Thursday

Well, I was supposed to go to Chicago today for a visit with daughter and grandkids, but that got derailed, so here I am, on this perfectly gorgeous September day, enjoying the sunshine and the quiet of the farmhouse.

Good morning, animals! Good morning September flower beds!

Ed, having fixed the furnace yesterday (it was the micro switch on the air pressure sensor -- it seemed to have developed a nonconductive film over the summer), is ready to attack the leaky shower pipe. After our breakfast moment.

This leak has had our kitchen ceiling dripping down water for months! Not anymore. Late in the morning, he proclaimed the pipe to be refitted, sealed, and moisture free!

And immediately after, we set out on our bikes for Stoneman's farm. They have corn today, and as you know, we love their corn. 

We asked how much of their crop was lost to the drought. They estimate that they're getting this year about 20% of their regular yield. What a bummer! On the good side -- their season is extended now and we can expect one more haul after this. Our freezer will be humming away happily with several freezer bags of kernels for winter cooking.

Naturally, I allocate time to take those kernels off quickly and freeze them now, while hot off the fields. 

And I allocate time for ballet.

And then it's pick up time. Just Snowdrop today. Don't ask. Our plans are still in a flux.

She'd been asking for a visit to the Chocolate Shoppe (an ice cream place nearby) and the weather seems just right for it.

(She's thinking about what new ice cream flavors might win the "name a new flavor" contest they're sponsoring. We entered her idea!)

From there it's home, for a replay of countless afternoons of years past: lots of uninterrupted reading, some play, some discussion of important things like...whether a daughter of a cousin's child on her father's side is the same relation to her as a daughter of my sister's son. (It is!)

The day flew by.

Just as the sun gets close to the horizon, Ed and I pull weeds. He wants to plant next year's garlic patch (you do that in the fall), I just need to get those flower beds cleaned up.

And in the evening, for the first time in a long long time, we no longer listen to the drip drip drip of water leaking from the kitchen ceiling into a bowl. Heavenly quiet!

Wednesday

If you leave the porch door wide open all night (because you want to give cats the freedom to go in and out, because you're very sympathetic to cat feelings) and it's right around 50F (10C) outside, you're going to wake up to a cold house. If, furthermore, you decide (therefore) to test the furnace in the morning and find it to be not working, your house will not miraculously warm up. Thus, in addition to the new hole in the wall exposing the leaky shower pipe and a new determination on the part of Ed to fix that pipe, we have a cold me, asking to maybe delay the pipe fix and explore the various furnace error messages that are causing our house to remain cold. All morning long.

When you live with someone who designs tools and machines, you have the enormous benefit of having a person at home who can basically fix any machine or device that is humanly fixable. But it can take time. Still, a warm house is a priority, don't you think?

He wanted to sleep in. Instead, I did the animals, glanced at what's blooming in mid-September...

... then I bundled myself up in a fall jacket and sped out for a quick bike ride (because biking warms you up and besides, I have no time later in the day), while he contemplated what of the many possibilities could be wrong with our heating system. By the time I came back thirty minutes later, the house was almost warm.

I celebrated with a special breakfast (of a reheated croissant with milky coffee, to match my new sweatshirt for the year, one that celebrates my most favorite breakfast).

The rest of this morning is spent with my dentist. Sure, he did dental work. (He is excellent at it.) But we also compared in great detail our replaced knees. He had his done two days before I had mine. Same hospital, same procedure, completely different experience, down to the final stitch -- well, neither of us had stitches. I had staples, he had glue. 

In the early afternoon I pick up the kids. It's the kind of day when we're not in a rush to get inside, despite just-purchased croissants and yummy fruits waiting for the little guys.

And in the evening, I sat over drinks and food with my two good friends in town. They're recent empty nesters and this really brought back memories because we became friends just when I became an empty nester, nearly twenty years ago. I assured them, kids never go away. And they never ever leave an emotional vacuum within you. Every single day has a kid or a grandkid thought to mull over and evaluate and feel deeply about. Every single one. They move out spatially, but not otherwise (well, unless you're the kind of person who goes out on a boat and disappears over the horizon, leaving no email address behind).

Later, much later, I drive home and think about how calm a September evening can be. No mosquitoes, no threat of heat. A sunset that's not too early and not too late. Sweetly gentle, glowing with gold.

and love...

Tuesday

It's the kind of morning you dream about: cool, comfortable, with the promise of sunshine. Ed asks, even before we are fully awake -- want to go for a bike ride?

I do. Very much so! 

The animals and the garden walk first.

And we're off. It's still cool (mid 50sF, or around 10C), but nothing a sweatshirt cannot cure.

Our loop is the same, but as we challenge ourselves more, so that it is now reduced from 45 minutes to 40. 

It's beautiful: the pause by the lake, taking note of the animals we pass (families of wild turkeys, groundhogs, always the Sandhills, occasionally a deer), the rolling hills of farmland, a pig farm, a prairie, an oak savanna. All on a splendid September morning.

(the golden soy at this time of the year almost looks artificial...)

Breakfast, on the porch, together.

Then ballet. I have the confidence of a person who likely doesn't know how poor her technique really is: I finish Ballet 1 and go on to Ballet 2! All these years of lesson-watching pays off! (Or, inflates the head and pushes you to keep going.)

And then I pick up the kids.

Have we established a good routine yet? Two steps forward! 

And have I told you that it is a beautiful day? In and out and all around.

And the evening? Time to roll out comfort foods.  Either that, or turn on the furnace. It's nippy outside tonight!

(farro with tomatoes, doused with parmesan cheese and basil, from the Smitten Kitchen)

with love...

Monday

Here is how not to start a new week: when you get up to a cool and wet day, when you know your beloved has a perpetual list of chores and that list is long, and her possibility of riding a bike or walking is remote (as I said, it's wet), when you yourself are prone to stashing weird foods in the freezer, foods that are soon forgotten and left to be shrouded in white freezer burn (think: apple pie purchased twelve years ago), when your pile of stuff "of significant interest" is growing by the couch and on the tiny living room coffee table, when your idea of clearing away used plates is to push them to the side of said tiny coffee table, you should probably refrain from coming upstairs in the wee hours of a Monday morning and saying -- "when are you going to get rid of and use those frozen fruits you bought at the beginning of the pandemic?" It just sets a tone to the morning (and therefore to the day and therefor to the week) that I would call "unfortunate." 

Wet cold uninteresting morning be damned. I'm going for a brisk walk. After feeding the animals of course.

Sometime around 11 Ed comes down -- hey gorgeous, have you had breakfast yet?

By then, I will have fed the animals, taken my 45 minute walk, baked the muffins -- these:

... and read several chapters of a book. And yes, I will have had breakfast. Alone.

Time to resort to the Feedback Wheel -- the device that allows you to explain to your sweetie why you are ready to take a box of overripe blueberries -- not the ones you stashed in the freezer in 2020! -- and dump it on his big clueless head. (You know, the method that allows you to express frustration without arguing: explain what you heard, explain what dumb ideas you thought were festering behind his words, explain how it made you feel, and the denouement -- say what he could do to make it better.)

Ed doesn't really tune into long winded feelings analyses, so keeping it short (all four points, less two dozen words) is vital to getting even a fragment of the message across. He laughs. I wont do that again. We both smile and move on to higher ground. I tell him about my new discovery of this morning: the name of the coffee shop (and apparently food and market place too, all rolled into one) going into the new development near us. Tati of Fitchburg. The place has no ties to the local food or coffee scene. It appears to be a developer's appeasement of the new homeowners' push to get a coffee shop into the neighborhood. In other words -- putting in that coffee shop i's a marketing ploy (they're still building and selling new homes). But I'll take it! A warm space that sells good coffee (maybe) and (maybe) a pastry within walking distance? I'm in!

And now comes ballet. 

I first run a Youtube from the Royal Academy of Dance (for "silver swans!") for a refresher. Then I go to a Youtube that has a whole ballet-ish sequence (for the instructor and her mother!). And when I'm done, I tell Ed -- I loved that. And he says -- you'll be tired of it in three weeks. And I smile, telling him -- it will have been three weeks well spent.

In the early afternoon I pick up Snowdrop and Sparrow at school (they start the school day insanely early and end it pretty early as well; and no, Snowdrop is never cold!).

Food, books, toys. In other words, the essentials for a happy afternoon on a cool and wet day at the farmhouse.

("Snowdrop, am I doing this right?" "You are, Sparrow, you are.")

Dinner of leftovers. A quick bike ride to close my rings. Couch time, because Ed and I can think of no better way to spend an evening than to spread out, watch a movie, doze a little, and maybe reflect on how easy it can be to flip a day, when really, so much is pushing this week in a good direction.

with love...

progress

Good morning! Beautiful day out there! Typical September in Madison weather -- stunning and for the outdoor pleasure seekers -- just right.

Right at the outset, we take our bikes out for a lovely loop. To the lake, to the park -- it's all so splendid in the golden color of this month.

And home again. For breakfast on the porch.

And now to face one of those life's dilemmas: how can you make progress when solutions seems so out of reach? Two steps forward, one step back? Or is it often two steps back, no steps forward? Some problems are just tough to fix. How should you proceed? And some problems are fixable, but you have to strip yourself of any feelings of fairness and deservingness to fix them and some of us just do not want to go down that road.

Those were my thoughts this morning as Ed once again tackled the leaky shower pipe that has been dripping water into our kitchen for nearly a year now (and into the cavity of the ceiling far longer). At the beginning, we merely observed the stain. It grew larger. We penciled it and watched. Still larger.

Eventually Ed cut a hole in the ceiling and worked his fingers in around the pipe. It was wet. He was sure he found the place of the leak. But no. Further probing had him thinking that it was up closer to the shower handle. Today, having borrowed a nifty little camera at the end of a line (which you then connect to your laptop), he found the trouble spot weaving the line through the hole from the shower fixture. It's a weirdly worked over joint that the plumbers put in when we paid them to put in a shower upstairs just before I moved in here (in 2011). Here, you want to see it? The tiny camera eye snapped a picture!

Not surprisingly, the plumbers have refused to take responsibility for it, even though Ed is confident that it was a faulty installation. How is that fair?? On the other hand, he wont hand over the job now to anyone else, since his trust  -- usually quite low in the work of hired help -- is rockbottom at the moment. But to replace that piece of pipe? Oh, it's going to be a huge project! I foresee many more months of steadily dripping water from the ceiling in the kitchen.

In the afternoon I dig out weeds. I'm paying for summertime weed neglect. There are going to be many days that have that clause in them ("today, I dug out weeds").

You ask -- but what about ballet? Did I start in on my tendus and releves? Well no. You see, our climbing vine -- the one I planted in a pot in spring (a noninvasive morning glory that produced not a single flower all summer long but instead gave us a mass of vines and leaves) -- fell off the porch. The string supporting it could not support the weight of all those leaves. Ed climbed up on the roof to throw down a stronger rope and we attached it once more. There, it looks like this:

The image of Ed on the roof reminded me that it had been a full year since I was up there myself. The glass panes are covered with pollen film. Rain wont wash it off. You have to climb out the window, work the hose up there, then get down on your knees (well yes, in that there is a problem!) and scrub the stuff off, with the help of a rag and a strong spray of water. 

If I'm going to do this, it has to be now, when it's still reasonably warm. You get wet and the wooden strips holding the panes down are covered with slippery moss, so you need to go barefoot and grip the strips with your toes and hang on for dear life. 

It took me over an hour to (more or less) wipe down that glass roof. By the end I was so totally spent  (bending, to avoid getting on my knees, and scrubbing) that, despite the arrival of my beautiful ballet shoes, despite the careful selection of stretch pants and a pink top this morning that I thought would be perfect for my debut workout, ballet seemed like the last thing I was primed to do. Besides, Monday begins a new week. Should it not also begin a new hobby?

In the evening the young family is here for dinner. Loving, sweet, chaotic, delightful.

(Sparrow was sure Sandpiper would knock down his structure. Instead, Sandpiper joined in the play...)

(Sparrow had his first violin lesson last week. He's demonstrating his newfound skills. Sandpiper dances.)

After dinner  my daughter expressed an interest in getting some goldenrod for her home. We are on it!

And there you have it!

I had not problem closing my watch rings. It was a full day!

Saturday's chase

Was it Jimmy Buffett who said that you should "Build your life around what you love?" Wise man. It took me many years to figure that one out. He picked it up much earlier in life.

But I'd say that today, if measured against those words, was a remarkably good day, despite the somewhat nutty beginning.

Saturday is market day for me and if the weather is nice, I'm thrilled to bike the awesome paths and roads leading to downtown Madison. But first, the animals.

Good morning, beautiful day!

(looking out from the kitchen...)

(the nasturtium will keep going strong until the first frost)

(the phlox still has a few good days left)

(the girls, let loose...)

What? Oh, cats! What animal have you hunted down and gutted all over the sheep shed floor?! That's both sad and disgusting! Well, never mind. I'll feed you all anyway. 

Back in the farmhouse now, getting ready to leave. Ed is coming along. We're pulling on long sleeved shirts. It's only 51F (10.5C)  outside! But wait: what's going on out there, on the porch? A cat has brought in a bird? Feathers everywhere. Eat bird, eat cat food, then throw up. A familiar pattern. So now we have a mess to clean up on the porch.

This is when you start to not like having cats around.

Except that feeling doesn't last. We remember the farmhouse before the cats settled at the farmette to call it home. We had constant mouse problems. You couldn't keep the rodents out. The foundation is porous and there are plenty of spots where they could squeeze in and come inside to do damage. And the smell! Mice are horrible house mates! We'll take our cats over them anytime!

We're late starting out, but that's okay: we've gained a couple of degrees of warmth. And here's what else we have gained: bikers. Moving in the opposite direction. Hundreds of them!

(photo taken while pedaling; Ed's before me...)

It's the morning of the half-Ironman (tomorrow is the full one). We pedal and admire. So many fit people! And indeed, in addition to the bikers, we see on the paths many many strollers, casual cyclists, joggers. The city is full of people enjoying a morning of movement on this glorious day! Makes me proud to be a Madisonian! (Even though we are only fake Madisonians, as we live outside the city.)

At the market, I cannot find the fruit stand that was my most important reason for being here. They advertised Door County peaches. I would love some late season Door County peaches. It is not to be.

Too, my favorite flower vendor's flowers aren't as lovely as some of the others. Should I stay loyal to her anyway? How can I pass by these brilliant ones in another stall?

I am not loyal. I buy the preferred flowers. It's a market! You're supposed to spread your shopping to others, right? 

Here, Ed and I split up. He has an errand to run, I want to continue on to Madison Sourdough to pick up (and freeze while still fresh!) croissants for the week. The kids have been devouring them. Too, the flakey little guys would be lovely to eat this morning.

Okay, done. Basket full of life's essentials.

And now for the ride home. 

Breakfast! On the porch, of course. [Ed brings chunks of melon to the meal. He's been eating a lot of melon because our field of melons has been exploding. I told him there's only so much cantaloupe I can stomach in one season. He, on the other hand, loves anything and everything that we grow here, including the apples from the ancient apple tree (they have skins that make your mouth pucker!) and the pears that have the mouthfeel of cotton. And melon, which admittedly is good, but it's, well, melon!]

And there you have it! My watch just told me that I am setting records in my daily moves. And I haven't even started ballet yet!

A Zoom call with a most precious friend, a few minutes pulling out weeds from a flower bed.

What a day... Built around things we love, indeed!

to be bad at something

Last week, during a restaurant dinner with the young family, Snowdrop took out a pack of conversation cards. You pick a card and then go around the table discussing the question asked. It was actually more fun than it sounds. Us grownups had to think deeply and come up with honest answers to stuff we dont often think about. Like this one: what hobby do you wish you'd take up? 

It's easy to come up with ones you're already trying to perfect. For me, that would be writing, photography, growing flowers, getting more fluent in French. But new ones? By the time you're 70, you pretty much will have tried anything on your wish list, or given up. But they pushed me and so I finally blurted out -- ballet. I got a lot of quizzical looks on that one. Ballet? Seriously?

The thing is, I'm terrible at it. At least I was made to feel that I am terrible at it when I took ballet lessons in Poland at age 6. Somehow to those watching (mostly the teacher and my family at home), I didn't appear to have the makings of a ballet dancer. After a childhood year of beginning barre work (it seemed interminable), I gave up, choosing instead more "tomboy" (remember that word? difficult years to be a girl) activities. Skateboard, jackknife in my jeans pocket, tree climbing -- that kind of thing. On my own, because there weren't many girls interested in skateboarding, jackknife games, or tree climbing (living in New York City may have had something to do with that). 

So why did I blurt out ballet now, over a beer in a Quebec restaurant?

My younger daughter was a dancer. Her ballet was exquisite. And I know from those years of watching her dance, watching her peers dance, that for all its virtues, advanced ballet is ruinous of your feet, and demanding of a ballet figure and form that is devastating to both those who can never have it, and not much better for those who strive to achieve it.

And I want to dance ballet?

The fact is, I love the movement. The precise yet fluid motion. The balance, the demands on your limbs and core -- it's all beautiful! In my imagination, I do not dance, I don't do arabesques, I don't spin. I just do the movements, perfecting them slowly, over time.

And wouldn't you know it, this morning, there appeared in the paper an article about seniors who in their retirement took up ballet. Well that caught my attention! And, according to the wise women and men who practice this form of dance way into their 70s, the benefits are greater than any stretch you can get from yoga. (Balance! Ballet is all about balance!)

So this morning, after feeding the animals and not doing much in the garden...

I take a walk in the neighborhood of the new development (those rings!!) and then I go on Amazon and buy ballet shoes -- a $13 investment into my new hobby! (Lessons? No need! I don't want added Covid risks! For now, there is my friend YouTube. I'm excited!)

I tell Ed about this over breakfast. Predictably, he laughs.

(Ed is the kind of partner who makes you strong by all the teasing and rib cracking and knuckle pulling he does with you.)

In the afternoon, I pick up just Snowdrop at school. We are still finessing the schedule. This week, I am to take her to the farmhouse then to a ballet class. Next week will be different and the week after -- different still. For now, I'm just rolling with whatever works for the young family. So, farmhouse, then ballet. For her!

(chomping down a croissant while getting ready; sometimes it seems that the after school afternoon is one long snacking session!)

And after dance, I drive home and reheat the squash curry from last night. Portions in our restaurants are always very very large!

And in between all those moments and thoughts and shoe acquisitions and ballet preparations (for Snowdrop), I keep thinking about our hobbies. Did you ever plunge into something you're not good at because you enjoy it anyway? You did? Good for you!

with love...