island living
five things, september 23rd edition
2. I think these smiles will be erased if we get the predicted rain over the weekend, thus canceling baseball practice and games.
3. I think I never dreamed I'd be sitting at baseball practice.
4. I think I must have to dust and sweep every. single. day. Will shedding season never end?
5. I think I'm ready for fall. Bring it on.
pot pie
tart's boudoir
What I do remember of this chair is of it in my grandparent's house. Not a tart's boudoir. Past the days of parlors (and whorehouses, I suspect), this chair never looked like it belonged. It just didn't look quite right with their green shag carpet, ya know?
Still, this chair appealed to me, and when my grandparents died, I knew I wanted it. We tried it in the living room, but it just wasn't a look I was going for. Still formulating that look apparently. It landed in the dining room for awhile, but it was damned uncomfortable at the table (too low), even though the red looked really lovely against the turquoise walls.
The Tart's Boudoir belongs. In my bedroom no less.
I'm okay
This blog has always been meant as a gift for my family, and when I say that, I mean primarily Neel and Callum. I don't mean that the rest of my family doesn't count (!), it's just that when I think about this space, I think it terms of capturing our lives and honoring the things we do together and hold dear. Sometimes it's hard to know how much (or even what) to say. I know that other people check in here, and I appreciate that more than I have words for. But I also sometimes get caught in wondering what I want this space to be. What it means to me versus what I want it to mean to others. And should I even care? Should I try to move us forward or just keep on keeping on?
All that to say simply, it's okay. I'm okay. Everything's okay.
lazy sunday
chili-dusted sweet potato fries @ The Pepper Mill.
five things, september 16th edition
2. I think I really appreciate the sweet note I got from my friend Marianne this morning.
3. I think every year I seem to forget how hard it is to settle in to new school year routines.
4. I think I'm sitting in a place of both disquiet and gratitude.
5. I think I'll try to focus on the gratitude.
goodbye old paint
We had to say goodbye to the Red Zephyr this week.
Our last connection to our lives in California, this was the car that made me feel like a mom. Does that make sense? I mean Callum was two when we got it, so I felt like a mom in lots of ways, little and big, before we got this car, but a station wagon? Nothing says mom like a station wagon, right?
The Red Zephyr brought us here from California. Our dog Phoebe watched the moving vans take all our things away (again...she'd moved out to California with us too) and was so nervous she'd be left behind that she would jump into the back seat and refuse to come out. She was old by the time we made the trip and slept in the backseat next to Callum most of the way, but when we hit the mountains of western Virginia she must have smelled the East Coast because she sat up eagerly. She wanted to ride on the center console between us the rest of the way to our new home.
five things, september 9th edition
2. I think that I am officially clumsy. I fell again this past weekend. This time coming down our rain-slicked front steps. Several things were similar from the last time I fell: water+flip flops. Apparently a bad combination. Thankfully this time I didn't hit my head. Just my back and left hip, leaving some lovely bruises and making for interesting sleeping and sitting this week. Neel and I are hoping that I'm getting all of my falling out of the way before I'm old.
3. I think that car salesmen do a lot of sitting around and waiting. And I decided that because of this they feel compelled to make us do a lot of sitting around and waiting.
4. I think, in honor of my friend Anthony (Fern Marie), I will be making this recipe sometime next week. Does this sound familiar, Fern?
5. I think that this weekend I will be reading this book and this book. Because I remember, and remembering is the absolute least I can do. As John Kennedy said, "We do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard."
what we did
We've been joking for years that when Callum became a teenager he'd move into our third floor attic, fondly referred to as the "soft stairs." Callum named it when we moved in because it's the only room in our house that has carpet. But let's face it folks, I don't think he'll ever sleep up there.
What he might do however, is play up there.
And I guess that's what I mean when I say that things have changed. He plays differently now. Friends running in and out, the Wii or X-box on. So maybe a growing up kind of boy needs a growing up kind of space for himself.
Trouble is, our attic has been looking like this.
So what did we do on our summer vacation?
And in case you thought we'd had enough celebrating around here, today's my mom's birthday! Happy Birthday, Mom!
twelve
I can barely believe it. He's suddenly a man-child. Still very much my child.
dominion
Yesterday, Callum managed to go golfing just in time to pour the third. That left me.
Each 4x4 requires about 12 or 13 bags of concrete, which Neel pours one at a time. That part comes after excavating and placing and leveling the mold. I helped dig. I helped square the mold and level it too. Then I was in charge of watering the concrete and scraping it out of the wheel barrow into the mold. It didn't take long for us to get a rhythm going, and it was fun! Hard work, sure, but so satisfying too. The concrete part took us less than an hour, and all told, I think we worked on it about an hour and a half. Not a bad Labor Day's labor.
five things, september 2 edition
2. I think I might celebrate the start of a new year with a book-buying orgy of my own. And curtains. Even though Neel doesn't want them.
3. I think I'm finally up to admitting that I'm not loving my dining room very much these days. Fortunately we have a plan. And a new lamp.
4. I think I'm pretty proud of my boy this week.
5. I think it's interesting that Neel and I are both eating more mustard lately.
thank you
fall is here
Sixth Grade starts TODAY.
Come on, Irene
Friday was easily one of the hottest, muggiest days of the summer. We helped some neighbors who'd been out of town pull their stuff into the garage, got the doors boarded up, and the car pulled deep into the driveway (the other car we left at Neel's work). Friday night was eerily calm. We watched the Italian Job, and by 11 p.m. the wind was just beginning to dust the treetops. By 11:30 it started to rain. We had squally rain and wind all night, but Saturday almost started out like any other stormy day. We started a Harry Potter, and the weather started going downhill. The lights flickered and went out at 10 a.m., seemingly for good. Already? This thing wasn't supposed to really hit us until late evening. But, as one neighbor put it, "If someone farts on this street, the power goes out." True dat.
By 11 the power was back on, and miraculously it stayed on. The street flooded. This is normal.
The bad weather would come in bands, with lulls in between. This is pretty normal too. After each band, the wind would get stronger and the rain heavier, but we took advantage of the lulls to walk the dogs (ha!), and during one, we took a longer walk ourselves, down the street to the river.
For some perspective, here's a before shot for you:
And here we are on Saturday:
The wind was merciless. Whipping the trees all day long. But the power stayed on. We had wraps for lunch (using that bacon!) and watched another Harry Potter. Come dinnertime, I wasn't sure what to do. I wasn't ready to cook dinner with power. We weren't hungry at 5, but when the lights flickered, we quickly made some burgers on the griddle, kept them warm and ate them a few hours later, in front of another Harry Potter.
By bedtime, things were feeling pretty dicey. The rain and wind were both at their worst, and the center of the storm had passed just south of us. I remembered from Isabel that the worst of the winds came from what my friend Marianne called the "tail whipping us after the storm has passed." The same was true Saturday night. We moved the dogs' crates up to my office, our interior-most room (they usually sleep on a sunporch which is pretty exposed), and Callum slept on a mattress on the floor with them. That room opens into our bedroom so we were all together. And of course, as soon as we were all tucked in the power went out. Callum and I both saw the transformer flash. All night we could see the tree tops whipping (of particular concern was a giant old gumball at the edge of our yard) and hear the wind howling (and the transformers blowing). We could also hear the balcony off our bedroom creaking in the wind as well. We'd been talking about it before, but this storm pretty much decided it: the balcony is coming down, and the doors out to it are becoming windows. Soon.
Callum was up all night. I was up all night. I took migraine meds in the middle of the night. Neel slept pretty well. By morning, it was still windy, but the sun was starting to peek through the clouds.
We took another walk. Back to the river.
Last winter I took some pictures of the docks along the water nearest our house (we're about three blocks from this spot). Here's the before shot:
And here's the after:
Part of that dock landed here:
Just this morning (we got power back on late last night, 24 hours after it went out) I went back and read that post I'd mentioned on Friday about Hurricane Isabel. It's been inevitable that we compare these storms, I suppose. That was such a different time for us. We barely knew this place, but it was our home. So Isabel was scarier in a lot of ways. Similar in others. We know so much more, and each storm, be it snow or Nor'easter or hurricane, teaches more about living here. I'm still learning. How do you food shop to have food for the storm and a power outage? Do we need a generator, given the fact that we tend to lose power several times a year? And there are things I do know: I lovelovelove my full-size water heater for the hot shower I got yesterday, even though it was in the dark! It will take a pretty large storm to flood my house. I still find hurricanes fascinating, perhaps even more so now that I'm somewhat in the path.
So, it's all good. Power's on for most of us. And for those who are saying that this storm was over-hyped, let's remember that there were people who were killed due to Irene this weekend. And people who lost their homes or who are dealing with serious damage. Just because my clean up was easy and Manhattan didn't get an It Could Happen Tomorrow-type scenario like you see on The Weather Channel doesn't mean that those government officials weren't smart to take this storm seriously. One thing I do know about hurricanes is that the track is easier to forecast than intensity. Better to over-prepare and be inconvenienced than not to prepare and risk your life. I'm just sayin'. It was certainly an adventure, but thankfully not (in my neck of the woods) as bad as it could have been. Time to look ahead. School starts tomorrow.
five things, august 26 edition
2. I think my biggest regret is that we didn't get to the beach more.
3. I think that 6th grade is going to be a very good year. Callum gets his class list today (he found out his homeroom teacher on Monday and is very excited), and he can't wait.
4. I think I'm ready for our old/new routine to begin.
5. I hope that the ocean is this serene soon again. When I originally wrote this blog post (and on a good week, I can sometimes get ahead of the game), I blithley hoped that I'd be blogging about the first day of school on Monday, but I suspected that I'd be blogging about this gal. Have ya seen the news lately? We have a target on our backs apparently. All week, as we've watched the weather (and I have to say, our weather guys are generally pretty low key), the news has gotten worse. Right now we're hearing 60-80 mph winds and 12 inches of rain. Last night we went to bed knowing that today would bring a decision to evacuate. It's not yet dawn, but right now our plan is to hunker down. We're under a Hurricane Warning now. Parts of our city are under a mandatory evacuation, but not us. At the very beginning of the blog is a post about Hurricane Isabel, and comparisons are thick on the ground. This could be worse. We have supplies and plans and friends around us to help. We have doggies who will be very worried, and an eleven-year old who thinks he's in for the thrill of a life.
Anyhoo...I may not be around for awhile. I fully anticipate losing power pretty early into this thing. I don't suspect my readership is so large that there are millions around the world worried about the state of affairs over here at Still+Life, but for those of you who are, we'll check in when we can. I don't think Callum will be starting school on Monday.
And one final thing. Callum's wearing orange today, and I'll be digging out Neel's UT shirt (all my Tennessee gear happens to be pink, go figure), to show my pride in this woman.
we do it every year
