Mommy Mind – Page 9 – The Hillhouse

Gleaning

September 21, 2014September 22, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Mommy Mind, Pics, VidsLeave a comment

Yesterday was the last day of summer, and it was a day of the great year-end harvest at a friend’s vineyard here in Greenfield. Mike and Kelly began to plant vines several years ago with the hopes of making their own wine one day. The first batch was made last year, and this year the operation’s really begun to pick up speed, as Mike’s finally built himself a great structure in which he’ll make and house his stock. The vineyard sits on Martha’s farm land, and when she’s gone, much of her property will go to a land conservation group in town, and the rest of it, plus the grand, two-hundred year old farmhouse will go to Mike and his family. He and I have known this farm since we were tiny, and it feels wonderful to see it enjoying a re-birth with his new business. My son derives a great sense of continuity knowing that I worked on this farm when I was his age, and he’ll continue to have a relationship with the place well into his own future. Who knows, maybe even his children will one day find themselves helping to pick the bounty at the end of a growing season.

The temperature for working outdoors was simply perfect, the grapes were at their targeted sugar composition, and the harvest was a success. (I will note that one of Mike’s young daughters had a rather bad accident which landed her in ER. While she’s ok, she did require some extensive sewing up. We feel horrible that it happened, but relieved that it wasn’t worse.)

Martha Carver’s grand farm house, once lived in by Elihu Wing, one of Greenfield’s earliest residents, and built in 1802 by his father, Prince Wing, who supplied neighboring Saratoga Springs with the horses needed to pull the increasing number of carriages in town.

As when I was a child, horses now live on the farm again.

We stop in to visit Martha. Just in time to meet egg farmer Dick as he makes his weekly delivery. He’s kind of a rock star in our world.

A visit with resident hound dog Masie. A real sweetie and Martha’s faithful companion.

I love all the little details of this house, unchanged since I can remember.

As a child I went haying in these fields. Amazing how land can find new purposes – and in such a relatively short span of time.

This is what we’re cutting free from the vines.

It took a lot of friends to help bring in the huge harvest.

There were kids and dogs everywhere.

Elihu and I get started.

It was kinda like a treasure hunt. Grapes were everywhere.

Elihu and Sam enjoy some grape juice. It was so very delicious – surprisingly tart, yet at the same time sweet. Hard to describe, but lovely to taste.

When we’ve filled our five gallon bucket it gets driven back to the weigh station.

This took about fifteen minutes to pick, and weighs in at around 18 pounds.

Then it gets hauled off the the wine making shed.

The total take for the day was around four thousand pounds. !!

Here’s where it ends up. The old farming gear in the foreground was in use when I was young.

First, the grapes go in here to get de-stemmed and seeded.

Then they go into that giant red vat. Gravity alone pushes the juice out, and it comes thru a tap into the waiting bucket. That’s the slow way – the faster, more labor-intensive (and thorough) way is to squeeze the juice out. Either way, the juice goes then goes through tubing into giant stainless tubs after it’s pressed.

Here’s where the juice is held for now.

The big space inside. There’s storage for casks on either side, just outside of the frame.

How cool is it that ‘Red Red Wine’ just happened to be playing as we got to the wine shed? Seriously. (Ok, so this is white wine, but still.)

Yeah, fall’s on its way.

This was an unintentional harvest; from our chicken poop/compost pile emerged this gigantic squash plant…

…with crazy-big leaves.

And lots of blossoms. I’m careful to pick just the male flowers to fry up for supper, as there are more of them than the female blossoms, plus females, of course, will turn into fruit if pollinated. One year we had a serious shortage of bees and had to knock up our blossoms by hand. For real.

Here’s a newly knocked-up blossom.

Here’s a cross-section of a female blossom. They grow closer to the main stem while the guys kinda stick out a bit more.

The result. Pretty! We’ll leave them to grow a bit more before we pick em.

We have so very few apples and pears this year. Just as well; my post-Atkins weight gain all started last fall when an abundance of fruit ‘necessitated’ I bake lots and lots of pies. !

I found a turkey feather where our old garden was last year. Turkeys are always roaming through our property. My mom feeds hers daily, and they come right up to her house. Mine keep a safe distance from bird-chasing eleven year old boys.

The new flock on the hill.

And our house atop the same hill. Our yard has four terraced levels to it, this was taken from the third one down from the house. At the bottom of our yard, the woods continue on down to the road below.

The pullets have started laying! But look at how small their eggs still are. Not all of the gals are laying yet, either. We’ll still have to buy eggs from Dick before we’re back to self-sustaining again.

It’s been a while since we’ve had any variety in the color of our eggs. All eggs, regardless of whether they’re green, brown or white, taste just the same. It’s just fun to have different breeds and enjoy the variety of colors.

After enjoying a fun visit and bonfire with our neighbors, we ended up setting our own pile on fire. We’d waited for the perfect night, and this seemed to be it. We even said goodbye to these crazy gingerbread figures we’d had around for a while. It was our own burning man.

I found some sparklers leftover from the 4th.

The grapes have been harvested, the eggs are in our fridge, and all of our scraps and sundries have gone to the heavens in the fire. Onward into a new season we go. Good-bye and thank you, summer. Hello and welcome fall.

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Badass Not

September 17, 2014September 18, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Growing Older, Mommy Mind1 Comment

Back in the day, I kinda thought I was a badass. I wasn’t, of course, but I tried hard to convince myself – and many of the people around me – that I was. Inside I was full of self-doubt, but I was still together enough to pretend to the world that I was fine. More than fine. And truthfully, there were moments when did indeed feel strong and confident. Maybe there were some moments when I really was a badass. Good at something in my own way. I think I knew it on some level, yet still, a voice nagged at me… They’ll figure you out one day if you’re not careful…

But for a while, there was something I truly did have going for me. I was in shape. And for a few years there, fitness was my thing. Really my thing. Worked out six days a week, and worked out well, thoughtfully. I’d have women come up to me and ask me for tips, for help with their routines. Back then I hadn’t the life experience to know that a good measure of that fitness was, plain and simple, thanks to youth. And thanks also to a chronic sense that somehow I could just never measure up. And so I made up for it the best ways I could. Being a mini rock star in my small sub-culture, dressing fine, and being on stage – whether I actually was on stage or not. Always fundamentally insecure, always trying to appear that I wasn’t trying. And frankly, the only true barometer I had that showed me I was truly good at something was seeing my hard work paying off in the form of a fit body. So I kept at it.

Until, of course, life took over. My story is not unique, really. Nope. Woman has kid, becomes busy, hell, becomes divorced, poor, run-down by the duties of the post, and, well… Next thing you know a decade’s passed and thirty extra pounds have come to live on your frame. It does sneak up on you. I had no true understanding of how large I’d become until it became necessary, once again, to buy ‘fat clothes’. That, and the observations of my young son that “I really was getting big now”. One can only stall so long. Clearly action was needed. But when I stared down the solution in the face, I wondered how I would approach it. What motivated me then didn’t drive me now. I couldn’t just put on the 80s hair metal cassette and kick some ass… It wasn’t about any of that anymore. How was I going to do this? Sure vanity drives me still, I think all humans share that to some degree, but this time it was more about my quality of life. And the very length of it, too. I’d taken enough of those online tests that determine your ‘actual’ age vs. your ‘age in years’ to know that my prospects weren’t quite as good as I pretended they were. Bad enough I’d smoked all those years. Then there was this inactivity thing on top of it. Ich. Time to move.

At first, I did not want to go to the Y. For one, all I’d ever gone to were women’s gyms. There I was off the hook. Didn’t have to look good for anyone. (Keep in mind, the last time I spent a lot of time working out I was much younger, and my wiring was different than it is now.) And this time, some shadow of that adolescent concern still bothered me. It bothered me for or a day or two. Until I realized that, unlike the me at 25, it honestly wasn’t about my ego anymore. My fitness or lack thereof. And ironically, in some ways, being an overweight, middle-aged woman gave me a new feeling of freedom. Some of it due to the anonymity of my demographic, some of it due to the fact that I don’t care so much anymore how I appear because there are more important things in my life. Course I do care, but also, I don’t. You know, not in the way I once did.

The variety of ages and abilities of the people attending the Y blows my mind. I’ve never before been a part of such a diverse population. Not in my jobs, not in my small, personal world. Not really even on the street. But at the Y – there are ninety year olds and two year olds all doing something. Hell, there are mommies pushing infants in jogging strollers… It’s amazing. Kinda reminds me of the picture books for young children that show all the goings-on of the outside world. Like a Richard Scarry book, or like a Sesame Street short. People of all shapes and colors and ages are there, just doing their thing. Gives me a lot of latitude just to chill and concentrate on doing my own best – and not worrying about looking my best while I’m doing it. I’m still kinda acclimating to the idea of being really sweaty and gross looking in front of, well, everybody, but it is freeing. And while I may not be able to go as low into my squats as the women in my Zumba class (seriously, when did I become this friggin weak??) I know that it’s ok. I don’t have to be a badass anymore. I just have to be. Thank God.

As I’ve passed my first week of routine workouts, I’ve come to notice a couple of things. One, is that my long morning workouts have not served yet to raise my overall energy, instead, I feel like passing out on the drive home. ! This, I hope, will change before long. I remind myself that it’s hardest in the beginning. That I haven’t worked out like this in a decade. (At least one hopes these are sound arguments for hanging in there.) I’ve also come to observe something about the way I move through the world – about the way in which many, likely most folks move in this world: I used to move through this world in spite of my body, now I’m moving through the world because of my body. Simply walking has become a more thoughtful process. And crazy as it might sound, I feel less daunted by it. It feels more familiar. I don’t look for the closest parking space anymore cuz I don’t dread the walk. Ok, so maybe I might not love the walk, but still, it doesn’t feel like quite the burden it did just a week ago. Which is hopeful, because this time, I have a feeling this workout thing might have to become part of my life for the long haul.

And maybe, if I live long enough, and well enough, maybe that’ll give me enough street cred to finally make me a legitimate, card-carrying badass.

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Fine Day

September 14, 2014September 17, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind, PicsLeave a comment

Today Elihu and I made our annual trip to the picturesque village of Lake George, in the Adirondacks. Each year, just as school’s beginning and the summer is coming to a close, we head up north to enjoy a lakeside meal and a little adventure. On the docket for the day was watching an attempt to break the Guiness record for the longest parade of Ford Mustangs; they needed 621 to be successful. We saw but one Mustang on the way up, and when in town saw maybe two or three more. It surely didn’t seem a world record was about to be set. Elihu had wanted to earn some cash, and we’d thought busking for the crowd here might work, but when the cars – and the crowds – didn’t show up, and when we heard the sound of music coming from the bandshell, we knew it wasn’t the time. So we headed to the place we always eat, and enjoyed a lovely meal of steamed mussels and calamari instead.

After lunch, although Elihu was jonsin to play, I asked him to humor me and go hear the band first – from what we could pick out over the relentless onslaught of Jimmy Buffet covers from the duo on the neighboring restaurant’s deck – I thought I’d heard some real music. It had been way too long since I’d heard any good stuff (Saratoga is a town mainly of cover bands – in the summers the music that floats through the air sounds kinda like montage of never-ending wedding bands). The busking could wait. And frankly, when we got to the stage and learned this was the weekend of the Lake George Jazz Festival plus saw there was a tuba player – both busking and record-breaking lines of cars were forgotten. I admit that I tried Elihu’s patience when I insisted he meet the guy after the set – but Elihu was glad we hung around. The tuba player showed Elihu how he could play melodies on his mouthpiece, and that stuck with him. It was just the right inspiration at the right time, and he was psyched to have met the guy. The two of them chatted for a while, we took some pictures and then parted ways. Elihu felt Saratoga would be a better opportunity to make some cash, so after a couple more enjoyable and impromptu chats with folks en route to the car, we headed back.

Once on our turf, he had his plan. He hit both of his usual spots, and in between played for a bit with a fellow we’d not seen before on the street. I did my dutiful mom thing as he played, sitting off to the side, all but ignoring the kid (he’s eleven; he needs to retain his dignity. Who wants a hovering mom?) and waited. Elihu was playing well, and trying some new things. It made me smile to hear him playing well, and playing with such joy. I had a pleasant chat with a gentleman with whom I shared a bench, and shortly Elihu declared he was through for the day.

These days, Elihu and his classmates are rather consumed with the culture of Pokemon. I’d thought it might have passed by now, but no. Elihu gives a lot of mental energy to assembling his deck. He gets lost in thoughts of how he’ll battle his opponents, what powers he’ll use, what special EX cards he’ll need to win… I try to share in his excitement, or at least I try to show interest, but really, it’s hard to keep it up. My son is lost to me in the world of Japanese anime characters, and I can’t possibly understand. But I can support him, and when he’s worked hard all week, done the chores I’ve asked of him, finished his homework and practiced his bass, I feel it’s altogether fitting that he be allowed to buy himself a little treat. And especially when it’s with money he’s earned himself. In about forty minutes he’d made around thirty dollars, and so I took him to the store to get the newest release of Pokemon cards. He was beaming all the way home.

Elihu talked with his father on the phone for a bit as I made supper, and then afterward we watched a little ‘Simon’s Cat’ on YouTube for a quick nightcap of laughter, and then he was off to bed. “This was such a good day” he said as I turned out the light. Yes, it was, sweetie. It was a fine day, indeed.

Beautiful Lake George in upstate New York.

I’ve waited all week for a glass of wine. !

Here’s a gratuitous selfie with the same view.

Glad we brought these this year. Elihu really can’t see much detail beyond the deck without em.

And this is a shot of me, in the reflection of Elihu’s large, dark glasses. When I talk to him, I can’t see his eyes – all I ever see is myself – so I snapped a pic to kinda show him what it looks like.

This is the crowd…

And this is the event.

The view from the lawn. I grew up being part of really huge events, so this seems quaint by those standards. But hey, it’s been so long since I’ve heard any music at all that I’m thrilled to be here. You can’t beat the scenery, and a smaller venue is so much more pleasant in many ways.

The group? Billy Martin’s Wicked Knee. That’s Billy on the drums.

And that’s Elihu’s new pal Marcus Rojas on the tuba.

Showing Elihu how much you can play on a mouthpiece alone.

Elihu shows his djembe to Marcus’ little boy.

This is Will on the left, he plays accordion – and the yellow CD on the right is a brand-new project he and Marcus played on together (look for their group Musette Explosion). Will was going to be playing later on in the afternoon. It was a posse of NYC musicians there.

Peace out, Marcus! See you next time…

Back home in Saratoga Springs, Elihu stopped to leave a tip in this guy’s case, but instead, this man insisted that he tip Elihu, who he’d heard playing djembe across the street. How kind!

Then Warren invited Elihu to play with him for a bit.

Here’s what it sounded like.

In an alley on the way back to the car, we heard the most beautiful and plaintiff melodies from this harmonica player, and Elihu felt compelled to double-back and leave him a tip and a kind word.

Keepin it real. This is what all that cash was about! After pack upon pack of humdrum cards, Elihu lands a couple of good ones back-to-back. Love it.

A fine day – in so many ways.

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Magic Bus

September 12, 2014September 12, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Growing Older, Mommy Mind2 Comments

It’s the small victories that keep us going, right? Today will mark the first time my son will have taken the bus home from school, and that in of itself – what with the savings of another twelve plus miles in my gas-guzzling CRV plus the hour out of my day – can be taken as a small victory. It’s got me fairly giddy with freedom, yet in spite of having made great strides on my to-do list, I still feel as if I should be further along for all this pedaling. I didn’t make it to the Studio yet to put time in insulating, but I did find a local feed store that’ll deliver 200 pounds of layer mash for a modest delivery fee, and a price that beats the corporate-owned Tractor Supply Company. That was another win. I signed up for Weight Watchers online, got my cheapo laptop to talk to my printer (the tower’s done for, I’m afraid), and was able to get some necessary docs printed out. Maybe not much, but still. Progress.

And then there was the Y yesterday. It felt strange to be back in the culture of fitness; I realized, mid-mile, that it had been over a decade since I’d taken a stab at coming to a gym. Not since my son was a baby and I’d made it my priority to drop the enormous amount of weight I’d put on during pregnancy had I spent more than two hours in a health club. I’d tried once a few years ago, but couldn’t muster the focus. But now, having given up smoking in earnest more than two years ago, and finding myself drifting, without a sound excuse, pound by pound, up and up through the numbers… Now I had to do this thing. Funny though, for as incredibly difficult as it was to get the proper clothes together, figure out my schedule and then actually join a class (which was already going when I got there, ich, I’d so hoped to sneak into the group at the start and become invisible), once I got moving – it felt good. Wow. Not saying it was easy though – that Zumba class kicked my butt, and that itself shocked me. I’d not fancied myself quite so out of shape. Or quite so large. I hadn’t been in front of the mirror for the nearly hour-long class, so when I began to walk around the track and caught sight of myself in the mirror, I was disappointed. Man, I’d been getting into my groove again, sweating in earnest as I hadn’t in years, and now I was rediscovering my ‘old gait’ (it amused me to see how naturally my body found its preferred form) and beginning once again to think maybe I just might have a little badass left in me – when I saw my profile. Shit. Was I really that goddam wide? Guess so. Second lap. Check again, maybe it’s not as bad as it looked the first time. Maybe I was looking into a seam in the glass or something. Nope. Still wide.

Thankfully it didn’t dampen my spirits. In fact, I improved my time each lap, until I’d done a little better than a mile. It felt good to move again, and I was happily surprised at it. I would never have guessed I’d enjoy it so much. I hoped it wasn’t simply the magic of the first day. It’s the beginning of anything that’s the hardest, so I reminded myself that it was an achievement just to have finally gotten here. Today I felt a tiny stab of guilt at not going, but I simply cannot do it all. I’d neglected my desk for several days, and we all know how that stuff adds up. I’ve mapped out a morning workout each weekday after I drop Elihu off at school, and it looks like it’ll work well. That will give me time to work at the Studio, prepare teaching materials, work at my desk, and maybe (I almost dare not say it) begin to organize material for a book. I hesitate use the words ‘my book‘, but to be truthful, it’s on my mind. May take a while to get to it, what with Halloween coming (killer costume yet to be made – that’s hours upon hours of labor) and getting the Studio ready for winter. But with the school bus relieving me of a trip three times a week and a new, predictable routine, I think I might see some possibility growing…

Bus’ll be here before long, and I gotta get back to it. The bus number is easy to remember, and nice, big numbers, easy for my kid to see. Even if I’m next door at the Studio, I have the peace of mind to know my son is now old enough to walk down the driveway by himself and get himself a snack. He can ride his bike and watch the men working on the new house, he can play a video game or play his bass, read a book or spend time with his chickens. I feel freer and more hopeful about the future today, and I have a lot of things to thank, among them, that wonderful, magic bus.

Our Way

September 10, 2014September 12, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Growing Older, Mommy Mind, Pics, Waldorf Life5 Comments

As so often happens with my plans for things, everything I had on my list for the day has changed. The cable company is working on the line at the moment, so there’s no internet, no phone. The builders are moving my driveway right now, so there’s no way to leave the property to do errands. Elihu’s home sick anyway, so everything I’d hoped to do today is postponed until the next window of available time. He’s put in some time practicing his bass, so I suppose I might follow suit and get some time in at the piano. By now I do have some experience with unexpected changes, so I’ve gotten pretty good at rolling with it. Might just be an opportunity today to do something I might not have done otherwise.

We’re not quite in our new groove here at the Hillhouse, but we’re on our way. It certainly feels this year as if we’re at the doorstep of a new age in both of our lives. To me, it feels like that past six years here were about learning this new way of living; being a single parent, raising chickens, beginning a garden, making some fixes in the house, figuring out how to go it on our own, and in general getting our feet firmly planted on our own soil, as it were. The neediest days of the tiny child are now gone, and so too are a lot of the unknowns that came with our new life here. Now I know how to start my furnace, how to butcher a bird, shoot a gun (not that I’ll ever do it again), and prepare my garden. I’ve learned how often I need to clean out the gutters so my basement doesn’t flood and how many mice I can expect to get rid of in a week. I’ve got skills I didn’t have when we started out on this adventure, and I’m far less intimidated by the varying routines that go along with the changing seasons.

Elihu has also got a good foundation for himself; he’s a good person, with sound judgement and a good heart who eats well, plays well, learns well and has a wonderful, witty sense of humor. With his tinted contacts in (the new pair just arrived!) and his braces off, his chickens, his sketching tools, a string bass, plus his new ability to ride a bike – it feels like he’s ready for anything. Finding the Waldorf School a couple of years ago was one of the most important pieces in the puzzle. Elihu loves going to school, and for that I feel beyond blessed (in fact he really didn’t want to stay home today, but his asthma was bad, so I insisted. He had done his homework early, so that helped in my decision). Lately I’ve been teaching him how to prepare some basic meals, and I feel he’s able to fend for himself in a whole new way. Truly, it offers me some relief now, and allows me to invest some of my energy in other directions.

Our new direction is becoming clearer, but it feels like it’s been hard to actually get underway – there have been so many small detours. Elihu gets his contacts, but the first time he puts them in, they rip. I get the supplies to insulate the Studio, but can’t find the time to do the work. I left my job to free up more time, but ironically, the few classes I play end up cutting my day in awkward sections, leaving me too little time to drive back to Greenfield and get any work done. Plus the cost of gas will just about match the income. Not good, but I remind myself, not permanent. Nothing is permanent. I just have to be patient, and prepared.

It feels like we’re at the bend of a road now, but the straightaway is just up ahead… My neighbor came over last night with her three kids, and we chatted as the four children bounced on the trampoline. She too felt as if a big change was underway in her own life. Could be that we both see the new house that’s going up in between us as somehow symbolic – it certainly is for me, but there’s more to it than the changing landscape. She and her family have put their house on the market and hope to move. That means change for us, too. Two new families will soon be living next door. The dynamic of the neighborhood is yet to reveal itself.

Then of course, there’s the Weight Watchers adventure beginning anew. It’s not a complete unknown to be sure, but something feels different this time. At my age, I feel I have less time to horse around – with my health and with my happiness. So I’m thinking more about balance – I’m more about the long haul than I am about just getting it done. And I can’t help but see it as a metaphor for the way in which I might want to approach all the new projects coming up. Low and slow… Take more time if need be. Get it done, but take care to do it right. No more quick fixes.

I was eleven years old when my parents built the Studio. I still remember well running through the skeleton of the structure with my little brother, I remember first seeing the plans, then the cardboard model of the building, and finally, after one busy summer, there it was. It’s funny, but I don’t remember much of my life before the Studio was there. That means that in some way that my truly conscious life began at eleven; the same age Elihu is now. That thought intrigues me; both my son and I coming to know this new incarnation of the Studio in the same year of our lives. It gives the shift a certain symbolic emphasis, and it helps inspire me. And I can use all the inspiration I can get. !

I hear the earth-moving equipment busily re-directing the trajectory of my driveway as I write this, and it too seems like another metaphor. The next time we leave our property, we’ll be heading out in a new direction, and in the next couple of years, our lives will be going forward into the future in a new direction, too. Our plans might change from day-to-day, and we might sometimes take the scenic way over the highway, but in general, we know where it is we’d like to go. We have our destination in mind, even if we still don’t quite know our way.

Back to bass-ics. Sorry.

Okay, maybe this is overkill. But those ones are still showing up.

Dare I? I awoke last night, and this is what I saw. Ok. I’m done now, promise.

The sixth grade will be working towards their Medieval Games at year’s end. Here’s one of their first archery lessons.

I think it’s pretty funny, the blind kid shooting an arrow. He’s been successful in hitting the bag, now he hopes to get closer. Problem is that while he can see the circle, he cannot make out the tiny arrow tip in front of him, so lining it all up becomes something of a crap shoot. He’s not daunted, however.

Finally getting to the big burn pile. Local folks boast that they like to ‘burn things up, Greenfield style’.

This is high Greenfield style. Burning things up in my bathrobe under the light of the full moon.

This gal has a beard. She’s one of the new flock Elihu calls Sylvia.

Thumbs Up is not as innocent as she seems; if I hadn’t caught her she would’ve been pecking her way through the groceries. No kidding. She can ruin a loaf of bread while your back is turned.

We love our Baldy. He’s still king around here.

One of the new gals surprised me by landing on my arm from out of nowhere.

Now this is kickin it Greenfield style. On my last hurrah before WW, I’m enjoying a glass of wine and some salt and vinegar potato chips while still in my bathrobe. (Don’t we love Sundays?) Hoo-haw!

And this is Elihu kickin it with Austin, our crazy guinea fowl. He adds a great dose of comic relief to the joint.

Here’s the new house smack at the end of our driveway. We can see it from many rooms in our house. Oh well. Time to plant some trees, I guess.

The driveway as it looked this morning, by this evening it will have been slightly modified. That’s ok, it’ll still lead to the road. All that matters is that we can still be on our way.

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Sixth Starts

September 4, 2014September 5, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Birding, Farm Life, Growing Older, Mommy Mind, Pics, Waldorf LifeLeave a comment

Going from fifth grade to sixth is a thing. It’s more than just another grade level, it signifies a whole new era in a child’s life. No matter whether you call it Junior High or Middle School – we all can agree that some big changes are about to happen now. Neither small children anymore, nor yet the older, more adult-like children of high school, but playfully somewhere in between; now they’re better able to learn more challenging lessons in class, to grasp more nuanced concepts and techniques for doing things like making music or playing sports. They’re a bit bigger than they were before, and yes, they’re a bit smellier too.

And on top of that, soon they’ll be wrestling with much more: all those agonizingly embarrassing moments as mistakes are made and as jokes find their targets, the ongoing awareness of social strata, cliques and what it is to be popular (or not so popular), and, of course, the real beginnings of romantic expression. How this thing works in such a small and static group of kids, I don’t know. I’ve been told that Waldorf kids will often ‘date’ (!) up or down a grade to relieve the tension of ‘dating’ within their own small class. (Please folks, understand how very loosely I use this D word.) As a sixth grade girl, I myself remember ‘going’ with a young man, but that simply consisted of being made to feel sick in the stomach from a mixture of horror and intrigue as my girlfriends made me walk next to my ‘boyfriend’ on the way home from school.

Here at the Waldorf School of Saratoga Springs, the middle school years are also marked by a physical separation from the younger grades; their classrooms are now on the ground floor. It’s a metaphor none can miss. And I, as a parent, find a certain, stinging nostalgia to this time; no longer do I watch the class eagerly bound up the stairs, listening to their many feet rumble on the creaking wooden staircase. Now, they slip to the back of the building and are gone… Gone to those new places, gone to meet all that new learning, all that life… Now my child is just that much less my child – and more a child of the world. But that’s ok, I know that’s what’s supposed to happen. And hey, my son even turned to kiss me – on his own – after getting out of the car this morning. So I have it good, I know. And so does he.

Everything in life is constantly moving and changing, but one doesn’t always see the change in distinct, clearly-defined ways. This year, however, there’s no doubt about it. The change is easy to spot. Yes, this is different. Because this is sixth grade.

He’s up super-early, but still moving swiftly to get stuff done before it’s time to go. Loading a couple final Pokemon cards into his binder (which, btw, is not going to school. It was just on his mind).

Gettin that backpack zipped up quick.

Elihu appears a bit thoughtful in the backseat en route to his first day of school, but we’re listening to polkas, his very favorite kind of music. Hm. Can one be pensive and listen to polkas at the same time?

On the move..

And being greeted by Mrs. Maguire, once again, at the door. She knows every last student and has the lovliest, warmest way of making everyone feel truly special.

He’s on a mission; there’s no looking back now.

I’m not the only one watching with bittersweet emotions on this first day of school.

Such bright and gentle weather this morning.

This is the Rose Ceremony, in which the 1st graders ceremonially cross over the rainbow bridge and are welcomed to the Lower School. Here the faculty sings to them as they enter the space.

Here they come – the new 1st grade, led by their teacher (who will be the group’s teacher all the way through 8th grade). She was the school’s well-loved handwork teacher in years past, and it’ll take some getting used to her ‘belonging’ to one grade and not the whole school.

A dad and a grad. Adam is a baker par excellence and West-African-schooled drummer, and Kai just spent his freshman year of college in Norway, studying violin. (Adam has two younger boys at Waldorf.)

Here the new 6th grade teacher (in blue, with tie on the right) expresses his wishes for his class through the coming year. Elihu’s previous teacher left her post at the end of last year, as she’d done the 1st through 8th cycle twice before and felt a shift in career focus was what she needed at this time. The transition from 5th to 6th is a good one for such changes. Btw – while we dearly loved Abigail, my son is beyond thrilled with his new teacher. And I’m happy for him to have a male presence in his life on a daily basis now.

The boys in blue… of course, mine’s the one with the dark glasses.

As with years past, we celebrate the first day of school with a visit to the Congress Park ducks. Soon they’ll take flight and migrate.

With a half a loaf of bread to work with, Elihu easily snatches up several ducks in our short visit.

He’s getting a better grip on this one.

And now he’s savoring having her in his arms. This never gets old.

I suppose this doesn’t get old either… Some boys come home to a dog, Elihu comes home to a hen.

Sometimes even two. Yup, things are off to a fine start this new school year.

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Saratoga Streets

September 2, 2014September 5, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Mommy Mind, PicsLeave a comment

Well, it’s here. The end of the tourist season in Saratoga Springs, New York. Elihu was away for much of the summer, but he still got a little time in busking and meeting folks. I keep telling him to rake it in while he’s still relatively little and cute, cuz the tips just don’t come as easily when you’re a pimply-faced teenager (or an adult!). But in the end, he does it because he loves it, and the money is really just icing on the cake. He will likely continue to play into the cold months, but the sweet season is over for this year. Here are some highlights of our final weeks on the streets of Saratoga…

I’m always extra proud of my son when he tips the other street performers without a word from me (and he always does).

This is chalk art by Alexis Broz, now billing herself as the ‘original’ chalk artist of Saratoga. You go, sister, we know you are!

Here Alexis left her imprint on a T-shirt artist’s street space.

We ran into some fellow Waldorf School students and everyone hung out for a bit.

Here’s the charismatic Eryn (and also a former student of Elihu’s teacher at Waldorf) doing her thing, shortly before jetting off to attend The American University in Paris.

Another view of the same scene.

Cecil Myrie’s a Jamaican banjo player who’s been a staple of the Saratoga street scene for the past three decades. (Here he’s showing Elihu how to play this resonant bass box.) He has bone cancer now, and in spite of his desire to, he just wasn’t able to muster the physical strength he needed to join us out on the town. As we chatted about life – and about Chicago – imagine my surprise when he recounted for me his memories of hanging out at the “Step-Hi Lounge” on Wabash… the very haunt in which I myself passed away many hours in my days as a film student at Columbia College. (CCC is right across the street, but the Step-Hi is now no longer: a parking lot takes its place.)

Cecil’s trying to give me a lesson, but I’m having a hard time here…

Okay, I’m pulling it together now…

But my lil man has it down. Just look at that left hand!

And speaking of mentors, here’s our dear pal Ed, at Saratoga Guitar, giving Elihu a little impromptu lesson.

Looking good Elihu! Maybe next year you’ll have another trick up your sleeve when busking season arrives.

Here he is on the final day of racing at the track (the major tourist attraction here since 1863).

Here Elihu is playing alongside Skidmore music degree grad Paul, who plays the Gyile from Ghana, West Africa. It’s tuned in a crowd-pleasing pentatonic scale, and thanks to Paul’s great feel, he rocked those five notes hard all afternoon. Goodbye til next year, all you fellow buskers… it’s been a lovely season.

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Cool and New

September 1, 2014September 5, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Growing Older, Mommy Mind, Pics2 Comments

It’s a lovely, late summer morning. A cool, humid breeze blows gently in from the east, causing the still-green trees to gently nod and twist. The temperatures inside and outside match, at a comfortable 70 degrees. For the first time in a long while, one can detect the season that’s coming in a few weeks. Though still green, the leaves are not the bright, lit-from-within green of spring, nor are they the rich, full green of a tree deep in the middle of its growing. Now, they are what I call a tired green… Just the faintest hints of olive and yellow begin to emerge when the light is just so. As I sit here this morning, the light itself is gray, the skies heavy with a coming rain, the green still looks like summer. But the rays from a setting sun would betray what’s really going on. This is that time of year in which we must all make our internal goodbyes, our quiet inventories of all that we’ve managed to do during the brief time when we didn’t have to wear anything extra to go outdoors… This is when we sigh, we surrender ourselves to the inevitable change. We shrug our shoulders, declare to friends that whether we’re ready or not, fall is just about here. School, after-school programs, the tasks of making lunches and cooking planned, sit-down suppers… Routine is coming. And soon after, colder weather.

Although I’d given notice at the Waldorf School back in June, and was assured mid-summer that I did not need to concern myself at all with the possibility of being needed again at school in the fall – that there was already an interested prospect for my replacement in the works – plans changed, as I had suspected they might. Apparently the ‘new’ gal who’d been enthusiastic about the post came to realize that the time it actually represented (yeah, I know, how hard could it be to be a musician? Ya show up and just play, right?) wasn’t worth the lousy money they were offering. Coulda told her that. For me, however, it had been worth it, as I had wanted to be with my son, I had wanted to get my reading chops up again, I had wanted to make driving him into town every morning worth the gas money. But it wasn’t enough for her, and I’m back on the hook. Which is a lousy thing at this particular time. I have a lot going on with the Studio – much of which I must do with my own hands – and this job will interrupt my workdays in awkward ways, blacking out entire mornings or afternoons, causing more delays in my progress. I wasn’t able to work this summer because I had things backing up here at home, I had a few house guests, many large-scale outdoor projects, and at the end of the summer I had a child about. This fall I’d planned to hit the ground running… But now I’m stopped. I can’t see an entire movement program at the school hanging in the balance should I refuse to play. I can’t do that to the kids, or the school. I had promised I’d help if they absolutely needed me, and disappointingly, now it turns out they do. They assure me it’s only for the first quarter. Yeah, the quarter in which I begin to teach my class at the high school, start up again with piano students, begin a new diet – plus it’s the quarter in which I must get both the Studio and my home ready for winter. Pretty lousy timing to be sure.

This afternoon we dropped our house guest Ken off at the train. He is setting out for an unknown adventure of his own, going to live somewhere new and turn to the business of tending to his health and even more importantly, his painting, his peace and his sanity. I feel like Elihu and I are also embarking on a new life; middle school, playing in a full orchestra and wearing contacts for my son, restoring and building the Studio while still working part-time, keeping a supportive home life and a full teaching schedule for me. I’m a little afraid, to be honest. It’s a lot on its own, and on top of it I’m planning on beginning another weight loss campaign at Weight Watchers in a week’s time (sponsored by my mother) and that will be an enormous challenge, I’m sure. The Atkins diet, while allowing me great and relatively fast success, assured I was seldom hungry (yet it also assures one gains it all back when eating as one did before). I know well enough – from having lost 55 pounds after Elihu’s birth – that WW is not as easy-going as Atkins. And me, I’ve been finding my solace over the past few months in chips and wine – exactly as Elihu had predicted I would over the summer – and this will not be an easy habit for me to break. Yeah, I have no friggin clue how I’ll pull through. Some folks have suggested the ‘humiliation’ diet: admitting – to the pound – on my blog how much I weigh each week, how I’m failing or succeeding – in real-time. Naw. I don’t have the stomach for that. So I’ll continue to share my experience, and at the risk of seeming catty, will casually fail to mention any hard and fast numbers. As you may see, I’m trying to give myself a bit of cover, a bit of safety to withdraw into should I – in the words of sixth grade boys these days – experience an ‘epic fail’. As of this moment, I really don’t have the confidence that I’ll make it. Still hoping against hope that I’ll find it in me to pull the motivation out of thin air.

As soon as the train had slid north out of the station and our friend was safely off on his journey, we turned to go and in our path found a young boy with caramel-colored skin standing beside an enormous, broken duffel bag, a faint smile on his face, in the middle of the pavement and looking lost. Happy, but lost. Like he could use some help. I asked him where he was going, and he told me Skidmore. “A student?” I asked, feeling almost silly – he was clearly too young to be anything else. Man, he looked like a lost doe in the woods… “Yes” he answered – with a gentle voice, and some vague, hard-to-pinpoint sort of accent. I spent the next fifteen minutes trying to figure out what kind of accent it might have been – or even if he had an accent at all and maybe I wasn’t just confusing it for a relaxed conversational style. I asked him where he was from and he told me New York. “Well, Brooklyn, actually” he added. Hm. “We can give you a ride to campus, would you like that?” “Oh yes”. He was still all smiles, despite having to move his broken and uncooperative bag to the car. In a short ride through town I got a few answers from him and his profile began to flesh out a bit. Raised by a single mom, one of three kids, the last to leave home, and in possession of a flip phone almost out of minutes and just a handful of change to his name, he was undaunted and ready for his new start. “So how were you going to get to school? What were your plans?” I asked, mystified. “You were my plans, I guess.” he smiled his response. What an interesting person, I thought to myself. What an interesting adventure is this life…

We found his new dorm and there was a cheerful crowd of students there to not only meet him, but to carry his bag for him and welcome him with handshakes and pats on the back. Byron (who liked poetry and computer programming and answered with surprising enthusiasm for an eighteen year old when I asked if his first name was Byron, “as in Byron Keats”) had made it to the end of a long day’s travel, which had started very early that morning on the subway, where he and his mother had parted ways. All I could think of was: what if this were my boy? Left to find his way on his own, not enough juice left in his phone to let me know he’d arrived and not enough money left to eat? I felt maternal towards him and wouldn’t leave until I was satisfied that he was safe and sound and at his destination. Just as he was about to be swept away by the welcoming committee to his new room – room 222, another seemingly serendipitous nod from the universe that things were all as they should be – I opened my arms to hug him goodbye. I kissed his cheek and held him as his mother would have if she’d been there. It was the least I could do for her, so far away from her baby. I insisted he get in touch when he was able, and then, not entirely sure that he ever would, made a mental note of the dorm name. Then off went Byron, on his new adventure, leaving us in the same, cool-headed manner in which we’d found him. Off to his new world. It started to rain, and we turned to head back the few miles left to our place, where soon we would be starting off on a new life of our own.

It did indeed rain today. It rained so hard that I could hardly see to drive, so hard that when I pulled in the driveway I found its entire surface one large, moving sheet of water. All my new landscaping was a few inches under fast-moving water, and our creek bed was finally living up to its name. I called Elihu away from his video world and had him join me outside. We followed the stream of water down the yard and into the woods onto the steepest part of the hill. Down it tumbled, making wonderful gurgling and rushing sounds which excited us both and drew us farther along its path. We passed almost an hour making dams, pulling up leaves and roots, freeing up the water here, stopping its progress there… We both fantasized, as we have done for the past six years, about what it might be like if we could one day afford to free up our stream bed again. How exciting it would be to have a real pond, a real creek… But then again, would we necessarily enjoy it so much more than we were now? Our lives were so simple, yet it didn’t diminish our enjoyment of what we had. As I listened to my son’s still-high child-voice, I realized that perhaps next year things might be different. He might not enjoy passing an hour in the rain with his mother as he did today. That our life, just as it was right now, was delightful and precious. And that one day, in the not-too-distant future, I might well look back on this time with a sigh of longing. No matter if our water ran in nothing but a grassy ditch across the yard, no matter if our schedules were scattered and a little too full for our comfort, no matter if money and heating oil would be scarce again this year, I knew that we still had it good.

The year coming up looks more unfamiliar than any of those that have come before in our six years here at the Hillhouse, but somehow I know it’ll be ok. I’m not saying I’m not scared, cuz really, I am. In all honesty, I think I feel more frightened than ever before. Yeah, definitely. I am. Yet somehow, I’m not sure quite how, I’m managing to keep my cool as I face down this new life of ours and watch the old one disappear behind us in the rear view mirror. And like our new friend Byron, I guess it couldn’t hurt to keep a smile on my face along the way.

I can’t believe my artist pal’s been living in this kitchy, Americana barn for the past two years. Cute, but enough already. Time to move on, indeed.

Engine’s here…

One final selfie…

Elihu spreads his wings as Ken departs.

Next thing we know, it’s “Welcome, Thoroughbreds!” Here we are at the lovely, wooded campus of Skidmore College.

A cheerful coed with a clipboard is here to meet us…

A whole team is here to meet us! I unload one of Ken’s paintings – done when he was about the same age as these kids – so that we can unload Byron’s bag.

I feel better when I see such a great reception.

After a hug, he’s on his way. All the best to you, happy freshman year!

We spy a hawk on the way home. Always a thrill.

This, however, is not such a thrill. My heart still sinks. I know we’ll adjust in time. Just one more new thing to accept.

After a vigorous rain shower, our place looks tidy and clean.

Spreading our wings now, ready to fly off into the new school year.

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Summer Flies

August 31, 2014August 31, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Farm Life, Low Vision Life, Mommy Mind, Pics2 Comments

If a picture says a thousand words, then this might just be my longest post ever. So much has happened in the past few weeks, I can hardly recount it all but to look back over my photos. These are our final days of summer, and we’re savoring them to be sure. This photo barrage may try the patience of some, and if that happens to be you, please skip on ahead and we’ll see you next time…

We’ve reached a first here at the Hillhouse… Not enough eggs for breakfast (all but three of our older gals have all died, and the new pullets aren’t laying yet). This is our first store-bought egg in a long, long time. Confirms for me the benefits of happy, free-range hens. Our gal’s egg is on the right. Could ya tell?

That crazy guinea fowl of ours, Austin, has just learned a new trick. I know it’s ‘bird’ seed, but we meant it for another kind of bird here…

Thumbs Up and me.

The ALS bucket challenge comes to Greenfield… Ken, right, videos his old pal Walter. Now retired, as state troopers they were once partners and shared some amazing stories together on the job.

Mid-ice bucket dump. The Greenfield Mamas are next, whenever our schedules will finally permit (my donation’s been made, so the challenge is additional, I realize, but still important.) We’re having a backhoe dump its massive bucket of ice water on us. No doubt we’ll need to plan it carefully for safety’s sake. The goal is to amplify our challenge by reaching a broader audience. Stay tuned.

Elihu enjoys a little RC heli time. What’s significant here is that it is the last photo ever to mark the driveway sans house at the end. Sigh.

Friend Ken’s also a pilot, and here he’s showing Elihu what the controls look like on a plane preparing to land.

Hopefully, after we log the property this winter, we’ll restore a panoramic view closer to this than the one we currently enjoy (this spot is another hilltop property in Greenfield). When our house was built in 1970 it looked like this, now we see the horizon mostly in between the trees.)

This is our old family friend Ruth Lakeway’s house. She was a soprano who sang regularly in dad’s Baroque music festival, and she died some seven years ago now, but no one’s lived in the place since. As a child, I had many happy memories in that home. (I even had visions of living here when or if I returned to Greenfield one day.) As of this writing, only the barn and garage remain. We Conants speculate that the house may have been built atop a spring; it suffered from constant water in the cellar, a problem no professional could rectify. This spot will always be special to us, house or no house.

On to happier things… Ah, the county fair. Pure America.

Ready, aim…

…and for the second year in a row, Elihu wins a goldfish!

Elihu and friend Roger have the swings all to themselves.

A word of caution…

…which neither one of us heeded. !

We know this Emu hen – she is twelve years old and in the pen with her mate of many years. See that white membrane over her eye? It’s her nictitating eyelid, and her closing it like that is an expression of trust and pure enjoyment. I’m smooching her neck and she’s actually leaning in to me. We love her so. For me, this is one of the highlights of my entire summer. Elihu’s too.

Okay. It’s official. I am the crazy bird lady.

Elihu gets to hold a blue ribbon-winning hen. He’s kinda crazy for birds, too.

Talk about a sub-culture. So much to know. A bird can easily be disqualified for a poor comb. !

This guy looks well-qualified to me. IMHO.

I miss having homing pigeons. It’s on my list for future adventures.

Yes, Ken’s an equine artist, but ironically he’s very allergic to horses. This brief up-close visit resulted in tearing eyes all afternoon.

Here’s a sample of Ken’s work. And yes, his art is for sale – plus he does commissions. If you want to immortalize your pet, Ken’s your man!

Here we’re passing the farm on which our old goose, Maximus lives. He’s one of the white dots just to the right of the two yaks and horse. Really. See for yourself.

We received a little emergency septic attention. When you live on your own – with no city sewer system – it’s your job to get rid of your waste. As the old saying goes, ‘out of sight, out of mind’… It’s easy to forget to keep on top of such mundane business. (The guy who pumped the tank was thrilled to have me as an audience as 7:30 am and he gave me all his best material. He assured me that when it came to his job, he knew “his shit”.)

Look – that’s my foot! I’m actually making this thing move!

Al, our friendly local excavator (pilot, nature-lover and bicyclist), gave me a little lesson at the controls.

The Studio’s last summer program. (Mom’s house is on the right – she’s just up the driveway.)

They’re wrapping things up…

…and taking home their work.

So beautiful.

This one too.

After Al did some work on our septic system (I accidentally deleted the cute shot of Al and Elihu standing over the open septic tank and holding their noses – but I think you get the picture without, well, getting the actual picture) he let Elihu ride on the tractor down the long driveway and back to the road.

Look what awaits us at the driveway’s end. Ich.

The guy building the spec house has kindly agreed to give us some leftover cement for our front step. Getting the huge cement truck back here without hurting our great maple tree was a feat. The driver was good about taking care not to break any tree limbs.

Nick helps skooch the cement into the frame. Afterwards, we two screed it (yes, ‘scree’ is a verb; a ‘scree’ is a tool one uses to settle the cement into place), and then I put a broom’s brush finish on it. Always more stuff to learn how to do. Nothing is as simple as it seems. !

Now we visit the sight and take a look at the plans. I’m relieved to know the house will be finished in dark, natural tones.

A view down the old farmer’s road on our property…

..and a gorgeous study in light and dark. So much beauty in our little corner.

We visited grandma’s house (the Studio’s on the same property), just a driveway down the road to the west. See the house taking shape down the road? My heart positively sinks.

Ich. It’s getting taller.

But at least we have a nice new front step.

Elihu has a friend over. They’re happy to sit, side-by-side in a virtual culture. (Don’t worry, I got em outside too.)

We’ve brought out the country in our city friend!

Elihu loves those amphibians. This is a particularly robust specimen. Cute, too.

Neighbor Chad gives Elihu a spin on the zero turn. All that RC piloting has given him a usable skill!

We brought mom to the animal auction. This is where our avian adventures all start.

A donkey was up for bidding when we arrived. Sold for $25. No kidding.

Next up, a Llama.

One of the regulars.

“Backstage”, mom talks with another regular at the auction house. He’s a nice guy, always helpful, and very knowledgeable about the animals.

At these bargain-basement prices, it’s easy to talk yourself into taking home a new friend. It’s the morning after when the real adventure ensues.

A little inside fun…

…a little American Gothic humor…

…and finally, a new view on things. This is the first photo ever of Elihu outside with his eyes wide open, no sunglasses. He’s wearing his new, tinted contacts here. But the story’s not over… He got home, put them in for the first time, and they RIPPED! He was so good about it, and even though I wanted to cry, I didn’t. If he can be strong, then so can I. The new contacts will be in soon…

To finish, here’s a little video of Elihu’s first moments in our home with his new contacts…

There will be more to come, no doubt, on Elihu’s new life with contacts as our adventures continue…

Cape Cod Scrapbook

August 28, 2014August 28, 2014 Posted in An Ongoing Journal..., Mommy Mind, Pics4 Comments

“Cape Cod Scrapbook” is a companion post to the previous one, entitled “Two Weeks Gone”

Finally…

My Uncle Paul and his sister (my mother) Nancy, my son Elihu and my Aunt Sandy.

Cousins Elihu and Rusty take off in search of sea life without a word of goodbye.

This is the dock behind their house; at high tide the water comes much closer in.

This is the small neighborhood beach. Just perfect at low tide to find critters.

After our first brief visit, we all headed out to this local eatery.

While we waited for our food, Elihu and I went out to the pier to hang with the fishermen.

I think all eleven year old boys get a kick out of live fish.

Aunt Sandy, Uncle Paul and mom at the end of a fine dinner of fresh, local seafood. The harbor is just outside.

Elihu points out the location of the restaurant on this mural of what Wareham looked like over a hundred years ago.

As painted by Nanci. Love it.

A picturesque New England dock scene from the restaurant window.

If you’re ever in Wareham, Massachusetts, stop by Narrow’s Crossing and get the whole fried clams.

The following morning we found a nice little breakfast joint in the neighboring town of Onset.

We’re at the Pier View Restaurant. The bay is right behind mom and Elihu.

Note the Linguica. It’s a Portuguese sausage, usually kinda spicy, always tasty. (Dig the great prices, too.)

Mom’s not usually down with me making changes to the menu, but I requested that my Eggs Benedict be made with the local linguica instead of ham. I suggested that they might want to call it “Eggs Elizabeth” should it become a hit.

And here’s the handsome man who carried out my culinary wish.

We’re not at our family’s beach here, but rather another, more expansive stretch of coast about two miles away to the Southeast. I preferred it as it was much more wide open than the small neighborhood beach, it was sparsely populated and there was lots of sand.

We fed the seagulls earlier, and when we left the beach to go into the water, they ransacked mom’s bag. The gall of those gulls!

Mom on the beach. She spent much of her youth here.

My Cousin Janice, in the middle, is about to undergo her third year of chemo for an unrelenting cancer. She’s got a great spirit, and both children and grandchildren to live for. She’s ready to kick its ass once again.

Elihu shows his Great Uncle Paul his catch from the day.

Uncle Paul is in his chair, on the right. Since his stroke in ’91 he still gets around well – drives too – but speaks very little (might be due in part to his wife – she kinda makes it hard for the poor guy to get a word in edgewise, stroke or not!).

Sandy gave mom a history of the Jackson side of the family, compiled by Paul and Nancy’s paternal grandmother. I know mom doesn’t have great feelings about this side of the family (her father left her mother and never supported them in any way, nor did her father’s family help out), but nonetheless it’s nice to have this information.

This is a letter from Uncle Paul’s paternal grandmother, describing in part the contents of the book. Dated November 11th, 1963. There’s a fascinating amount of detail going back a couple hundred years. Both the Conants and the Jacksons have been in this country for over three hundred years, so when people ask me what nationality I am, I tell em that I really am American more than anything else. But hey, at this point in the game, aren’t we all pretty much mutts no matter what our lineage?

Uncle Paul and Cousin Rusty. Rusty likes to say in his local accent that I’m his “Cape Cawed Cahzin”.

This is the shack where Rusty keeps his stuff and works on various projects. His father was a shop teacher, and it seems he has the tinkering gene too.

There’s a lot of stuff here… certainly more orderly than my own brother’s mess.

Sadly, since Uncle Paul’s stroke, his boats have languished here in the back yard. If only I lived nearby! I dearly miss the sailing era of my life.

We discovered these very odd-shaped fungi poking up through the ground all around the house. The craziest part is their smell – super funky bad, almost like skunk.

This is Gertrude – or Gert, as locals know her. She lives directly across the street from my family in a house painted the color of tomato bisque. She knew my mother’s mother, Lydia, and is thrilled to meet Lydia’s great-grandson. Gert’s in her early nineties.

We’re enjoying a visit with Gert in her breezeway. (I just love these time-capsule homes – nothing’s changed in forty years.)

A sweet good-bye.

Gert sang with big bands in Boston in the ’30s and ’40s and regularly appeared on live radio programs as well. We have both those things in common! She has difficulty remembering what day it is, yet she remembered me well from my visit two years ago – she even remembered that I ‘was the singer’. I was impressed! She’s one spunky lady. She zips around the neighborhood in her motorized wheelchair and seems to know just about everyone in town.

The boys on their second and final search for critters.

What’s this?

A tiny crab!

One more cast of that magic trap…

And look! A flounder! Crazy looking creatures they are, with both their eyes on top like that. They swim flat along the bottom and usually don’t come in this close to shore. Rusty assured us this was a really lucky catch.

These folks invited us over for a drink. Mom’s on the right.

The world proved itself to be a small place once again; the woman on the far right has a brother who lives in our town. !

Crane spotting.

Mom, pulling away from her brother Paul’s house, as he watches from the porch. (Note Gert’s tomato bisque-colored garage door in the side mirror.)

After she waved, mom noted to me that that might well be the last time she would ever see her brother. What is there to say? Poignant, and quite possibly true.

Later that night we had one of the best dinners I’ve had in a long time at Mezza Luna in the town of Buzzards Bay. Great music played, the vibe was elegant, the food expertly prepared. Highly recommended by all three of us. Their house clam sauce was spectacular.

The next morning we set out for home – the long way. This was the house in which my Auntie Helen (mom’s Aunt) lived – in New Bedford, Massachusetts. High class, high style.

This is the front hall. !

Mom indicates the large staircase…

…and Elihu investigates it.

This was the office of my mother’s uncle, who was a doctor. She remembers getting a vaccination under protest in this room as a young child.

This is our host (yet another Nancy!) in the grand foyer.

The new owners have put together a small history of the house and their progress with the restoration.

As a child, mom used to think these decorations looked like door bells. We all agree. They do.

How about this garage. Not too shabby, huh?

Now we’re off to see if we can find Auntie Helen’s summer cottage. But first we’ll have lunch at the harbor.

We’re eating at Sail Loft, just behind the marina in South Dartmouth, Mass. I’m enjoying the iconic “law-b-stah” roll. I am not kidding when I tell you these were among the very best french fries I have ever had. Really. This place has a cozy vibe, plus live music. I’d go back if I were a local.

The house on the right at the end of the pier was Auntie Helen’s.

My son is clearly comfortable here.

And there’s an osprey nest here too. A little bit of heaven for each of us.

An ‘almost’ selfie of us on the new pier with the yacht behind.

As a child I remember walking down this yard and path to the beach.

Inside Auntie Helen’s old house, Elihu zones right in on the bird art.

Elihu and Grandma look out over the bay to a view I marveled at as a child.

We passed a lot of boats and bridges on this trip.

Now we’re visiting the house mom lived in for her middle school and high school years. She had a lot of happy stories to recall for us as we drove around Fall River. Her bedroom had been upstairs on the left.

And this enormous structure was where she went to high school.

On the steps that she once scrubbed with a toothbrush (see the previous post for the backstory on that).

Durfee High School, Fall River, Massachusetts. Long-time drummer for the band Steppenwolf, Ron Hurst attended Durfy HS too, years ago. The grand building is no longer used a school; it’s a municipal building now.

Now we’re in Barrington, Rhode Island at mom’s very first home.

Eighty years ago it was all farm land. The house on the left side of this picture is the same house as in my photo above (sans the addition, which is on the right in the first pic.) Both mom and the current owners knew the family that still lives in the small house on the far right side of this photograph. Mom knew the generation that came before, but still the same family. I thought that was a sweet thing to learn. In this photo it was all wide-open fields and orchards – it looked just like this when mom was Elihu’s age – but now the area is heavily wooded and houses are everywhere.

Here’s the view of the ocean from the front door. In the old days there was only an orchard of fruit trees between this house and the water.

One quick stop to get directions…

…and to smooch a pooch.

Now it’s goodbye until next time. Thanks, you lovely ocean, you. You feel like home to me.

The Hillhouse

The Journey of a Mother and Son

Category: Mommy Mind

Gleaning

Badass Not

Fine Day

Magic Bus

Our Way

Sixth Starts

Saratoga Streets

Cool and New

Summer Flies

Cape Cod Scrapbook