Friday

 the law and you, revisited

Yesterday, in my Ocean post, I tested your commitment to a lawful existence. Are you maybe less law abiding than you think? I wrote about common infractions -- such as crossing the street on a red light. Several of you pushed back, claiming that you didn't even go that far: you walked when the little green man told you to walk. One person noted that it may be a cultural thing. People in Japan or Denmark (rather than the the ruggedly individualistic U.S.) have a culture of obeying traffic laws. But I think it hits beyond culture. I'll never forget an early trip  with my girls to New York. Having lived in Madison, their experience with pedestrian traffic signals was minimal. And on trips to Chicago, we always obeyed the signals. Traffic moves swiftly and rather recklessly in that city. Enter Manhattan: do pedestrians ever pay attention to traffic lights there?  I mean, geez, when you're on 54th and 2nd, you can practically see the movement of cars in Chinatown! Nothing is careening down the avenue? Cross! Indeed, if you walk along the avenues and wait for street lights along the cross streets to change, I swear, you're going to hold up the whole rhythm of the city! So, naturally, I crossed. With the girls. On red lights.

They were properly horrified! And they refused to go along! My little girls stood at the street corner, holding hands, waiting for the light, even as hoards of people passed by. Now that's a firm position on obeying the law! (Or maybe they were staging a mini rebellion against mom's know-it-all-ness?)

But I'll take you to another infraction now -- you obedient types out there! If, until the 2003 Supreme Court decision (Lawrence v. Texas), fornication (i.e. sex without or outside of marriage) was illegal in your state, were you, perhaps violating a law there? Because if not, according to the numbers, that puts you in the minority. And so are we back with the position that some laws are best left ignored?

I breathe a sigh of relief. My future stays at (illegal) AirBnBs are secured!


who's who on the Internet

Here's a pattern: I plunge into a new social media forum, then (and only then) I learn the rules. And one rule I learned is that your name is yours to use, from the moment of birth til the day you die -- except when you venture forth into the brave new world of the internet.

True, on Face Book, you can only participate if you use your real name. Are you Judy Schultz in real life? Well then, Judy Schultz you must remain for the purposes of your FB account. I know several people who do not follow this, possibly not having read every last detail of the contract between themselves and Face Book. But most people obey: your real name, or bust.

In blogging, writers are all over the place. Mostly they take on names that match their blog content. A gardening blog might be written by the "wild rose of texas." Parenting of infants may have something like "tired and cranky" as a pen name. My night with a screaming baby. By Tired and Cranky.  When I began blogging in January of 2004, I assumed that I would have to stand behind my words so I chose the very exciting blogger name of Nina Camic. Which happened to be my real name. Creative, no?

In twitter, I again used my real name. I mean, I blog with Nina Camic. I Face Book with Nina Camic. Why would I be different in this forum? But now I'm learning that if you're a nobody, often you play with names there as well. Though "wild rose of texas" would be suboptimal. Too many letters. Choose short and sweet and often nonsensical. Now, if you're famous -- say you're the Queen of England, you put your twitter name right out there. But if you are that famous, someone else will most likely be writing your tweets for you. So if you see a name on Twitter that you recognize, don't get too excited. A paid staffer may be tweeting.

In the end, I'm glad I stuck with the same name in all circumstances, for all purposes. When I run into people who recognize me from Ocean, they don't say "Hi, wild rose of texas!" They say "hi Nina!" It feels personal and warm.

cheepers

And speaking of warm, here's another update on the Polar Vortex and the cheepers.

After breakfast, in the front room of the farmhouse...






...but before leaving for the weekly trip to The Store (grocery day is a big deal if you live in the country), I peek in on the brood.

You have to check for eggs frequently or they'll freeze, crack, explode, or do who knows what. In other words, you may have yourself a wasted egg (except if you're Ed, who insists on eating it even if it freezes, cracks, explodes or otherwise looks weird). And, besides the egg check, I have this great fear that one of the hens will freeze while standing around waiting for spring to come and so I want to check on them a lot, to nudge them forward in case they forget to move.

They do a lot of standing on one leg and gazing south. I think their brains are working overtime, trying to figure out how to escape the cold. (They stand on one foot to warm the other.)





The chickens are fine. Off I go to shop. Which takes a while.

I come back and look toward the barn. They're still within its orbit. As if fearing that a walk away from this relatively safe haven will plunge them into another unpleasant environment. After all, they don't know that winter is as bad as it gets. They don't follow our calendar. I don't think.

I call them up for a treat. This is the time to bond with the hens, to placate Oreo, to feel like I am really tied to the farmette land, flora and the animal kingdom that passes through.










And then I lead them back to the barn area.





It's such a simple existence for them! So very lovely! But right now, I keep thinking -- so very cold.

thoughts on hardy stock and breaking the law

Would you break the law if you knew that everyone was doing it? What if you knew, too, that you wouldn't incur consequences?

Most anyone I know would say -- not me! Maybe to save the life of another, or unwittingly, or in tiny ways, but for personal gain? Not me!

This is where I want to tick off all the ways where we routinely go against the rules, big and small. My favorite is crossing the street on a red light when there is no traffic. I'll never forget this scene: it was in Fukuoka, Japan, some dozen years ago. I was standing with a small group at a corner, at night and there was absolutely no vehicular traffic. Nonetheless, everyone waited for the light to change. My customary impulse to break that rule was so strong that I could not, could not resist the pull to place my foot on the street before the light turned green! Not only do I appear to violate this rule of the road routinely, it seems I can't NOT violate it, even when there's social pressure to obey.

There are no traffic lights around the rural roads that twist and dip around the farmette where I live and when I go out for a walk, I make a point of walking into the traffic, like I know the law requires. But there is another little area of rule violations that I dabble in and as I step deeper into the fray with this particular activity, I'm just a touch surprised how seemingly indifferent I am to the fact that here again, there is a law and I am either breaking it, or at the very least, participating in someone else's lawlessness. Sort of like an accomplice to a crime.

I'm referring to renting through AirBnB. I've stayed in rooms or apartments rented under the table, so to speak, in a number of places -- Berkeley, Dublin, New York, Paris, Warsaw -- the list is not short! I know the rule on when it's legal in Ireland, because an AirBnB person there explained it to me (but I didn't check if she was right or if she followed it). I pretty much can guess that in the other places the rentals were in violation of local ordinance.

But everyone is doing it!

Well now, there's an answer! Truth is, though I think the laws should be adjusted to permit some form of space sharing, for the most part, I understand the reasons behind the rules and in any case, it's not up to me to decide if the rules are good or bad. Is it? Or maybe it is? By massive violations, we are making a statement that change is needed, no?

Phew. I feel better. This still doesn't explain my feverish desire to cross a street in Fukuoka on a red light, but at least in the case of AirBnB -- I'm making a statement! (Of sorts.)

I write about this as I tidy up my plans for a trip in a few weeks (AirBnb, yet again) and, too, as I consider the possibility that in the years to come, AirBnB will play a huge role in my travels across the ocean.

And you know that it must be a gray day, here in Wisconsin, because thoughts of travel are with me from the minute I wake up this morning.

Gray and cold. I push Ed out of bed.  
Your turn to let the cheepers out. I make that up. We don't take turns. Ever since I agreed to let Oreo, (the batty rooster that's Ed's beloved pal), remain at the farmette, I laid this condition: you let them out in the mornings! I don't want Oreo to attack me at sunrise! Of course,  Oreo has, for now, settled down and frankly, none of the chickens are especially energetic at sunrise or otherwise. An attack would require a lot of running and flapping on his part. He hardly seems geared for that since the weather turned cold.

Ed dutifully gets up and stumbles out toward the barn, half asleep going out, still half asleep coming back inside.


Okay. Time for us all to move this day forward. I get up, look out the window...
Oh! You didn't tell me there was a bit of snow on the ground!
That deserves and receives a grunt. I can get the guy to open the coop at the break of dawn, but this is not the time to look for dialogue.

I go out, with my camera, because you know, those first dustings of snow are always so special!





The cheepers don't share my enthusiasm for it. They're out of the coop, but they absolutely show no interest in leaving the barn. Drafty as it is, at least the barn doesn't have snow on the ground.

Chickens hate snow.

And yet, they need exercise. I take out grains to entice them out. One stumbles to look, pecks once, retreats, as if to say -- not worth it.






I nearly give up on them. At breakfast (in the kitchen today), I tell Ed -- they're stuck for the season in the crappy old barn! 


 



But as we look out the window, we see that they are moving toward us. Perhaps they spotted the light in the kitchen window. Tentatively, gingerly, they are making their way to the farmhouse.






Bravely, so bravely, they step along the half frozen path (we are now at the beginning of a two week spell of complete, bone chilling cold). I go to the farmhouse door to greet them.






I feed them raisins and seeds and nuts and they peck away, but still oh so tentatively. As if their carefree life has been blasted out from under their feet and they have to figure out afresh what's what.



(Butter pecks at the potted mums  -- is there anything that's living left in this world?)


But here's the amazing part: whereas all chicken people I know by now have given up on regular egg collection (you can force hens to lay with lights in the winter, but we're not going to do that), our girls are still going strong. Against all odds, breaking all rules, so to speak, they're giving us three eggs every single day.

Hardy stock. We've got a lot of that floating around the farmette these days.



(note Isie boy behind the glass door: he's still a little intimidated by the whole cheeper deal)

And that's a good thing.


P.S. to the NYTimes piece from yesterday: I really enjoyed your comments here and, too, the comments of NYT readers after the piece itself. I especially recommend those to my demographic: if you're thinking you may be a grandparent soon, go back to the article and find out what young parents are saying about the whole grandparent schtick.

The New York Times

Why sit on your hands and wait to hear from agents about your big manuscript, when you can be writing small pieces and stories in this interim period? And submitting at least one of them, say, to the New York Times?

Last Friday morning, as Ed was poking me with his elbow, to show me a youtube clip that he found relevant to our daily existence (sometimes he strikes gold, other times -- more like aluminum), I muttered empty uhuhs and yes dears and typed away at a piece that was eventually retitled "Soon To Be Grandma, Ready to Learn." And submitted it to Motherlode -- the section of the NYTimes that deals with families.

And boom! This boomer has spoken! It was accepted and it appears today. Read it by clicking here.

And do comment, if you want, over there, over here -- agree, disagree -- this is your chance to join the discussion on what it's like to plunge into something familiar, yet brand new. Hey, wasn't I a mother? Doesn't that give me credibility with my own daughter (possibly both daughters) as they become mothers too? My blunt answer is: no, it does not. Find out why.

In other news ...wait a minute, you want more news than that? Alright! I'm on a roll!

In case you have thought me to be stuck in the tried and true, like for instance, committed to posting photos every day of breakfast at the farmette table (and I am committed to it! for now!)...






...and of our four very free ranging chickens -- cheepers in my parlance -- on this cold cold day in Wisconsin...



(early morning, looking toward the barn, on my sleepy walk to open the coop)





(sunrise!)





(two of our brood)



...well yes, there is that, but I am also jumping (feels more like plunging: think falling off a cliff rather than crossing a great divide) into the next stage of technological acumen by embracing Twitter. From now on, I am as committed to daily tweets as I am to daily posts here, on Ocean. If you're a Twitter nut, follow me there @ NinaCamic. Too much, you say?

There is never too much writing in my life. Not now, not in my first year after retirement.

Tuesday

And what would you do on a day that is suddenly so... uninviting?

I look outside and notice snow showers. This will have been the highlight of the day: snow showers. So wet that they don't even stick. The landscape remains predominantly brown. Thank God for the red sheep shed and the remaining crab apples!






(Can't see the wet snow falling? Let's look again.)






Ed lets the cheepers out, but they don't seem inclined to make the long walk from barn to our front door (whereas on previous days, they'd any annoy the hell our of Isie boy by claiming squatters rights to our doorstep, making it impossible for the cat to go in or out without coming into contact with at least one of them -- a risk too big for our rather distrustful guy).

I go out and call to them -- cheepers! cheePERS! Move! You need the exercise!

Nothing.

We eat breakfast surrounded by chickens of the type you place on your dining table.



(tussled hair)


(Can you look less out of it, Ed? Thank you!)






After, I try again. Cheepers!






Alright. The girls heard me. slowly they make their way over. I reward them amply with stale bread (their favorite) in addition to black sunflower seeds, trapper peas, and GMO-free milo. (Dont ask; it's what the Chicken Store sold us. For a special treat.)





When they finish picking out the foods from the soil, they retreat under a bush and there they rest for the better part of the day. This leads me to say to Ed -- you know, I can't really think that they are happy in winter. They must live with a constant feeling of cold.
I can't give them Florida, he responds and goes back to his computer. Ed is very matter of fact about what can and cannot be had in life.

Since the sun refuses to show any signs of emerging, I follow its lead and stay inside. Wouldn't you? It's just a degree above freezing and the forecast tells me that this is the warm spell for the next two weeks. But without sun, it just looks dismal out there.

I'm thinking -- if the cheepers need exercise (and they do), then shouldn't I nudge Isie boy toward some activity as well (in the few minutes out of the day when he is not asleep)?

I try.





As you can see, very unsuccessfully.

This is the kind of day where the best thing you can do for your (retired) self is to read, write and hatch plans for better days and sunnier spaces. I do all the above!

And for dinner, we eat home made chicken soup, ignoring the brutal fact that the meat in the broth is awfully similar to what we have resting in the coop right now.

Monday

What a pretty day this is! So gentle and calm -- with the softness of September rather than November. A quiet day with no shouts, no great noises.

Breakfast is a little rushed, because I do have a doctor's visit. (That frozen shoulder/elbow begs for a quick assessment.)






(As I pull out of the driveway, the hens look up from their scratch work, asking with their whole bodies, in the way they always do -- where are you going?? I always respond. This time I tell them -- I'll be back soon!)






My doc has me do the needed xray and within a few hours dispenses the needed reassurance that I have not yet given over my upper left joints to arthritis or worse. I tell Ed, radiantly, happily that I have this good fortune of just a small problem rather than a large problem.
He grins: this is what you do -- you imagine you have something, you go to a doctor, get the report that it's actually no big deal and then you feel good! Wow! 
I growl at him (but with a wide grin): I needed to make sure!
Of course you did, he nods his head, with understanding if not sympathy. (The man will be one of those who dies early because he refuses to ever believe he is sick or in need of care. Or, he'll be in that special subset of people who will reach 100, because he has absolutely convinced himself that he is incapable of being really ill. They write stories about people like that: the psychology of believing you're fine is, apparently a powerful medicine in its own right.)

And so I am at peace, happy, relaxed. The cheepers look up as I pull in, the sun dapples our pathway to the barn...





The world is unbelievably kind to me.


I work hard on various writing projects. But as I look outside, I note that kind, gentle sky and I think -- one more game! We surely should be heading out for one more tennis game!


We play as the sun recedes quickly toward the horizon. (If you step beyond the court and cross the line of trees, you can see it --- here, take a look.)






Alright. Done for the year. We put away the rackets and warn out balls and drive home as the last sliver of light blazes over the tree line.






Goodnight trees.
Goodnight sweet hens, settling in their respective spots (Ed will pick them up eventually, in his most fatherly way and carry them into the coop).






Goodnight Oreo.

patterns

What do you do when your partner's range of operations diminishes over time? When the idea of heading out (or even heading downstairs) seems less pleasurable than, say, staying under a quilt with mountains of material to read on the internet?

I've said plenty here, on Ocean, on the topic of Ed's desire to stay closer to home -- to not travel across the ocean, to forgo trips even across the continent. I've stood up in favor of traveling alone when your partner digs his heels into his (or her) familiar home turf. I've said it time and again -- solo travel is cool! It allows you to open your eyes wider to people and places you encounter. It buys you freedom. It's cozy, it's comforting, it's adventurous.

But what if that range (your partner's range) keeps growing smaller? So that you're recalling months of hikes, expeditions, explorations together -- all in the past tense?

I thought about this after Ed and I finished our Sunday cleaning this morning and I saw that he was ready to crawl back under the quilt and resume his reading. I didn't want to wait for breakfast, so Isie boy and I ate alone.





As Ed came down sheepishly, right when I was finishing my last bite of oatmeal with kefir, honey and fruit, I thought -- maybe it's time to give a little nudge. (If I were to be honest, I'd have to admit that it was more like an impassioned plea.)

And so on this last fine day before the polar vortex begins its slow descent to our neck of the woods, we do not retreat to our various projects. Not today. It becomes, instead, a day we'll spend together and I mean more than being simply in the same room of a farmhouse.

We pick a beautiful segment of of the Ice Age Trail and we hike, pausing not infrequently to explain various parts of our projects and preoccupations to each other.











I don't know that Ed needed that, but I certainly was missing some back and forth.











It's such a perfect place for a probing conversation: a back and forth up there, where the trees are now bare, the grasses golden and the air as crisp as the leaves beneath our feet.






On the way home, we make two stops. At Culver's for the frozen custard...






... and at DB Chocolates (in Madison), where Ed tells me to fill a box. I do.





Most of the times, he and I give each other plenty of room to hunker down, pursue our own projects, stay put in our own bubbles. But sometimes that alone time is just too long. Today, I so appreciated walking in step again.


In other news -- the chicken mama called and left a message: sorry it took so long. I'm coming this afternoon to get Oreo.

I saw Ed's face drop. I watch Oreo trundle along, after the white hens...





...trying his hardest to keep up. Winter is coming. I'm not out in the yard that much. Oreo is part of the pack. I call the chicken mama back: don't come. We'll keep him until spring.


In the evening, my girl and her husband come over.



(I told her to look pregnant!)


There aren't many of these Sunday dinners left. A number of the weekends between now and her due date will be given over to other activities -- holidays, travels, etc.






You think you've established a pattern and before you know it, the pattern is untenable and you have to start afresh.

Sometimes breaking a pattern is a good thing. Other times you're just so hungry for a new one to fill its place.

free range chickens as a metaphor for a life well lived

I can hear the quiet mumbling among some of you, see the eye roll, the shake of the head: here come those cheepers again! It's like Ed for breakfast: a record replayed over and over again!

You are so right. The brood of hens and the rooster are, to me, like a play, a hit parade -- with hints at something greater, vignettes of a life that proceeds along a different path than, say, yours or mine, but it is a life well lived and I assure you, we profit by watching it unfold before us.

So like the breakfast that sets our day in motion...





...the cheepers, too, have their place in my day.

Fact is, they scale down my expectations for it. Consider this: a throw of seeds and bread bits leaves them in a state of bliss for hours on end.






An ill conceived snack of crushed yam tortilla chips (I know, I know, whose dumb idea was it to buy those?) has Scotch come back to our door and ask -- can we do better here?






They have group think, yes they do!


 



But sometimes they go off on their own explorations (this next photo is yesterday's but I forgot to use it).






They're curious about us, but they're not overpowering in their affection. In other words, if we're not around, they manage. (As, for example, when we go for out game of tennis today.)






There is a give and take, of course. The eggs. (Still laying!) Their pleasant demeanor. Their fine looks.






But they want help with food and shelter. We deliver. In the winter, they're in the big barn.






But they always -- every day, in fact several times each day -- come to the farmhouse, right to our door, reminding us that sometimes a little gift can go a long way...






By dusk, they move closer and closer to their coop. The roaming foursome, respectful of property lines, always moving not too far from each others field of vision...


 


...slowly retreats when the sun is just this close to the horizon.

Their conversation subsides. The white girls find an evening spot where they will linger, often together, dozing off, forgetting that there is a safer place (Ed needs to lift them off the fence each night and place them inside the coop). Scotch finds her favorite place right in the laying box and these days, Oreo climbs up and sits in the upper doorway, so that the white hens have to squeeze past him as they climb up. Chickens don't make a fuss about personal space violations. No one protests when there is a bit of pushing and shoving.

In general, they're all so agreeable. Give them an open field, a safe place for the night and a handful of grains and they ask for nothing more. They are, otherwise the masters of their own well being. They fashion their own castle -- right there in the dirt or underneath a bush or pickup truck. Tell me there is no such thing as a happy chicken and I'll invite you to spend a day around our cheepers. Just so you can see their take on what counts as a good day.