keeping happy

Your friend did that to you? That’s just wrong! After all you’ve done for him! You’re mad, aren’t you?
No.
Why? I mean, it’s maddening, anyone would see that…
Look, I’ve got what, maybe five, ten years of life? (we like to exaggerate imminence of demise in this household) Why would I waste them on feeling mad at stupid things?



(later)
I have soaked the pot in water. I have squeezed orange rind into the potting mixture. I have rinsed the roots of the orchid in grapefruit dishwashing suds. Still, the ants keep multiplying and spilling out onto my condo floor.

That’s it. Out it goes. I wanted to wait until the frost date, but this plant has pushed me over the edge. It stays on the balcony, frost or no frost.
Put it in a basin of water overnight. The ants wont be able to leave. Let's think about it.

(the next morning)
Any ants out and about ?
No, they’re probably having a town hall meeting in the root ball, thinking of the next move.
Put the plant outside for the day.
Yes, just that. It’s never coming back in.
But the water basin worked, no? The ants were contained?
Yes, but the roots don’t like to be placed in water…
Then put the plant on a platform, above the water. The ants wont be able to get out to the condo. They’ll farm aphids, or whatever the hell it is that they are doing in your orchid.
So, I should keep the plant inside like this?
..with a moat around it. Ants are happy, your condo’s happy. What more could you ask for?


Keeping happy.

It can be a moat around an orchid with ants.

It can be a game of tennis on a cool but sunny Saturday afternoon.
You're getting better! Fewer Nina hits! (He means fewer totally odd body contortions on my part.)

Phone calls from loved ones? Yes, those too.


(later)
I read an article in the Isthmus (our weekly alternative paper) about the appearance of loons on Lake Monona. It comes as a surprise: loons don’t like cities, they don’t like people, noise, they don’t even like to share a lake for mating purposes (odd thing, considering Lake Monona is bigger than a bed and loons are smaller than humans). Yet, they’re here, several dozen, passing through.

Ed and I head out to the lake to see if we can spot them. Black beaks, red eyes, darting underwater for minutes on end – they’re easy enough to separate from, say, the common duck. There, see it? A loon.





Shy, but daring, at least when in the company of fellow loons. But spooked by noise. And, over by Monona Terrace, on a sunny Saturday, there is plenty of sound. Out would come the loon, floating, as if on a forgotten Canadian lake…





…and back underwater it would retreat. Again and again.





The water hides them for a while and I never know where they will emerge next.

Ed lies down on a stretch of grass and dozes as I lean on the edge of the terrace wall, waiting, watching.

It’s funny how a new face can get your attention. The local mallard reminds me that he, too, is not without beauty. Yes, you’re right, you duck…





He paddles off to play with his mate on the silky waters of Lake Monona.





So happy. So very content to be following her this way and that.

adding tones

You don’t need it. Your hair looks great, you’re hair looks great.

Nah. I can’t buy it. For one thing, half the time he’s saying it, his nose is buried in something or other.


It’s nippy again. The sun is deceptive. The thermometer is telling me 43.

That hair that looks great is getting in my way as I swing my tennis arm. A little wild, but I need the extra motion to keep warm.

Kids at the next door court are half volleying, half talking. It’s cool to see that: two young boys toying with the game, with the afternoon.





I have to go. It’s a 6 mile ride for me – I tell Ed.
I pedal to Jason’s.


Happy New Year – I tell the color genius. I haven’t been here that long. He’s got a new tattoo. He’s into yoga more, too. There’s growth in my hair and growth in his life and on balance – I’d say we’re chuggin’ along in our orbits just fine.


I bike home more slowly. It’s near evening and I’m not in a hurry. Friday at dusk is a no hurry time.

Your hair’s okay, Ed tells me. At least he’s consistent.

full

There is so much to be said for a Thursday in mid-April (I’m fudging dates a little). The teaching week is over for me. The days are April days, which, no matter how cold, smell differently. Of thawing earth. Somewhere between rotting wood and forsythia. Probably closer to rotting wood as forsythia hasn’t yet made an appearance here.

But here’s the downside of any Thursday: it’s a long work day. Bike to campus…





Look out office window (with a smile)…





Finish up, bike back.





A good day. Yes, and awfully, awfully full.

wednesdays

From the beginning of April until the end of September, Wednesday evenings, for Ed, are bike riding days. It's befuddling how he can stick with this, given that the man does not like scheduled commitments. He rebels against excessive travel planning (“let’s just fly somewhere cheap in Europe and then decide…”), he shies away from setting any long term goals except in the vaguest way (“someday, we will go sailing along the coast of Central America…”), he loathes the predictability of meals (“why wouldn’t you eat marinated mushrooms in the morning?”). But, I learned early on, that Wednesday evenings are for bike riding. Always.

I joined him once (the Wednesday rides are a big deal here: hundreds participate in each week’s chosen loop), but only once. I thought then that I held him back. Put Ed and me at the bottom of a hill facing up, and you got the classic snail chasing the hare. And the hare has added leg muscle, just to make it totally unfair.

But this year I’m kind of revved up. And so, after a 45 minute warm-up round of tennis at the still cool (low fifties and falling) and still secret tennis court…





… we set out.

Or, rather, I set out. I need a head start. I take hills slowly. I stop for photos.

Groups of cyclists pass me. Black spandex stretches across bulging muscle. Me, I’m wearing jeans with the right cuff rolled up.

It’s cold, but the sun is still out. The landscape is pretty, in a very Dane County, Wisconsin way. Cyclists and pickup trucks, passing through.















But the wind picks up as the sun scoots down. It can’t be more than 40 now. I’m doing the short loop – a mere 20 miles, but the hills are coming on strong.

Ed catches up. You don’t want to finish the short loop with me – I say, hoping to hear the Ed that loves to contradict: yes I do.

He doesn’t say it, but he stays behind to keep me company. I’m averaging only 12 mph. That’s slowpoke speed for Ed.

The sun is just about gone. A pony watches as we pedal on. A goose pushes away from the water bank.










See that car with the boat? I ask.
Yeah?
How can people afford boats?
They’re not much if you buy used ones. Guys buy them from each other… They’ll go out on the lake, maybe with a six pack, almost always with a buddy.
Why? Guys don’t really have conversations with each other.
Grunting counts.

He tells me about Sundays with his dad and his dad's friend, out on the Sound, in a boat with an outboard and a bag of sandwiches and soda for the long day on the water. This is my favorite mood of his -- the one that recalls with affection something from the past. In my mind, the happiest people are those who have a truckload of such good memories.


We roll into Cottage Grove, the end of the loop. It could be that I am the very last one in. I don’t know.

The moon is large. I turn on the heat in Ed’s little Geo to full blast. The old car can only do full blast or no blast.

quiet

Late in the evening I made chili. I had spent a good part of my free hours talking to various family members about weighty family issues and making chili seemed the right way to close the day.

My cooking has been growing increasingly simple – nudged in that direction by Ed who prefers simplicity over anything fussy.

We eat the chili late into the night, keeping a half eye on the TV screen and another at our laptops.

In my mind, I am contrasting my very, very quiet life to the one described in the previous post, where tumult is the order of the day.

Ed is drifting off and so I flip off the DVD. It is incredibly still in the condo. I finish writing and go to sleep. Only to be awakened in the middle of the night by someone helping himself to a second bowl of chili.

growing old

A conversation today with someone far away lead me to think about how people change as they grow old. Yes, for reasons of health, there’s that. Beyond that – there are personality issues. I know people who mellowed as they grew old. Maybe the gruffness had lost its potency and so they let it go. Others – well, they got more cantankerous. More snippy. Angry even.

Are you sure that’s a change? – a friend asked when I got into my speculative mood on this later in the day. Strikes me the person you’re talking about was always a little… difficult. I suppose I knew that. Still, what if "a little" suddenly becomes "a lot?"

What do you do with that? I’ll say this: it’s easier to confront “difficult” if you don’t live with the bitter old grump. But what if you do?


I rode my bike to campus. It was cold and terribly windy, but the absolute promise that this would be the last of the transitional cold days had me motivated. You can take a lot if you know the unpleasantness is fleeting. Scheduled to disappear tomorrow.

There was a goose on the large field that separates UW Hospitals from the lake shore. His partner goose was sitting some feet behind him. Maybe they weren’t liking each other at the minute. Maybe the old goose had become too grumpy, too difficult to sit with.





I’m thinking about Warsaw now. My father still lives with his wife (in most ways she is that and then some) in the city of my childhood. They’re in an older apartment building (when I lived there as a teen, it was already old) and most everyone in it is a generation older than me. But the apartment windows look out on a small park and there are always young voices down there, beneath the branches of the chestnuts. People walk their dogs, children jump rope, young couples hold hands and stroll. Shouldn't that make you smile?

I’m thinking about this as I sit yet again at the infusion center at the hospital. Several stalls down, an older woman sits at the side of her husband. She has to be the most agreeable white haired person I’ve come across. Is her husband equally so?

Who can tell.


As the sun retreated, Ed and I went out to the court. We played a medium good game.

[UPDATE: The post is about conversations with people who live far away. Ed, I am happy to say, has never had grumpy leanings. Mellow to the core.]

back and forth

Two more days and then I promise I’ll stop whining.

Waking up to snow on the ground was dismal. Knowing that the temperature would never climb out of the thirties today was worse. Hearing that tomorrow will bring more of the same was enough to make me dislike Wisconsin spring, period.


But, one must look forward.

Photo-wise, it was an irrelevant day. Housecleaning and errand hopping do not inspire a point and click. I went to the rooftop of my condo building, pressed once and retreated.






Back downstairs, the phone rings. My water polo was canceled. Want to play tennis?
Are you serious? (I ask, remembering that it did not ever pass 37 today.)
Good exercise…

Ed knows how to get me going. Ever since an MD told me I have the heart rate of a runner, I like to keep the pretense going.

I approach the court warily. Note the apparel on the kid. April? Huh. It’s that cold.





We go forth nonetheless. It’s a wild game. I actually return hits that, two weeks ago, I would have deemed unreturnable. Getting better, Ed tells me.

An hour later, we head back. Most of the snow has melted. Most of it.

pruning

My occasional traveling companion, Ed – he’s just not a big pruning guy. Cutting off live branches seems, to him, cutting off life. So imagine his three-acre farmette: home to every exuberant plant and all their kinfolk. (Except quack grass. Ed has a thing about quack grass.)

But in his small orchard, there is a peach tree. Deer have gnawed at the trunk, and still it keeps on chugging along. And so Ed has taken a special interest in preserving it and tending to its needs.

This week, he checked out a Hometime video from the library on pruning. It was a very dated video – where the woman was deferential and the guy was domineering. You don’t see videos these days where the guy bosses the little lady all hour long. (Art, typically, outpaces life.)

The video had a huge impact on Ed. (Not the part where the guy bosses the woman – he didn’t notice that.) Today, we drove to his farmette and he handed me three variously sized clippers.

We went to work.

Scaring the birds with our efforts.





In the late afternoon we take a break. For a tennis round or two at our secret court. And then we go back to pruning. The door has been opened. We hack away.






You may not think this was big deal day, but in pruning, I saw Ed step out of his element. So that by dinner, I decided to let him climb back to the world he knows and loves. (Cheap and simple.)

We drive slowly, watching the winter storm sky roll in. The sun is low but visible over a string of empty rail cars.





We buy frozen X and frozen Y at Trader Joe’s. And we watch tennis videos over this imperfect or very perfect meal (depending on whose shoes you're in).

fishing

I’ve tried many approaches to the slow coming of good weather: complain, sulk, ignore, deny, look forward. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not.

Today, the tactic was to deny and I biked, for the first time, along the Lake Path, pretending it was a reasonable thing to do.

Several comments: It was reasonably pretty.










…but, the dirt segment was dry. That means that I waited longer than last year to begin using the path, because I really remember muddied slushy patches that messed with my first spring bike ride back in Spring 08.

…so I have to conclude that I am getting more fussy (and less adventuresome) about weather.

Which brings me to the point of age. I entered a colleague’s office the other day almost panting after class. Don’t know if it’s animated lecturing that does this… pant pant.. or age. Age – he said with a smile.

So, it’s tough to stay animated when you pass 55 and it’s colder along the Lake Path and weather occupies your sensibilities (and therefore your blog) more than you would like.

Great.

Not all feel this way. This dude is happy to sit tight, winds and cold air notwithstanding, as ducks swim by.





On the up side – like so many hobby growers this year, Ed and I are (for the first time for us), rushing the planting season by sowing seeds into little peat cups.

Mine are doing okay. I think. No?

to and fro

Riding the bus to work this morning, I thought about how incredibly friendly the drivers are. Good morning! Have a wonderful day! – to every one who steps on or off. Most often, they don’t even get a reply.

The short walk from bus to school is terribly plain. I rarely take out my camera. My mind is on classes and I have no patience for finding elements of beauty in very ordinary city blocks.

But today, I did notice that we are finally catching up with the crocuses I saw on the east coast several weeks back. They deserve a spot on Ocean.






After the last class, I walked to a meet-up point with Ed. A terribly plain walk. Made plainer by the slowness of the coming of spring.

Except, at the meet up point, there was this handful of purple. So you get this as well.





Crocuses coming and going. A purple majesty, though without the mountain.

Other thoughts on the day? It was cold enough that when Ed generously hauled me off to a dinner out, I opted for a steaming bowl of fish soup.

notes on comments and on fools

First, a reminder: I have been getting a trickle of comments (some nice, some not so nice; a shame, but there you have it: there willl always be those, who hang on blogs they don’t much like and scribble animated thoughts on other people’s wrong turns in life) without names attached to them. I make no exception here: no name = no publication, and no kindness = no publication. I only listen to nice people. Others? Nah... they mess with the psyche. (I mention this because I do understand that especially new Ocean readers do not rush to read blog clutter on the sidebar, so you may have missed these rules of mine.)


It is, of course, April 1st and I have always, always attempted to prank my daughters on this day. For the most part, this stopped being successful decades ago, but sometimes I get them just when they’re waking and so they do not yet remember the date. For a second, I’m in fool heaven.

But today, I think I outsmarted them. I wrote an email with something so outlandish that I am sure they dismissed it instantly as an April Fool’s mom-is-at-it-again thing. Except that it was the truth: daughters, I wrote them, I’m off to Poland soon, for a Saturday afternoon in Warsaw.

Now, here’s the thing: is it a fool’s gag? And if so, am I teasing Ocean readers as well? Given yesterday’s post, you may think yes. Or... no.

Time will tell.

subdued

For the first time in years I did not visit my father in Poland this winter. I don’t think he especially noted this. Perhaps the days of winter appear indistinguishable for him. It’s dreary in Poland then. Sometimes she comes, other times she does not...

I received in the mail today an invitation to the wedding of my closest Polish friends’ daughter. Not a big deal event, but still, an obviously important date. In three weeks.

The airfares are remarkable now. Possibly the cheapest since the time I traveled to the States in the 70s.

Should I go? For the week-end?

I’m about to embark next year on a supremely strenuous teaching schedule. So perhaps this is the good time to go?


It used to be that travel, like young love, provided a thrill that reverberated down to my gut. Not anymore. I have been kicked hard for my past trips (not the least – financially). So now I’m less adolescent about it and, therefore, less thoughtlessly excited.

It’s a shame. I remember the thrill of clicking “purchase.” Not anymore. Not anymore.

I’ll probably stay home.

bear arms and birds

He hits the tennis ball, his long arm swatting it from the side, bear-like. I hit back. The wily one against the powerful. He wins, of course. Put rabbit next to a bear – the forceful one wins. Always.



(not our secret court, and yet, there are the pines...)


I’m in blue jeans. For me, that’s concession to spring. I put away my very well worn beige-rosé cords. The ones that have the souvenir of a tumble this winter, on the path at Cinque Terre. A rip on the knee. Who needs to buy memories? So many cost nothing.

He has a meeting late this afternoon. (A fresh t-shirt, okay? How about it? Okay?)

I have a date with the Infusion Center staff again. A time to listen to the stories of others. A patient looks up – such nice flowers! -- she tells the nurse. Yes, from someone who just finished treatment. Six weeks, twice a day. We got to know him well. (I wonder if he misses the routine, or is he plain happy to be out of there?) In a stall not too far from mine, a man cannot stop talking about the basketball championships. Nurse stops by my unit. You want to speed it up, don’t you? Uh huh. Okay. Seven minutes and you’re out of here.

I bike home, up the hill in Shorewood, past the shrubs where birds scream during the day and then fall silent. My daughter tells me I have become obsessed with spotting birds. Me, bird watching? I can’t stand still long enough to spot birds.

warm up

Sometimes I think of Ocean as just a warm up for the real thing. To keep dirt under my fingernails before the planting season. So that I’m ready and sharp when the moment comes.

And indeed, I have had long spells where I worked on the real thing (The Great Writing Project), grateful that I had had days, years even, of focusing my camera on an image and then writing about it. I felt sharp and ready.

At other times I wonder if my breaks from the real thing are too long. This has been one of the longest ones. I haven’t returned to The Great Writing Project since winter set in. And winter set in early this year.

With long breaks, Ocean becomes more than just dirt on my hands. It becomes central. If I crashed tomorrow, there would be some 80 pages of unfinished text and Ocean. That would be my life’s art.



Last night I returned to the old neighborhood. I had been cold for most of the afternoon (I was not ready for this return to dreary winter) and going up Old Sauk hill, I thought that really, the evening could not look any worse than this.





We sat around the table eating well and drinking equally well and eventually I forgot about the unpleasantness waiting for me outside.





As midnight approached someone kindly called a cab and I allowed myself to not look outside much. The driver took a long route for this very short distance, but I did not mind. There are times when closing your eyes to the world and letting someone else take over life for you is immensely pleasurable.

staying warm

We had been told to expect the return of cold air. Those predictions are, unfortunately, almost always accurate.

I hear my daughters are enjoying cherry blossoms in DC. Me, I wake up to a cold, gray day.

Oh, to love gray! Ed tells me daily how great my hair looks. It’s a shortcut for him saying: long is good. Gray wisps are good. Don’t waste money going to Jason. I’m not convinced. I haven’t let Jason near my hair all this year and this retreat to what I feel is somewhere between hippie and unkempt makes me cringe. And yet I listen and half hope that Ed is sincere. Over and over: your hair looks gorgeous, your hair looks great. It’s like telling an alcoholic that mineral water tastes a hell of a lot better than the real stuff with the hope that eventually they’ll believe.

Gray skies, brown fields. Nothing green yet. Except for this. Fertilizer. Maybe cow manure – Ed tells me.





You want to play a game? He asks now, but he knows I do. Even though it is 29 degrees out there. Shirt, sweatshirt, wool coat, gloves. Not exactly tennis duds. But, I keep them all on. Yesterday I was blinded by the sun. Today, the air is fuzzy with the steam from our breath.

The tennis court is, as usual, empty. (even Madisonians would have trouble guessing where this is – I’m not sure anyone knows of its existence. Or cares. It’s well hidden behind tall pines. Needles lie in clumps on the green asphalt. Ed wants to sweep them off, but I find them charming.)





We volley the balls, Ed gets boastful, I chase missed balls. I’m warming up. Cheerfully even. We get a good hour and a half in before the gusts of wind remind me that we are to get snow tonight.


But, shortly after we finish playing, I’m cold again. You can only shake that kind of disgusted-with-this-winter-weather feeling by warming your insides. Like at your favorite bakery, where a family of bakers is putting out loaves of hot bread.

next day

You know how cool it is to wake up to a new day? I do. Winter grime, wiped away. Just like that. Oh, oops, hi there! Fancy seeing you like this!





It is a brisk day. Too brisk. I have no reason to go out and so I don’t. All that I need for a good day is at home. But Ed nudges me. Hard. I’ll buy you a latte!

That works. And indeed, I now note that, in spite of the chill, it is a bright day.





We pause for my latte – I linger over it, Ed dozes.





It’s almost evening. But we have our Wal-Mart rackets in Ed's car. We go to the tennis court and we volley balls back and forth until the shadows are long. My arm hurts from the effort. But we’re getting better. Things are getting better.

adjusting to the inevitable

As discussions at work lead toward a resolution today (why do resolutions always involve more work?), I’m thinking to myself: I’m used to this. Stability and predictability? These are not my driving forces. I’ve never known either in my world of work (except for a brief while when, in Poland, I was employed by a textile factory during the summer: I could have played solitaire all my hours there and still my job would be waiting for me the next day). Yet, here I am. Employed and doing work I like. Even as times are tough. Even without tenure (unlike other profs, I have never been on a tenure track).

So I’m thinking – this is me: stressed but happily plodding along and so it shall continue. (Until the next hurdle.)

In this upbeat mode, I am posting a photo of my wonderful and esteemed colleagues. I ran into them as I scooted down Bascom Hill for an espresso fix. To me, they radiate joy. In the middle of a work day, there can be joy.




So long as you can look forward (not backward, never that!) and spring is ahead of you (never mind the expected blizzard this week-end), days are indeed fine.

bread

Preoccupied with work issues again. None of them are easy. None of them are, for now, bloggable. But, I can say this – nor are they tragic (yet), in the way that an economic downturn can so quickly be tragic for some.

But then, I am very much a product of post-war Poland. Life’s not tragic until you or your loved ones kick the bucket.


Since my mind is on work and since I cannot write much about it, I’ll leave you with a photo of the loaf of bread I used for dinner. From my favorite bread baker, of course.

You could say that indeed, even as I blog, I am very much aware of who butters my bread.

snapshots from a rainy day

Perhaps not snapshots. I can’t offer much on a day when work dominated most waking hours. Initially, I thought I’d ride my bike to campus (for the first time in ’09!) and then the rain wiped that idea and placed it right in the gutter.


I returned home late. The light was fading, the rain kept falling. I looked out on a city sidewalk, wet and somewhat mellowed by evening light.





And still, in the off minutes when my thoughts strayed from school issues (and, in the course of a day, my thoughts often stray), I couldn’t help but think about people who find joy in being with someone else. Not alone, but with someone else.