I’m not generally a superstitious person. Except when it comes to the power of jinx and when it reinforces my deepest, most paranoid theories of impending doom. I bring this up only because I think I’m sort of in the throes of it right now.
I should explain that I’ve always been a pretty fearful person. I spent much of my childhood, most of my adolescent and a grand chunk of my adulthood with my stomach in a knot, constantly afraid of horrible things happening to me and those around me. I had actually made good progress on my fear and anxiety (sobriety helped not a little) when my mother died in 2003. That seemed to spark my fear and anxiety a thousand-fold. I reeled with the sense of being completely out of control, being unable to stop tragedy. I became absolutely terrified that more of my loved ones were going to die, especially my husband Chris. To the point that I would lie awake at night, watching him, unable to sleep for trying to stem this giant tide of panic that wasn’t constantly threatening to undo my world.
I know. Maybe not so healthy.
I don’t live in that place of intense, uncontrollable fear anymore, but I get wind of it every once in a while. It pokes at me occasionally, trying to get my attention. Reminding me that all is not safe and stable. Clearly, I’m sort of there now, tonight, which explains this post after a long absence, written late at night.
I wrote here not too long ago about an old friend of mine who died entirely too young and entirely too tragically. I’m not ready for dying friends, just as I wasn’t nearly ready for my mother’s death. It unsettled me and I’ve been unable to shake entirely that feeling of insecurity.
A few weeks ago, I learned that my uncle in Scotland has cancer. And today, I discovered that another much-loved friend of mine has also been diagnosed with cancer. The good news (we hope) is that it has been diagnosed early in each case. The rest is up in the air and I don’t know what it will mean for either of them in the scheme of things. I do know that it’s scary and it has me very uneasy right now.
A more superstitious person might note that these things tend to come in threes, sending her mind racing, worrying about who’s next. A more superstitious person might knock on wood to try to stave off that possibility. A person like me might do it anyway. Just in case.
June 10th, 2009
…I married Chris at the bottom of my parents’ garden in Louisville. There were a lot of things about that day that the perfectionist in me would change. All but one string of the fairy lights I’d envisioned strung around the backyard failed. The floating candles for the pool sunk. The small set of steps we built so that I could gracefully navigate the steepest portion of the hill in the yard nearly weren’t wide enough for my father and me to descend together. I know now that these are minor details, but it’s funny how they’re the ones that stick with you.
What I wouldn’t change, nearly without exception, is everything that has followed for Chris and me. I’m not saying the past eight years have been without difficulty. Obviously, they haven’t. We’ve had a number of changes, moves and transitions. There has been conflict and confusion, but very rarely about us, as opposed to the world around us. We have weathered unbearable sadness when my mother died just two years into our marriage — and, yes, that’s one of the few things I’d change if I could.
The sum total of it, though, has been good. It has been more than good. It has been an exceptional experience. When you get married, you’re so smitten that you imagine the big challenge ahead will be to maintain that level of interest and emotion and passion for the years ahead. What you don’t know is that it gets so much better than that. That it gets weird and hard and deeper and more resonant and the attachment and respect and fondness grows so much stronger than you’d ever guessed possible. You fall in and out of love a million times, sometimes in the same day or week, but you always land in a better place. Who knew? I didn’t.
I think back to that night eight years ago, when a relatively small group of our friends and family gathered and celebrated and danced the night away. I think of how everyone else’s lives have evolved. Two of the people there died suddenly and too young, which seems statistically significant for a gathering of less than 50 people. But — and here’s the beauty part — there were also two brand new lives there, even though we didn’t know it at the time. Both my friend Beth and my sister Jane were pregnant. They have seven-year-olds now. Seven-year-olds!
Among our guests, some relationships lasted and others split apart. Some friendships slipped into the ether. Sadly, I’m no longer in touch with a handful of the people who attended, some of whom drove all the way from St. Louis to be there. So much has happened and so much has changed. We have been loved and supported by our families and friends and we couldn’t have done it without you. So I thank you, all of you, from the bottom of my heart. Eight years. Can you even stand it?
May 19th, 2009
A few months ago, I got an email from Crate & Barrel thanking me for my purchases over the past year — in other words, giving me props for snapping up the clearance page stuff other people passed on. They offered me a $25 gift card to spend how I saw fit at DonorsChoose.org. At first, I thought it might be a bit of a bogus cross-promotion where I’d click a button and wind up inadvertantly agreeing to buy an $800 patio loveseat. So, of course, I did it anyway. (I’ve since learned that this is an award-winning effort Crate & Barrel’s been making for the past few years, issuing these gift cards so that customers can help direct how the company spends its charitable contributions. Which I think is very cool. Would that more companies follow suit.)
Anyway, I followed the DonorsChoose.org link and was intrigued to find that this is a website where teachers, mostly from high poverty schools, post pleas for financial help purchasing specific supplies — books, teaching tools, etc. I picked a project somewhat randomly. It was near the top of the list and it caught my eye. A teacher in Northern California needed $24 more to meet her goal of buying copies of Judy Blume’s Superfudge for her class.
I love this one from my pal, Sal. Why does he like books? “Maybe because some are funny.”
The project piqued my interest on three different levels. First, my mother was a teacher who felt very passionately about imparting to her students the love of reading. I figured my meager and free (to me) donation would honor her in some small way. Second, I was nuts about Judy Blume’s books as a kid and I remember Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing and Superfudge were particular faves. And third, my donation would complete the amount the teacher requested and I do like to be a closer!
I’d completely forgotten about the project I’d selected when I fetched my mail today. In it I found a thick white envelope from DonorsChoose.org and with the following words printed on the outside: “Hurray! Your student thank-you letters for your donation have arrived!” I vaguely recalled that this was part of the deal — getting a thank you from the class or the teacher.
“When I grow up I’m going to be just like you – donate stuff to class rooms. Sincerely, Eunice.” Yes, Eunice, because that’s what I am best known for.
Still, I didn’t expect what I found inside — 24 individual hand-written thank you notes addressed to me. With names and drawings and notes about why they liked the book. I should mention that I’m an unbelievable sucker for a thank you note. I was raised in a household where writing them was mandatory and to skip them an unthinkable sin on par with putting your elbows on the table during dinner time. (Guess you had to be there.) Now it seems there are so few people who write them that to get any at all is always a treat. To get a thick envelope full of them from a bunch of little kids who are loving their books is pretty remarkable.
Kids are so wise, aren’t they?
I’m not saying the expectation of thanks is a reason to consider donating to DonorsChoose.org. I’m just saying it doesn’t hurt.
May 14th, 2009
I wasn’t sure I wanted to go. Chris was heading to NYC on a business trip last Wednesday and we had a spare ticket we had to use up before too long. So I decided to tag along, despite the fact that heading to New York always puts me into a bit of a panic. I get overwhelmed just by the idea of the city and its offerings. I get consumed with the idea that I’ll do the wrong things and I’ll miss out on all the good things and wind up catatonic on the subway, rocking back and forth, unsure where to get off.
That didn’t happen. It never does. I didn’t say it was a rational fear. I’m just not a very good decision maker — I have trouble picking something off a menu — and there’s so, so much to do and see in New York. I feel like I’m supposed to go to museums and take advantage of the culture but the truth is that what I really like to do in the city, in any city I visit, is wander. Aimlessly, sometimes. Operating with a vague idea of where I might want to end up or which neighborhoods I might like to see. A boutique or craft store I might want to check out.
I like to punctuate my wandering with frequent stops — sitting at an outdoor cafe and people watching. Pausing in a park and people watching. Standing dumb-struck on a street corner, people watching. You get my drift. And, boy, did the weather cooperate. Beautiful days stretching into one another just tailor-made for doing not much of anything and covering a lot of ground doing it. Thus, the trip I was reluctant to go on turned out to be (of course) one of my favorite to NYC yet.
We stayed at Le Parker Meridien in Midtown, about a block south of Central Park, thanks to my husband’s amazing acumen at finding stellar hotel deals. This one didn’t disappoint. If you have a partner who enjoys the mind-numbing and crazy-making task of developing complex strategies for bidding for hotels online — or, you know, an expense account — I heartily recommend it. Compared to our last visit, our hotel room this time was practically cavernous and at 28 floors up, afforded us a nice view into Central Park and onto the outdoor living spaces of those in buildings shorter than ours. Not that it mattered a ton, considering we spent most of our time wandering the streets of Manhattan, trying to ignore aches and blisters.
On the day of our arrival, Wednesday, I napped. I’d like to tell you I did a whole lot more than that, but it would be a lie. We had to get up at the ungodly hour of 5 in order to catch our flight, which routed us through Chicago, so I was more than done by the time we were able to check into our hotel at 3. (Do any of you ever experience what Chris has affectionately taken to calling my propensity for “morning tummy”? That is, if travel requires me to get up super early, I tend to spend much of the day queasy and nauseous? No? Fine. It’s just me.)
Anyway, Chris was off at meetings with probably very important people and returned just in time to drag me out of bed and out of the hotel for dinner, lest the day be entirely wasted. I wasn’t up for much, but I have to say the matzo ball soup at the nearby and infamous Carnegie Deli was just the thing for my delicate constitution. Not so much the table pickles, but what do you expect? I’ve probably only had matzo ball soup five or six times in my life, but I’ve never had balls this big. Yeah. I said it. You can’t possibly actually have expected more from me.
Plus, you get to watch people tackle inadviseably tall (and exorbitantly expensive) piles of pastrami on rye while gazing at walls covered in framed, autographed headshots of stars from the late seventies and early nineties. Oh, neighbor guy from The Jeffersons. What a looker you were!
In the interest of rigorous honesty, there might have been some brisket after the soup, but I prefer to have you think of me as the delicate sort of flower for whom the above would be a complete meal. If it makes you feel better, the brisket didn’t do me any favors and absolutely nixed the possibility of having some amazing-looking cheesecake for dessert.
After dinner, we wandered among the throngs in Times Square and while I did my fair share of gawking and photo-snapping, I must say I don’t enjoy that level of crowdedness. I have to fight the constant urge to just shove the hell out of people, which would be disastrous for a number of reasons but mainly because New Yorkers would shove back and I’m pretty much a wuss. Nor do I find, as I heard one woman remark to her toddler, the lights of Times Square to be “beautiful.” Unless by “beautiful” you mean “draining the world’s precious energy resources,” in which case, I concur.
At this point, my feet started to suggest to me that perhaps I might consider taking it easy on them this first eve in the big city, what with three full days of walking ahead. So I did what I do every time I’m wandering around a new place: I ignored them. Instead, we kept walking, this way and that. Over by Radio City Music Hall, where the Flight of the Conchords were playing a sold out show. (We were only a tad jealous; we’ve tickets to the Detroit show this Friday.)
Next, we swung by 30 Rock to see if Tina Fey was waiting to meet with me. I didn’t see here, so I can only assume that somehow the message didn’t get to her. It’s hard to find good help, isn’t it?
I consoled myself by watching ice skaters and seeing if I had magically developed the ability to make good use of my camera’s night time settings without actually learning how. Turns out, no. Still, we had a good old time watching the skaters, which were an odd mix of adolescent girls, families and a small group of mad-fast break-skaters whizzing around the ice, whipping in and out among the regular folks fast enough to put the fear of God into the small children. Occasionally, one of them would put an elbow down on the ice and spin around. Not the most impressive move, but whatever.
That seemed like plenty for one evening, so we high-tailed it back to the hotel. Chris had meetings the next morning (what is with him?) and I slept entirely too late, before dragging my ass from bed, grabbing a sammich and heading to Central Park to get in an hour or so of hard-core people watching. And watch I did. It was a spectacular day. The trees were in bloom, forsythia branches exploding and it was like all of New York had crawled out from their office buildings to sit in the park on their lunch hour, blinking their mole-eyes in the sun’s bright light.
Folks were running, the playground was swarming with kids, horsies were dragging fat tourists around in open-air carriages. All good stuff. I saw fat people and skinny people and tall people and short people. I heard seven million different languages, although my favorite eavesdropping moment was in English, when a young girl pointed at a horsie and said, “Mama! I see something poking down from the horse’s belly!” Yes, you do dear. Because it’s spring. It’s spring!
When Chris’ business was finished for the morning, I met him back at the hotel and we decided to hop on the subway and head down to Soho, mostly in search of Purl Soho and Purl Patchwork, a duo of yarn and fabric shops. I’ve ordered fabric from the website before and was eager to get a chance to browse up close and personal some colorways I’d seen online.
Along the way, in NYU’s law quad, we saw the first of many stunning magnolias lighting up the city. They’re barely budding back home and here some were already losing their petals. Nature doesn’t do many things more dramatic than magnolia-makin’.
I didn’t actually wind up spending much time in Purl Soho or its sister shop, Purl Patchwork, a few doors down. I knew they were rumored to be small spaces, but they were even smaller than I anticipated. I just get so overwhelmed and claustrophobic in tiny shops, so I barely stayed in the yarn one for more than a minute or so. When confronted by that many balls of yarn, packed tight, piled high in cubbies for the ceiling, I do the aforementioned panic and sort of shut down.
I lingered a bit longer at Purl Patchwork, although it was just as tiny. There were some fabrics designed by the owners I’d wanted to check out and I was glad to have had the chance to see them up close. I also fell in love with some Indian cotton drapery fabric there, but at $37 a yard it was a) out of my price range and b) pointless, since I have no use for it. I left empty-handed, but with that happy fabric-y feeling only fellow sewers will relate to.
We had originally thought we might try to hit Ellis Island on Thursday but they recommend allowing two or three hours for the full effect and the last ferry leaves at 1, the park closing at 5. Since Chris wasn’t done with work until well after the last ferry, we went for the cheap, cheerful and fast alternative: the Staten Island Ferry. Sure, it doesn’t stop at Ellis Island or give you the option of an up-close visit with Lady Liberty, but on a beautiful afternoon such as we had, it offered us a closer view of both than we would have had on shore and some pretty sparkling sun off the water.
I tell you, no matter how jaded you might be, how many times you might have seen the Statue of Liberty in photos (or even in person), and no matter how tiny she might seem way out in the water, you’re just a cold fish if you don’t get a bit of a lump in the ol’ throat as you glide past.
Walking through Times Square again on the way home, we picked up some half-price tix to see Blithe Spirit, the Noel Coward play, at the Schubert Theater, starring Angela Lansbury, Rupert Everett, Christine Ebersol and Jayne Atkinson. I like Coward well enough, but I like Everett even better, so although the seats were tight and we were about as high up as you could get in the tiny theater, it was a delight. A delight!
I’m not a very shoppy lady, but if I have one extravagance, it’s bath products and glorious scents. While other women think nothing of dropping big coin for purses or shoes, that doesn’t much tickle my fancy. I will, however, save my pennies to splurge on some really quality bath goodies. Thus, Friday morning, I made Chris schlep all the way up Madison Avenue with me just so I could set foot inside an actual Jo Malone boutique.
My husband created a monster this past year when, on separate occasions, he treated me to the red roses bath oil and the honeysuckle & jasmine bath oil. (While the latter is divine, the former is perhaps the best thing I’ve ever smelled. Not cloyingly rosey, but green and fresh and amazing.) There were so many different scents I wanted to try and reading about them on the website wasn’t cutting it. I sniffed just about everything, dropped my pocket money on a refill of red roses bath oil and a small orange blossom cologne and figured I could die a happy woman.
Except we were going over to Brooklyn, so I needed to stay alive a bit longer. Thanks to my friend Amanda’s great tip, we found our way to Brooklyn General, a really lovely yarn and fabric shop. So many sweet notions and pretty things to look at. Such nice help. And more Amy Butler fabric choices than I’ve seen in one place. They also had a nice selection of vintage fabrics and spools of vintage ribbon. I bought several yards of the latter, not because I have any idea what I’ll do with it, but because it was just so sweet. I also bought myself my first cut of Amy Butler fabric, plus the pattern for her weekender bag. Probably a bit ambitious, but I was feeling creative and full of possibility. This too shall pass.
Then it was off to meet our friends Matt and Claudia — and their adorable eight-month-old son Diego — in Crown Heights. They suggested a neighborhood Mexican joint called Chavarella’s, where we sat outside despite the cooling air and I ate some of the best fish tacos I’ve ever had.
Saturday was our last real day in the city. We debated heading over to Coney Island but the thought of spending nearly an hour each way on the subway while the sun was shining seemed a tad silly. So we headed instead down to Union Square, which boasts an art and green market on Saturdays. Fresh flowers, local art, street food, strong sun. All so good.
From there, we wandered through the Village, then stopped for lunch at what has become a favorite dining spot in the West Village, French Roast. We were able to snag a table outside and Chris almost saw Parker Posey. That is to say, he saw a woman who vaguely resembled Parker Posey. I should probably mention that, at this point, I was already bitching up a storm about not having seen any celebrities on this trip. I really want people to believe that I am far more evolved than this, but it’s not like they wouldn’t figure it out after knowing me for ten minutes or so. Instead, I made us play a game of pointing out people who could have been stunt doubles for famous people and that was far more lucrative.
After filling our gullets, we ambled more around the West Village, where I saw this gorgeous fire department doorway below. We ducked down side streets, marveled at sculptural window box displays and just generally enjoyed the atmosphere. We didn’t stop into a whole lot of shops, though we made a very happy exception for Pure Dark, where I would very much like to say we learned all sorts of things about how chocolate is made. In reality, we learned mostly about tasting chocolate, particularly in its drinking chocolate form, with nibs. Almost too much for two people to split. Almost.
Exhausted from all that eating, we followed Christopher Street west to where it dead ended at Hudson River Park and plopped ourselves down on the steps at the waterfront to watch people some more. Tons of folks were out, walking their weird dogs and their weird kids. And I stretch out a bit on the step next to me and look to my right and there’s a woman who looks a lot like Janeane Garofalo. Because she is Janeane Garofalo. (If you don’t know who that is, why are you even reading my blog in the first place?)
So, like an asshole, I took a few surreptitious pics of her which only fear of litigation is preventing me from posting here. As I’m snapping away, I’m well aware of the fact that this is an invasion of privacy, which I’m less worried about than how horribly cheesy it makes me look. As I’m contemplating all of this, I look up and, passing right in front of me is the adorable Jason Bateman, his wife and their lovely daughter. I wasn’t feeling quite ridiculous enough to blatantly take their picture because, you know, I’m cooler than that, so you’ll just have to believe me. Or not. Whatever. (Note, that is not a celebrity in the photo below. It’s just some random man with his dog. Clearly I had no problem violating his privacy, either.)
That was about it for our last afternoon in NYC. There was some dinner, of course, lest I starve and a little more walking through Central Park, accompanied by a lot more complaining about how sore my feet were and a sheepish eight-block taxi ride back to the hotel so that poor Chris could live to see another day. We had to be up early for our flight again on Sunday, so we were tucked in bed at an hour on Saturday night when, I’d venture to guess, most people in the big city were just heading out to enjoy themselves. Which was fine by us. We’d seen all we came to.
More photos of our trip on my Flickr page.
April 21st, 2009
