wear jewels. I ask for no diamonds, nor gold, not even pearls. A pair of earrings, I'll put on those, but that is all. This never impresses anyone, as few of the people I hang with are different in this regard.

Yet it cannot be said that I do not indulge whimsy. Mine is and always has been travel. At no time will this be more evident than in spring, when I will basically live elsewhere for several months. Jewels of a different nature.

This coming weekend I am traveling as well (though not nearly as far as in spring). I am going to Arizona. The last time I was in Arizona was two years ago (same purpose: a reunion with law school friends). I was introduced then to precious stones used in jewelry, as there was a gem exposition in Tucson at the time of my visit. I did not buy jewels, but I did befriend an Afghani guy, who followed the gem show in his truck. He sold carpets that his uncle made back in Afghanistan. I bought one tiny one. Each time I glance down at it, I think: this came from a gem exposition.

Last night I was at a birthday party. If friends were to bring beverages to my birthday party, they would know to bring wine. Maybe one or two would bring cosmo fixings. For this celebration, the beverage of choice was one that I know little about. I sampled. All good, and especially for the fantastic color they cast on the table in the evening. Gold.





This afternoon I accompanied a friend who is contemplating a move downtown. I am all about supporting those who want to move downtown. We looked at beautiful units in an older building, a place that reminded me of the fifth avenue unit I lived in as a young au pair in New York. They are such perfectly constructed gems. Worth so much more than new places that flash wealth at the beginning but eventually lose their gloss (and value).

It was clear that there was one optimal one for her. Btw, it is not the one with this view:





Why did I take note of this view and what’s with the pink box? That’s the warehouse where I’m living these days. Those three windows are my three windows.

Are jewels and gems synonymous? They should be. Are they?

Saturday, January 28, 2006

why does a chicken do the things she does? 

And what is the definition of a chicken anyway? A person who faces her first hill of the season and tells Mr. B: forget it. I’m walking.

I biked far yesterday afternoon. Errands pushed me to the now distant west side.

Ed, come ride with me. I want company.

We set out on a brilliant sunny day. Thermometer topped fifty for sure. January in Wisconsin.

Mr. B can’t keep up with Ed’s fancy racer. The thing is, I like Mr. B’s easy manner. Mr. B can navigate streets like no other. Still, I think I am a groggy pedaler on the rural Old Sauk hills. Adding to my ridiculously slow pace is my habit of stopping to take pictures.

Burning question for my cycling friend: why is it that you don’t spend money on clothes but have this monster bike and biking shoes and an electric air pump? All you need is latex pants.
You will never see me in latex pants. Ever.
Good.

It is a beautiful landscape.

I understand the university’s sheep expert (we have a sheep expert??) keeps his herd here. They’re out today, getting fat on scruffs of dried grass. (Of course, I don’t really know what they’re eating, but what else causes them to bury their snouts in the ground?)






I have a friend who lives around here. He makes furniture for galleries and rich people on Michigan Avenue. Want to see?

We turn off toward a barn, converted into a workshop. The space is dazzling. The tools alone make you believe you are in the presence of a skilled master. With a bent toward orderliness.





The crafted furniture is exquisite. I mean, beyond exquisite. If I had a single piece I would get rich selling tickets for people to come and look at it.



Dick in his studio, with chest

So what is your current project?
Actually I’m in between things. Occupying myself with a few chickens we recently acquired. Come look.

Here, life is beautiful…Even the chickens are beautiful.






big bird?






Sadly, nothing that we lawyers do is this creative, I say this wistfully as I stare at Dick’s portfolio of finished pieces.
Now wait. My favorite TV show is about the law these days. So don’t knock the creative impulse there.

I once said that I am in awe of people who manifest creative brilliance in some domain of their lives. The trouble is, hanging around giants can often make you feel, well, small.

Friday, January 27, 2006

reunion 

Coming together after a separation. Family reunion, high school reunion, camp reunion, recognized fora for reconnecting.

Torts small section reunion.

Remember when I bet you at the beginning of the semester that you would do well?
You owe me a drink! I did not do that well!
Let’s discuss what’s well...

During winter break I did nothing. So strange, from everything to nothing.
I remember my law school days for this: the break after a semester. Where you do nothing. Never again did I have nothing to do.

Your exam, I ran out of time, you know that, don’t you? I knew the stuff. There wasn’t enough time.
There never is enough time for all that you want to say or do.
I didn’t mean to get heavy here.
I meant to say yeah, I knew that.



Ocean author turns pink

Thursday, January 26, 2006

detour 

A difficult class to teach today. Everything touches on everything else. The law is confusing. New developments, daily almost.

After the lecture (filling an 80 minute slot perfectly, with 30 seconds to spare for the proverbial: are there any questions? – as if I could respond then), I am spent.

I want a country walk. Sunny, forties, perfect.

But I am fragmented, torn between demands. It’s no use. Walking will not calm me.

But a detour might help. A two-block sidestep puts me on Union Terrace. Curious. In the fifties, students start wearing shorts here. In the forties, will they bring sack lunches to the lakefront?

They do not. Terrace chairs are stacked in tight rows, chained to each other.



winter terrace


The sun is too weak. Useful only for the shadows it throws on strips of snow.



winter sun


One person dares to go out on the lake. Sit down. Put on skates. One person.



winter daring


The rest of us are in limbo: caught between stacked chairs and thinning ice. Between good walking weather and demands, sucking us into a less sun-drenched sentiment.

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

overload 

Does someone sitting late at night in her office, wanting desparately to finish an overload of to-do tasks for the day, but taking a minute out to photograph her fantastic teeny bird collection and reflection of self in large window -- does that person appear to be the type that would write a nice and thoughtful post for her blog?

No she does not.




I do want to reflect on one thing. I teach a seminar. Most of what I talk about is pulled and synthesized by me. It does not exist in written form. So I tell them, come to class. You must come to class. It is imperative that you come to class.

And then, because I want some teeth to these statements, I add: you will lose grade points if you miss more than one class.

So of course that invites disease and illness of close relatives and moot court competition conflicts and every other reason invented and realized that leads to that occasional skip.

I tell them -- be grateful! I present materials never before read by man woman or child. You will learn. Come, come students! Listen attentively. Play computer games if you must, but come and listen! You are so fortunate! At a university visited by me last week-end, professors who did not have published materials to work with put together packets that looked like this:


overload

And they come. And they listen. And they play computer games. And I really don't care that they do. As long as they come. Am I a professorial wimp?

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Confessions of a fresh and honest narcoleptic 

Monday, January 23, 2006

confessions of a repressed fresh and honest food fundamentalist 

Sunday, January 22, 2006

from New Haven: take flight 

A day to wrap things up here on the east coast. Daughters are easing back into their own habits and routines. Parents are coordinating schedules in anticipation of evening flights back to the Midwest.

I am itching to walk. Pace outside, face the sun, take rapid steps, get that feeling of something coming to an end out of my system. Walk, briskly, walk already!

Opposition was strongest before breakfast. But then Bella’s platters were put before us…


blueberries inside, strawberries on top

Suddenly, faced with the possibility of returning to a closet of ill-fitting clothes, everyone wanted to stretch and saunter.


It’s easy to forget that New Haven is on the Sound. The oceanfront is somewhere beyond the city’s highways and warehouses. You can’t see it, smell it, access it. Yet a mere two highway exits away, there is the West Haven promenade.

Sandy stretches, coves, inlets, sandpipers, gulls, sea shells, and the ocean water, positively sparkling on this sharp day.



shimmering



beach moment (is it January?)



take flight


We follow a long stretch of sand out to cliffs. Edgy cliffs, cliffs with a sharp side to them, cliffs with a personality! Climbing the rocks, we are mesmerized. In crevices we find hundreds of shells. Birds dive toward us. Ha ha ha, you can’t fly! The water is calm, the water is wide...



so many shells...


The water! Wait, the level seems to be changing. What happened to the stretch of sand connecting us to the mainland? What do you mean, disappearing rapidly? What do you mean gone?



erasing


How the winds are laughing,
they laugh with all their might…

Like a swallow has learned to fly? No, not us, there, rooted to the ground. We haven’t the bodies for it. Only in our heads. Or with the help of some monster airplane. Otherwise – no wings. Just feet with very wet pants and shoes.




submerged, distant now. such quick changes. wings -- wings help. other options? move quickly, get wet. or sink. or swim.

Saturday, January 21, 2006

from new haven: adjusting 

A gala night. Roomba food and Claire's cake, gifts and kisses, candles. True, my girl turned twenty-one a day ago, but her’s is a protracted celebration. She is adjusting to our visit. She is willing to party for a few more days.



She was born on the coldest Wisconsin day of the century. And she kisses childhood goodbye on the warmest Connecticut January ever. A girl of extremes. The superlatives that I would insert here would leave her blushing.


Looking out of the hotel room now, I think about the first trip here some seven years ago, when I helped my older girl, her sister, move for the first time to attend college. They both share the city now, but back then, kicking that first bird out of Wisconsin and pushing her to stay out east felt difficult, to say the least. That she adjusted well is beside the point. It’s my own adjustment that kept me up at night.

The view outside is not all about Yale. The right corner spires are church spires that haven’t a thing to do with the university (the left side, though, is university through and through). Yet who would doubt that this is Connecticut.





And so is this:





It’s a place you can walk to in less than an hour from New Haven’s downtown. And if ever there is a day for walking! Of course, the riverbanks are dormant. It’s January, come on, how can I expect the warmth to be anything but an illusion, a cheat, a tickle and reminder of what it will be like three months from now.








On the way back the girls (can I call them that still? No? Okay, let me begin again:) On the way back the adult daughters lead us to a place that is not a flower shop, not a café, not a take-out food shop, but all the above. I would kill for this in Madison. I would even adjust and start eating lunches, if they could be like the one wolfed down here.

Naturally, I had to make a spectacle of myself by photographing that, which I would only have great lust for:











…before settling down to what I would actually consume.









We are moving to America for a few years, I was once told. We’ll be changing homes, back and forth. You’ll have to adjust to life there, then back here again.
Really? I can deal with that.


Look outside, it feels like spring, here, in Connecticut. I hear it snowed in Wisconsin. The walk to work will seem long and cold there again. The daughters – far again, the lunches less tantalizing, the work mounting. The ice boats cracking the lake, the granola and berries in the morning predictable and satisfying. Back and forth, back and forth.

Friday, January 20, 2006

in a fog 

Thursday, January 19, 2006

gulp 

I no longer have babies.
My littlest one turns twenty-one today.

A day to look back at old photos...
And to remember why I love her more than roses.







Happy birthday, little one.

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

three gifts 

In the last day or so, I received two gifts of a material nature. One expands and contracts, is snazzy and sleek, German-made, steel gray in color. The other is soft, with large holes. It is handmade, blue, equally useful and pleasing in design.

Today it was my turn to buy a gift. My choice was pearly white in places, small by comparison, perhaps not very useful, but still marking a change that is soon to take place in someone's life.

Gifts. I want to say they are an exquisite idea. I am reviewing these three over and over in my head, I think of the accompanying words, spoken, or written, and in the third case -- about to be spoken and written, and I want to say -- if only the givers (and soon the receiver) knew how much more has been said because something was given along with words. Sometimes words benefit from an added boost.

I'm sure you'll be able to figure out which is what, though maybe not... My close-ups are meant to obfuscate the obvious:



rubbed steel


blue knots


pearly white

Tuesday, January 17, 2006

the interpreter 

Monday, January 16, 2006

come sail away, come sail away, come sail away with me 

Ed has these friends. These friends have ice boats. Ed, ever mindful of the fact that I am never as happy as when I have something to shoot (in the digital sense), calls friends and asks if we can come out – he’ll sail, I’ll take photos. Friend says to Ed: let’s put her on the ice boat. I’ll teach her to ice sail.

Ed knows that my one sailing experience took place this summer, on Lake Mendota, where I learned nothing much, finding solace and comfort against the choppy waters, in huddling in the back corner and counting the seconds until we docked. Some of the longest hours of my life.

Ed’s a shrug-shoulders kind of guy. If friend wants to teach Nina how to ice sail, that’s life for you.

Not to worry. I am not a mere slip of a girl out there on the ice. I am equipped! Friend (call him Scott, for the heck of it) makes me wear helmet and life vest and tough-guy gloves.

Why the life vest?
Oh, it will make you feel more secure. The ice is actually still about 6 inches thick. Don’t mind the cracks. Not much can happen there…



I'm prepared

Man, this thing is speeding! Wait, did I pay attention enough? How do you STOP it? Turn to the wind. Look at the little thread, it shows you the direction of the wind. Okay, it’s from there. What the hell does that mean? Let me just turn this thing around and hope the wind dies…




stayin' alive


Addictive! This sport is absolutely cooler than cool. True, it was a perfect day for it.

Afterward, while others sail, I borrow a pair of skates and go visit a fishing party in the middle of the lake. They have their Weber grill out on the ice and are waiting for the fish to bite. So far, it looks like dinner is going to be beer and chips.

Skating back, I see the cracks, I feel the soft patches of ice, melting under the strong sun.

At dinner, relaxed, drinking wine now, waiting for the steaks to grill outside, I notice the jump rope on the table.







You’re exercising with that?
No, Scott answers. I always take it with me. In case I go under. See the nails? I can use the handles to crawl out onto the ice.

Thanks for sharing. Glad I knew nothing of this while speeding on thinning ice.
Don’t worry. I work the volunteer rescue patrol. We would have found you within five minutes.

I think how slow time passes when you are underwater in Wisconsin in January for a whole five minutes.

[I have to end with a note of absolute truth: this afternoon was awesome. Get Scott to teach you ice sailing. What, you don't know Scott? Watch for the auction on behalf of the Jefferson County Humane Society. You can bid on ice sailing on his little boat. No question, it's a total high.]

Sunday, January 15, 2006

swooshing 

Skiing and I, we go back a long way. I was on wooden boards before I could say a single word in English.

But it hasn’t happened here, in Madison. I hardly ski. In fact, that’s too generous a statement. Basically I do not ski except in the most extraordinary of circumstances.

There are many reasons for it and I intend to explore hardly any of them. I will say this: when I moved to Wisconsin I’d have this conversation about skiing and I'd get all animated and I would shout with great exuberance “yes! yes! I do ski!” only to find out that the person was talking about cross country.

People who downhill don’t get people who crosscountry.

I mean, what’s the thrill? You want to walk through the woods, just walk through the woods. Why do you need boards and poles?

Still, I am loath to knock in any significant way this weekend’s extravaganza, geared to make Madison, yet again, the capital of year-round-fun: the “ski around the Square” event that took place yesterday and today.

Problem is: no snow. We are experiencing a January with weird weather.

But hey, I am in Madison, a city teeming with Scandinavian uff-da or uff–ya or some such thing, and so suddenly, there appear truckloads of snow piled all around the Capitol, so that anyone can clip on the boards and ski.

I myself did not.

I was plenty impressed with the people who went around and around and braved the dirty slushy snow, but somehow I failed to see the point. Then again, it could be that I’m suffering from my usual cross-country inertia and apathy, failing to see the glamour of swishing up and down a trampled, snow-laden path.

Plus I had a bunch of exams to finish grading. A nearby café with unlimited strong stuff of the caffeinated nature, served up until 1 am seemed like a much sounder idea.



green grass, gray snow...



...and a strong brew

Saturday, January 14, 2006

hostile takeover 

I’m waking up. The sun is out there. The temps are hovering in the thirties. There’s no question. It’s a day for rescuing the prairie.

We show up late on the Ice Age trail, north of Madison. You’re supposed to be eager and raring to clip and prune at 9. At 8:30 I’m still tampering with my stove-top espresso maker and stuffing granola into a baggie.

By the time we arrive at the designated meeting place, the gung-ho types have long gunned up to the savannah grasslands, sheers and all. We kind of take it slowly. I mean, such a beautiful day! I munch granola, take a photo or two.

Half a dozen eager prairie rescuers are ready to clip around the Trail.

It’s mostly honeysuckle and cherry we want to get rid of.

Honeysuckle and cherry? Sounds pretty to me. I planted honeysuckle and cherry trees in my yards of the past. What do I know.

So clip it low to the ground and paint it blue.

Are we even making a dent? Looks hopeless to me. Lots of clumpy things up and down the hill.

These stumps? They’re cedar stumps. We got rid of those last year.

So I wonder if cedar is a bad tree. I guess so. I'm so uninformed. But I do indeed want to see the prairie restored. I like the idea of pushing back excess growth and finding flowers again.

Come out in May. You’ll see the fruits of your labors: violets and shooting stars everywhere.

Someone else will have to witness the fruits of my labors. I’m on the other side of the ocean then.



into the sun: looking down from the Ice Age trail



into the sun: gold and blue



driving back: farmland and one old house



rewarding hard work: blueberry cheesecake at Sophia's

Friday, January 13, 2006

weary traveler 

As I make arrangements to rent a room in a French village for several weeks this spring, I am asked to send over a deposit to secure the deal. Pas de probleme, I say. Euros you shall have.

Up the hill I trudge to the old financial giant that has held onto my money for some quarter of a century now. [In fact, I am actually in the process of writing out check number 18,500 from my checking account there. Do you know anyone who has written over 18,000 checks from one lousy little checking account? That’s banking loyalty for you. Indeed, when I wanted to switch to a credit union because I became more with-it and politically correct over the years, I did not do it for the sole reason that I liked my high check numbers. Stupid? Yes, but that is not the subject of the post.]

The point is that I walk over to this major financial institution and am told that it no longer deals with foreign currency. If you want a foreign check made out to your favorite French village homeowner, why sure, okay, they will take care of it for you (at a fee), but they will have to outsource it. And you’ll get the check in several days.

Outsource it? That sounds like asking cheap labor in India to do it for you. Surely, I am not getting my check for 166 Euros from India? Do we really have such low demand for international dealings here in my home town that we're outsourcing Euro transactions to distant places?

Suddenly, I feel like I live far away from everywhere.

This weary traveler is going to end with two photos, taken seconds ago from my window here at the loft. Then off I go, eventually ending the evening at the Weary Traveler, in fact. If you’re there later this evening, look for me. I’ll be the one groaning about banks without an eye toward borders. Or the need to cross them.



looking out my window as I write this...



...tonight, on Friday the 13th

Thursday, January 12, 2006

hooky 

lessons

What are doing?
Working. What are you doing?
Working. But it’s fifty degrees outside. Warm enough for your trial run.

So, before I teach you how to ride this thing, can you remember that there is a hand brake and a foot brake and you should use both?
What’s that?
The clutch. Maybe you should stay with just first gear today.

I meant to put it neutral! How did it jump to second? And why is the damn gas pedal in the handle bar? !

Ed and the art of motorcycle maintenance. Nina and the art of relying on someone else to maintain anything mechanical given that she knows nothing about machines.

So there are two gas chambers...
I listen patiently. I need to know this stuff. The intent is for me to be able to manage any old wreck of a motorbike this spring in rural France. I’m to work there in quiet surroundings for weeks on end. All I need is a village (found one), a set of rooms (found them), a local hero willing to set me up with the Internet (done), and a motorbike to get me places (working on that).





bright skies and promises

No question. Today’s sun fills your soul with winter warmth. We pause to watch a metal sculptor load his pieces onto a truck for an exhibit.

She’s sunbathing, I think.





On Lake Waubesa, the ice is cracked and puddles of water are forming on the surface. Big Ed walks out a few feet onto the lake. The ice remains firm. Little me follows. It cracks and I see my shoe getting wet. You weakened it, that’s why!






And then, suddenly the wind turns cold. I take pictures from the back of the cycle as we speed back toward Madison. The sun again. Making a painting out of winter trees.

And then the moon. Framed by the knuckles of the limbs, striking against the perfectly clear sky.

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

everything’s better with blue bonnet on it 

Maybe only one or two readers are old enough to remember this little ditty from our b&w TV screens of the early sixties. You had to imagine that there was a blue bonnet on the cute little thing pictured on a box of Blue Bonnet Margarine.*

I thought of that bonnet on this day when the sun finally broke through. I mean, it was not a break-through of a drop-dead gorgeous variety, but it was pretty good. The photos below tell me that against the rays of the sun or a blue sky, even gnarled trees look okay.


*You know, I think we’ve lost something over the decades: the old ad jingles were such peppy little numbers. They encouraged us in our pursuit of happiness (double you pleasure, double your fun…); they helped us belt out our feelings of anger and hostility (rolling heads, rolling heads, rolling all the way…), our zest for life (I’m a pepper, he’s a pepper, she’s a pepper, we’re a pepper); they told us it’s okay to feel inadequate (sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don’t), and to dream big in our love life (oh, I wish I were an Oscar-Mayer wiener, that is what I'd truly like to be, 'cause if I were an Oscar-Mayer wiener, everyone would be in love with me).



rays, finally



blue bonnet on it, or at least around it

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

I’ll make an honest woman out of me if it’s the last thing I do… 

It may be the last thing I do.

Truthfully, I want to be an honorable person, I do. I want to do right by my family, my friends, my community. I want to pay bills on time, carry no credit card debt, turn in forms and papers ahead of schedule.

But intent matters not at all in life. It’s all about result.

During the last 24 hours I found that only the debt-free credit card remains on my list of virtues. I’ll give just one example of my fall from grace. The others are too embarrassing to blog about. But this one is typical of the whole lot of them:

Yesterday, a friend was giving me a lift to the gym (noble! I went to the gym!). I asked that he drive by a mailbox so I could dump there a whole stack of bills, timely paid, a week in advance. I get out, kiss the envelopes farewell and throw them down the blue monster mouth of the corner mailbox. Back in the car I hear my friend say “sure is a pain with the postal rate change going into effect today.”

Postal rate change going into effect today? Today?

[Q posited to the USPS: what will happen to all my bills, sent with 37 cent stamps? Answer given in that bored voice you reserve for people you hate: we will notify the recipient that they can pay the missing two cents. Otherwise, if they refuse, we will keep it at the Post Office for ten days, then return it to sender. Oh come on! MG&E, SBC, Charter Com, Verizon, etc. – are they at all going to sign over two pennies for the pleasure of receiving my bills?! Thanks, USPS. Even car rental agencies and credit card companies give grace periods.]

Leading a barely-one-step-ahead-of-the-law, devil-may-care kind of life was much easier. I was pretty good at that. This virtuous stuff sucks the life out of me, really it does.

(I took the picture below because it just was so in my face with its ugliness: bare gnarled branches, not a speck of green, not a flake of snow. Weird month. Really weird.)

Monday, January 09, 2006

sticks in the air 

Sometimes I know how to throw many sticks up and catch them brilliantly as they fall. With my eyes closed. I'll watch a movie when cooking a meal, talk to a person on the phone, all the while keeping an eye on the Mozilla Inbox. And still there will be room for other things. Like maybe learning a language or something.

But I cannot write posts unless there isn’t anyone within ten miles of my space and I am enveloped in total silence. At the very most, I’ll tolerate some constant noise like the buzz in a café, or a CD playing one song over and over again.

And I cannot frame photos and be socially engaged in any way. When I take out the camera I want no enticing conversation. One or the other. Not both.

And so I have been a complete failure when it comes to blogging or taking photos during social events. True, we used to have blogger dinners. True, people would post witty texts and take beautiful photos, but I would hide behind the stove and not participate in any of this blogger activity in a significant way.

Yesterday I went to a dinner where there was no comfortable stove to hide behind. I was not cooking. I could not even help as the cook is one of those people who is completely in control of things, producing wonderful foods without dirtying a single surface. And people brought their computers and I, of course, had my stuck-to-the-hip camera and so there would be expectations of posting and picture taking and the whole thing was threatening to be one big nightmare blogging-wise, even as the foods would be magnificent and the company splendid.

I know myself well. This morning, looking at my notes and photo file I thought: wow. I really am adept at producing nothing of great worth (sadly enough, this is especially true when surrounded by great people doing great things).

I cringe as I include here the following sample. All from last night:

The hosts have children. So sweet and gentle. (I wrote that before the littlest one took a hammer to the toy. With vim and vigor.)



How old do you have to be to start a blog? I mean, do you even need to know how to read? A parent can assist in the selection of templates and sidebar stuff.




The food is magnificent. Someone commented that the first course alone was worth the entrance fee. (No, wait, that came out wrong. There was no entrance fee. Lovely text, no?)




The second course had this great meat thing and stuffed peppers. We're talking sublime stuffing. I'd eat the stuffing alone and call it a starred meal.




Hey, I did find a more than decent photo from the evening. Predictably, I did not take it. Someone was messing with my camera. Next time I'll just hand it over and wash dishes. Even if they are all clean at all times.



B of Oscar association, N of Ocean association

Sunday, January 08, 2006

shades of gray 

A walk downtown this morning reminds me what month we’re in. Oftentimes, Madison has brilliant winters. But there are weeks like this one, where it’s not exactly cold but it may as well be. The snow melted under the violent rainstorm last week. The skies refuse to clear for more than an hour or two. It just seems bleak out there.

Walking along Lake Monona, I’m thinking that there is a reason why people from Iceland feel comfortable here.




I swear, I have not tampered with color in these two shots: the camera was set on normal mode. The sun is coming through, but just barely, in small bands of faint yellow against a gray everything else.

In some spots, water is seeping to the surface. Maybe from a current or stream, maybe from a pipe. Somehow this is reassuring. In another couple of months we’ll see water on the entire lake again.

Wont we?

Saturday, January 07, 2006

grains of sand 

It’s long past midnight and I am writing a post about a movie. I don’t typically write posts about movies, but the four of us were dazed by Brokeback Mountain. Agreement is rare among this very opinionated group. Worth savoring. And so I write. Quick notes, keeping me awake. Except that I would be awake anyway.

Have you taken to liking sweet wine? This one is just as…well, sweet, as the last you opened.
No, you could say that I’ve taken to buying cheap wine.

Hours later I am making blueberry pancakes. Do you want a second one? You have a long trip.

Why do we feel the need to eat for any journey? These are not the days of mules and horses pulling wagons past empty prairies. Still: please let me make you another batch.

In a few more hours the loft will be empty.

I park the car close to the back door. Many suitcases and boxes need to be loaded. These are post-holiday travels. I pause to look at the empty lot that stretches along the tracks, toward the lake. In the morning, the colors are gentle. If you sigh, it comess out as a gentle sigh, to match the peach in the sky.





The daughters are seasoned travelers. Well organized, prompt, they know the routines. We watch them take the escalator to the gate area. They turn the corner, out of view now.

My ex helps me at the loft. I have never in my life seen my ex sit back and do nothing when there are things to be done. The daughters’ room is going into sleep mode until their spring return. He puts away the last plate, the pan after the blueberry pancakes. I take him to the Chicago bus.

Echo Tap, Findorff Yard, Electric Earth Café – names given to mixes put together by a daughter for much of our car travel this winter break. They’re names taken from notable places around the loft: a bar-dive, a café we like to make fun of, the construction company that gutted and rebuilt the lofts where I live. Mixes that I don’t want to listen to this morning.

I break my glasses. Damn! I don’t have a valid prescription. I spend the afternoon at the mall, seeing an eye doctor. I did the same thing three years ago. My eyes are peered at by men who see dozens of patients a day, only once, never after. Transient doctors, never staying long here, in this commercial crazyhouse, working mall hours. The patients don’t ask for them by name. Next available, like at a grocery store checkout line.

Waiting for the glasses, I walk over to Barnes & Noble. I want books for little tikes that I am to visit tomorrow. I am drawn to familiar volumes. Can’t say that they’re perky titles. Can’t say these are perky times.





Long lines for everything. I haven’t showered yet. How can I be out and about wearing skuzzy clothes with yesterday’s lotion on my hands?

On the drive back to the now empty loft I dare put on a CD mix. I am used to sadness. If you look at the hourglass, where sand is changing compartments, you can see how tight things are there in the transition from one to the other. Then the sand settles in an easy way in the lower chamber. I’m in that bottleneck of grains passing tightly around me. They’ll settle down. I’ll settle down. It’s always like that.

run with the sheep 

Friday, January 06, 2006

why why why why why 

one plate after another 

Late last night we set out to find food. Nothing reminds me more that I live in a small town than the absence of conviviality in eating establishments here after the clock strikes nine. Actually, the absence of open eating establishments itself late at night is enough to make me think it’s time to pack up and head for a more Mediterranean approach to eating: late, with lots of people, making lots of noise, over good food and wine.

Wait! No need to pack my bags! We have ourselves a new place off the square, run by a known chef. And and and and…..it is open until 1 am! Madison delivers! Home sweet home.

Time to support these efforts to keep our knives and forks clattering and working late into the night. We show up nice and late. And it’s still crowded. How many good surprises can I stomach during one evening?

One look at the menu and my spine tingles. French onion soup, pumpkin soup with roasted seed oil, figs and goat cheese drizzled with lavender honey, oysters and Madagascar prawns, lamb loin with white bean puree and violet mustard, truffled mac and cheese, scallops with braised endive – we ordered them all! And, because I witness a plate of fries making its way to another table, I practically accost a random waiter to bring us some of those as well. With a tub of garlic mayo for dipping purposes. Yum.

And then it gets confusing. When do you eat what? Tied to convention, we are thinking that first comes the soup then come the meaty fishy plates. We share, but only to a point. Each of us becomes invested in our selection. Don’t touch it! I have a right to try it first! – this is a common cry at our table as three forks reach for the plate of the fourth diner.

And so we eat. And it is good. Plates come and go, some large, some small. I am ecstatic. And increasingly not very hungry. Awaiting my last dish – the oysters and prawns – we banter and laugh and sit back, pleased with life, pleased with this new spot called CocCoLiQuot. And so we wait. And wait. And wait some more until we are the last ones there (it seems) and finally I note that the kitchen is empty and I have the feeling that a cold oyster still needs to be caught or cleaned or something, or maybe the flight from Madagascar is delayed, for these delicious foods are not before me.

It was not to be. Our waitperson, confused by the eating habits of our lot (for we ordered so much!), forgot to place my seafood order. Or, she thought that we should end with les pommes frites. For whatever reason, the last dish never came.

Do we leave displeased? But no! We are able to put aside small transgressions such as missing plates of food. We are thrilled; I, the sole resident of Madison out of the bunch, I am thrilled as can be. I can eat downtown, after midnight. I can eat morning noon and night. I am happy.



les wonderful pommes frites

Thursday, January 05, 2006

Ocean update: a new and improved comments policy! 

Most blogs I read have comments sections. In nearly all, commenters identify themselves in a consistent way – either with a link to their blogs or webpages, or by use of a pseudonym. The pseudonyms do not change over time. Indeed, I have come to know the commenter personalities by recognizing the name they give each time. The names may not be real, but in my reading of their posts or comments, I know something about these people. And so the conversation is a good one.

In only a couple of blogs, I find a heavy use of complete anonymity in the comments sections. I do not want Ocean to become a forum for anonymous commenters (who, for all I know are only one or two people, muckin’ around as if they were many). So long as I permit the use of “anonymous,” I cannot screen these out. And indeed, some are quite innocent. The writers may not know that I would like a consistent use of an identifying label.

Some are perniciously evil. Some play games by making up a name that they then toss out, only to pick up another. Some have taken to using a name that someone else has adopted as their own. You guys suck and if I sense that this is going on I will ignore you or delete you, as I see fit.

I respect and like comments, but I don’t want a trail of Anons. So please, use names, don’t steal the identities of others and stay with your choice. Please.

[I will also delete comments that bully, jab at or in any way demean anyone the wide world over.]

With deep appreciation,
Nina

Wednesday, January 04, 2006

toil and trouble 

Upon learning of the Recent Great Changes:

Where exactly did you move to?
A loft. Downtown. It is exactly what I need: a large open space where the kitchen opens to the dining area, which in turn opens to the living area – all merging into an organic whole, ideal for a person who wants to cook for others and have them be present there, socially integrated into the process of putting food on the table…

Wow. So how long have you lived there?
Four months now.

And you’ve had bunches of people, eating together at the loft, enjoying each others' company, merging into an organic whole… wow.
More like an organic hole: there hasn’t been much of that actually. One housewarming dinner thing back in early October.

But you’ve cooked for your family and the occasional person that stops by?
Oh sure, that occasional person has had soups and stuff… Organic, but in the agricultural sense…

And family? Surely your motherly nin-clinations have led you to outdo yourself?
Indeed: I was glued to the kitchen space for Christmas Eve, Christmas breakfast, Christmas lunch, Christmas dinner. The buck, or rather the stove, stopped there. It did not help that we all decided clothes were getting tight.

So now, you still have daughters starved for their favorite mommy-meals, drifting in and out of the loft… are you cooking?
Well, no. You're asking why? (pause for profound thought…) I want to support the local chefs, that’s it! They’re having a rough go of it, what with people getting their credit card bills after the holidays, students being gone. I’m doing this for charitable reasons.



tonight's great sacrifice

Tuesday, January 03, 2006

heading north 

Time to leave the big city and return home. Yippitayayey, git along little doggies, you know that Wisconsin will be your old home.

Where are you from?
I don’t know how to answer that. I live in Wisconsin for now.

No, wait, that’s no longer true. In 2006 I am introducing a new line:
I live in Wisconsin. I will keep on living in Wisconsin. Nothing leads me to believe I will live anywhere else. Except for long summers away, riding a motor bike in rural France.

When the weather turned nice in Evanston on Sunday, my thought was: I need to get to some place where the quality of the weather matters. It doesn’t in Evanston. Except when it is cold and you have to move the car every two hours until 6 pm because the parking police are out to get me. They already got me once, the little creeps, not again. Never again.

And on a tour of four night stands, my suitcase and computer in hand...
I could live four nights out of the week elsewhere. I could work on my classes, do my reports, emails, calls from some hole up north and come down only to teach. I need WiFi and a good grocery store, that’s all. Probably hard to come by up north. Forget it.

I have a song, I think it’s a song, it's about you…
I have this discussion with my friend Ed all the time. I ask:
Do you need other people?
No, not unless I can engage them and they me. Not for the sake of just being with people.
But, but, how is it that you could talk to someone and not try to engage them?
It either happens or it does not. It's okay if it does not.
And when you are engaged? Then what? Do you come to need that person (those people) to make you happy?

I got him there, because the answer is, of course, yes.

I wont move up north, south, east or west because I am engaged in multiple ways right here.

[Except when I have to pack up and leave. But only for a while, always just for a little while.]



first Cosmo of 06: to Ocean readers

Monday, January 02, 2006

sailing, sailing over the Ocean blue 

Happy anniversary to me…

Awkward first steps: in my second blog post ever (January 3, 2004), I am already riddled with doubt, as I find myself without good material. I panic: if I post daily, will I resort to writing about the weather?

Eventually, I discover that I can write about the weather, or I can Write About The Weather. Eventually. But there are months when I worry: can I sustain this?

Happy anniversary to Ocean…

Is Ocean an extension of me? A small subset of nina expressions? Notably, I have never invited guest bloggers (kep doesn’t count)…

Happy anniversary selfish nina…

Hey, but I invited commenters this year!

Happy anniversary to me.

January 2nd, 2004, Ocean first popped up on the Net. A painless birth.

And now it’s been two years. AND I NEVER SKIPPED A DAY! People died, marriages crumbled, barren mountains beckoned and against all odds and perhaps for no good reason, each day I blogged, only once adjusting the clock by a couple of hours because while posting, I sort of kind of fell asleep at the computer and did not wake up til 2 am the next day. There, confession done with, let me go on.

If you don’t have anything to write about, why don’t you skip a day? Why force yourself to put something down? It’s your blog, you can write as often as you feel like it. Like, when you have something to say?

It is never the case that there is nothing to say about any particular day. Sometimes it takes a minute or two, okay, an hour or two. Once I must have taken (wasted?) three before I felt satisfied that a theme was good (enough) to develop into a (very short) story here on Ocean.

And so each day, I write.

I’m tacking onto this anniversary post a celebratory photo, taken just after midnight on New Year’s. What’s it like to live here, on this side of the ocean? What’s it like to put on striped hats and red white and blue leis? What’s it like to travel to Evanston just to eat dinner here at midnight? Ocean stuff. Pure Ocean material.




Just yesterday I got asked yet again (this time not in the context of blogging): why do you do things in such a crazy way? The answer? Obviously, to me, it doesn’t feel very crazy. Nutty people think themselves to be walking a straight line even as they zig zag all over the place.

Oh, and thank you. For reading. These daily posts. God, I can’t believe I’m still doing this. Okay, I can see the insanity. In a lucid moment that comes every once in a while. I can see it. But it still feels right.

Sunday, January 01, 2006

at the end of the day 

When the bell tolls I would like to be at a table eating and drinking and laughing. Some (my mother?) may find this to be a superficial and sketchy approach to things, but there you have it. I am what I am. When the work is done and the sun has set, I want the sensual pleasure of a meal, prepared by someone who appreciates the need for the fresh and the honest.

[And yes, I have to come to this table with tired hands, hands that have done their work, hands that have wiped tables and helped frail little ones, hands that have buttered bread for others, hands that have carried bags across the boundaries and borders, hands that have held pens, scribbling endless words until the ink runs out.]

And now, these hands want to hold knives forks and spoons, to raise glasses, toasting life, toasting stories told by others, toasting the end of the day, the end of the year, all endings sad and beautiful, finished with a sip of good wine.

To this table I should come adorned because adornments are a precious statement that we are not animals, we preen ourselves and our environments to provide joy and some minimal levels of beauty. Behold! That is you and me, clean, fresh, glittery, colorful, dramatic.

On New Year’s Eve, minutes before the small stores of Lincoln Park close their doors to the old year, I am rifling through racks of camisoles, ones that show off lacy patterns and silky textures from behind my low-cut sweater, itself outlined in glittery beads.



in the dressing room: which one?


Finally, adorned and festively attired, we make our way to the Chef’s Station (the papers proclaim it to be the best meal in town for those who care about their bank accounts).

A gratifying sight: the table is set for serious eating. No glitter here, just good, sturdy cutlery, at least six pieces deep, announcing at least 6 dishes ahead. The chef will be on display tonight, this proudest night for any cook. You don’t hold back on talent or ingredients now. You let it all out. And he does: pate with sour cherry chutney and balsamic, rutabaga and carrot bisque with cardamom cream, cedar planked salmon with a winter terrine and a lobster-saffron sauce, black cherry sorbet, tenderloin with lobster mushroom and chervil soufflé in a red wine reduction and white truffle oil, pistachio crusted goat cheese on baby greens with roasted strawberry dressing and the best of the best: warm dark chocolate cake with milk chocolate and lavender ice cream in a raspberry coulis.



set for serious eating


At midnight the hats and horns come out. I nudge a not too shy fellow diner to start his song. He has been wanting to sing to his Scottish heritage even as his date keeps telling the world that this is a huge mistake – the lad cannot carry a tune.

No matter, he’s drowned out by the merrymakers who make it their own song.

Two more food presentations and we are done.

The last lick and slurp, the last gulp, the year has ended. 2006 begins.



the end, presented at the beginning of 2006

I'm Nina Camic. I teach law, but also write (here and elsewhere) on a number of non-legal topics. I often cross the ocean, in the stories I tell and the photos I take. My native Poland is a frequent destination.

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