Purple blooms, cows, & remembering Babcia

It took six hours to finish Market buying for L’Etoile today. Three comments on the foraging: too much, too long, too windy.

This is my one day to go nuts with color on the blog and today anyone could tell that purple colors dominated nearly every flower stand.


a bucket of purple 


purple in every bunch 


a rainbow -- with purple 


a great pairing 

What’s with the cow? It was THE Saturday to bring cows to the Square and so the moo motif was evident in many side stands set up to promote dairy products.


pinch the cow 

And the line, is it the beginnings of a queue for the Tuesday sale of Clinton’s memoirs? No, just the typical Saturday crowd waiting patiently for a L’Etoile croissant.


worth the wait? 

The season is shifting rapidly: this was the tail end of the asparagus; even the strawberries will start to taper off soon. But we have the cucumbers, summer squash and beans now making an appearance.


baby cukes 

Since the berries are so sweet this week, I bought several dozen pints for home use. There is always a part of me that wants to do the entire bit of wintering-over fruits purchased at the peak of the season. But I regret the impulse the minute I get home. Washing, trimming and storing all that I buy will take the better part of the evening.

My grandmother ("Babcia") would have filled shelves and shelves with her own fruit preserves and syrups. What a woman. I wouldn’t have the patience. She, on the other hand, always seemed comfortable working long hours in her very primitive country kitchen. Definitely your picture-book classic Eastern European grandmother. Because I moved away, I stopped eating her food – her blintzes, pierogi, poppy seed cake and strawberry compote – they’re all just a memory now.

Here’s a photo from my last visit (almost 30 years ago) in her Warsaw apartment (to which she moved when she could no longer look after her country house and garden). She deserves a separate post singing her virtues, though this buried little paragraph seems more fitting with her shyness and overwhelming modesty.


Babcia, 1976 

In the dog house

In “My Life,” Clinton admits to sleeping on the couch for at least two months after confessing to his wife that he had had an affair with Monica Lewinsky. A reader asks – “How small is the White House anyway? You mean to tell me there are no spare beds to be found in the entire building, so that the guy has to retire each night to a couch?”

Bill Clinton has always been just a regular kind of guy, making do, like you and me, with whatever is available. Breakfast at McDonald’s, a month or two on the couch. With his dog Buddy keeping him company through it all.

Movement

A friend coaxed me out for an early morning walk. No, that is so incorrect. “Coaxed out for a walk” cannot be used in the same sentence with “me” in it. No one has to coax me to walk. I don’t think I have ever turned down a walk offer in my life. At most postponed it. And it would have to be for something of the magnitude of a wedding (I may not even decline for a funeral).

This walk was a bit absurd because I had a pile of work that JUST HAD TO BE DONE TODAY (n.b. it did get done) and I had already promised my flowering-into-eternity inner something-or-other that I would revisit the Yoga people at their early morning encounter with sweat (why does it have to be exactly 98 degrees there?) and pain today.

But I went for the hike anyway. (I’m serious. I never say no.) My walking partner (who is just a year younger than I am) talked about taking Argentinean tango lessons and going next month to language camp. I heard about trips to off-beat places where there were crushed pineapple smoothies and salsa dancing late into the night.

Energy. Others assume that it is just there for some. It’s not. It takes as much rigor to fight lethargy as it does to post in a blog on a regular basis. But the rewards! Oh, the rewards!

I’m off for another walk. Someone just suggested one. No weddings to attend tonight, and the sky is absolutely gorgeous.

Urban “noise” of a different kind

It has long been the practice in Rome to fund restoration of monuments by putting up scaffolding and selling advertising space on it (read about it here). The benefits are obvious: they say that Rome these days is looking cleaner, spiffier and that such ads are covering 100% of the costs of the facelifts. The downside? It appears to offend many a Roman to see gargantuan faces of models plastered over their beloved monuments. Moreover, some are beginning to suspect that scaffolding is staying up longer than necessary. Indeed, the need for some facelifts may be exaggerated so that additional revenue may be generated.

New limits are being placed on the type of ads that are appropriate and the amount of space they can take up. The city governing body is, of course, spending a great deal of time debating whether a face of a model is more offensive than, say, rusty scaffolding and a green cover net that would be otherwise in place to shield ongoing construction or restoration.

Can’t you just see the Italians arguing with great passion about which photo of a beautiful woman is more appropriate for the cover to the Spanish Steps? Of course, there is a peculiar subjectivity to the entire debate. One person’s rubble may be art in its purest form to another. Wasn’t there a famous New Yorker cartoon depicting the American troops’ entry into Rome during World War II, where one of the soldiers looks at the Colosseum and says something like “Damn those Nazis! Look at the damage they did to that building!” ?

In full public view

The squirrel that zonked out during last week's warm spell on the branch of the apple tree outside my window, came back today to clean herself up for a big night out. She has no shame. Really, anyone could see her go through her routine!

Street music

Today’s Isthmus describes the tribulations of the Library Mall Orange piccolo player. (He wears all things orange, always). He’s been cited for his playing before (too loud, too long --say the street vendors) but a court hearing exonerated him and the city of Madison had to pay not only court costs associated with the proceeding (it went all the way to a jury trial), but reimburse him for his legal expenses as well.

Last week the city issued another citation (no res judicata, they say: it’s a new offense). Apparently the vendors (and the city) are willing to let him play for an hour, but will not permit the two and half hours he feels he needs to get by (he lives solely off of his earnings from the street music).

The issue of the right to silence on city streets is a curious one because, of course, a certain level of noise pollution is constant. I am sitting at home right now, hating the loud lawn mowers that never stop, especially on week-ends (sometimes I am the one pushing one around and so I am equally guilty of creating noise). At some point the din downtown could get to such high levels that even I’ll rally around citing the offenders. But are we there yet? I expect city noises in and around State Street. A quiet downtown would seem to me to be more disconcerting than a noise-filled one. And in Chicago, I always give money to the street saxophonists – they never fail to lift my spirits.

It constantly surprise me how easily (and vehemently) annoyed people get at small irritants (if his playing is indeed an irritant, because he obviously does have a sizeable following).

It never struck me, in fact, that our downtown was exceptionally loud, even though during my 4 – 5 hours at the Farmers Market each Saturday, I of course hear many musicians, politicians, performers. Last Saturday, the Madison Police Department, along with other rescue squads and organizations were putting on a show for young kids all morning long. These same police officers may have at some point taken a break and walked to the other side of the Square to issue a citation to the piccolo player. Odd world.

Tuning out on myself

Not once but twice in the last 24 hours I have recounted lengthy stories only to forget, in the midst of telling them, why I launched into those particular details to begin with.

I am reminded of my work in Japan with the aid of a live translator. Every few sentences I would have to pause while the person translated what I had just said. The biggest challenge was to stay tuned, engaged, ready for the next idea or question. Allowing myself to drift off in boredom destroyed the progression of the interview or lecture.

When I tell a story here, I am often accused of not getting to the point fast enough. I make too many embellishments, holding off on the punch line for as long as possible.

I have, I think, reached a point where I am boring myself with the length of my own stories. Like during translations, I am tuning out on words, only this time they are my own words.

Reforms are in order: my tales henceforth will be shorter. I can’t afford to lose myself as one of the listeners. At the very least I should be able to stay interested enough to get to a story’s end.

What stands out 30 years after getting my B.A.? Bach, photography, and the African Queen.

“Careful: this person is not used to free choice.” That’s the warning that should have been pinned to my coat when I landed as a student on the American academic scene. But this post isn’t yet another run at nostalgia. It’s about breadth versus specialization.

I was looking yesterday through a stack of black and white photos I had taken some 30 years ago. The stack is large because at the time, I had enrolled in a photography class at Columbia and the requirements had us work through many darkroom assignments. Here’s one that I am fond of now – taken on the lower East side of Manhattan:


Lower Manhattan, 1973 

Why photography? Was it a filler class to ease an otherwise heavy load? Uh -- no. After my first two and a half years at the University of Warsaw, where the curriculum had been set and included such heavies as Advanced Calculus, Multivariable Analysis, Theory of Logic, Linear Algebra, Programming, Political Economics, Economic Theory, History of Economics – yes, truly, all the classes were like this – I landed in NY and the first thing my academic advisers told me was that I should let loose and develop a liberal approach to education. Explore! – they said. Go for classes you’ve not tried before!

You could say that I listened to this advice with vigor. In the remaining two years in college I took Photography: darkroom techniques, The study of the African Queen (this may have had a sexier title, but that is what we did: we analyzed the African Queen all semester long), Italian 1, 2 & 3, Metaphysics, J.S.Bach, Cultural Anthropology, Renaissance something or other, Introduction to Psychology, Twentieth Century Music, Urban Landscapes, and then a handful of basic sociology classes to fulfill my new major requirements. I have to say, none of these classes could really be labeled as “fluff.” They had their own built-in rigor that was oftentimes more challenging than my run through higher level mathematics (well, perhaps not Cultural Anthropology: I haven’t a single kind thing to say about that class).

One could ask “what’s wrong with that”? Nothing perhaps. Though for years I’d thought it merely to be great training for cocktail party conversations.

Comparing the two curricula may lead one to conclude that a balance might have served me well. Yes, that’s the easy answer. But isn’t it significant that from this assortment of disparate courses each stands out in some way, having left a strong mark on my educational memory? (Again, all general comments here have absolutely no application to Cultural Anthropology: that deserves a special spot in a pile of refuse along other items best forgotten.)

In the summer before going to Law School, instead of brushing up on my lackluster knowledge of the American legal system, I signed up for a UW class on Marcel Proust and his French contemporaries. And again, I remember just about every one of those very excellent lectures, not even so much for the content but for the passion that the professor (Elaine Marks) brought to literary analysis.

Quite obviously, the directive to explore was more than a push toward the unemployment line. And what of the need to specialize? Back in graduate school, one of my professors boasted that there isn’t a subject out there that he couldn’t in two months master well enough to teach to a roomful of students. It’s not an unfair statement. Substance is the easiest thing in the world to learn (it’s also the most easily forgotten) and more often than not one has an entire professional lifetime to learn it in. When law students come to my office, agonizing over class selection, I like to tell them that I was hired by the Law School to run a clinical program and to teach Family Law, having myself never taken a clinic or Family Law when I was a student here.

I’m mindful of all this now, some 30 years after my own college days, when I am again picking up old photos and other little bits and pieces of those other classes, and recognizing their odd presence in a variety of areas of my life.

Yoga for breakfast

I wrote in a post yesterday that I’d do yoga and so early this morning I went to a yoga class (there was some egging on taking place from a friend who clearly has been doing this long enough that she could actually twist into pretzel shapes and look great next to my sweaty misaligned form).

How would I rate the experience? Level of difficulty: 10. Niceness of classmate who asked me later if I was sure I’d not done yoga in recent years: 10. Patience of teacher with new students (meaning me): 10. Degree of joy when the clock reached the ending time: 10.

If I were to issue one constructive comment I suppose I’d say that it’s not necessary to tell us to flower into infinity. The idea of being at one with infinity is kind of freaky to begin with, and I cannot wrap my mind around the notion of flowering into it. And I don’t believe that the mere act of breathing out deftly will get rid of many of the toxins within. But those little quips notwithstanding, I am willing to admit that it is a strengthening, health-promoting activity. We’ll see if I can get myself to do a rerun. Just thinking of it makes my muscle groups shake.

A blogger’s delight

It has been said that blogging opens doors, brings people together, creates new bonds. Indeed. Yesterday I had dinner with three people that I met entirely as a result of my entry into the world of weblogs. Mother-in-law came up to Madison and she brought with her a friend whom she met through the Internet (the friend lives in Le Havre, France) and we were joined by Mother-in-law’s REAL mother-in-law. The frosting on the cake was that we ate at L’Etoile, thus I could reap direct benefits from my market foraging of 25 pounds of snap peas (they were floating around my piece of halibut) and two crates of mushrooms (they were frothed in my amuse bouche) and several flats of strawberries (they were in the chantilly meringue dessert); and I could make life difficult for the unlucky waiter (sorry, James) who had to endure my ridiculous but sincerely motivated questions about the source of one ingredient or another (he’ll get me for that one day in the kitchen, I’m sure).

I don’t typically put in photos of the “here I am against the background of X” sort, but this one deserves to be the exception (though I’ll let the reader match faces with blogs, in laws, and French guests) as it is proof positive that blogging may lead to many smiles and warm encounters. And good meals.


blogger meets blogger & co. 

To be honest...

I came across the following comment the other day: Blogs are places where you can make yourself look better than you really are.

Now is that fair? I could equally posit the opposite: in an encapsulated story from your day, little irksome events and traits may receive greater prominence than they deserve. You may be significantly better, nicer, less odd than in your blog.

Still, in the spirit of balance and fairness, I do feel compelled to admit to some rocky moments from my past. Let me do it through the eyes and words of others.

A good place to poke around in is in my ancient report cards. Did I imply that I rushed through school tripping over my own excellence? Consider this report card from 3rd grade (at the UN school, barely a year after arriving in New York as a shy little thing from Poland):

first semester:



Third grade, second semester -- any improvement?



Silly? Rambunctious? Alright, let's skip ahead a few years. Sixth grade, first semester:



One more try. Sixth grade, second semester:



I did want to balance the red circles with something not quite so...undisciplined and so I inserted a few purple circles to indicate that I did have a small cheering squad out there that gave pats on the back for my exuberant and energetic approach to school (and life in general). Still, you'd think with my initially imperfect English and my unpopular at the time Polishness, I'd be meeker, more to the sidelines, keeping QUIET, at least in the presence of teachers. I seem not to have known how.

Take charge! Load on the good stuff

In an attempt to turn the tide and create for myself on a more positive, cheerful stretch of days [after my morning epiphany that I was slated to tumble into an abyss of gloom if I kept on writing depressing posts on the EU and Poland (see below) each day], I decided to update my “to do” list by inserting some cheerful, buoyant and inspiring activities and eliminating some disagreeable ones.

Here’s what got added:
1. inspiring: yoga with friend who is convinced that this is absolutely the most incredible thing you can do to your body (tomorrow)
2. innovative: dinner with person tonight whom I have never met before, except through blogging
3. consumeristic: a new book, of course, to add to my stack of unread ones
4. indulgent: writing some nice, long emails again, much to the chagrin and consternation of those on the receiving end (I am cheering MYSELF up, not them)
5. so simple I can’t believe I hadn’t thought of it before: baking something extremely difficult that no one will eat because everyone I know is on some kind of diet, and no diet that I know of permits baked goods
6. requiring physical exertion: painting a room comes to mind, or chopping down some trees in the back yard.


Here’s what got deleted:
1. scheduling dental checks – (last week I told the dentist he was my least favorite person in town; he failed to see the humor in this)
2. a reading of the morning headlines (replaced by reading more blogs, especially upbeat ones of which there are many)
3. going to my office tomorrow or the next day or the next day and facing clutter (of unread papers, catalogues, journals, etc.)
4. thinking about having to teach a workshop in several weeks on a topic that’s pretty much a mystery to me
5. writing thank you notes: I have a pile to do, but the list is so old that I am sure those in need of the thanks have resigned themselves to my rudeness by now (I may reinstate this one later on; even as I write this, I am engulfed in a sea of guilt)
6. Doing chores. Period. No more chores. I am staging a boycott of chores. A long boycott. I have HAD it with chores. I quit.

Hope Does NOT Spring Eternal: Facing a Disappointing Election to the New European Parliament

In the Alternative: Quit Reading Newspapers and do Yoga

An informed and astute reader from Poland writes: "The politics of this country are really something... Yesterday were the elections to the European parliament. So far some of the most backward, right-wing, religious (e.g. Liga Polskich Rodzin [nc: the League of Polish Families, which, n.b., opposes Poland’s participation in the EU] - the name says it all) groups are in the lead, with record-low attendance. Why, oh why does Poland have to be the laughing stock with its religious crusades that are so outdated and comical at times?"

Why indeed. I don’t understand why religion and governance create a conservative unity in the way that they do for Poland. Though perhaps it’s to be expected. Poland has always been isolated, torn apart, divided, left to its own. That kind of history invites allegiance to a strong institution that can pull its people together, doesn’t it? Neither the government nor its neighbors have provided certainty or stability. The church authorities have been astute enough to seize every opportunity to fill a void created by the unfortunate alliances that have stood in the way of peace and prosperity for Poland. How ironic that in the end, the church can offer neither peace nor prosperity. Its conservative base will not permit anything but a restatement of tired, archaic principles. How many more decades must pass before Poles realize that they have been had by the church as well?

In the meantime, the European Parliament continues to disappoint those who saw the governing potential of this unique institution. Politicized, filled with under-qualified members and without the popular support of member states (most don’t understand what it is that this institution can accomplish and quite a number are rethinking about the wisdom of EU membership), it is more likely to move slowly, erratically, inconsistently through the maize of reforms that will come before it in the next several years and even the first hurdle – the adoption of the Constitution – again appears insurmountable.

I know, these kinds of reflections are not a healthy way to start a morning. Even the title of the post should be wiped out and given a somewhat more cheery spin. [Note addition of subtitle just now.] There is a reason why I left politics out of the blog for all those weeks. If only I'd stop reading the headlines and commentary coming out of Europe... Skip the morning press, do yoga, look at green trees. Maybe tomorrow.

To tell or not to tell: musings at knife-point

This morning I was at the UW hospital for a needed medical procedure. Obviously it’s not anything debilitating as I am home now blogging energetically.

But I once again confronted the following issue: should I tell the surgeon that, oh by the way, not only am I a lawyer, but I teach torts, which in common parlance is really the same as personal injury law and yes, we devote a good amount of time to medical malpractice?

The benefit of such a revelation: I am sending the message that if there is an iota of greater care that can be expanded, go ahead an expand it now, because I am one of those people who is very comfortable with the courtroom. But that seems rather selfish, doesn’t it? I do have strong communitarian principles engrained in me and these let me know that my medical care should be the same, not better not worse than that of the bloke next in line. Oh come on now, that’s great reasoning in the abstract, but as the surgical team is sharpening the blades, such good collectivist ideology quickly hides under the warm and cozy blanket.

The down side of disclosure: once I tell them I am a lawyer, I can never ever pinpoint them on anything. Questions such as “am I going to die tomorrow?” or "why are you sweating so much and taking four times as long as you had implied for this?" will no longer be answered. It’s too risky. What if they err in their judgment and I turn lawyer-nasty and cause them professional hardship? So they clam up.

Still, the blades are turning my way and in a moment of weakness I tell all.

Unanticipated consequence: this personal revelation cracks a barrier and the team turns chatty. So, the doc working the blades explains how he himself wanted to be a historian but he hated history grad school here at UW and oh, I also teach family law, do I? Why, his wife died young and he became a single father and so he knows what that’s all about and one son is now in Iraq serving in the Army and yes he WANTED to go there and incidentally have I heard of this lawyer he knows since yes, she does practice personal injury law, ha ha ha, some of his best friends are indeed personal injury lawyers… and so on. Whatever benefit I accrued from the “greater care given to the person who might sue,” I lost because he was now entirely focused on his own recollections.

And the technician was no better. Directing a machine, a teeny wrong movement of which could lead me to have permanently damaged vital organs, she informs me that her son is applying to Law School and could I speculate (how, please tell me? You are in my neck area, I dare not move for fear of being slashed in the wrong places) what his chances might be? He got this on his LSATs and that for his GPA, and he comes from a line of UW grads and then there's his sister…

I have always been told that there is something about me that makes people talk and tell their life’s story. I had, up until today, fancied that to be a talent of sorts. I believed that it was my gently persuasive and caring manner that instills trust and confidence. Now I know better. Today I did not cajole gently. I did not encourage this flood of story-telling at all. What they were obviously reacting to was this feature that I have: it is a Concerned Frown that I have had for years and years, which stays on my face no matter what, even if I am laughing with abandon: the Concerned Frown is always in place. Since the team was up there working in its vicinity, it is clearly what inspired the revelations. If you don’t buy it, please consider this:



Wouldn’t you spill your life’s story to a person who looked at you in this way? (I should note that The Concerned Frown was especially pronounced this morning because I was also quite concerned that they would all stray a bit and hit the wrong connective tissue and I would thereafter no longer be connected.)

A P.S. on our very fleeting interest in faraway places

In commenting on my Walesa post (Saturday, below), a very open minded reader writes the following: “I'm always very interested to hear perspectives on the fall of Communism from people who were on the receiving end.” She may be in the minority on this.

I have to say that mine was a strange personal history, since I criss-crossed the ocean too often to fully feel the impact of life under any system – capitalist, communist, or post-communist. My greatest emotional connection (to a country or a system) came during my adolescent years and all those were, indeed, spent in Warsaw (under communist governance). But I thought my 6 years of childhood in New York (during the 60s) were also significantly impressionable, especially as I experienced the American reaction to me (and to my family) at the time.

We were an anomaly in those years. Tourism between Poland and the US came to an almost complete halt after the war, since the US would not grant visas to Poles who hadn’t a plausible connection to someone in the States who could vouch for their financial solvency (and Americans were fearful of traveling to a country “behind an iron curtain,” as if, indeed, there was a real curtain and Poles held the key, to be used randomly for locking in visitors from the West). Of course, there always was that trickle of Polish immigrants, but we weren’t like them: we were regarded with suspicion because we weren’t seeking asylum. We intended to go back to Poland after my father’s work at the UN was finished. Why would anyone want to return to a country like Poland --was so often the unspoken question.

Or spoken. Because I did get this query upon occasion. The antipathy here toward all things associated with communism or socialism was unbelievable. Even at the UN school, of all places, I remember a classmate asking my teacher: “why do people hate communists?” and the teacher answering “how would you like it someone took away all your money?” Those were interesting times.

The end of Communist Party rule in Poland is a welcome relief, of course, greeted there with euphoria and incredible optimism (tainted now by the 20% - 25% unemployment rate and the collapse of the welfare safety nets, though flickering again with Poland’s entry into the EU). The sense of relief on this side of the ocean is palpable as well. Not so much because we (I speak now as an American – I flip flop in this way constantly) have such great empathy for the political climate of insignificant small states far far away, but because the imaginary threat they once posed has suddenly vanished and they again can become insignificant and irrelevant, while we focus our attention and interest on places that have greater economic linkages to us here.

The one final comment I have for now is that I think Americans would be surprised at the great love that Poles have always felt for this country, regardless of its political make up du jour, regardless of the on again off again interest that Americans have in Poland’s future. In this sense Lech Walesa was absolutely correct: Poles loved Reagan because for a moment, Reagan made them feel that the love affair was not one-sided. Few presidents before or after have given Poland and Eastern Europe more than a second glance.

Meet the flake

There are few events that tug at me more than “meet the author” gigs and book-signings. It’s not the signature-in-text per se, it’s the little talk that precedes it, where the authors comment on their ‘creative process,’ recall a little anecdote maybe, and read a bit from their most recent volume. I have been to quite a number of these around town and each has been good, even when the audience has been small and I could see the embarrassment and disappointment on the writer’s face: travel all this way for 5 people?? -must be every author’s nightmare to draw really small crowds.

I was looking forward to tonight’s reading/signing at Borders. I’d even bought a copy of an earlier book by this guy. I was psyched. A friend who’d accompanied me to a couple of other readings in the past was going to meet me there earlier so that we could stake out seats, just in case it was packed.

Of course, I got off to a late start and so I careened to Borders at the speed of a maniac, arriving just seconds before 7. I noted that the parking lot was not overflowing and I was glad, therefore, to be adding my body to the possibly emptyish signing, though I was surprised at a low turn out since the author had been a National Book Award Finalist. These kinds of honors usually bring out the celebrity-seeking types. Not me, I thought, I applaud even the unheralded authors. I’m all about giving praise to anyone who manages to spit out a final draft, send off the completed manuscript for publication and then get an invitation to talk about it all at Borders.

Inside, all was quiet. No friend. No author. At the information desk I am reminded that today is NOT June 12. That was yesterday. So was the book signing.

[The sad thing is that I must have 'flake' spelled out on my forehead these days, so that my friend was not even surprised yesterday when I did not show up. It’s as if one can’t expect better of me, as if asking me to keep a calendar straight is laughable, as if I belong to the tormented, harrowed sort that cannot even show up anymore at the right time or the right place.]

I couldn’t get myself to ask if the signing had been well attended: a ‘yes’ would have filled me with regret, a ‘no’ would have filled me with shame.

First grade friends, career choices and an email from my sister

I got an email from my sister (who lives in Warsaw) telling me about a recent conversation she had with Janek. (In an earlier post I describe him as the first ever to announce that he and I will someday marry; the announcement came when we were buddies in first grade.) Apparently he was trying to locate me last week to arrange an impromptu meeting between him, myself, and our old school chum, Monika (who is briefly in Warsaw). Of course, my sister had to say I was not there and so the effort failed. Still, the reemergence of Monika was a jolt.

Monika is the daughter of a famous Polish economist. But I didn’t know that when I was six. She was a pal simply because we picked each other out in our first grade class (Janek was our buddy as well).

It’s interesting how there are circles that form in one’s life, bringing together fragments, creating continuity out of seeming chaos. Monika’s father died (1965) before I returned to Poland (I lived in the States between 1960 and 1966). But reading his last published work, The Introduction to Econometrics, lead me (in 1969) to choose econometrics as my field of study at the University of Warsaw. He was one of those economists who moved from west to east, both in terms of residence and economic theory. Once a prominent economist at the U of Chicago (he was there prior to World War II – he was an ‘older’ father to Monika), he returned to Poland after the war and aligned himself with the socialist government, calling himself a Marxist theorist and a champion of the state-run economy. I knew little about his work except for this last book on the emerging field of Econometrics which I did think was cool and worthy of further academic study.

It would have been a fantastic reunion. Poles have a strong attachment to their school friends. Most continue to live in the same city and so following the vagrancies and vicissitudes of former classmates is not hard. But our particular once-tight little circle has become fragmented: Monika now lives in SF, I live in Madison, Janek is still in Warsaw. Maybe next year we can better coordinate our reunion.

In the meantime, I am trying to pick out Monika from my first grade photo below (taken in 1959; click to enlarge). Only one of the faces seems potentially fitting. Circled also are the faces of Fela (post from last Friday on ‘Politics at the Personal Level’), Janek, and myself (the school ‘monitor’, of course!).


Warsaw Elementary School no. 43, first grade 

You THINK you’re in a sea of strangers…

I ran into someone at the store this afternoon. I know this person, I thought. I know quite a bit about him. I know something of his family life, his travels, in fact I know where he ate dinner recently. On the other hand, he knows me not at all. If I introduced myself, he would not recognize my name. He would stare blankly at me and say something like “sorry, I don’t believe we’ve ever met.”

It’s odd that there are these imbalances of information out there. Because on other days, the flip side of this must happen too – where I am in ignorance of the fact that the person standing next to me knows all sorts of details about me as I innocently go about picking strawberries or granola.

With so many former students remaining in Madison after Law School, the probability of someone recognizing me and me not them is high (it happened just today at the Farmers’ Market). Still, prior to the blog, the amount of information that they would have about me would be limited, for the most part, to what I said in class or in my office. Though not always. It’s a small town and people pass all sorts of stories about others. Teachers are a good target for this kind of talk, I’m sure.

But today was different. I was the one tipping the informational scale. In the end it felt strange to say nothing and so I did introduce myself as one who knew him in this odd one-sided way. Which freaked him out completely. Next time, I think I’ll just grin knowingly. At worst I’ll appear excessively friendly, perhaps deranged even. But I wont cause such great discomfort as I did today, when I said “you don’t know me, but I sure know YOU.”

How a Country Defines its Heroes, then Changes its Mind and then Changes its Mind Again

There was a time when Lech Walesa was every person’s good guy. In Poland, he was, of course, the symbol of change, the leader of the quiet revolution, the one who linked different factions to form an effective, cohesive movement, transforming the country, transforming the continent of Europe. And that’s not an overstatement.

Then he became the President of Poland. That was tougher: skills that he had brought into Solidarity weren’t necessarily ones that would benefit him as the leader of the reemerging democracy. Poles were less generous with their praise for the Walesa of the 1990s.

Eventually, Walesa lost much of his political clout and now he is just one of many voices commenting on the political and economic climate in Poland. His words no longer astonish, nor are they even on par with the voices of other commentators who are far better educated, well-read, critically sharp in their insights. Still, Poles are tolerant of maverick voices and they have a special fondness for this one – especially now that it no longer is sounded from a position of authority. As memories of his governance fade, his stature as history’s great man again begins to be felt.

Yesterday, Walesa publicly expressed his views on the Ronald Reagan era. Myself, I wish he’d sit quietly and say less. I am not so enamored with people who fail to recognize that current events have moved rapidly forward, leaving them permanently at the margins of the new political reality. Perhaps that’s a cruel way to dispose of heroes. But it is the special confluence of events that favored Walesa’s rise to prominence. And it is the ordinary progression of events that has pushed him aside. That’s the way things work in political life, isn’t it?

Walesa’s letter eulogizing Reagan (reprinted yesterday in WSJ.com) is a great example of one man without a clue about the complexity of events commenting on another who once held an equally limited grasp of the entirety. How telling that Walesa, in this article, also includes in the handful of great world leaders such progressive ‘visionaries’ as Margaret Thatcher and John Paul II. Reagan, Thatcher and the current Pope. What a club!

Generous that I remain toward Walesa of the 1980s (and I am very very generous), I cannot stomach his comments on these figures from the past. Marveling at Reagan’s commitment to such values as basic human rights, Walesa writes:

I often wondered why Ronald Reagan did this, taking the risks he did, in supporting us at Solidarity, as well as dissident movements in other countries behind the Iron Curtain, while pushing a defense buildup that pushed the Soviet economy over the brink. Let's remember that it was a time of recession in the U.S. and a time when the American public was more interested in their own domestic affairs. It took a leader with a vision to convince them that there are greater things worth fighting for. Did he seek any profit in such a policy? Though our freedom movements were in line with the foreign policy of the United States, I doubt it.

Not grand enough yet? Consider this, then, further into the article:

…(Only one group of politicians is) convinced that there are values worth living for, and even values worth dying for. Otherwise they would consider their life and work pointless. Only such politicians are great politicians and Ronald Reagan was one of them.

And a reflection on how a Pole would regard a cowboy:

Cowboys in Western clothes had become a powerful symbol for Poles. Cowboys fight for justice, fight against evil, and fight for freedom, both physical and spiritual.

Really, enough already. Bringing back heroes isn’t always such a good thing. I am forgiving of Walesa’s missteps as President, but only if I don’t have to hear him speak now, because his words only serve to remind me that greatness can be easily lost if we keep on talking when we no longer know what we are talking about.

The World of Markets and Restaurants, continued

If these colors don’t send you into a state of ecstatic rapture, you are one tough reader to please.









It was one of those days where the lazier you were, the better off you wound up being. Early marketers had the gloom, the chill, the fog. Late risers had the sunshine, the music and plenty of foods and flowers left to choose from.

I filled L’Etoile’s cart several times over. The best part? People watching at the Market. The worst part? Let’s just say the chilly wee early morning and let it go at that.

I did also hang out for a bit in L’Etoile’s kitchen. At this time of the year, even standing in the walk-in cooler is pleasant – the little refrigerator-room smells of everything that’s fresh and wholesome. (In the later months of the summer, the walk-in is greatly loved for another reason: it’s a place of respite from the horrible heat of the ovens conjoined with the horrible heat of the season. Did I say this before? L’Etoile is the only high-end restaurant I know of that does not have air conditioned kitchens. It is HELL there during the summer.)

The cook was working on the Vesuvius dessert prep. More precisely, it is the ‘Chocolate Vesuvius with Dark Chocolate Truffle, Red Currant Cassis Coulis and Vanilla Crème Anglaise.’ Many places these days make a Vesuvius-type dessert (including Chili’s!), but L’Etoile’s really is at the top – though only if the morning cook remembers to grease the forms well enough so that the final product slides out and doesn’t create a crisis for the sweating, harried night cook. Nothing, NOTHING flares the temper more than one stuck Vesuvius, at a time when all other desserts are ready to go.


nice and greasy Vesuvius forms