a Saturday in the city

As many of you know, I was a high school and university student in Poland. I moved to the States somewhere between what Americans call sophomore and junior years. The difference between being a student in Warsaw in the early 1970s and in New York were tremendous, but what I recall vividly now are the large and small ways in which the life of the American student seemed to me then to be so very decadent. There was the obvious: the dizzying array of irrelevant (to your future career) courses (suddenly, my transcript was peppered with such course titles as "the photography dark room" and "J.S.Bach" and "The African Queen's impact on the development of film" and "Italian for beginners.") There were, too, the small things: a cafeteria, with trays of donuts and big vats of coffee for those morning classes. Or the smell of pot in the residence halls. Then there was weekend brunch at the casual restaurants of upper Broadway.

Not only did Poles rarely eat out in those years (oh, how things have changed!), but brunch was not even in our vocabulary.  When a guy invited me out for morning brunch (of dim sum, because, you know, it was New York), I wondered -- how do I dress for this? As I followed him into a narrow restaurant with Formica tables and somewhat torn vinyl booths, I was impressed by the slow flow of conversation (Poles never talk that slowly). The casual way in which people ate, with a spread of the Sunday NYTimes on many tables.  Decadent, I tell you.

I still think of brunch as an unusual and, for me, special event. Ed and I never go out for it. Weekend brunch has become that wonderful extra meal to be enjoyed when, for example, I am visiting a daughter living in another city. This is when I look forward to this exotic and wonderful late morning indulgence -- as foreign and deliciously decadent to me now as it was when I first encountered it on the upper west side of New York.

This morning the three of us head out to Hola Arepa.






What are the origins of these dishes? I ask, digging into the yuca hash, with beans, pickled cabbage, and a poached egg.
Venezualan.





Oh, how the food culture has changed in the Midwest! Both my daughters and their husbands pay attention to food in good ways and I wonder out loud if they call themselves foodies. Predictably, they don't much care for the label.
Am I a foodie? I ask, somewhat amused. I thought the answer was a resounding yes. I've moonlighted in restaurant kitchens for God's sake. Why else would I burn my hands in hot ovens after teaching classes during the day if not for the love of good food?
My son-in-law teases me -- you're too much into healthy foods to be a proper foodie.

Damn it, he's right. Over the years, I've backed off, admiring great meals mostly from afar. On menus, I get excited by vegetables (mushrooms will do!). And yet, I study dishes and combinations of ingredients as if my life depended on it. I care deeply about the foods we eat.


Time for a walk. The temperatures are about to make the leap to above freezing and there they shall stay for weeks on end! But in the meantime, it's on the cool side and so we go to the Conservatory to admire plant life that belongs to another climate, or at least another season.






We walk through it twice. The humidity alone is worth the trip: it's like stepping into a spa for your eyes and for your winter weary skin too.











And then I have business to discuss with my sister in Warsaw and so we make our way to a coffee shop where I can Skype with her over a wonderful aromatic cup of coffee. (The young people lose themselves in books.)






As if this whole trip wasn't indulgent enough, we do another thing that I almost never do these days -- we go for ice cream at the Milkjam Creamery. People have very individual relationships to ice cream. For me, it's not just a food -- it's an evocative treat that brings forth memories of other places, other cones and cups eaten over a lifetime. But Milkjam is memorable in its own right. How can you not love a flavor called Indian Elvis (curry, banana and peanut butter)? Or one that mixes the milk of a cow with that of a goat?






The sun comes out now: it's as if our ice cream defiantly pushed thoughts of the cold season away for good. We linger in the neighborhood of the ice cream store, window shopping, pausing to look. Why rush now? Sun's out. Life is warm.






In the evening, we go to a new kid on the Twin Cities -- St. Genevieve. It's styled to be a buvette -- a kind of neighborhood bar with great food where all are welcome -- locals, with or without kids, the occasional visitor. And it is excellent!

(As you can tell, I love photographing people and I especially love photographing people I love. You can decide if these two are posing, or oblivious to my camera work.)






A full day, a beautiful meal, a late night. A good night. Good night!

up up

... and away! A day of travel. A weekend away. Except I'm no urban escapee from the chaos of the city. I'm leaving the quiet of the farmette to once again wallow in the deliciousness of a visit to the city.

I don't take off immediately. At sunrise, just as the first splash of pink leaves its quiet mark on the patches of snow...






... I am up hurrying to open the chicken coop. There's squawking inside and I think I am not incorrect in believing that Butter is picking on little Henny again.

And yet, the chicken way of thinking remains a great mystery to me. Though it's below freezing, the girls come trotting out -- all but Henny. I open the roost -- she is huddled inside, but not for long. Hearing her buddy Java below, she goes down and both hens follow the older girls outside. What happened to warfare?

I have to think -- might we be past the worst of it? Let me stay with that chipper cheeper vision. As rosy as the morning rays of sunlight...






Breakfast at the farmhouse. Warmed by the early sunshine.






Things are looking up, no? When I come back, every hen will have found her place in the wee group of four, right? The snow will be gone, the crocuses will continue their steady push toward the heavens. Dream big.

And as if to give substance to these lovely thoughts, I go outside and see a vignette that warms my heart: the cheepers are not that far apart. Henny feels safe next to Java. Nothing, not even Butter, seems threatening when she marches by the big black hen's side.





Spring, peace, harmony -- here we come!

There is a morning of chores -- of shopping, of car washing -- the usual end of week stuff. But in the afternoon, I do the most luxurious thing: I board a plane for Minneapolis. The big airlines have introduced discount fares (no seat, no this, no that -- stripping it down to the bare essentials of going up, staying up, and landing in the place you want to be) and I grabbed one before it disappeared. That's a 45 minute journey, as opposed to a brutal and cold five and a half hour bus ride.

Up up indeed, over the isthmus that is Madison...






What, you can't spot our Capitol? Look closely.






A slight turn west and north and we disappear into the clouds (the same ones that have just dumped an inch of snow in Minnesota, but I have no complaints: our sister state is due for a warm up starting tonight. Remember: rosy thoughts, Ocean readers, rosy thoughts).


In the early evening, I am in the Twin Cities, riding the lovely light rail to meet my daughter and her husband. A stroll through the maze of skywalks, a quick drink in the office building where my girl works and then the three of us head out to dinner at the Brewer's Table.






It's the restaurant that sits right in the belly of the Surly Beer company. It has a well deserved reputation for delicious food (the chef here shares the honor Madison's young food geniuses received this year -- all nominees for a James Beard award) and we choose to have it paired with superb craft beers.  Yes,  despite my love of good wine, I am perfectly capable of saying kind words about beer. You just have to catch me at the right place and at the right time. This weekend, in Minneapolis, at the Brewers Table with this wonderful twosome for example.

But shhh! They're both fast asleep as I write this. I am proud to say that for once, I outlasted the younger generation. Snore away, my dears. Me, I'm already thinking about tomorrow's adventures.

Thursday

Oh, the noise, the squawking, screeching, flailing! I heard it when I stepped out to place a letter in the mailbox. It sounded desperate and mean.
Ed! Ed! -- not that he could hear me through the closed windows of the farmhouse, but I felt the need to shout for his help.
I'm inside the house now, panting -- I think the coop has been attacked!
Did you go see what happened?
No! I want you to come! It sounds awful!

But of course, I'm dressed and ready. He tells me to get going -- I'll catch up.

As I approach the coop, the noise is just tremendous. I see that Scotch is outside and she is part of the trouble. Standing on a bench by the sheep shed, the girl is positively screaming. I would transcribe it to something like - I don't like this! I don't like this! I don't like this!

I turn toward the coop. Ed is at my heels. Downstairs, Butter is chasing Henny who is a great flyer, but you just can't fly in a space that is less than two feet tall. Java is upstairs, taking up a huge portion of the roost. (She is one big girl.)

I chase Butter out of the coop with a broom. Everything is suddenly very quiet. As if nothing had happened. As if there had been no battle, no great disturbance.

Well it sounded horrible!
Pecking order: they're still working it out.

I blame their prolonged squabble on the bad weather. We'd introduced new hens before: I'd say it was more like placing a new singer into an existing choir. Oh, you have to shuffle things around to make room, and someone doesn't like being put behind, another one relishes the front row spotlight, but eventually the singing continues and apart from a kick and nudge, you'll hardly notice any ruffled feathers. But here, it's cold and the new hens are staying in the coop and it seems that every time Butter walks by she feels compelled to show how put upon she is by the intrusion. She wont go after big Java in a confined space, but she has no problem chasing Henny, who is, in fact of a more anxious disposition.

The warm air is almost with us. Perhaps tempers will ease and the hens will move back to the business of laying eggs. It cannot happen soon enough.


Breakfast. A blissfully quiet meal. A moment of total peace.






And now I shift gears again. I'm with my granddaughter one last day before again retreating for a bit, this time because of a trip up north to visit my younger girl and her husband.

Snowdrop is already dressed and ready to play and as I watch her, I smile at how sometimes an article of clothing will bring on a mood. I remember seeing a number of skirts and dresses this season that have a sort of dancer's element -- gauzy skirts, that kind of thing. It's a fad, it will pass, but this season, girls, big and small (at least on the other side of the ocean) seem to sport these fuller skirts. And the funny thing is that in this morning hour, Snowdrop, who otherwise seems not especially dance inclined (at this stage, she is a runner and a climber), seems to be raising her leg just so.






Favoring her tippy toes...






Stretching out her arms in her run.






Oh, I know it's just in my mind, possibly because of this impending visit with my younger daughter who, in fact, was a great dancer once, but it is a sweet recollection and I enjoy it especially because it came without prompt or any actual awareness on Snowdrop's part of what she was doing.

Onto the more serious business of what, in fact, has been an important discovery for the little babe -- sometime this week, she has enthusiastically embraced the game of "point to (fill in the blank)." Ask her to point to a giraffe or a strawberry and she literally pounds her finger on the given item (possibly because that has been my way of pointing as well).






And why use just one hand ...






And so is our morning: point to the banana! the baby! Oh, the joy of understanding what's what in this world!

In the afternoon, well, this was the one thing on her mind: are we going out yet?






Why she loves these excursions on days when we're just hovering around freezing is beyond me. Perhaps a testament to her time of birth -- in the deep chill of January.



(pointing, this time to the pinwheel)



We've discovered a new favorite cafe -- a bit further, but the staff more than makes up for the chill of those extra minutes outside. Lovely people who make a point of remembering your name. And her name.






Yes, telltale signs of cookie on her mouth. I always buy just one, for Ed, and she and I split a few crumbs of it.






Today, I let her explore a little on her own.
Just watch the wine bottles, Snowdrop!






Can I run here, grandma?
Go for it, little one. Go for it.






I'll leave you with that image of the girl on the run.


At home,  I find Ed petting Butter (to appeal to her gentler instincts) as the new girls watch.





We feed them in their various private places and eventually they all migrate upstairs in the coop. Not a sound. No protest. Tonight, all is calm. The beginning of a more permanent truce? One can hope.

Wednesday

Sometimes sunshine can perk up the most prickly set of hours. Then there is a day like this one:

The old hens laid their eggs in the barn. We hadn't noticed. The eggs froze.

The new cheepers are up in the roost without interruption for what is now the second day. I brought up food for them, feeling like I have two aging grannies rather than spry new hens.

The morning reading on my walk to open the coop was 5F (-15C).

At breakfast (in the sun room), Ed thought it was funny to hide behind the blender container.





At Snowdrop's home, the little girl wanted to pound on my laptop even more than she wanted to play with penguin, hat and jacket. When I refused, she was crestfallen. And no, distraction didn't work. At least not for significant parts of the morning.

She didn't finish her breakfast and was therefore hungry.

The banana I ate was so rotten that for a moment I wondered if even a pig would reject it.

And so on.

None of these are great menacing events in the scheme of things, but they show that the day was just a little off center. As if someone forgot to give us instructions on how to keep things on an even keel.


And yet, there is that golden warmth of the sun...






... and the snow and the sky took on beautiful shades of blue...






And Snowdrop never goes for long without showing her radiance.






After all, happiness can be as little or as much as a crumb of cookie after a cold, long walk to a cafe...











... or a page full of penguins.







Later, at the farmette, there is the usual negotiating with the girls: which chicken gets what treat in whose corner. Ed had intervened, picking up the new girls and placing them outside. I throw each pair of hens food, making sure that no one is expropriating the riches of another.



(not afraid to touch snow)




(still afraid of nearly everything)


Finally. Everyone is set for the night. Safely inside the coop. At the farmhouse, I heat up leftover soup for supper. Outside, a herd of some dozen deer pass through.






The start of the day was rocky. Now, at the end of it, I can hardly recall why. Looking back, it seems so very lovely.

March

Everyone's recalling the old saying -- March roars in like a lion. Maybe it does. But looking outside, I'm grateful that the overnight big snow was not so big after all. I've missed a plentiful snow cover all winter long, but come March, I'm done with winter dreams. My foot is firmly into Spring.

But it is below freezing, and there is a wind, and there is some snow on the ground. I wonder about the cheepers. The young girls seem completely baffled by the manners and foibles of nature. We chalk it up to a lifetime of barn-living, but who knows -- perhaps they are still adjusting to the newness of their environment, coping, as it were, by taking on a watchful stance.

I am up very early. I don't want warfare behind closed doors, where Java and Henny are trapped and have to endure the pecks and squawks of their "superiors." But as I approach the coop, all is quiet. Ed had thrown some old sleeping bags to keep the winds and snow out and honestly, it looked peaceful and snug in the newly winter-pretty landscape.

I open the coop door and dust off snow that has blown in and covered their feeding tray. Butter and Scotch hear me and they come down readily enough. I had shoveled a path to the barn for them and they step out tentatively, testing the gravity of the situation.






Good enough! They're off!






Good bye, top hens! Enjoy your barn romp! (I throw them some treats there to keep them happy. It is, after all, not their fault that nature programmed them to establish order and hegemony in a brood of hens.)

Back in the coop, I raise the roost flap. Java and Henny are snuggled inside.






They do get up when I poke my hand in to clean the place up for the day, but one look at the snow-dusted gangplank and they turn back. Suit yourselves, girls. Some day you'll understand (if not appreciate) the beauty of the seasons.

I walk back to the farmhouse, taking in perhaps for the last time, the snow, the stillness of the land...






It's not still for long. We get a call from a local several tree service. They have a truck heaped with wood chips that they're looking to offload. Yes, of course! We'll take them! (We never pass on a free load of chips and indeed, we throw down several dozen truck loads in the course of a season. We use them for weed suppression and soil enrichment and path maintenance and for aesthetic reasons too. We think that the beauty of the farmette depends on a steady supply of (preferably free) chips.)

The tree service company dumps the load underneath the big willow. From there, we'll distribute the chips as needed. The tree guy is anxious to unload and get it all out before the entire lot heats up to dangerous levels.

I tell Ed that even though I spent the first years of life and nearly every childhood summer in the deep Polish countryside, I never learned this truth about a heap of damp organic matter: it can turn into smoldering fire that will burn down your barn if you let it be.
Every farmer knows this about storing silage, Ed tells me shaking his physical science-inclined head in that "what kind of a country woman are you anyway?" manner.
I'm not a farmer. And by the way, how hot does it get when we leave the chips alone for a longer spell? (We take our time in spreading them.)
I've checked them in the past -- not really more than 100F, but give them the right environment and boom! Combustion.

Nature has so many surprises for the planet's uneducated inhabitants.

Finally, breakfast. Warm oatmeal in our warm kitchen. Heaven on a morning like this one.






The roads are icy, but I'm used to it. Everyone here, in Wisconsin is used to it. You take the turns slowly. You concentrate. You watch for the mistakes of others.

I arrive at Snowdrop's home only one minute late.

And now it's time for her breakfast. Hey little one, you must stop expressing sheer joy at seeing penguin. It's hard to feed you mush with blueberries when your mouth is all over that guy.






After, she runs to the kitchen and finds that I have set out her jacket and cap for a later excursion. 
And excursion? Can we go now? 






I'll put on my cap! Run, run run...






Not so fast, little one. Bath time, play time -- we have lots to do here.






Snowdrop is flexible. And so happy with whatever game she invents for herself. Today, Snowdrop is at her most creative: she plays all day long with these three items: jacket, cap and penguin, arranging them, carrying them, placing them in interesting setups, all the while keeping a lively patter going, as if telling a story.






(She shares her story here with the family queen, who, for once, listens.)






... until tiredness overtakes the little girl.






Nothing that a nap and a meal can't fix. The afternoon -- well, I suppose you'd call it adventuring on a small scale. All morning, the snow continued to gently fall and now, things are looking rather pretty outside. What if we venture out to a store? Time to restock on peanuts and daffodils from Trader Joe's no?






...followed by a visit to a cafe. You can see her sense of comfort now, as if she were thinking -- I can get into this coffee culture.






She remains perfectly satisified with a few crumbs of a gingersnap cookie.






Outside, I let her manage just a little on her own. Okay grandma, if penguins can walk through snow, so can I!






I feel like the girl grew in leaps and bounds these past few days.


And at the end of the day, I drive home to that treasured place, the farmette, that humbly stands beneath our great Midwestern sky.






Home, where the cheepers greet us (the old girls had spent the day in the barn, the new girls -- in the coop... so predictable!), and trees are just waiting until the moment when their buds burst with signs of life again.






I make a pizza for dinner. Did you ever wonder which topping is placed first -- the mushrooms or the cheese? I've been making pizza for a while now and only today have I come to a satisfactory resolution to this great dilemma. Can you guess?





(Answer: in my opinion, do the sauce first, then the mushrooms, then the cheese, then a few more mushrooms and garlic. There! Ocean has placed itself in the thick of great controversy!)

March came in like a lion, but only weather-wise. All other ways: a lamb. A total lamb.