Should auld acquaintance be forgot…

Yes! I have an acquaintance that everyone would agree should be forgot. But why is this song so sad? It played at home minutes ago and one could only think: funeral time!

Looking forward with zip and enthusiasm to 2005, shouldn’t we pick something more up-tempo for a NYEve ballad? Hey Ya! – someone here just suggested it as a replacement. I’m in agreement. Bring out the strobe lights and the champagne! I wanna see y’all on y’all baddest behavior! [In other words, to translate for the older set: Hell with New Year’s Resolutions, they suck!]

Okay, just a thought.

I guess the fat lady hasn’t sung yet…

…because the topic of resolutions appears to be not quite ready for the refuse pile.

First, I’m getting email “lack of progress” reports from certain writers over at Professor Barnhardt’s Journal. That’s what I call getting punched in the noggin: I struggle to articulate something reasonable, something possible, something worthwhile to set as a 2005 target, and I get a little reminder that my goals are likely to go the way of the toilet paper – flushed in the weeks immediately following January 1st. Resolutions are made to be broken.

And leave it to academics to point out yet another problem with this whole resolution mess. Over at U of Minnesota, a psych prof notes:

But research shows that six weeks after people make their New Year's resolutions, 80 percent have either broken them or couldn't remember what they were.
Write down your resolution at the top of a sheet of paper--in big, bold letters!

Oh my God, this is written directly to me, isn’t it? You deliberately forget every small and large task that lies before you: write it down already!

Others tell me that’s not enough. Forget writing things down. The reason we break our resolutions is that we do not recondition our brains to think in new ways! An optimum performance expert says this:

“People don’t understand how their brain functions and therefore renege on their resolutions 99% of the time within very short order. Using will power is absolutely the worst way to achieve your new goals because it is controlled by your conscious mind, which is only responsible for one sixth of your abilities.

You mean I don’t need will power?? So what is it that I have to do (remember – I just want to write more; I don’t want to lose weight, drink less, make new friends, I just want to write!)?? Our performance guru has this advice:

It takes about 30 days of everyday mental training to re-train the brain if you want long lasting and permanent weight loss or if you want to earn more money. By doing a few simple visualization exercises seeing yourself at your perfect weight or career, you start to recondition your internal image and you begin to erase the old image. The more you do this the faster you’ll see results...

Another simple technique you can use is a written positive affirmation declaring,“I now weigh xxxx. My body fat is xxxxx. I feel and look great and I am at my ideal and perfect weight now."

I’m into trying new things. Let me give it a whirl. Beginning tomorrow, I will post pictures of me writing with declarative sentences to this effect “I am now writing excessively. I am at my ideal writing performance level now. At this very minute, I have more pages of text than I can possibly deal with. My works are flooding the shelves of every literate person on both sides of the ocean...”

But let me not get ahead of myself. That is tomorrow’s post.Today I am just a slovenly, still-in-my-pajamas law prof with a stack of unread exams, spending too much time at the computer, producing worthless dribble.

P.S. on resolutions: not amusing enough for you?

If my resolution (see post below) left you disappointed, let me tell you, there are many more out there on the Net that you can peruse and reflect about. I’ll leave you with a few choice samples from lounge.bust.com, where a number of commenters have resolved the following:

From jilliec:
- Devote more time to playing my fucking guitar.
- Smoke more pot.

From spunkychick:
- replace the 'blech' items in wardrobe with new funky fun items

From rebookie:
- Have sex again

From dusty:
- stop slacking with housecleaning, work, paying bills, hair care answering emails and basically anything in my life that involves responsibility.

From mandolyn:
- cut down on the alcohol and drug-consumption.

From isotopia:
- stop picking at my skin

From tyger:
- stop pulling the hair out of my knees and knuckles as stress relief

From nanuk:
- Finish grad school applications

From pinkpoodle:
- Moisturize more

From Venetia:
- Publish three things in refereed journals.
- Go to Italy (or else Poland, but probably Italy)

[I was with her until the last one. Definitely she should go with Poland. Italy is everyone’s choice. Poland is for the lovers, the intellectuals, the truly forward-looking.]

Resolutions for the New Year: the final post on this topic

The house is quiet. Everyone is out doing things that for one reason or another I do not want to join in on. It is VERY quiet. Eerie almost. Very very quiet. In the still of this silence, I can write down the resolution that will have to do for this blog, for the coming year:

I resolve to write more, rather than less, in 2005.

That’s it. Nothing more.

A post on my longstanding attachments to letter writing

Forget about blogs, emails and the entire technological revolution. I love letters. I want to go back to letters. I admire them and the people who write them well. Some of my favorite books are compilations of letters. I refuse to throw out the recent New Yorker because it has the letter exchange between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell. I love it. Completely totally.

On the strength of that, I went to Borders today and looked again at their (meager) collections of correspondence. People are private about their letters -- not much is made available for publication. But in my search through the anthologies I came across something almost as enticing: A Chance Meeting – Intertwined Lives of American Writers and Artists, 1854 – 1967. W.E.B. Du Bois and Charlie Chaplin. Norman Mailer and Robert Lowell. Gertrude Stein and William James. Etc. Private history (a term coined by Mark Twain). You can’t ever conclude anything on the basis of the scant information that we are presented with, but still, it can give you pause: a chance meeting and we have a changed person. That it then has an impact on her (his) art or writing goes without saying. The Mystery is absolute though, because the reader can never fully understand how different things may have been without that little pod of influence.

Just a fragment from “A Chance Meeting:”

In years later, Gertrude Stein used to tell the story that one beautiful spring day, after she had been to the opera every night for a week and was tired, she had to take an exam in Professor James’s class, and she found that she “just could not.” Writing in the third person, she described herself sitting there: “Dear Professor James, she wrote at the top of her paper. I am so sorry but really I do not feel a bit like an examination paper in philosophy today, and left.” He wrote her a card saying that he perfectly well understood and, according to her, gave her the highest mark in the class. That she actually passed with a B seems to have been solidly obscured in her mind by her preference for her own version of the events – one that illustrated the deep sympathy between Gertrude Stein and William James.

Ann says yes to cell phones on planes, I say take them to the bathroom and stay there

On second thought, why should you have the privilege of the limited washroom facilities? Ann claims that the plane is a noisy public place and that if you are in need of quiet, buy and iPod!

No no no, do not force me to dangle white strings from my ears, I do not want an iPod. But I also do not want to listen to Gidget discuss her shopping trip with Aurelia for two hours right as we are flying over Buffalo.

People who use cells in public do so loudly and without attention to the other. It has become such a nuisance that trains on the East Coast, in Europe and in Japan (and the world over for all I know) have created quiet cars. Seats there fill faster than in the “regular” cars. I wonder why.

We are generally a noisy people. It is said that Americans stand out abroad and I can see that: we boom and bang our way through most chatter. But if the rest of the world is to be trapped with us in tight spaces, can’t it at least request of us that we shut the little hell-toy up for a few hours? Let’s get email on the planes up and running. Yes, yes, I’m all for that. But please, keep that little cell jingle on silence mode while in the air.

Resolutions for the New Year: surfing for ideas, continued

Still not satisfied with yesterday’s web-based suggestions, I am digging deeper into other people’s failed lives and unaccomplished goals from years past. Maybe in these heaps of botched effort I’ll find inspiration – or at least nuggets of wisdom on what to avoid for 2005.

When I need to find the weird, the obscure, the original weblog, I go to the cool, the wonderful, the prolific boingboing.net. After all, they were the source of the link to Shizzy’s Page, where a guy recounts how he developed an email correspondence with a lowly employee of Starbucks while pretending that he, the blogger, was the CEO. [A handful of Ocean readers thought the prank was mean beyond mean and they threatened to boycott Ocean if I posted a link to it, so I restrained myself. I agree that it’s mean beyond mean, juvenile, impish, vile even. To agree along with us, check it out for yourself, here.]

Boingboing did not disappoint. They offer a link to 43folders.com where a geek (Merlin Mann) recounts his implementation of principles articulated in the popular “Getting Things Done.” Yeah!

Reading just the last few entries floods me with the realization that things are slated for failure unless you keep your projects small and you get rid of ambitious and complicated to do lists. I am staring at my ambitious and complicated “to do” list as I type this. Dare I tear it up for the New Year? Wee hoo! Merlin writes [emphases are my own]:

I try to ensure that any action I identify as a next action can be finished, front to back, in less than 20 minutes time—preferably in fewer than 10 minutes. So, forexample, while “Write an article on GTD” is practically useless (that’s a project!).

[Furthermore:]

In a previous life as a producer and project manager for some good-sized web projects, I once approached my work with a completely baseless optimism and sense of possibility that I had absolutely no business feeling—let alone foisting off on others as way to guide big projects... Yikes. Simpler times.

The reality is that projects change, and projects break; that’s what they do. It’s their job. The smaller your project is, and the shorter the distance there is between “here” and “there,” the less likely you are to have to chuck it and start over for reasons you couldn’t possibly have foreseen when you were knitting up them fancy GANTT charts for Q3/2007.

Okay, resolve to resolve small things, and get rid of grand plans and unwarranted optimism. I'm getting warmer now to the day when I can actually resolve something! Stay tuned.

Resolutions for the New Year, continued

Sometime at the beginning of April, I wrote this teeny little post-it to myself: “I will think kind thoughts and not write slanderous emails” (or something to that effect). I dated it, signed it, and put it up in the corner of my computer screen in my office. It was an impulsive gesture, probably a step toward some desire for self-improvement, or, more likely, written after I had sent some impulsive email (SO me) that I knew would cost me my life, except that this penetrating piece of wisdom did not strike me until after I had already clicked “send.” It happens. Of course, the little post-it became part of the fabric of the place: I came to take it for granted. In fact, I sort of forgot all about it. It was like a fly on the wall that had left a permanent, yet quickly forgotten splotch. Others may have noticed it – I ceased to pay any attention to it.

This December, in my absence, the computer in the office was upgraded (I posted about this earlier). The techies actually took the little post-it and transferred it to the new computer. HOW AWFUL!! Now they know I am capable of thinking evil thoughts and writing horrid emails.

So, if resolutions in the middle of the year just lead you to make a fool of yourself, what good are resolutions set for January 1st?

Readers state their preferences

Thanks for the emails about *things that you like* in the blog. That polenta photo generated a number of kind comments. But the thing is, I cannot keep posting photos of What I Am Up To. They would be like this – me taking a self-portrait, sitting at the computer looking off-the-wall bizarre. Want proof? Here's one, taken in a self-indulgent moment ten seconds ago:

...that blue glow in the eye looks ominous...what *is* she posting?? 

Volunteerism, carried to new *heights*

Do you mean I could make a difference in helping people get from one place to another during this busy holiday travel period? Should I volunteer my services? Would I do a better job than experienced employees? The NYT reports that US Airways has faith in us, the off-the-street ready-to-jump-in volunteers! I’m ready. I’ll do my bit.

This post is in response to the NYT online news brief. Here it is, in full bloom:

US Airways Is Predicting a Smoother Weekend: US Airways said that with the help of volunteer employees, it expected a smooth weekend at its Philadelphia hub after a Christmas weekend of mishandled bags.

Resolutions for the New Year: Introduction

In the last three days of the year, there is nothing left to groan about except the unopened property tax bill, the healthy living program that was to go into effect on December 26th and faltered on the 27th, and the forthcoming January 1st deadline for getting my resolutions in order.

This year, I decided to do what in previous years I could not have done (due to blog-ignorance, laziness and sloth): check out eminent bloggers and read what they had to say on the subject of resolutions.

One of my favorite lists of resolves comes from Professor Barnhardt’s Journal (it’s a webzine, with a handful of writers posting each Tuesday on topics selected by the editor, Bob Sassone, who himself is also a contributor at McSweeney’s, Salon, Esquire, etc). And so, to warm up to the topic, I decided to share some interesting possibilities, ripped from their January 2004 posting. Later, I will craft my own, but for now, if you’re thinking to resolve things, mull over these options:

(From Tod Goldberg): …Don’t resolve to fundamentally change a part of my personality. I’m an asshole, I recognize that, and thus it would be silly for me to decide come January 1st to become the Mother Teresa of Gen-X novelists... [And on a more practical note:] Learn to wipe sitting down. Now this is a weird thing. All my life, I’ve stood to wipe. My wife learned of this a few years ago and informed me that I was “weird” and that what I was doing was “wrong” and that I should learn the “right way”… 2004 is the Year of Sitting Down, folks.

(From Joe Lavin): … If this year I come up with a resolution in December, I will act on it immediately, instead of waiting until next January just so that I can make it an official New Year's resolution…. [Also] I resolve to be more mysterious, even if people just think I'm being an idiot. … [And on a more practical note:] I think I'll have some cheesecake.

(From Brian Lewandowski *): … [Remember, this was written in 01-04. Sigh…] I resolve never again to vote for any Presidential candidates with 6 or less letters in their last names. They have been nothing but problems… think about it. All the good ones have more letters than that in their monikers. So I am sorry Mr. Dean and Mr. Clark, it looks like I am gonna be riding the Kucinich - Sharpton ticket all the way to DC! [And in a less practical vein:] I resolve to also never ponder if it’s a NASCAR or a NASCAR car.

(From Bob Sassone): More drinking, more smoking, more sex.

* Because he shares my last name (in its "maiden"--oh, what a curious word that is! -- version), and because his recent blog post speaks to my own holiday gluttony, I thought I'd cite here a few sentences from his exclamation-point.com entry yesterday:

Breaching the 200 lb mark for the first time in my life, I am feeling a little plump. Traditionally, like any good Lewandowski, I am carrying that weight in my belly. No where else, just the big belly on my little chicken legs. I look like a freaking Weeble balanced on toothpicks.

So in order to lose the weight I put on sweats today. That's the ticket, right? I see tons of really fat people wearing sweats at the mall and I see athletes wearing sweats. The sweats must make all those mall fats turn into athletes...

Update: email nightmare resolved and it was not my fault! Surprised?

In installing a new computer in my office (I think it was to be a surprise), the tech dude (inadvertently?) set it so that the new email program (another surprise) would download email from the server every ten minutes. If I retrieved something at home (or elsewhere) before it got downloaded – mine! If I did not, it was wiped off the server. Some three fourths of email got slashed in this way, though I ultimately retrieved it in my office today.

I can only respond to it from the Law School because it is there and not here, and unfortunately I am here and not there. I will get to it all, I will. In the meantime, here’s a small chunk of attenuated responses:

Thanks, sorry you feel that way, no I cannot do that, of course you should study that for the exam, yes please do send it to me, gym would be fantastic, I liked your Christmas pictures as well, thanks for that story, no I am not insulted, of course I read your blog, I would love to eat dinner and I’m glad you’re not holding grudges over that unfortunate incident back in November.

Why is there a bright orange shirt set up as if it had a person in it?

No, it's not a shirt ripped off the back of a Ukrainian.

I think Poles are predisposed toward artistry. I mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it? Even at a time when art was blandly subservient to a political agenda, Polish artists developed a reputation for spectacular poster art (remember “Cyrk” posters from the sixties and seventies?). Poles had a knack for the stuff.

But fashion – it suffered in postwar Poland. The styles were conservative, the colors were uniformly washed-out. Burgundy looked like last year’s plum preserves. They said it had something to do with the quality of the dyes. Maybe. I think it had to do with a national disinterest in developing a great fashion industry. In fashion taste, Poles were being compared with their neighbors – to the west (Germany) and to the south (Austria), except it was said (I’m just reporting here, not commenting on the veracity of the claims) that the Germans and Austrians at least made shoes to last, even if you didn’t especially want to wear them.

So don’t you think that it is reasonable to compensate for the years of dyspeptic colors in this new Polish market economy by flooding the stores with strong statements about color?

I bought the orange shirt in Poland at “Reserved,” which like “Tatum,” is a leading Polish clothes retailer, sort of our meager analogue to J.Crew. Reaction here to my proudly displayed shirt:
-> it looks like it should be worn by a traffic person
-> nice and bright, isn’t it?
-> next time bring me one…around the end of October
-> really bright…

See, I knew it: suddenly it’s on everyone’s wish list. How nice to see that Polish clothes are making a statement again!

What to do when your connectedness waffles and wanes

Lately, things have been slow on the email front. Vacations! Holidays! – I told myself. But today, a colleague sent me an email basically asking why I haven’t responded to her emails no. 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Why? Because I never got no. 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. But I got no.6. Oh oh. Further investigation reveals that other emails also have not reached me. Yet some have. Moreover, this has been happening for several weeks now.

Panic. I am certain that I have missed the crucial, all-important deadline. And, I have appeared rude to students, colleagues and friends. (And truthfully, some have appeared rude to me.)

Clicking onto the web-based Wiscmail reveals a completely empty Inbox. What???? I have been erased from the web planet! I am no more. Except sometimes, I am as before.

I will unravel this, I will get to the bottom of this hellish email ride. In the meantime, if you have written and received no answer, it is not my fault! The cyber gods and I appear to be having issues over who is really in control and at this point, they are ahead in the battle. Hang in there, nlcamic at wisc dot edu has got the wise and wonderful tech support staff on her side. They’re scratching their heads as we speak.

Sorry for being distracted – I am reading Admissions files

Would you like me to be blogging away, chipper and carefree, without great concentration or commitment to the stack of folders in front of me? No you would not. You would appreciate the fact that applicants spent a good deal of effort in putting together law school applications. They should get a careful reading. Goodnight Ocean, hello personal essays and explanations of youthful arrest records.

Other Side of the Ocean joins in effort to get you to click on behalf of those across the ocean

Feeling like it’s impossible to even imagine the enormity of the disaster in Southeast Asia?

Click here (select International Response Fund) or here. It will make a difference.

Survival of the less fit

The threatening email accusing me of hording the 365 Organic Angel Fluffies (see my post here) has got to stop. You pick your own addictive chips! May I suggest Organic cheddar popcorn? Yummy! But the Fluffies – they are mine mine mine. The holidays are over, my generosity of spirit is packed away until December 2005.

I’m off to stock up. I don’t trust my readership at all.

The new face of Poland?

I am so glad market capitalism has flooded shelves in Poland’s stores with delicious foods and beautiful artifacts. I am glad that people aspire to better work, that countries in the EU are accepting Polish workers, that elections aren’t riddled with corruption and fraud.

I am less happy to read about certain social transformations that have accompanied the Great Change (here, though in Polish). Recent studies reveal that Poles now think of themselves as alienated, indifferent toward their neighbor, angry and downright mean-spirited. Those in the rural areas still regard the village community as supportive and kindly disposed toward one another. Elsewhere? Forget it. I'm dismayed to read the words that now describe daily life: “wyscig szczurow” (race of the rats), “wzajemna agresja” (mutual aggression). In some regions, only 7% of the population think that that people these days are well-meaning or kind. Lovely: a generous nation turned brutish and sour. Best visit now before you’re greeted with daggers and swords at the airport.

Confessions of a law prof

I knew it halfway through the Fall semester: I’d grown weary of the text I’d been using in Family Law.

I’ll admit that I find it hard to stay with a text more than two years and not be somewhat revulsed by its shortcomings (I teach Family Law I both Fall and Spring semesters). When I have to make an effort to enjoy delivering a lecture based on assigned readings, I know it’s time to think about a change.

And so last night I stood up and formally announced (to myself and anyone who was listening): I will make the switch now. Effective immediately. No looking back.

It’s not that the students would have noticed had I stayed rooted to the old dog – they appear to enjoy whatever compellation of readings I pass on. And not an insignificant handful like using the notes of Family Law alums. Sorry guys, the notes are worthless. I’m starting afresh. I’m bored with the old stuff. I dislike the ordering of topics, I find the chapter notes silly and the problems ho hum.

And so comes the paradox of paradoxes – in order to make my semester more enjoyable, I have to pile vast amounts of additional work onto my days. Changing a text is almost like teaching a brand new course. New lectures have to be written. New questions need to be addressed. Halfway through the semester I’ll kick myself I’m sure, but for now I’ll be oh so happy to kick the offensive fat book further under the table, along with the other well-used and now abused texts from years gone by. Welcome, newly anointed chosen one (it’s amazing how many there are to pick from)! I hope you and I enjoy each other’s company. For at least a year or two.

Quiz on social correctness:

Is this right, is this wrong?

1. Cellphone rings in restaurant. You answer it.
2. You’re talking to your pal and the cellphone rings. You pause in your talk and check to see who is calling.
3. You’re at home, the phone rings, you wait to see who it is and if you feel like talking to him/her.

If you read the NYTMagazine article on the evolution of connectedness, maybe you’ll have given a fleeting thought to your own standards of what is passable behavior. The author considers the following trends in the ways we attempt to connect to others:

In fact, it’s now considered rude not to have some sort of machine to take messages for you. And not only have we become used to machines that take messages, we also sometimes prefer them to live communications…

Between cellphones, email and instant messaging, it’s now considered exotic to be truly unreachable at all.

The article suggests that in making decisions about answering, checking the caller’s ID, etc, you are making a series of instant status judgments. You flip open your cellphone for some, not for others.

It says something about me that I am constantly being preempted by a cell call. It could be that I am boring. It could be that people even get coconspirators to dial their number, just so they could have a respite from our exchange. At less paranoid times, I have concluded that I appear so completely benign and informal that the world out there has determined that I cannot easily be offended by such behaviors. Or at least that I wont kill the perpetrator.

Okay, I’ll confess: I wont kill, but I do hate the whole imposition of pseudo-connectedness on human interaction. You’re hanging at home – pick up the darn phone. You’re out and about, hanging with someone, trash or silence your cell, or at the very least, ignore the precious Ode to Joy when it sounds in your pocket. Bach would have wanted it that way.

Classic post-holiday behavior

And how did you commemorate the day after? My day thus far had the following scintillating components:

A visit to a store to exchange a game. We’re into games around here but, predictably, everyone has strong preferences as to what talent is to be tapped. I, for instance, hate trivia games, but love “make up creative lies” type games. Others feel differently about this. I have been accused of being extremely competitive, to the point that I will use every devious strategy to sink a competitor and come out victorious. Of course, this is the opposite of how I really am. Honestly!! Anyway, I exchanged my first choice for someone else’s first choice. It’s Christmas, I can be magnanimous.

A visit to the gym. This goes without saying. Anyone who stands and cooks all day long and then devours all that comes off the stove, sometimes even before it is fully off the stove, needs to go to the gym after the holidays. I was not the only one there.

Reading the newspaper. I have not done this for a while. I’d been gone, I’d been busy, I’ve had every excuse to avoid picking up hard, dirty print. Today I am back at it. Things that caught my fancy: Maureeen Dowd’s tribute to Mary McGrory. Part of me would very much like to be like Mary McGrory: brilliant with words, always on the job, inquisitive, plucky, biting sharp, pushy. I think I can appropriate two from that list: plucky and inquisitive. The rest – merely aspirational. At the end of the article, Dowd cites McGrory’s advice to her nephew, given to him at a stuffy D.C. party: “Always approach the shrimp bowl like you own it.” Absolutely right. There’s no need to pander to stuffiness in this world.

Christmas Day, part 3

The transmogrification of food traditions

The palate changes over time. Over the years, we adjust for it. The buche de Noel shrinks (who can eat that much…), the chocolate ‘bark’ grows darker, more bittersweet, because that’s how preferences fall these days. The Cornish hens get zestier, spicier, the warm mushrooms in the salad get funkier, more exotic.

But the basic ingredients stay the same. Unless you forget to buy some of them. Then you adjust. Happy are those who can adjust, because let me tell you – all grocery stores are closed on this day, and the local PDQs do not carry such fancy items as heavy cream (for example). Adherence to rituals and traditions is satisfying. But shifting things around a bit is what makes the day especially interesting.

The final item to come out of the kitchen: a buche that recognizes current tastes and makes do with available ingredients. 

Christmas Day, part 2

Further proof that my proper place is in the kitchen:

The puff pastries come out of the oven in time for Christmas breakfast. The spice cake was made last night.

Starting the day with a nice carb high 

Gifts: am I for them or against them? Oh, for them. Especially when the gift giver really wants to make you happy with that little wrapped package. Someone thoughtfully purchased for me Baltic Voices 2 (Estonian choir, singing “choral riches of the Baltic Sea countries”). Being sort of an out-of-it type, I’d never heard of them before. Wonderful music, written by contemporary musicians. Makes me ashamed that I ever doubted Estonia’s greatness and influential position in the world. Yay Estonia! Glad you’re in the EU after all.

And, fan that I am of the Daily Show (I pay for cable just to occasionally catch Stewart – you might say that I am that deprived of opportunities to laugh), I somehow completely neglected “A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction.” Today it appeared under the tree. It’s a good book to flip through. I just picked up this piece of legal trivia that I am certain will help me sound impressive in social gatherings: Until 1943, Supreme Court nominees were wrapped in litmus paper and dipped in acid to determine their worthiness for the Court. later Courts were less literal-minded.

Gifts are good. They put a shirt on my back and a pear in my stocking.

Christmas Day, part 1

Merry Christmas to all who wish to be merry, and to all a good morning!

Does anyone else wake up at 5:30 and cannot return to sleep because of a nagging thought that they forgot something?

By 6 a.m. I finally recall that I did not wrap a pair of mittens from the Polish highlands. Nice sheep’s wool, warm and still smelling of fur and firs – I am certain that I did not wrap them. By 6:30 I give up on the idea of sleep and start searching for them. In the suitcase pocket: eureka!

For some, night visions of sugarplums, for others -- Polish mittens 

Being older means you still toss and turn on Christmas morning and think about the day ahead, it's just that your issues change somewhat.

For instance, here’s issue number two: I wonder if anyone will notice that I forgot to buy apple cider to steep the dried apples in for the morning apple puff pastries… And btw, I'm still fretting about the misplaced camera case.

An update on this promising-to-be-interesting day will follow.

And outside, just at dawn, the fir trees receive their dusting of snow.

Christmas Eve, part 3

What is the leading story in the Polish online newspaper right now? Predictably, an article accompanying this photo:

The Pope (he is Polish, remember?), resting before Midnight Mass.

Christmas Eve, part 2

Alright. The accusations have begun. I am asked if I have abandoned my love of the kitchen stove given that I am nowhere near it and evening is almost upon us. May I remind you, all you emphatic critics, of the fantastic Sicilian meal I put in front of your noses last night? You even took a picture of me, la vostra mamma, smiling away at the pot of parmesan polenta and the pollo siciliana (okay, I made the name up). Remember??

See how happy I look? (That's because I am near the end of the 45-minute stirring that polenta demands.) 

More photos of this type will dot the blog throughout the holiday period demonstrating my utter commitment to cooking. Is Ocean to become a ballyhoo on the author’s kitchen antics? It’s more that during these weeks, I have a photographer in the house who is quick to snap, especially in the kitchen, so evidence of my tornado-like cooking habits abounds.

Christmas Eve, part 1

Christmas Eve Day has always been a favorite for members of this household (amazing, considering the secular leanings of most, though not all of the persons herein). The day is full of good things, many of them edible, all of them jovial. So what was my contribution to this spirited day?
- A search for my camera case. I cannot find it. Where the devil is it? I am obsessed with looking for it. My co-hunters have given up on me and on the camera case. I, however, am determined.
- I’m on the Net right now. How pathetic is that…
- Filling the cart at Whole Foods. The Whole idiot that I am, I allowed little elves to sneak in their favorite: Angel Fluffies. As a result, our cabinet at home looks like this (posting the picture reminded me of the lost camera case; the hunt must continue!):

I would call this a serious addiction 

- going to the post office to mail a package and cards. The teller looked at the stack and told me that especially the international cards would, for sure, not get there in time for the holidays. I think she is not expansive enough in her thinking. The holidays can take a while to resolve themselves.
- I have four separate baked goods to put in the oven. I am not starting in on any of them. Instead, I am about to return to the mall. I have this unwieldy curiosity about what the mall is like minutes before it closes for the holiday.

A note of caution: Ocean will not opine about much of anything important between now and the close of 2004. Look not for studious commentary and stay away if you crave reflective insight. [In other words, Ocean will proceed as it always does, in a whimsied, designless manner, without any clear idea of where it’s heading or why it is going there.]

Dropped best friend in favor of speedy resolution to car problem

In an earlier post I described a growing dependence on a person who has become a fixture in my life: the AAA rescue guy who came to fix stalled, flattened, dead cars. Two had lost their air, their power, their pizzazz. That was then. Today, we are up to three deflated, depleted, debunked cars (not all mine! We have here two ancient drivers, two young drivers, three ancient cars).

My trusty rusty truck (alright, ye of high accuracy standards – I mean van) let out air in all four tires, but especially in one. That was the final straw. Not a single machine stuck by me during this cold spell. Thanks, guys.

I abandoned my man of slight mechanical aptitude but great friendship potential and called the local heroes at the Mobil station. I am in full support of friendship, but when my days are being trampled upon, it’s time to think selfishly about taking care of myself. And my van.

I finally made it to that dreaded place: the mall

Overheard, at Williams Sonoma and then again at another (secret) store across the mall:
Store clerk(s): Tomorrow, everything changes. The crowds diminish. It will be mostly men with a last-minute enlightenment about what their loved ones really want.

Items purchased: few. But I felt the season would be imperfect if I had not even once made it to the mall.

Mood meter: shoppers appeared benign, like they really did not mind being there. Odd!

Prospects of returning anytime soon: when the weather changes and I need a new bathing suit, if then.

It looks just as exquisite in the daylight

isn't she a charmer... as the sheep looks on 

the branch is sagging and so the little guy gets to go skating on the floor 

so many colors... 

In celebration of lateness

Oh to be late, to be late for everything! How wonderful.

Late in buying holiday cards? On sale, 40% off. Late in mailing present to parent in Berkeley? No lines at the post office anymore. Late in putting up yard lights outside? Let it go – no need to do it now, maybe next year. Late in getting dinner started? Oh, don’t bother, we can just eat out (I’m hoping for this one).

Poor suckers who get things done ahead of schedule – you don’t know what you’re missing!

I’ll be (anywhere but) home for Christmas

According to a recent study conducted by expedia.com, one-third of adults in the United States would rather head to the beach or the ski slopes, or go out on the town for a night, than visit the home of a friend or relative during the holiday season.

The IHT article reporting this (from Paris) gives anecdotal evidence of a restless populace, tired of visits to picturesque villages along the Normandy coast where the old relatives still reside, anxious, instead, to get out and see the world during the holiday season (the article reminds us that in Europe, the holidays generate a greater number of time-off-from-work days than in the States).

Does anyone think that travel during the holidays is fun? La Guardia early in the week was a nightmare and this was without winter weather interference. Prices at traditional vacation havens are inflated, local eating establishments are often closed. What is the joy in this?

Maybe this is more of a comment on the nature of our encounters with family and friends. We are so unused to seeing each other that forced holiday get-togethers can be a bit of an encumbrance. During the everyday, we surround ourselves with people exactly like us, we do not relish accommodating the inclinations of others. How boring, then, to deal with the aging parent, the cloistered setting of the family home that we’ve outgrown. Oh, we’ll do it, we’ll pack the bags and the gifts and head out (the study also notes that in reality, only 12% actually do abandon family in favor of holiday escapes), dreading it, waiting for the return to our own piece of heaven at home. Of course, someday we will be at the receiving end as our friends and relatives eventually lump us into the category of the boring and seek ways to escape. Maybe the solution is to find the boring less boring, if only during this brief holiday period.

Eat, drink, be merry!

Ann* suggests that the word “Merry” before Christmas is misplaced. The word connotes a revelry that perhaps is less appropriately matched to a holy birth. Wouldn’t a greeting of “joy” be more fitting, in that it tracks both the sacred meaning of the holiday, at the same time that it gives breathing room to those who wish to preserve the more secular traditions of the winter holiday?

Maybe. And the French would agree with her, since they use the word she favors: “joyeux.”

But the Poles would not. We tell each other “Wesolych Swiat,” which literally translates to “Merry Holi-days.” If we have enough air in our lungs, we say “Have a Merry Holi-day of the birth of God.” The word “holiday” preserves sacredness, in that it keeps the emphasis on the “holy” (whereas in English, we have come to think of “holiday” as something that entitles us to time off from work).

As for the merrymaking – it is entirely right that one would wish the very jolliest, richest (calorie-wise) of celebrations. A Polish Christmas is all about family, friends and food. The tree goes up, the crèche is artfully arranged and then you feast. And feast. And feast. I can think of no words that more aptly capture the spirit of these days than “Merry Christmas.” Unless it’s “bon appetit,” but that’s a little too French.

* Yes, I do read other blogs. But Althouse offers abundance, both in quantity and quality. Moreover, it has no “comments” feature. For all these reasons it inspires a greater number of links than the average blog.

A new best friend

A reader may be thinking – gosh the posts are getting skimpy and superficial. Must be because she is so full of holiday preparations… Wish she’d post some photos of the fresh pastries baking in the oven or stories of pre-holiday excitement.

I’m doing none of that: no baking, no holiday anything for that matter. I am, instead, cultivating a long and enduring friendship.

I met him by chance, but we have become great friends. We tell each other things, we speculate about the future, we turn to each other in stressful moments, we enjoy a good laugh together.

The only thing is, I can’t quite remember his name.

He first showed up at my doorstep yesterday to fix car number one. Then, of his own accord, he tackled car number two. And today he is back, tackling the freshly stalled car number one. He hasn’t much faith in it, I can tell. Nor did he have an easy time towing it away. He followed me up and down the Beltline, finally dropping off the problem child at the dealer’s service entrance. But friendships don’t die easily. He’ll be back soon, I’m certain of it.

Being boring

Do men and women who stay home and care for infants and use their free time to watch TV and play video games become boring? Ann suggests that this may be the case. But wait, if you are satisfied to spend your free time thus, are you not inherently a boring person anyway? Would you be in any way more interesting if you were out and about in the workplace? Don’t we know oh so many people who enter their work world and have absolutely nothing interesting to say about it while they are there, nor at the end of the day, when they retire from it?

A tree inside the house

Anyone will tell you that getting a tree up and fixing it to your satisfaction is a huge effort. My parents gave up on the project when I was thirteen. Their attitude was – you want a tree, you get it. And so I did. They did tolerate it though, whether our Christmas break was spent in the village with my grandparents, or in Warsaw, or even in New York – I’d find the tree, and up she would go. So you could say I’ve been putting up trees in the house for nearly forty years.

Last night’s tree enterprise was trouble-free. Over the years the stand has grown so that there now is a monster of monster stands, sturdy enough to hold a tree meant for Rockefeller Center. So the tree is up, it is not tilting, and it is adorable in its adorned state. It is a tree of stories because every single ornament was purchased in a special place at a special moment. Each year a handful is added and somehow or other there is always room for those new additions.

Everyone knows that my favorite is the simple cut out of two little faces at the window. But I am a fan of so many more – the winners and losers, they all were carefully selected and placed with great ceremony and, in the Polish way, with lots of accompanying food to move the task along.
Just a few photos for blog readers who like trees, like the holidays, like the idea that you can let your imagination create something so colorful and lovely right inside your home.

My favorite: two little girls smiling at the world. 

Yes, Polish glass-blown ones as well. 

From different corners of the world, side by side now 

The polar bear got a name this year and he got a pal, from the tights store in Paris. 

And on the top? A simple ribbon and a dried flower. There's a story in that as well. 

So where’s my partridge?

I’ve got three people here for the holidays, two cars with flat tires, one car with a dead battery, and zero patience for the entire mess, which, for reasons that are circumstantial but real nonetheless, is entirely in my lap.

Perhaps due to the inordinate pressure this has put on the day for me, I backed out the one drivable truck right into the Christmas tree in the garage. That’s okay, I think the dent in it will be rather charming, Charlie Brownish almost. Perfect trees are not real. This one will look real.

If I can’t have a partridge, I at least want an organic pear tree. Or for the AAA truck to come NOW, so that I can leave the house and buy some fruit already. Grrrrr!

And don't any of you, friends and blog readers, even think you're getting a holiday card from me this year. I hereby send greetings to all. There, are you happy now?

UPDATE: That sounded cheerless. Greetings may come, but maybe a little, um, late-ish and perhaps via email. I'm full of remorse, okay?

The spoils and riches of travel

I am unpacking suitcases that have been crammed in the past weeks as I passed through Krakow, the Tatra mountains, and finally Warsaw. Add to it that I have generous types making sure I take some of Poland back home to Madison, plus the fact that we have the holidays before us, and we’re looking at one (or two) bulging little valise at my feet.

Anything to show off for the blog?
Okay, here’s one: chocolate covered plums: you should be ogling a dinner invitation from me in the next weeks just to be served these for dessert (with a brandy if you’re into that sort of thing). Succulent and aromatic and totally yummy.

after-dinner treats 

Plums in chocolate. Okay. Cool. What else?
How about this: artisanal vintage numbered plum preserves.
Artisanal, vintage, numbered. Why?
Well, because plums, like grapes, have their good year and bad year. These preserves are stirred in large kettles, then packed by hand: only a couple of hundred jars are made each year. I have jar no. 184.
Could you tell the difference if it was from the year 2002 rather than 2001?
Jam should be eaten with as much care as anything else. I bet if I paused and savored it and rolled it around on my tongue…

one small kitchen (outside of Warsaw) makes these in limited quantities  

What else?
Honey from pine forest undergrowth.
Say what?
I can’t translate it. You need to taste it to understand how the essence of the forest can make its way into a great honey. This jar is somewhat depleted not because I had a honey craving and dug in halfway through the trip, but because some of the honey exited from the jar mid-flight.

"eco" means that it meets organic production standards 

Continue!
How about these artisanal cholcolates, individually crafted? I think Belgium is going to have to share the stage pretty soon: Polish chocolate is catching up to its EU neighbor!

delicate, refined, unusual. 

Anything non-foody?
Too many holiday secrets in my suitcase. But I can show off this rooster that I now put in the kitchen: he is made of Polish hay and let me tell you, it brings the barn smell right into your home.
Is that a good thing?
Yes: I am referring to the fresh, sweet smell of hay. Okay, maybe it’s not that pungent, but if I bend down and sniff and close my eyes, I can see the haystacks before me…
That would not be a winter image now would it?
No matter: the rooster traveled straight from the holiday market in Krakow and as he sits perched on my kitchen countertop, he is my tiny reminder of who I am and where it all comes from. I am transformed again. Friends wont recognize me.
(Oh oh, are we going to see more of that Eastern European angst? The eat, drink and be merry cataclysmic personality that plunges and plunders and then writes dark brooding stories about the meaninglessness of life? )
(People have such weird ideas on what it means to be Polish.)

hej, gory, nasze gory... 

Celebrate the countdown toward summer!

It is always a relief to survive December 21st. Understanding that henceforth the days will again grow longer feels extraordinarily wonderful. Ocean is all about celebrations: cheers to the coming of summer!

Hardy peasant stock? Maybe not.

Yesterday, when temps hovered in the upper thirties, New York dogs wore sweaters and Burberry coats. This morning the weather turned vicious. The streets had a dusting of snow (and a two inch layer of salt, it seemed). Temperatures imitated Wisconsin. Dogs were being carried by owners across the street. The wind kicked up, reminding me what winter was really like back home. Thanks a lot, New York. I would have appreciated one last morning of something gentler and tamer. This stuff is for the Olafs and the Ingas and husky Vladimirs of this world. Me, I’m the one that is genetically linked to the Ludmilas who stayed home by the kitchen hearth and stirred the porridge. Or, better yet, my ancestors were probably of Mediterranean stock, those that got mixed up during the European battles that merged our troops with theirs. Bottom line: this winter stuff isn’t for me.

A slick early morning walk 

where are the pink tones and gentler temps? 

"Voices leaking from a sad cafe... On Bleecker Street."

Being away means keeping to a schedule that bears no resemblance to the one at home. It means not reading the Sunday Times, not tracking anything beyond the top half of the front page (displayed on newsstands). And not cleaning, organizing for the week. And it means writing inconsequential posts.

There is something innocuously pleasant about going to the Village and walking down Bleecker Street, stopping at the (crowded!) Magnolia Bakery for cupcakes and looking at the cute and quirky holiday decorations on brownstones and in store windows. That’s it. Nothing could be simpler, less taxing. And short-lived.

Tomorrow, a return to the moment when I nearly missed the bus for O’Hare. Sigh. Poland didn’t quite leave my system the way it was supposed to.

No room inside for a tree, or for the family bikes. 

From Magnolia Bakery: two down, seven to go