It could have ben a sunny day -- like those that were generously given to us all summer long. It wasn't that. On the other hand, it could have stormed and rained all day and we would have had a messy time of it, given our mostly outdoor plans. It wasn't that either. So on balance -- I'm so relieved. We mostly won out.
This is the second day of Karolina and Pawel's visit to Madison. (Their two younger ones are here as well.) And honestly, I want to pack in all of Madison's gems into this day, because yesterday was just a small intro and tomorrow they will be leaving. So it's this or rust!
I get up early. Flower fields to clean, chickens to feed, cats to comfort.
Breakfast, by myself. For once I do not want to wake Ed.
And then I am off to meet up with my lovely visitors from Poland.
If you're a Madisonian, what part of the city would you show off to people who have traveled so far to be here? On a cloudy day with the threat of rain? Where the two adults are architects?
We start off with the farmers market on the Square. But really abbreviated, with a lot of cut throughs, because it's one thing to come up here from Chicago and another to come in from Poland. You want something more than just stalls of food (even though stalls of food say a lot about a community's foibles and predilections). We do touch on one of the stalls that scream Wisconsin at you: Farmer John's, for the cheese curds. Which everyone liked.
And I found it hard to pass on the flowers -- they are so beautiful at the August markets! But, if all goes well, I'm leaving next week and flowers seem like such an extravagance for just three days of table time!
This is when the threat of rain is the greatest, so we turn toward the Capitol. It's such a beautiful public space. The dome is magnificent, inside and out.
Of course, we walk up to the upper most balcony. Views are to all corners of the world. This one is to the south, where in the distance you can see the rooftop fountain of Wright's Monona Terrace.
And from the Capitol, we walk over to the spot where a very hidden Frank Lloyd Wright house stands (the so called Lamp House). And then still further down, toward Lake Mendota, where we have to share a path with geese and all that they leave behind. So much walking! No one protests. If I may generalize, Poles are terrific walkers
Still, it's time to find something for the youngest member of our group and so she and her dad detour to the Children's Museum while the remaining three of us grab a coffee/tea at Starbucks. And from there -- we all hike over to the terrace on the Monona Terrace.
Inside, there is a motorcycle convention, which makes for a very bizarre juxtaposition of indoor convention space (as planned out by FLWright and then, finished off by the Taliesin architect Puttnam) and shiny monster motorcycles. I should be grateful -- they let us meander around anyway, even though it is their space for the day, but really, the inside of Monona Terrace doesn't thrill me a whole lot in the best of times, so we keep that visit short.
And now it's time for lunch.
We eat at Merchant, which has a special place in my heart, as both daughters had their post-wedding breakfast bash here and it was wonderful. These days, Merchant has spacious outdoor seating, the kind you can only dream about when you're bumping next to your neighbor in, say, Paris. We have a lovely and very leisurely meal.
With the colors of Majorelle right at our table! (Both Karolina and I love that deep blue! We also love our mimosas!)
(The others study their cheeseburgers carefully. Are we all-American or what??)
In talking to them and their kids, I get a sense of how an artistic predisposition develops. Both Karolina nd her husband are obviously artistically inclined. So are the kids, though of course, whether they act on this in any way as they get older remains to be seen. But so often you can see that trail of breadcrumbs that starts with parental talent and leads right to a serious involvement with the arts on the part of the kid. Oh, sure -- there are many artists who were never nurtured with their craft, but many were, and extensively so. In fact, Karolina told me that little Frank (as in Lloyd Wright) had a mother who so believed in his future genius that even in his crib she hung pictures of splendid buildings for him to admire and, in some way soak up into his artistic consciousness.
The market is winding down by now, but we pass by one vendor who has not yet packed up and Karolina and her daughter put together a bouquet for me to take home.
And I do head home now, so as to give them some space to explore more of FL Wright's houses (scatted throughout Madison) on their own.
But they come back for dinner at the farmhouse.
(First, a stop at the picnic table for a fraises de bois hunt...)
Then more porch time. It's not exactly a home made dinner tonight. Instead, I let them make up their own (takeout) pizzas for a casual pizza supper.
Again we linger. Over chocolate chip cookies and watermelon. And Jeni's Splendid ice cream. The little girl dozes off and still we linger. And it is sweetly nostalgic, because it is our last evening together. I'm sure that our next encounter will be some day, some year, back in Warsaw.
Distance friendships. So tough at times, but so very special when it all comes together and someone makes that effort to travel such a distance to see you. They made that effort and I love them for it!
