Topic 214: Acid Tests

Carol:

The Dead Zone

 

I call the stretch of the I- 10 between Blythe and Indio the Dead Zone. It  peaks at Chiriaco Summit, which at 1700 feet altitude isn’t much of a summit unless you consider that you are climbing from 800 feet at Blythe in the middle of a desert and jockeying for position with massive trucks that slow to a crawl. I reckon I have driven The Dead Zone over 100 times since we moved to Arizona in 1983.
 

We called it the Dead Zone not just because of the arid terrain. Our radio reception would usually die out somewhere after Quartzite. We had a stack of tapes to counter the monotony, but often we would just talk, letting the conversation meander all over the place.
 

The first few years, we made the trip with two toddlers strapped into car seats. Going west, we usually broke the journey with a stop for breakfast in Blythe. As the kids grew older and quit napping, they would ask questions that often couldn’t be answered with our pooled knowledge which was long on language and literature and short on science and technology. How many times I wished we had a dictionary or a portable encyclopedia so that we could find the answer right away.
 

By the time the kids outgrew their car seats, I often made the trip without Marc to visit my parents and brothers’ families in southern California. If we left Thousand Oaks by 5 a.m., I could avoid the worst of the traffic crawling into Los Angeles from the San Fernando Valley and the kids would sleep until we hit Blythe for a food and fuel stop. The Dead Zone seemed to stretch during those years, no conversation for the driver and no music if I forgot to pack the travel tapes.
 

The kids grew up, the vehicles changed and the technology evolved.  Our current vehicle has an I-Pod port and a CD player, but the conversations continue. Last August  Megan and I read essays out loud from a 1925 writing textbook. By the time we hit Blythe, we had committed to writing our own essays and creating a website. The first Daily Theme essay was posted on September 1, 2010.
 

On September 5, 2011 we found ourselves again traveling the I-40 back to Arizona after a family wedding. The radio was turned off, and conversation picked up after Indio. Did we know that Chiriaco Summit has a General Patton museum? Should we gas up over the border in Ehrenberg, or should we continue to the Pilot stop at Quartzite? My mind wandered ahead to the daily theme due the next day.“Acid tests.”  Hmmm.
 

I cheated a little and threw out a question to Marc. “So, how would you define “acid test”? Is an acid test the same as a litmus test?  If only we had a dictionary or an encyclopedia.”  A voice from the back seat suddenly announced, “According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, an acid test is….” Megan’s cell phone, not much bigger than a playing card, had become our dictionary thanks to the Internet.
The conversation eventually led us to Ken Kesey, the Merry Pranksters, Tom Wolfe and The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. Like I said, we are short on science and technology and long on language and literature.
 

Megan says the satellite reception on that dreary stretch of desert between Indio and Blythe was strong and clear. Guess, I’ll have to find another name for The Dead Zone.

Megan:

I came back from California with a little cold, which has now transformed into a serious sinus infection. For those of you who may not know, I start a new job next Monday, and I'm pretty sure that if I call in sick on the first day, I will fail the litmus test for new employees (litmus test being interchangeable with acid test, according to Merriam-Webster) and this is the best I can do. 

Back to bed.

Topic 207: Subway Scenery

Carol:

Art on the Fly

I love riding public transportation, especially in big cities where having a private vehicle is an expensive liability. In New York, our hotel of choice is an easy ride from the airport, involving only the transfer from the Long Island Railroad at Jamaica Station to the A Train.  Off in Chelsea, walk two blocks and we’re there.  Tourists are often reluctant to ride the subways, but using the MTA is safer than it was 40 years ago, and definitely more fun.
 

I was afraid in New York back in 1973 when my then fiancé was working for the summer in a Manhattan law office. That August, heading to the airport for my California wedding, I carried my bridal gown on the subway. My imagination got the better of me, and I started constructing newspaper headlines. “Woman’s wedding gown stolen week before her wedding.” “Bride-to-be mugged on subway.”  Head down, holding onto purse or package or wedding dress, I rarely saw the graffiti on the tunnel walls or passing rail cars that constituted much of the subway scenery back then.
 

New York City was dangerous back then. The crime rate was a national scandal.  Riding mass transportation put me slightly on edge, completely alert to the passengers around me, yet trying to avoid eye contact. Thanks to a decline in drug use and major changes in the NY City police department, including more neighborhood-based police, the crime rate has steadily dropped over the last decade. Robbery statistics  have plummeted, from 32,562 cases in 2000 to 19,466 in 2010. Remember, this is a city of such a huge population that its subway system handles 5.1 million riders per week (source: Official NY City Statistics). When I visit New York now,  I can actually enjoy the scenery, not just on a walk through Central Park, but on the subway.
 

Yet, the image of The Big, Bad Apple still exists. To attract more riders and positive publicity, the MTA (Metropolitan Transit Authority) has created Arts for Transit, a program  that supports visual and performing arts projects in subway and commuter rail stations. According to the MTA website, “Arts for Transit’s projects create links to neighborhoods with art that echoes the architecture history and design context of the individual stations.” Some installations are permanent, such as wall murals.  Many of the stations use ceramic tile art, a tradition that started with ceramic plaques used since the system’s opening in 1904.
 

The scenery on the New York subways isn’t just visual, however. Performance Art includes musicians from the “Music Under New York” program, including opera, jazz, blues, and classical music on subway platforms and train stations. Over 200 soloists and groups participate at 25 locations throughout the system, and complete information about the musicians, special events and locations are published on the MTA website.
 

Next time you’re in New York, enjoy a walk through Central Park, then look for the nearest subway station and head down, down, down to ride one of The Big, Bright Apple’s 26 routes. Treat yourself to the vibrant, creative subway scenery of a clean and safe  New York City.

Sources:
Arts for Transit MTA program.
Image of Canal Street subway tiles. Wikipedia. Gryffindor. ({{Information |Description=Canal Street (BMT Broadway Line) |Source={{own}} |Date=2010 |Author=Gryffindor |Permission= |other_versions= }} ICategory:Canal Street (BMT Broadway Line))
Image of 59th Street ceramic tile sign. Wikipedia.  Magnus Manske. {{BotMoveToCommons|en.wikipedia|year={{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}|month={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}}|day={{subst:CURRENTDAY}}}} {{Information |Description={{en|Close-up of another mosaic for en:59th Street (IRT Lexington Avenue Line) station's upper level.
New York City Crime statistics.
Official  NY City Statistics.

Megan:

Yesterday my mother wrote about The Channel Tunnel, which she has never taken.  My first year in England, I spent the Christmas vacation travelling around Europe with friends, and at the end, took the Eurostar train from Paris back to London.  I don’t remember too much about that trip (the train part) except that I didn’t pre-book my ticket, so had to stay an extra day. Also, it snowed in Paris and the train was delayed for several hours and everyone’s ticket was free. Once the train went into the tunnel under the water, there wasn’t much to see (obviously).  My ears popped and I thought, “This is just BART.”

That’s what happens when you travel a lot. You try to make sense of the new by comparing them to the familiar.  European cities remind me of each other, and of San Francisco. And I spent enough time in England that when I was driving through the sheep farms in Southern Oregon on my way to visit my brother, the landscape reminded me of England and not the other way around.

Anyway, I was meant to be talking about Subways. The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) was my first experience that I can remember with underground public transportation – and it’s only underground for about half the time. I often took BART from Oakland into The City so I could wander around the mission district, and attend author readings in bookstores. My senior year, my friends and I took the train to the Castro for Halloween. That was one of my favorite nights ever – I was a French maid, Kelly was an “Russian housewife on the lam” and our other friends were a cat, a scarecrow, a pimp, and a flapper. After hours of debauchery, and an encounter with the masturbating bear, we took the last train back to the East Bay. The cars were standing room only, and everyone was in costume. Seated nearby was a ninja with a sword strapped to his back. He had on a black fencing mask and it was impossible to see his face or where he was looking. Freakiest thing I ever saw – he pops up in my nightmares sometimes – just sitting somewhere in the background with no face.

The only other subway I’ve ridden with regularity was the London Underground – which is more like New York’s subway system than BART.  The Tube (as they call it) is a vast and confusing network of trains, which you navigate with a map that was designed for symmetry and is in no way to scale. Hundreds of thousands of people ride the  Tube everyday, and although I used it regularly whenever I was in London, I never really got the hang of it. I worried that my uncertainty identified me as a tourist, and was hyper-vigilant of pickpockets.  And, although I never had a problem with planes after 9/11, after the bombings in 2005, the underground trains made me nervous. When you’re walking shoulder to shoulder with thousands of people, it’s not hard to imagine the danger of a panicked stampede.

That being said, subways are a very efficient way to get around. I’m a big fan of public transportation, and the benefits definitely outweigh the risks.

Topic 182: First Impressions

Carol:

The Tricks Old Dogs Can Teach Us

On first impression, you might think Prescott is a sleepy little town full of old white-haired folks who drive too slow (or too fast) and spend their afternoons searching for the best early-bird dinners.  In reality Prescott is full of old white-haired folks –31% of the population is over 62 years old. But Prescott is anything but sleepy these days and people over 62 (of which I am one) have a lot to teach us about the quality of the “senior years.” In fact, a visit to two local organizations show just how energetic and varied the retirement community can be.

The first is the Rowle P. Simmons Community Center, home of the Adult Center, which   provides a wide range of activities and services for all adults but particularly meets the needs of a senior population for a gentle-on-the-wallet $50/year membership fee. Sure, you can sign up for the typical senior center activities such as bingo and bridge, but the Adult Center also houses the Veterans History Project (part of a national oral history initiative), provides one-on-one tutoring sessions for PC and Mac users, schedules numerous health and fitness classes—from gentle yoga to high-energy Zumba-- the Meals-on-Wheels program, and hosts political forums. And, the parking lot is always full. 

The second is the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute(OLLI)  on the campus of Yavapai College. The Bernard Osher Foundation, headquartered in San Francisco, provides funding for higher education and the arts, including OLLI programs at 118 college and university sites geared to older learners, who the Bernard Osher Foundation refers to as “seasoned adults.” A wide range of learning groups reflect the interests of OLLI members, who have a voice in choosing the curriculum and in facilitating the groups as volunteers.  In between a morning learning group discussing modern China or current events and an afternoon group studying Gilbert and Sullivan opera, OLLI participants gather in the college food court for lunch and talk, their own brand of non-digital social networking. OLLI members make a lot of noise, have a lot of fun, and epitomize the notion of “lifelong learning.” No grades, no required homework, but they show up for class, ask questions, engage in hearty discussion,  and let their facilitators know when they appreciate a topic—or not.

 So, what’s the message here for our daily theme readers who are at the other end of the demographic picture—under 62, not retired, not ready to get old (who is?). What can these “old dogs” teach you? Learn something new everyday, not because you have to but because you want to. Take a class. Don’t want the homework or stress of grades? Most cities have community education programs. Don’t have time? Turn off the TV. Don’t have the money? Many community education programs and activity centers such as the YMCA have sliding scale fees and offer scholarships.

My essay is on the short side today. That’s because I have to get ready for my OLLI class on mythology and human experience.  As a co-facilitator for the learning group, I have  research to do on trickster figures in world cultures, and the 25 participants in the class will have lots of questions.

Loki, the Nordic Trickster

Sources:

Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Prescott.  

Prescott Adult Center.  

Megan:

A Second Chance to Make a First Impression

Yesterday my mother wrote about our trip to New Orleans, so today I think I will fill you in on my experience. We made this trip so that I could attend the American Library Association’s Annual conference. For a week, more than 20,000 librarians converged on the city. Everywhere you looked you could see determined and sensibly dressed women (and men!)  carrying red ALA tote bags, and checking schedules on their smart phones. I’m sure the city, which has a huge convention center, is used to large professional conferences, but New Orleans has a special appreciation for librarians.

The ALA plans its conference years in advance, and in 2006, the Annual (as it is known) was scheduled to be in New Orleans. After Katrina hit, the ALA debated moving the conference but ultimately decided to proceed as planned. I spoke with people who’d attended the Annual that year, which was the first conference to be held in New Orleans after the hurricane.  One librarian told me that most of the stores were closed, and whole city blocks stood empty. She said that the city had bussed people in to work in the restaurants and hotels. Another woman told me how she would sit in a café reading and would be approached again and again by locals asking for her magazines. At that point, almost a year after the storm, nothing but essential mail was being delivered by the post office.  “Some people didn’t want to come to the conference,” she said, “but I thought it was our duty to come and just spend as much money as we could.” At the opening ceremony this year, Mayor Mitch Landrieu personally thanked the ALA for all it had done to support the city.

I didn’t attend that conference in 2006 because I was in England getting ready to start working at the prison. Though I had followed the news closely when it happened, it was hard for me to imagine the level of destruction and devastation Katrina had wrought on the gulf. And I’d sort of assumed it had been rebuilt by now. Certainly that was my first impression of the city, from the downtown area where we stayed on the edge of the French Quarter. From the pictures my mother posted yesterday, there was little evidence of the storm. The beautiful houses in the garden district all had a freshly painted look to them –as did the buildings in the French quarter. Aside from the slightly “new” look on old buildings, everything looked perfect.

As part of the conference, I spent one day volunteering in a school library. It was downtown, just off Canal street and a group of us were bussed there from the conference center. The bus driver either misunderstood our destination or decided to deliberately take us the long way, but we wound up taking what the school director called “The Misery Tour.” The bus headed uptown, beyond where the street cars stopped and drove through a lower-income residential neighborhood. These homes, though smaller than the Garden District mansions, were still average sized older family homes, with porches and yards and playground sets. It would have looked like a nice place to live except that half of the homes stood vacant, boarded up and caved in. On many doors and walls it was still easy to read the spray-painted code used by rescue teams in the days following the storm: an X with the date the home was searched, and number of dead or living inhabitants. 

 

I understand why it was necessary to rebuild the tourist areas first. New Orleans relies on the convention center and the tourist industry to fuel its economy, which has also been harmed by last year’s oil spill. And everywhere I looked in that damaged neighborhood, I saw signs of construction – houses had been lifted onto cinder blocks or simply rebuilt high off the ground. While we were there, local news reported the final safeguard to prevent another breech of the levies had just been put in place. A lot has happened in five years, just not as much as I’d expected. The ALA Annual is not currently scheduled to return to New Orleans, but no doubt we’ll get back there eventually. I hope I will  see more houses like this:

Topic 181: On Recovering from a Love Affair

Carol:

Trains and Boats and Planes and Trolleys and Feet

I have never really shared most Americans' love affair with the automobile.  When I travel, I really enjoy seeing new places and watching new faces while learning to navigate subways, busses, and trains. You might say, I recovered from my love affair with automobiles by forming a new attachment to Bart and Max.  
 

Our trip this last week to New Orleans (aka The Big Easy Crescent City, Saint City, Paris of the South, Birthplace of Jazz) reminded me that there are lots of places in the US where a person can live quite happily, thriftily and conveniently without owning an automobile.  

One of the best deals in town is the day pass for $3.00 that gives unlimited passage on city busses and the three trolley lines that operate along Canal Street, St. Charles Street, and the esplanade bordering the Mississippi River, Once passengers debark   at the terminus, conductors walk through the old-fashioned car, reverse the directions of the wooden seats --no need to turn the streetcar around. 

The Canal Street line goes through the heart of the city where most of the tourist venues, businesses and major medical facilities are located. One branch ends at the   above-ground cemeteries 3 miles from the streetcar’s starting point; the second branch ends at City Park and the New Orleans Museum of Art. The walk from the streetcar stop  can be either direct along the wide, European-style avenue leading to the Museum, or indirect along the meandering, lakeside shaded paths of a park that is twice as large as New York’s Central Park.

 

The St. Charles Avenue Line advertises itself as the oldest continuing operating street railway in the world, but large sections  were closed for several years after extensive damage from Hurricane Katrina to both the tracks and the cars. The seven-mile route shows off the best of New Orleans, from the majestic homes of the Garden District to Audubon Park and Zoo to the campuses of Tulane and Loyola Universities. The leisurely progress of the streetcar affords the rider a chance to view the little details of New Orleans life that become a blur to an automobile rider: moss-draped trees sparkling with gaudy beads from last year’s Mardi Gras, ornamental statues and elegant porch swings, late afternoon dog walkers.

 

The Riverfront Line is the shortest (at two miles) and newest (built in 1988). It is a popular route that takes the Convention-goers along the waterfront with views of the French Quarter and French Market before it ends at the foot of Esplanade Avenue. A tourist can hop off just below Jackson Square and spend a couple of hours on the River itself,  lunching on southern fried chicken and chugging cold drinks on the deck of the Natchez Queen, the last steam-only operated Riverboat on the Mississippi. A cheaper alternative is the ferry that crosses from the riverfront over to Algiers on the west Bank, free for pedestrians.
 

Now that I’m back in rural  Arizona, it’s back to relying on the automobile…and the kindness of the family chauffeur. There is a bus company in town, but it starts about six miles from where I live and has both a limited schedule and limited routes, The good news is that if I really can’t recover from my love of Bart (Bay Area Rapid Transit) or MAX (Metropolitan Area Express), I can head down to Tempe and try out the METRO Light Rail--$3.50 for an all-day pass. On second thought, I think I’ll wait a few months. The day we flew back to Phoenix from New Orleans, the temperature was 114 degrees.  


Source:
“Streetcars in New Orleans.” Wikipedia

Megan:

There are many ways to recover from a love affair. Some people get in shape – I know of someone who split up with his girlfriend and started walking his dog five miles a day. He’s lost 80 pounds. A good friend of mine used his breakup as an opportunity to try new things – he bought a motorcycle, learned to ride a horse, took a pottery class. Both those guys took their pain and tried to form better selves. When I was in their situation, I chose to emigrate.

Some of my relationships only came to pass after I’d already made plans to leave the country. When the time came for me to go, we’d parted amicably and said something about the timing and how it was wrong. Only once did I hesitate and consider staying, but the relationship ended anyway. I went back to England and stayed for almost 6 years.

The problem with running away is that, in order to make sense of a strange, new place, one’s mind becomes occupied with comparing the present situation with the previous. Even after putting 6,000 miles between you and the former object of your affection, you may still find your mind wandering back to the what if’s and if only’s, replaying it all in your mind and wishing things were different. Believe me, this can really ruin your experience abroad.

I sometimes  think the best way to get over a relationship is to start another. This probably isn’t the case with everyone, but I don’t have the capacity to maintain deep and emotional connections with more than a few people at the same time. I have friends all over the world, but, with a few exceptions, my closest friends at any moment are the ones who I see the most. Simply put, I’m kind of a ‘love the one you’re with’ sort of person.

The last time I fell in love, it ended badly for me. For a long time, I thought something had permanently broken inside me. As time passed, I realized I was just young and naive and I finally emerged from that pain a better person (I hope). But I worked with that man and saw him every day. I watched him meet and then marry someone else. The week their child was born was the week I moved back to the United States. I had plenty of other reasons, which have been described at length in these essays, but those relationships bookend a very significant part of my life, and I like that there’s a symmetry to what drew me to England and what brought me back.

Topic 179: On Being Worth Knowing

Carol:

   

                Vocabulary Lessons

Things are worth knowing as well as people. 

I think it’s worth knowing how to read cookbooks.I have lots of cookbooks, some of which I bought for their photographs or drawings-- like my cookbooks from Provence. I still have the first cookbook I ever owned, Betty Crocker’s Cookbook for Boys and Girls (1957), which I  use once in a while because the recipes are uncomplicated and jargon-free. The vocabulary of cooking can be daunting, an extensive polyglot when we evolve from basic to gourmet, from child’s play to Childs’ play : Bechamel, Bernaise, Bordelaise, Hollandaise, Meuniere.  The serious cook learns how to move from “eggs in a frame” to “egg soufflé,” how to master the wrist movement for flipping, folding or whipping an egg.  And the master chef learns the difference between a dash of this and a soupcon of that, a pinch of this and a hint of that.

A Tort. In case you didn't know.

I think it’s worth knowing how to read music. I enjoy looking at a piece of music and being able to read it just like a book because it has its own vocabulary, tells its own story.  The composer not only shows us which sound to sing or play, but how quickly or slowly to play it, how long to hold the sound, and even what mood to express. The writer gives us less to work with although descriptive words like adjectives and adverbs help create the mood. I like looking at a piece of music and hearing it in my head, imagining my fingers picking out the notes on a piano.  I can tell by looking at the following piece of music by Chopin that I would butcher it if I didn’t practice a little bit at a time. Its speed “andantino” is a little faster than andante, which has “vigor or spirit.” The piece also has three sharps, which adds another layer of difficulty for me as my fingers are required to stretch ever so slightly up from the white to the black keys.

I also think it’s worth knowing how to read maps. I love maps, and my family teases me because I pour over maps and prefer  a wrinkled and torn paper roadmap to even the most soothing computer voice of a GPS.  Reading maps is like reading music. There is a vocabulary of sorts to map-reading, knowing what the thickness and color of a  line says about the condition of the road, whether or not its route is scenic or speedy, whether it bypasses a major city, etc. City maps are not only useful for navigating new places, but they  show a “mood” by how the streets are laid out (mathematical grids or whimsical snakes), how many parks and natural spaces are incorporated into the design of the city, where the public transportation lines go.

 

I guess I am passionate about all kinds of reading: the vocabulary, notations and abbreviations that translate the three-dimensional world of sound, sight and taste onto a flat page. I may not be a gourmet cook or a world-class musician, but I think it’s worth knowing that a torte differs from a cake in that it contains almost no flour, that I can find  my way from a cheap hotel on the outskirts of Vienna to the five-star Sacher Hotel to indulge in a piece of delectable chocolate Sachertort before I plan the shortest route to from the hotel in the first district to the third district  Konzerthaus  for an afternoon concert of Viennese waltzes.
 

Oh, yes. I absolutely believe it’s worth knowing another language. Vocabulary Lesson #1:

Source:
Sachertort: Simfan34. Sachertort, Café Sacher, Vienna. Wikipedia 
        

Megan:

Networking for (Insecure) Dummies

I suppose, on a social level,  most people consider themselves worth knowing. I certainly do. I’ve said before that it takes some effort to get to know me. As is probably the case with a lot of writers, I’m more confident on paper than I am in person. I find small talk with strangers excruciating. I’m trying to work on that because I hate being the person at the party alone in the corner or hovering around the one person I know. I don’t want to stand around with the other outsiders; I want to participate. As usual though, I’m starting slow. I made a joke with the barista at my regular coffee house. I comment on the weather with my softball teammates (most of whom I don’t know). By the end of the season, I might ask about their weekend.

But there’s another way to look at this topic, and that is being worth knowing career-wise. I’m talking about professional networking.

To aid in my job search, I have “liked” and subscribed to a number of advice columns and library list-servs. I followed the advice about “branding” myself and establishing a professional presence online. I joined relevant groups on LinkedIn and followed big names in the library profession on Twitter. I made business cards.

What I haven’t done is joined in the conversation. In the job seeking circles there are numerous threads and discussions about the effectiveness of personal branding etc. There are also a lot of complaints about the economy, library closures and long-term unemployment. I find these topics depressing and unhelpful. If I sit around participating in the whining circle, I start to remember that in addition to being unemployed,  I’m turning 30 in a few months, I live with my parents and I am single. The male version of this cliche would be playing video games in the basement. But I’m writing blog posts in the shed about how I have nothing to contribute.

This is all the more frustrating for me because I used to be worth knowing. The community of prison librarians in the UK is  small, but  active. When I worked at the prison, I was on the national committee. I was a person other people called for help, for advice, and for information. I helped plan and execute training days and annual conferences. Professionally, I had a lot of potential and I was ambitious and … I totally burned out. But that was because of the prison, not the job.

Anyway, next week I’m going to New Orleans for the ALA annual conference. I will be volunteering in a school library and attending a job fair. I will make jokes and talk about the weather. I will go armed with a fistful of resumes and business cards and if anyone follows the address to my website they’ll be directed here.

Um.  I may not have thought this through.

Topic 178: Earth Odors

Carol:

Hawaiian Holiday       

A honeymoon in Hawaii seemed out of reach as my law student fiancé and I planned our wedding.  We would have been happy with a camping trip to Sequoia; but, thanks to a resourceful travel agent, we got a package deal to Honolu for $50 extra that included a stop-over in California for the wedding. Most visitors to Hawaii will talk about the vibrant colors of the vegetation, the deep and clear pools of water, and the dramatic vistas from atop the volcanic islands’ highest peaks. I remember the smells.
 

The first smell I remember is the fragrance of flowers.  The lei I received as I stepped off the plane in Honolulu was a surprise, part of the honeymoon package.  I think the lei was made of white plumeria, and its fragrance filled our hotel room that first night.  The sweet scent was already familiar to me because in high school I had been asked by a neighbor to write an advertisement for a Hawaiian perfume she was selling in her Canadian gift shop. Everywhere we went on Oahu and Kauai, we were met with the scents of blooming plumeria and orchids.  I wore a flower in my hair from the lei for several days.

 

Another smell I remember is dead leaves, the rich loamy blanket of decaying vegetation that nonetheless smells clean and dusty in a good way. While visiting a park near Honolulu, Marc decided that it would be fun to venture “off the beaten path” of the designated walkways (smooth and asphalt-topped therefore “boring” I guess). As he pulled me into the bushes beside the path, I looked down at my flowered muumuu and pink suede clogs and thought for a moment that maybe I wasn’t dressed for adventure, but hey it was my honeymoon and my new husband assured me it would be exciting to explore the forest of tropical trees and plants in search of…birds, insects? As I gingerly made my way through the heavy growth, the vegetation under my feet grew deeper and “spongier,” and my feet sank deeper into the leaves the farther we moved. When I inevitably fell face down into the bed of leaves and branches, I was already perspiring from the humidity and ready to return to the safety of the walkways. As I pulled myself up and tried to scrape off the dirt on my face and dress, I saw a foot away a discarded beer can. So much for adventure “off the beaten path.”
 

I should have known better when later in the week Marc took me sightseeing to an area near a volcanic crust. Where that spot is I can’t recollect after 38 years, but it was probably somewhere along the Pali highway near the Koolau Volcano. I may not be able to remember the place, but I remember the smell, the powerful odor of sulphur and rotten eggs. Despite warning signs, Marc convinced me that it would be a unique experience to walk out onto the lava crust—just a little ways—to get a closer look at a steaming, yellow-green deposit of rocks. The first few steps onto the dark volcanic rock were firm, but suddenly I could hear the crunch as the ground underneath sunk an inch or two with each step. As the odor of the sulphur became overwhelming, I suddenly imagined the headlines as the Honolulu newspaper reported a young honeymooner falling to a hot death through a crack in the volcanic crust. Another tourist who ignored the warning signs—and common sense—in search of adventure.
 

The strongest odor I remember from our Hawaiian Holiday is not the sweet fragrance of the plumeria but the not-so-sweet odor of …FEAR. 

 

Megan:

Bella Smells

A few weeks ago, I took Bella with me when I went to Cornville to babysit my cousin’s kids. When I let her out of the car, instead of going to greet the kids she ran haphazardly through the big yard, nose on the ground, tail straight up in the air. It wasn’t the first time I’d brought her there, but it was her first time off leash. My cousin’s son, who hadn’t met her before, asked why she was running around smelling everything. I said to him, “Imagine if you went to a new place and it was full of toys and food and kids you never played with before, and everyone was calling your name.” That’s what I think it’s like for dogs sometimes.

Chasing a fly

I don’t always understand how Bella chooses what to be interested in although sometimes it’s obvious. I know that, as a retriever, bringing me long dead animals is instinctual for her. She’ll dig through a pile of laundry to find an used tissue or a handful of dog treats I left in a pocket. But I don’t know why, when she stops to sniff poop, she’ll ignore one kind and eat another. I had to pry the same (progressively smaller) ball of manure out of her jaws three times this morning.

Sometimes in the middle of a long drink of water, she’ll pause, growl and then start digging in the bowl, knocking it over and spilling everywhere.  When I took her to Cornville that day, she reacted the same way in Oak Creek, snapping at and digging in the water. I want to get a kiddie pool and see what she does, but my father is not interested in paying for one just to satisfy my curiosity. Bella was too timid to get all the way in the creek,  and was content to eat the remains of a crayfish she found on a rock. Of the four of us, I was the only one who managed to get caught in the current and swept down stream. I was still holding onto Bella’s leash, so she trotted along the bank with me while I tried to grab something or catch my footing. The kids thought this was funny.

Before I got swept away

After we went swimming, we got some fast food to eat in the car and Bella made herself an enemy to those children forever. They were already nervous around her because she’d jumped on them, but when she smelled the grilled cheese and popcorn chicken she went into a frenzy. I was driving so I couldn’t react right away and the kids screamed and cried as she first stole the sandwich and then buried her face in the container of chicken. The children’s tears were nothing compared to mine on the drive home as she produced odors that made the little hairs in my nose burst into flame.

Similar to what happened to the chicken

Bella’s grown so much the past few weeks that she’s almost as tall as Milo. She can stretch and span the width of the bed and it’s harder for me to sleep well when both dogs are with me. We always start in the same position: me on the right, Milo curled up on the pillow next to me, and Bella down by my feet.  But In the middle of the night, she still likes to scoot up next to us, and usually wakes me up with a wet nose in my armpit.  I guess she’s comforted by the familiar smells of her teachers and friends. She stays there for a minute and then moves again, this time resting her nose by Milo’s butt.

Topic 175: Late Arrivals

Carol:

Warning: Baby on Board           

Dear Readers: if you are the kind of person who gets bored when women tell birth stories, this essay is not for you. Mothers never forget the events and emotions surrounding childbirth, and I simply could not pass up the opportunity to tell one that so perfectly fits today’s topic. I realize that the “normal” range for the gestation of a human baby is really a couple of weeks on either side of 40 weeks (259-294 days). But, Megan was really late. Three weeks.
 

I’m talking about 3 weeks after my obstetrician told me at my mid-August check-up that there was a 50-50 chance I would go into labor within the next 48 hours. So, what happens when a first-time mother gets news like that? Does she go into a frenzy of last-minute “nesting,” obsessively refolding stacks of tiny baby clothes in the brand new nursery, furiously cooking and cleaning so that the house will be in order when she arrives home with the new baby? I took a more placid approach and packed that little suitcase for the hospital and pretty much sat down to wait.
 

I felt  a tremendous relief that very soon—50-50 chance within 48 hours—I would be freed of sleepless nights in the California heat of August, continuous indigestion and swollen feet.  I contacted  friends and family  in expectation of a new baby within a week.  But, most of all I remember the mounting frustrating as that 48 hours went by, then a week, then two weeks. Meanwhile, the phone was ringing as well-meaning friends and family checked in to see if this baby was ever going to come.
 

The waiting, of course, spilled over into Marc’s routine.  He was a public defender whose office was about a half hour from the house, and this was before the advent of the cell phone or even pagers really. Sooo, I started going to court with Marc everyday, sitting in the back of the room while he handled a variety of cases. I could only fit into one dress at the time, so I’m sure there was a lot of talk at the courthouse about that crazy pregnant women in the flowered muumuu hanging out at court.
 

Right about the time that a woman gets to that outer end of the “normal gestational range,” official things start to happen. For me that meant driving about 15 miles down the coast to Scripps Hospital in La Jolla for stress tests that would check the fetal heart rate for signs of distress.  By the second test, my obstetrician decided it was time for medical intervention, and September 26, 1981 was scheduled for inducing labor.
 

Wednesday, September 24 was pretty peaceful and Marc and I were looking forward to a relaxing evening in front of the TV as we counted down to our final day as a childless couple.   The contractions began mid-afternoon, we drove into the hospital parking lot at 11 p.m, and  Megan was born by C-section at 4 a.m on September 25.
 

That might be the end of the story of how our first child was a late arrival for her own birth-day. But, she had another surprise for us and that three-week delay was just a warm-up. At 7 a.m. on September 25 our red-headed curly-top baby was transported by ambulance to a neonatal intense care unit in San Diego.  Our supposed-to-be August baby slept in her  brand new nursery for the first time in  November. Six weeks after her birth.

 

But, that’s another story. And my late baby girl hates it when I’m late.

Megan:

 Please check the arrivals gate 

for any friends you forgot to collect

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I am a compulsively early/on time person. This quality came in handy once when I was on the way to the airport a few years ago. I was flying from London Luton airport to Prague to spend Christmas with a friend.  Not far from the airport, my car stalled in the middle of a roundabout and wouldn’t start again. A helpful police man pushed the car onto the median and then went on his way. I would have been quite happy to abandon the car  as long as I didn’t miss my flight, but the policeman didn’t offer to give me a ride. My point though, is this: even after the tow truck arrived and took my car to the garage, jumped it and checked it out and then gave me directions to the airport, I was still 3 hours early for my flight.

I’ve missed a number of flights in my life, but it’s never been because I overslept or didn’t get to the airport on time. Usually, I’ve missed connecting flights on international trips after the original flight was delayed. Most recently,  my New Years travel plans to Colorado (to meet the same friend who used to live in Prague) were delayed by unexpected snow fall here in Prescott. That was extremely frustrating, but I still managed to make it to Vail before midnight on New Years Eve.

Although I am meticulous about confirming travel plans and getting to the airport on time, I have friends who are not. Twice I have arranged a visit, once to DC and once to LA, only to have my friend not show up to meet me. In fact, my friends had forgotten I was coming that day at all. Both times were before cell phones became ubiquitous, and tracking them down was difficult. When I finally reached my L.A. friend (Kelly!), not only had she forgotten I was coming (all the way from England), she had taken her own trip to San Diego and wasn’t due to return until the next day. I wound up taking a shuttle to my uncle’s house in Thousand Oaks, where I was welcomed by my surprised relatives who hadn’t even realized I was back in the country.

The DC friend, who is also the Colorado and Prague friend, had to borrow a car to come get me after she’d forgotten, and I sat at the Baltimore airport for 3 hours. In her defense, that was the first time I’d visited her, and on the countless times we’ve since arranged to meet all over the world, she's never forgot me again.  And neither has Kelly. But I always call or text ahead of time, just to make sure.

Topic 170: On Living in the Present (Future)

Carol:

Traveling in the Now

Vacations are supposed to be opportunities to live in the present, especially if you have been planning that vacation for months and counting down the days until that future became The Now.
 

A year ago today my husband and I were debarking from a transcontinental flight with two lay-overs (cheaper than non-stop) and headed to a ubiquitous Travel Lodge somewhere in the center of historic Edinburgh, Scotland.  We were exhausted and couldn’t get into our rooms, so we sat in the lobby waiting for the arrival of daughter Megan, who had flown in from England with belongings from four years of living abroad. So ubiquitous are the Travel Lodge hotels in Edinburgh that Megan spent the afternoon of June 1 searching for us at the wrong hotels. When she arrived several hours later at the right Travel Lodge, she was cranky, really cranky. We were glad to see her anyway.   

The Scotland trip was meant to be a transition for her, a chance for one last vacation experience in another culture before returning to Arizona and the uncertainty of her future. For us, it was one last time to experience another culture in the capable hands of someone familiar with driving “on the wrong side,” round-abouts, lay-bys and quaint road impediments such as herds of sheep. A time also to make special memories with our daughter.
It was also a great time to practice being “in the moment” as we headed out each morning to explore the Scottish countryside and look for the perfect spot with a view to picnic or lunch at a tiny restaurant. Counting down the days until that future date when  the trip was over would have spoiled the experience although I’m sure Megan and Marc allowed their thoughts to stray into the future—work and looking for work—more than did mine. I have always been good at compartmentalizing.  

Ullapool, Scotland

So, now just about a year later Marc and I have returned from a shorter, closer jaunt to the Northwest where we spent four days with friends of 40 years in Seattle and four days with our son in Portland.  Familiar places and people, but we were able to fill each day with some little spontaneous adventure that kept us excited to be living in the moment. The bay view from The Oyster Bar on Chuckanut Drive south of Bellingham, Washington was spectacular as we ate fresh fish over a leisurely two-hour lunch that allowed us to reminisce about the view from another seaside restaurant in Ullapool, Scotland the year before. An hour spent with Marshall waiting for seats at the popular Toro Bravo restaurant in Portland provided a surprise opportunity to sit together and listen to Brazilian music played on mandolin and guitar.

Chuckanut Drive, Washington

As the days ticked by, it would have been easy to slip out of the pleasures of living in the present to fret about the future— court appearances, car maintenance, getting the deck re-stained, cleaning out the basement—and a return to routines such as cooking and cleaning and  the daily theme. I think I did a pretty good job of staying in the present, of allowing each day to create its own story.
 

But, vacations are retreats from, not abandonment of, routine. So, here I am back at my desk straining to come up with an ending for today’s theme, glad to be back home listening to the wrestling dogs and familiar cranky  voice: “Are you done with that essay yet? You said it would just be a few more minutes.”

Megan:

 On This Day

On this day last year, my Irish friend Sean gave me a ride to Stansted airport and I left my home in England for the last time. I only flew to Scotland where I met my parents and we traveled around for a couple of weeks, so on the 15th of this month you can probably expect “On this day last year, I moved back to the USA” or something similarly whiny and emotional.

It’s funny how little one can accomplish in a year. If I’d known that I’d still be unemployed and living with my parents a year later, I probably would have stayed in England. And in another month, I’d have been eligible for permanent residency. In my lower moments, that’s a regret I have. But I also would never have believed that I’d be happy here without a job or a place of my own.

Sometimes I miss living alone, but I spent all last week by myself and every night was an exercise in trying not to freak out at strange sounds, patrolling the house with a knife in one hand and my cell phone dialed to 911, my finger posed to hit the send button.  I thought about breaking a couple of glasses and leaving the shards in the entry ways, but then realized that no burglar’s gonna come into the house barefoot, so I’d probably just wind up hurting myself or one of the dogs. Bella exposed another chink in the armor when, annoyed at being separated from Milo, she jumped straight through an open (but screened) window to reunite with her one true love. The screen wasn’t damaged -- it just popped right out. All of the windows, which before seemed beneficial – letting so much light and air into the house –suddenly became additional weak points that must be defended.

It wasn’t all bad. The dogs and I had dance parties. Our previous dog Trixie, used to dance along at moments like those, or rather, she would get excited and hump a leg. Milo and Bella just sit and observe, tails wagging and no judgment on their faces. I got the impression that they would like to join in, but were shy because they didn’t know the moves. I turned up the stereo all the way  and danced and sang at the top of my lungs,  which is something I couldn’t do when I lived in an apartment, and also is not something I can do when my mother is home. It’s not fair to make her cry and wet her pants with laughter more than once a day. Too much laundry is bad for the environment.

I seem to have strayed off topic. I’ve written recently about my plans for the future. I head to New Orleans at the end of this month, the GRE is fast approaching and so are the application deadlines. I intended to spend time last week preparing for those upcoming events, but between the daily dance parties and the evening night terrors, I also babysat, hung out with my friends and spent one entire day cleaning the fridge. I’ll get everything done eventually, but there is enough to keep me occupied in the present, I'm not going to waste all my time worrying about the future.

Topic 164: On Outgrowing One's Family

Carol:

The Lure of the Golden West

The 1930 census lists two transplants in Maywood, California, a tiny Los Angeles suburb  that had grown from a population of 1000 in 1924 to 6000 by 1930.  Winifred Fike from New Jersey lived at 4637 58th Street.  Texas-born Ed Scott lived a few blocks away at 5645 59th Street. What brought them to California?  Why did their parents uproot themselves from large, close-knit families?
 

In 1880, the population of Los Angeles was just above 33,000. Easterners had already been reading about California in Overland Monthly and Out West magazine   By 1876 the Transcontinental Railroad was completed and by 1887 the trickle of immigrants became a flood when 120,000 people came to Los Angeles in a single year, “drawn by the promise of pure air, warm sunshine and prosperity” (source: The West). By the time the Fike and Scott families arrived, the population of LA County had climbed to almost one million, and it would increase by another 135% to over 2 million by that 1930 federal census (source: Los Angeles).
 

Thousands of families headed West, pulled by a desire for a fresh start, the universal story of immigrants  seeking  a Promised Land of opportunity. To overcome the inertia  of habits and family connections, there must have been two forces at work, both a push and a pull.   The  private circumstances that pushed them out of the family nest are not told in the statistics of a federal census or a city’s population tables. But looking back to 1920 Fike and Scott census reports gives  a hint as to what catalysts set them on their journeys to California.   

There is no 1920 census report for Winnie Fike’s family. But  January 1920 death records show that her maternal  grandmother died after living with the family in Plainfield, New Jersey for almost 5 years. Did Grandma’ death release the family to pursue a secret dream? What conversations took place that led three neighborhood families to pack up their Model T’s and caravan to California that spring of 1920, a six-week trip that left them out of both the New Jersey and the California census reports?

Winne with Grandma, New Jersey

 Ed Scott’s 1920 census report shows him, his younger brother, Texan mother and step-father in New Mexico, the childhood home of Ed’s father, who had died in 1915.  What dream was Ed’s step-father following that took them to California? Or were they just trying to distance themselves from the ghost of a dead husband and the influence of his extended family? 

Ed with Grandpa, New Mexico

 

Did my father Ed miss his grandparents in New Mexico, did my mother Winnie feel homesick for her cousins in New Jersey and Pennsylvania? What about their relatives that stayed behind, who watched  loved ones ride off to pursue the lure of the West? Did they envy their intrepid son or daughter? Perhaps, they felt resentment that their brother or sister had let  wanderlust outgrow the families left behind?
 

Home is so Sad   (Philip Larkin)

Home is so sad. It stays as it was left,
Shaped to the comfort of the last to go
As if to win them back. Instead, bereft
Of anyone to please, it withers so,
Having no heart to put aside the theft

And turn again to what it started as,
A joyous shot at how things ought to be,
Long fallen wide. You can see how it was:
Look at the pictures and the cutlery.
The music in the piano stool. That vase.

Sources:
“Los Angeles.”  Wikipedia.
Larkin, Philip. “Home is So Sad.” Poets.org 

Burns, Ken. The West. PBS.org 
 

Megan:

My brother and I were the only kids in our neighborhood when we were growing up. We lived too far from town to spend much time with other children (aside from at school and at the sitter’s house), so we explored every inch of our wild back yard. We used to dig through the bushes, playing and screaming and running and fighting. Our 1.5 acres has never been tamed, despite occasional attempts. A collapsing fence still outlines the area where we kept the goat that came with the house. A sandbox stands empty in cactus and catclaw. There is half a tetherball pole, cemented into the dirt – the consolation prize after the guy who replaced our deck failed to complete the promised basketball court, itself a consolation for the pool I’d always begged for. My mother is the only person on her side of the family not to have a pool or a hot tub, and I think she should be ashamed.

But now, 20 years later, our neighborhood has changed. The number of houses has tripled at least. The elderly neighbors have been replaced with loud and active families, with trampolines and forts and 4-wheelers. Our middle-aged neighbors are now elderly. 

For as long as I can remember, I wanted to escape from here – from what I considered a dry and dull backward place. I loved my family, but I was eager to move far away from them, start out a new life, like my parents had when they were in college.  Until my grandparents moved to Prescott in the late 80’s, we had always lived hundreds of miles from anyone else in the family.  When I was in high school, a cousin moved to the area to go to college. Then came an aunt and uncle,  and then another cousin. The cousins married (not each other), had kids, and I moved back to Arizona last summer to find myself surrounded by family – with some still  far enough away to take vacations to visit.

I was so afraid that I would hate being back here that I didn’t even notice when I started to love it. If my MFA plan works out (or I find a job), I’ll likely be moving hundreds of miles away again, but this time I won’t be telling myself it’s forever.  There’s a lot of value in living close to family.  You learn a lot about yourself observing how people with the same blood can turn out so many different ways, have different values, take advantage of different opportunities. 

I’m still waiting to see how I turn out.

Topic 159: Watch your step!

Carol:

Le Diable Et Le Bon Dieu

I realized this morning that regular readers of our daily theme essays may by now have gotten a skewed impression of me because I use self-deprecating anecdotes to get a laugh (or at least a faint smile). I may give the impression that I am a simpering, idealistic, weepy, food-stained, wispy-haired reality and crime TV addict who is obsessed with genealogy and dogs. Please… that’s only 80% of who I really am. The other 20% is an eclectic intellect who used to be able to read French plays by Sartre in the original language, knows the route from Haworth town centre to the Bronte Parsonage (make sure you follow that little lane to the left) and has cultivated a lifelong interest in architecture. Let me illustrate.

I had a devil of a time finding my way around the Winchester Mansion “Mystery House” in San Jose, California. Not because I lack a sense of direction, but because the Winchester House itself lacks a plan... deliberately, so the story goes. Take a tour of the 160-room mansion with its 367 steps, stairways to nowhere (certainly not to heaven), and you will hear the story of distraught widow Sarah Winchester. Sarah sought the counsel of a Medium after the death of her only child. Her husband William Wirt Winchester had left her 50% of his holdings in the family business, i.e. the company that manufactured “the gun that won the West.” The Medium, so they say, warned her that the Winchester family was cursed by the spirits of the people killed by their guns, so in an effort to elude the ghosts Sarah kept adding on to her California mansion for 38 years, building trick doors and windows and a maze of rooms that even the servants couldn’t navigate without a map. Or, a less romantic story is that she designed the mansion herself instead of hiring a good architect and just didn’t have a strong aesthetic (source: Sarah Winchester).
 

Thank God, I was also able to travel to Spain to see an architectural marvel in mid-construction in 1969. A college friend and I arrived in Barcelona on Christmas Day and headed straight for the Basilica Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Familia, that wonder- in- progress of Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi. Construction on this monument to religious faith began two years before construction on the Winchester Mansion began, and the current goal is to complete the Basilica by 2026, the centennial of its chief architect Gaudi’s death.  Although its spires rise straight up to the heavens and can be seen from all over the city, it only has 350 steps, 17 less than the Winchester mansion.  By the time I had reached the top of the building, my legs were shaking uncontrollably from the steep climb even though I was only 20 years old at the time (source: Sagrada Familia).
 

Both the Winchester Mansion and the Sagrada Familia have prompted controversy over excesses of decoration, expense of construction, and delays in completion. Sarah Winchester attempted to expiate family sins and elude Le Diable by constructing a wood and brick, hide-and-seek touristic curiosity. Gaudi took the plans of an earlier architect to build a tradition church and transformed them into a grand and completely unique structure to exalt Le Bon Dieu.
 

If all you want is a good set of stairs to challenge your lungs and leg muscles, I suggest  the Washington monument in our national’s capitol, dedicated on Washington’s birthday in 1885. The tallest stone structure in the world, in the six months after the dedication,   over 10,000 visitors climb its 897 stairs to the top. (source Washington Monument).
 

Whatever your architectural destination, a bit of advice:

   

Sources:
Image of the Sagrada Familia Basilica. Bernard Gagnon. 
20 Sep 2009.     
Sagrada Familia.
Sara Winchester.
Washington Monument.

Megan:

Watch your step!

The main floor of our house is mostly open plan, but between the foyer and the living room, there is a single step down.* After 28 years living in this house, we don’t even think about it, which is why we never remember to warn our visitors. Whoops, we say too late. There’s a step there.

If we’re used to that one it’s only because we’ve all had fallen on every other staircase in the house. I’ve already documented the time I tried somersaulting down the stairs . The parents have tripped many times carrying loads of laundry, and when my brother was a baby, he fell off the first tier of the basement stairs (which at that point had no railing) and bit through his lip. When I did gymnastics, I used to practice handstands as I made my way up the stairs. That sounds more dangerous than it was. Since I wasn’t very good, I mostly just kicked and flailed my legs behind me – one time kicking a parent in the face.

When my parents bought this house, it wasn’t finished. The wrap around deck didn’t fully wrap around, and for most of my childhood we had two doors we weren’t allowed to open – one off the kitchen, and one off my parents room. The fall probably wouldn’t have killed us, but broken limbs were certain. After the rotted front staircase gave way on my mother one morning, I remember crawling over her as she lay in the gap where the step used to be, and ordered me to go back into the house to give my father a message.  The new deck wrapped fully around and my parents had a balcony to themselves. That was at least 15 years ago, and we still rarely use those doors.

Off of the kitchen, we now have a staircase that is so steep it requires intense concentration to descend, even for the dogs. Milo’s okay but Bella won’t go down them after dark, instead doing her business at the top of the stairs much to everyone’s annoyance. I could probably train her by walking down with her, but the truth is, I don’t like those stairs in the dark either.

Stairs have been my nemesis for as long as I can remember. I wrote a short-story while I was in college about someone who lives alone, falls down the stairs and lays undiscovered for weeks, eaten alive by a cat. It was a lot funnier than it sounds. It was also meant to be a metaphor about relationships, but all the examples of falling down staircases were taken directly from my own experience: at the courthouse after paying a parking ticket, at the church when my shoes fell off and clattered down the steps beside me, and all the times in my house. I was grateful that when I finally did live by myself, in England, I lived in a ground floor flat with no stairs. I fell numerous times in the prison, but always on my own with only the cameras to witness.

I don’t mind falling on stairs. I have enough experience now to fall correctly and minimize injury. It’s always better to fall up. I just get so embarrassed when someone sees me, especially because they always act so concerned. I’d rather they just laugh at me the way my mother does.


*From the living room to the foyer, there is a step up.