Christmas Eve

I’ve been through so many! I’ve gone through Christmas Eves when there was fog (79), when there were stormy clouds around me ( 98, 99…), when there was such cold, only to become even colder in the weeks after (84), when there was too much snow and so nothing was easy (66), and it was especially difficult to find a tree to bring home (67), when all bad things happened to others but I thought that I was somehow spared (77), when it seemed that life was unfair just because a toy could not be put together easily (86).


This morning, I got up early enough to watch the night recede. Looking out, I knew that this would be the year of gentle, pretty snow.





The kind that clings to every twig. The kind that does well if left undisturbed. Sensitive, delicate snow.





We started the day as every year: at Hubbard Avenue Diner.





Surely it is possible to have a quiet Christmas – a no fuss Christmas.

Ours is not a quiet, no fuss Christmas. Which means that the day before has no pockets of idleness.

For someone raised in a family that could not decide how it felt about any holiday celebration, and now, finding myself in the company of someone who feels no ambiguity at all but chooses instead to ignore holidays and grunt at the mere mention of them, I’ve gone in a different direction: I love these handful of days and all the possible ways they can bring together people, food, music and lights: You like the spiritual dimension? It’s yours. You’re a food nut? Cook up a feast. Thinking of others brings you satisfaction? Give of yourself – this is your day! Music – that’s your joy? Wow, you’ve got choices.

It’s a beautiful time.

notes

I’m thinking -- here we are, at the inception of winter, and there are short days and cold nights and there is nothing inspiring about either. And yet, never mind, we surge forward anyway, as if there’s great enjoyment in skidding and sliding and freezing and turning on the lights at 3:30 in the afternoon.

We are a weird lot.





Sometime in mid afternoon, I pause to drink coffee with Ed (do not infer from this that Ed drinks coffee – he does not; beguilingly, he sleeps through most of our encounter). But it is a fleeting (if warm and pleasant) thing. After, I go on to finish all shopping that has to be done in anticipation of Thursday and I go home to complete The Promise.

The Promise is no great wonder – only a childhood cake (mind you, not my childhood; no parent baked anything ever during my childhood) that has been on the list of “can you please bake this again” cakes that my daughters present me with when they come for a visit.





I’m not sure when we are supposed to eat this (there are so many other items that must make an appearance), at the same time that I am sure that it will be eaten. Christmas time is like that: some things you can count on, others – you must wait and see.

[Written while listening to the strains of Clare College: the Holly and the Ivy, our favorite holiday CD.]

steps

Ten years have passed since I last saw the Nutcracker ballet. By comparison, in the five year time frame before that, I had seen the Nutcracker at least 25 times. If you throw in rehearsals, the number multiplies.

We have a dancer in our family. If genes gave her talent, they certainly were of the kind that skipped my generation. But man oh man, could that girl dance. She was so enchanting that she rose through the ranks and danced on point far earlier than was probably good for her. And we all loved to watch her.

But after she went on to do other things, I stopped going to the Nutcracker. Until today when they persuaded me to come to Madison’s seasonal show.

At intermission I watched other little ones in their very dressiest, take a minute out from all that quiet watching. I know some boys like ballet and I know some girls hate it, but on balance, more girls than boys like it and more girls than boys come to be mesmerized by all that costuming and grace.




















I was surprised to see very very young children in the audience. Like around the age of one. Surely the one year old did not fully appreciate the coming of age story. Her coming of age will be when she is weaned off the bottle.

The tyke in front of us was both curious and sick, leading him intermittently to wheeze and ask lots of questions. I could not decide if I should mind. In the end, I found him to be disarming as he snuggled in his mom’s lap, sneezing, coughing and being actually extremely sweet.

Most people do not find that there is much of a story in the Nutcracker, but I think the best coming of age depictions (in film or music) are ones where plot is irrelevant and the whole drama concentrates on what goes on in the head of a person stepping into adulthood. Ever since I first saw the Nutcracker at the girlish age of ten back in New York, I have felt quite emotional about it. Predictably, I got emotional now, at the age of 55, but I would venture that it was for different reasons.

Outside, after the show, the air was so cold that it was sometimes hard to breathe.


Today, the air remained cold. I had some unpleasant tasks to do (shopping at the mall) and I asked for a ride over to West Towne. There again the world showed its gendered tones. Men sat in any and all available spaces and waited for the ordeal to be over. Women shopped.

Personally, I hate shopping at malls too, but I would not pause for a minute there to wait for anyone. Too chaotic in a disconcerting sort of way.

I left as quickly as I could and only when I was outside, did it strike me that getting home would be a challenge. Ed was out and about, daughters were out and about and I was basically carless. Buses do not run in the way that would lead me quickly home. And so I set out to walk the 4.5 mile stretch to my condo.










That was a mistake. I was not dressed for below 0 F weather. My legs lost feeling quickly and I lost patience equally fast as the sidewalks along Mineral Point Road (a major Madison artery) were in many places not plowed.

I called the one person nearby whom I thought would rescue me and he did. He happens to have a car with seats that warm up and as I melted in the passenger chair, I thought the only thing missing was a laptop to warm the top of my thighs.

trees

When the snow falls, it’s easy to get carried away with photographing trees. A leafless tree is in itself dreary and uninspiring. Put it on a snowbank and suddenly it’s splendid.





There’s something about the contrast that looks so modern. Suddenly, you, the photographer are creating art.





But actually today I am focused on the Christmas tree. I picked it out early in December and it had been resting at Ed’s in the days when I was away. Until Friday night, when we loaded it onto his truck and drove it to the condo.





Now, I have always assessed the size of Christmas trees by their height. And so when the nursery had told me that this one is about ten feet, I thought – fine. My ceiling is ten feet.

But just as people vary in their width and girth, apparently so do trees because this one is just so wide! And the trunk is like the torso of a heavyweight champ, weighing more, I’m sure, than two normal trees its height. So that even big Ed and determined me had trouble getting it on and off the truck.

And then it did not fit through the door. Branches had to come off. And it would not fit into the massive stand. Ed had to hammer it in. I almost returned it and asked for a baby sister in its stead, but Ed persevered and it is now standing.





You need some perspective? Well, at 5’5” I hit about its middle. And when I lay down on the floor next to it, I find that there’s more tree beyond my feet and beyond my head.

I ask Ed if he has any ideas about getting it down and out at the end of the season. He tells me – the only way is to dump it over the balcony.

Now, I am on the rules and regulations committee of my condo association and I do not think that there is a rule about not dumping trees over your balcony, but nor is there a rule saying you can’t dispose of dead bodies in this manner and yet I feel someone would make a fuss if you did.

No matter. Let’s be Scarlettian about it and worry tomorrow. Today we have a tree and it is magnificent!


LATER

In the evening, the Chicago travelers pulled in and set to work.

This morning, this bitter bitter cold morning where the winds are howling and snow is drifting and I am assured it’s -30 F, what with all that wind and white stuff, I walk into the living room, turn on the lights and think how nice it would be to drink a warm cappuccino in front of the tree.

slushy sentimentalism

I would have headed home Friday morning, but there were plenty of warnings to stay off the roads until the crews could push back the foot of snow that fell overnight in southern Wisconsin. I delayed my return, therefore, and daughters and I headed for the center of downtown Chicago – the Daley Plaza. [Daughters will be coming to Madison for their winter vacation late Saturday. Me, I need to get things ready for their arrival. More on that in my next post.]

Since my Chicago visit was to be a “one nighter” (later, after Christmas, we’ll return for a slightly longer spell in the city), I was dressed more for a long car ride than for a walk in city snow. You know how cities feel after a snowfall? Slushy and wet. You hope that there’ll be stretches where someone has cleared a path for you, but it’s not guaranteed.





Over time, the snow turns into mush. At the curb, icy lakes form and you have to dive right in. There’s no other way of getting from one block to the next.

Within minutes, my little black socks and the decorative but insignificant black boots and all ten toes are soaked. Swimming in shoe slush.

Not important. We’re downtown now and it is seasonally festive and colorful here. We make our way (past countless signs announcing the danger of falling icicles) to the Daley Plaza, where vendors have set up stalls in much the same way holiday market stalls have appeared in most towns and cities of Europe (and especially Germany).





Daughters eat hot dogs and potato pancakes and I slurp glühwein…










..which warms my insides but stops short of warming my toes.

We pass stall after stall with colorful crafts and we look up at the display of trees that borders the market.










… and because it is close by, we stroll over (did I say stroll? Slosh is a better choice here) to Macy’s. Daughters pause to admire the holiday windows.










If someone would have told me, when I was little that, for all of my adult life, I would be in some way connected to the city of Chicago I would have said – not possible. Too stodgy, sprawly, dangerous, brutal, cold, corrupt. But, things change, people change, cities change. As the cop shouts out happy holidays to the people whom she helps cross the crazy intersection, as the snow is pushed back by the sanitation workers, who also take a moment to throw snowballs at each other,





...as the El screeched and the taxi honks and the pigeons warm their dirty feathers…





… it strikes me that I may even like Chicago more than New York now (I have spent an equal number of years in both by now). Weird how you can open up to a place you just couldn’t wait to leave way back when. Or maybe that in the holiday season, sloshing through the wet puddles and underneath falling icicles with daughters, you get kind of sentimental about a place.






It was dark by the time I pulled up by Bascom Mall back in Madison. I walked into my office, took off my shoes and dripping socks and massaged my toes for a good many minutes.

from Chicago: sensual

This Land Is My Land

Driving down to Chicago (for an evening of food fantasies), I am thinking that the landscape is especially pretty in the hazy sunshine of the afternoon. I pull off the highway to take a photo or two. Oh! A deer? And another?





I have no telephoto lens, but surely I can get closer. The one is hoisting herself up to reach the leaves of the tree. It’s a pretty sight. I turn into a dealership in trailers and towing rigs. No, still not good enough. I follow a road from the dealership until I come to a sign that says private, no trespassing. I take an imperfect photo and start to head back in reverse.





An SUV is behind me now. A raging driver gets out. What do you think you’re doing? – she asks.
Taking a photo of the deer. Look! – I point to the two in the field.
Do you know that this is private property?
This road? Yes, when I saw the sign, I stopped and tried to head back. Now you’re in my way.
All of it is private! – she tells me. How rude of you to be here!

I thought about the days when we used to camp along river banks in Poland. The concept of “keep off” was one that I did not fully understand until I moved here. Of course, landowners have a right to keep people out. I get that. But dealership parking lots? I want to wage a legal argument here, but think maybe this is a waste of time, so I wait until she backs away, freeing me to leave.


All Is Bright

I am in Chicago now. It is evening, but still early for the food flight. Daughters (in Chicago at the moment) and I want to make good use of our time here and so we head to the Lincoln Park Zoo for their (free and beautiful) display of holiday lights.

Hello, holidays! I’d forgotten about you in my weeks away. But now, after three hours of radio holiday music and this walk, I am fully entranced and ensconced.















Especially enchanting are the trees that twinkle to the sounds of the Ukrainian Bell Carol.





But it is cold, out there by Lake Michigan. Ice sculptures, icy toes, chilly night.





After a while, I huddle with the creatures in the warm gift shop.






A Show of Food

And now for the spectacular food flight. As for any show, you need to prepare -- internally and externally.





I have written about the art of molecular gastronomy before, two years ago, when I first ate at Alinea in Chicago, and this past October, when I came down to watch a demonstration by Chef Achatz on the occasion of the publication of his new book. Alinea is not just a meal, it is an experience. You don’t go there to talk business or to catch up on news with friends, you go there as if you are going to a show, except that you also get to eat the presentation. In our case, we take the short flight, the tasting menu, which Achatz presents as a twelve (but really with extras thrown in) course sampling menu, ranging from bite-size morsels of potato, or parsnip, or candycane















… to more substantial plates – of bass draped in chamomile and celery, or crab with popcorn sauce, butter and curry, for example.










It is a four hour show and the time flies! The staff, as always, helps move things along expertly and with humor and so the whole evening is a blockbuster success. A standing ovation!

I have cared about food – its role in daily life, in family life, in amorous pursuits, in the life of the planet – pretty much my entire adult years. A visit to Alinea is like a trip to the studios of the grand masters. This isn’t about art for your living room walls. It isn’t about piling on expensive imported ingredients. It’s about testing the boundaries of what is possible. In food, and therefore in life.

Filled and inspired, we leave after midnight, to be greeted by a taxi and snow.

for the love of food

It is indeed cold outside. The weather forecast tells me – snow. Up to a foot, overnight. Between work, holiday work, housework, other post-travel work and the weather, it makes little sense to head out, right?

But if you were asked to come down for a dinner and a show in Chicago (a three hour drive, in good weather), you wouldn’t say no, would you?

I didn’t say no. Especially since the dinner and show are all one. And so this afternoon I’ll be heading “south.” Navigating that evocatively worded “wintry mix” (Chicago hasn’t decided if it’ll settle for snow, sleet or a combination of the two). All for the love of gastronomic spectacles.

I’ll be back tomorrow morning. I’ll fill in details then.

from France, one last time

I don’t even question it anymore. It rains, it will rain. The only unknown is how much. And will there be pauses.

There are few guests at the hotel now. With only three rooms per floor, le Grimaldi has always felt intimate. But now it feels positively ours. If we leave the tiny elevator on our sixth floor, it will be there in the morning when we take it down for breakfast.

The desk clerk fusses over our breakfast. Can I scramble you some eggs? Yes! Eggs, rolls, cheeses, breads, croissants. Tangerines. Sweet sweet tangerines. I work on my computer, Ed reads. And reaches for breakfast foods in a way that I never see back home. It’s that it’s free, sure, but also it is because breads, cheeses and eggs here are beastly good.

And then he naps.

I use this time to go out. Past the square with the discombobulated tree.





I'm itching to shop. Meaning, to try on things that I would like to wear. I know I am tempting myself. Still, between the acquisition of things and travel I’ll always pick travel. And so I shake my head to the clerk and retreat without anything. Except for a lipstick. A lipstick? – Ed asks back at the hotel. Can’t you buy the same thing at Walgreen’s?


In the early afternoon, we ignore the skies and head out for a hike. Past blocks of houses that combine the colors of Nice (orange houses, green shutters) and the colors of Provence (yellow houses, blue shutters).




Past houses and gardens that are all Nice (orange house, green shutters, orange tree, olive tree).




We make our way to the old port first – deeply atmospheric in this weather.





And now I want to eat lunch. At home, I never eat lunch, but when I travel, every meal is an opportunity to fall in love with new foods in new, locally colorful spaces. Ed is the opposite, of course. At home, he eats throughout the day. Here, except for breakfast, he resists regular meals. And so again I eat alone. Water, do you at least want water? I ask. No, nothing. He fiddles with my camera while I make very important food decisions.




The waitress asks me – he is a professional photographer?

I think that life is funny in this way: a guy, who is comfortably underdressed, wrinkled, unshaven, gruff, preoccupied, if, moreover, he is consuming nothing, or the wrong thing -- all those things cause him to be intriguing.

She is smiling at the man who is confidently snapping away. No, I say emphatically. The camera is mine. [And the endless, endless flights that earn me business lounges at foreign airports? Not his! He is the tag along, not me! I am the employed person who has work to do on her laptop, me, that one is me, not him. Sigh.]

I eat delicious slices of raw artichoke, with lettuce and slivers of cheese, all dressed in lemon juice and olive oil.





We continue our hike. Ed talks about details of the boats we see in the harbor. Some are monster boats – huge private vessels of the Onassis type. To me, they're an eyesore -- pompous and overbearing. But, the port has all sizes. From the monsters to the shrimpy ones – colorful and well tended.





And now we head up to the forest and the summit of Mont Boron. The air is moist but it is not raining. The wetness gives us a fresh, earthy smell. I want to tell Ed – there: even in Nice, there is quiet. See? You can find it up here, on the path up the Mont Boron: quiet.

The views are surprisingly majestic.





You would think visibility would be poor, what with the clouds, the rain, but it’s not. Hey, the Alps! I can even spot the Alps just north of us!





On the east side of the summit, we see the coast of Villefranche and Ed becomes wistful. Imagine sailing here, in this protected bay between Mont Boron and Cap Ferrat (a peninsula extending on the other side of Villefranche)!





I look at the sea, and at the port where ferry boats from Corsica come in. Imagine coming here in spring and heading out for a few weeks in Corsica!

This is it: right there on the summit of Mont Boron, we have before us the reason why we are only occasional in our traveling companionship: neither really likes what the other regards as sublime. I cannot sail. It makes me ill. Ed finds staying at b&b’s or inns boring. So boring in fact, that he squirms at the mention of any future travel.

We hike down Mont Boron. It is our last hike here, along the coast of the Mediterranean and I no longer feel the lightness that should be mine on this descent.





We pause near a small school. Children noises. I miss children, my children, even though they’re not children anymore. We smile as we look at the notices posted on the board by the gate. School lunches for the week. I remember arguing with schools back home about what kids should have for school lunch. They wont eat it if it’s healthy was the common response. I’ll not translate this school’s menu for you, but I’ll tell you this much: it’s healthy.






And again we are by the port: first one side...





...then the other. It's dusk and the lights are coming on. Port lights, holiday lights.





We walk along the shore, back to Nice, centre ville...










…and return to our hotel. Not for long though. We have an early dinner at a very unassuming, very atmospheric Nicoise restaurant. The food is simple but good: salads with chickpeas and onion, fried zucchini (both vegetable and flower), stuffed sardines. The waitress gives us a homemade orange liqueur. To Nice. To return trips. To dinners where someone else cooks with imagination and with zest. To all of it.






In the morning, we leave while it’s still dark to catch the local bus to the airport. And for the first time on this trip, I get wet from standing in the rain.





Did I oversell travel in early December? No, not at all. But there is the inevitable long return. And in December weather, only the patient and the hearty will not be bothered. Nice has rain. Flight is delayed. In Paris, the fog is dense. That we land on the runway is amazing. Not surprisingly, the flight to Chicago is delayed. In Chicago, there is a snowstorm. We circle the airport for hours. Finally we do land and there is the applause of relief as we touch a completely snow-covered runway. The bus to Madison? Running hours behind schedule. It eventually does come, but the three hour ride becomes a five hour ride and it is well past midnight when pull in at the Union. Where the cab we called is … delayed. All that waiting, much of it in bad weather. Nothing chills you more than waiting for a cab in the freezing night after 24 continuous hours of travel.

I’d do it again tomorrow.