hang

So many ways to use the word hang. And each time, the meaning changes: hang on. Hang up (the verb). Hang up (the noun). Hang in there. Hang on. Hang loose. Hang nail. (Or, is it hangnail?) Hang it! (Or, is that one dang it?)


Drizzle. Wet walk, nose turned down to the pavement, hand protecting good camera. Except during this one shot. For the rose that’s hanging in there... until what, Thanksgiving? Winter break?





For me, until the weekend. And a much much needed break from work. Any work. Hang in there, readers. On Saturday and Sunday, I will not write about work.


Evening drizzle. Step off the crowded bus, look up.





Trees, with nothing left hanging. Wet bark, dark skies, a very wet walk to the shop, and then finally -- home.

kick

Rules to live by:

If the IRS squawks at you for not supplying proper documentation with your tax return, give them some more papers. And if they squawk again, supply them with even more papers. Don’t get hung up on the unpleasantness of it all, just keep churning out the papers.

If you find a superb bargain on a replacement camera (for the little Sony that mysteriously lost its shutter release button – that same button that Ed so brilliantly tried to replace and affix, except that in the end, it wasn't quite the same), go ahead and buy it, but be prepared: the bargain may be a scam. Even if the merchant has good online reviews, , it still may be a scam. The good reviews may be a scam. Cancel the order. Don’t keep hoping. Let it go and buy the one at Amazon for $30 more. Don’t keep fretting about losing the good price, because that price wasn’t a good price at all, it was a scam.

If your day has no breaks in it, except for the 15 minutes that you cut out for an espresso down the hill, don’t gripe about how brief that break was. Enjoy the espresso and think of the longer breaks ahead of you.



(a food booth down the hill)


Gripers and whiners are not good souls.

Kick me when you think I am getting dangerously close to their league.

forever

It’s the last of the really tough weeks (for this year; in January, a fresh set of challenging schedules clicks in). I’m sure, we, down on campus, all need a break. Between workload increases, budget cuts, furloughs, swine flu threats – it’s been quite the semester.

Last night at the shop where I moonlight, a most cheerful type came in to pick up a few items for himself. I pegged him as having had a good year. He seemed positively buoyant. Only when I took his credit card information did I realize that he was a top level UW administrator – not likely to be without work anxieties. Some people handle stress well.

And I do too. The previous night, when I had locked the shop and was counting change, a young man with pants halfway down his buttocks tried hard to get me to open up. He looked like he was running from someone. I didn’t let him in, but it didn’t strike me then that he may have been dangerously ill-disposed toward me (and less ill-disposed toward the momentarily opened cash register).

It is true that, for the most part, I stay level at times of crisis.

Of course, these days, I am spending time with a person whose stress levels are at his usual low. Ed, my occasional traveling companion, is unfazed by the cold weather (Brisk! Wonderful!), by the darkness of the night and the darkness of the day (turn off the lights! I like the dark..), by the onset of age (if you make it to 60, you shouldn’t complain), by too much work (retired; what more can I say). Sometimes I think the big decision for Ed is whether to read lying down or sitting up. In any case, I am around a guy who is very very calm.

We pick up bagels for a late (post moonlighting) supper of egg sandwiches and home-made broccoli soup.





In years past, I used to buy bagels at this place quite often. I remember those years: life moved rapidly in shocking ways and nothing was certain. Maybe I learned to shrug off stress then. Over a cup of coffee and a toasted bagel.





Tonight I’ll shrug off ominous threats of stress over a bagel again.

Good thing bagels are forever.

home

I get curious about this city. Surprised, aren’t you? So often I look for ways to leave – vacations, week-ends: Ed, can we travel?

But there are days when I do just want to stay within the city limits of Madison. Ed and I pull up our old guide to the historic neighborhoods of this town. We've explored most of these in years past, but the Third Lake Ridge Historic District is still familiar only because you get to know pretty much every neighborhood if you've lived here as long as I have. We haven't examined its historic soul. Until today.

The (online) guide is more than twenty years old and sometimes it seems a trite overinclusive. It’ll mention a prominent home from a previous century and only toward the end of the commentary will you learn that actually, the house is no longer standing.

Or, the guide will describe the detailed features of a once beautiful home that has since been converted (in its disrepair) to student housing. So that it now looks like, well, student housing. You stare and contemplate its long depleted splendidness and you feel exceptionally sad that the home should now be so neglected (in the way that you would feel sad for any other historically insignificant house that may also be run down).

That’s the downside of the guide. The upside is that it offers a closer look at houses that were built at around the time of my grandparents' childhood years, now more than a hundred years ago. My adventurous Polish grandfather traveled through Wisconsin at the turn of the century. When I see homes from that era, it makes me perk up.

This morning, Ed and I set out for this Third Lake district spanning Madison's near east side (from just east of the Capitol, along Lake Monona, all the way to the Yahara River.)





We noted the significant homes here...















We appreciated the lakefront. We checked off homes of merchants, homes of plumbers, homes of real estate dudes. Greek revival, Queen Ann’s, Prairie, Italianate.





Ed and I aren’t necessarily well matched on these historic walking tours. He likes to read about the entrepreneurial spirit that led to the success of so many who lived in the more splendid homes. Somewhat predictably, I listen for information about the families, the daily habits, the infrastructure of the time. We're both curious, but, in looking at history, our curiosities don't necessarily overlap.

For me, the historic houses, in isolation, cannot relate a story of a neighborhood. I stare at a building, I listen to a description of its construction, of who paid what to have it placed here, and still I cannot bring it to life. I'm distracted by the ten mailboxes at the entrance and half a dozen bikes on the porch and I note that the paint is peeling and the walls are crumbling and the window frames are cheap metal. In my mind, I write a story of who is there now and how it came to be that the house is no longer as it once was.

A few more buildings of note and we are done. It’s cold today and I am glad to be heading back to the car. We are no longer in the forgiving days of mid autumn. The landscape may look mellow (consider these photos of the Yahara River, which flows at the eastern border of the neighborhood we walked through...)










... but there’s a bite in the air. You can’t photograph a bite, but believe me, it’s asserting itself.

One last look back -- not at the old structures, but at the more funky sweet nature to this neighborhood. Everyone will tell you that the near east side is where people of various means coexist well side by side. It's the Madison that we like to believe is alive and well all over town. But it's more palpable here. And maybe this is born out of the mix that always was here. Plumbers and politicians. Neighbors then, neighbors now.

that overused word

How I love a morning espresso with a wallop of hot milk! And this, too: muesli with chopped fresh fruit (mangoes are available) and kefir! (Note the exclamation marks.)


It’s the middle of November. In Wisconsin that’s about as interesting a time as oh, say the middle of March. Naked raw earth, bare limbs. Yawn.

I don’t think Ed minds, or even notices. Every day is your birthday...

Do you want to bike from McFarland to Lake Kegonsa? Oh... I am completely in love with the idea of biking somewhere that is not work!

It’s gray and the forecast says “showers later.” Later. I’m okay with that. Later. Not now.

We leave our bikes by the McFarland Town Hall, where farmers are selling (against all odds) roots and apples and hemp bracelets.





We buy apples. You can always use apples. Ed’ll eat five at a sitting and consider it a fine meal. Fresh and honest.



The twenty mile bike loop is easy (Ed’s evaluation). Just small hills. I love how small to him is strenuous to me. And how my cold is his toasty. And how he can push the pedal down so hard that one stroke will put him miles ahead of me.

The scenery is pretty in spite of November's best effort to make the world bleak. You can always count on cows to add life to a toneless landscape. Ed watches as I step down to take photos. Run from her! She’ll eat you tomorrow!





I briefly consider giving up meat forever.





Close, but no. Maybe next year.



The air is pungent with the smoke of burning leaves. This is autumn as you want it to be: smoky, woodsy and slightly threatening (with rain).

We come to the point where the Yahara River runs into Lake Kegonsa.





We were here four years ago. Kayaking. I remember iy well: we landed here.





The me of November 05. The Ed of November 05. In those days, I still showed off my perky and robust ways. Now I grumble about hills and steep inclines and cloudy gray skies.




A few tentative drops of rain hit the windshield as we eventually make our way home. Okay, not home. We part ways: Ed is off to get a beard trim, I’m off to work at the shop.

I think about how hard it is to love mid November. Except that today, it's sort of easy.

three weeks

The end of the semester is in three weeks. It is, therefore, within my imagination: I can envision three weeks. Three weeks. When I was pregnant, three weeks ‘til birth seemed very real. A short period of time within which to get ready. Not quite tomorrow, but still, within spittin' distance.

When you intensely want something, three weeks seems interminable. But I am not needy. I merely want time. I can wait. Time will come.


Though, I have to say, this fall has put time on a roller coaster. The days have been a blur.




Today was no exception.

vignettes

My good camera continues to dangle from my neck on both the morning ride in and the evening ride back. I hear it muttering there, as it bounces against my coat: come on, put me to good use! We can do better!

I ignore its voice. I hate cameras that whine.

Ed, my occasional traveling companion, and I have come to an interesting crossroad: how do you eek out companionship when one person works 1.5 jobs and the other person doesn’t work at all? (Ed is retired.) In addition to my 1.5 jobs, I have set myself the goal of figuring this one out. The motto of an immigrant is this: surely there must be a way.

I don’t use the bike today. Fighting the cold in the morning and evening hours seems just too hard. I take the bus.





But I’m home – for the first time in many many days (or, more accurately – nights) I do not have to work after work. I am a different person tonight. I am normal.






Ed is at the cusp of round two of trials in New York. I am working to preserve my trust in the judicial system.

Evening. Quiet. Time to let go. Isn’t it ridiculous when people say that? As if you can let go.

the line

It is near closing time. A woman comes into the shop where I moonlight. She is accompanied by a dog. A medium sized one. I notice that the dog is wearing a pooch sweater. Odd... It’s unseasonably warm outside.

I hesitate about letting the dog in, but then I think – in France a dog would be welcome. We sell French products. I’ll make the dog and owner feel welcome. Especially since we have been put on notice that sometime this week a secret shopper will be making the rounds. I don’t want the shop to lose points (secret shoppers rate the seller and shop on any number of performance variables) just because I wasn’t friendly to the dog.

Still, the pooch is off leash. As its owner chats, he darts in every corner, in the back room, too. I’m getting nervous. The shopper appears oblivious.

I try to assess her shopping needs. They appear to be zero. Killing time, she tells me as she leans on the counter. In the vernacular of my youth, I would say that the woman is clean cut. Her hair is styled, her complexion looks healthy.

I’m taking steps to close. I’m sweeping, I’m bringing papers from the back room. I try to direct her to a shea butter hand cream – everyone in Wisconsin needs a shea butter hand cream in the winter. She looks at it, tries a little, then returns to resting against the counter.

By now, I’m wondering if she is unstable. Or lonely. Or the deliberately difficult secret shopper. Her dog is bored. He’s sitting by the door, looking out at the dark, empty night.

So, what is it that you teach? I already told her what I teach. I repeat the list, offering no detail. She describes a problem that she has that may require legal intervention. I’m used to that. Tell someone you’re an attorney and they dig out every miserable mishap from their lives.

When she starts probing more about my law school classes, I decide she has crossed the line. It’s bright and visible, that line between shopper and seller. You can exchange stories: you can say where you’re from, what you do, you can talk about your children and grandchildren, you can flatter the other with praise for their choice of jewelry. But at some point, you have to know that it can go no further: the transaction will end, the customer must leave, you have to return to closing the store.

Shea cream. Consider getting some shea cream. With essential oils from the south of France. She shrugs her shoulders and lets herself out. The dog trots dutifully by her side.

stories

It’s no secret that I believe I have in me a book. I also have in me essays. Unlike the book, these have been coming out in a fairly steady stream over the past decade. Less so in recent years. But certainly something that I took seriously in the last years of my marriage.

I pulled out some of those essays this week. I could have thought: splendid! I must do something with these! But I didn’t. Instead, I thought – what a bunch of amateurish crap.

This is not unusual. Tearing apart my own work is a fairly common event for me. I go through so many drafts before I stop and think – why am I doing this? Why am I reworking stories that will never be audience ready?


I’ll leave you with this day – told in four pictures: morning (familiar, no??), noon-ish, evening, and nearly night.















Yes, and night... or nearly night...

ad for iphone

If the world imploded on a Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday, I would not know it, were it not for my iphone. The tiny NYTimes icon on it allows me to remain confident that we are all in one piece. So far.

It’s not that I am completely out of the loop on those days. I know, for example, weather patterns very very well. It was fairly mild this morning. Biking to work past the lake was deliciously warm...





...but by evening, a chill crept in and I could not pedal fast enough to overcome it.


I know, too, how long it takes to microwave a frozen Kashi or Amy’s dinner and that, too, isn't knowledge gained from the iphone. There, I would be pointed to the nearest eatery and if I chose that option, I’d lose all that I earned at the little shop that evening.


I installed an app on my iphone that identifies (just by listening to it!) the song that’s playing out there. On Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday evening (or Sunday or Saturday...) I can thrust the phone in the direction of the music playing at the little shop and it will identify the piece for me. In case I want to listen to it even more, beyond the hours when I hear it at the shop.

The iphone has a camera in it, but I never want to use any camera during these days. It’s too awful to search out interesting ways to photograph the same old lakeside path, especially when you are in a hurry. Some days, this is the best I can do:







There is email on the iphone, but most of the hours I spend in the classroom or at the shop – neither of which permit email. But I do click on it when I am in the bathroom or on the bike. Yes, I use the iphone while biking. I endanger noone (but myself) with it and it helps me keep up with details of work, so that they all don't hit me in one fell swoop when I get home late just before midnight.

Yay iphone. I could not manage without you.

Immigrant

Three women from a southeast Asian country (not positive which one... China maybe?) came into the shop this afternoon. After much consultation and mutual prodding, two bought lovely boxes of wonderful items. They were happy, I was happy. As we were finalizing the sale, one of them asked – where are you from?

I told her, but I looked puzzled. Their English was not perfect. Most non-native speakers cannot tell that I have a slight accent. Oftentimes, I cannot tell that I have a slight accent.

She noted my quizzical expression and said – you have a most melodic voice! Up and down! Most people here speak in a flat tone.

I didn’t tell her this, but she was, in reality, paying a compliment to herself. I have this trait (my daughters first alerted me to it): I pick up the speech patterns of my audience. If they are melodic, I, too, become melodic. If they have a Scottish clip, I will, within a sentence develop one in response. Right. A bit of one.

It cannot be helped. Most likely, I developed these strategies of coping when I first came here as an immigrant. I wanted to fit in. To become like you.


On this (beautiful and warm) morning, following the usual house cleaning, my occasional traveling companion and I set out for a quick hike through the Pheasant Branch Conservancy. We’d been there briefly yesterday. Today, we intended to walk the long loop. We had two hours. Enough to do it if we picked up a sprightly step.

Hiking with Ed is comfortable for a person like me – I don’t have to strain to sound like him. We both like quiet and we often hike without words. When he does tell a story, it is animated in ways that are so specific to his culture and background that I don't try to merge with his pattern.


We hike in this sprawling park that borders the creek and even though the prairie grasses are dry and the oak trees look like they may never sprout a a bud again , it is a very beautiful morning.




















We pass by the creek and we pause. Do you see those gurgles? These are artisan springs, pushing water from maybe underneath this hill, or maybe Michigan. Or Canada.





Immigrant waters! Welcome, waters. You’re among friends now. Most of the time!

five hours

How do you approach a November Saturday that is off the charts toasty? So toasty that you could bounce around outside in a tissue t-shirt and still think you were overdressed?





It’s the last day of the Westside Community (outdoor) Market. Typically, you feel sorry for the vendors on this day. They freeze to give you one more chance at stocking up on turnips and beets.

Not today.





Warm, it’s so warm! Even as the selections of produce is predictably limited. I stock up on garlic and onions.





Weather confusion is not easy. You want to love this gift of warm air and yet you feel that it’s prank, a scam. Someone is cheating.

There have been years when I regarded these unexpectedly brilliant days as a mandate to head out. To go north, or south, to tug at Ed and urge him to go with me. He is, after all, an occasional companion.

That, however, was yesterday’s freedom.

Still, one mustn’t get all hopeless and despondent about the absence of uncomplicated time. Surely anyone can willfully create a block of free hours. We do it. We climb on board Ed's old Honda and set out.


A whirlwind morning (and early afternoon). We zip between Poland, France and the deep Midwest.

The Polish Heritage Club of Madison is in charge of Poland. We’re at their annual craft fair and the lunch crowd is packing in platefuls of cooked cabbage and sausage. The smell of the sauerkraut stew is potent.

We watch a wreath-maker weave flowers into a wreath, paper cutters cut patterns sketched onto colorful papers, and musicmakers play something that sounds vaguely holidayish.









And we get hungry. But not for sauerkraut and sausage. We head for the wonderful and not too distant world of La Baguette. I practice saying “this day is magnificent!” in many combinations of French words.









And now there are only minutes left to my block of free time. A handful of minutes is more than no minutes. Ed and I are determined to not waste them.


At the Pheasant Branch Creek Conservancy (just at the northwestern edge of Madison), we watch demonstrations of forest management.









And pfft! The hours are gone. It may as well be midnight. I have to change into my retail black clothing and head to the shop. The fragrance there is sweet and comforting. I try not look outside, where the day is magnificently radiant. Sweetness over radiance. I'll accept that. I'll not compalin. Radiance is overrated. Yes, it is. Yep. Uh-huh.

new world

A friend recently became a grandmother. Again. The world of babies is foreign to me right now, much as it was before I gave birth to my own. Definitely once mine were out of the crib, I lost touch with the baby world all over again.

But I do remember the handful of years when my infants were my universe. I immersed myself in baby literature, I considered every faddish idea. Like so many parents then (and now?) I obsessed about everything. When I heard that the famous pediatrician and kid shrink, Dr. Terry Brazelton, was fielding calls from Massachusetts General, I called. The renowned doctor picked up the phone. He had quite the bored voice. Or maybe it was my issue that was boring. But I wanted to know – am I wrong to pick up my baby every time she screams from her crib? Am I??

Somehow, I assumed baby care hadn’t changed much since those years. Oh, sure, I do recall reading somewhere that bright colors in the crib were in, and then suddenly they were out, and all mobiles became black and white, so that it looked like babies in their earliest months had cows spinning over their heads. But basically, I assumed my generation figured out this parenting thing and all subsequent generations would learn from us.

Not so.

My friend tells me that the boundaries between the baby bed and the adult bed have become more fluid. That a crib may even have only three sides – the fourth one staying open and merging into your bed so that you can reach out for the crying infant.

And diapers. Yes, you can still do cloth – indeed, that’s the green path, but plastic cover pants are out. Maybe your grandson is unusual? – I ask. Maybe others are still in those things that resembled a shower cap? No no, she tells me. I would bet no one sells clear plastic cover pants anymore.

We commiserated about how fine the world was, how much better, neater, saner – with cover pants to cover the, well, mess.


Let me mention another highlight of this day (there were many). Picture this: it is November in Wisconsin. Feeling sorry for us? You shouldn’t. Not today. Record highs of nearly seventy.






Other news? Well, Ed is temporarily back, but the new world (can I call New York that?) will pull him back again in a few weeks. Perhaps I’ll tag along.

scrambled

There isn’t a good way to recover from an overextended week. Sleep? I can’t sleep. Not any more. I’m too tired to sleep. (A disinterested observer might suggest that I cut back on the Nespresso espressos I make for myself each day at home. To that disinterested observer I would reply that it’s either that or finding a device that would keep my eyelids from closing shut in the course of the day.)

I pedal home from work satisfied, but disappointed, too. Satisfied because the week went by and I did with it as much as I could. Not a minute wasted.

Disappointed because I still haven’t a clue as to how I should balance everything without winding up exhausted. And so I know that even if tonight I am free (from the shop, from class preparation), it is only a lull. The pace will pick up again this week-end and thereafter.


Still, it was a beautiful morning and I do love the ride, gusty wind notwithstanding.





And it was a beautiful afternoon, so that running down the hill for an espresso (no comment) was actually pleasurable.





And the classes were good, and the students were sharp and responsive. and I actually took the time to talk to colleagues at the Law School which, for me, is rare.


Still, that dusk, that awful dusk closed down on me again. It could be that it was the time Ed reached me to tell me the trial did not conclude on time and he would not be coming back today after all. It could be that I almost threw my hands up then, even though I don’t really throw my hands up, as I am not prone to dramatic gestures. It could be that I had no food at home as we were supposed to go out to celebrate his return. It could be that I wanted to tell Ed this, even as he was spinning on to the next sentence and the next one. It could be that I never had a chance to say that my day had gone reasonably well and that the students were sharp and responsive...


I stopped three times on the bike ride home. To take a few photos of the lake at dusk.










... And to pick up eggs for a solo supper of scrambled eggs and whatever.

... And to say hi to my boss and coworker at the little shop down the hill where I moonlight.

Because at dusk, being around people who track your everyday is a good idea.


At home, I ate my scrambled supper, opened a new box of ginger snaps and thought long and hard about whether the cookies pair well with the cheap box wine I’d poured for myself this evening.

motion sickness

When you think of New York, you think – speed. That city moves fast! If you'd watch people navigate between connecting subways, you' d be impressed. A mountain stream at spring time. After heavy rains.

And yet, in places, the city movement is painstakingly slow: Traffic at rush hour. Court proceedings at 31 Chambers Street. [For newer or erratic Ocean readers, my occasional traveling companion, Ed, is in New York, participating in ongoing litigation at said address.]

At first, I blamed it on the lawyers (ones on the other side!). They had at least three sitting there last time I counted. Ed, too, had three. Sometimes four. Attorneys (at least those on the other side, the weaker side!) make whimsical requests that need to be honored by her honor (for example: your honor, I need to give a speech tomorrow afternoon. Can we block out two hours for that? And, so long as we will recess from 2 to 4, maybe we should agree to simply come back the next day?).

Then I thought it was a function of the way litigation proceeds. Motion upon motion. To dismiss. To admit. To breathe. To go to the bathroom. (Or so it seemed.)

Finally, I thought it may be due to the busy court schedule. The judge set aside two weeks for this trial. For reasons that are mind boggling to me, that timeline proved unrealistic. And so I thought maybe it’s that the whole lot of them – judge, clerk, recorder, security guard – has other plans that they need to honor.

Maybe.

I do know this: the judge hearing the case is brilliantly with it (that is my perception, from reading the transcripts and watching her in action the first two days). She moves things along. So she is not the one applying the brakes.

Then maybe it is the fault of the court reporters. And lunch. Maybe it’s all about lunch.

Because how else do you explain this day, a typical court room day: Convene at 12 (late, for any of the above reasons). Break for lunch at 1. Reconvene at 2:15. End at 4:45.

Well, no matter. It’s over. At least this stage is done with (you, legal types understand, I’m sure, that there is always a next stage). Ed’s coming home tomorrow night. He did well in trial, the Yankees won and I think he ate more oysters than I’ve seen him digest in the period of a month ever. Even when we were in Brittany, the most oyster infested region of the planet, he showed restraint. Not this time. (So, I was at this bar, and the game was on in the background and the oysters were a buck and a half each... – is this the man I know? The one who pretty much never drinks, rarely eats oysters and has expressed nothing but antipathy for organized sports?)

People evolve.





In the meantime – I bike to work (we are so near freezing here in Wisconsin!), pausing for one quick look at the lake. Swans. That’s rare. Lake Mendota is not a swan haven. I watch, even though I’m late for a meeting. I can’t help it. Have you ever noticed the way swans move? It’s graceful and powerful, all at once. I admire that. They don’t rush to where they’re going. But they have such force that you don’t doubt they’ll get there, no matter what.





Companions on the lake, companions in travel. Tomorrow, Ed will be asking the same old questions to my face – why don’t we not fuss with dinner? Why don't we go sailing off the coast of Nicaragua or Mexico sometime? And I’ll give the same old true answer – I get motion sickness on ocean waters.

We’ll go over this a few times and eventually we'll settle into our tasks and maybe we’ll go back to the events of the past weeks and maybe not. You can’t tell. Life is hugely unpredictable. Except I can say one thing with utmost certainty: I do get motion sickness.